Starts with a Match

Her

We only talked to Beth for a few minutes before she had to go—before I was begging her to hang up and find somewhere safe. She's a soldier of her own kind. Her voice was calmer than mine. She said her and another spouse who lost her wife in the pentagon were going to hide out together; the surviving spouse's sister has a bunker under her cabin in North Carolina. It's not that far away from the madness of DC, but it's good enough for now I guess. At least it's more than just pregnant Beth alone.

Beth said she loved me. I cried and couldn't say it back.

Hannah called from post. She hadn't heard about Jim. Don handled that phone call. Never seen him cry like that.

Alex and Claire took off for Kansas as soon as we turned off the TV. We agreed it would be safer for all four of us to not be trying to travel with two cherries in our midst. Claire and I went over the path while Gracie helped Alex pack them up; they'd take a different route in Dorris now that she's all good to go.

Don and Gracie said they would lead them as far as they could, and then they'd go join Gracie's family in Connecticut. Since we're so far in the west, moving center, we should be okay to avoid any new grand canyons made by other countries fighting back. Should be.

Goodbyes were fast and painful, rib crushing and blurry. I don't remember if I hugged Don long enough. I know I didn't hug Jim long enough at the airport. Hugging Alex hurt. Hugging Claire made me nearly throw up.

They left in such a rush that they forgot a couple of his socks, one of his tennis shoes.

I got a call to report to post. So did Don, and Hannah.

We all agreed not to go.

Not after we found out the last person we could trust, Sarah Hockins, had been killed in a head on collision right after the Address.

Not after we found out the bombs that have already started to detonate on American soil have decimated through the last of the borders.

If they want us, they'll have to hunt us down.

Like hell am I leaving my family now.

—

Toby and I clearly mourn differently. I've seen them rage, but never like this. Found them in their dance studio after all the others left, and it was like a tornado went through the garage. Glass everywhere, their mirrors all shattered, looked like the boom box was thrown through one of them.

There was blood on nearly every surface. I knew the place must've reeked like cherries, but I couldn't smell a damn thing.

They refused to come inside, sitting on the ground with their destroyed knuckles in their lap, unlit cigarette between their fingers.

Meanwhile, I'm desperate to be around people. Like after Elijah, how I was around my friends, touching them, hugging them, desperate to keep them close and feel their hearts beating.

Toby figured it out without me having to tell them. Cause I kept hovering, kept checking on them, finally resorting to begging them to please come inside. They left their disaster of a studio with band aids over their hands and held me on my sofa while I cried into their arms.

Took me a few hours, but I'm calm enough now that I can take deeper breaths. Toby gets me to drink water and encourages me to eat a piece of toast.

Checking in with me with a tired smile and hands on my face, Toby stands up, whispering that they want to clean the garage.

"We're gonna be gone soon anyway, babe," I tell them, circling their waist with my arms. "Why does it matter how it looks?"

Toby gives a loose shrug and brushes hair from my forehead where the strands have grown too long. "I don't want to leave it like that. Don't want to leave. Our house. Like this. There was so much I wanted to do here. So many things I wanted. To have here."