They lie there wrapped in one another's arms. The cocoon of two people and a variety of blankets is warm and protected. The rain patters on the ceiling of the farmhouse and down the hall their children are sleeping.
Tomorrow, Henry will think it odd that the boy has looked into his classroom mid-lecture twice. It's too late in the semester for a student to not know which room houses their intended class.
Tomorrow, Elizabeth will hear the rapid popping noises. She will already be pushing furniture by the time her students realize that there's no reason for fireworks.
Henry will open his classroom window on the first floor and instruct his students to run, and to not stop running until they make it off campus or are instructed to do otherwise by police.
Elizabeth will finish barricading her door with the help of the wide-eyed children she is meant to be teaching, and she will think of her own children safe at their middle, elementary, and pre schools. She will think of her husband, and as she ushers her students into a less visible corner, she will suddenly not be able to remember where he teaches his 9am. She will viscerally pray that it is not Pfeiffer Hall.
Henry will think of their children, too, but as people begin rushing down stairwells, screaming, crying, he will think only of his wife. His wife, and the international relations course she teaches at 10am two floors up, in Pfeiffer 301.
A colleague will catch him by the arms as he tries to go upstream, upstairs, against the stampede. He's up there, you can't go up there.
My wife— he will try, but the man is pulling him into an office with too many other people, door locking behind them.
Bess will be okay. You have to stay here.
I have to get to her, he'll exclaim, looking at Mike Barnow in disbelief.
Are you crazy? the man will reply. You two've got kids, Henry. What would Bess want you to do?
Henry will think of the mother and father-in-law that he never got to meet, and though everything in him strains for Elizabeth he will allow himself to be pulled to the floor.
He will snap his cell open and call the number he knows by heart. There will be no answer. He will listen to the sirens getting closer and the gunshots above him and the stifled cries of his colleagues and he will pray.
Elizabeth will silence her cellphone so as not to attract any attention to the room.
Dr. McCord, what do we do? a student will whisper frantically, tears in her eyes.
She will put a finger to her lips and push one last chair against the pile of furniture. This is all she can do for them. When the door handle rattles viciously and the screaming, the shooting, gets louder, she will clamp one hand over her mouth just in case.
Open the door the voice will demand, and she will put her free arm out across the students behind her as if they might comply. The kids (because they are kids, all of them) cry out when the first bullets strike the opposite wall. She will think that this might be it. Please be okay, Henry, please be safe. I love you I love you I love you, her stream of consciousness will whisper.
When the order comes to evacuate, she will usher her students out first. In the hallway, Elizabeth will check pulses. There will be none.
Outside, she will put her hands on her head and abandon her heels to run across the green as the authorities instruct. The helicopters, news channels and police, will be whirring overhead, and people will be crying, screaming, and her heart will be in a racing two-beat of Henry, Henry, Henry. She will not see him anywhere. His office is on the first floor of Pfeiffer, but he was teaching a class at 9. Where was his class? She should know, does know, but she cannot remember and this one fact likely determines if her husband is—
He will not be able to spot her anywhere. He will think, for a split second, that he sees a flash of her blonde hair, but it's the glint of the sun. He will think of breaking away from the authorities and running back, searching for her everywhere. Mike will push him forward with the rest of the crowd. If she's been shot she'll be with the medics. Keep moving.
If she's been shot, he will think suddenly, she could easily be dead in her lecture hall. He will turn and retch onto the burning concrete, bracing himself with clammy palms on his knees. SWAT will yell for him to put his hands back up as they pass through yet another checkpoint, and he will use the opportunity to bring his phone back to his ear. Across the green, he fixes his eyes on the tree under which he and his wife had picnicked as undergrads.
You've reached Elizabeth McCord, please leave a message he will hear her say, voice bright and to the point and vividly alive.
They will eventually be allowed to slow from their jog, lower their hands.
If you're looking for someone a frazzled looking woman standing on the back of an ambulance with a clipboard will yell line up and give me your name and their name and settle in for a long wait. If you're injured, please proceed to triage.
My name is Henry McCord, he will whisper as he suddenly becomes aware of how he's shaking, I'm looking for my wife, Elizabeth McCord. She's—she would've been teaching on the third floor of Pfeiffer Hall. He will ignore the look of pity she offers him when he says the building's name.
I'll let you know if she comes looking.
Tomorrow, they will literally collide in triage. Their hands will skim over clothes and faces and the only words they will be able to form are one another's names. In the chaos they will not let go, bound up together with two tight grips as medics and officers swarm around them, ignoring them as it becomes evident that the blood on Elizabeth's hands does not belong to either one.
The authorities will interview them both.
They will pick up their children from school and answer frantic messages from her brother and his family as they watch the news.
They will attend the funerals of colleagues and students alike. They will attend the candlelight vigil on the green where they had their second date. Aside from that, they will not leave the house, choosing instead to cocoon again in their bed, their children in the blankets with them.
In ten years, Elizabeth will snap at the Governor of Texas on live television.
"I think I speak for the entire state of Texas when I say that it's mighty important to us that our guns be protected under our Second Amendment right," he will drawl, smiling falsely.
"Well, Governor, I think I speak for most everyone who has survived the terror of a mass shooting in this country as I have when I say that our children deserve to receive their educations without the threat of assault rifles in elementary schools and on college campuses."
That will be the first time either of them speak about it publicly.
"Babe," Henry will whisper one night five years after that as they're curled up in bed together in the White House, "how would you feel about my First Gentleman initiative being more highly regulated gun control?"
Her grip on him tightens, and that is answer enough.
But all of that is for the next two decades and tomorrow. For now, Henry and Elizabeth McCord lie in their bed in the farmhouse and listen to the rain.
