Page 45 of The Shield
Owen jogged up, vest half-zipped, a coil of caution tape slung like a bandolier. “Tide’s in forty. Cones on East Bay. Public Works says the Huger siphon’s hiccuping. We’ve got volunteers at all three sandbag sites.”
“Push the map again,” I told Kimmy. “Use the hashtag. If they’re watching the kiss, they can watch the water rise. Caption it:Not unprecedented. Just poorly handled.”
She started typing.
The square in front of City Hall swelled and thinned like breathing. Volunteers in yellow slickers shuffled sawhorses. Tourists took photos and then decided to be useful and carried sandbags instead. The Public Information Officer hovered with his crew, ready to co-opt what he couldn’t control—camera pointed at my face like it had been born for it.
“Ms. Kennedy.” The interim council president’s voice arrived before he did, his umbrella spearing the air like a black flag. Robert Fitch had two aides flapping behind him with clipboards and wet hair.
I gave him a calm smile. “Council President.”
“What exactly do you think you’re doing?” he demanded, shoulders hunched against the rain. “You are not an elected official. You cannot commandeer communications.”
“Someone had to fill the void,” I said. “We’ve already moved twenty-seven cars just from the live stream. Ambulance corridor’s clear down Meeting because people listened. Do you want to tell them to stop?”
A ripple of laughter ran through the crowd. Butch made a small, proud harrumph under his umbrella without committing to applause.
Classic Granddaddy—cheering me on while pretending he wasn’t.
Fitch flushed. “You’d do well to remember Evelyn Hart.” He set his jaw like a man picking a scab. “This city just learned what happens when we trust the wrong woman.”
The old, cold thing under my sternum tried to rise. I kept my voice steady. “We learned what happens when we trust the wrongperson. If she’d been a man wired the same way, the same bribes, the same lies, the same disgrace.”
Someone shouted, “Tell ’em!” Another: “#CharlestonLoveStory!” A cheer broke quick and hot. The Public Information Officer’s camera panned to catch my face. My ponytail was soaked, my jaw was set, and I didn’t care.
Fitch bit down on words, then stalked off, muttering. His aides scuttled after like crabs.
Butch sidled in, umbrella tilted over both our shoulders, a fatherly move he’d used on me since I was ten. “You sure know how to pick your fights,” he said.
“Or they pick me.”
“You’re not wrong,” he allowed. Then, softer: “They’ll come for you harder than that.”
“Let them,” I said, and surprised myself with how simple it was. I was done shrinking to fit the size the room would allow.
The rain deepened to a velvet sheet. I stepped back to the ad hoc mic—a handheld fed into Kimmy’s phone, which was currently feeding half the city—and took a breath.
“You want to ask about the kiss?” I said, because the reporters were practically vibrating. “It was me living the same way I’m asking you to live: out loud, prepared, forward. I won’tapologize for who I love any more than I’ll apologize for telling you to move your car before it floods.”
A wave rolled through the square—claps, whistles, those little happy screams people make when a thing lands exactly where they wanted it. Phones shot higher. Comments stacked like bricks. The hashtag spiked again. Across the street, the chef with wet socks from earlier banged a metal pan like we’d scored a goal.
“Now,” I said, “here’s the checklist. Park higher, not closer. Clear the drain in front of your house. Don’t drive through standing water—if you can’t see the road lines, you can’t see the road. Sandbag sites here, here, and here. And we’re activating the Emergency Operations Center—functionally is fine, but officially is better.”
The Public Information Officer flinched like I’d tugged a thread on his suit, then nodded because the camera was on him.
“Not unprecedented,” I said again, steady. “But what we do next can be. We can handle it smarter.”
Kimmy’s voice in my ear: “You’re at seventy thousand views. Huck says the Emergency Operations Center’s lights are fully on. He sent a photo. I love you.”
“Love you back,” I murmured, then lifted my chin at a pair of teenagers who’d stopped nearby with skateboards. “You two. Want a job?”
They blinked like deer.
“You’re now Drain Crew,” I said. “Find every grate on this block. Clear it. Text us photos. We’ll Venmo you for pizza.”
They lit up like Christmas and bolted into the rain.
I walked the line, giving strangers verbs—move, lift, check, text, share—and each one snapped to like I’d flipped a switch under their ribs. Work was a drug. You could feel a city get cleaner on it.
