I shouted to Warren. Screamed for him to run, and I pointed the gun at the largest shadow looming behind him. I squeezed, and the glass shattered, the pieces flew, catching the light as they flashed, catching the dark as they fell around me. And around Warren.

And it was the day he was born again, and I held him, precious and terrifying in my arms and he wailed, pink face screwed up with rage, until his face wasn’t pink anymore but white, and his rage went quiet, wrinkles smoothing to a mask. A dark stain spread around him.

And I stayed there, holding him, sitting in broken glass until there was nothing between me and the sunlight. Moths danced around the flaring bulb, raining dust from their wings and casting wild shadows over the walls, and over me.

In the shards that shone like mirrors, figures moved and pressed themselves to the glass, before slipping around the jagged edges and out into the world, into the light.

Crosswind

CROSSWIND

Jacob stood his ground, feet planted, windbreaker whipping against his body. His microphone was useless in the wind, but he kept reporting. The other trucks, the desk-jockey weathermen, had all left—retreated to studios and green screens. The story is out here in the sky. This is why they watch. Live, now. And later they’ll share it to their timelines, text it to their friends. See the storm?

Footage of the twister that had killed Paula still creeps up in search results. The people who watch it “ooh” at the debris cloud—oblivious that one of those zooming specks liked pineapple on her pizza and sang along to opera in languages she didn’t know. Maybe she knows them now.

Even magnified on the wall-sized screen in the studio, he couldn’t tell which speck was her. Couldn’t see where she learned to fly—tasted the storm in ways he never had. Maybe never would. The closest he could get to her now was here on the beach, telling everyone to take shelter. Take cover, the last thing he’d said to Paula, but too late.

“Took an unexpected turn,” is what he said—what the storm did. What so many storms do—unpredictable, always reminding him I was wrong I was wrong I was wrong.

They still called him Radar. He was right more often than not. He saved lives, the anchorwomen reminded him. And sometimes they die anyway.

Blowing sand sounded like angry snakes against his cinched hood. The earpiece broadcasted static. He recited the same wind stats again, rambled about currents. They couldn’t hear, back at the desk, but no one cared—they just want to see him stagger, watch something heavy blow away in the background. Good TV.

When he felt the wind shift, saw it was on the move, he wrapped up.