“That would be nice, if it were true,” Sean said, producing an imitation of a reassuring and reasonable tone, “and maybe there were days when the toll was higher, but it doesn’t work like that. Statistics are not that clear. They go up and down from day to day and it doesn’t mean anything.”
“I wrote down every number for the last three weeks.” Zac’s voice was a little shaky.
“Zac! You’ve been taking the phone every day?” All this time she had been trying to firewall him, he had been methodically informing himself.
“Just look.” Zac darted into the dark and was back seconds later. “See.” He held out his math notebook, open at a roughly drawn graph. The book shook but the candlelight shone in his eyes. In them, she saw the look of power that he had when he was two years old and learned that he could change the world with a simple word like “no.”
“You have to find a line of best fit, even if the points go all over the page, and they do a bit. There are a couple of dots from last week that kind of mess it up, but the thing is, you don’t look at them. Look, it went up and here, it peaked on that day that had twenty thousand.” He looked distressed—whether from the number or the memory of breaking the phone, she couldn’t tell. “And then it started coming down. And this one here, the curve for new cases, is almost exactly the same, just shifted and bigger.” He smiled. “They’re bell curves. Kind of. Well, they look like they’re supposed to be bell curves, but in real life nothing is exactly like that. But that doesn’t matter because they’re coming down.” Zac smiled at her again.
The world had changed. He had changed it with information and thought.
Sean took the notebook from his hands and held it to the candle. He studied it carefully. “You know, life doesn’t always fit a nice curve. There are other factors involved, complicating factors.”
Zac snatched the book back. “I know, it’s amazing. Look, you can see right here. That’s when the water went off. And then, see, a few days later, the number starts going up again for infections, and a few days later for deaths. That’s because of all the people who left their houses. And then it levels off and it’s higher than it was, but look, if you moved it all down a bit, the curve would keep going.”
And there it was, a line that meant so many different things. If you integrated the line, math Zac hadn’t got to yet, it would tell you how many people had died. You could extrapolate how many more would die before it reached zero. But it was also hope, a road map to the way out, a promise that this would end.
Zac looked at his handiwork with pride. “If they gave us examples like this at school, I’d see the point.”
“If there are three zombies and each zombie takes two minutes to eat one brain, and five minutes to find its next victim, how long before a school of a thousand kids are all zombies?” Sean chuckled, and Zac joined in. Her planning was not for naught. There was an end.
They celebrated Zac’s insight by stealing some of Oscar and Ella’s milk powder and cocoa and wasting gas on making hot chocolate. Zac did the making and she turned away when he spooned out the powders, easier not to know than be obliged to spoil the fun. Sean lined up three mugs on the outside table and Zac carefully lifted the saucepan to pour.
Sean, a little out of the circle of light, was fumbling in a cupboard. Zac picked the biggest mug and took it back to the kitchen table. While his back was turned, Sean produced a bottle of Kahlúa and spiked their drinks. He gave her a furtive smile.
It was easy and reassuring to slip into bed at the same time as Sean, but the cold of the sheets was a shock to her system. Couldn’t the epidemic have waited until summer? Sean inched across the bed until his body rested against hers. He was warm with life. His breath heated the side of her neck, raising goosebumps.
He sighed heavily, rustling her hair. “I’m glad you’re here.”
She turned her head to look at him, nose to nose. “I’m glad I’m here too. Of all the places to be stuck for weeks on end, this would be my pick.”
He smoothed down the fine, loose hairs at her temple. “You did all that planning. I don’t know how we’d cope without you.”
She sat up on one arm. “You would. You’d cope.”
“I don’t know.”
“You’d have to and you would. If I’m ever not here, if that’s the way the odds flow, promise me you’ll cope.”
“I wouldn’t want to. I wouldn’t choose to be without you.”
“Ah”—she kissed him lightly—“I wouldn’t want you to choose to cope, but for Zac and Oscar, you’d have to.”
“One crisis at a time. We did that one, it’s over.”
“Unless it comes back.”
He ran his hand down her arm. “Or it doesn’t. And we don’t think about it until it does.”
Right now, right here, in the warmth, she took a night off from planning a life that didn’t include her.
As they sat in the winter-morning sunshine on the back patio, making breakfast, the water got to lukewarm and no more. Sean shook the gas bottle, but it and the gas burners made no noise.
“No problem.” He scrambled over the fence and passed her the gas bottle from Stuart and Natalie’s barbecue, shaking it as he did. It was at most a third full.
“That’s from my house.” Ella’s assertion took Hannah by surprise. She realized that even if she didn’t quite think of Ella as one of them, she had stopped thinking of her as belonging on the other side of the fence. “My mum will be cross.”
“No, sweetie, she won’t mind. We’ll buy a new one when she comes back. But we should have asked you first, shouldn’t we, because it is yours. That would be polite. We’re using it to make breakfast for you too, so it’s okay, isn’t it?” It was a careless error. They had worked hard to avoid mentioning her mum or dad, or the house next door.
After they had restored themselves with rice porridge cooked on pilfered gas, Hannah cleared away the breakfast things. The warmth of the sunshine and the rest of the pot of coffee, bought at too high a price, enticed her. She collected her book and her mug, but Sean and Zac had pulled the table off the patio into the middle of the lawn. Sean was standing on it, surveying the neighboring gardens while Zac steadied it.
“What on earth are you doing?”
“Dad’s counted three that he can see, and plenty of them will be under a deck or in a shed. I guess we can’t get the ones in the sheds. Unless we break in.” Zac looked thoughtful. “Dad, are we going to break in?”
Sean did an unconvincing splutter. “No, of course not. I’d never break into someone’s property.”
“Except…” Zac jerked his head in the direction of Stuart and Natalie’s.
“That’s different. We know them and they left us implicit permission.” Sean tilted his head towards Ella.
“I still have no idea what you’re doing up there.” Hannah’s outrage was tempered by curiosity. “Can you see anyone? Is there anyone else around?”
“Nope, not a person. Not that I can see. Three gas bottles, at least, for the taking.”
“They’re probably not all full, Dad,” Zac corrected him, in a serious teenage way. “On average, they’re probably half full, so that would be one and a half bottles.”
“You are not stealing gas bottles from our neighbors.”
Sean looked down at her with a smug smile. “Since I’ll only go to empty houses, if you think about it, the bottles are abandoned. It’s more like finding.”
“What about Gwen? She’s home but you don’t see her. Just because you can’t see people doesn’t mean they’re not there.”
“This conversation isn’t securing our energy supplies. So I’ll leave you to debate the ins and outs while I get the job done.”
“And the last time you went off on your own when I said it was a bad idea, I was right and you were wrong, so the conversation is in fact over. You stay.”
“This is not the same at all. No risk because I won’t be on the street—it’s safe as houses. I admit the need
for coffee was frivolous, but this is an actual necessity.” Sean stepped down from the table, using Zac’s head to steady himself. “If it will make you feel better, you go put some cash in some envelopes and I’ll leave them in place of the bottles. But that’ll increase the risk. We need a surgical strike, in and out.” Zac was grinning at him. Too much fun was being had.
Sean jumped the fence to Gwen’s, lifting himself with ease, even managing not to dislodge the fairy lights. Proficiency at breaking into your neighbors’ was not a skill developed in ordinary times. The most exercise any of them got was a stroll from the front door to the back, but, she noticed as he vaulted over the top, he was leaner.
Once Sean had given Gwen’s house a quick look, he beckoned to Zac. In one fluid movement, Zac was over. She swore he was taller than yesterday. Sean kept going, over the next fence, and passed a gas bottle across. Zac left it at the bottom of Gwen’s fence and followed Sean into the next yard. Sean jumped the next fence on, handing another bottle to Zac, who lowered it into Gwen’s garden.
Hannah had lost sight of Sean. She called out to Zac, “Isn’t two enough?”
“Dad says if we don’t get them now, they’ll be taken by someone else.”
“How many do we need?”
“This one’s almost empty.” He shook the one he was carrying.
There was an enraged yell and she saw the top of Sean’s head streak across a backyard three houses down. Zac dropped to the ground and rolled into the shadow of Gwen’s neighbor’s fence, out of sight, beyond Hannah’s protection.
She fell on her knees and pressed herself into the palings.
“Mum, what was that?” Oscar came trotting out of the kitchen.
“Shhh. Shhhh. Go back inside.” She hissed at him. The battle cry came again. A man’s scream. Oscar stared, transfixed, in the direction of the noise. She grabbed his arm and yanked him down.
“Muuum. That hurts.”
“Quiet.” She could hear sounds, a door slamming, someone running. “Did you see Daddy?” she whispered.
“Where was Daddy?” Oscar stage-whispered back.
“Don’t talk.” She could barely hear herself. “Nod or shake. Did you see Daddy?” Shake. “Did you see Zac?” Shake. “Did you see anyone?” Shake. She held Oscar to her tightly, her heart knocking hard against him. He squirmed in protest at the constriction.
“Crawl along the fence back to the house. Go inside. Be quiet, keep Ella quiet.” She let go of Oscar but he froze, a panic of indecision on his smooth face. “Go.” He still didn’t move. “I’ll be in soon. You have to be quiet. Inside.” She could see his chest heaving as he crawled away.
“Hey, Oscar,” she whispered after him, “it’s all right. Daddy did something silly.”
She lay still, listening for noises. Nothing, not even the sound of Zac. Between the palings she saw nothing but the next fence. She counted seconds, to calm herself and measure the moments of danger. Every minor noise—a bird in the distance, a branch in the breeze—distracted her from the count and forced her to start again. And again. By now it was minutes.
She crouched, her head just below the top of the fence, and looked through the gap between two planks. No sign of anyone. She raised her head slowly until her eyes just reached above the palings. Still no one. She climbed on the fence, just high enough to see Zac lying along the far fence two yards on, calmly staring at nothing. She waved a little, one eye on the distant backyards. She waved more vigorously.
He looked up and she gestured for him to come, but he lay still and pointed down the side of the house. She couldn’t bring to mind which house he was behind—what it looked like from the front, whether it had a gate across the side passage. Even if the way was clear, he still had to make it across the backyard, all the way to the street, and past Gwen’s house before he reached their front porch. And all that time he would be out of her sight.
She gestured more frantically for him to come to her. He shook his head. She tried to look commanding. He shook his head. Although he sprawled on the ground, he wasn’t completely relaxed. There was something about his lounge that indicated wariness.
She mouthed at him, “You are safe.” A shrugged incomprehension. She mouthed again, “Come now,” and beckoned with both hands. “Now.”
He moved into a crouch and unfurled himself slowly. Once his head was high enough for a clear view, he twisted to see behind him, his feet fixed to the ground. He darted to the fence and vaulted it without stopping. His foot caught, somersaulting him over. Plenty of noise. She bobbed down, keeping watch through the palings. As he pushed himself up on one arm, she saw him grimace and glance at Gwen’s back door. He would be fine. He could outrun an old lady. Unless he’d hurt himself. Unless the yeller decided to take a tour of the houses looking for Sean. They had to make a move. She stood to her full height, a landmark in the empty scene. Still no one.
“Can you climb?” She tried to sound normal, practical, not motherly.
Zac looked up at her, aghast, and waved at her to sit back down.
“I need you to stand up and tell me if you can climb the fence or if I need to come around and help you.”
His left ankle collapsed under him as he tried to stand.
“Right. I’m coming.”
“Stay there. I can walk.” He looked over his shoulder at the palings.
“Go up the side of Gwen’s house, stay hidden. Don’t come onto the street until you see me.”
Zac rolled his eyes at her but he got up. He disappeared into the side passage in a couple of hobbling steps.
She rushed through the house but opened the front door slowly, turning the key in the grille as smoothly as she could so as not to make noise. She tried to keep herself concealed behind the wall dividing Gwen’s veranda from theirs, although that put her in full view from the other direction. No one in sight. The only life she could see was the edge of Zac’s face around the corner of Gwen’s house, inappropriately impish. On her wave, he limped the gap, jumping the small wall between the properties, and skidded onto the porch.
“Mum, where’s Dad?”
“I saw him run. I don’t know where.”
Zac nodded, looked as if he were about to say something, stopped, and then started again. “I saw Gwen’s breakfast. It was still next to the front door where I put it this morning.”
“Oh.” She thought for a second about what to say.
“I should have gone to help Dad.”
“No, you should not.”
“He might have got in a fight.” Zac was rocking from foot to foot.
“Zac”—she wanted to put her arms around him, keep him still—“he ran away.” Zac looked shocked. “Which is exactly what he should have done.” She couldn’t stop herself. “Except what he should have done is not gone thieving gas bottles. But since he did, the very least he could do is to not get into a fight, risk contamination, and make an enemy who knows where we live.”
They waited in the kitchen. A change of scenery from waiting for Sean at the front door, but Hannah was growing impatient with his recklessness. Repetition didn’t extinguish her anxiety. She tried to let the time wash over her, keep her mind away from things she couldn’t control, but Zac kept getting up to listen at the front. Still, she started when Sean scrambled over Stuart’s fence.
“I went a couple of houses along and waited until I knew no one was coming, then headed to the back lane.” He was smiling, satisfied with the way he handled the crisis. “Headed all the way back to the other end and jumped the fence of the house with the brick wall. To misdirect anyone who happened to see me. I’ve been making my way through the backyards.”
“You’re an idiot.” She turned to Zac. “I apologize for lumbering you with the DNA of an idiot.”
“I was careful.”
“You were robbing the house of someone who was at home.”
“I was passing through their yard. I told you I wasn’t taking from anyone who was there.”
“How the
hell would you know? They don’t put a sign out. If they have any sense, they’re trying to stay hidden.”
“I could tell.”
“And that’s it, you could tell. We’re supposed to put our safety in the hands of ‘I could tell.’”
“I thought it was empty but I wasn’t sure, so I didn’t take anything. I was passing through. What did you want me to do? We can’t eat uncooked rice, and the water won’t sterilize itself. Have you seen the color it is when it comes out of the tank?”
“And what if you’ve taken someone else’s cooking gas? What happens to them?”
“We are out there every day, every fucking day, three times a day, cooking. How many of them have you seen at their barbecues?”
She could tell that he was looking to be agreed with, but she wasn’t going to help him feel justified. Even if they couldn’t see the people around them, they were there and their needs were just as real.
He continued in a tone filled with self-justification. “What do you think they do, cook in the middle of the night? Those people are gone. Do you really think they’re coming back for their gas bottles? We are so close, so close. We are not going to fail because the gas runs out.”
“Dad, Gwen hasn’t eaten her breakfast.”
“Hasn’t she?”
“We can’t go next door, Zac. If she’s”—Hannah didn’t know how to say it—“gone, she’s gone. And either she’s gone and there’s nothing to be done, or she’s gone and there’s still nothing we can do.”
“I know what you’re talking about, Mum.”
“You didn’t go into Stuart’s, Zac. You don’t understand what it’s like.”
“Look,” Sean broke in. “Seeing won’t help her or you.”
“But, Dad, what if she’s sick?”
“Then there’s more reason not to go, not less. We have no medicine. Half a packet of Panadol won’t cure anything.”
“But she’s alone, Dad. We can’t do nothing.” Zac was close to tears.
“We haven’t done nothing, we’ve kept her fed. That’s what we can do. We have the three of you to consider.”
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