I left the opening on the word *emergency*.

Blood still bright on the service-floor concrete. Susan's cry thin in my ears. Sam's mother frozen in the recess. I did not stay to manage the story. My hands shook so hard in the car that I had to pin them under my thighs. Too much. The night had gone from canvases and donations to glass and skin, and my body had not caught up.

---

Morning came with banging.

I had locked the door. The sound of it being tested pulled me out of thin sleep. When I opened it, Sam stood in the hall with his bandages and a face...