Chapter 6
Returning felt smaller than leaving.
The transport vehicle rose through the tunnels with mechanical indifference, and when the doors opened onto her street at dawn the world appeared unchanged — dust suspended in early light, factory sirens preparing their hourly lament, neighbors emerging with rehearsed casualness. Yet Rory felt as though she had expanded beyond the boundaries of the town and was now attempting to compress herself back into its narrow dimensions.
Her mother rushed forward first, embracing her tightly, searching her face for signs of damage or revelation. Her father stood slightly behind, his gaze analytical, measuring not just her physical state but the intangible shifts in posture and expression that might indicate transformation.
“Well?” her mother asked gently.
Rory hesitated.
The truth hovered on her tongue — the ocean, the rain, Johannes’ hands tracing the hollow in her mouth — but the system depended on selective disclosure, on the understanding that privacy was both promised and performed.
“It was beautiful,” she said simply.
Her parents exchanged a glance that blended relief with curiosity.
She went inside, closed the door to her bedroom, and stared at herself in the small mirror above her desk. The gap in her molar row was visible if she opened her mouth wide enough, a small absence that now signified experience rather than potential. She ran her tongue along the space and felt a surge of thrill that startled her.
She could say anything.
She could construct any narrative.
No one would verify.
No one in her district had been there.
The week belonged exclusively to her memory and to whatever records the government maintained in inaccessible archives.
At the factory later that day, whispers trailed her like invisible threads, not accusatory but inquisitive. Sixteen-year-olds returned altered; it was expected. She caught Oliver watching her from across the floor, his gaze sharper now, as if searching for evidence of something he suspected.
“How was it?” he asked when they found themselves alone near the supply crates.
She considered telling him about Johannes’ constellations, about the way rain had enclosed them in privacy, but instead she shrugged lightly.
“It was fine,” she said.
The lie slid easily into place.
Oliver’s eyes narrowed slightly, perhaps sensing omission, perhaps recognizing the performance because he too had learned its mechanics.
That night, as she lay in bed, she looked out her window toward the sky barely visible beyond factory smoke and searched for the third star at the base of the pot. It flickered faintly, nearly obscured by haze, and she imagined Johannes somewhere beneath another contaminated sky doing the same.
The longing that rose within her was sharper than she expected.
The week had not satisfied desire; it had awakened it.
Factory life felt constricted now, each helmet she assembled a reminder of containment. The sisters’ intact smiles seemed almost defiant, as if they had foreseen this erosion of contentment.
Days passed.
She found herself speaking more boldly, testing the boundaries of consequence, inventing details about her week to different listeners and observing how each reacted. With her parents she emphasized emotional connection. With coworkers she hinted at physical intimacy. With Oliver she offered nothing substantial at all, enjoying the way ambiguity unsettled him.
The power of narrative intoxicated her.
One missing tooth.
Thirty-one remaining.
The math whispered possibilities.
On the fifth night after her return, she overheard her parents arguing in the kitchen, their voices low but strained.
“She is different,” her mother said.
“She is older,” her father replied.
“She wants another week.”
“She will not get one yet.”
Rory lay still in her bed, heart pounding.
They were right.
She wanted more.
Not necessarily romance again, though the thought of Johannes’ hands still ignited heat beneath her skin, but something — anything — that would rupture the monotony of factory rhythm.
The next morning at work, she saw Oliver lift his shirt slightly to adjust the bandage near his ribs, and the movement revealed again the faint outline of a spray-painted number on his back, darker now, fresher.
A new one.
Her breath caught.
“You did it again,” she said quietly.
He did not deny it.
“It pays,” he answered.
“For what?” she pressed.
“For other people’s fantasies.”
The words settled heavily between them.
She imagined him running through forests, hunted by strangers chasing double points, his body reduced to a numbered target for someone else’s Tooth Week.
“Why would you risk that?” she asked.
Oliver met her gaze steadily.
“Because some weeks aren’t offered on the menu.”
The implication lodged in her chest like a splinter.
That night, as she stared once more at the third star, longing sharpening into something more desperate, she made a decision that would alter not just her life but the architecture of the system she had barely begun to question.
She would take another tooth.
Without permission.
And she would find Johannes.
What she did not know — what she could not possibly know — was that somewhere beneath the city, her name had already been highlighted in red on a producer’s screen.
“High engagement metrics,” someone said.
“Prepare escalation.”
