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Nomi woke in the middle of the night. She was thirsty and her hands hurt. She looked down at them, expecting to see bruising there, but there wasn’t any. Next to her, Amanita shifted in her sleep, her lips parting slightly. Nomi considered going back to sleep, but she suddenly realized that they weren’t alone. It wasn’t startling. In fact, it was the opposite. She’d been expecting someone.
But she hadn’t been expecting who she saw when she looked over her shoulder, towards the kitchen: Sun.
“Sorry,” Sun said, though it didn’t sound like she was.
“It’s okay,” Nomi replied, voice barely above a whisper. “But I don’t want to wake Amanita. Can I come to you?”
As she got out of bed, she was suddenly in a small concrete cell. “Oh. Right.” Her eyes flickered to the wall, where she saw blood stains. She remembered punching that wall, even though it hadn’t been her. It had been Sun. And Capheus. But her hands still hurt all the same. Maybe that was what woke her. “We can go back to my place. We just have to be quiet.”
And just like that, they were there. Nomi took a look back at the bed and walked into the bathroom, which was at least farther away and out of earshot, if they whispered. If she whispered. “What time is it where you are?”
Sun, who didn’t have a way to tell time in the solitary cell, shrugged. “After dinner.”
“Okay.” It didn’t seem to Nomi that Sun was there to talk. So she made herself busy, organizing things in the shelves that didn’t need organizing, unfolding and refolding towels. Eventually she gave up and went to go get the water she’d wanted when she had first woken up. She didn’t check to see if Sun followed, because if she thought about it then she didn’t really need to check at all. She and Will had fallen into something of a rhythm, but with Sun, all she had were her instincts. And right now her instincts told her to wait for Sun to speak.
So Nomi went about whatever business she would have gone about anyway. She had her drink of water, then decided to make some tea in the hopes that it would help her get back to sleep. If Sun didn’t want to talk, she was going back to bed.
It was several minutes more of awkward silence before Sun said anything. “Aren’t you worried about her?”
Af first, Nomi thought she meant Riley. Of course she was worried about Riley, currently laying in a coma in Iceland. Weren’t they all? But then it occurred to her that Sun was talking about Amanita. Either way, the answer was the same. “Yes.”
“Then why do you let her stay?”
“I don’t know.”
Sun quirked an eyebrow. They couldn’t read each other’s thoughts, not really, or not exactly, but they were still so close it didn’t matter. At least, that’s what Nomi had come to understand, from what Will told her of what Jonas said. She sighed, both because she wish she knew more about what was going on and because Sun was clearly waiting for the truth.
“Because the idea of her not being here is scarier than the possibility of what could happen to her if she’s around me.” She shook her head, thinking of all the times Amanita had saved her. “Not that I think I could make her stay away if I tried. Have you ever loved someone so much that you’re not sure what the world would be like without them in it?”
“Yes.”
In that moment, Nomi knew that Sun was thinking of her mother. She sighed. “My mother wasn’t like your mother. Isn’t.”
“I know,” Sun replied. She gestured back towards Amanita. “But there is nobody in my bed the way she is in yours. I had to give my dog away.”
Nomi’s jaw dropped. “Amanita isn’t like a dog.”
“No, of course not.” Now Sun sounded annoyed. “But my dog loved me unconditionally, as all dogs do, and would protect me with his life. And now he is gone, because I made a choice to protect my father, as my mother would have wanted.”
It was the most Sun had said since they’d been speaking. Nomi wasn’t positive, but she thought it was the most she’d ever heard Sun say. “Okay, but my girlfriend isn’t comparable to a dog.”
Sun looked at her. “I’ll go.”
“No, wait.” But it was too late and Sun was already gone. Nomi tried to follow her, but she couldn’t. Sun must be keeping her out somehow.
She sighed and went back to bed, but it took a long time before she could sleep.
--
The next morning, she told Amanita what had happened.
“Oh my god, seriously, Nomi?”
“Yeah, I know, right?” Nomi shook her head. “I can’t believe she compared you to her dog.”
“No,” Amanita nudged Nomi’s leg with her knee. “I can’t believe she was reaching out to you like that and you pushed her away because you thought I’d care about being compared to, like, the most loyal, loving animal in the world.”
“Wait, what?”
Amanita shrugged. “Listen, I want to be compared to an animal about as much as the next person, especially the next black woman, but maybe if we think about it in context it’s not really like she was saying I’m a sub-human animal with a little brain.”
Nomi was confused. She scrunched her nose. “You just said dogs were great.”
“Sure, honey, but humans are better.” She leaned over and planted a kiss on Nomi’s cheek. “Especially you. Didn’t you say she loved her dog?”
“Yeah,” Nomi could feel what it had been like for Sun to leave him behind. Heartbreaking.
“Okay, so, like… again, I’m not saying I’m not going to have a word with her next time I have the chance, but maybe you should go apologize?”
But Nomi didn’t need to go anywhere. Sun was back, sitting in a chair across from the couch, smiling faintly. “I was asleep, but I could hear you.”
“I’m sorry. For… waking you. And for getting mad at you last night.”
Amanita’s face lit up. “She’s here?”
Nomi nodded. “On the chair.”
“Great,” Amanita looked at the chair, even though she couldn’t see Sun. “Don’t compare people to dogs, but I’ll leave you two to talk. We need some more almond milk anyway, I hate soy in my tea.”
When she was gone, Nomi look at Sun. She wanted to ask what had brought her there last night, what her mother was like, how she was doing in prison. But instead, she decided to ask the important things first. “So,” Nomi said, and she could see the tears in Sun’s eyes already. “What’s your dog’s name?”