by E. J. Mellow
“Termination,” Dev says quietly. “In seven Earth cycles.”
I exhale slowly, letting the reality of his words seep in. Termination. I’d thought I’d feel a wave of relief or guilt, anything, but I only feel hollow and tired.
“Aurora?” I ask, because that’s really all that matters now.
“She—” Dev swallows. “She didn’t take it well. She’ll be monitored by a physician until she can calm down.”
It’s like I’ve been punched. “We should see her.”
“No,” Dev says sternly. “I’m sorry, but you’re probably the last person she wants to see right now.”
“But she’s my friend. Our friend.”
“I don’t think she shares the same sentiment at the moment.”
I open my mouth to respond, but then shut it. He’s right. As horrible and misguided as it is, of course she blames me for Aaron’s sentencing. The look I saw in her eyes out on the battlefield floats in front of me, the hate… In all of Terra, how has so much gone wrong?
“This might be horrible of me to admit,” Dev says, bringing me into his arms. “But I’m relieved. Having Aaron here… Now what happened can’t be repeated.”
Despite our public surroundings, I seek his comfort, wishing I could feel the same relief, the same assurance for a new future, but there’s still so much to be done to accept it just yet.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” an out-of-breath female voice breaks into our moment, and we move apart to find a messenger. Her face is flushed as she pulls a letter from her satchel. “But I was told to personally hand deliver this message to you immediately.”
“Thank you,” I say, curious. Tearing the envelope open, I smile seeing Becca’s familiar handwriting, but it slides off my face into a puddle at my feet as I take in the two simple lines.
“Oh my God.” I cover my mouth as the world around me blurs.
“What’s happened?” Dev asks.
“I have to go,” I say, glancing up to find his worried blue eyes. “I have to go right now.”
“What, where? Molly, what’s going on?” Dev peers over my shoulder to read, but just then Hector pulls the letter from my fingers, his face growing even whiter as he reads. I know in this moment he and I are sharing the same cold dread and, as we lock eyes, are still seeing the inked words scrolled across the paper.
Come back now. Your grandfather, he’s had a heart attack.
— 29 —
It’s strange how much one person can endure. You’d think a species that depended so heavily on shelter, clothes, food, and regular sleep would crumble under the slightest pressure, the smallest challenge. But while our bodies tend to be weak and needy, our minds can surprisingly withstand an unwavering amount of onslaught. Even as the long list of high-priority responsibilities weighs down on me, all my swirling doubts and fears threatening to be the final drowning weight, I still manage to somehow hold myself together as I sit beside my grandfather’s hospital bed. Not even a tear has so far crept from the corner of my eye, and I don’t know if I should be proud of that or terrified.
This is my first time back on Earth after weeks away, the first time I’m naturally blanketed in the sun’s warmth and am able to reconnect with Becca, Rae, and my parents. I remain beside my grandfather, who has just come back from surgery. Silently I watch his slow intakes of breath and count each beep of his heart monitor, waiting for the moment he wakes up.
Because he has to wake up.
My parents are outside talking to a nurse about the recent procedure and to find out how long he’ll be comatose. I curl a hand into his cool wrinkled one and squeeze.
“Stop being so lazy,” I whisper. “You always said oversleeping was for the addlebrained, and we all know you are not that.”
I’m greeted with the rhythmic whooshing of his breathing machine.
“I got you a few sodas and bags of chips.” Rae walks into the room, carrying a bounty of vending-machine snacks.
“I told him you didn’t need so many carbonated drinks, but he wouldn’t stop until he had one of every kind,” Becca says, glancing to her boyfriend with endearing annoyance. Rae gives her a lopsided grin, looking every inch human in his unzipped gray hoodie, which is thrown over a white tee and dark jeans.
He deposits the snacks on a nearby table, while Becca plops into the chair beside me, her green summer dress pooling around her legs. Even with our current circumstance, they look happy together, and I can’t help noticing a lightness in Rae that wasn’t there before. Which is saying something, since he was already the most positive person I had ever met—well, besides Becca.
Turning back to my grandfather, I take a deep breath.
“Where’s Hector?” Rae asks, handing me a soda.
“He said he was going to check on something.” My attention goes to the open door, where my parents stand a few feet away.
After more than sixty years of not seeing my grandfather, Hector had astonished us all by saying he would accompany me home. We hadn’t talked much in the moments that took us from the recovery wing to the hospital in Pennsylvania, but as I had watched him gaze upon Robert’s prostrate form with tubes connected to every inch of him, Hector’s mouth had opened on a silent gasp before a swallow bobbed down his throat. His green eyes grew large and then narrowed to angry slits as his hands curled into fists by his side.
That’s when he announced he would be right back, mumbling something about hunting down at least one intelligent human who called themselves a doctor before fleeing the room. I let him go, knowing despite whatever excuse he gave, he needed a moment alone.
“How’s your new job?” I ask Rae, catching him in the middle of pouring the last remnants of a bag of chips into his mouth. He smiles sheepishly while dusting the crumbs from his chin.
“We don’t need to talk about that, Mols,” he says.
“I need to talk about it actually.”
He and Becca share an understanding glance. “It’s good.” He settles against the wall, running a hand through his hair, the brown strip mixing into the blond strands. “They seem open to me messing around with the material of the boards. Even gave me a space in the back to work.”
“That’s great,” I say, happy for him. In their earlier letters that Sonja delivered to me, Rae wrote that he found a job at a surfboard startup company who just opened a shop in Brooklyn. It’s a perfect first human job for my old Vigil guard. With his honey-brown skin and sun-bleached locks, he already has the surfer appearance down. The fact that he actually has a passion for the sport and, to Becca’s delight, was quite good at it was a bonus. They managed to make a few trips out to California since my leave, Rae wanting to show her a favorite spot of his that he’d often visit when Terra allowed him the time.
“He might have found a way for the boards to be quicker in the water.” Becca beams proudly.
“Might being the key word,” he says. “I can’t take direct technologies from Terra, but I am allowed to figure out how to organically bring some here.”
“Loopholes,” I say.
“Precisely.” Rae winks.
I’m startled by the small chuckle I let out, feeling like I haven’t laughed in a very long time. “God, I’ve missed you guys.”
Becca’s hand covers mine. “Turtle, you have no idea. I mean, Rae hates coffee,” she says with a disgusted shudder. “It was very nearly our deal breaker.”
“I thought my refusal to watch rom coms was the deal breaker.”
“Yes, well, you made up for that in other ways.” A blush momentarily blossoms on her freckled cheeks. Thankfully, my parents walking back into the room closes that particular conversation.
“What did the nurse say?” I take in the tired appearance of my mom and dad. They stand in their matching lounge clothes, dark circles under their eyes, while their usual primped and tucked-in appearances are nowhere in sight. My dad hasn’t shaved since the incident, and my mom’s brown bob needs a good washing.
“Your boyf
riend has been very…beneficial,” Mom says after a moment of searching for the right word. “Especially for never meeting your grandfather before.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I clarify. “Just a friend.”
“Well, whatever he is,” she says, “he’s been extremely helpful. He’s managed to get us the official surgery’s test results much quicker than we would have otherwise.”
“Oh, well, that’s good.” I shift in my seat, not used to feeling gratitude toward my Vigil guard. “What were they?”
“His heart attack was due to severe plaque buildup,” Dad answers wearily as he goes to the other side of my grandfather’s bed. “They thought they might be able to put in a stent but realized quickly they needed to do a coronary artery bypass grafting.”
“A what?” I ask.
“It’s removing a healthy artery or vein.” Hector’s voice brings our attention to his tall form now blocking the doorway. “And replacing it with the blocked section. It creates a new route for the blood to travel to the heart.”
“Are you a doctor?” Mom asks, clearly impressed.
“No” is Hector’s short answer as he steps farther into the room and hugs the wall, his eyes never leaving Robert’s body.
“Hector likes reading about this sort of stuff,” I say in a way of an explanation.
“Oh” is Mom’s simple reply.
“So how long do they think it will take for him to wake up?” I ask.
“Could be in the next twenty minutes or the next day.” My dad moves a few displaced gray strands across my grandfather’s forehead back into place. “They said at his age he’s lucky to even have survived the attack, let alone the surgery.”
The room falls into a thick silence. Eventually my parents engage in some polite conversation, asking how my work is. I haven’t told them about getting fired yet—I’ll need to figure out an alibi at some point, a way to live what little time I spend on Earth without drawing suspicion. Another problem for another day. For now, I say it’s fine, explain that Hector is a friend of Rae’s from his new job. Rae and Becca go along with my lie, and then I convince my parents to go back home, which is, luckily, only a few minutes away. If not to get some rest, than to at least freshen up and eat something that didn’t come from the hospital cafeteria. I said I’d call if anything changed.
Becca and Rae remain with me, nothing I say moving them from their seats, and Hector stands frozen against the wall. I want to ask him how he is, what exactly is going through his mind, but we haven’t yet formed such a relationship. While I’m used to his presence and have grown to like him, there’s still a distance between us, a gap of intimacy that comes more from him than from me, as if he’s holding things back.
A low moan emanates beside me, and I turn to see my grandfather shifting ever so slightly.
“Grandpa!” I go to his side, Becca and Rae standing with me. “Grandpa, can you hear me? It’s Molly.” His wrinkled eyes blink open a few times, his mouth moving in an attempt to speak. “Shh, it’s okay. You just got out of surgery. You had a heart attack, but you’re okay.” I stroke back his hair, this time finally feeling the tears come.
“Molly,” he eventually rasps.
“Yes, it’s me. I’m here. Charles, your son, he just left, but he’ll be back. And my mom, Kathy, you remember her?”
He suddenly tries to sit up but then gasps from the impossible effort.
“No, don’t move, Grandpa. You’ve got wires covering you. You have to stay put.” I glance to the others. “Get a nurse,” I say, and Rae immediately leaves. Hector just stands there, his breathing uneven, the pulse against his neck fluttering rapidly.
I turn back to my grandfather. “Just try to relax,” I say softly. “You had a major surgery. You need to relax.”
Soon a male nurse walks in, followed by Rae. The nurse mutters calming words to Robert, checks his liquids and charts, scribbles some things down, and then says a few more words, which my grandfather tries to respond to. The fact that he’s showing signs of lucidness brings a sigh of relief, and the nurse explains that all looks fine, that he just needs to rest.
As the nurse leaves, we circle his bed, well, except Hector. He’s still planted on the far wall, and part of me wonders if he should leave—discreetly. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea that he came. Robert did just suffer a massive heart attack. I can’t see how the sudden appearance of Hector wouldn’t induce another.
“I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck,” my grandfather grunts.
“Well, you sort of were.” I gently sit on the side of his bed.
“It’s all those cakes your mother makes,” he moans out. “She put me here.”
“Grandpa,” I admonish, unable to hide a small smile, knowing he’s the reason she makes them, his addiction to the sugary treat. “That is not true and not a very nice thing to say. You better keep that to yourself when they come back.”
He merely harrumphs and then, seeing Becca on the other side of him, a twinkle forms in his eyes. “Have you been assigned to nurse me back to health?”
My mouth pops open at his cheekiness, and right after nearly dying, no less!
But Becca merely laughs and says, “That depends. Can my boyfriend here be the one to do your sponge baths?”
“Becca!” Rae and I both say in shock—well, Rae actually says it more in disgust.
My grandfather merely chortles from his bed before choking on a wince of pain.
“Don’t make him laugh.” I glare at Becca, who says sorry.
“Don’t yell at her,” my grandfather wheezes, clearly not as strong as he was trying to let on. “I’d rather go out laughing.”
“Well, I’d rather you not go out at all, especially from a gross innuendo.”
“That wasn’t really an innuendo,” Becca clarifies and then pinches her mouth closed as I pin her with a glare.
Throughout this entire exchange, I forget the other person in the room, but as I catch my grandfather’s eyes narrow at something at the end of his bed, I turn to find Hector now standing there.
My heart pounds, my skin prickling with nervous energy as I scan from my Vigil guard back to my grandfather. Each man stares at the other, and I watch as my grandpa’s eyes slowly fill with recognition and then shock, his head pressing farther into his pillow.
“Hector?” he whispers, the words as softly spoken as the ghost he surely thinks he’s seeing.
“Hello, Robert.” A hesitant, almost shy smile inches across Hector’s lips. “Been a long time.”
And then the machines monitoring my grandfather’s vitals begin to blare.
— 30 —
A weary sigh escapes my grandfather’s lips as whatever sedative the nurses recently attached to his IV drips into his veins. It took two of them and a doctor to bring Robert back to a stable state after his shock, and I shove Hector, hard, as soon as they leave the room.
“What the hell! Was that really the right moment to reveal yourself? Jesus. He just woke up after suffering a heart attack.”
“Mols, maybe lower your voice a bit?” Becca nods to the few people peering in through the small glass window to our room.
I pace away from the Vigil, unable to look at him anymore.
“Hector?” my grandfather croaks, his eyes darting around to locate the Vigil, and I bite the inside of my cheek to stave off another wave of anger.
“Grandpa,” I say softly, going to his side. “I think we should let you get some rest now.”
“Was that really Hector?” He looks at me imploringly. “Was it?”
I close my eyes briefly, letting out a breath of defeat. “This better not kill him,” I say over my shoulder to Hector, who’s hovering just beyond my grandfather’s view.
“Yes, it’s me,” Hector says in a gentle tone, kneeling on the other side of Robert’s bed. His hands flutter awkwardly, like he wants to take Robert’s hand but is unsure if he should, or can.
“Hector,” my grandfather sobs. “Where did yo
u go?”
Hector swallows.
“You never came to see me.”
As if that simple statement breaks whatever wall Hector was desperately trying to keep in place, he slips his hand between Robert’s, the smoothness of the Vigil’s skin in contrast with the age-spotted wrinkles of the other. “I’m seeing you now,” he says in a hush. “I’m seeing you now.”
My grandfather grip tightens. “I tried to find you after, but they wouldn’t let me leave the Center, and you never came back.”
“I’m…I’m sorry.” Hector’s brows pinch in before he lets out a small gasp of surprise as my grandfather lifts his finger to trace the scar across his left eye.
“This. This is why.” It’s not a question.
And then Hector does something that stops my heart. He leans over and sobs.
Becca, Rae, and I wait outside my grandfather’s closed room, my attention unable to move away from the scene of him and Hector talking quietly. Even with my new sensitive hearing, they mutter too softly for me to make out anything, and I huff in annoyance.
“What do you think happened?” Becca asks beside me.
“That’s what I’m trying to hear.”
“Let them be,” Rae says.
“Do you know what happened?” I look up to him.
“No.” He shakes his head. “I know it has to do with the war, but the specifics are lost to me.”
“Hector cried,” I say for the fifth time.
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” Becca replies. “He obviously cares about him.”
“I didn’t say he didn’t.”
“Then why are you so surprised by it?”
“I don’t know.” I tap my finger on my leg, gazing into the room. Neither one has moved from the closed-in conversation. “It’s just that it’s Hector.”
“I get it,” Rae says, pulling out a granola bar from his pocket. “He’s never been one to show many emotions besides blithe indifference or sarcasm.”
“Well, I like him,” Becca quips, flipping her red curls over one shoulder.