13 Morning: The First New Day

I had already told the leadership team about the tours while I began assigning people to groups.

“OK,” said John I. “Let’s mix in and eat.”

People were already starting to line up for breakfast. The team spread out, introducing themselves as they joined different family groups, talking about the tours and what people would see.

Marguerite was tense.

The plaid-jacket guy stood behind her in line. In front of her were the little girl with the red scarf and her parents.

Marguerite said to them in a friendly enough tone, covering what she felt, “Yes, we’re giving tours today.”

The little girl turned, looked up at her, and said, “Are you a hero? Are you one of our heroes?”

Marguerite went still.

Q: Yes.

But she could not say it. Her tension was fear. Fear that all these people could damage the Wild Village she and almost ten thousand others had spent forty-five years building. But John II’s words from the meeting still rang in her: Kill all the men, women, and children? She knew she could not do that. She also knew some of these very people would become burdens, and some might become threats. That much was already clear to her.

The man in the plaid jacket touched her shoulder lightly from behind.

“Say yes,” he said, almost whispering. “It’s OK.”

Marguerite turned and looked at him.

There was no edge in him now. No argument. No challenge. Only a kind of steady kindness.

He gave the smallest nod.

Marguerite looked back at the little girl, who was staring up at her, eyes wide, already wet.

Marguerite set her tray down.

Then she held out her arms.

The girl lifted hers at once and Marguerite picked her up and held her close.

“Yes,” Marguerite said.

Her voice caught. She swallowed and said it again.

“Yes. I am.”

The little girl buried her face in Marguerite’s shoulder and began to cry the way only a little girl can cry, all at once and without holding anything back.

“You want me here?” she said. “My mom and dad too?”

Marguerite looked at the parents. Then she nodded.

“Yes,” she said. “Your parents, too.”

That was as far as truth would let her go, and for now it was enough.

Then Marguerite cried too.

She thought of the Generals. The cousins in California, Jackson Hole, and Switzerland. All still alive, if the plans had held. All with their own enclaves now opened or still closed. She wondered if they were standing in lines like this one, with frightened people in front of them, and impossible questions in the air.

She set the girl down gently.

Then she turned to the man in plaid and said quietly, “Thank you. How did you know I needed that?”

He gave a little shrug.

“I know what it’s like not to be listened to,” he said. “And I know what a child hears when an adult won’t answer.”

Marguerite looked at him differently now.

Not trouble. Not a problem to manage.

A man carrying his own wound plainly.

They moved along the line together. The man in plaid, the little girl, her parents, and Marguerite sat down near the family’s tent space with their food.

After a moment, Marguerite smiled at the girl and said, “We’re going to have a good tour.”

The girl nodded hard, still sniffling, believing her.

“What’s your name?” said the girl.

“Marguerite.”

“What’s your name?”

“Wren.” said the girl. To the guy in the plaid jacket, Wren says, “What’s your name?”

“Marcus,” he says. “Thank you for asking. Wren is a beautiful name.”

Wren says, “Yes, like the beautiful birds.”

Q: Logged.

Q: Logged.