The trunk wouldn't close.
Katarina pressed down on the lid with one hand and tried to push a stack of folded tunics flat with the other. The trunk politely informed her, by way of springing back open the moment she let go, that this was not going to work.
[I packed too much. How did I pack too much? I came here with one bag.]
She had, in fact, come here with one bag. She was leaving with that bag, a trunk, and a separate satchel for the air conditioner prototype, which sat on her desk wrapped in three layers of cloth like a very expensive newborn.
Pirra was sitting on Katarina's bed with her legs crossed and her chin in her hands.
She hadn't said much in the last ten minutes. She'd offered to help once, gotten waved off, and had then resigned herself to watching Katarina lose a fight with luggage. Her boots were on the floor in two different corners of the room, which was Pirra — she never thought about where things landed.
"You could leave a tunic," Pirra said.
