by Byron Tucker
“Bring her in. We have limited power and almost no supplies left, but I'll see what I can do.”
Experiencing a tremendous surge of relief and hope, Sam darted out to the motorhome, shouting at his wife as he bounded up the steps inside the door. “Come on, Irene. I've found a doctor. Let's get her inside.”
Jimmy's Journal Entry, December 22nd, 2019
If it's not one thing, it's another. If you look at it one way, we're surfing on a tidal wave of luck, escaping one close call after another, but on the other hand, we can't catch a break either. As I write this, it's like two or three in the morning, and the three of us are sitting in the waiting room of a nearly abandoned hospital, hoping and praying that Eliza will be able to pull through. When we pulled in just after it got dark, we were thrilled that we were able to find a doctor that was able to help my sister, but almost as soon as we brought her into the doctor's exam room, he informed us that she's quite ill, and that he was going to have to run IVs into her, as well as giving her a bunch of medicines.
That was about eight hours ago, and we haven't heard a peep from the doctor since. Mom keeps wanting to check on her, but Dad is making her stay out in the waiting room. The good thing is that a nurse came by earlier in the evening offering a bowl of soup for each of us, which we were tremendously grateful for, as we were super, super hungry, especially me. The bummer about the soup though, it's done nothing to stem my appetite, and I've been poking around looking for any scrap of food I can find, like a stray candy bar inside of a smashed vending machine, but there's not even a crumb to be had.
But yeah, the big concern is Eliza. I know the doctor is doing all he can for her, and we're extremely glad we were able to find help, but we can't help but to fear that it may have been too late. We tried finding some help for her before we rescued Dad from the military compound, but the hospital up there was closed up tight with chains on the doors and everything. We didn't freak out so much then, as Eliza wasn't doing so bad, but ever since we were able to find Dad and get back on the road again, she's gone from bad to worse. So yeah, that sucks pretty bad. At least we're in a safe, comfy spot for the night, as the nurse told us that the looters have pretty much moved on, now that the food's gone. She also told us that the military from the Coalition came through the day before and took away a bunch of volunteers, a “fight for food” sorta deal. I sure hope they don't come through again while we're still here, as we need to get to Mobile ASAP. The ship is scheduled to dock later today or tomorrow, and we need to be ready to board that boat as soon as it does, so we don't get bumped by other refugees. Dad says that not too many other people have as much gold as we have to offer, but I still think we'd better be on that dock when the ship comes in. Good thing we know what it's called (Coronith) so we know what to look for once we get down there. I've figured out that it's about 275 miles from here to Mobile, and we may not have enough gas to make it, since using the snowplow is cutting into our mileage.
About an hour ago, I got the idea to get a couple Jerry cans and the siphon hose and get some gas from abandoned cars out in the parking lot. When I told Dad of this, he said, no, let's wait until we see how Eliza's doing, but that's stupid, as we need to do what we can to get gas now, so when we're ready to roll, we can just hit the road and drive to Mobile nonstop. I'm going to insist on driving again too, as I can make better time than Dad will.
I'm going to stop writing now, as I see that both my parents have nodded off. Hopefully they'll stay asleep for a while, as I'm going to go ahead and find some gas for the motorhome, even if it's only like fifteen or twenty gallons. I've gotta do something anyhow, the waiting is about to kill me.
Chapter 32
“Mr. Durant?”
Sam sat up, turning in the direction of the voice. It was the balding doctor, looking even more haggard than he did earlier. Irene was asleep nearby, but he wasn't ready to wake her yet. Jimmy was nowhere to be seen, but he couldn't worry about him yet. “Yes. How's Eliza?”
The man sat down in a chair in front of him, looking as if he could fall asleep at any moment. “Well, it's a good news / bad news situation. The good news is that I've been able to get her stabilized, with her fever knocked down and her breathing stable. However, she's got a case of classic pneumonia and needs to be kept on an extensive course of antibiotics. If this was a normal situation, I'd expect a fairly quick recovery, but as you can see –” he took a moment to wave his hands around him, “– this is not a typical situation. Believe it or not, I am the only person left working in this entire hospital, and I've been up for two and a half days straight, and I'm in desperate need of some rest. I'm going to ask you, do you have any place that you're going?”
Sam swallowed the dry lump in his throat. “Yes, we do, actually. We're headed to Mobile, where we're scheduled to catch a boat that'll take us to Costa Rica.”
The doctor seemed disbelieving at first, but then he said, “I certainly wish you the best of luck with that, since this country is a lost cause. Whatever little aid we've been getting is all being diverted to this dammed war with Texas, which is an incredibly stupid thing to do. Whatever food they may have over there will surely be exhausted as quickly as it has been here.”
Fearing that the doctor was straying from talking about his daughter, Sam asked, “What do you propose we do with Eliza, then? Are you not able to keep her here any longer?”
He shook his head slowly. “I'm sorry. I've done all I can, and the generator is about to run out of fuel at any moment. We have almost no food left, and if the military comes through here again, I'll surely be drafted for the war. What I can do is give you an IV kit and enough solution to complete this course of antibiotics, so if you can find a way to keep her stable, she should be okay for the time being. Just do your best to keep her warm and hydrated, and I have a couple extra packs of soup mix you can give her as well. But I'm going to have to ask you to take her now.”
Sam looked around him again, wondering where Jimmy was. He'd ordered him to stay within sight, but he was probably on the hunt for food. Irene stirred awake, visibly surprised by the doctor's presence.
“Is she okay?” She asked without preamble.
Sam looked at her and said, “Yes, but we're going to have to take her now. The doctor's exhausted and there's nobody left here but him. Will you go with him to get Eliza while I look for Jimmy?”
“Okay.” She stood up, wiping the sleep from her eyes as the doctor urged her to follow him down the hall.
Sam walked briskly to the entrance, held the door open and shouted, “Jimmy! Where are you?”
Much to his relief, he got a response almost immediately. Jimmy came walking around the rear of the motorhome. “I've gotten four cans' worth of gas from the cars in the parking lot and dumped it into onto the tank. I'm thinking that's enough to get us to Mobile with some to spare.”
Rather than be angry at him, he felt relieved at the possibility of having one less thing to worry about. “Good, since we're being kicked out.”
“How's Eliza?” he asked with a note of concern.
“Better, but we're going to have to keep her on IVs for a while. Mom's getting her now.”
“But is he giving us enough meds for her?”
“I think so, along with some soup. But that's for her, not for you, okay?”
Jimmy nodded reluctantly. “Yes, I understand. Let me get the motorhome started so I can get the inside heated up a bit.”
“Good, you do that while I help Mom bring Eliza out.”
Sam jogged back inside, greeted by the sight of Irene carrying their fragile-looking daughter in her arms. “Irene, let me have her.”
As soon as he had Eliza in his arms, Irene said, “I'll get the supplies. Please give me some of the cash, I want to be able to pay him.”
Sam laughed, despite the situation. “That's probably the last thing he cares about right now. I'll get Eliza comfortable, you get whatever supplies you can from the doctor.”
Sam carried his
still-sleeping daughter out to the motorhome, grateful that the door was standing wide open. Just after he set her down on the couch inside, Eliza woke up and said, “Where are we, Daddy?”
Sam smiled, taking this as a sign that she really was getting better. Carefully holding up the IV bag as he pulled a blanket over her, he said, “Somewhere in Mississippi. The doctor says you'll be okay enough for us to hit the road again. We'll be in Mobile in no time, honey.”
“We sure will,” Jimmy shouted from the driver's seat. “Even at thirty-five miles per hour, we'll be there in eight hours.”
Just then, Irene appeared, her arms full of medical supplies and a metal IV stand. “He's written down the instructions of what to do, but he insists that we're not safe here and we should get going immediately.”
Apparently taking that a cue to get moving, Jimmy said, “Pull the door shut, we're getting outta here.”
When Irene got the door closed behind her, the motorhome started moving as Jimmy gunned the motor.
“Whoa, who said you can drive?” Sam shouted.
“I did. And you guys better hold on, as I see some vehicles coming down the street.”
The motorhome rocked violently while Sam struggled to get into the passenger seat. He wasn't happy about Jimmy taking the wheel again, but that was a battle he could fight later. The last thing they needed right now was to have a run-in with bandits, or worse, the military. If they had some sort of APB out on them...
“Damn, it's a whole convoy!” Jimmy shouted, pointing to the left. “I know exactly where to go, so just hold on.”
Sam waved his hands to try and get him to stop. “You can't let them see us.”
“Too late for that now.”
The engine grumbled as the motorhome bumped over unseen obstacles buried in the snow, rolling over a hedge and a small fence before coming out onto the street, going in the opposite direction of a long line of military vehicles rumbling down the street. The ungainly vehicle finally picked up speed. Gunshots rang out, and some of the bullets buried themselves into the skin of the motorhome. Irene let out a terrified shout while Jimmy continued to accelerate, running up on the sidewalk when a Humvee pulled out directly in front of them. Miraculously, an on-ramp appeared, leading to Highway 45 South. Jimmy took the ramp at top speed, nearly rocking the motorhome over on its left wheels.
“Slow down, Jimmy. You'll get us killed.”
Jimmy didn't answer, wheeling the motorhome onto the expressway heading south, the back end fishtailing in the snow. After a couple of minutes of watching the plow scraping the snow off the road, Sam dared to take a look in the rear-view mirrors. A pair of headlights was gaining on them. “There's somebody behind us.”
“I don't think it's military,” Jimmy said. “I think they're trying to escape like us.”
“Hope you're right, since we have no way of defending ourselves.”
“Oh, I ain't stopping until we get to Mobile. I'll run them off the road if I have to.”
Sam took another glance at the mirror, relieved to see that the vehicle was no longer gaining on them. His son was right; it looked like an ordinary pickup truck. Looking back over at him, he said, “You're doing great. We'll switch later on, but I think we've got things under control at the moment.”
Jimmy glanced at him, a smile breaking the grim determination he'd been wearing.
Maybe there's hope after all, Sam thought, watching his wife holding on to his daughter, doing her best to keep her comfortable.
Two hours and some eighty miles later, dawn broke, and the amount of snow on the road decreased to a layer thin enough not to require the use of a plow. Jimmy increased the speed from thirty-five to forty and eventually up to sixty, chewing up a mile every minute. Whatever vehicle that'd been following them was no longer in sight, so Sam said, “I think it's time to switch places. You've got to be exhausted.”
Jimmy shook his head steadfastly. “Me, exhausted? I'm running on rocket fuel right now.” He pushed the motorhome to an even higher speed. “I'm doing just fine here. How's Eliza doing back there?”
Sam looked behind him, and saw both her and Irene were curled up on the couch, sleeping. “Just fine, I think. I'll let you keep driving, but the minute you start to feel tired, we're switching places.”
“At this rate, we'll be in Mobile in a little over three hours. I'll not be getting tired before then.”
Sam tumbled the words three hours in his mind a few times, wondering if it was really possible that this ordeal could be over in such a short span of time. He also couldn't help but worry about what they would find once they got to Mobile. In all likelihood, there would be no ship waiting to take them to the promised land of Costa Rica, which meant they would have to search for food and shelter. There was Florida of course, but Sam knew his brother would be right about what he would find there, a “sea of destitution,” as he had put it.
Perhaps it was time to do a bit more praying, since that seemed to be their last and only hope to get where they needed to go. The motorhome continued to rumble down the empty highway at sixty-five miles per hour. Sam closed his eyes in quiet meditation.
Chapter 33
The sound of the horn blaring amid Jimmy uttering a string of curses jolted Sam awake while the motorhome shuddered to a stop. Looking ahead, he could see a line of cars blocking the two-lane highway in front of them with a group of armed men moving in front of them.
For once, Jimmy didn't seem sure of what to do. “Should we try to bribe them with gold, Dad?”
Watching several of the men approaching the vehicle, waving their guns menacingly, he said, “No, they want food, and we have none to give them. Get us out of here.”
“Sure thing, Dad.”
The rear wheels bit into the snow as Jimmy put it in reverse, pressing the pedal down to the floor. Several of the men raised their guns to shoot. “Faster, Jimmy. They're going to shoot us.”
As Jimmy accelerated in reverse, the men began shooting at the motorhome, although the bullets didn't penetrate the Plexiglas shielding covering the windshield. More worrisome, however, were the couple of large pickups coming up on their rear, threatening to block them in. “We've got people behind us,” Sam shouted.
“Yeah, I know.” Jimmy slammed on the brakes and put it into drive, stomping on the gas to go forward.
“What in the hell are you doing?”
“Hold on, I'm going to ram these assholes.”
Sam stared out the front as they approached the blockade, the shielding becoming increasingly pockmarked as the men continued to fire at them. Only at the very last second did the men leap out of the way, the plow slamming into one of the cars with a terrific crash, slinging it out of the way like a kicked soccer ball. Unfazed by the collision in the midst of his mother letting out a couple of ear-piercing screams, Jimmy accelerated down the highway, quickly surpassing sixty.
Sam glanced at his right-side mirror, spotting at least two vehicles giving chase. “They're coming after us.”
“Yeah, I know. When they get closer, I'll take care of them.”
How? He found out a few seconds later when one of the vehicles approached the motorhome from behind. Jimmy slammed on the brakes without warning, causing the pickup to slam into the back of the motorhome, eliciting additional screams from Irene. However, the trick seemed to work, with the second vehicle behind the pickup crashing into it, disabling them both.
“I think I've got them,” Jimmy said. “They should have known better than to mess with this rolling fortress.”
For long moments, Sam studied the rear-view mirror, finally letting out the breath he'd been holding when no additional vehicles could be seen chasing after them. “Looks like we're okay now. That sure was a close call, though.”
Jimmy glanced over at his father, smiling. “Nah, I knew we could blast through there.”
Sam looked at the snow-covered woods streaming by and asked, “Where are we anyhow?”
“Less than forty miles from
Mobile. We should be at the port in forty-five minutes if we don't run into trouble.”
Forty-five minutes. And what then? “I sure hope that boat is there waiting for us.”
“Yeah, no kidding. I don't know where else we'd be able to go if the Coronith isn't there.” Jimmy pointed at the pile of atlases lying on the floor next to Sam's seat. “Grab the one for Alabama and look up Mobile. I need for you to guide me to the port.”
Sam thumbed to the page showing the city of Mobile and studied it for a moment. Thankfully, it appeared that the docks were located in an easy-to-reach area very near the downtown. “Jimmy?”
“Yes?”
“When you get to Interstate 65, hop on that going northbound, and then take I-165 into town. That should take us right to the docks.”
Jimmy stared straight ahead while the motorhome shuddered and shimmied on the snow-covered roadway. “Yeah, I'll do that. But keep that thing handy if we have to take another route.”
Sam turned in his seat to look back at his wife and daughter, who were holding on to each other as they sat on the couch. “Are you guys okay?”
Looking at him with a tear-streaked face, Irene said, “We're okay, but I don't know how much more of this we can take.”
“It's just a few more miles, honey. I have a feeling we won't have any problems getting to the docks. Is Eliza doing okay?”
Irene took a moment to look at their daughter before replying. “She's still pale, but I think her fever's gone down. I should give her some soup, though.”
“Yes, do that. It'll keep her strength up.”
“I'm not that hungry, Daddy,” Eliza said in a weak voice.
“But you need to eat so you can get well.”
Jimmy said, “I'll have whatever Eliza doesn't want though.”
Sam looked at his son with a horrified expression. “No, that soup is for her and her only.”
“But I'm starving, Dad.”