She doesn’t grab her daughter by the wrist, doesn’t want her to follow. She doesn’t attempt to look strong, to appear dangerous, to threaten. She only walks, arms out, stabilizing herself, readying herself for a curb, a gradation, a hill, a body.

People clap around her. People call out. Someone yells something about breaking through. Someone praises God. So many voices. Hysterical, absurd, convinced.

“TOM!”

Malorie yells his name but others are doing it, too.

Calling for Tom.

Tom on a stage, a creature in the crowd.

“TOM!”

She knows he can hear her. She knows he could’ve heard them at the gates of town if he’d wanted to listen that far.

So many people. Infinite voices.

“TOM!”

She trips on what feels like a curb, almost falls, rights herself.

Someone says something about freedom.

“TOM!”

Like she’s calling out to Tom the man, telling him to get up into the attic, don’t stay downstairs where Gary…Gary…Gary…

“Malorie.”

A voice, at her side. At her ear.

“Get away from me!”

She shoves him. Kicks the open air.

Then, a sea of people. Chants. Cheers.

“Malorie,” Gary says (she knows it’s him, it’s always been him, behind the fold with her, always, forever), “Tom doesn’t want you here. Tom is growing up now. Right now.”

“TOM!”

She shoves but can’t find him. She kicks but he’s not there.

“He’s looking at one right now,” Gary says. “It’s incredible, Malorie. Looking through a device of his own making.”

Malorie moves fast, too fast, swings at Gary, misses, as the voice of the one she believes to be Athena Hantz speaks through the megaphone, tells the people of Indian River that Tom is looking at the creature, that he and the creature look at each other right now.

“TOM!”

But Malorie is falling. As Gary’s laughter is swallowed by a burst of unbridled cheer from the people around her.

And from the stage…suddenly, softly, somehow heard by Malorie as she hits the ground.

“Mom?”

Tom.

He’s heard her.

And he sounds…

“Sane,” she says, planting her palms on the grass, getting to her knees. Her elbows shake, her wrists shake, her entire body rumbles with the horror of her son gone mad and the unfathomable possibility that he hasn’t.

“Mom?” he says. Then, “Malorie!”

Malorie is up. But the crowd is too loud. She’s losing track of him in a wash of lazy, dangerous strangers.

Someone is at her by the elbow, forcing her back the way she came.

Gary

Gary Gary Gary

Malorie makes to push but Olympia’s voice stops her.

“Mom, Mom. He’s okay. Tom. He’s looking…and he’s okay.”

The people around her explode with a cheer Malorie has long thought reserved for the day human beings discover a way to look at the creatures safely.

And has that happened?

And is today that day?