Genesis. Volume 2

December 18, 1986. Brookfield. Headquarters, Emma's room. 11 a.m. Emma was supposed to be in bed. The doctor who'd last examined her wound had been very specific on that point. Her left shoulder was healing, but any strain on that side would set her back two weeks. Don't lift, don't strain, don't sleep on your left side. Emma had nodded then, memorized it, and done exactly the opposite. She was lying in bed when the air changed. She didn't wait. She pulled on jeans, a t-shirt, a jacket—her left arm wouldn't obey, so she had to zip it with her right. She put on sneakers without lacing them, just shoved her heels in. "Where are you going?" Liam asked. He sat on a chair by the door, cleaning his pistol—a habit he couldn't shake. An oily rag lay on his knee. "Outside." "The doctor said..." "The doctor didn't see what I'm seeing." She walked out without waiting for an answer. Liam didn't follow. Maybe he knew it was pointless. Maybe he felt it himself—he needed to be here, not there. The street met her with silence. Not ordinary silence—dense, cottony. As if someone had turned off the sound, leaving only a low hum that came from inside, from her head, from the threads on her wrists. People were frozen. A woman with a stroller on the corner—the stroller had stopped in the middle of the crosswalk, and the child inside wasn't crying. A man with a newspaper—the paper had fallen from his hands, and the wind was blowing it across the asphalt, and he stood staring into nothing. Emma walked toward the center. Because she knew—it was worst there. Where there were more people, where the wave hit harder. In the square, she saw a family. A young mother with two children. A boy about four years old tugging at her hand and crying at the top of his lungs—he hadn't frozen; he was conscious. A girl about seven stood beside him and wasn't crying. Because she'd already realized it wouldn't help. The mother was frozen. Her face was already losing definition—features blurring, like a reflection in murky water. Her eyes were open but unseeing. Emma approached. Stopped a step away. "Mom," the boy called. "Mom, wake up." She didn't respond. Emma pulled the dog tag from her pocket. The metal was cold—she hadn't worn it around her neck since London; she kept it in her jacket, in the inner pocket. Now it was warming in her fingers—not from body heat. From something else. She placed the tag in the mother's hand. Just placed it—cold metal, a real object, with weight and temperature. "Hold this," Emma said. The mother didn't close her fingers. The tag would have fallen if Emma hadn't held it. She took the woman's hands—both of them—and gripped her wrists. Her left shoulder responded with a dull, throbbing pain. Emma didn't let go. "Listen to me," she said. "Count." She began aloud. Loudly, clearly, as if numbers were a rope the woman could climb back on. "One. Two. Three." The mother didn't respond. Her face continued to lose clarity. "Four. Five. Six." The boy stopped crying. He stared at Emma. There was fear in his eyes—not of her, for his mother. "Seven. Eight. Nine." Something in her left shoulder tore. Emma felt it like hot water spreading under her skin. Not a burn—a rupture. An old wound that hadn't fully healed, reminding her of its presence. She didn't stop. "Ten. Eleven. Twelve." The mother blinked. "Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen." Her pupils contracted. Her face stopped blurring. "Sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen." "Enough," the mother said. Her voice was hoarse, as if after a long silence. "Enough. I can hear you." Emma released her hands. "Take your children," she said. "Go home. Don't come out until evening." "What... what happened?" "I don't know. But it's safe now." The mother looked at the dog tag in her hand. "This is..." "Keep it. For luck." Emma turned and walked away. She didn't look back. Her left arm hung at an unnatural angle—she hadn't noticed when that happened. Maybe at the count of ten. Maybe earlier. The pain didn't come immediately. First—numbness. Then burning. Then—a dull, pulling pain that rose from her shoulder to her neck and down to her elbow. Emma walked, pressing her left arm to her chest with her right. She reached the headquarters fifteen minutes later. She sat on the bottom step of the porch because she couldn't go any further. Her left arm hung limp, her shoulder throbbing. She stared at the door and couldn't make herself get up. "Emma?" Liam. He'd come out of the house—must have heard her footsteps. Or just been waiting by the window. "Where were you?" "Walking." He looked at her arm. At the angle it was hanging. "To the hospital." "No." "Emma." "I said no." He sat beside her. Silently. He pulled small folding scissors from his pocket and began cutting the sleeve of her jacket. "What are you doing?" "Looking." The sleeve gave way. Liam peeled back the fabric and looked at her shoulder. The skin was blue, with a purplish tint—a hematoma spreading from her collarbone to her elbow. "Dislocation," he said. "Or fracture. I don't know. You need an X-ray." "Later." "Not later. Now." He stood and offered his hand. Emma didn't take it. She stood on her own—with her right hand, holding the railing. "Did you at least take your tag?" he asked. Emma froze. She patted her pockets. Right—empty. Left—empty. Inner—empty. "I left it," she said quietly. "Where?" "With a woman. In the square." "Why?" "So she'd remember." Liam said nothing. He just took her right hand and led her inside. Inside, it was noisy—Max bandaging his mother, Jenny lying on the bed with her palms wrapped, Lisa sitting on the couch, clutching a piece of chalk in her left hand. "Emma's hurt," Liam said. Everyone turned. "Not hurt," Emma corrected. "I dislocated my shoulder." "It's the same thing," Max said. "No. Hurt is when there's blood. This is..." "This is when there's pain," Arthur finished. Emma sat on a chair. Liam brought the first-aid kit. "Take off your jacket," he said. "I can't." "I'll help." He took off her jacket—carefully, barely touching her left shoulder. He cut her t-shirt with the scissors—from collar to hem. Emma didn't object. She didn't have the strength. "Lucky," Liam said, examining her shoulder. "Not a fracture. A dislocation. I'll set it." "You know how?" "I learned." "On what?" "On dummies." "Comforting." He took her right arm, placed his left on her shoulder. "Count to three," he said. "Don't..." Crack. Emma screamed. Short, through her teeth. The shoulder snapped back into place—the pain flared and began to subside. "There," Liam said. "Now bandaging." He applied a bandage—tight, stabilizing, from shoulder to elbow. Emma watched his hands. They didn't tremble. "Thanks," she said. "Don't mention it." He finished. Put the first-aid kit away. "The tag," he said. "What about it?" "You loved it." "It's not a Christmas tree. A tag isn't a Christmas tree." "You wore it every day." "Now she will. She needs it more." "How do you know?" "She has children." Liam paused. Then he nodded. "Alright." He left. Emma stayed sitting on the chair, staring at the wall. Her left arm ached—dully, throbbing. But it was in place. And she was alive. And the tag—somewhere out there, in someone else's pocket. With a woman who now knew the world wasn't always what it seemed. "Emma," Lisa said. "Yeah?" "You did good." "I'm an idiot." "It's the same thing." Emma smirked. Winced in pain. "Go to hell." "After lunch." They fell silent. Outside, snow was falling. Thick, wet, heavy. It fell on roofs, on trees, on the asphalt that still hadn't frozen. Emma watched the snow and thought about the woman in the square. About her children. About the tag that now lay in her pocket. "It will come back," she thought. "Not to me. To her. When she needs it." She didn't know where that certainty came from. But it was there. She stood and walked to her room. Lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. Behind her lids—the square, the mother, the children. And the tag she'd given away. "Right," she thought. "Right." She fell asleep toward evening. And she dreamed of nothing.