Virulent: The Release

by Shelbi Wescott

  “That’s right. Your family was going somewhere really far away, right? Some place in Africa? I heard about that.”

  “Kinda. Near Madagascar.”

  “Why?” Grant asked.

  Lucy flipped through more pages. Flip, scan. Flip, scan. “My dad was leading a team that had some major breakthrough at work. And he’d worked without a vacation for like three years. So, the company got him this trip. I think my dad picked the destination. He had written some report or something about the island a long time ago...they said they’d send him anywhere.”

  “Nice,” Grant replied. Then he opened his eyes and grimaced. “I mean—that would’ve been nice...it still sounds nice.”

  “It’s okay,” she stopped him from saying more. Let him off the hook. “It was nice.” She paused. “So, did you like it?”

  “What?”

  “The book.”

  Grant nodded. “Yeah, sure. I still remember, you know, we read it in class and our teacher, Ms. Houshmand, had this one quote written on the board for the whole unit and I just stared at it. I don’t remember what it said exactly…but something about infiltrating people’s brains or souls. Or something like that. It was up there, like a command.”

  Lucy didn’t say anything for a second and then in reply she repeated the quote back to him, trying to make sense of it. “Huh,” she shook her head. “That’s funny.”

  Grant raised an eyebrow incredulously.

  “I mean,” Lucy plopped the book on the ground. “I get it, you want control and so you limit what people think. But...look at us,” she motioned around the room, “someone out there found a different way. Infiltrate our bodies.”

  He let the phrase linger and then nodded, “Maybe you want absolute power, but you know you can’t control the people.”

  “Destroy the people,” Lucy finished.

  “Are we ever going to be safe?” Grant asked.

  “No,” Lucy answered.

  Someday people would wonder what the world was like before. Someday people would dream of a world free from the memories of bioterrorism, death, and fear.

  Life would never be the same.

  This was the new world.

  Salem didn’t return right away. They gave her space and time; they set her rationed lunch outside the journalism door and knocked and then retreated. But an hour later her corn nuts and peanut butter and jelly were still sitting there and she hadn’t made an attempt to come back to the room. While it wasn’t completely strange for Salem to allow a perceived wrong to fester, Lucy was usually the one who had to crawl back to her with an apology—deserved or not—and this typed of prolonged nonappearance was unusual. Salem needed to make her dramatic exits, needed the weight of her absence to be felt by everyone, and then she waltzed back in, accepted apologies, and went on with life as if nothing had happened.

  She was the quintessential drama-queen, still trying to cause a scene in a world with a dwindling population.

  It was aggravating to be her best friend sometimes with her sense of self-entitlement and her lack of self-awareness. It grated on Lucy. But Salem’s quirks notwithstanding, she was a good friend. A great friend, even. Sacrificial. Supportive. Fun. It was true Salem’s inflated ego caused problems, but she at least had inflated opinions of her friends too. If Lucy needed someone to go to bat for her, Sal would be there. No doubt.

  “She’ll be back,” Grant said numerous times. “Maybe she’s sleeping. Where could she go? She’ll come back when she needs to,” he mentioned with softness and deference. Like he knew her and was protecting her—because they shared pain and loss and because Salem had already fallen in love with the idea of falling in love with Grant while they wasted their hours in a glorified storage closet, among garbage and stolen treasures, surrounded by the constant stink of processed peanut butter.

  Lucy knew her.

  Salem didn’t need to say that she wanted Grant’s attention or his arms around her while she cried. Somehow the ache for love’s magic was made even more real by their proximity, their shared experiences, and their limited options. Throughout their entire friendship, Salem had longed for a boyfriend to sweep her off her feet. She was a romantic and a believer in love at first sight. She was the girl who needed an epic story to pass down through generations. You’ll never believe how your grandfather and I met. There was no dose of reality Lucy could administer and this made Lucy irate and irrationally angry. But Salem was Salem.

  “She’s waiting for you,” Lucy replied. She picked up her book again and pretended to become immediately engrossed in a particular passage, but she occasionally lifted her eyes to watch Grant’s expressions as he processed. “Pouting probably. Just go. Get her.”

  Grant sighed.

  He waited a few more minutes and then sighed again.

  “Are you sure?” he asked. He ran a hand over his stubble. “Why me?”

  Lucy rolled her eyes.

  “Fine, fine. Close the door after me. Four short knocks to get back in.”

  “I know the drill.”

  Lucy sat and waited for their return. It was nice to have a small moment of total aloneness. She thought back and tried to think if she had been fully alone since the first night at the school and she realized that she hadn’t. But after fifteen minutes, Lucy wondered what would be taking so long. She slid off her couch and walked over to the door and as she neared it, she realized that there were voices in the hall, hushed and whispering. Opening the door a fraction of an inch, Lucy spotted Grant and Salem standing in the small alcove outside the journalism lab. Salem’s foot was holding the door open and Grant held the keys. She could barely make out their conversation, but Lucy realized that they were oblivious to her and there was something about their body language and tone that suggested to Lucy she shouldn’t be privy to their dialogue. Yet she couldn’t turn away.

  “How long will we stay here?” Salem had asked in a whisper. “I’m going crazy.”

  “Is this the moment I remind you that this was your idea? To stay.”

  “It can be my idea and I can still hate living like an animal in a cage.”

  “A very big cage with a lot of peanut butter and jelly.”

  “Are you going to make a joke of everything I say?” Salem complained, but she didn’t sound too angry with him.

  Lucy’s heart quickened. And even though she knew that tone, that mischievousness, and the mechanics of Salem’s flirting, she couldn’t turn away. She wanted to interrupt them, shout at them to get back into hiding, but she knew that it would be pointless; Salem would only get more persistent and obvious.

  “I’m diffusing,” was Grant’s reply and he must have smiled. Salem smiled back.

  “You did a good job. It’s not that I don’t love Lucy,” Salem started and Lucy felt suddenly sick, she closed her eyes tightly, not wanting to hear what came next, but unable to shut the door and turn away, “but she can be so self-absorbed. It’ll be great if Ethan is alive…but this entire thing is not about her. We have big decisions to make.”

  That attack wasn’t even true. But she just breathed deeply. It was so plotting, so transparently manipulative, an attempt to damage her character as a precaution against Grant ever liking her instead. She was not a threat to their blossoming love affair and she wanted to yell at them to just get back inside already. Lucy wasn’t even angry, she saw the gears working and knew that in many ways Salem wasn’t capable of stopping herself.

  “Like what?” Grant asked and Lucy felt so sorry for him in that moment. He was so oblivious to her scheming.

  Salem tucked her dark hair behind her ear and leaned in. “I like you,” she whispered. “So, now I’ve said it.”

  From her vantage point, Lucy couldn’t see Grant’s face. He hadn’t moved away or said anything in return. Instead, it looked like he was frozen, waiting for her to continue, but Salem didn’t say anything else. She leaned in and kissed Grant gently on the mouth and then she coyly pulled back, biting the corner of her lip.
r />   Lucy’s heart sank.

  “I wasn’t expecting that,” Grant replied, his voice nervous. “I didn’t know…you felt that way.”

  “Confining spaces,” Salem giggled.

  Grant cleared his throat. “Or maybe you just realized I might be one of only a few teenage boys left in the world.”

  Salem found the comment funny and she hit Grant playfully on the arm. “It’s not like that.”

  “It could be a little like that.”

  “Then you got me. You’re the last one left and I want you.”

  Lucy grimaced at Salem’s boldness. She wished and hoped Grant could see through the shtick.

  “You’re fun,” Grant mumbled. But Lucy wasn’t convinced that was a ringing-endorsement for dating. “I’m surprised…and wow, I guess. Just wow, Salem. Wow.”

  She had heard enough. As she watched Salem position herself to go in for another kiss, she shut the door again without a sound and retreated backward.

  It wasn’t too many minutes longer until they both entered, knocking to announce their impending arrival. Lucy searched them for sheepishness or embarrassment, but if they were feeling awkward about their interactions, they gave no indication. They didn’t act particularly starry-eyed either and if Lucy hadn’t spied on them, she would’ve never guessed that they had shared a kiss in the doorway. But she had seen them and now she wondered what happened next. Would they attempt a clandestine relationship right under her nose?

  Salem hugged herself as she walked into the room and walked past Lucy to the corner, where she pulled up a blanket and fluffed it into a pillow. Grant closed the door shut and stood next to it.

  “It’s raining outside,” he said. “You can hear it in the other room and it’s dripping through the wood over the skylight.”

  Salem sniffed and looked to Lucy. “I’m sorry. For storming off. Sometimes it’s just too much…”

  “We all feel that way,” Grant said and he smiled at them both. Lucy looked down to the ground.

  “Maybe it’s asking too much,” Lucy started, “but maybe we shouldn’t be mad at each other for things that we have control over.” She had a speech planned in her head, a series of plans and procedures—places to go if they needed a break from their claustrophobic living situation, code words for expressing a desire for someone else to be quiet. But as she opened her mouth to continue, the long dormant intercom switched on with its telltale two-toned ding ding.

  Lucy scrambled off the couch and Salem jumped up from the floor and Grant swung the door to the hallway open wide as they poured outward toward the speakers.

  “Well, well, well,” Spencer’s raspy voice called outward. “It has come to my attention that a certain Lucy Larkspur King is a stowaway in my building.”

  At the mention of her name, Lucy jumped and took a gulp of air. She reached out and grabbed Salem’s arm, her eyes wide.

  “Naughty. Naughty,” Spencer continued, the slow drawl of his voice apparent as he clipped the end syllables.

  None of them dared to speak. They held their collective breaths.

  “If it were up to me, I’d shoot you on site for your insolence, and for wasting my precious air and resources. But it appears,” he paused, cleared in throat with a hack, “someone has purchased your freedom. And who am I to turn that offer down?”

  Lucy finally let out a breath. Ethan. It was Ethan. The use of her middle name was a giveaway, a hint, because only her family and Salem knew of her flowery moniker. Her older brother had arrived at last. His text was not an accident and not irrelevant. She turned and hugged Salem and then turned to hug Grant, uncaring about any potential jealousies or complications.

  “Don’t think I didn’t know about you,” Spencer spat. “And your little friends—” he trailed off. “You have five minutes, Lu-cy.” The breathy quality of her name on his tongue made her shiver. “And your friends, if they’re alive and still here, should come forward too. I offer up a onetime cease-fire and guarantee of safe passage. After that, should you choose to trespass…I will hunt you down like the dogs you are.”

  Then they heard the rumble of the gates, rising up into the ceiling, beckoning them.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Salem shook her head. “What if it’s a trap?”

  Grant walked back up to the hideout and opened the door and he ducked inside, leaving Salem and Lucy alone in the hallway.

  “He knew my name, so it has to be Ethan…but you’re right. I wouldn’t put anything past him.” She and Salem locked eyes. And they both recognized each other’s fear and worry.

  Salem nodded. “We have to go, I guess. He’s right. He knows we’re here now. Staying isn’t safe. It would only be a matter of time before he sniffed us out.”

  “Maybe we don’t go. Maybe we find another way out and meet up with Ethan on the outside. My brother’s smart. He’d find us.”

  Grant came back out into the hallway. He was carrying Lucy’s black backpack and two other small bags, filled with supplies. In many ways the call to the front office made Grant look relieved. He handed Lucy her bag and she swung it over her shoulder. They took a moment to regard each other all disheveled and tired. Lucy was still barefoot. They each wore some article of clothing pilfered from a student’s locker and they were worse for wear and drained, but still they mustered up the courage to face the man they had been hiding from for nearly a week.

  “We’re going,” Lucy stated. She took a deep breath. “Is it weird that I might miss our little room?”

  “Nah,” Salem smiled. “I think I might miss it too.”

  Their five minutes were ticking down and they were conscious that they were running out of time.

  “Where’s the gun?” Lucy thought to ask.

  Grant patted the waistband of his jeans.

  “Good. Let’s go.”

  Lucy walked with purpose down the English hall and around the corner. The bottoms of her feet slapped against the floor. Grant and Salem kept pace with her in a straight line, and they were silent as they moved forward.

  Spencer was waiting for them. He had changed out of his trademark suit coats, and even from afar Lucy could see that he had replaced his button-shirt with an oversized athletic pullover. He had a gun trained on them. It was a long-barreled rifle and he kept the butt of it flush against his shoulder.

  “Hands up!” Spencer called to them. In unison, they each raised their hands in the air.

  He didn’t move as they reached him. They stood regarding each other with his narrowed eyes never leaving Lucy and barely acknowledging Grant and Salem.

  “So. My trespassers,” Spencer finally said after a beat. “A little predicament…what to do with the two of you who have not been mentioned by name or desired.”

  Lucy cringed. If her friend’s jealousies over Ethan’s survival were already fragile, Spencer’s blatant announcement that they had no one out there fighting for them was too painful a reminder. Her heart pounded. She shot a glance over to Grant’s waistband, hoping that his raised hands did not expose their one and only weapon against Spencer.

  “We’re not leaving Lucy,” Salem called out. She sounded strong and brave. Lucy felt a swell of admiration for her friend. Whenever her relationship with Salem became tenuous, she did have a way of making it all better with a single declaration of friendship and support.

  Spencer shook his head, barely, and cocked the rifle. “You will do exactly as I say.”

  He nodded over to the front doors.

  “The doors are unlocked. Go. You two…the non-Lucys…go.”

  Grant hesitated. His bag slipped from his shoulder a bit and he moved to grab it. Spencer pivoted the rifle straight at him.

  “Hands back up or I shoot! I have a huge cement pool down the hall filled with the bodies of your former friends, enemies and teachers. I will not hesitate to add one more to the pile.”

  Lucy shuddered. So, her dream had been true.

  “Toss your backpack to me.”

  She balked
at his request. “I’m not doing anything you say unless you let my friends stay.”

  “Slide it over.” He repeated. “I am not negotiating.”

  “I want my friends—”

  Spencer raised the rifle and fired a warning shot into the ceiling. Tiny bits of sheetrock and plaster fell to the floor. Then he fired again, this time aiming at the window that led to the athletic office. The window burst and glass shot out in every direction. Tiny shards made their way to where Lucy was standing and she looked at her bare feet.

  She shed the backpack and put it on the floor, then gave it a gentle toss in his direction, it hit the ground and the sound of it echoed back down the hall.

  “Lucy,” Spencer said her name again, quietly drawing out the syllables. “Tell your friends to go.”

  Lucy turned to Grant and Salem and when she registered the fear in their faces, she started to cry.

  “Where’s my brother? I want to see Ethan!”

  She recognized the glimmer of confusion as Spencer tried to process her request. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know your brother.”

  “You said that someone bought my freedom. That I’m free to go! Right? Right?” She began to feel panicky and weak and her head was spinning. It had been a trap; Ethan was not here, they were not going to walk out of the school and into the daylight, laughing together, leaving the small room and a gun-wielding principal behind them.

  Spencer fired the rifle a third time and this time he shot at a display case a mere foot away from where Salem was standing. Salem shrieked and covered her ears and shut her eyes tight as the glass fell around pennants and trophies from athletes and teams from years gone by. When the sound from the shot died away, Salem looked up Lucy, her eyes wide.

  Grant took a breath. “I can’t.” He nodded toward the gun. “He’ll kill me before I can reach it.”

  “We’ll go,” Salem said loudly. Then she turned to Lucy, her eyes wet. “We’re going.”

  “No!” Lucy cried out. “No!” She turned to Spencer, raising her hands out toward him in supplication. “There has to be another way!”