“Fear is a bird,” Tortora replied. “It lands. I don’t invite it inside.”
She still didn’t believe in flight. But for the first time, she thought maybe a thing didn’t have to be soft to be worth staying for.
She looked at him. The salt wind had carved lines around his eyes, but they were still kind. For the first time in years, Tortora felt something other than truth and duty. She felt the small, dangerous flutter of wanting. tortora
Tortora pulled her hand free. “The fever ran its course. I just kept people alive long enough for that to happen.”
“That’s the same thing.”
Weeks later, a package appeared on her doorstep: a wooden box, no note. Inside lay a small carving—a dove, wings half-open, its body rough and unfinished. But the eyes. The carver had given it knowing eyes, the kind that had seen fever and salt and a woman who refused to call herself good.
“You saved us,” he said.
She shook her head. “A dove doesn’t save the storm. It just rides it out.”