by G M Eppers
“Unannounced? What are the odds?” I said. But I moved my hand a bit to lift the curtain out of the way and peered out the window.
THE END
CURDS and WHEY
#4
The Caravane Connection
by G.M. Eppers
For Daniel, Michael, and Jason
Copyright © 2018 by G.M. Eppers
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof
may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever
without the express written permission of the publisher
except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2018
G.M. Eppers
2064 Douglas Ave.
Racine, WI 53402
(Usual Salutations)
Many politicians have run for president on a world peace platform. Peace is something every rational being desires, yet it’s often considered unrealistic. But the world is different now. Millions of deaths from the Offensive Obstruction Pandemic Sweep, or OOPS, has drawn survivors closer together. It is my firm belief that the potential for such peace is at hand. It begins with opening a dialog with countries and entities we never considered conversing with before. I invite all world leaders to contact us in the interest of peace. In addition, I want to speak with leaders of warring factions, rebel armies, and dissidents so we can address their needs as well. As soon as possible, I would like to arrange a massive peace summit in Bern, Switzerland to do just that. And by electing me, it seems you do, too.
My opponent said she wanted to hunt down Ima Badassi, leader of the largest terrorist organization known as The Dismemberers. She and many of my colleagues feel that Badassi must be hunted down and slaughtered like a rabid dog. I do not. I do want to hunt him down, but not to kill him. I very much want to talk to him. No one is talking now. In my opinion, that is where most of our problems lie. There is precious little talking, and even less listening. Peace begins with dialog. We have spent decades now, no, wasted decades, tens of thousands of lives, and trillions of dollars showing the world that we do not respect their beliefs, fully expecting them to respect ours in return. If that approach worked, we would have had world peace centuries ago. Instead, we had a worldwide epidemic of Offensive Obstruction that raged out of control because of uncooperative governments and petty disagreements. Clearly, it is time to admit that fighting and attacking accomplishes nothing. It says in our Constitution, the very first amendment and the documented reason our ancestors came here from Europe, that we as a people value and respect all religious beliefs, including no belief at all. But we are hypocrites, and I’m tired of it.
In my campaign, I promised to change that. I promised to uphold the core beliefs of our Constitution. I will call for respect for all religious beliefs not just on our own soil, but abroad as well, on the water, and in the air. We will talk. We will listen. We will solve our problems as adults and not as schoolyard bullies. America will set an example. We cannot beat tolerance into another country, but we can show them the abundant advantages of it in ours.
As promised, when I sit down to my desk tomorrow for my first full day in office, I will be declaring all American wars of aggression to be over. I will open dialogs with what can be referred to as rival nations and use diplomacy to work out our differences without bloodshed. I already have skilled diplomats, translators, and negotiators prepared to help me. Their records and qualifications are available on my website and open to full scrutiny.
Let’s work together. Let’s show the world what maturity means, what exceptionalism means. We can make peace, lasting peace, by embracing respect. And unlike my predecessors and my opponent, I will not say “God Bless America.” I do not presume that a supreme being –*
President Richard Dacto’s Inaugural Address
*At this point, President Dacto was shot and killed while standing on the west front of the Capitol Building. The presumed shooter, Amadi Obeseki, was found dead by his own hand on the observation level of the Washington Monument. No motive was ever determined and no known terrorist organizations claimed responsibility for the assassination.
Table of Contents
Day of the Durrus
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Nixing Day
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Yeaster
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Day of the Durrus
Chapter One
“So you’re going, right?”
“I wasn’t planning on it.” I poured myself a cup of coffee and sat at the kitchen table with Knobby. He is the caretaker of the house where I live with my fellow CURDS teammates. CURDS is a quasi-military organization within the CDC which scours the globe trying to eradicate Uber cheese, which is cheese with an addictive substance added to the rennet. It causes Offensive Obstruction, a pandemic which swept the world about a decade ago, killing millions. It’s known as the big OOPS. The rest of my team is currently on their way back from Australia. I’ve been homebound due to an injury acquired in Italy and compounded in northern Minnesota. I spent a quiet Christmas here with Knobby, who had also been injured when his knees dislocated. He doesn’t have kneecaps, so it didn’t take much. But he had recovered weeks ago while my broken ribs kept me out of action much longer.
When I was eight or nine, our neighbors had a small but neglected apple orchard, ten or twelve trees in two rows. The ground was constantly littered with wormy apples from this year and rotted apples from last year, but I enjoyed going there anyway and climbing the trees. I didn’t climb them to get apples. I climbed them for the same reason George Mallory climbed Mount Everest: because they were there. Being short all my life, I quickly gained an affinity for being up high and looking down on the rest of the world the way I always assumed the rest of the world looked down on me. Even at that age, I was familiar with the caveat when it came to climbing: don’t look down. But no one had told me not to look up. I remember standing on a nice thick branch, confident that it wouldn’t crack, balancing with one hand on the trunk, and looking up at the sky. I knew it would make my stomach do flip flops. I wanted those flip flops. I thought they were cool. But I lost my balance and fell out of the tree, breaking my left arm. That was the last time I’d broken any bones, and it seemed to me that it healed pretty quickly, unlike my ribs, which took forever. I was eight or nine and not forty-mumble years old, but it still seems unfair.
In the meantime, my team fought Uber in Utah, Venezuela, Greenland (didn’t mind missing that one at all), and finally Australia, led by my son Billings in my absence.
“But you always go, at least if you’re in town,” said Knobby, taking a toast triangle and buttering it. He looked at his watch. “Hope they get back before I have to leave. I’m supposed to water the plants and feed the gerbil at HQC.” There are two other houses, in Virginia and Maryland, housing teams B and C. My team’s house, HQA, is in Washington D.C., putting all three in close proximity. Knobby takes care of all of them, driving from one to the other in his bright orange Prius. It is mid-January now, and a light dusting of snow speckles the ground.
“Have they even landed yet?”
“She’s going to expect you, you know. You don’t want to disappoint the President.” Knobby ignored my question completely. “And the team won’t want to be there without you, either.”
I’ve known Knobby since the whole Uber thing started. His wife was dying across the hall when my Dad was dying of obstruction before Uber even had a name. But I’d gotten to know him even better while I’d been confined. Well, not confined exactly. It wasn’t like I couldn’t go anywhere I liked, j
ust not on a mission. I just had to get recertified by our medical officer, Tyrone Nathaniel Thackery, known to us as Nitro. Our backyard consists of a battery of equipment to keep us in top form whenever we were home and I’d been braving the cold for a couple of weeks, since Nitro gave me the all clear just before they left for Australia, and making use of it. As Captain Farragut said, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. I had started to get worried when I could feel my back fat moving whenever I walked. This would have been after our third trip to Red Lobster the day after Christmas. Some people drown their sorrows in alcohol. I prefer to drown mine in melted butter. But in this job, you can’t have back fat. And after a couple weeks of progressive workouts I felt better and I knew I could pass, but I was still anxious to get it done and official. It had been a much more difficult road than I’d originally thought. “I don’t have anything to wear,” I said.
“It’s not formal. Wear what you usually wear.”
“It’s not formal for the public,” I specified. “I’d be there representing CURDS and it would be tacky to show up in jeans.” I love jeans. I have 50 pairs of jeans. If I could find denim underwear I would probably buy it. Today I was wearing my stonewashed jeans with fleur de lis on the back pockets, a green T-shirt with “Seriously?” on the front, and my tan Skechers. Knobby was wearing a red and white button-down flannel shirt and brown carpenter pants. “I have one fancy dress and I just wore it when I was there for Christmas. I can’t wear it again this soon.”
“You’re rationalizing,” said Knobby, sipping his coffee. “I’ve seen Roxy wear the same dress four days in a row. It’s all about accessorizing. And having a dry cleaner within walking distance.” Roxy, our legal counsel, liked fancy dresses as much as I like jeans. She dressed like she was going to a cotillion every day.
“I’m not Roxy. I don’t have accessories. Besides, I simply don’t want to go. It’s not like I’m going to eat it. I’m not interested.”
Knobby gave in. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry I said anything. You want to help me sort the mail?”
“Sure.”
Knobby went to the front closet and retrieved a cardboard box stuffed with mail. Some boxes, several magazines, gobs of sales fliers, and envelopes of all sizes. I cleared the lunch dishes off the table and we began to sort piles for each team member. The routine on returning home was always to immediately process the mail. We didn’t have time sensitive stuff normally, what with paying bills online from anywhere in the world, but people had missed important personal letters from time to time, or turned up a magazine months out of date because they’d put it off, so we all agreed to save ourselves from each other and just do it. Soon there were 8 neat piles around the perimeter of the circular table. Normally there would be a pile for me, too, but of course I was taking care of mine on a daily basis as long as I was home. It kind of made me feel left out. Maybe next time I’m grounded I’ll try to save some mail. Better yet, I was going to try hard not to get grounded again.
It was really hard staying behind. I didn’t know what was happening. Billings texted me from time to time, and I’d gotten holiday greetings from all of them, but no amount of detail would make up for not being there with them. And every text or call that came in scared the hell out of me that I would be hearing bad news. My teammates were my best friends and every minute away was a minute one or more of them could be seriously hurt. When they came home between missions it was a weight lifting off my shoulders. I thought I worried about them a lot when I was with them, but that was nothing compared to being separated. It was motivation to get myself back to fighting form so this would be the last mission I’d have to sit out. That’s why I’d spent a couple of hours every day in the yard, going through my paces in 30 degree weather.
I’m not only coordinator, but I’m also the oldest one on the team and, to be honest, I was starting to feel it. The physical qualifications I had to achieve seemed to take more effort than they had in the past. I could still do them, which gave me a good deal of satisfaction, but, mostly in the back of my mind, I was starting to wonder how much longer I could. A little closer to the front of my mind, I hoped that any effort I made to avoid another serious injury wouldn’t be a problem on a mission. Taking a personal risk was beginning to feel foolhardy. I couldn’t let my team see my doubts, though. I wouldn’t let my team see my doubts.
My phone vibrated in my pocket. It was a text from Billings that they had landed safely at JFK and were heading home. “They’re on the way!” I said, relieved and excited. “If the plants and gerbil can last another half an hour, you can help me greet them.”
“Maybe the gerbil ate the plants and I don’t have to go at all,” he said playfully.
“If only you had trained the gerbil to text you,” I replied. We adjourned to the living room and I turned on the TV, a giant 75-inch OLED that filled most of one wall and faced a U-shaped arrangement of mismatched couches. I flipped channels aimlessly for a while, then tossed the remote to Knobby. “You pick. I can’t focus.” I resisted the urge to pace and mutter “Where ARE they?” under my breath. They get here when they get here, I told myself.
My phone buzzed in my pocket again. I pulled it out and looked at the number, expecting Billings to be telling me there was some kind of delay. It was my mother, who lives alone in Springfield, Illinois, since my father died in the initial stages of the OOPS. I pushed the button to accept the call. “Hi, Mom!”
“Hey, Helena. It’s me, Butte.”
“Hold on a minute.”
My stomach turned to cement. Butte is my ex-husband. I couldn’t think of many reasons why he would be at my mother’s using her phone, but none of them were good. I stood up and covered the microphone with one hand. “Knobby, I’m going to take this in my room.” He nodded at me and began flipping channels on the remote. As I climbed the stairs, my guts churning, I spoke calmly into the phone, “Butte, what are you doing at my mother’s? Is she okay?”
“She’s fine, Helena. She’s just kind of upset.”
“Upset? What is she so upset about that she can’t talk to me?”
“It’s about your father.”
I nearly dropped the phone right there in the hallway. My father has been dead for more than ten years. I picked up my pace and hurried into my room, closing the door behind me. I sat on the bed and leaned against the headboard. “What about Dad?”
“They’re exhuming him.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It means they’re digging him up.”
“I know what exhume means! What’s going on?” I wanted to reach through the phone and strangle him. This is probably why he’s my ex-husband. He didn’t cheat on me. He didn’t beat me. He was just irritating as hell.
“Okay, so you remember that President Dacto is buried here, right?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Well, you might not have heard that his brother Reggie recently passed away. Alzheimer’s, I think. Anyway, when they dug his grave they found,” he paused, then blurted, “they found a body was already there. Now, the Dacto series of plots is right near your family’s plots and the police want to excavate everyone within three or 4 rows to see if they can find any more bodies.”
“It’s a cemetery, Butte. Give her a shovel and Helen Keller could find bodies.”
“You know what I mean. Unauthorized bodies. They’ve already dug up some people on the other side and found two more.”
“Have they been identified?”
“Not yet. At least, not that’s been released to the public. But two officers came to the house and had your mother sign a release to allow them to exhume and disinter your father.”
“When? What time?”
“They break ground tomorrow morning at 8. My plan is take her to brunch to keep her mind off of it.”
“Thank you, Butte. Can I talk to her?”
There was a pause. “She’s crocheting. I think it’s a couch cozy.”
In the background, I heard my mother say loudly, “Afghan, dear.
It’s an afghan.”
“Put her on the phone, Butte.”
I waited while Butte cajoled my mother into taking the call. “Hello, Sweetheart,” came her quiet voice. “It’s an afghan for Billings’ wedding present. Don’t tell him. And of course it’s huge. It will have to be extra wide to fit across three people and extra long because it’s Billings.” My son, Billings, who was leading the team in my absence, is over six feet tall and engaged to marry Avis, another member of the team. Avis, however, is really attached to her sister, Agnes. As in, permanently attached. They are conjoined twins. “As for the thing with your father, it’s just awful!”
“It’ll be all right, Mom. It’s just procedure. They aren’t going to disturb him or anything. When they finish they’ll put him back where he was. Don’t worry.”
“That’s what the officers said, but, I don’t know. I just can’t bear the thought of him lying there with all those dead people!” She made that sound that goes with an involuntary shudder. “This would kill him! It’s scandalous, Helena. That’s what it is. It’ll be in the paper tomorrow, then all my neighbors will know, and the crochet club, and the Bingo Buddies. Oh, dear! I can’t face them!”
“Give the phone back to Butte, Mom.”
After a moment, Butte came back on. “I thought you should know.”
“Thanks for calling, Butte.” It was way more thoughtful than he usually was. Mom probably insisted. “Did she call you? Why aren’t you here in D.C. protesting?”
“Why would I protest that? Thousands of people will get to eat all the cheese they want. That’s exactly what WHEY supports. It shouldn’t be such a todo at all. Why aren’t YOU protesting instead of endangering thousands of lives?”