The gap appeared first as a street with no color on it.
Tessa had spread three maps across the hospital desk: the depot’s pickup areas, the housing office’s aggregate figures and the hospital transport districts. Each had been prepared for a different purpose. Streets that appeared as a single block on one map split into separate buildings on another. The common count headings had made the totals comparable; they had not made the boundaries agree.
She placed a finger on the blank street.
“Who has this?”
The housing clerk looked at her screen. “Hospital zone.”
The hospital dispatcher looked at the paper. “Community transport. It’s outside the main site.”
Eli stood behind Tessa’s chair, watching the two women follow the same road to different conclusions. He remembered the relief of nearly matching numbers at the depot. A place could disappear without anyone erasing it, simply because each person saw a boundary that ended before it began.
“Can we reach someone there now?” Tessa asked.
