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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jack McDevitt has been described by Stephen King as “The logical heir to Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke.” He is the author of nineteen novels, eleven of which have been Nebula finalists. His novel
Seeker
won the award in 2007. In 2003,
Omega
received the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best science fiction novel. McDevitt’s most recent books are
The Cassandra Project
, a collaboration with Mike Resnick, and
Starhawk
, which follows the young Priscilla Hutchins as she seeks to qualify as an interstellar pilot. Both are from Ace. A Philadelphia native, McDevitt had a varied career before becoming a writer. He’s been a naval officer, an English teacher, a customs officer, and a taxi driver. He has also conducted leadership seminars. He is married to the former Maureen McAdams, and resides in Brunswick, Georgia, where he keeps a weather eye on hurricanes.
Nancy Kress — PRETTY SOON THE FOUR HORSEMEN ARE GOING TO COME RIDING THROUGH
The school hallway smells of chalk and Lysol and little kids. That smell don’t never change. What’s changed is that this time I’m called to school and missing time I can’t afford from my job ’cause of Carrie, not Sophie. Which don’t really make sense. What kind of trouble can a kindergartner get into?
“Ms. Drucker? I’m Olivia Steffens,” Carrie’s teacher says. “We met at the Parents’ Open House.”
We did, but we didn’t talk much. She was the property of the moms with sunglasses on top of their heads and highlights in their hair. I moved to this school district so’s my girls don’t have to go to that rat-ridden disgrace on Pelmar Street, but that don’t mean I really belong. I shake her hand, the nails manicured pink but one broken off. That helps a little bit.
We sit in tiny chairs that she fits into better than I do. Slim, pretty, she can’t be any older than me—but then, I had Sophie at sixteen. I face a row of cut-out paper pumpkins on the wall. It’s October.
Ms. Steffens says, “I’m so glad you could come today. There’s been an incident on the playground involving Carrie.”
“What kind of incident?” If it was Sophie who’d made trouble, I’d already know. Fighting, taking lunch money—kid is on my mind all the time. Last Sunday I lit a candle to St. Pancras that we didn’t move here too late for Sophie to outgrow all the shit she learned at Pelmar Street.
Ms. Steffens says, “Some older girls caught Carrie and another child, Tommy Winfield, on the playground at recess. The girls taunted them, and, well, two of the girls pulled Tommy’s and Carrie’s underwear off. I only learned about this when Tommy’s mother called me, quite upset.”
And
I
didn’t learn about it at all. Little bastards. I keep my face rigid—you don’t never give people that sort of edge over you. “Is that all?”
“No, I’m afraid not. Carrie went through the rest of the day, apparently, with no underwear, but your older daughter is in the perpetrators’ fourth-grade classroom.”
So this is about Sophie after all. I might of known.
“She found them laughing about the state of the underwear and has threatened to ‘get even.’ Her teacher would have been at this conference, too, but she’s quite ill and the class had a substitute that day, who is now out of town. Carrie—”
“Why wasn’t these kids being supervised on the playground?”
“They were, of course, but apparently not adequately. The same illness that hit Sophie’s teacher has kept us really short-staffed for a week.”
“You still got an obligation to protect my kids!”
“I know that.” Ms. Steffens’s voice gets colder. “The girls responsible will be punished. But Carrie didn’t fight back, which is what I want to talk to you about. She did whatever they told her to, without even a protest. And when James LeBlanc hit her two weeks ago—the principal called you about that, I know—she also didn’t fight back. She just stood there and would have let him hit her again if the lunch lady hadn’t intervened.”
I say, “What about the state of the underwear?”
“What?”
“You said the girls were laughing about the state of the underwear. What about it?”
Ms. Steffens looks like she said too much, which she did. She don’t answer.
I say, “Never mind.” The panties was probably ragged. Carrie needs new underwear, but Sophie’s shoes came first because you can see shoes and not underwear. Supposedly. “So what do you want me to do about it?”
“Two things.” Ms. Steffens is tougher than she looks. “First, talk to Sophie—we ca
“No.” I stand up. “Carrie don’t need no therapy. I’ll handle this.”
“But—”
“Thanks for letting me know.” I walk out, past the rows of pumpkins with crayoned-on faces, all gri
• • • •
When the volcano blew up, I was three months pregnant with Carrie. It was one of the worst times in my life. Jim had just disappeared, no forwarding address, no ways for the Legal Aid lawyer to get me any child support. They never did find him. Sophie’s daddy was in prison—still is—so no help there.
I got lousy taste in men. Since Carrie was born, I just stay clear of all of them. Safer that way.
So I wouldn’t of paid any attention to the volcano, except that nobody could
not
pay attention to it. It was everywhere, first on the news and then in the air. Even though it blew up somewhere in Indonesia, killing I don’t know how many people, the ash blew all over the world. Somebody at work told me that’s why the sunsets and sunrises were so gorgeous, red and orange, like the sky itself was on fire.
• • • •
I pick up Sophie from school and Carrie from after-school daycare. Carrie gives me her sweet smile. Two like her and my troubles would be over. But instead I got Sophie.
“Carrie,” I say in the car, which is making that clunking noise again, “did some older girls pull off your underwear on the playground?”
“Y… e… ss.”
“Why didn’t you
tell
me?”
“You weren’t there, you were at work,” she says, with five-year-old logic. Actually, she’s just barely five, the youngest kid in her class. I probably should of held her back to start kindergarten next year, but it’s a lot cheaper to pay for just after-school care.
“Why didn’t you fight back?”
Carrie just looks at me, her little face wrinkled, and I sigh. Sophie is, weirdly, easier to talk to.
“I pounded those bitches bloody!” Sophie said, once we got home.
“Language!” I tell her. “We don’t talk that way.”
“
You
do.” She faces me, hands on her hips, lip stuck out. Sophie’s been feisty since she was born. Also, she’s going to be pretty, and I know how full my hands are going to be when she’s a teenager. But she’s not going to mess up her life at sixteen the way I did. I’ll kill her first.
She says, “I was defending my little sister!”
“I know, but—”
“You told me to take care of her at school! Well, do I or don’t I?”
“I told you no more fighting! Christ, Sophie, do you want to get expelled or something? We moved here for the school, you know that, and yet you go and—”
“I didn’t go and do nothing!”
“Don’t talk back to me! I said that if you got into any more fights, I was going to ground you, and I am! You come home right after school for a week and stay here, no playing with Sarah or Ava—nobody in and nobody out!”