RONAN I walked fast toward my old room. The quiet in the house felt heavy and wrong. It was a big place, so big I used to joke it was more like a compound. With my family gone, all the life was gone too. The huge size just felt cold and scary now. I went into my room. My favorite polo shirt, some khaki pants, and my old workout shoes were still in the closet. Mom always made sure we knew we had a place here. The polo shirt snagged on the PMD. The adhesive pulling on my skin made me hiss in pain. I moved more carefully after that. Once I was in the fresh clothes, I went back out. Sergeant Mateo saw me right away. He smirked and shook his head. "You said your parents might have a car here?" I nodded and pointed to the garage door. We both walked out of the kitchen and across the main living area. When we passed the formal dining room, Mateo chuckled. "So why did a rich kid sign up to work for the government?" The question annoyed me. I had heard different versions of it my whole life. "We aren't rich," I said, my voice flat. We got to the door and I opened it, leading into the four-car garage. "We clearly have different definitions of the word, rich," Mateo said. He stepped inside and looked right at the perfectly restored 1965 muscle car. My father and sister Seraphina had spent over two years putting it together, with help from at least a dozen grandkids. It still wasn't finished. The engine hung from a hoist. A white tarp on the ground held pieces of a carburetor, each piece spaced evenly apart. The tarp was spotless, a perfect example of my father's need for everything to be just so. Those tarps never lasted more than a week before he threw them out and got a new one.I shook my head, annoyed. That man's stubbornness had strained our relationship too many times. I pushed the thought away and pointed to the sedan on the other side of the garage. "They must have taken the Utility Rovers." Mateo chuckled as he walked to the car. He opened the doors and looked inside. "Plural, huh?" "We're a very big family." "Oh yeah, same here. Three older brothers. You?" I realized what he was doing then and let out a laugh. "You still don't trust me, do you?" Mateo stood up straight from the other side of the car. "Not as far as I can throw this luxury car. But don't take it personal. My trust took a dive every time I lost a member of my platoon to friendlies." I put my arms on the roof of the car and hung my head a little. I couldn't argue with his logic. "I'm one of twenty kids. If you don't believe me, feel free to look at the family photos in the living room on our way back." "Don't mind if I do," he replied. He finished with the car and motioned toward the door. As we left the garage, he asked another question. "So what do your parents do?" "You mean, why are we 'rich'?" I said, the word sharp as we walked into the living room. "Sure," he said, not stopping. I rolled my eyes. "My mother is a software engineer. My dad founded the Guilt Free Meat Company. And no, we aren't rich. My dad always said you don't realize how poor you actually are until you manage to get a little bit of money." Mateo started to look over the family photos placed perfectly on the walls and shelves. "Or until the bank kicks your family out of your house," he muttered. "Is that why you think we're rich? Because you couldn't manage your money?" I snapped. I knew it was stupid to antagonize a trained killer with a rifle. But I was tired of the questions. At some point, the sergeant had gone from cautious to just plain rude.Mateo paused. His gloved fingers touched a picture of a very young Miriam, one of my nieces. "You aren't wrong. I couldn't manage my money. But I was pretty young too. Never should have even been able to get a mortgage. My wife and I were both cashiers at a store. That didn't stop the loan officer from approving us for an adjustable rate mortgage in '05." He looked right at me. "It's not the loss of the house that really stuck with me. It was my little girl crying through the night as we slept in our car." "You look pretty young for someone who lived through the Great Recession," I said. I wanted to steer the conversation away from his pain. We both had enough of our own from the last two days. I had no intention of soaking up anyone else's. "Got the treatment about fifteen years back," Mateo said. He kept looking at the pictures, stopping on one of my mother and father. "Your parents look like they got it too. No one looks that young after two kids, let alone twenty."I stepped closer and picked up the photo from the shelf. A smile spread across my face looking at my parents. Dad in his tailored business suit, mom in her sari. She hated the thing. She said it reminded her too much of patriarchal authority. But she also liked how it looked in photos. "Yeah, they got it right when it first came out in the early 2030s." Mateo grunted. "Before the subsidies, huh?"