Sher paused. She felt Kris’s panic. “Back to the church?”
“Which way?” Kristin stopped, surrounded by huge buildings, her breath short.
Sher’s eyes settled on Kristin, the bruises now splotches beneath the moon, her chest heaving. She reminded Sher of the time she and her dad had seen a quarter horse after it was forced to run a mile race at the County Fairgrounds. The horse died, Sher remembered. “Run too hard,” Sher’s dad said, shaking his head. “A real pity.”
“You won’t leave me, right?”
“I won’t.”
“Sher?” Kris said, overcome by fear.
“Just you and me now, cuz,” Sher said wrapping her arm around Kris. “We got each other.”
The girls cut east at Hennepin, their view of the street ahead of them obscured by a van. Two cop cars whistled past the girls, their lights flashing. An ambula
