The faces were vague, like phantoms seen in a dream–but Overseer Piers knew she was not among them. He hurried forward, pressing through the crowd of strange faces, unable to focus. He knew, somehow, in which direction she would be. It was a father’s instinct, the certainty of necessity.
There was pain somewhere inside him. He couldn’t place it and sometimes it did not hurt at all. He looked for blood on his hands, touched his head expecting warm stickiness, but he was whole and well. Outwardly.
This is the end, he thought, and I haven’t seen her. She will die without my seeing her again.
Section 8 tilted crazily in the aftermath. The streets led to places they had not the day before and buildings blocked paths that should have been open. The people pushed and shoved and held him back. Didn’t they recognize him?
“I am looking for Esmerda Piers. Do you know where she lives?”
He did not know why he spoke that way. He knew where she lived. He was nearly on her doorstep.
How his head throbbed!
He knocked rapidly, knocked, hoping, praying she would answer. He had been here only once before.
“It’s the end. We’re dying. Can’t everything be forgiven, everything reconciled?” he pleaded.
He tried the door. It opened. He walked in. The entryway was empty, but he heard talking further in.
She was at the kitchen table, eating with her husband. Her oldest child was married, he remembered, but her other two should have been home, especially after what had happened. When he stepped into the room, conversation stopped. Esmerda looked at him.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Her apartment was immaculate. The lights were low. Candles flickered on the table. He had interrupted a private meal.
“The city is dying,” he said.
She stared unblinkingly at him.
He approached. “I–I thought you might be…. We haven’t talked in years.”
“How many years?”
He stopped short.
“How many?” she demanded.
“I–I don’t know.”
“Seven years, three months, and two days, dad.”
“I’ve tried–”
“Have you?”
“There’s so much to do.”
“Reports to write, reports to read, theses to examine, to tweak, to test in double-blind studies. Stars to count, sand to shift, dirt to let sit. Rabbit trails to follow. Curricula to rearrange, children to retrain, graduates to reassign. Patents to approve, rivals to disprove, students to reprove. Papers to beget, Sections to refit, people to forget.”
“They’re burning now,” he said.
“Yes.”
He took another step, hesitantly. “I–I just want to hold you, like when you were a child and loved me. When I would read to you and you’d say, ‘Again, Again!’”
“I don’t remember that.”
“I do! I do! Let me hold you, please. Just for a moment.”
She stood. “I don’t think I should.”
“Please….”
He closed his eyes, unable to bear her gaze. He felt pressure against him. Solid pressure that built and built. It hurt. Her embrace was so fierce. He wouldn’t let her go, not for anything, never again. Never.
Beneath the solid metal beams that once supported the ceiling of his study, Overseer Piers lay crushed and bleeding, dying, dying, dying….
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