Page 70 of Nolan
For one prolonged moment, Apollo says nothing. Then I hear the weariness in his voice. “I’m sorry, Mia.”
My insides are instantly gripped by an invisible vise. “Sorry? Sorry for what? What’s happening?”
His voice cracks. “Nolan’s gone.”
“What do you mean?” I clutch my phone as my stomach drops.
I’ve never heard my brother cry. Not once. Not even a quivering voice. He’s always been the strong one, always smiling, laughing, never letting his guard down. But sorrow thickens his words.
“It got pretty bad out here. The boys and I were resting after our first shift out there, but Nolan went out with the rescue team, and . . . the pilot didn’t wait for him to load up. He was left behind.”
I shake. “Where is he now?”
“They tracked him down and picked him up, but he’s a husk. They’re sending him back BioNex. Dr. Taylor’s going to work on him, see if they can’t save him. But even if they do, he couldn’t back himself up in time.”
“So he’s not dead?” I ask, stricken. “He’ll—he’ll come back, he’ll be okay?”
Apollo is hesitant. “Yes and no. We had someone at the fire department comb through his last uploads from his memory banks to the department servers. I made an inquiry, asked if there’s anything . . . sensitive about you. But you weren’t in there. At all.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means even though they’ll be able to replace his body, they’ll only be able to restore what’s on company servers,” Apollo says somberly. “You have to understand he’s the first of his kind, and there’s no protocol or guarantee. There’s a chance Nolan might be the same old Nolan we know, but, Mia . . . he won’t remember meeting you.”
Tears spill down my cheeks as my brother confirms Nolan’s ultimate destruction. He won’t remember me? My heart is in agony. “Give me a second.” I put myself on mute and bow my head, rocking on my bed, unsure of what to say or do. All our messages, all our talks, our dates, our lovemaking, have literally gone up in flames.
A fire stole the man I love from me, and me from him.
My door creaks, and Jessica peers at me sorrowfully from the hallway. She’s been crying too. “Mia?”
I reach for her, and she crosses my room and hugs me tightly as I sob into her chest. She rocks me and caresses my head, squeezing me as tightly as she can. She speaks comforting words to me, but I can’t register them, too caught up in my grief.
I have to be strong. I try to stop weeping first. The point is, he’s going to come back. He’s going to be okay. That matters more than any memories of me. His life, his existence. My life isn’t over, and neither is his.
Putting Apollo on speaker phone, I implore him. “What can I do? Tell me what to do. I’ll get on a plane, I-I’ll come out.”
“No, don’t do that,” Apollo says. “What’s left of Nolan is being sent priority via plane to BioNex as we speak. They’re going to see if they can salvage anything, and study the rest to improve his next version, and other bionics too, I imagine.” He speaks so bitterly in this way, and I can’t blame him. We’ve lost someone we love, and it’s so—technical. So cold.
“I have to go,” Apollo says. In the background on his end, I hear a flurry of activity. “Bye, Mia.”
“Be safe,” I say desperately, more fearful for him now than ever without Nolan there to look out for him. “We can’t lose you too.”
“I will. Talk soon.”
My eyes sting with tears I haven’t shed and I fall quiet. Laolao enters the room and sits on my bed near Jessica. She says something to me in Chinese that I don’t understand and reaches for me. I rest my head on her lap.
Nolan, my Nolan, may be gone forever. And even if he isn’t, he’ll see me as a stranger.
There’s nothing anyone can say or do to comfort me. Laolao and Jessica do their best, and Jessica’s mother treats me like her own child. She stays with me the entire night, letting me rest my head on her lap, as she runs her fingers through my hair, whispering kind and loving words until I pass out.
“Please, Chief. I want to be there. I want to see him.”
When Apollo tells me several days later that what’s left of Nolan is on the way to BioNex, I couldn’t sit around and twiddle my thumbs. I went to the fire station.
I stand before Chief Bennigan in his office, wearing my best clothes and earrings. My hair is curled, my makeup is on. I stare at this large, intimidating man with a faintly reddened face and a slightly overgrown gut.
He squints at me from behind his desk, tapping the surface with his fingers. “The boys mentioned there might be a girl,” he says in quiet consternation. “But I didn’t think it’d be you, Miss Bennett.”
“When the plane lands and Nolan’s body is taken to BioNex,” I repeat, “I want to be there with him.”
