by Tom Abrahams
“I’ll need some identification, sir,” replied the soldier without expression. “We need to validate your right to enter this zone.”
“I don’t have any identification,” started James. “As I was expl—”
“Sir,” interrupted the soldier, “I cannot let you enter this zone without proof you live or own a business inside this zone.”
“I don’t have any identification,” James repeated through his teeth. He felt Leigh’s hand gently squeeze his thigh. “Is there an alternative way to prove our right to be in the zone.”
“Do you have a registration for this vehicle that might show your address?” The soldier walked to the rear of the truck without awaiting a response and then returned to the window. “There are Vermont plates on this truck, sir.”
“Yes,” James began, his hands white-knuckling the steering wheel. “I can explain everything—”
“Sir.” The soldier raised his hand to stop James from speaking. “Without identification, I cannot allow you to pass into this zone. This is a primary checkpoint. If I let you through here without the proper documentation, you’ll be stopped at the next one. So—”
“Hang on, soldier.” James had long since lost his patience and his wife’s tighter grip on his thigh did nothing to restrain him. “You get me a superior. I have every right to be here. If you had any clue what we’ve been through to get to this point…to be this close to home…you’d get behind the bumper of this truck and push us there.”
“Sir.” The soldier squared his jaw. “I am the superior as far as you’re concerned. You need to turn your car around and head north, or we’ll be happy to confiscate your belongings and offer you a free, comfortable ride to the FEMA camp we have set up just the other side of the barrier.”
“You—” James started before Leigh cut him off.
“Sir?” Leigh leaned over her husband and smiled at the young man. “Could I please speak with you? I’m a little less stressed than my husband is at the moment.”
The soldier looked at Leigh, glanced back at James, the kids in the backseat of the truck, and nodded. “I’ll come to your side, ma’am. Sir, please shut off the ignition.”
James cranked the key and the truck coughed as the engine stopped. The soldier nodded and moved around the front of the truck to Leigh’s side. Her window was down.
“Yes, ma’am,” said the soldier. “You have something to add? As I’ve already told your husband, we cannot let—”
“I understand you are doing your job,” Leigh said softly. “And I can only imagine how much pressure you’re under, how tough it must be to be away from your family while guarding this gate.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The stoic soldier flinched, his eyes blinking rapidly for a moment.
“Please give me the courtesy of explaining to you our predicament”—Leigh smiled—“as I’m sure you’d want for your mother or young girlfriend.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The soldier relaxed his grip on his M16.
“We were on vacation,” Leigh began, “when whatever happened, happened. We barely survived a tsunami. And that was just the beginning.” Leigh went on to explain every last detail of the previous nine and a half days. She told the soldier her husband nearly drowned and then almost died of pneumonia. She relayed the unlikely escape from the church in Acton, Maine, and the heroic stand at Camp Driggers in Sweet Valley, Pennsylvania. She went so far as to tell him about the pandemic six years earlier and the deaths of four family members, including their eldest child.
The soldier didn’t interrupt her once. Instead, he empathized, telling Leigh about his father’s death from the Jakarta flu and how he’d been the one to take care of his mother in the weeks and months afterward. They had only each other. She was staying not far from the checkpoint. He’d brought her with him from Delaware, a restricted zone into and out of which there was virtually no migration.
“Look.” He sighed. “As I instructed your husband, if I let you through, you will be stopped at the next checkpoint and immediately sent to a FEMA camp. You’ll lose your belongings, and there is a possibility you’ll be separated from your husband.”
“So what do we do?” Leigh pleaded. “I’m praying you’ll have a workable solution to this.”
The soldier bit his lower lip and then held up his finger. “Let me see what I can do, ma’am.” He walked over to a pair of soldiers standing at the Mercedes. He pointed back at the Rockwells and the soldiers glanced at them. One of them, a sergeant, shook his head, but the soldier kept talking. The sergeant looked back at the truck again and followed the soldier to the truck.
He stopped at Leigh’s window. “Private Jorgensen tells me you’re distant relatives?” The sergeant had one eyebrow raised higher than the other.
“If that’s what Private Jorgensen says…” Leigh flashed a smile.
“We have what’s called a status exemption for the relatives of our soldiers here,” explained the sergeant. “Each of us gets two.”
Private Jorgenson looked down at his boots as the sergeant explained the particulars of the exemption. The private used one of his allowances for his mother. He was prepared to use the other for them.
“The exemption is a piece of paper,” said the sergeant. “It’s worth its weight in gold. We give you the exemption and you can travel freely across the boundaries for the zone to which it applies. You need to get into Zone Five?”
“Yes, please,” Leigh said.
“You’re awfully quiet.” The sergeant leaned on Leigh’s window, directing his comment at James.
“It’s better that way,” Leigh explained. “He tends to get frustrated in these kinds of situations.”
“Who doesn’t?” The sergeant laughed incredulously. “So, if you’re prepared to accept Private Jorgenson’s lone remaining status exemption, I’ll get you the paperwork. You’ll show it at every checkpoint connected to Zone Five. You’ll pass through.”
“We accept,” said Leigh. “Thank you.”
The sergeant nodded and walked back toward the Mercedes, disappearing around the corner. Private Jorgensen approached the window.
“You remind me of my mom.” He smiled. “She’d want me to help you.”
“Thank you, Private Jorgensen,” said Leigh. “Your mom would be proud.”
CHAPTER 56
EVENT +1 Week, 2 Days, 15:32 Hours
White Hall, Maryland
Northern Gate Alpha Checkpoint 2, Temporary Recovery Zone 5
The Rockwells approached the familiar-looking concrete barriers on Interstate 83. The line was nonexistent, with most of the traffic not passing through the first checkpoint or being diverted to a FEMA encampment in Stewartstown, Pennsylvania, on Highway 851.
James slowed to a stop and showed a pair of soldiers his status exemption. They checked the paperwork and waved them through the maze of barriers, placed like checkers to keep cars at a slow roll. It prevented drivers from speeding past any given checkpoint.
“Rock,” Leigh said, staring out the window at the barbed wire, temporary fencing, and altogether bellicose arrangement of the checkpoint, “I think we’re gonna be okay.”
“I think so,” James said, his blood pressure having dropped significantly during the slow but easy drive between New Freedom and White Hall. “You really worked your magic back there.” It was the first he’d acknowledged her successful navigation through the first checkpoint.
“Is that a ‘thank you’?” she said coyly, turning to face her husband. “If so, you’re welcome.”
“I was wrong,” James admitted. “I should’ve stayed calm. But that’s getting more difficult for me to do. I find myself…just…reacting. I don’t even think about it.”
“I get it, Rock,” Leigh said. “But everybody is on edge, right? Everybody feels the same way you do. The military, the militias, the good people, the bad…”
“That doesn’t help.” James accelerated around another barrier and then swung the wheel back to exit the checkpoint.
>
“I’m just suggesting cooler heads prevail,” Leigh stressed. “Kill them with kindness.”
“Poor choice of words, Leigh.” James looked over at his wife and then back to the highway. They were clear of the checkpoint.
“You know what I mean.” She smirked. “Speaking of which…” She turned to look at the children, assuring they were asleep. “How are you doing with everything?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” James kept his eyes straight ahead, relying on his headlights to see the road. Beyond the checkpoint, they were the only lights aside from the dim bluish glow on the horizon as they headed south. To the left, the blue blended into purple and then reddish-orange. It reminded James of the event. He’d never look at a sunrise or sunset the same way again.
“You know what I mean.” Leigh kept her voice low. “You’ve had to be strong this whole time. You’ve had to—”
“You’ve been strong too,” James interrupted. “You saved my life and kept it together when I was useless.”
“Rock.” Leigh put her hand on his shoulder. “I haven’t had to kill anyone. I know you well enough to see what’s going on behind those eyes of yours.”
“Now’s not the time.” James pushed the accelerator and adjusted his grip on the steering wheel. “We can talk about this when we get home. Once we’ve had time to process it and get back to normal.”
“Normal?” She squeezed his shoulder, massaging it gently.
“Whatever normal turns out to be.” James checked the fuel gauge. It was at a quarter of a tank. They’d burned a lot of gas sitting at the first checkpoint, but they should be good to make it home.
“I won’t nag you,” she said, dropping her hand to his leg and shifting to face forward.
“Too late.” James laughed, trying to change the mood and the subject.
“Ha!” Leigh said, slapping his thigh.
“Get some sleep,” James suggested. “We should be home in a couple of hours, assuming traffic isn’t bad once we get to College Park.” He slowed the truck, pushing hard on the brakes to swerve around a car stopped on the edge of the road. Its hazard lights were flashing but dim.
“I love you, Rock,” said Leigh, closing her eyes and folding her arms across her chest.
“I love you too,” James said, checking his speedometer. He was cruising at forty miles per hour. That was the fastest speed at which he felt comfortable driving at night. There were too many hazards, even on the highways.
As they’d driven south from Maine, the major roadways became less congested and less dangerous. There were more stalled vehicles dotting the landscape, especially near exits, and James had to pay attention for people walking in groups along the shoulder, but it was still an improvement.
He wondered what they would find when they finally pulled into their cul-de-sac. Was it the war zone he feared? Or had his neighbors done a good job of holding down their respective forts.
There were six houses encircling the cul-de-sac at the end of Fletcher Road. Each sat on pie-shaped, quarter-acre lots. They weren’t huge pieces of property, but they were plenty big.
James pulled on his high beams and considered how the neighbors might have weathered the last nine days. He knew some of them were prepared and some were not.
Moving clockwise around the circle, there were the Whistlers, Neil and Abbey, who’d lived on the street longer than anyone else. They were empty-nesters in their late fifties. He was an English professor at the University of Maryland. She sold homemade jewelry on Etsy.
Next to the Whistlers lived Grant Wood and his wife, Emma. They’d lived in the house a couple of years and had three children, all of them in elementary school. They seemed nice enough, but Leigh knew Emma better than James knew Grant.
Sonny Lawrence lived at 809 Fletcher Road. He was single. His wife died a year after the pandemic. She survived the flu, but it damaged her lungs, and she succumbed to pneumonia. Sonny was a retired police officer and a great neighbor. He was as close to being a “prepper” as there was on the street. James knew he had a wall armory in his basement, where he also stored a lot of canned goods.
Stuart and Susan Gilbert lived between Sonny Lawrence and the Rockwells. Both of them worked at the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute. James imagined they wouldn’t have much to do after the electromagnetic pulse.
On the other side of the Rockwells, in the last house on the cul-de-sac, lived Jack and Lee Pollock. They were a reclusive couple. Jack telecommuted for an energy consulting firm and Lee was a librarian. They didn’t have children. And really all James knew about them was that his Leigh spelled her name differently than Mrs. Pollock and that Jack religiously walked five miles every morning.
James couldn’t wait to be home. He checked the speedometer and pushed harder on the gas pedal. He set the cruise control at forty-five miles per hour.
CHAPTER 57
EVENT +1 Week, 2 Days, 17:16 Hours
College Park, Maryland
Temporary Recovery Zone 5
The reddish-orange glow pulsating on the horizon was the first indication all was not well in College Park. The farther south the Rockwells traveled on US 1, the more they could see of the black smoke pluming skyward. The belly of the smoke plumes were singed red and orange. Whatever was burning was fully engulfed.
“Is that the university?” Leigh asked James. “It looks like the fire is right there on campus.”
“I think you’re right.” James was looking southwest, to the left of US 1 as it cut through College Park on its way to Washington, DC. “That’s the campus.”
James took the exit, heading west, onto Highway 193. They’d drive along the University of Maryland’s western edge, right by the campus golf course, on the way to their neighborhood.
“Dad,” Max piped from the backseat, “this doesn’t look like home.”
“Can we camp out too?” Sloane pressed her face and fingers against the glass, looking at the tents dotting the golf course to their right.
They were alit by trash cans doubling as bonfires. There were at least a dozen of the fire cans, people huddled around each of them. It looked like a scene from a depression-era film reel, but in living color.
“I don’t think so,” said James. “We’re much better off being in our own home, in our own bed.”
“Mmmm.” Leigh closed her eyes and pressed her lips into a cheeky smile. “That sounds amazing. Doesn’t it, kids? Our own beds?”
The children agreed with their mother. James was too focused on the road ahead to have heard her. In the dark, and without any lighting other than the pale yellow beams from the truck, it was difficult to navigate even what were familiar roads just two weeks earlier.
“You okay, Rock?” asked Leigh.
“Yeah.” He nodded, vaguely aware of her question. “Just concentrating.”
“We’re almost there,” she reminded him.
James didn’t respond. He leaned forward in his seat, both hands on the wheel as he turned left and accelerated onto Adelphi Road.
Adelphi was lined with trees; the streets branching off into small enclaves were dark. James had no sense of how the neighborhood surrounding his had fared.
“I wish we were getting home in the daylight,” said Max.
“Me too,” echoed Sloane, gripping her stuffed bear, Noodle. “I can’t see anything. It’s too dark.”
“Me three,” said Leigh. “It’s totally different with the streetlights working. I would have thought we’d have power by now, being so far south.”
“I didn’t,” James admitted. He’d privately held his belief much of the country, or at least the Eastern Seaboard, was dark. An electromagnetic pulse, or pulses, was the culprit. He was sure of it. And while he knew the EMP couldn’t account for the tsunami they’d survived on Peaks Island, Maine, he was sure it was a central part of whatever had imploded their world on the final day of a summer getaway.
“There’s your school, Dad.” Max pointed across his sister
as they passed the sprawling parking lot of Northwestern High School to their right. “It’s dark too.”
James glanced to the dark, open expanse between clumps of tall evergreens and oaks. He’d worked at Northwestern for ten years and was a proud Wildcat. He loved most of the twenty-two hundred students, and enjoyed telling people he worked at the same school where Kermit the Frog was born. Jim Henson, the Muppets’ creator, attended Northwestern in the early 1950s. He knew more than ever, as he reconciled the likely end of that career, at least for the time being, it wasn’t easy being green.
James turned left onto Underwood and into the tangled web of shaded streets that made up University Park. They didn’t technically live in College Park. Their address was University Park, but they typically told people College Park. It was more familiar because of the university.
James slowed the truck as they wound their way closer to home. A left, another right, and a final left put the Rockwells on Fletcher Road. James could feel the sledgehammer of his pulse in his neck. The closer they got to the end of the street, the more apprehensive he felt.
“The homes look okay,” Leigh offered. “I mean, from what little I can see. There are no fires. No burning trash cans. That’s good, right?”
“Right.” James knew his wife wanted reassurance more than anything. “I think everything looks good so far.” He neared the cul-de-sac and slowed to make his way to the right, past the Pollocks’ house.
“We’re home!” Sloane exclaimed as her father pulled into the driveway at 819 Fletcher. Their house, a tasteful blend of white HardiePlank siding and faded red brick, sat patiently at the end of their driveway. Nobody responded to the nine-year-old’s cheer. Something was wrong.
There was a small Chevy Camaro at the end of the driveway, close to the single, double-bay garage door. It had West Virginia plates. James felt the sweat on his palms against the wheel as he noticed a faint glow emanating from an upstairs bedroom. It danced against the window as would candlelight.