by Morris, SJ
Chris sat next to me for dinner and nudged me every so often when I was just moving my food around instead of eating it. Turkey, mashed potatoes, and gravy are one of my favorite meals, but I didn’t have much of an appetite after today’s ordeal.
Chris nudged me again, and I looked around to see that everyone had started cleaning up. I looked down at my plate, and it was a big lump of food mixed together from me moving it around.
Chris whispered to me that I should eat, but I just got up and dumped my plate in the garbage. I turned to everyone, faked a happy face, and told them I was tired, so I was heading off to bed.
Chris looked at me dejectedly but said nothing and made no motions to intercept or talk to me. I hugged my children goodnight, and they each gave me a peculiar look. I guess I was giving off the ‘something’s wrong, but I don’t want to talk about it’ vibe. I said goodnight to the little kids, checked them all for fevers, which they didn’t have, and I was off to bed.
I was just about to fall asleep when there was a soft knock at my door. I should’ve known I wasn’t going to be able to get away that easy. I pulled the covers up to my chin and invited whoever was at my door in.
To my surprise, it was Allycia.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Hey Ally, what’s up?”
“You tell me. You were in a funk all throughout dinner. Is everything okay with you and Chris?”
“Me and Chris? What are you talking about? There’s no me and Chris?”
“Okay Mom, you may think there isn’t, but I know that there’s something between you two, and I think it’s great.”
“Really?”
“Well, yeah. Chris seems like a great guy, and you deserve to be happy, Mom. I know you still think of me as just a little kid, but I know that dad is gone, and he’s not coming back. You still need someone in your life to be there for you other than Lance, Tyler, and me. I think Chris would be a great fit to be that someone.”
“Listen to you, Miss Well Beyond Her Years.”
“Cut it out, Mom. I’m serious. Christine thinks it’s an awesome idea too. She said she thinks her dad is crazy about you. Come on, what’s not to like?”
“Thanks, Ally, but I have other things on my mind at the moment. My love life or lack thereof is not high on my list of priorities right now.”
“Come on, Mom. You have to live in the here and now. I know I haven’t really seen what’s been going on out there the last few days, but I can imagine it’s pretty crappy from what we experienced getting here. Whatever happened out there today that made you come back with this defeated attitude, I’m sure it was something that had to happen to keep us all safe. You’d never do anything that wasn’t for the benefit of Tyler, Lance, me, or anyone else here.”
I looked lovingly at my beautiful and intelligent daughter, “I love you, sweetie. You know that, right?”
“Yes, and that’s how I know that whatever’s going on in your head is just in your head. I love you too, Mom.”
With that, Ally gave me a big hug and left to go make sure the little kids were still occupied with the movie. I curled up in my blankets and had some of the best, dreamless sleep I’ve had in a long time.
Chapter 15
For the next few weeks, everyone at the cabin got used to our new lives within our fenced-in walls. Everyone took on chores at the house, and we worked as a team to make sure that everything that needed to get done was getting done. The crops were planted in the small fields and in the greenhouse. The animals were tended to, and the house was never dirty.
A few more of our families and friends arrived as the weeks went on, but unfortunately, not everyone showed up. We all held out hope that they were still alive and making their way to us but that they were taking it slow to be safe. The ones that arrived all had horrible stories of how the outside world was falling apart right into the mouths of the infected.
Yet, all of these horrible stories, thankfully, had happy endings with their arrival here. Most of the groups that came in didn’t lose anyone on the trip to us, and now, they were finally safe.
The apartments were just about filled, though, and Allycia was growing more and more worried about her boyfriend, Jake, and his mother, who still hadn’t arrived yet. Thankfully, the arrival of her friend, Denise, and her family was a welcomed distraction. At least they all made it, and no one was infected. However, they did pick up two people on the way who did not make it to the cabin with them. They were not ready to tell the story, so we left it at that. We had already experienced or heard enough terrible stories to be more than comfortable avoiding hearing another one.
Troy and I worked together in his lab, trying to run as many tests as we could with the limited supplies we had. Troy had brought some high-tech equipment with him, but the solar panels could only give off so much power, and that limited us in what we could do.
Chris said there were extra solar panels in the barn, and all they needed was someone to find a place to put them and install them. So, we were off to a new project.
It was challenging to find a place to put them. Every available spot on the roof was already full. Eventually, I came up with the idea to fasten them to the tops of the concrete wall that was surrounded by the outer fence. It was just wide enough that we could secure the panels to them and they were out of reach, so no one could mess with, or break them.
We had the extra panels installed in two days with the help of Dan’s father, Tony, who was a contractor. Dan and both of his parents were proving to be invaluable to all of us. Nancy fussed over every little cough the children made and enjoyed being a doctor again.
Tony, other than helping with the solar panels, decided to make a swing set for the kids. They all loved that. When he finished the swings, he built them a treehouse.
After that, he even built Jacob and Ginger, Linda, and Stephen’s Lhasa Apsos, a doghouse. Lilly wanted nothing to do with it or the foo-foo dogs. She was content to follow Allycia everywhere she went. She was Allycia’s little guard dog.
Jasmine eventually healed from her injuries, and Nancy cleared her medically to resume normal activities. It was tough for her to accept that everything she knew before her and Lieutenant Tangle answered the call to the gas station was gone, but Tom helped her through it.
He was like her shadow, and she didn’t seem to mind. It turned out that she was married to her work as an officer before the outbreak, and now that she wasn’t a police officer anymore, she had time to learn new things and get to know Tom too. They became very close fairly quickly. I was elated to see them both happy.
Jasmine also learned to cook from Kristen, and Jaz was always helping Tony with whatever he was building at the time.
Even Megan, the eighteen-year-old teacher’s aide we saved at the preschool, was doing better and learning to cope with her PTSD. She and Lance became quick friends. I made sure to revisit the birds and the bee’s discussion with Lance one night after dinner and that didn’t go well. He was extremely embarrassed, and he thought I should have thought that he already knew better. I certainly hoped so.
I remember being a teenager, thinking I was in love. Well, actually, thanks to my dedication to my schoolwork, my bouts with stupid decisions in the love department held off until I met Jack. And we all know how that turned out.
Allycia would bring Christine and her friend Denise to my room every so often and we would do each other’s nails and hair just so we could spend some girl time together. I got to know Christine a lot during those visits, and she was a sweet, smart girl with a good head on her shoulders. She told me that her mother, Krista, had died just over a year ago when a drunk driver hit her.
She and Chris had separated two years before the accident. Christine said that her mom had a hard time dealing with Chris being away all the time on missions or deployed, and Krista couldn’t handle what it did to him over time. She said it was as if he changed a little every time he went away and came home. Like, he became a different person over time, whi
ch is the way Christine put it.
I could definitely see how that could happen. Especially after hearing the stories of what Jack, Dan, Tom, and Chris went through on their missions. That kind of stuff has to have a lasting effect on a person, no matter what kind of training you have.
Christine said that her parents stayed good friends throughout the separation, and she made it a point to tell me that more than once. She also repeated that what her parents had was over long before they even separated.
Allycia always smiled at me when she said something like that. I just wanted to yell at both of them, ‘Yes, you want Chris and I to get together and make each other happy, but we’re kind of busy right now with other more important things!’ Instead, I would just shake my head and ask what color she wanted on her toes, or I’d find some other way to change the subject.
During the next five weeks after the infection began, everyone in our little settlement got to know one another better. We became somewhat of a community. Sometimes we all ate together in the dining room or outside, and sometimes we each stayed in with our immediate families, but either way, we were all there for one another, and it was turning out to be pretty good for all of us.
There was no fighting like you used to see on reality television shows. We all had our own place, and we all fit in somewhere. It was really nice.
Chris came to visit me in the lab with Troy a lot, but we didn’t really have time for each other. I knew he wanted to spend more time just the two of us, but I was more worried about learning everything I could about the Z-Strain virus and testing possible cures. It was my mission to find something to stop this, or at the very least, slow it down.
Especially since after the first week what little news was coming in over the television or the Internet pretty much stopped. There were no longer any television updates. Every channel was static or the emergency broadcast system, which faded to static after only a few more days.
The Internet was gone entirely, and any radio transmissions that Dan and Tyler were able to intercept had stopped too. It was as if someone flicked a big switch to turn off all communications. Our radios were working fine with one another, but we didn’t pick up much of anything outside of our own transmissions after that first week.
After we stopped getting anything from the outside world in the form of news, we all got into our own rhythms, our own routines. All of us seemed to be living our lives as if the outside world no longer existed. Hell, for all we knew, it didn’t anymore.
Nothing would ever be the same for any of us, and it was a harsh new reality, but that’s what it was, reality.
I woke up groggy, showered, and got dressed. I expected it to be just another day, with our new regular routines.
However, as I readied myself for the daily chores, I could tell this was not going to be a regular day. I could feel it in the air somehow. I knew something was off, but I brushed it aside as one of those feelings you get when everything seems to be going too good, and you’re just waiting for something terrible to happen.
Usually, that bad thing would never happen, but nothing was truly typical anymore, so why should today be any different?
Tyler ran into the lab, almost knocking over Troy as he was pacing, trying to figure something out in his notebook.
“Mom, Mom! You have to come quick! Dan and I got a message over the radio from Jake, Ally’s boyfriend!”
I held my hands up, startled at the sudden and loud interruption, “Slow down, Tyler. We’re coming.”
The three of us jogged over to the surveillance room. Dan was sitting at his desk, with one earphone up to his ear, while he was writing something down. I looked at the paper that read:
‘This is Jake. Ally, if you get this, please send help as soon as possible. I, my mom, and a few other survivors we picked up are in an old farmhouse a few miles away from where your mom said the cabin would be. We’ve been surrounded for days by those things and can’t get out. Please, send help fast. We’re at 118 Greenwich Street in Desmond. I love you.’
As soon as he wrote that last sentence, he put the headphones down and explained that the message was on a loop. From what he could tell, it was recorded sometime late last night. I wasn’t sure what to make of it because I always air on the side of caution, but Dan said the kid sounded freaked out and scared.
I just knew the normalcy we had all experienced for the last few weeks couldn’t have lasted.
I got all of the adults and Allycia together. I told them what we’d just heard, and of course, Ally started freaking out, yelling that we had to go and get Jake and his family right away.
I was able to calm her down, reassuring her that we were going to come up with a plan to get them as soon as we could. I was leaving the planning part up to Chris, though.
Chris, of course, wanted to hear the message for himself to see if he could pick anything up from it. He listened to it more than ten times, and each time, with the same serious face, eyes closed and without saying a word.
I finally stopped him before he listened the eleventh time to ask him what he thought of it.
“Well, he does sound scared, but the thing that’s bothering me is that there’s no other background noise. There’s no one else talking, crying, and moving around, nothing. I take it, as either he made sure everyone was quiet, so that the message was as clear as possible, or someone made him record this message. Does Ally know if this Jake kid has prior knowledge of how to work a CB radio and could possibly know how to put the message on a loop like this?”
I didn’t know so I ran to get Ally and didn’t have to go far. She was already heading down the stairs toward me because she wanted to hear the message for herself. She said she thought he’d taken some computer programming classes where he might have learned it, but she admitted to not knowing much about the boy other than he was the quarterback for her school’s football team.
I wanted to tell Chris about the bad feeling I had, but every time I almost brought it up, I heard how stupid it sounded in my head. I knew, either way, we had to go and try to rescue Jake and anyone else that might have been with him. Plus, I was also sure that Chris would have a plan ready, just in case something went wrong. He always planned ahead.
Chris got all of the adults together, and we looked over routes to take to get to the address Jake provided. Dan was able to print out maps of the area and handed them out, along with the super-duper GPS watch doohickeys, to everyone that didn’t already have one. Dan looked up at Chris before handing me one, and Chris nodded at him. Dan gave me the watch and sat back down.
This pissed me off. Dan pretty much asked Chris’s permission for me to be able to go out with them. As far as I was concerned, this was still my house, and the decisions made about this place and what I did were for me to make. I had my little temper tantrum in my head, though.
Now was not the time to scream, ‘I am woman hear me roar!’ while Chris was doing his whole, ‘Me Tarzan you Jane,’ bit.
The plan was to pack up all the gear tonight so that everyone could get a good night’s rest, and we’d head out at dawn.
This time, there were nine of us going out on our little trip. It was Chris, Tom, Dan, Justin, my neighbor Mark Neigh, who was retired from the Air Force, Reed Fulston, who was a firefighter with Jack and Justin. Also going was Reed’s brother, Harry, who was an electrician, but he knew his way around guns reasonably well, and John Finch, who was also a firefighter with Jack and Justin. The ninth person going was little old me.
I was the only girl on an all-boy team, and I hoped they weren’t going to treat me that way. I guessed that only time would tell.
I got Tyler, Allycia, and Lance together in my room and went over what was going on for tomorrow. Lance wanted to go but understood he was needed to protect the cabin and everyone in it. With the nine of us gone, there would only be a handful of capable adults to protect the cabin and its now more than forty residents.
Lance and Chase, Dan’s son, had become pret
ty close friends, and when Lance’s friend Chester and his twin sister Tori showed up, they formed a pretty tight-knit foursome.
The teenagers practiced hand-to-hand combat daily with each other under the watchful eyes of Chris and Tom. My kids and I might have had the same bad feeling about this trip, but I knew the people we were leaving behind were capable of taking care of themselves and protecting the cabin.
We hugged each other and said our goodnights. Allycia wanted to sleep with me, and I had no objections.
She went to get ready for bed, and I got all of my gear together. I had everything laid out and prepared for tomorrow when Allycia came back. She had her teddy bear she used to drag around everywhere with her when she was young. I didn’t know she still had him, but here he was. She gave me a kiss and crawled into my bed. She was snoring lightly before I finished brushing my teeth. I needed a hot shower to calm my nerves if I was going to ever fall asleep tonight, so that’s what I did.
I was in the shower until there was almost no hot water left before I climbed into bed next to my sleeping daughter. I wasn’t sure what tomorrow was going to bring, but I knew I would do everything in my power to make sure I got everyone back to our families.
I set my alarm and listened to my daughter’s sleepy noises as I drifted off to sleep myself.
I woke up the next morning at four-thirty. It was starting to get light earlier now, so dawn was around five forty-five. I got up quietly, so I didn’t wake up Ally and took another shower. This one was colder, to wake me up.
I geared up and went to the kitchen where the eight men were murmuring, sipping coffee, and eating breakfast. I joined in on the coffee and eggs but not the conversation. I was not in a talking mood this morning. My bad feeling was worse than it was yesterday, and I guessed it was because we were leaving in a few minutes.
Yet, it very well could’ve been because something horrible was going to happen today. I didn’t want to think about it, though. I only wanted to think about rescuing Jake and his family. My only goal was to bring everyone back here, safe and sound.