The Julian Year

by Gregory Lamberson

  “Turn around and head back the way you came,” one soldier said.

  Stopping, Weizak raised one hand palm out and used the other to hold up his ID. “I’m a reporter for the Daily Post.”

  “Turn around and head back the way you came.”

  “Have you heard of freedom of the press? This is the United States, not Iran.”

  The soldier aimed his M4 at Weizak’s head. “This is your last warning.”

  Lowering his hands, Weizak turned and walked away.

  Anibal entered his apartment in a panic. “Jasmine!”

  No one answered him.

  “Jazzy? Juan?”

  He moved from room to room, searching for his family but finding only silence.

  Two suitcases had been removed from the closet.

  They were both gone. Jasmine had gone underground and taken Juan with her.

  Anibal slumped onto the sofa. A minute passed before the tears came.

  Cathy walked out of the kitchen when Weizak closed his apartment door behind him.

  “Hi,” he said, conscious of the surprise in his tone.

  “You don’t mind, do you? I mean, you gave me a key.”

  “No, I don’t mind.” He just hadn’t expected her to use it so soon.

  She kissed him. “I’m cooking dinner.”

  “Terrific, thanks.” He took off his coat and hung it in the closet.

  “How was your day?”

  The level of domesticity in the conversation felt awkward to him. “As strange as you expect. How about yours?”

  She shrugged. “They’re closing down the medical office where I work. The partners want to get out of town.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it. They’re still going to have to practice wherever they end up.”

  “That doesn’t help me, though. I want to stay here.”

  “You’d better find a job fast. They’re drafting people for the armed services and the NPF.”

  “I know but there are a lot of jobs out there.”

  Weizak smiled. “Unemployment has never been lower.”

  He took a shower and they ate dinner. Then they watched TV and went to bed.

  After sex, Cathy stroked his chest. “How would you feel about me moving in?”

  He didn’t love her, but he didn’t want to spend his last days alone, either. Maybe I can learn to love her. “Sure, why not?”

  Part IV

  I Am the Last Omega Woman on Earth

  “Good morning. You’re one day closer to the end of the world. You have been warned.”

  —ad for The Omen

  Thirty-five

  May 18

  Rachel awoke with light in her eyes. Not sunlight but fluorescent light from the fixture centered in the stucco ceiling of her bedroom. Blinking, she felt fatigue. Once again she had battled insomnia, and when at last she had managed to sleep, she dreamed of red eyes. But the dream had not awoken her, so she didn’t consider it a nightmare, and she thought that was a step forward.

  She remained on her back for several minutes until her alarm went off—she liked to give the rising “sun” a chance to awaken her before the piercing alarm—and then she got out of bed and put on her Lycra running suit.

  In her living room, drapes hung over the spot in the wall where a window would have been in a real apartment. The unit was smaller than the one she had stayed in at Shady Trees, but she didn’t complain. She didn’t need a lot of room and didn’t expect to anytime soon. Only because of her late arrival and the availability of a new apartment had she been spared the irritation of a roommate.

  Some families had already formed, comprised of men and women who felt an attraction to each other and an obligation to care for the children among them. Rachel had no intention of hooking up with a man or raising any children in the foreseeable future. She felt she had missed an opportunity for true love with Morelli, the timing hadn’t been right for Ethridge, and she gave very little thought to Weizak, although she missed reading The Julian Year.

  Rachel put on her running shoes, then set one heel on her dining table and stretched her leg, arm, and back muscles. After cracking her neck in each direction, she snatched her key card from the table and hurried out the door.

  She began with a light jog down the carpeted corridor, which was lined with doors to other apartments. She had learned during her orientation that the sanctuary had been designed so that three levels’ worth of units could be built above the existing ones in the future. The February 29 survivors needed to become builders if they planned to reproduce, and wasn’t that the whole point?

  Breaking into a run, she passed a police officer with his hand resting on the butt of his Glock. She wondered if he had been a real cop aboveground or if he just played one in the catacombs.

  Rachel circled the concourse, with a ceiling as high as a high school gymnasium. Several makeshift shops were already operating, with room for plenty more. The combination of a fountain with a waterfall in the center and gentle air-conditioning created a pleasant enough environment. The track circled the shopping area, and as she increased her speed, she saw another police officer ahead.

  The cop waved and she waved back.

  May 19

  Sitting at his squad room desk, Larry sipped his first coffee of the day and listened to Anibal arguing on his landline in Spanish.

  “Tu hija se va a morir!” He slammed the phone down in its cradle.

  Larry knew enough Spanish to understand that Anibal had just told someone their daughter was going to die.

  Shaking his head, Anibal sighed. “My mother-in-law. She knows where Jasmine and Juan are, but she won’t say. Today’s Juan’s birthday. He was born at 9:15 a.m. I know because I delivered him myself right in our bedroom.”

  “That must have been an awesome feeling.”

  “It was the most amazing moment of my life.” He glanced at his watch. “In a little over an hour, my boy is going to turn into something unholy. I want to hold him and kiss him and tell him I love him and say good-bye to him, but my wife stole that from me. In a little over an hour, he’s going to try to kill her.” His voice cracked. “I don’t want that to happen.”

  “So what are you doing here, partner? Take a personal day and go look for them.”

  Anibal took a deep breath. “Anytime I approach my in-laws in person, they call the cops. I can’t get anywhere near them. Yesterday I spent four hours down at Homeland Security because we didn’t get Juan to detention. Jasmine’s got two months left. I got four. That’s a long time to carry around what’s going to happen.”

  “It sucks your in-laws aren’t cooperating. They seemed like good people at that party I went to.”

  Anibal didn’t meet his gaze. “Everyone’s acting out these days, especially when it comes to family members.”

  “I don’t have that problem.” Larry’s father refused to speak to him; his mother had died two years earlier.

  “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry about that. It’s not too late for you and your old man.”

  “Where was that party, anyway? On the Grand Concourse, right?”

  “Yeah, 1049. I’ll be right back.” Anibal rose and wandered into the corridor leading to the bathrooms.

  Larry jumped to his feet and strode past half a dozen soldiers standing around the coffeemaker and entered Lugones’s office. “Captain?”

  Lugones looked up. “Knocking is still appropriate.”

  Larry jerked a thumb behind him. “Today is Rivera’s kid’s birthday.”

  “The one who went underground? I didn’t get a notification about it.”

  “He’s acting strange. You gotta keep him off the street.”

  “I’ll send him home. He shouldn’t be here anyway.”

  Larry raised both hands. “No, he’s better off here. Just find something to keep him busy. I’ve got an idea on how to find out where his old lady’s holed up with the kid. It’s better if I find them than him.”

  “Does your hunch involve this precinc
t?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Then I’m reluctant to grant your request.”

  “Once the kid turns into a Regan MacNeil, it won’t matter what precinct they’re in, does it? I’ve only got an hour.”

  “Good hunting.”

  Running a few red lights, it took Larry thirty minutes to reach the Grand Concourse in the Bronx. Uptown, where greater space allowed, he saw more Humvees on the street.

  Half an hour, he thought as he got out of the Cavalier.

  Crossing the wide, inclined street to the blocky building, he spotted a police cruiser parked at the curb and several soldiers standing along the concrete wall. At the corner, he passed a trio of teenage boys who moved out of his way and allowed him to enter. Inside the deep lobby, he ran a finger along the cloudy glass covering the tenants’ directory. His finger stopped on Figueroa, 5D.

  He sprinted across the lobby, his rubber-soled shoes slapping the tiled floor, and took the stairs two at a time. Five flights!

  He passed kids in the hallways, doors through which music seeped, and a man walking his pit bull. When he reached the fifth floor, he collected his breath before knocking on the appropriate door.

  Inside the apartment, music cut off. The glass peephole darkened, and the person on the other side slid and turned locks. Within seconds, Miriam Figueroa stood before him and he saw recognition in her eyes.

  “Good morning, Mrs. Figueroa. I’m sorry to bother you, but I think you know why I’m here.”

  “We told the police that Anibal was harassing us, and they told him to stay away and leave us alone. Now you come.”

  “Yes, ma’am, I understand, and I don’t want to disturb you. I don’t know what Anibal said or did. I just know this: in twenty minutes, Juan is going to be possessed. He’ll stop existing, and something evil will live in his body. I know you love him, but I know you love Jasmine too, and she’s in danger.”

  Miriam’s eyes turned sad. “I’m not stupid. I’ve seen what happens. We’ve lost members of our family already. But Jasmine is Juan’s mother. If she wants to hold him in her arms when he changes, it’s her business. She’ll die in two months anyway; maybe this way she dies a mother. A woman shouldn’t live longer than her children.”

  Larry thought briefly of his mother, who had died from lung cancer. “I understand how you’re feeling. Anibal is beside himself. He’s worried about Juan and Jasmine. So am I. I think of them like family. Something horrible is going to happen to your daughter if I don’t reach her in time. Please don’t let this happen; I’m begging you. This morning you feel like you’re doing the right thing. Tomorrow, or even in a few hours, you might feel differently. Parents know better than their children, don’t they?”

  Miriam swallowed, her eyes shining. “I promised my daughter . . .”

  He had almost broken down the wall of her resolve. “Are you religious, ma’am?”

  She nodded.

  “Catholic?”

  “Sí.”

  “Then you know that suicide is a sin. By willingly allowing Juan to kill her, Jasmine is risking her soul. How can you weigh two months of grieving against an eternity of damnation?”

  A muscle in the old woman’s cheek leapt, and she lowered her head, fighting back tears.

  “I can save your daughter, but you have to tell me where she is.”

  When she looked up, tears streamed down her cheeks. “There’s an abandoned building on 175th Street. People who have gone underground hide out there.”

  Larry’s heart quickened. “On the concourse?”

  She nodded. “You’ll know it by the graffiti on the outside: murals of singers who have died since the tribulation began.”

  Running downstairs, Larry glanced at his cell phone: fifteen minutes to go. His footsteps echoed through the lobby, and he stormed outside and across the street. Unlocking his car door, he threw himself inside the vehicle, fumbled with his keys, and switched on the engine. Ignoring the soldiers on the sidewalk, he made a U-turn and got back onto the concourse.

  Within a minute he found himself stuck behind a slow-moving military convoy.

  Jasmine paced the living room while Juan sat on the sofa, playing a video game. Extension cords crisscrossed the floors, providing electricity to the flat. She had sterilized the apartment and furniture as best she could and had bought some decorations to make it feel like a real home.

  She purchased water from a vendor who went from door to door in the building each day and boiled it on the electric stove for cooking, laundry, and baths in a claw-foot tub that seemed to have been relocated to the cramped bathroom from a larger one somewhere else. The vendor resembled a crackhead but the water seemed clean.

  They had spent the entire month indoors, reading and playing. She missed Anibal, and Juan cried for him, but she knew she had to hide her boy to protect him, especially after what had happened to Julio.

  Goddamn President Rhodes to hell.

  He had no right to do what he did. How could he have known for sure Julio would have been possessed? It wasn’t fair. Millions of Americans executed. Innocent Americans, she bet.

  Reaching into her handbag, she took out her cell phone, a disposable model her mother had purchased for her from a corner store. She had bought the account herself from another emaciated door-to-door salesman. The black market thrived thanks to desperate people who went underground for a chance to live. Switching on the phone, she experienced an internal jolt as she saw the time—9:09 a.m.

  Six minutes.

  Her hand shook as she set the cell phone back in her bag. “Juan, turn off the game and come here, baby.”

  Ever obedient, the nine-year-old switched off his game and stood before his mother. He had worn the same sad expression ever since his parents had returned home without Julio. “What is it?”

  Jasmine sat on the sofa. She had been unable to remove the stains from the fabric. Setting her hands on her son’s shoulders, she looked him in the eye. “You know I love you, right?”

  Juan nodded.

  “Then I want you to sit with me. I just want to hold you.” She guided him onto her lap and kissed his forehead.

  “I want to go home. I miss Daddy.”

  She cradled him in her arms. “I know you do, sweetie. We’ll see him soon.”

  She promised herself that she would not cry, that she would be strong for her son. She would pray for his soul; she would will him to remain himself. And if she needed it, she had Anibal’s off-duty, snub-nose .38 revolver in her bag.

  Larry aimed his vehicle between the two lanes of military traffic heading in the same direction and floored the gas. The Cavalier raced forward with a foot to spare on either side; he could have reached outside his window and touched the green metal monsters. He had considered setting his portable siren on the roof but didn’t want to warn the other occupants in Jasmine’s building that a cop was en route.

  The driver of a troop transport on his right honked its horn, and he was unprepared for the deafening blast, which sounded more like the horn on a cruise ship. The sound so unnerved him that he wavered in his trajectory, and the Cavalier’s side mirror on the driver’s side vanished in a soft explosion of sparks. Correcting his path, he honked his own horn in a staccato burst that he doubted the driver even heard.

  Trapped between the vehicles, Larry couldn’t see the tall buildings beyond them. Then he cleared the front trucks, and the concourse came back into view. He decelerated when he spotted an old building at the corner covered in a mosaic of colors that formed portraits of singers who had died over the previous four months. Jerking his steering wheel to the left, he cut across the traffic and saw a soldier gripping an M16A flinch at the sound of squealing tires. He pulled over to the curb in front of the building and hopped out, then waved his shield in the air so the soldier could see it from across the street.

  He leapt over the front step and opened the door, then stumbled into the foyer. The inside door was locked. Drawing his Glock, he smashed one
of the small glass panes in the door, reached inside with his other hand, and opened the door from the inside.

  As he entered the lobby, a muscle-bound Hispanic man at the desk reached for a shotgun leaning against the wall.

  Larry aimed his gun at the man. “Don’t think that I won’t shoot to kill.”

  The man hesitated, his fingers inches from the shotgun’s barrel.

  “Step away from that weapon.”

  The man eased away from the desk.

  Larry released his grip on the gun with one hand to take out a pair of handcuffs, which he tossed onto the floor. “Cuff yourself.”

  Eyeing Larry’s Glock, the man leaned forward, took the bracelets, then handcuffed his wrists before him.

  Returning his hand to the Glock, Larry moved forward. “I’m looking for Jasmine Rivera.”

  “We don’t ask names here.”

  Larry wanted to split the man’s skull open. “Foxy Puerto Rican lady with a nine-year-old son.”

  “Apartment 3D.”

  “March outside with your hands held high.”

  “You buggin’.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t give you a chance.” Larry pistol-whipped the man, who sank to his knees, then pitched forward, his face crashing to the floor.

  Larry raced up the stairs without checking the time; every second counted. He didn’t see another sentry on the second floor, but halfway up the next flight of steps a Dominican man whose wifebeater left his tattooed arms exposed stepped to the edge of the stairs, a gleaming silver .45 in one hand.

  Larry brought his Glock up even as he slowed his ascent. The Dominican raised his gun, and Larry drilled him in the chest. The man took a step backward, dropped his gun, then fell forward. Larry thought he heard the sound of teeth shattering as the man slid headfirst down the stairs, passing him like driftwood in a river.

  Reaching the third floor, Larry scooped up the .45, which he jammed into his waistband, then allowed his Glock to lead him to apartment 3D like a divining rod. There was no knob on the door; scavengers had probably removed it for scrap. He opened the door a few inches, but a chain lock held it back. Drawing one knee to his chest, he kicked the door, which flew open amid the sound of splintering wood.