ALLAM HAD ONE THOUGHT ONLY: I could have stopped her from going to help the neighbour that day. Conditions in Aleppo were too dangerous. If I had stopped her, she would be alive. Who could say which of the buildings would be bombed? We should have left long before that; we should have left our country when our daughter did. Our now-broken country that once we loved.

ADDIE KNEW THAT CHIYO was hovering, keeping watch. Chiyo could be trusted. She felt Chiyo’s hand rubbing her shoulder soothingly. But Addie had gathered herself. I’m fine, said her inner voice. I need sleep, that’s all. Lots and lots of sleep.

Cassie walked in with a tray that held a rectangular cake decorated with white icing, candied green leaves, red berries. It was December, after all—the festive season. A small and brightly decorated tree had been placed on its own table at the side of the room. Everyone looked up blankly, greeting Cass as if she’d bounded in off the surface of a cream-cheese moon. She set the cake in the centre of the table and looked around at the faces.

Good timing, she said to herself. Definitely good timing.

The members of the company roused themselves and ordered a round of drinks, and then made short work of the cake, which had the slightest hint of rum in its December icing.

On His Watch

TOM

Tom was thinking of dragonflies in Nova Scotia, jewel-like neon colours, violets and purples, greens and blues, flashes of silver wings. How they flitted toward him and away, abruptly changing direction while going about their business. During one visit, his grandmother had told him that dragonflies were the devil’s darning needles. Grampa Murray scoffed and tried to offset superstition by explaining their usefulness and worth. “They eat mosquitoes and blackflies, for a start. We have dozens of species right here in our own province,” he told Tom. “Dozens. They’re here for a purpose. Part of the life chain.”

While Tom waited for Dave in the roundabout at the entrance of the Haven, he recited softly three lines he’d written during that childhood visit to Nova Scotia. He was fourteen years old and writing poetry even then. He and his grandfather had taken the rowboat out early in the morning, fished for an hour and a half, caught their breakfast, released a few.

“Put your hand under the belly, keep it underwater as much as you can. Don’t lift it by the tail; you’ll damage the spine.”

Later, when Tom was alone in his upstairs room, he pulled a small notebook from the pocket of his suitcase and wrote:

beside us

wide-winged dragonflies

stared with big bead eyes

The only lines he could remember. Much water under the bridge since he’d written those. His was the work of an amateur, he knew that. But he kept on, worked at the poems anyway. And continued to read poetry, whatever he happened to lay his hands on.

The door of his Jeep was wrenched open, and Dave hitched his barrel body into the passenger seat. Was Dave thinner? Seemed that way to Tom. As if staves of weight had dropped from his skeleton overnight.