n the morning, and Ella watched Bri

ed her eyes to stay on her shoes. But after the gala, after the champagne and the silence a

tes, like a castle that had learned to teach. A black car idled at the

ne buzzed

you on yo

e uniform. Then I'

ear anything. J

lurched around the bend and the school vanished behind the

years e

ten, Ella Ames wore shoes tha

hem, black leather with a tiny silver buckle, and Ella had looked at Mar

ered at the school gates, kissing

ryth

. Come home and t

ll girl in a too-big blazer, carrying a lunchbox with a faded

laying a game on a tablet. A girl was crying because her nanny had forgotten her favor

she s

s and a white collar without a wrinkle. She was surrounded by whispering parents and she did not loo

turned her head, a

le, the kind you give a stranger bec

did not s

s parted. Her small hand lifted halfway to her chest and stopped,

d on her heel, and marc

, and a teacher named Mrs. Abernathy

with your name

aired boy named Henry was already sitting there, building a tower out of crayons. A

olded, chin lifted, sat the

aking the chair beside h

e not f

I just li

feeling that nobody had ever said such a thi

ong shoes," said

down. Her e

she admitted. "But they'

look c

nd a small, steady smile tugged

irl b

She wanted to keep looking. She wanted, for no reason she could name, to ask this strange

ed her chair bac

!" announced Eden Ashf

r seats today, Eden," sa

t like

't given i

't wan

ve a small, frightened sniff. Only Ella stayed quiet, watching the furious girl b

ore either of them un

elves to her like ducklings. Across the cafeteria, Ella sat on a b

t in half and slide the

a said, loud enough

red one of the ducklings

or," said another

t down

r or shame, she could not tell which.

said sharply. "She think

lent. Then the gi

ow her where

her curls bouncing, looking so happy without a nanny or a driver or a single imported snack.

hate

hate

ve years old, and her voice

been born in the same storm, and cradled in each oth

top, and Ella blinked

glass catching the first sunlight. She gathered her bag,

, stop. Don

phoned the building at 6 a.m. She demanded y

d expected it. But reading the

t it didn

a:

rsonally. She called HR at 6:30 and said if anyo

red at t

never once involved herself in a cleaner's

e her, the tower blazed in the morni

ld she

the thirty-first floor, she felt, quite sudden