by A. R. Shaw
When she was done with that task, having filled ten bottles, she pushed the bucket out of the way and then stood and lifted the lever for the pump and began wrenching the handle down once, twice and a third time then cold water gushed from the spigot into her container. Some of it splashed outside and she thought herself wasteful. Finally, it was almost too full to carry and she wondered how she would be able to hold her gun and carry the pot at the same time. There was no way to do it well; she’d have to make a decision—holster the weapon and carry the pot with two hands with the backpack on her shoulders.
She took another hard look all around her and decided to take the chance and reluctantly holstered her weapon. Then she donned the loaded backpack and knelt down to lift the full container of water. She didn’t want to have to come back for more later, so she reasoned that she only wanted to do this once today. She started hurrying down the crusty grass when she heard a male voice call out to her, “Hello!”
Startled and terrified, she slipped on the frozen grassy hill. The pot of water turned toward her in that moment as she reached to brace her fall, and two gallons of water landed on her chest as she lay on her back on the frozen ground, drenching her chest entirely.
She twisted to her side as a dark shape began to approach her and wrenched her Glock from her holster. Her damp and dripping hair covered her face so that her vision was obscured.
“I’m sor…” the voice began.
“Don’t come closer!”
“I won’t, I won’t.”
When her vision cleared, a man stood only ten feet from her with his hands in the air.
“I swear to God, I’m not here to hurt you.”
“I don’t care who you swear to. If you take one step toward me, I’ll kill you.”
“Look, I’ll even back up three paces. I just see that you got my note. I thought I’d introduce myself.”
“I don’t care who you are. I have sick children or we would have left already. I need to get them well and then we’ll leave, I promise. Just please give me a few more days.”
“I’m not trying to kick you out. I saw you ladies come in during the storm. You’re welcome to stay here. It’s pretty safe. No one has come around here yet.”
“Are you the caretaker?”
“Well, sort of. I’m the second cousin of the guy that haunts that house.” He pointed toward the house with a raised finger. He was trying to be funny and she sort of believed him.
“It’s not haunted.”
“Whatever you say. It’s creepy enough. Look, I’m a doctor. I came out here to check on my mom’s place on my way to Portland and just happened to be here when the wave hit. I can take a look at your girls. I’m an internal medicine doctor.”
She moved the damp hair away from her face and studied him for a moment. He was tall man with light brown hair and even in these times he wore what you’d expect to see a doctor wearing, a mildly plaid button-up shirt and through the v of his neck she could see a crisp white undershirt. His jacket wasn’t one for the rugged outdoors but one a doctor would wear over his shirt in cold weather. He was clean-shaven even still, with only a hint of a shadow on his face. He wore dark wash jeans and had on expensive leather hiking boots. She knew the type, career driven. He was handsome and said all the right things so far, but she could never trust him. She glanced at the pot on the ground but still held him at gunpoint. “No, that’s okay.” She began to move away from him and farther down the hill toward the house and her children.
“I swear to you, I’m a friend. It’s only me here. I haven’t even talked with anyone since this began.”
“Look, I don’t need your help. I just need a few more days here to get my girls well and then we’ll leave.” She continued a few more steps away.
He nodded. “Okay, stay as long as you need to. Seriously, it’s just me and I would never hurt you. If you need me to look at your daughters, I’m right here. Just knock on the door.”
She glanced at him like he was crazy.
“You sure you don’t want to refill the water?” he asked, pointing at the empty pot.
Now she was annoyed and drenched. “I have enough for now,” she said and pointed toward her backpack.
“Okay,” he said, getting the hint, and backed away with a charming smile on his face.
She lowered her gun and stalked back to the house, knowing he watched her every more.
31
Chances
* * *
“Did you feed Sally?” Mae said in what Sloane feared was delirium. She was thrashing with her fever and making statements that had no bearing on their current situation. It worried her even more. She’d already used half the water she brought with her and had given each of the girls medication to lower their fever but nothing helped.
“Mom, we have to do something more. This isn’t working,” Wren cried while rocking back and forth on her knees beside her sister.
Sloane hovered over both girls. Nicole had already gone through another convulsive event and barely became conscious enough to swallow water and the medication that Sloane coaxed down her throat.
“What else can we do?” Wren implored.
Sloane rubbed a hand through her hair in frustration. She held her palm over her mouth considering her only alternative. It was a risk and she hated to take it but like Wren said, they were running out of options.
“Wren, I’m going to go and get the doctor I told you about earlier.”
“The stranger? Mom, no!”
“I don’t know what else to do. They’re getting worse, not better. We have to take a chance on him.”
“Okay, okay. Please hurry back. I’m afraid what will happen when you’re gone.”
Sloane put on her coat and kissed the top of Wren’s head. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
“Okay, Mom. Hurry.”
Then Sloane didn’t dare look back. The darkness had descended hours ago and she held her weapon tight as she ran again from the back door to the living quarters on the side of the barn.
She barely knocked when he opened the door. He held a paperback book in one hand and the ambient light of the fireplace glowed around him. “Is there something wrong?” he asked with concern etched on his face.
“I wouldn’t be here otherwise. Please, can you come and look at my girls? Their fever…I can’t get it down.” And in shame Sloane was horrified that tears were springing from her eyes and streaming down her cheeks. She wiped them away as quickly as she could. She couldn’t help their persistent descent.
“I’ll grab my bag,” he said and left the door ajar while he disappeared inside for a moment, trusting her when she would never trust him. He showed back up momentarily with one arm inside a jacket. In his hand he held a canvas bag.
He ushered her off the porch and they walked quickly back to the main house. “How long have they been running a temp?”
All the days seemed to scramble together. “A few days now?”
“Did they have a cold or a virus before you left?”
“They…were inside a hideout when soldiers threw in these smoke bombs. It killed our dogs but I got to the girls in time to pull them out. I think it’s related to that somehow.”
“Okay, and that was two to three days ago?”
“Yes.” He was clearly in doctor mode now. She hated it how doctors demanded to know down to the day you started your period or the first day of a virus event, etc.… “It started off with a sore throat and then a fever.” They reached the back door and as they entered Wren stared back at the tall stranger in their midst. “This is my daughter Wren. She was also in the bunker when the gas struck but it didn’t affect her as badly.”
“Hi Wren. I’m Dr. Kent. You don’t need to be scared. I won’t harm you or your sisters.”
Wren just stared and nodded at him but she was clearly still very protective of her sisters.
Dr. Kent came forward with his sight locked on the jumble of blankets in the gray room, intermixed with tw
o feverish girls.
“Mom,” Nicole said.
Wren looked to Sloane and said, “She keeps calling to her mom.”
Sloane held her palm over her mouth again. She had to get hold of herself. Getting emotional right now was the last thing that would help their circumstances.
In a very calming tone, Dr. Kent explained, “Sometimes when our fevers are so high we tend to hallucinate and dream. It’s the brain coping with the high fever.”
Wren nodded as if understanding why they were talking about deceased loved ones helped her cope with the worry of possibly losing her sisters to death’s grip.
He opened his bag and took out a thermometer. He held it up to the light and shook the mercury down. “Back to the basics. My electronic one broke,” he said with a smile. “Wren, could you remove their blankets?” Sloane assumed he was trying to give Wren something to do in order to help her cope with the situation.
Sloane continued to stand behind the man, watching him closely. She wanted to trust him but was no longer capable of believing the best of any man. Nothing was left to chance when it came to her daughters. She stood even as the man worked with her hand over her Glock, though it appeared to her that the doctor before her wasn’t even armed, as far as she knew.
“Well, I’m not sure what caused it but it certainly sounds like pneumonia,” he said after he removed his stethoscope from Nicole’s chest. “Both of them.” His look was grim and pensive. “I’m afraid they need round-the-clock care. You shouldn’t take them anywhere. I’ve seen cases like this and it takes weeks to recover.” He held his hands up. “I swear I’m not giving you a line. I’ve got antibiotics to give them but even with those, this will take time to recover from. You can’t take them anywhere for a while, I hope you understand that. Neither of them will be able to stand for long periods of time, let alone walk for days, even if they start to recover from this tonight. The first thing we need to do is lower their temperature. Do you trust me enough to let me help them?”
Not feeling as if she had much choice in the matter she said, “Can you?” But he was suddenly distracted from answering when Nicole again went into convulsions. Her young body was so wracked by fever her brain went into shock trying to relieve itself. He gently slipped his hand behind her sweat-covered head and then tilted her onto her side. Then he looked to Wren’s startled face and said gently, “It started to snow earlier and I saw the pots outside. Could you please gather one of them, or perhaps two if you can manage it?”
Wren scurried away and he turned his attention to Sloane while he held Nicole as she went through the seizing. “I didn’t want to say this in front of your older daughter but…they could die. This is serious. I can’t promise you that I can see them through this but I’ll try.”
Sloane had not removed her eyes from Nicole in what looked like the throes of death. “Please, please help them.”
Wren returned with the pails of snow and he acted quickly. Taking off their clothes and packing the snow around them, he let it melt and soak into their blankets underneath them. He emptied the first pail and then handed it to Sloane. “Keep them coming. We have to cool them down quickly.”
She ran to the back door, soon followed by Wren doing the same task.
A short time later, both girls looked as if they were making snow angels in the gray room with the white snow packed between their extremities and full buckets to replace what snow melted from their body heat.
He took their temperatures again and both girls showed improvement. “It’s not enough. We need to keep it up until it’s at least lower than 103 degrees. Let’s get more water into them and I’ll slip in the antibiotic.”
“We need more water,” Wren said.
He looked to Sloane, imploring her to trust him alone with the girls. “It’s okay, I’ll go get more. Just keep an eye on them.”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll go.” She looked to Wren. “You can come with me so you know where it is.”
“It’s safe. I promise. I haven’t had any problems here,” Dr. Kent said.
Sloane nodded. She couldn’t help herself looking back at him once more as she left him alone with her daughters. She was taking a chance and it scared her more than anything. She couldn’t help but run again up the slope to the barn. Wren picked up on her sense of urgency and hurried as well.
“I think he’s okay, Mom,” Wren said.
A thousand responses flew through her brain but none of them would work well. “Just hurry,” she said as she ran out of options.
What’s he going to do? She reasoned. Take off with two sick girls while I run out to get them water from the well? It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine… she told herself over and over as she flew through filling the bottles with water that mostly flowed over the spout. When they finished filling the ten bottles, Sloane remembered falling down the frozen grass earlier and warned her daughter, “Don’t run here. You might fall.”
They slid down the hill and continued running, holding five bottles each. Once back at the house, Sloane couldn’t help herself. She bolted inside and found him sitting in the exact same position beside Mae’s side, checking her pulse with his finger to her neck.
“She’s fine, that is, they’re doing slightly better. Temperatures are dropping, so that’s good. Do you have dry blankets for them once we get their temps down?”
She shook her head as she handed him the first cool water bottle. “No, that’s all we had. We had to leave almost everything. I found these upstairs but that’s all I could find.”
“It’s okay, I’ve got extra blankets in the cabin. I’ll go back and get them soon. Or you can. They’re in a chest at the end of the bed,” he offered.
“Actually, I think there are more upstairs in the bedrooms. Wren, can you take the flashlight and go see what you can find?”
“Sure,” she said as Sloane handed her the flashlight.
When she was out of earshot, Dr. Kent cautioned. “You sure you want her to wander around this house? I swear it is haunted.”
She stared into his hazel eyes and she thought perhaps he was serious. Perhaps he was trying to make their situation lighter with humor. She appreciated the effort but still, she hoped it was only his wit showing. “This house isn’t haunted, it’s perfect—a little dusty but perfect.”
“Sure, have it your way,” he said. “I’m telling you, my mom always warned me that her cousin still roams these halls looking for his wife.”
She scoffed. How in the world could he make her feel less tense at a time like this? Soon, the sound of someone running down the steps caught her attention.
“See, here he comes.”
She shook her head at him as Wren hurried into the room, sheet-white but holding a stack of blankets in her arms.
“Are you okay?” she asked, taking the dry blankets from her daughter’s arms.
“Yeah,” she huffed, out of breath. “It’s scary up there. Everything’s so old but in perfect condition and it’s dark, creepy,” she shuddered.
“See, I told you,” Dr. Kent said to Sloane.
“That doesn’t mean the house is haunted,” Sloane said.
“Mm-hmm,” he said as he packed more snow around the girls.
A short time later, he checked the girls’ vitals again and looked to Sloane. “They’re doing better but I think I should keep an eye on them tonight, here. Is that okay with you?”
“Yes, please.”
“Look, I slept well last night but you look as if you’re going to fall over any minute.” Before she could protest he held up a hand to stall her. “I know you don’t trust me but you need to sleep. You’re no good to them exhausted. I swear to God, I won’t go anywhere. I need to monitor their vitals every hour and push fluids whenever I get a chance. You two can make a pallet closer to the fireplace to stay warm.”
Wren already yawned at the prospect of sleeping, causing Sloane to automatically repeat the gesture. Darn it! She was just going to deny her sleepiness when the yaw
n irresistibly overcame her.
“See? Look, I’m not armed. I mean you no harm. I’m only here to help you. You can open your eyes and you’ll see me right here. There’s nothing to worry about, I promise you. I won’t let anything happen to you here.”
There was no way she was going to trust those words but she needed to sleep and he had given her no reason to distrust him so far. He was right in one regard: if she didn’t sleep soon, she was going to fall over. She’d only slept a few hours in the whole time they’d been there.
“Okay, but only for a little while. I’ll wake up in a few hours and then you can get some sleep too.”
He laughed a little in a way that made her comfortable. “That would be nice. Hey, I know your name is Wren,” he pointed at the teen. “What’s your name?” he asked Sloane.
“It’s Sloane. Sloane McKenna.”
Then Wren asked him, “We know your name is Dr. Kent but what’s your first name?”
“Phineas. You can call me Finn,” he said and then wondered why her face suddenly went blank.
“That…that was my Dad’s name,” Wren said.
“I’m…so sorry. Did he pass recently?”
Sloane listened to the conversation intently though she hadn’t responded as she set up a pallet for both her and her daughter. Her stomach clenched at the mention of her dear deceased husband’s name. She looked at him, startled.
Wren replied in a quiet voice after glancing at her mother, “No, he died during the pandemic. He was a science teacher. I miss him very much.” She looked sad but a little smile at his remembrance too.
It comforted Sloane to know her daughter was healing over her father’s death. The event was such a horrible heartache for them all, and what took place after his death—she’d never forgive herself for putting her girls through it all.