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Her faith bolstered me. Jesse’s hand on my ankle helped me find my voice.
Stretching my lungs, I spoke as loud as I could. “Thank you for coming. I…uh…”
What should I say? Even if I’d had months to prepare a speech, I wouldn’t have been able to produce a message that would vanish their problems. And I wouldn’t give promises I couldn’t keep.
So I spoke from my heart. I told them about my family before the plague, about my journey here, leaving out the gruesome details and focusing on the heroic people I’d met along the way. I talked about the Lakota and their respect for all living things. Ian, the young man who’d helped me cross the Atlantic. The brutish Icelandic men, who didn’t speak my language but sacrificed their lives to lead me to the volcano. My guardians, who dedicated every breath to protect me. I unfolded stories about Georges and Tallis, Shea and Link, and the proliferation of Arkendale, and how the peninsula began with the determination of Link’s men and women.
As my words echoed through the canyon, I knew only a fraction of the congregation could hear me. But my stories would ripple, like their kneeling postures. The details might change, but the meaning would carry: Women wouldn’t be here without the extraordinary acts of ordinary people. People just like them.
When my voice grew too hoarse to shout, I thanked them again. Then I spent the next three hours greeting the continuous rotation of men and women. Many of them had dogs with them, which filled me with warmth. The world needed more loving companions like Darwin.
I touched pregnant bellies, rested my hand on countless bowed heads, and whispered words of encouragement. At first, I wasn’t sure what to say, but as I looked into each set of eyes, it was easy to simply say what I felt. When a woman smiled, I told her she was beautiful. If a man had a soldier’s bearing, I told him he was strong. You’re brave, remarkable, thoughtful, gentle, earnest… I gave them my honesty and approval like a chant.
The crowd of thousands queued without an end in sight. I could’ve gone another three hours, but the sun was waning, and exhaustion drew circles under my guardians’ eyes. Michio, less so, but the three of them never left my side, their vigilance straining their shoulders and tightening their necks. At the very least, they needed to eat.
I gripped Jesse’s hand. “It’s time.”
There would be a tomorrow and a tomorrow after that. I couldn’t offer food and shelter to thousands, but I would return to the surface in a gesture of hope.
I lay in bed that night, perpendicular to Roark’s body, curled on my side with my head on his chest, as Jesse and Michio molded around my lower half. My limbs felt lighter, my heart fuller, my entire being immersed in the essentials of life. I had love with three men, hope with my child, and purpose for my existence.
My guardians had been unusually quiet through dinner, and now, with their eyes closed and breaths even, they were either asleep or deep in thought like me.
Our daughter was due at the end of August. Two months. Was that all the time I had left? I needed to reach more people outside. Needed to collect more baby supplies. Needed a name for our child. Needed to talk about the future with her fathers.
I needed more time.
The next morning, I woke with a tiny foot pressing against my bladder. She stretched and twisted in my womb, each movement surging a shock of pulsations through me. I’d felt her aura strengthening over the past month, but her life force was substantial today. It felt like Michio’s humming vibrations, only more pronounced, as if I were inside her instead of the other way around. She felt like a warm conductor of emotional and living energy. The kind of energy that could expand beyond all boundaries.
And prevent me from sleeping in.
The lamp in the corner remained on to light my nightly trips to the bathroom. Beneath the dim glow, Darwin lifted his head from the floor, watching me as I sat up, careful not to wake the guys. I needed to burn off some of this restlessness in the tunnels, and they needed their rest before we headed back to the crowd outside.
Their sprawled positions formed a triangle of hard muscle and naked skin around me. They lay on their sides, facing me, where I slept in the center. But I mostly slept on them, arms and legs entangled, using some part of them as a pillow.
Slowly, quietly, I climbed over Michio’s legs, slipped off the bed, and glanced back at their relaxed faces. All eyes were closed.
I pulled on a pair of shorts and gathered my hair in a ponytail.
