Dragonfly by Jaxn Hill

The little guy had a point. We were no threat to Nikolai. But I didn’t like that he was even aware of us. The little guy had a name — Franz. Of all things. Small as he was, with a name like Franz, he must have gotten his backside kicked every day in school. Probably how he got over was spying on people, getting information they didn’t want broadcast and using that for protection. Sneaky. But smart.

He caught up to Torstein and told him everything he’d told us. Torstein gave him some more sunflower seeds and told him he should report to Nikolai — that we had no secrets and if Nikolai was interested, he could come and join us himself. That was how Torstein looked at the world.

We covered a lot of ground that morning. The street we were on, Seventh Avenue, now led us right through the suburbs of the city, block after block of single family homes with green lawns and automatic garage doors. At each corner, Sully stared down the street at the houses, like he thought that was summer camp or DisneyLand down those streets. There might be kids in a yard running through a sprinkler, or a lady walking a dog. Sully would stand and watch until whoever was at the back of our group would grab his hand and pull him along.

“Let’s stay here,” he finally said. I guess he’d never seen a suburb before. I don’t know how he thought we could stay there. He’d taken it hard that we couldn’t stay at the church — maybe he thought these people might let us sleep in their basement like Pastor Ruiz had. Maggie picked Sully up and started carrying him. He was small, but he was too big for her. I took him from her, and noticed she was crying.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I could have had a house like these,” she said. “And 2.5 kids, and a dog.”

“You still can if you want, Maggie,” I said. “I don’t guess you’re 40 yet, and people keep having kids right up to 43 or 45 these days.”

Maggie gave me a funny look, but before she could speak, Sully, who’d been listening, said, “Yeah! I’ll live with you!” That made Maggie cry harder.

We were crossing a major intersection. On one side of the road there was a strip mall and grocery store, and on the other side a big park. Torstein was heading to the park, but he’d sent some guys to the grocery store, so I guessed we were stopping for lunch. I didn’t know what was wrong with Maggie, or how to help her, but she grabbed my arm and said, “Thanks, Andy. I know you mean well.” Then she hurried forward to walk with Torstein into the park. Sully wriggled away to run ahead of them.

My brother, who’d been walking a bit ahead of us, dropped back beside me. He said, “I think we need more dames in this outfit. You’re terrible at comforting a woman.”

Thanks, Pete.