Erick
I knew something was wrong the very moment my mother called me that night.
Elise Blackthorn was many things, unyielding, poised, iron-willed but fragile was never one of them.
Yet her voice over the phone had held a quiver, small and nearly undetectable, but it was there and I heard it.
A crack under too much weight.
“Erick, dear,” she had said, soft yet strained, “I will be coming to Smallville tomorrow. Maybe I could be of help…”
I’d paused mid-step, frozen in the middle of the street.
Even with the crickets chirping and lamplights flickering, all I could hear was the echo of fear I pretended not to recognize.
“Mother?” I asked slowly. “Are you alright?”
“I am,” she replied too quickly. “Just… rest, Erick. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She hung up. Just like that.
And for th
