She does not know the purpose of technology if it does not do what she wants when she wants it. Playing nice with machines is, on occasion, beyond her capabilities as a human in the world. In college, she drove a car that straddled the line between functioning and junk every time she drove more than a few miles. She’d babied the thing, paid more than the car’s worth to have it repaired, cleaned it regularly, monitored the fluid levels, got regular oil changes, never let it dip below a quarter tank of gas. And still it died on the freeway in the deepest, hottest point of summer, leaving her stranded and burnt and out nearly two thousand dollars. The biggest indignity was having to call her parents for the money to buy something to get her to class only for them to turn around and get her something brand new and smelling of favors.

Favors are the hardest part of her humanity. She’s surrounded herself with beautiful, loving people who have nothing but everything to give and are more than happy to make up for the places where she lacks something. But it leads to things like this. Maybe it’s the dark night. Maybe it’s the stress of work. Maybe it’s the pressure of trying to knit together the disparate parts of her life into something cohesive and meaningful. Whatever it is, she knows that she has gotten in too deep with the favors.

Every inch of the home around her was a gift given under the covenant of the kind of friendship so deep that it mingled in her bone marrow. It was a haven in the darkness of violence and fear. And now it is familiar but grey. It’s a house wallpapered in the loss of opportunity. She’s afraid of making memories here because she knows she will have to give them away along with the keys. When she leaves, she knows it will be forever and she can’t bring herself to make it worse by filling the house with more things. She’s donated most of her clothing, culled her books. There is one box in the closet, filled with the tiny memories of Jeremiah as a baby, but the toys that he hasn’t touched since they moved in are all packed in the car, waiting to be donated. She is sweaty and exhausted and trying to fight the rising tide of pain in her gut.

She starts a new job in the morning. Another place to do good, to portion out her skills and personality for a meager paycheck. She knows the importance of sleep for cognitive function, but every time she turns off the light, her eyes float to the ceiling and the literal space beyond it. When they close, she is transported into some impossible historical hellscape. The nightmares are omnipresent at this point and is too risky to consider any chemical help. So she stays awake, the glow of the television reflected back into her irises but never making much of an impression.

The chirping starts two hours after she was meant to go to bed. Someone is painting a wall on the television and the sound has reached into her consciousness and pulled her from the blanket of unfocused existence under which she’s fallen. Suddenly, the edges of the room go sharp and realized. For all of the months she’s lived in this home and all of the months before when it was a safe place to visit, she has never heard this chirp. It is technological in some manner, an electronic plea for attention. Immediately, her eyes go to the little red light on the smoke detector, which blinks at her inconsistently. She waits an eon before the chirp sounds again.

Her new set of skills don’t often prove useful in her everyday life, but she is tired and the allure of half-consciousness calls to her almost as soon as she pinpoints the problem. In a moment, she has scaled the wall and unhooked the little white smoke alarm from its cradle. It is silent in her palm even as she digs through the drawer in her kitchen for the right size of battery. She is triumphant when she manages to slip the old battery and replace it with the new in one fluid motion. It is silent as she climbs the wall again and hooks it gently into place. She is halfway down the wall when she hears the chirp again, loud but further away than she’d thought. Glancing at the alarm on the wall above her as if it has betrayed their agreement, she finishes her descent and uses the stairs in search of any other alarms.

Upstairs, there is another little white dome in the hallway just outside Jeremiah’s bedroom, its inconsistent red light, in the moment, not blinking at her. Quickly, with all of the hustle of a person impatient to get back to the quiet of absolutely nothing, she scales the wall and retrieves the device. While she’d been careful with the first, cradling it in her palm like a duckling, she carries this alarm downstairs in a tight grip. She is two days away from a time change, when she would normally change the batteries in the damn things anyway, but it is impatient and she is not willing to coddle a piece of plastic and wire. Soon, she has switched out the battery and jammed the cover back into place. This will be the end of it and she will be able to go back to her life, the life in which she was thriving before technology intervened.

She takes just two steps away from the drawer before the alarm chirps again. It is absolutely the alarm in her hand as the sound is louder, more shrill. Incredulous, she stares down at the plastic, turning it over in her hand, looking for gaps or incorrectly installed batteries. All is as it should be, but still the little red eye blinks at her once and chirps again. It is more insistent now, more intelligent. It knows that she is exhausted. It knows that she will do anything to placate it. She climbed a wall for it, so surely she will bend further to its will. She brings the plastic closer to her face to inspect the hairline seams where the manufacturer fit the pieces together. She looks for loose wiring, glints of copper out of place. Americium oozing or whatever it is americium does. But there is nothing. Everything is snug and proper. Just where it is meant to be. When it chirps again, the sound pierces her head like an arrow.

It happens quicker than her consciousness realizes it. Her rage bursts out of her like a laser as she throws the plastic pieces to the ground and they shatter into a star field on the kitchen floor. All around her are tiny landmines for her bare feet and she stares at them for a solid second before letting out a guttural shriek, her fists clenched tight. The frustration of disagreements and work and favors, it all piles on top of her, pressing down on her until her ribcage creaks and her lungs are too thin to take in air.

When the screaming is done, when her throat can no longer handle the threat of so much rage, she turns from the kitchen into the living room. Her hoodie is draped over the couch and she shoves her arms into it as she slips her sneakers on. The television goes off as well as the lights and she closes the door softly behind her. The air is cool but acrid from the far-off fires, but the smoke doesn’t burn the way it did the year before. She can taste it, but every part of her feels stronger than the smoke. With a long breath, she walks down the front steps and pauses at the driver’s side door of her car. Her reflection stares back at her in the dark window and she is struck by her mussed hair and pale face. Sliding into the driver’s seat, she sits in the seats that sold her on the car in the first place. In this seat that feels like home as much as the home in front of her, she can see the places on that facade that are the most familiar. There is a bay window in the front where Cara’s curtains used to hang. The corner of the front step that is chipped and in need of repair. The plants in the stately little planters that are browned in preparation for November. In the dark, on the street, she feels as if she’s failed the little house.

The tears come hard and fast, making her chest heave. They burn sticky trails down her cheeks and leave spots on the front of her hoodie. At once, she loses strength in her muscles, letting the seat hold her upright as she covers her face with both hands. She doesn’t know how she’s gotten here, surrounded by so many favors that she doesn’t know how to show appreciation for, but she is drowning in her inability to do anything for anyone. She is not a hero. She is a woman, a vessel too small for the things that have been thrown into her. Regret and hopelessness wash over her and Jessica, for once, is not in her ear, encouraging her to get herself right. The other half of her mind is quiet, observing and sad.

When the tears slow to intermittent hiccups, Jules looks out at the night just beyond her car’s window. It is still. No lights. No sirens. No blue-grey televisions in windows. Pulling her cell phone from her pocket, she googles the closest hardware store. It’s closed. There is a Target a few miles away, but she wouldn’t make it on foot before it closes. It seems impossible to choose anything that would deprive her of the night air and she wants to walk until her limbs shake from something other emotion.

For a moment, she feels the spring of frustration bubble inside of her again. It is immature and unwarranted, but she would just like one thing to go her way. Gripping the steering wheel tightly, she breathes deeply, working everything down her esophagus into her belly where it can rage and fizzle out. With one last long breath, she sorts out her face and steadies her hands. With a swipe down her face, evidence of tears vanishes. She is an adult, and if she has learned anything over the last year, it’s that fear and anger are not good motivators. They burn hot and fast, and soon all you are left with are questions. And she is too tired to answer to herself tonight.