by Lopez, Rob
“Nope. When I was fifteen, I did six months in juvenile for hitting a cop. In the 3rd Infantry, I wound up in the cooler for hospitalizing a guy in a bar. Did more time after trashing the PX. In the Rangers I got busted down from Corporal after driving a Humvee through the mess hall. I don’t recall doing any of those things because I was drunk at the time. Got my jaw busted in a fight I don’t even remember being in – I just woke in a medical facility with an MP next to my bed waiting to escort me to the stockade. I was lucky not to end up in Fort Leavenworth on a five-year stretch. In fact, I don’t know why I didn’t wind up in there. I sure should have done.”
“I don’t get it. You don’t strike me as an alcoholic.”
“That’s because I wasn’t. I was a bored drunkaholic. Wasn’t till the first Gulf War that I quit drinking, because when my tour finished, I signed up for special forces and volunteered for every operation going. As long as I was busy, I wasn’t a problem. Being on a base stateside was the same as being a civilian. Tedium. Couldn’t stand it.”
“You’re stateside now. What’s the difference?”
“I’m still on operations. This is a combat zone. There’s no bullshit rules, no officers, no judges. I grew up wild and never assimilated into peaceful life. I ain’t civilized.”
“Dude, there were plenty of wild guys living day-to-day normal lives. You just got a bad start. I can imagine you in some biker gang, strutting your stuff on your Harley and complaining about the feds.”
“Yeah, my brother was like that. Got busted dealing meth and cocaine. Beat his girlfriends up. A real asshole. We’re a family of bad blood.”
“I don’t think so,” said April thoughtfully. “You’re nothing like your brother.”
Scott looked at her. “You don’t know that.”
“Trust me, I know bad blood when I see it.”
“You do, huh?”
April looked awkwardly away. “That was another time.” She gazed out the window at Josh tentatively plucking at nettles. “You know? It might not always be a combat zone. I mean, things could settle in time. Folks could band together and form villages, grow crops, herd cattle. Like in the old days. We might even end up with sheriffs and deputies. Little by little, the law could come back.”
“Oh sure. Saloons, spittoons and robber barons. Assholes running for mayor and wanted posters on the walls.”
April laughed. “What would you do then?”
“I’d take to the mountains and become an outlaw.”
April stayed her laughter with a smile. “I like that,” she murmured shyly.
*
On the way back, Rick and Lauren stopped by at the hospital. They found Sally tending to the patients alone.
“Where’s Harvey?” asked Rick.
The stench in the ward was worse than Rick remembered, and Sally looked pasty faced and gaunt.
“Mrs. Hemsworth died this morning,” she said wearily. “He’s outside burying her.”
An elderly patient under a dirty sheet raised his hand and groaned. His jaundiced skin was stretched tight over his cheekbones. Sally moved to his bed and took his hand in hers.
“It’s okay Mr. Moore, I’m here. Do you want anything?”
Mr. Moore grunted something that Rick couldn’t catch.
“Sure,” said Sally. She took a cup of water from the nightstand by the bed and dripped a little onto his lips. All the time, his bulging, bloodshot eyes stared at Rick.
“We’ve brought you some powdered soup,” said Rick, taking a large can out of his bag. It was one of several catering-sized containers he’d found in the golf club kitchen. “Have you got any way of heating water?”
Sally wiped Mr. Moore’s chin. “Afraid not. We could try a bed pan over a candle, but we’re running low on candles.”
“We’ll see what we can get you.” Rick averted his gaze from the patient who was still staring at him. “We’re moving out of the area, though. Headed south. I can’t say when we’ll drop by next. Maybe in a few days.”
Sally moved to the next bed. “That’s okay. I appreciate your help.”
Lauren had hung back, visibly shocked at the spectacle on the ward. Pulling two apples from her pocket, she hurried forward now, handing them to the nurse. “We’ll be back sooner than that,” she urged. “That’s a promise.”
Sally gazed at her. “Thank you,” she whispered.
On the way down, Lauren paused on the stairs, distraught. “Why didn’t you tell me it was that bad?” she asked Rick.
“Sometimes, it’s better to see it for yourself,” he replied.
Lauren looked back up the steps. “It’s not right to leave them like this.”
“I know, but the patients are too ill to be moved. There’s nothing else we can do.”
“Goddamn it,” uttered Lauren. “This sucks.” She hesitated. “We should give them the other can as well.”
“They’ll be fine for a couple more days,” said Rick. “Don’t worry, we’ll look after them.”
Lauren gave him a shamefaced look. “I take back what I said about them some days ago. You were right to offer to help.”
“I know,” said Rick, “but don’t get too emotional about it. When it comes right down to it, we do have to look after ourselves first, so you weren’t totally wrong. Got a long way to go before we’re out of the woods.” He mulled that over. “If we ever get to that stage,” he added.
15
They took a shopping cart and strapped it between the two bicycles to raise its flimsy and erratic undercarriage off the ground. A pair of broom handles tied across the two sets of handle bars steadied the front wheels and gave Lauren and April something to push. Into the wire basket went the wood they had cut, tools, a tied sheet half-full of shelled, leached acorns, a box of apples, the .22 rifle they’d taken off the man Rick had shot, and Lizzy and Daniel, who preferred to ride rather than walk. Josh helped push the contraption from behind, Rick walked several yards ahead on point and Scott several yards behind as the rearguard.
The sky was overcast and gray, with an early morning chill that portended the coming of winter, though they were still in November. They walked down an arrow-straight boulevard, four lanes of highway separated by a wide, overgrown median strip, and the trees on the wide verges by the sidewalk were slowly layering the ground with red and yellow leaves that stuck wetly to the tires mushing through them. Widely spaced mansions drifted by on both sides, and fallen transmission lines lay draped across vehicles whose windshields were turning opaque with dirt.
“This is like a wagon train,” puffed April as she pushed. “Pioneer families trekking to some promised land.”
“I believe the pioneers had horses to draw their wagons,” said Lauren.
“Not all of them,” asserted April. “Some pushed carts like this one. Well, not like this one, but you get what I mean.”
“You sound cheerful this morning. Anything I should know?”
“Do I? I don’t know. Maybe it’s good to be moving again.”
Lauren glanced across, but April wouldn’t meet her gaze. “Are you sure there isn’t something you want to be telling me?” said Lauren.
“No, really. I’m looking forward to this new place you’ve discovered.”
Lauren, studying her, wasn’t convinced, but she let it drop. “I guess it’s okay. It’s bigger.”
“Are you kidding me? The way you described it, it sounds amazing.”
“I suppose.”
“Well, hey, is there something you should be telling me?”
Lauren frowned. “Just feeling a little guilty, that’s all.”
“About what?”
“Those people at the hospital. We’re leaving them behind.”
“I don’t have a problem with that. Tell me – is this a good time to get sentimental?”
Lauren gazed into the distance. “Maybe it is. Maybe we need it now more than before. Perhaps it’s more important now we’ve lost the safety net.”
April rol
led her eyes. “I can see why you and Rick got together. You’ve both got the same soft streak. Now Scott, he’s a lot more practical. Doesn’t worry about being nice and stuff. I mean, he can be nice and all, but he’s got a hard core.”
Surprised, Lauren looked at April, whose eyes widened momentarily. As if she’d been caught out saying more than she should.
“Are you two …” began Lauren.
“No,” said April hastily. “It’s not like that at all. I’m just saying … there’s, like, two sides to every argument. You know? Contrasting viewpoints.”
“Uh huh,” said Lauren, narrowing her eyes.
“And that’s all it is,” concluded April.
“Right,” said Lauren slowly.
“No, really, it is.”
“Sure.”
“Girl, you’re assuming too much.”
“I haven’t said anything, yet. You’re the one getting touchy.”
“I ain’t getting touchy!”
“Are so.”
“Mommy, why are you arguing?” asked Lizzy.
Lauren and April both glanced back into the cart, forgetting they had an audience. “We’re not arguing, honey,” said Lauren with a smile. “We’re just …” she turned to April for her opinion. “What would you say we were having?”
“A contrast of viewpoints,” said April archly.
Lauren nodded, amused. “That’s right. And why not?”
“Exactly,” said April.
Lizzy gazed suspiciously at both of them, as if wondering what she’d missed. “It’s silly,” she said, finally.
“Quite probably,” agreed Lauren.
“Sure is,” echoed April.
Josh quit pushing the cart and unslung his air rifle. He’d seen a squirrel scampering along the branch of a tree. Lauren followed his gaze. “Not now, Josh,” she said.
“It’s food, Mom. Didn’t you enjoy the meat we had last night?”
“It was pretty good,” admitted April. “Not a lot of it. Could have done with more. But it was good.”
Josh lined up his sights. There was a distant crack, and something ricocheted along the sidewalk nearby. Lauren stopped, dimly aware that someone may have taken a shot at them.
Scott suffered no such hesitation. He sprinted past them suddenly, yelling, “Get into cover!”
Rick also reacted instantly, firing two rapid shots at a church tower up ahead.
Lauren froze, trying to process what was happening, then plucked Lizzy out of the cart. “Move,” she hissed.
April grabbed Daniel and they dashed away from the cart, throwing themselves behind a tree. Josh leaned out, trying to see ahead with his scope, but Lauren dragged him back. “Stay still.”
She had no idea where the shot had come from, and could see no sign of a shooter. The sheltering porch of a house lay about thirty yards away, but she wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to try and get there. She hugged the ground, crushing Lizzy beneath her, running through her options.
In contrast, Rick and Scott acted decisively, alternating between shooting and running, working in tandem. Their training, and their experience, instilled in them the need to attack the ambush, rather than merely take cover and allow the shooter, or shooters, to take their time over a second shot. Realizing she should help, Lauren aimed her scope at the church tower, but she couldn’t see a viable target.
Rick and Scott circled around the church and disappeared. Finally, worried that there might be other shooters, Lauren chose a course of action. They were too exposed here in the open. “April, take the children to that house. I’ll cover you.”
April herded the children while Lauren aimed at the tower again. April reached the porch and blasted the lock on the door with the shotgun, kicking it open. Lauren waited until they were safely inside, then sprinted across to join them.
“I can’t see anything at all,” said April, visibly shaken and peering cautiously out the front window of a living room.
Lauren bade the children lie flat on the hardwood floor, then thought about Packy and his grenade. A single explosive sailing through the window would finish them all. “Everybody upstairs,” she said. “And stay away from the windows.”
Every upstairs room had a window, so she made the children lie down in a connecting corridor between the rooms. As they lay listening to their own breathing, she realized she hadn’t heard another shot.
“Do you think the guys are okay?” whispered April.
Lauren had no idea, but didn’t want to relay her fears. “They know what they’re doing,” she said.
She hoped she was right. Breaking her earlier advice, she crawled into a bedroom and sneaked a look out the window. The cart stood forlorn on the sidewalk, a leaf floating down onto it. The .22 rifle was still in it and quite visible, making it a tempting target for any would-be thief: if that had been the purpose of the ambush.
“April. Go and see if anyone’s moving around outside the back window.”
April moved out and Lauren scanned the street, but everything was as still as a photograph. Minutes passed, and she wondered whether she ought to go out to check on the guys. They seemed to be taking too long and she wondered if anything had happened to them. Were they hurt? Or had they encountered a gang and been taken prisoner? The thought horrified Lauren. Under such circumstances, she knew Rick would want her to lead the children away to safety. Tactically, it was the right thing to do. There was no way she was going to do it, however, until she knew for sure what the situation was.
Feeling increasingly paranoid, she prepared herself to head out just as she caught sight of movement outside.
It was Scott, dashing back to take cover behind the tree by the cart. Relieved, Lauren tapped the window to get his attention, and he came into the house.
“Is Rick okay?” said Lauren as she ran down the stairs.
“He’s fine,” said Scott. “He’s waiting for us.”
“Did you get the shooter?” called April from the top of the stairs.
“Nah, he took off before we got there.” Scott held up a spent cartridge. “He only fired the one shot.”
“That’s because he knew he was up against pros,” said April.
Lauren glanced up and saw the obvious adoration on April’s face, laying bare the reality she’d only suspected before. Scott didn’t appear to notice, though. He seemed disappointed with himself.
“Nah. He shot one round and we fired over ten. Can’t afford that kind of expenditure now. It was a dumb move. Come on, we’ve got to get off this street. It’s too open.”
They left the house and ran the cart up the avenue. Rick waited for them at an intersection by the church, the tower pockmarked with bullet strikes. Directed toward a side street, they continued to run, fearful of another shot. Scott took over on point and Rick hung behind, gauging the distance from the tower to where his family had been when the first shot had been taken.
The range wasn’t so great that a decent shot couldn’t have hit one of them easily.
*
“Maybe it was just a warning shot,” said Lauren.
“Or some idiot who couldn’t shoot worth a damn,” said Scott.
They were in the ballroom of the clubhouse. A fire in the hearth lent a warm glow to the frigid room and scattered reflections across the chandelier. Heavy tables had been pushed up against the windows and doors. Lizzy and Daniel lay asleep on cushions that had been laid out on the polished floor. Earlier, before it had gotten dark, they had been running in wonder through all the magnificent rooms, the scary incident in the day having been forgotten.
The adults weren’t so sanguine.
“We have to ask ourselves one question,” said Rick, toying with the spent cartridge. “Why would someone sit in a church tower, with no support, just to watch that one road?” He looked at them all. “For what reason? If someone can just sit there on the off chance that someone might come into view, it means they’re not hungry. No attempt was made to rob us, and unless they knew w
e were coming, they must have sat there for hours. To what purpose?” He held up the cartridge. “This is a .223 round. Probably from an AR-15. If they’d been using a scope, they’d almost certainly have hit one of us, so I think he was firing over open sights. The shooter wasn’t a professional and made no attempt to defend the church. He just ran.”
“How do you know it was a 'he’?” asked April.
Rick conceded the point. “Could have been a woman. Or a girl. The point is, I think they were positioned there as a lookout. We strayed through someone’s territory, maybe claimed by a group, and they don’t take kindly to strangers. My question is, do we hunt them down, or move on? Because we’re not far enough away for me to feel comfortable leaving them be.”
“Nice deductions, Sherlock,” said Scott, “but it’s just speculation. We’ve identified one nut out there already. It could be him, or another. It’d be a shame to leave this place already. I think we can fortify it pretty well. It’s like The Alamo. We need to recon the area anyway, so why don’t we see what we find before we make a decision?”
“If there is another group nearby,” said Lauren thoughtfully, “maybe we can try and contact them. Maybe we’re not the first to have thought about creating a community. They could be survivors who grouped together.”
“Sweet Jesus,” said April. “They took a shot at us and you still want to be friends?”
“We’re all armed,” reasoned Lauren. “Josh here was even lifting his rifle to take a shot at a squirrel. Maybe from a distance we looked threatening.”
“Damn right we do. That’s the only reason the shooter took off so fast, and that’s the way I like it.”
“Okay,” said Rick. “I vote we recon the surrounding area tomorrow and then make a decision on whether to stay or not. All in favor?”
Everyone stuck their hand up.
“Good. I’ll take a patrol out just before dawn, but Scott, I need you here to assess the site’s defensive potential, so I’ll take April.” Rick turned to her. “You could do with the practice.”
April hesitated. “Uh, actually, I, uh, need to … stick around. For Daniel. First day here, and it’s a big place, so I want to keep an eye on him. And I’m pretty good with a saw now. So, I can help. With stuff.”