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CHAPTER 200: One Year
publish date:
2026-08-18 21:57:16POV: Avalon Pierce
It was Selene’s wish on the Foundation’s second birthday - this Saturday, no fanfare: no party, no media, simply those who had built it in the very room where it had all begun. Now the corner office was an entirely different space. More furnishings.
An actual couch situated near the window.
Maya’s visual language bloomed on each of the four walls in its fully realised, alive expression, yet the whiteboard looked much the same as it had ever done, and even in that, even newness, Nene's mark of their own had been preserved in the corner. Kevin Walsh had arrived with his mother and discoursed uninterrupted for a significant twenty minutes. Gloria Reyes attended with her daughter Esperanza, her movements somewhat impaired by her advancing years, yet she insisted on standing resolute in front of the board bearing the name of the land trust that was affixed to the wall; from which she pressed her finger with considerable earnestness to each parcel of land as if it was being injected into her own person.
Amara, standing with the remains of a drink in her hand, meandered beside the whiteboard, assessing and absorbing every facet of the room’s new arrangement with her characteristic proficiency.
“Two years,” James said, his breath touching the hair at the back of Avalon’s head. “Yes, two years,” Avalon acknowledged. “Longer than that, I feel,” James amended.
“Shorter than that, I feel,” Avalon rejoined. Already, in the distance within the space, Selene chatted with Elena at her hip and the person of Patricia Ruiz, whilst Maya stood somewhat detached, her hand resting upon the beginnings of what was soon to protrude outwards from the center of her abdomen with Kofi looming protectively adjacent to the soon to be expanding belly with both of them gazing devotedly at Selene as though she was part of some pantheon. Avalon ambled to her side.
Selene uplifted her gaze as he entered.
“You’re putting on The Face again,” she stated.
“What face?” he inquired. “You’re preparing yourself to make sentimental utterances.”
“ I shall utter absolutely no sentimentalities.”
“Ah, but you always do.”
“ Nene would adore this!” he exclaimed. “That says all there is to say.”
Selene’s perambulations concluded as her focus fell on her surroundings. “ She undoubtedly would have found reason to take us to task for a time or two,” she conceded.
“Indeed, without question, “ he affirmed.
Elena, quite suddenly, lunged forward and grasped a fistful of his shirt-another instance of the numerous body parts he was in the process of adapting to the new sensation, much in the manner in which his entire personage was. She was drawing in to him deliberately, with full intent, and while his gaze met hers down at the height of her eyes, so did he comprehend the sheer totality of this immense feeling of completeness that permeated him; of being truly all-encompassed.
His phone’s alert tones emanated from his hip pocket. For one spectacular instant, he allowed it to signal; entertained the thought for a fleeting moment.
Yet Selene witnessed this hesitance.
“What is it?” she enquired, her vocal pitch solidifying into a more level and authoritative key as he perceived the weight of the phone as he drew it forth from his person, only to discover a message displaying a sender designation as David Kim’s workplace that bore the subject line: Sentencing update- Daniel Reyes/Jonathan Reeves. He hadn't the vaguest intention of ever hearing any such news today - let alone at this moment; not now, not in this particular area where all of his victories to this moment lay spread out before his eyes like a glittering carpet.
“What?” Selene repeated. He pressed a key and opened the email to find himself reading its first few words that subsequently broke down his otherwise steely demeanour.
“ Avalon,” Selene uttered.
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