Page 3 of Shatter

Flat and small, like a balloon.

Her window explodes. Glass sprays across her lap and into my face.

Mamma screams.

The wheel jerks out of her hands and we spin, headlights and black trees whipping past, until the ditch comes up sideways and slams us still.

Hissing. Something dripping.

Mamma is twisted around in her seat, reaching back for me with one hand.

The other one is pressed hard against her belly.

Red leaks out between her fingers.

"Espen. Espen, look at me." Her voice is wrong, high and thin. "Don't look down. Look at me."

I look down.

"Hey."

Cold fingers under my chin, turning my face.

The airport comes back. Mamma's crouched in front of me, her eyes wet.

"You're here," she says, and wipes my cheek with her thumb. It comes away shiny. "You're here with me. You're safe."

The lady in the blue scarf comes around the counter. She says it's time, in English, and then again in Norwegian when I don't move.

Mamma walks with us to the rope where the line starts.

She can't come past it. A man in a uniform points at her and shakes his head.

So she kneels, right there on the dirty floor, with people stepping around us.

She takes my face in both hands. Her palms are cold.

"Listen to me, Espen." She says my real name so soft I almost miss it. "You forget my face."

"No."

"You forget this name. You forget me." Her thumbs press under my eyes. "You go and grow up big and have a good life, and you never come back here. Promise me."

"I don't want to."

"I know." Her mouth shakes.

She kisses my forehead, hard, and holds it there. She smells like hospital soap, with her perfume underneath.

"Jeg elsker deg."

When she starts to stand, I grab her coat in both fists and hold on.

She has to peel my fingers off one at a time.

She cries the whole time, without making a sound.

Then she straightens, one hand on her stomach, and walks away.