The organizer read the crossed-out entry a second time, and Kellan stopped her before she reached the total.
“Crossed out because they arrived, or because they left your group?”
“Left. Her sister’s shelter sent someone.”
“Which way?”
She put her pencil on the map, searched for a mark that no longer existed on its current copy, and swore softly. They had redrawn the approach after the surge. The family had gone before that. Kellan brought the older sheet alongside it. A door, a water point, the narrow part of a wall: three things a person could remember without needing the street to retain its shape.
The family appeared on the receiving liaison’s separate list. Two adults and their child. Accounted for. The organizer drew a line between the entries rather than erasing either.
The next added household had arrived with the convoy. The children at the reinforced wall had not.
Tessa’s broken message lay beside Kellan’s hand, written as the radio operator had heard it. Wall. Two adults. Ankle needs support. Marker moved. After that, an unfinished description of the approach. The operator had left the unfinished sentence unfinished.
