Charles advanced on Charlie again, knife slashing at the arm holding the metal pipe. Charlie’s grip weakened, the pipe dropping from his hand. He swung at their uncle, a right hook landing across Charles’s cheek, sending the older man staggering backwards. Nora held her breath as Charlie advanced, fist still at the ready, but before he had the chance for a second strike, Charles lashed out, his knife embedding itself directly into Charlie’s chest. Charlie lurched back, knees buckling. With an apologetic look at Nora, Charlie collapsed to the ground, sprawling on his back, the blade protruding from a chest that heaved twice more before falling achingly, permanently, still.
“Hello? Ma’am?” came Pranav’s voice from the other end of the phone, but Nora had already dropped the receiver, time seeming to slow around her. Charles stood over her brother, his facestiff and somber. He wrenched the blade from where it stood and turned to Nora.
“I must apologize,” he said. “I told you I don’t want to do any of this.” With that, he charged at her, the raised knife bearing the blood of her brother. For a moment she wanted nothing more than to let it strike her. For the first time in her life it wasn’t death she feared, it was a life alone. Or maybe that’s what she’d truly feared all along. If Charlie was dead, then what was the point of anything? Why bother fighting?
But then her sense of self-preservation kicked in, the same sense that kept her from eating foods high in cholesterol or wearing makeup with carcinogenic ingredients. But this time it didn’t tell her to run from the dangerous thing. It told her to run towards it. As the knife swooped on her, she charged forward, torso hinged, and rammed herself at full force into Charles’s stomach. The assault sent them both into the air and down hard onto the pavement, the knife flying out of Charles’s hand and skidding across the driveway. They both scrambled after it on hands and knees as the sound of tires crunching on pavement grumbled from behind them. Charles looked back at the sound, but Nora kept after the knife, crawling until her fingertips brushed the hilt. Up close, her brother’s blood was thick. A wave of nausea washed over her, dizzying and sweaty.
Car doors opened and feet tapped and Nora ignored them all. Charles had caught up with her now, grabbing her by the ankles, dragging her towards him. She kicked, trying to force him to release his grip, but his fists held too firm. She swung the knife at him impotently as he pulled himself to his feet above her. He’d found Charlie’s discarded metal pipe and raised it now, primed to strike it against Nora’s head with all the strength he possessed.Nora kicked his shin, his flinch buying her just enough time to roll out of striking range. She lunged at him, something new and powerful propelling her forward, but before the knife in her hand had a chance to connect with Charles’s flesh, he swung the pipe, the metal colliding hard with Nora’s ribs.
She sank to the pavement in spite of herself, the air ripped from her lungs by the blow. She gasped, choked, tried to refill her lungs through the pain. Charles’s sleek boots filled her vision. She looked up to find him hovering over her, metal pipe primed for one final strike across her head. She could have screamed. She could have begged. She could have done whatever it took to live, just as she always had. But this time, she didn’t. Through the throbbing in her ribs, the stinging in her lungs, the threat that faced her from above, Nora did something she had never done before. She laughed. At the situation, at her uncle, at Death. Quietly at first, the pain of the laughter nearly causing her to throw up, but once she’d fought through the nausea, the laughter came out in long, high bursts. It was all so ridiculous. This is what she’d always been afraid of. The thing she’d been running from her whole life amounted to nothing more than a pathetic little man in a sweater-vest. It was absurd. It was hilarious.
Her laughter seemed to catch Charles off guard, and for a moment he appeared frozen by it. Without a second thought, Nora sobered up and plunged the knife in her hand through one of Charles’s sleek boots, embedding it with enough force to send him screaming. With that, she collapsed on the ground, her last shred of strength lost in the knife hilt. Nora knew what this meant; she was a sitting duck now, but somehow it didn’t matter. She flinched, waiting for the final blow from the metal pipe, but it never came. Instead a blur of neutral fabric whirled past her,toppling Charles to the ground beside her. Nora looked over from where she lay to find her uncle grappling with Patty’s petite form. More footsteps sounded, the altercation quickly interrupted by the sound of a gun’s safety clicking.
Phil walked over, rifle in hand, the barrel aimed at Charles. “Patty, move,” he ordered.
Patty obediently rolled away from her brother and over to Nora, carefully helping her back to her feet.
“Right, we’re done here, got it?” Phil shouted down at Charles. “We’ve put up with your shit for long enough.”
“Myshit?” Charles raised his arms in response to the gun in his face, but his expression was all hurt and innocence. “Everything I’ve done, I’ve done for our family.”
“Bullshit,” spat Nora. She dragged herself the rest of the way up off the pavement, palms scraped and stinging, torso aflame. Every part of her trembled from grief and fear and pain and anger and other emotions she couldn’t yet put a name to. “You did it for you.”
She shambled back to the dangling phone receiver, praying Pranav was still on the line. This was all she had left to do. The politely professional voice filtered through the speakers in reply to her words. She described their location, the gas station built between nothing and eternity, then promptly hung up the phone as a flurry of questions tumbled down the line. There would be time to answer them later.
When she turned back around, she found Patty waiting just behind her, her face an apology. Nora wasn’t ready to accept it. Charles was still on the ground, held at gunpoint. And Charlie…
Charlie was still there, too. Still sprawled on his back, limbs unnaturally akimbo. Eyes still shut. Chest still empty of oxygen.Nora pushed past her aunt, stumbled past her cousin and her murderous uncle. None of them mattered. Her only real family was lying dead on the concrete. She was numb and feeling too much, a husk about to explode. She sank to the asphalt beside Charlie, knees hitting the pavement hard. The pain caused little more than a twitch.
Nora swept the springing threads of bleached hair off of her brother’s brow, cupped his furry cheek in her hand. He was still warm, but that wouldn’t last. Soon his body would stiffen and cool. The blood would leave his cheeks, his features would further slacken, and everything that made him Charlie would be an echo in his unmoving chest. A Collections Agent would arrive, and his soul would move on, and Nora would be truly alone.
For all she knew about death and what led to it and what came after, it always seemed to come as a surprise to her, the reality of it. How utterly unremarkable it was. How utterly, pointlessly final. But Charlie had lived. Nora knew that much for a fact. Now she would have to do the same, since he no longer could.
A sob escaped her, the reverberations drowned out by the bleat of sirens in the near distance. Unmarked black vans packed into the driveway, sleek and organized as ants. Others sailed past, racing towards Virgo Bay. S.C.Y.T.H.E. special forces leapt onto the pavement before the vehicles pulled to a stop, agents’ boots heavy, the commotion rattling the earth. Somewhere behind her, Nora could hear Charles being apprehended by S.C.Y.T.H.E.’s team. She wouldn’t have to worry about them doing the same to Charlie. Their uncle had taken his life for them.
Patty was beside her now, trying to lead her away. Nora couldn’t grasp anything. Couldn’t understand why she would ever be anywhere but here. When her efforts failed, Patty simplylowered herself to the ground and sat with Nora, saying nothing. There was nothing to say.
The leader of the task force approached Nora. She couldn’t see them through her tears. Nora said things, some of them comprehensible, and eventually the team cleared out and she lost herself completely to the depths of her grief.
30
Three Months Later
The procession was small, which was exactly as it should have been. Nobody cried today. They’d already done enough of that. Once S.C.Y.T.H.E. had finally cleared out, after a drawn-out investigation, tears had flowed freely throughout Virgo Bay as the dust settled and reality eventually set in. This morning wasn’t for crying, it was for saying a final goodbye.
The little church looked different as the mourners approached, the garden dug up, ready to fulfill its ultimate purposeas a graveyard for the first time. Nora’s breath caught as she saw the earth peeled back, a hungry void in its place. She could still see Bubbie’s coffin descending into the dirt where it would remain until there was nothing left of it or her or anything recognizable.
Patty looped an arm through Nora’s, guiding her gently towards the church. They walked in silence, helming the procession. They hadn’t bothered bringing in a priest to officiate the funeral. No religion in the world was equipped to understand what the people of Virgo Bay had experienced. Instead, Richard stood on the mound of upturned earth, ready to speak on behalf of the town.
As they crossed through the garden gate, Patty gave her niece a nod and they separated, finding their places among the small crowd. Patty gathered near Phil, Vic, Pickles, and the rest of the Birds Nora hardly knew. They were Patty’s people, the ones her aunt knew how to be with in times of grief. Nora hovered under a nearby tree, at a distance from the funeral and the family. Richard spoke and the caskets were lowered.
She had never wanted to return to Virgo Bay after everything that happened. It was too painful. But for this, for today, she’d endure the pain. Jessica sailed overhead and came to land on her shoulder. Nora acknowledged the bird with a tip of the head, and together they watched the proceedings, a Bird and a bird at the edge of the world.
31
Less than twenty-four hours later, Nora was back on the doorstep of her home. She wasn’t entirely sure she could even call it home yet; it was still mostly boxes and furniture and boxes doubling as furniture. She would need to unpack eventually, but she wasn’t ready to just yet. She supposed she’d start feeling at home at some point. Maybe once she’d explored the neighborhood more. It wasn’t really her scene from what she could tell, but the place could always surprise her. There were more bars and clubs than cafés, but after all this was a college town. She wasn’t exactly the target demographic. She wouldn’t be here forever. The architecture program was only two years long, and who knows, by the end she might actually find her place among the other postgrads.
She lowered Jessica’s cage to the stoop and dug her key out of her purse, fiddling with the unfamiliar lock until she finally heard it click. Inside, she tossed her keys onto their designated hook and hung her coat on its own, flicking on the lights to illuminate bare white walls and the stack of boxes waiting for her by the living room door.
