Birth of a Revolution

Marrow's body was an honest one. Thick, muscular thighs from her morning runs held up a soft stomach, courtesy of a midnight nacho habit. Like most women in her neighborhood, she made the chips herself.

It was her nightly ritual, cutting the tortillas into triangles and frying them up in whatever fat she had available. It was usually coconut oil. She always kept homemade salsa in the little refrigerator that sat underneath her sink. She was lucky - tomatoes and cilantro both grew reliably in her windowsill garden.

That small refrigerator was also where she kept the locket. Marrow smiled to herself, remembering the phrase "frozen assets" from her father's time. Of course, freezers in homes were rare these days. Modern refrigerators were the size of a shoebox. They looked nothing like the ones in old magazines. She and her sister Dael used to marvel at them in her grandma's yellowing collection of Better Homes & Gardens. They looked almost like small closets - closets for food. 

Marrow cringed to think of the wanton energy consumption of her great-grandparents' generation. Even light bulbs were used sparingly now.

They just didn't know any better, she reminded herself. It was a different time.

Dael would lose herself in the verdant images. "I would have loved to see real holiday lights," she'd once gushed. "Imagine, Marrow, driving down the street, greens and reds and whites and golds and blues...all so bright against the night sky." She had twirled as she said this, brown hair bouncing and gangly limbs spinning through the smoky air.

Dael was always spinning.

Marrow had scolded her, but secretly agreed. Dael could say things like that. She could dream. She could faint. She could fall behind. Dael could admit to being squeamish at the sight of blood, knowing her big sister would do the dirty work. Marrow could stitch a cut, birth a baby, and set a broken bone before lunch time. 

Nobody in their middle class neighborhood could afford a hospital membership. Instead, they came to Marrow. That's how she made a living.

It's also how she got the locket.

She was known for doing meticulous work. Her patients almost never suffered infection, and her diabetics lasted longer than most.

"Her face is stern," she'd overheard a neighbor say, "but her stitches are flawless." 

The nearest hospital had approached her several years ago. They'd heard rumors of her skill and wanted to offer Marrow a nursing job. With modern medicine, their patients - the wealthiest of the wealthy - were living well into their hundreds.

Marrow thought about it. The pay wasn't much, but she would have access to their care at half the regular membership fee.

Ultimately, though, even that was too much. She turned down the job.

Besides, the hospital was almost two hours away. She couldn't leave her hometown now - not with Dael's stomach growing larger every day. 

Marrow suspected it was Dael's pregnancy that had inspired Cadence to  give her the locket.

"Bring it to the hospital," she'd said, "and ask for Dr. Kenton Blair. Tell him it was your mother's - that her name was Marigold Oren." She pressed the locket firmly into Marrow's hand, leaving a white outline on her flushed skin. It was heart shaped and smooth, rendered from silver that had long since tarnished.

Marrow had never dared to open it.

"It will only work once," she emphasized. "He might be angry when he finds out you lied. Get the care you need and leave." Marrow had nodded, speechless. 

She wondered why Cadence didn't keep it for herself. She was so young, only a year older than Dael. Cadence had a voice to match her name and a good career teaching music to wealthy children.

Deep down, though, she knew. Cadence's full cheeks, thick ginger bob, and smattering of freckles made her look younger and healthier than she really was. Her shaky hands and bloodshot eyes betrayed her, though. Cadence suffered from the same disease that had killed her mother at twenty-six. 

Even with consistent care and a hospital membership, Cadence wouldn't make it past forty. 

Marrow and Dael, on the other hand, each had a full life ahead.

Dael, with her round, firm stomach, had two. 

That's why Marrow's blood ran cold when her sister came to her door that day, a trickle of blood on the inside of her thigh.

It looked like lightning.

Marrow gasped. Dael cried out in pain or fear or both. Marrow told Fisk, Dael's husband, to stay behind. She could not bring both him and the locket. That would be too great a risk.

Fisk nodded wordlessly. His face had gone ghost white. Tears streamed down his cheeks.

Pregnancies were plentiful in their neighborhood. A healthy birth was much harder to come by. Fisk took Dael's face between his palms, and tried to memorize it...just in case.

After a harrowing ride, Marrow helped Dael stumble to the front desk. The perky brunette attendant smiled widely.

"A birth! How exciting!" Her straight, white teeth and bright lipstick made Marrow feel uneasy. Before she could blink, Dael was in a wheelchair, being pushed toward the elevator by a broad shouldered young man. The lady at the front desk still had her eyes locked on Marrow.

"Card?"

"We, um, forgot it in all the excitement."

"Of course." She smiled warmly. "Do you have her serial number?"

"I, um...no." Marrow squared her shoulders in a false show of confidence. "She's actually a transfer, and her paperwork isn't in yet. Dr. Kenton Blair has all her information."

The receptionist's eyes narrowed as she punched in some numbers. She gestured gracefully to the waiting area. Marrow obliged with relief.

Pretend you belong here, she urged herself.

Marrow sat still, trying not to vomit.

A man with round cheeks and a shock of ginger hair entered the waiting room. Marrow stood and extended her hand.

Her lower lip was trembling when she handed Dr. Blair the locket. She willed it to stop, biting down until she tasted blood.

"Her mother, Marigold, told me to give this to you. She said you'd take good care of her."

With a sharp intake of breath, Kenton Blair brought his hand to his mouth. Then, he looked deep into Marrow's eyes. He pretended to believe this sweet, desperate young woman. It was the only way to relate to her with dignity.

The lie could be the thing that saved him, after all. Doctors helped secret love children, mistresses, angry bookies, and other indiscretions all the time. The administration looked the other way. 

To give treatment for free, though...and to a stranger?

That would have ended Kenton's career.

When her baby was born healthy, Dael wept.

"Name her Marigold," Kenton pleaded, "after your mother." He lowered his eyes. "Rest her soul."

He watched the girls leave three days later, their treasure pressed to Dael's chest. He never checked up on them. 

Decades later, though, as Kenton watched Marigold on tv - giving speeches, winning debates, inciting riots - he liked to think he had played a small part in the revolution.