City Spies Oneshot Collection

Alone

Charlotte lies awake her first night as a boarder at Kinloch

This was the first night Charlotte had shared a room with someone, besides hotel rooms on vacations and missions. It was the second time she'd lost the adults in her life. And this dorm room was the third room in her life that was supposed to be home. But Charlotte wished she had better things to count.

But this wasn't home. And she knew it never really would be, even when she'd been there for years and was about to graduate. The FARM hadn't been home for her, either. Maybe it was for some of the other kids, she thought, but it wasn't for her. Home was in the past and across the Atlantic, now existing only in some dead fantasy.

It had been dark in that dorm room for three hours now. Charlotte's new roommate was fast asleep. Charlotte was closer to tears than sleep. No one would notice if she cried. It was ironic, that. Her parents, or Monty and Mother, would have always noticed something was up before, even when Charlotte had the privacy of her own room. No one would come to comfort her now.

Even stuck with a roommate, Charlotte had never been more alone.