A History of Glitter and Blood by Hannah Moskowitz Page A

dance around while her metal cooled and feel free, as if that was something otherwise hard to feel.
    â€œIt’s so blue up here,” she says.
    â€œHmm?”
    â€œI thought it would be black.”
    â€œNah,” he says. “Not this time of night.”
    â€œNah?”
    He laughs. “Yeah. Nah. Like no.”
    â€œI’ve never heard that before.”
    â€œYou guys all talk really pretty.”
    â€œThank you.”
    Piccolo says, “Hold on here,” and they surface through a hole in the massive net. The threads feel like water on Beckan’s skin, and they only cling for a fraction of a second before they let go.
    â€œIs my glitter going to get all over . . . ?”
    â€œYou’re fine. I don’t mind. You’re safe now. Here, sit.”
    She blinks the last threads out of her eyes. Around them, the net spins into a floor, with edges that curl up like the edges of a bowl. Everything under her gives and bounces and scares her. The air feels thicker here, and she smells smoke.
    â€œWhere is everyone?” she says.
    â€œBy the fire. See?”
    She follows his finger across the sky, buildings and buildings away, where a low-slung hammock hosts the fire she could barely see from the ground. She can see a few tightropers laughing, but she can’t hear it.
    â€œThere really aren’t many of us here, you know?” he says. “Just army. And we lost a lot of guys.”
    â€œYou’re in the army?”
    â€œNo, my dad’s a general. I’m a messboy.”
    â€œWhat’s a messboy?”
    â€œI clean up after them and stuff. Spills and things, after meals, latrine.”
    â€œThat sounds . . .”
    â€œOh, it’s shit. My dad volunteered me.” He flashes her a smile and flops down on the web. “We don’t get along. You can walk here. It’s packed together. Thick.”
    She takes a few careful steps. Her feet feel so wide.
    â€œHere.” He stands up and ties a thread around her wrist. “Lifeline. It won’t snap if you fall. You’ll hang.”
    â€œLike you were.”
    â€œMmmhmm.”
    His fingers are cool on her wrist. Her glitter gets all over his skin, but he doesn’t brush it off.
    He doesn’t seem to mind.
    He’s good at messes, though.
    â€œMy dad’s here,” she says, to share something with him. She roots around her bag but doesn’t find the jar. “Oh. I left him at home.”
    â€œYour dad . . . is really small?”
    â€œHe’s in a jar. There’s not a lot of him.”
    â€œOh. I’m sorry.”
    She shakes her head. “He’s alive.”
    â€œAren’t you guys always alive?”
    â€œHe communicates. Blinks. That’s how we know.”
    â€œSo if he couldn’t blink at you, then he’d be dead?”
    She doesn’t like this conversation, but she knows he can’t tell. “If I couldn’t talk to him, he’d be dead.”
    â€œThat sounds arbitrary.”
    â€œWe’re an arbitrary species.” She knows how to be glib about this the same way she knows to ignore the feeling of her glitter falling to the ground.
    â€œDo you like it up here?”
    â€œI can’t see anything.”
    He points toward the edge of the web. “Lead the way.”
    She does, on her hands and knees to feel a bit more secure. She sits at the edge of the web and holds a thread slung above her head for support. She checks the line tied to her wrist again and again.
    â€œStop worrying,” she whispers. He looks up. She says, “Tell me to stop worrying.”
    He laughs. “No way.”
    And she looks up and down and out at the world.
    Nothing is gray from here. The city sparkles with blues, and she sees pockets of light from streetlamps and a few buildings still lit throughout the city.
    â€œAre all of those your shops?” she says.
    â€œAnd headquarters