The Survivor

smoke from his decimated torso. He gazed up. Waiting.

“You actually gonna help this time,” Nate asked, “or just stand there looking dead?”

“Help?” Charles said. “This is all you.” Even across the ember-flecked distance, the words were clear as day in Nate’s head. “It’s always been just you.”

Nate felt something that had been gripping his insides release, something so long forgotten that he knew it now only from its absence. Charles’s stomach began to fill in, the edges of the wound stitching together, and the dried blood on his face and hands moistened and flowed backward, sucked into his body like a horror movie on rewind. Charles touched his intact stomach in wonderment. Then he looked up at Nate again and grinned.

“’Bout fuckin’ time,” he said.

Pavlo sputtered and clutched at Nate, forcing his focus back to the roof and the steel rings enclosing their wrists, joining them. The weight of the man hanging on him, the muscles glistening with sweat, blood, and ink. One step to the left, the plummet.

Nate felt the grainy night take itself apart, pixel by pixel, and reconstitute itself. He thought about Janie’s body surrendering to him in the riptide. Wheeling her out of the maternity ward with that pink bundle in her lap. Cielle’s saving up at the car wash to try to pay for private school. His million-dollar life-insurance policy. Sitting on the bridge above that stream, his daughter’s head resting against his shoulder. Janie’s mouth at his collarbone, her ankles crossed at the small of his back. Their house with the loose brick of the front porch mortared into place again. The family portrait hidden in the depths of Cielle’s closet, waiting.

Pavlo held on with all his strength. He looked into Nate and must not have liked what he saw, for his grin ossified on his face, a skeletal grimace.

Nate tugged his wrist back, testing the strength of the handcuffs.

Then he gave the faintest of smiles.

WHAT WAS FOUND

Funny how fallin’ feels like flyin’

For a little while.

— Otis “Bad” Blake

Shevchenko, Pavlo Maksimovich

? — November 2

Overbay, Nathan John

AUGUST 10, 1976 — NOVEMBER 2

Nathan John Overbay died Friday of injuries sustained in a fall. On October 23, Nate played a heroic role in thwarting a robbery at the First Union Bank of Southern California, likely saving many lives in the process. The aftermath of that event found him targeted by the criminals behind the failed heist. A statement released by the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office credits Nate’s courageous actions with leading investigators to a cache of incriminating evidence that helped break up the criminal ring.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Nate attended UCLA on an ROTC scholarship before serving in the U.S. Army. Upon completion of military service, Nate became a Professional Crisis Responder with LAPD, where he was highly regarded by his colleagues for his empathy and commitment.

He is survived by his father, his loving wife, Jane, and his daughter, Cielle.

Epilogue

Morning light suffused the kitchen, bleaching the walls, buffing the counter to a high shine and lending the room a bright afterworld tint. Wearing the pressed blouse and plaid skirt of her private-school uniform, Cielle perched on one of the barstools, spooning oatmeal into her mouth and staring thoughtfully through the wide doorway into the living room. Above the mantel the old family portrait hung at a minor tilt. She and Janie had restored it to its rightful place the previous night in a quiet impromptu ceremony. There had been no words, just the two of them working in concert to balance on the stool, lift the heavy frame, and guide the hanging wire home.

Afterward they’d stood for a time gazing up, holding hands.

Now Cielle breathed the morning quiet and ate her breakfast. Her face was as pretty as ever, and full, though not as full as it had been.

Footfalls descended the stairs, and then Janie emerged, rubbing one eye with the heel of her hand and stifling a yawn. Passing behind Cielle, she gave her daughter’s neck an affectionate squeeze, and Cielle caught her hand and clasped it. Janie paused, followed Cielle’s stare across to the portrait, and they took a collective moment. The three of them preserved in a crisp photograph, cracking up, the frame still slightly askew.

Janie started up the coffeemaker, leaning over it on locked arms as it percolated, and then she filled her mug and sipped, her eyes wistful. Cielle finished her breakfast, washed the bowl in the sink, and they headed together for the garage. The door closed behind them.

A moment later it opened again.

Cielle came back in, crossed to the living room, and, lifting a solitary finger, straightened the family portrait. She studied it a moment, her features heavy with remembrance, and then a private memory flickered beneath the surface, firming her cheeks, bringing up an incipient smile. She jogged back out, lighter on her feet.

The door swung shut.

The sun lifted above the east-facing windows, softening the quality of light.

The house sat at peace.