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Rohan had a system.  Open the gate slowly. Step over the third floorboard. Keep his jacket on until he reached his room.  That evening, it almost worked.  "What happened to your hand?"  He froze.  Ananya stood in the kitchen doorway, wiping a steel plate. Her eyes had already found the cut on his palm. A rough scrape. Skin peeled back just enough to burn.  Somehow had a radar for these things that never failed.  "Nothing," he said. "I fell."  "From where?"  "My cycle."  "On the highway?"  "No"  "Rohan."  "...the field behind South City College," he muttered. "It wasn't on the road."  The plate stopped moving in her hands.  "You were racing again."  "It was a field. Not the highway."  "That makes it safe?"  "Nothing happened!"  "You're bleeding!"  "It's a small cut!"  She crossed the room, took his wrist, and sat him down at the kitchen table. Her grip was firm...