Opening scene from my new WIP
Chapter One.
“… A month since the near devastating attack on Washington D.C. Residents in and around the capital have been arriving for the commemoration event today outside the White House.”
Bruce Paulson flicked through the channels. The coverage was pretty much the same on all networks. It seemed that the question on everyone’s lips was the same one that Bruce had been asking himself for the last month.
Where was Captain Hart?
Of course, Bruce knew the American superhero merely as Leo Hart, the trans man with whom he’d shared an apartment in Arlington since they’d finished college.
Bruce tried to remember when he’d realised it was more strange finding out that his roommate spent nights patrolling the Washington metropolitan area after being bit by an escaped dog from a medical research facility than that Carrie—Leo—was doing so as a guy.
It felt like Bruce was somehow betraying Leo’s memory to remember him as anything other than his chosen gender.
It also felt like Bruce was betraying Leo when he stumbled across phrases like ‘Leo’s memory’ in his mind.
Bruce had no more idea than the rest of Washington or America what had happened to Captain Hart after the Battle of Washington. Leo had never returned home. Bruce tried calling his phone as the footage began to be televised. Non-surprisingly, the calls had gone to voicemail. Bruce, with the rest of America, had been glued to his television as the space ship soared through the city like a flying tortoise. The internet filled up with YouTube clips of the alien space ship from the ground. Like them, Bruce had been desperate for a resolution that would not end in the destruction of the White House.
In the days afterwards, when Leo still didn’t return, Bruce tried sending him emails.
I know you’re probably hiding out after everything that went down. Bruce tried to sound understanding about something he had no idea how to understand. But if you need a friend… I’m here.
He agonised over the wording in his emails, not wanting to send something that came across as scared or needy when Leo had literally gone through hell for the sake of America. He’d done what no one else could have done when he shut off the power core that had connected the ship to the rest of its species. Scientists employed by the American government had apparently been able to confirm that the co-ordinates of their little planet Earth hadn’t been sent to the rest of the alien species before Captain Hart had disabled it. There would be no future attacks.
Hopefully.
That was the other hard part of the Battle of Washington. It had shown human kind how behind they were in terms of space travel and technology.
Bruce could hardly stand to watch the news feeds online and on TV in the aftermath of the Battle. He’d only turned the television on tonight to try to feel some connection to the roommate who had suddenly become one of the most known faces in America today.
It wasn’t working. Bruce clicked the television remote one more time. The TV turned off.
