“You did not know what would happen.”
“No. But I knew you had already been exposed once.”
Daniel stayed silent.
Avery looked at him. “Has she told you?”
“The parts she wanted to.”
Avery nodded.
“That sounds like Mara.”
I leaned against the lobby wall and let the shoulder ache settle.
The incident had not been a heroic movie scene. It had been confusion, damaged vehicles, smoke, screaming radios, and a transportation route that had to be rebuilt while people were still moving through it. I was injured when a second blast struck near the recovery vehicle. The shoulder never fully stopped reminding me.
What I remembered most was not pain.
It was counting.
Vehicles. People. Litters. Fuel. Minutes.
The discipline of reducing panic into tasks small enough to complete.
Avery had remembered too.
“You kept the route open long enough to move the last medical vehicle,” he said.
I looked at Daniel.
He knew that part.
“What he may not know,” Avery continued, “is that I recommended you for a decoration you initially refused to attend the ceremony for.”
Daniel laughed softly.
“That sounds like Mara too.”
I rolled my eyes.
Avery smiled.
“I am not going to tell your dinner table the story. But I am glad to see you.”
He shook my hand again.
Then he looked at Daniel.
“She made us better at our jobs because she did not confuse being quiet with having nothing to say.”
After he left, Daniel and I stood near the coat check.
“You okay?” he asked.
“No.”
“Want to go home?”
