So I know Amy gets all of three seconds of screentime in the show, but I've been planning a (different) AU for a couple of years where she features prominently, and then suddenly she's a main character in my head. I'd say send help, but I love her too much to have regrets.
If you're like me and enjoy having music associated with characters/fics, you should definitely check out The Dirt Whispered by Rise Against for Amy and this fic.
This fic is super, super self-indulgent, but I really hope you all like it anyway!
Amy Dylandy is sure her life has never been so unfair.
She's up early, dressed in her school uniform, while Neil and Lyle are still fast asleep. Their high school has an in-service today, so they get the day off; her middle school, on the other hand, is in session. On her birthday, of all days, and she has failed in begging a free day off from her parents many times in the last week. She deserves a day off too, she argues. It's her birthday—she shouldn't be the only one who has to go to school! Even her dad, who usually works long hours at the hospital, has gotten the day off to celebrate once she's home from school.
It's not fair, but no matter what she says her mother refuses to let her skip school—so she's sitting at the kitchen table, pouting, with her backpack at her feet and a half-eaten breakfast before her. Her mother smiles sympathetically as she pours herself a mug of coffee, sitting across from her.
"It's a Friday," she says, and Amy grunts. "Once I pick you up from school, we'll come home and open presents, all right? I'll make lasagna for dinner, and I think your dad said something about triple chocolate cake…"
She hesitates, slightly mollified at the mention of her favorite dinner and favorite dessert, but—"It's not fair," she mutters. "Why don't Lyle and Neil have to go to school?"
"You'll be able to see your friends, too," her mother says, and doesn't answer the question—after all, they both know Amy knows the answer. "You'll be home before you know it, I promise! And there will be plenty of days you get off that Neil and Lyle need to go to school."
She grunts again, scuffing the toe of her shoe against the table leg as she glances up to her mum. She looks tired, but eager to make her feel better—and Amy frowns for a moment longer before huffing, shoving a forkful of eggs into her mouth. "Promise?" she says, and her mum quirks an eyebrow. "That we'll do presents as soon as we get home."
She laughs into her mug, her eyes squinting a bit in humor as she nods to Amy. "I promise."
.
.
School that morning is…well, school, and Amy isn't terribly enthused about any of it, despite the birthday wishes she gets from her friends. Many of them are planning to come over tomorrow night for a small party, promised by her dad ("Eleven's a big year!" he said with a grin, ruffling her hair the way she hates before she left this morning), and she's certainly looking forward to that, but…school is school. By the time she steps out of her mum's car, waving goodbye and rolling her eyes as she blows her a kiss from the driver's seat, Amy's ready to be done with today.
After lunch, she's even more eager to be home—and struggles to pay attention in class and take notes as she should. She's usually a good student, and after lunch she even has her most interesting classes—history, science, and technology—but she's impatient, ready to start celebrating her birthday properly.
She's distracted, but not too distracted to notice the shift in her teachers' moods. She writes off Mr. Simpson's pale face and red eyes as a cold, though it's clear something is bothering him, as he wipes at his eyes several times during class. But when both Mrs. Chatham and Mrs. Buford look similarly out of sorts and distracted, pulling out their phones the moment the bell rings, she starts to worry if something's wrong.
She's not the only one, it seems; as she meets her friend Anna by her locker, her face is pinched in worry, too, and she asks Amy if she knows what's going on.
"No idea," she says, but is gratified to hear that she's not the only one. "I'll ask Dad when we get home, he'll probably know."
Anna makes a noise of agreement, throwing the last of her books into her bag before walking up with Amy to the front of school. She usually spends an hour or so in the after-school program, as both her parents work—and so Amy gives her a hug before parting ways, walking alone toward the roundabout in front of school, expecting to see her mum's minivan ready and waiting to take her home.
It isn't there.
She frowns, doing another once-over of the cars lined up and waiting, but she's certain her mum's isn't here. Rather upset, she plants herself on a bench, crossing her arms and waiting for her mother to show up.
A few of her friends are still waiting, too, and join her, grumbling and wondering what the problem is. It's a Friday, after all—and their parents are always good about showing up on time. Amy's mum, especially, needs to be a couple miles away soon after to pick up her brothers—and is notoriously punctual, cutting short any conversation Amy might be having to ensure she's on time retrieving Neil and Lyle.
But her mum isn't here, and as the minutes stretch on, her frustration starts to turn into worry and honest distress. It's her birthday, and everyone promised to start celebrating as soon as she came home! Her friends, still waiting on their own parents, promise her that they've just lost track of time, or are planning a surprise for her that's taking longer than intended.
Their parents, when they ultimately show up, offer a more practical answer: traffic is awful, and an entire city block a couple miles away has been walled off by the military. None of them say why (though that same worry Amy saw on her teachers' faces is mirrored here), and as her friends slowly get picked up and she is left alone, she finds herself rubbing tears from her eyes, huddled on the bench by herself.
A few minutes after her friend Jimmy is picked up (leaving her with a long, tight hug, promising to see her tomorrow and that his present for her would make up for the wait), one of the women from the front office comes out to find her. "Amy," she calls tentatively, and she turns, wondering whether her parents have called the office to say they're very sorry that they're late but they're on their way right now. "Would you like to wait in the cafeteria for your parents? I can let them know where you are, once they get here."
"Mum said she'd be here as soon as school got out," she says, wiping again at her eyes. "It's my birthday, we're supposed to be celebrating…"
The woman's face falls (she knows Amy's mum well, with all of the volunteering she tends to do for school functions), but she reaches out a hand to help her up. "I'm sure she'll be here soon," she says kindly, "but wouldn't you prefer to wait inside? I'll come and get you as soon as she shows up, I promise."
Amy hesitates before taking her hand, readjusting her backpack straps and following her inside to the cafeteria. She sees Anna nearby and walks quickly toward her, again wiping tears from her eyes. She's being silly, she knows, but her mum promised, and she's starting to get scared; she's never been this late before.
"Amy?" Anna says as she walks up, blinking at her in surprise. "Why're you still here?"
"Mum hasn't shown up yet," she says quietly, dropping into the seat opposite her. She doesn't want to pull out her own homework, because she's sure her mum will be here any second—so she just crosses her arms on the table and rests her head on them. "I dunno where she is."
Anna's face falls in concern, and she pushes her own homework away to lean toward Amy. "I bet they're planning a surprise," she says, though she sounds more hopeful than sure. "I mean, your mum's really good about being on time, right?"
"Yeah," she says, even more quietly. "But it's been almost an hour, she shouldn't…"
Anna frowns, worry obvious on her face, but can't seem to find anything to say to that. The two of them sit in silence for several minutes longer; Anna eventually pulls her homework forward again, but Amy finds her hands shaking too much to even think about doing the same. She only sits, staring blankly at the tabletop, and waits for her mum to come and tell her that everything's all right.
.
.
Half an hour later, Anna's mum arrives to pick her up, and the after-school program is closing, and Amy has never been so scared in all her life.
"Amy?" Mrs. Holmes looks exhausted, like she usually does, but she's surprised to see her there. "Have you heard from your parents?"
"No," she says, and this time can't keep up with the tears falling down her face. Mrs. Holmes' frown deepens, and she promises to be right back, hurrying back toward the front office.
Only a couple minutes later she returns, looking extremely worried but nodding to Amy. "You can come home with us, if you want," she says. "We can call your parents from there, too. I'm sure everything's fine…"
She trails off, frowning at nothing for a moment—but just as quickly, it's gone, and Amy does not care enough to ask what it means. "Okay," she says tentatively. Mrs. Holmes and her mum are good friends, after all, and she and Anna spend a lot of time at each other's houses. She doesn't think she'll get in trouble for going home with them when she doesn't have any other choice.
Mrs. Holmes seems relieved by this, smiles at her though there is something on her face that Amy cannot make out, and leads them out to her car.
Amy scarcely notices the car ride home, staring out the window listlessly as Anna and her mom talk. There's a huge plume of smoke a couple blocks away, and she frowns at it, wondering what might have caused it. She asks Mrs. Holmes, cutting off their conversation abruptly, and she glances that way, obviously worried as she hesitates to answer.
"There was…some sort of explosion at the mall, according to the news," she says, and Amy's stomach flips. An explosion? Their city has always been quiet, and Amy has never worried about even biking by herself to the corner store. Something so violent has never even crossed her mind. "The military is saying it's contained, but they're diverting traffic quite a ways out."
Amy makes a noise but doesn't respond, and Mrs. Holmes looks at her with concern in the rear-view mirror—but she says nothing more about it, and the rest of the drive to their house is spent in silence.
Mr. Holmes arrives home about the same time with Anna's younger siblings, but Amy avoids them all and heads straight for the landline in the kitchen, pulling it from the wall and dialing her mother's phone number from memory.
Mrs. Holmes comes up beside her as she listens to it ring, and Amy waits impatiently, her stomach twisting as she waits to hear why her mother completely forgot to pick her up from school. On her birthday, no less, and she feels justified in her anger—
But her mother's phone rings to voicemail, and Amy listens to the recording rather numbly before hanging up, staring at the phone for a moment before slowly punching in her dad's number, instead. He's always really good about answering his phone—a habit of being on call for the hospital, he says—and so surely…
But her father doesn't pick up either—and Neil and Lyle are similarly ignoring her, their phones ringing one after the other to voicemail. By the time she hangs up after trying her mother's phone again, the tears are falling thick down her cheeks—and most of Anna's family is crowded nearby, clearly worried.
"Do you have phone numbers for anyone else in your family?" Mrs. Holmes asks gently, putting a hand on Amy's shoulder that she scarcely notices. "Your Aunt Kathryn lives in town too, right?"
"Yeah," she says, very quietly, and reaches for her backpack, dumped unceremoniously at her feet, to find her emergency contact sheet. A few moments later she's dialed Aunt Kathryn's number, holding the phone close to hear ear with both shaking hands, trying to contain her sobs.
The line connects after two rings, and she cannot keep a high-pitched sob from escaping her throat.
"Hello?" And yes, that's her aunt's voice, hoarse and worried, and Amy needs to swallow a couple of times before she's able to respond.
"Aunt Kathryn?"
"Amy?" She sounds relieved—desperately relieved—and Amy frowns despite her tears, wondering what's going on. "Are you with your parents and brothers?"
"No…" she says slowly. "Mum—she didn't pick me up from school, and I had to go home with my friend Anna because everything closed down, and…"
She trails off, sobbing into her sweater sleeve, and hears Aunt Kathryn breathing slowly on the other end of the phone. "You were at school today?" her aunt asks, and Amy nods, even though she can't see her. "Do you know where your family is?"
"No," she says, anger suddenly flaring, because it's her birthday and Mum promised—she promised—that they would have lasagna and cake tonight but now they aren't answering their phones, and they forgot to pick her up at school, and—"Mum promised we'd celebrate my birthday but I don't know where she is, and—and…"
What composure she might have left crumbles away, and Amy finds herself hysterical, leaning against the kitchen counter as she sobs. Mrs. Holmes steps toward her, concern on her face and in her voice though Amy cannot decipher the words she's saying, and she knows she's being ridiculous—she's eleven, now, and needs to start acting like it—but she has not seen her parents since this morning and her brothers since last night, and she wanted to celebrate her birthday, that's all she wanted, but now—
"Amy," Aunt Kathryn says loudly into her ear, and Amy tries to settle herself, tries to listen, because maybe her aunt—"I'm sorry, I'm just—everything's all right. How about you spend the night at Anna's house, and—and we'll come pick you up in the morning?"
"No!" She knows she sounds like a child, but—"Mum said we would have lasagna and cake tonight, and Lyle promised we could play video games, and—"
"Amy," Aunt Kathryn cuts her off, and Amy blinks, because her aunt never interrupts her like that. "Are Anna's parents there? Can I talk to them for a second?"
Her voice cracks, and Amy frowns, but Aunt Kathryn is starting to scare her; she holds the phone out to Mrs. Holmes wordlessly, and she frowns down at her in serious concern before taking the phone, glancing to the crowd around her before disappearing across the house. Amy watches her go, wishing desperately that she knew what was going on.
Anna is standing nearby, her arms crossed tightly across her chest as she stares in worry at Amy. Mr. Holmes hesitates before corralling Anna's younger siblings with promises of a board game, pulling their prying eyes away from a still-hysterical Amy. She appreciates it but at the same time doesn't want to be alone—and when Anna hesitantly suggests they go sit on the couch instead, she accepts in an instant, grasping her friend's hand tightly when she offers it.
They sit in silence for a couple of minutes before Mrs. Holmes reappears; her eyes are a little red, and her hands are shaking as she holds the phone before her. "Amy," she says, and tries very hard to keep her voice level though Amy can see through it easily, "your aunt says you need to stay here tonight. We can make you lasagna and a cake, if you want, but—she said she won't be able to pick you up until the morning."
"Why's she picking me up?" she demands. "Where are Mum and Dad?"
Mrs. Holmes doesn't say anything for a moment, is breathing steadily through her nose as she stares a little past Amy and Anna. "Everything's all right," she says after a moment, looking back to them, though her tone says otherwise. "Your aunt just—it would really help her, if you stayed here. I'm sorry, I know it's not how you wanted your birthday to go, but I'm sure everyone will make it up to you this weekend, right?"
Amy wants to argue—this is unfair, and she thinks she has a right to know where her parents and brothers are. But she also recognizes that Mrs. Holmes is very upset, and it was obvious that Aunt Kathryn was distressed, on the phone. And even if Amy's upset too, Mrs. Holmes looks on the verge of tears—and she's a full-grown adult. She knows it takes more to make adults cry, and this is just worrisome enough to give her pause.
Her mum always tells her to do right by other people, and if her staying the night will make Mrs. Holmes feel better, she will do so.
"All right," she says, slowly, and Mrs. Holmes swallows thickly and smiles at her, stepping to engulf both her and Amy in a hug before disappearing into the kitchen.
.
.
They do have lasagna for dinner that night (though it's not nearly as good as Dad's), and Mr. Holmes goes out to buy her a chocolate cake, and Anna gives her the present she was meant to get at her birthday party. It's an okay night, but it's her birthday, and she does not know where her family is—and she's up early the next morning, wearing borrowed clothes from Anna as she waits impatiently for Aunt Kathryn to pick her up.
Mrs. Holmes is sitting at the kitchen table with her phone in hand, a mug cooling on the table. She jumps badly when Amy greets her, stowing her phone away as she approaches. It doesn't look like she's slept at all, tonight, and despite her own worry, Amy frowns as she sits opposite her, dropping her backpack by her feet. "Is everything okay?" she asks tentatively. "I—uh, thank you, for my birthday last night. It was really nice."
Because it was—and Anna's parents went out of their way to ensure it, even when she's not their daughter, even when they had no warning that they needed to celebrate. "It wasn't a problem at all," Mrs. Holmes says, smiling tentatively at her though her eyes seem unusually bright. "I know it wasn't what you wanted, but I'm sure everything will be cleared up soon."
"What's going on?" she asks (she hopes not too harshly), because she is scared, and she misses her parents and her brothers, and after everything that happened yesterday, she thinks she should be told what's happened. But Mrs. Holmes only shakes her head and grips her mug a little tighter.
"I'm not sure, hun. Your aunt didn't seem to know, either—but I'm sure everything will be straightened out today. You don't need to worry."
"I miss Mum and Dad," she mutters, looking at the tabletop. "And Lyle and Neil. Are they gonna be back today?"
Mrs. Holmes looks up sharply at her, staring for a few seconds before looking again into her mug. "I'm sure they will be," she says quietly.
.
.
The doorbell rings an hour or so later, and Amy is up like a shot, rushing to the door to answer it. Maybe it's her aunt; even better, maybe it's her parents, full of apologies and love and ready to celebrate her birthday—a day late, but right now, she will forgive them even this if it means she can see them again. Mrs. Holmes stands, following quickly behind her, but Amy is the one to swing the door open without even looking at the security cam, and—
It's Aunt Kathryn, which she should be glad for, because she will finally have answers as to what happened yesterday. But she's a little disappointed that her mum and dad aren't here too—and Aunt Kathryn watches her deflate with something like despair on her face.
"Amy, we should go," she says, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder, and she blinks up at her, wondering what the rush is. "Thank you for watching her," she says to Mrs. Holmes, behind Amy, and she turns to see her standing there, her arms crossed close over her chest and her eyes far too bright.
"It was no trouble," Mrs. Holmes says. "If—if you need anything else, please, let us know."
"Thank you," Aunt Kathryn says, and then guides Amy gently out the door to her car, parked in the driveway. Amy, still a little confused and clutching her backpack by one strap, turns to wave at Mrs. Holmes, who has one hand covering her mouth as she turns away, not seeing Amy's farewell at all. Amy frowns at her as she closes the door, as her aunt points her to the backseat of the car. "What's going on?" she demands, as soon as they're buckled in and heading down the street. "Where are Mum and Dad?"
Aunt Kathryn does not answer immediately, though what Amy can see of her is tense, scared, so much like Mrs. Holmes has been since last night. "I'll explain once we get back to my house," she says, and Amy frowns.
"We're not going to our house? Why not?" There is something wrong, here—something like a secret the adults are keeping from her, something they don't want her to know. And all she knows right now is that they're keeping her away from her parents, and she won't let that stand. She won't—
"It's just a temporary thing," Aunt Kathryn says, and the words are reassuring, but her tone is anything but. "I said, I'll explain once we're back."
Amy is scared but Aunt Kathryn's tone does not allow room for argument; she only hunches in on herself a little more, still clutching her backpack's strap, and tries to figure out what's going on. She desperately wants to ask where her family is, but Aunt Kathryn made it clear she doesn't want to talk right now. Her vision starts to blur with tears and she tries to blink them away—reaching up with a shaking hand to wipe at her eyes when that fails. Aunt Kathryn glances to her in the mirror, her brow furrowed in worry, but she says nothing else until they pull into her driveway, several minutes later.
"We're home," Aunt Kathryn calls into the house as she unlocks the front door, and Amy's cousin Teresa—a few years older than Neil and Lyle—appears from the living room, her eyes red and puffy as she stares between her mother and Amy.
"What's wrong?" Amy asks her, worried, and Teresa swallows before glancing to her mum.
"Why don't we go sit in the living room," Aunt Kathryn suggests, her voice quiet, and Teresa nods clumsily, staring at Amy for a moment longer before turning and leading the way. Amy follows behind, dropping her backpack absentmindedly by the coffee table, and sits close to her cousin on the couch, still wondering why she's so upset. Asking again probably won't do anything to help, though, so Amy sits quietly and waits for her aunt to say something.
"Amy," Aunt Kathryn starts after several moments of silence, and she looks up at her expectantly. "There was—an explosion, at the mall yesterday afternoon."
"I know, Mrs. Holmes said," she says, vaguely upset by the fact that the mall will probably be closed for a while to repair the damage—she was going to ask to go shopping this weekend with her birthday money. But, after all, she's glad that her aunt seems willing to get her up to speed. "What happened? Was anyone hurt?"
Teresa sobs beside her, and Amy spares her a concerned glance before returning her attention to Aunt Kathryn. "Yes," she says, very quietly. "A lot of people were hurt."
Amy blinks, uncertainty and dread filling her gut as she watches her aunt's hands wring themselves dry, as she listens to her cousin try to stifle her sobs. "What…happened?" she asks after a moment, suddenly starting to wonder if the small, contained explosion she's envisioning isn't correct after all.
"The military says it's too early to say," she says. "It could have been a gas leak, but it…it also could have been a bomb."
Amy's mind spins around this idea, unable to land on it properly, because—a bomb, here in their hometown? The place her parents always prided on being peaceful and kind? "What?" she asks, and it comes out more as a rasp than anything else.
"The explosion leveled most of the building," Aunt Kathryn says, her voice just as low. "There were a lot of people inside, and the military says they're still getting life signs, but a lot of people—were killed, by the blast."
The horror pooling in her gut is rising, and Amy feels suddenly nauseous as she starts to understand what her aunt is trying to tell her. "Why would…"
She is horrified by this but at the same time realizes there is something missing, and it has to do with her cousin's abject misery, with her impromptu birthday at a friend's house because her parents never picked her up from school. "We're not sure of anything yet, but—Amy." Here, her voice cracks, and she needs to wipe at her face before she can continue. "Yesterday, did your parents say anything about going to the mall?"
.
.
Aunt Kathryn and Teresa try and keep her away from the news, every television and radio and online broadcast—local and national and even international—that's been discussing the explosion since the moment it happened. But even if Amy doesn't have her own phone, she nicks Teresa's old tablet that never gets used, charges it up, and against even her own better judgment, starts searching for news related to the incident.
Other member countries of the AEU have promised aid and intelligence work to determine whether it was a deliberate attack or an unfortunate accident. The president has come down from Dublin, giving some inspiring speech that Amy has no interest in listening to. The military has been working non-stop, day and night, with dogs and machines to try and find survivors and—and identify bodies.
There have been a lot of them, she knows, even though she does not have the stomach to read the details. There is a list of nearly 400 missing, compiled by the public that weekend, and Amy checks it compulsively, scrolling down to see her entire family listed neatly among complete strangers.
All 400 of them can't be dead, she tries to reassure herself—she's sure her family is just…just trapped, like the important military man said many were, waiting patiently for the government to rescue them. And then they will come home and hug her and assure her that everything will be all right—because the explosion wasn't a bomb at all (as many tacticians seem to suspect) but just an awful accident, and even if the death toll has been rising steadily all weekend, they are all right, perfectly fine, and—
But Aunt Kathryn told her how none of them are answering their phones, and how their house is locked up but clearly empty, and Amy realizes that they must have gone to the mall together but that doesn't mean—can't mean—
School is in session on Monday but Aunt Kathryn tells her she doesn't need to go. It's just as well, she decides. She heard her aunt talking quietly to someone on the phone—Mrs. Holmes, she thought—on Saturday morning, asking her to tell the rest of Amy's friends that her birthday party needs to be cancelled. She's sure her friends will be worried—even more so when she does not come to school—but she spends a lot of her time this weekend trying (and failing) not to cry, and school sounds utterly overwhelming.
The death toll continues to rise; it's approaching 100 by Monday afternoon, and the list of the missing still contains almost 250 names. She's lying in bed, curled on her side and staring listlessly at the tablet, trying to decide whether getting up to get some food is worth the effort, when BREAKING NEWS flashes across the top of the screen. She blinks and hesitantly taps it, wondering whether this is about the explosion, and her breathing stutters as she reads the headline.
"Terrorist group KPSA claims responsibility for massive bombing in Waterford," it tells her—and nothing else, thus far, and it's just as well because Amy wouldn't have been able to read it anyway. A terrorist group—this was a deliberate attack, not a gas leak or some awful accident. All those people (not her family) were killed by terrorists, and—
Her scream chokes into sobs, as she shoves the tablet off Aunt Kathryn's guest bed, as she shoves her face into a pillow. Why would people do this to each other? Who would look at a peaceful, happy city and decide it needed to be blown up with a bomb?
Aunt Kathryn refused to drive her by the mall, even when they eventually go back to her house to at least grab some extra clothes and her favorite stuffed animals—even after the surrounding streets were deemed safe and traffic resumed. But she found pictures easily enough in the news articles, and it's true—there is nothing left of the mall she used to love visiting. And her parents and brothers were (are) in that collapsed building, and it has been three days since the bombing, and—
And she is only eleven but she is not stupid, and she knows that three days in a collapsed mall is a long time, especially if you're hurt. Aunt Kathryn has tried to stay optimistic for her, but she can see the distress on her face easily (and on Teresa's, as she doesn't bother to go to school either), and—and she is not stupid, but they are her parents and her brothers and so they cannot be dead—
.
.
Except that they are, and Amy's world falls to pieces the next evening when her aunt answers the door to two solemn-faced military men.
Amy's in the living room but follows her aunt out to the front hall when the doorbell rings. Aunt Kathryn frowns at her, as if meaning to send her back, but Amy stands her ground, her shaking fists at her sides, and her aunt eventually sighs, only moving to open the door.
Amy gasps as the porch light illuminates the men, their sharp blue uniforms in contrast with their pale, exhausted faces. "Kathryn O'Brien?" the older one asks formally, as Amy looks on.
Her aunt swears under her breath, glancing to Amy again before turning back to the soldiers. "What do you want?" she asks, maybe a little harshly, but neither of them seem to mind.
"I'm very sorry to have to tell you this," the man says, glancing to Amy as well with a little frown, "but we have positively identified four bodies from the wreckage of the mall as your sister, her husband, and her two sons. The AEU—"
The man keeps talking; Amy can see his mouth move, can see Aunt Kathryn crumple beside her, but—this man means nothing to her; his words mean nothing; and she desperately wants to slam the door in his face and block out what he's saying. As if—as if that'll do anything to change the truth.
"I don't want your money," Aunt Kathryn snarls, breaking through Amy's muddled thoughts, and when she looks up, she realizes her aunt is holding onto the doorframe for support. She's—mum is dead. She's dead, even though she promised they'd celebrate her birthday as soon as she got home from school, and blew her a kiss at drop-off even though Amy scoffed, and—
Her mum is dead, and her dad is dead, and Neil and Lyle and oh God—
"If there's nothing else, leave," Aunt Kathryn says harshly, making to close the door in their faces. The younger man takes a tentative step forward, glancing, unsure, to Amy, and through her blurring vision she sees for the first time the cardboard box he carries in his arms.
"Are you Amelia?" he asks, his tone a little softer, and Amy does not even have the presence of mind to correct him. No one, not even her parents when she's in trouble, calls her by her full name, and—
And they're not going to call her by any name again because—
"She is," Aunt Kathryn snaps, stepping in front of her, putting a hand on her shoulder. "If you would excuse us—"
"We—the military—we thought you might want to have this," he says, much less formal than his superior, and glances to him as if for permission before holding the box out to Amy. "One of your brothers—he was holding it."
Amy blinks at the box, uncomprehending, and Aunt Kathryn eventually takes it, lifting the lid and looking inside briefly before all but slamming the lid shut. "We appreciate it," she says haltingly, stepping away from the door, pulling Amy by the shoulder. "Now leave."
The older officer inclines his head, and then Aunt Kathryn shuts the door in their faces, standing in the front hall for several seconds and looking down at the box in her hands. She takes a few unsteady steps toward the living room before changing direction quickly, disappearing into her bedroom down the hall.
Amy stares blankly after her, not even considering following or making her own way to the living room, until Aunt Kathryn returns—and stops when she sees Amy exactly where she left her. She hesitates before her face crumples, closing the distance between them and pulling Amy into a crushing hug.
It's several seconds before Amy finds the strength to return the hug, and several seconds longer before she realizes she's crying.
.
.
Amy returns to school a couple of weeks later, and returns to her parents' house to move her things to Aunt Kathryn's and help sort through her family's, but she doesn't start living again for quite a long time after.
The first time she re-enters her old house, after the funerals, she's sick on the carpeted floor; the second time, she can't help with any of the cleaning up because she's hysterical, lying on Neil's bed and sobbing into his pillow. All of his things—his comic books, laptop, even the airsoft guns locked in his closet—are useless now, just like Lyle's video games and movie posters and—
And her brothers are gone because a terrorist group decided to kill them and she still does not understand why. The internet has provided her only limited information on the KPSA—that they are a guerrilla group from Krugis (and she had to look up what Krugis was, too, because she'd never heard of it) that has claimed responsibility for several attacks in eastern Europe and Azadistan already. But none of those attacks were nearly as large as the one on Waterford—and she begins to wonder viciously whether the military didn't take them seriously, because of it.
She's hysterical, refuses to talk to Aunt Kathryn or Teresa or any of her other family who have come from out of town to help with the house. Teresa still has a mother, and all the rest of her cousins have siblings and parents, and she is the only one who has lost everything and—and—
And she thinks sometimes that this might be unfair, because her mum was Aunt Kathryn's sister and Neil and Lyle were Teresa's cousins but they were her family, and she knows she is justified in her anger and grief as she has to be pulled from Neil's room when they leave to grab dinner.
Her aunt asks her if there's anything she'd like to keep, because they can sell the house furnished and donate many items to charity (and the idea of other people living in their house, using her family's things, rubs raw the wounds that have not had a chance to heal), and in a fit of selfishness and fury she says she wants all of Neil's guns and comic books, and all of Lyle's video games and CDs, and both of their laptops because contained within them are all of her brothers' photos—of their family, of a time when they were still alive.
Something like worry passes over her aunt's face as she considers the small collection of airsoft guns that Neil left behind, but apparently decides not to deny her this—only saying they're going to stay locked up in the basement except when—or if—she decides to take lessons. That's fine. As long as Neil's prized possessions aren't sold off to someone who wouldn't appreciate them, wouldn't realize exactly who their owner was and what kind of a person he used to be—
Aunt Kathryn curses over the TV in the back room for hours, too, trying to set up their video game systems correctly, and when she's done Amy can't bring herself to play them. Maybe she will, someday, but her favorite racing games are boring without Lyle to play them with, and Neil's favored shooters are all but unplayable at the level he left them at, and—
And she wants her family back, except that they are gone, and no matter how Aunt Kathryn sets up their guest room to mimic hers back home, it will never be the same because—
Because her mother will never come to kiss her good night, and her father will never swing her around with his strong arms when he comes home from work, and Neil will never go along with her hare-brained scheme of the week, and Lyle will never come home late from a friend's and offer that half-apologetic smile—
What was the last thing she said to any of them? It's scarcely been two months, now, and she cannot remember—she thinks it must have been "good night" to her brothers, a throwaway phrase that she cannot let go now because it might have been the last words her brothers ever said to her, in turn. And her mother—she must have told her to have a good day, but she cannot remember because she was only half-listening, already moping about spending the day at school when her family—
She clutches to photographs and videos because some mornings she cannot remember the way her father's voice sounded, and some nightmares block out their faces because she cannot remember, and most of these end with her family being blown apart by some awful person, a terrorist with no respect for her or their family and what he was tearing away. Her nightmares continue for weeks and months after the bombing, for weeks and months after she learns to keep quiet so as not to wake her worried cousin and exhausted aunt. She knows they mean well but she does not want to see a psychiatrist; she does not want to go to support groups or talk about it.
She wants her family back, and even though she knows it is impossible, she finds she cannot bring herself to care.
.
.
A few months after, when everything has calmed down and Amy has settled into some semblance of a rhythm in this new house, Aunt Kathryn approaches her, a worn cardboard box held in her hands. "The military brought this," she starts carefully, and Amy remembers suddenly why it seems familiar. The only thing they could offer her of her family, of—"I…I'm not sure, but I think they must have bought it for you."
Amy blinks as Aunt Kathryn holds the box out to her, and takes it silently, her shaking fingers fumbling the lid a couple of times before she manages to lift it. Inside is a teddy bear—it might have been brown, once, but most of its fur has been burned away, and she can tell that it has been sewn together again manually, probably by her aunt. It was damaged, of course it was, if it—was found in the mall, if one of her brothers was—
She sobs, one hand flying to cover her mouth, and in doing so her grip on the box topples, and the bear is spilled onto the floor. Aunt Kathryn makes a concerned noise, taking a step toward her, but Amy leans down and pulls the bear from the floor, holding it in her free hand, staring at its mismatched eyes.
Neither of her brothers would ever buy a bear for themselves, so it must have been meant for her—a birthday present bought last-minute, maybe, and—
And if they hadn't wanted to buy her a present then they never would have been at the mall in the first place, and they would be—they would still be—
"Amy," Aunt Kathryn starts carefully, and as she looks up at her she knows her aunt has long come to the same conclusion. "It's all right if you don't want it right now, but I just thought—"
"No," she says, suddenly, and holds the bear a little tighter to her chest, and does not let it out of her sight for the rest of the night.
.
.
Aunt Kathryn cries when Amy quits dance, three months after the bombing.
She's been step-dancing since she was very small, continuing long after her brothers quit; she's always enjoyed the rhythm and exhilaration of it, dancing with some of her closest friends, the dresses and riotous hairstyles her mother always loved helping her with.
But her mother is no longer here to style her hair, and her brothers and father are no longer in the crowd to cheer her on. Her group's year-end performance is something they've been practicing for months, and Aunt Kathryn drives her to every rehearsal in the lead-up to the show, but she finds that despite working with the same people, the same instructors, the same everything, she doesn't care.
She doesn't care, and though the show promises all of its proceeds to victims of the bombing and sells out, raising far more donation money than they ever dreamed of, Amy can barely force herself to dance. She forces herself to try and ignore the empty spots on the stage where half a dozen of her friends are still in the hospital—to try and stop looking for faces in the crowd before her that she will never find.
They earn a standing ovation, when the last stomp fades into silence and they raise their hands into the air, and though Amy knows she should be smiling at a show well-done, she cannot bring her lips to curl up, and the tears have not stopped falling down her face the entire time they've been on stage.
She tells Aunt Kathryn and Teresa she's quitting on the car ride home, and her aunt cries, tries to talk her out of it—but she doesn't think she has ever been so sure of something in all her life. Teresa argues, too, saying she should keep up with her hobbies, and it's what her brothers would have wanted for her—
And Amy stops her there, because how dare she try to speak for Neil and Lyle—how dare—
"Amy," Aunt Kathryn says sharply, as Teresa shrinks back, looking hurt, "just think about this for a few days, all right?"
Amy frowns, wipes at a few more stray tears on her cheeks, and eventually nods—but when she approaches her aunt three days later and says she doesn't want to dance anymore, her aunt's face twists in distress. She doesn't argue, only promises to call her instructor and tell him of her decision, and Amy almost feels remorse, listening to her aunt sob as she walks away.
.
.
The next week, she decides to cut off her hair, and asks her aunt if she can join the shooting classes that Neil and Lyle attended a few years before.
She's been growing her hair out for about a year, from the short bob she used to keep it in, but it's grown unruly—and, after all, with no performances to style it for and no mother to do the styling, she doesn't want to deal with it. It's heavy and thick, and pulling it back reminds her of the way her brothers used to pull on her ponytails, and it'll be easier just to have it short and easy to deal with. And, if she decides she hates it, a haircut isn't permanent…not like a death is.
Aunt Kathryn cries again, and the hairdresser—a woman who's cut her family's hair since before Amy was born—stares hard at her as she repeats her request. But she does not argue, and only looks at the pictures Amy has brought in, suggesting which pixie cut she thinks would look best on her.
Amy trusts her judgment, is glad she's not going to argue the point, and walks out of the salon feeling freer than she has since her birthday.
But when she brings up Neil's airsoft guns, Aunt Kathryn finally puts her foot down. "Amy, I'm worried about you," she says, not quite harshly, but Amy frowns at her. "You're—I understand that you need to grieve in your own way, but going shooting—"
"Like Neil and Lyle used to do," she says. "I want to do it for them."
"At the expense of dancing?" she asks, her face twisting. "You've always loved dancing—why would you—?"
"Can I go shooting or not?" she cuts her off sharply, and Aunt Kathryn's jaw clicks shut as she stares down at her.
"Give it some time, Amy," she says, her voice a little quieter. "You're still—I don't think you're thinking straight. You don't need to do something just because your brothers did."
"I don't," Amy agrees. "I want to."
.
.
When she first walks into the range, the attendant looks at her askance, even after her aunt follows behind her. "I want to start lessons," she leads with, and the man's brows rise higher.
"You'll need parental permission," he says dubiously, because even for an eleven year old, she is small and slight, and she knows she looks younger than she is. But Neil and Lyle both started shooting when they were twelve—and she knows she will not be barred from it for her age.
"I'm her guardian," Aunt Kathryn says, stepping forward for the paperwork, and Amy sees the tightness around her eyes but does not comment.
The attendant watches as she signs all the consent forms before turning his attention to Amy, looking her up and down. "You're kinda young to be shooting," he offers after a moment, and Amy bristles.
"My brothers started when they were twelve," she says, and he blinks. "I'm eleven—that's close enough."
He considers this before shrugging, accepting the paperwork and glancing over it. "Dylandy?" he says, surprised, glancing up to Amy as if in a new light. "Neil and Lyle your brothers?"
It's only been four months, and Amy knows her grief isn't going to just disappear—but this man obviously recognizes the name well enough to remember them both, even a year after they quit shooting. The pang is unexpected and painful. "Yeah," she says, a little quieter, and sees the man blink at her, unsure.
"They were—in the mall," Aunt Kathryn tells him quietly, and though Amy does not look up at him, she can hear his sharp inhale. "With their parents."
"Oh," he says, and his voice is a little hoarse. "I'm—I'm sorry."
They sign her up for weekly lessons, and Amy explains quietly that she still has Neil's guns, so they won't have to rent or buy any more. The attendant—his nametag calls him Michael—offers to set her up with the same instructor that her brothers had, and she agrees. Even Lyle had admitted that she was an excellent teacher, and the few times Amy had seen her at competition or tagging along to pick them up from practice, she had been very kind.
They're set up quickly for Monday evenings, and Amy leaves the range with her aunt, wiping at her eyes in a way she hopes is inconspicuous. "I think Neil would have loved to shoot with you," Aunt Kathryn says quietly, once they're in the car, and Amy looks up. "He and Lyle—they both loved spending time with you. To see you taking up their old hobby…"
She trails off, her hands tight on the wheel though she hasn't yet started the car. "I don't mean to be hard on you," she continues, "about dance, and your hair. I just—I want you to be happy."
"I'm not," she says, quietly, and is sure she never will be again—not when everything has been taken from her.
"That's all right," Aunt Kathryn says, just as quietly, and turns to look at her, in the backseat. "You don't have to be, right now. But—you'll find a new normal, and I think you'll be okay. Teresa and I, and everyone else, we're here if you need us, right?"
"Yeah," she whispers, curling in on herself—because she'd like to think her aunt is right, but…
Aunt Kathryn hesitates a moment longer before smiling, exhaustion clear on her face though she seems sincere, and reaches to pat her shoulder gently before turning around to start the car.