The Line

To say goodbye

Where there was life, there was death. And that meant a funeral.

All the bodies were buried within the town cemetery's heated perimeter--one of the few places where the ground was brown soil instead of a thick layer of ice with a thicker layer of snow on top--and all kinds of colorful flowers grew by the graves. Although Flynn often snuck in here, trying to forget the cold by watching buds bloom--even though he would sketch those buds, always throwing the drawings away shortly after completion--learning their names had never crossed his mind, not once.

Underneath a patch he couldn't name--the blue flowers were the prettiest, somehow delicate, somehow pure, a liquid blue, like the sky that ought to be--lay the grave.

"I need to," Flynn reminded himself.

He uprooted the plants, taking extra care not to damage anything, and buried their roots beside the plot, patting the dirt till it was smooth and even.

He dug his shovel into the soft grave.

***

Flynn lifted his aching head, banishing the memory; reality crashed with nearly as much violence as the unruly waves all around. Blinking quickly, he reacted by drawing breath and instantly regretted it: the air was salty, metallic, like his lungs were swallowing blood.

Despite the water-repellent jacket that covered his shoulders and torso, the dampness underneath it kept his teeth chattering--and his still-stinging arm poured hot oil into his veins. Despite that, the Weather Man deftly controlled the wheel, totally silent, totally unfazed.

The situation was so surreal.

///

"How long?" Flynn asked in a small voice.

"Not long," the Man said. "My boat isn't like the others." He added, "I've contacted Weiss. He'll be waiting at the dock."

Flynn nodded, slowly. After a long shiver and pause, he asked, "Did I ever tell you, Weather Man, why I thought I got sent here?" His voice was foreign; he heard himself say the words, but he hadn't thought them before they'd come out.

The Man said nothing.

Flynn went on anyway. Fast and unbridled, the words spilled out of his lips like some kind of rain. "Blue flowers. They picked blue flowers for the grave. I thought the flowers were the prettiest thing I'd ever seen. Really, I did. They were, too, but I didn't know that for sure until later."

"Whose grave?"

Flynn waited for the ring in his head to subside before he took a shallow breath and spoke again. "A friend. I tried to take back some of the keepsakes they left with his corpse."

"You dug him up?" For once the Weather Man seemed genuinely interested.

"I dug them all up, the ones who died early. The North Side isn't as big on technology as the South, you know. Medical care sometimes just consists in waiting for sick people to die." Flynn balled his fists so tight it hurt. "I had to dig them up, you see. To say goodbye. I couldn't say goodbye when everyone was watching. It felt wrong. And I needed to take something of theirs, to remember. I like to think that's normal. That I'm normal. But maybe I'm not." He sounded like he was chocking. He was. "Weiss picked me for the Retrials because of my... relationship with death. Because I understand it. That's what I think, at least. At least..." Another long pause. Flynn looked away from the water, burning a hole into the deck with the eyes he knew were sparkling. "At least."

"What happened to you, Flynn?" the Weather Man asked. "Why were you in the water?"

The hollow ring made Flynn vomit the answer. "Juan pushed me. He pushed me. I fell."

"Juan is gone."

More ringing. Flynn spoke louder, hoping to dull it. "I know. I know! There's a storm coming, you don't think I know?"

"Juan is gone," the Man repeated, with emphasis this time. "He tried to kill you when he pushed you. The pluggers will be going after him."