“You tell me … the name of your development, the address … we have some reports. Places we know are still in bad shape.”
She told him her address, and Ramirez dug out a fat notebook, with the pages bulging with scribbled notes. He flipped through it.
“No. Not seeing anything here. Could be—” his eyes up—“could be okay. Or—”
She knew then that she’d have to take her chances.
She didn’t have to convince the cop it was a good thing to do.
But it was her kids that she needed to speak to.
She stuck out her hand. An odd gesture. But the cop took it, his hand cold despite the day’s heat.
What kind of night has he been through?
His startlingly blue eyes on her again.
“Whatever you do, miss … get some rest.”
As if in that shake he could gauge her total fatigue, the ways even her knees wobbled as she walked.
She released his hand.
“Good luck,” she said to him.
Because—today, now, this world, this moment—if you didn’t believe in a creator watching and deciding who lives and who dies, luck was about all you could hope for.
And Christie went looking for her kids.
9
A Second Decision
Christie saw Kate talking to a girl who looked near her age.
She stopped for a moment, thinking.
It’s almost normal. Two teenage girls, traveling with their families, talking.
That is, if you didn’t know that one family was running away, fleeing the city. And the other—
What are we going to do? Christie thought.
But then she looked around. Where was Simon?
Kate stood there by the car, but where was Simon?
She ran over to Kate.
“Kate!”
Her daughter turned.
“What?”
A bit of old Kate’s “bite” in her question.
“Where’s Simon? You were supposed to—”
Kate raised an arm and pointed. Simon, by a nearby car, talking to a kid as well.
“He’s right there.”
“Sorry,” Christie said quickly. “I couldn’t see.”
Kate nodded. Then:
“I need to talk to you.” Christie looked over at Simon. “Both of you.”
Did she really mean that? Was Simon part of decisions being made? Just a kid?
Was that crazy?
“Simon,” Christie called.
She saw Kate turn to the girl she had been talking to.
“Good luck,” Kate said.
More luck.
The girl smiled back.
Simon ran over.
“I need to talk to you both. Something we need decide. Come on over to the car.”
She walked away, and led them back to the car.
* * *
She said slowly … “We need to think carefully about what we do. You see, all these people—”
“Running away,” Kate filled in.
That stopped Christie for a moment. “I mean, that is what they’re doing. That’s what that girl said. Her father says it’s not safe anymore.”
She saw Simon’s eyes on his sister.
“That—may be true,” Christie said.
It was Simon who asked the obvious question.
“What are we going to do?”
Christie looked around at the cars, the cops, the soldiers, their trucks, the guns … guns everywhere.
She’d had only minutes to think about this.
To think about the options.
“Well, they don’t know where it’s safe, where it isn’t. Maybe—where we live is okay.”
Kate: “And maybe not.”
“Yes. And there’s this. These people … they’re all going somewhere. Must have relatives. Friends. A place to go, people to take them in.”
“And we don’t.” Kate again, and not a question.
We’re a good family, Christie thought. Strong. We work together, help each other.
But we’re all alone.
“I—I don’t know where we’d go.”
Christie looked at Simon. He knew about the world today that they lived in, but until last night … he hadn’t really lived in it. Now—well, could he deal with all this?
How much can a kid take?
“There’s another thing. At home, your dad—” her voice caught. Not even twenty-four hours. The pain ready to flash back into a terrible fire.
“He had things hidden. Gas. We’re going to need gas. Who knows what we’ll find out there. Food, a lot of food that we locked up. First-aid kits. Flashlights.”
“Yeah—I got it,” Kate said. “There’s a lot of stuff at home.”
Was Kate’s own fear making her snap at her mother? Had they gone from being together in this hell, to—already—now snapping at each other?
“Yes. And guns. I mean, I—I … you’ve seen what happens. The w-way things are, and, and—”
And then—
So totally surprising.
So totally coming from nowhere, like a freak wave crashing into a shoreline, swamping everything, washing all else away—
Christie fell apart.
She turned from them, and fell against the car and sobbed.
And sobbed.
And sobbed …
* * *
Until she felt a hand on her shoulder. Then, another hand on her other shoulder. She had raised her forearm to her face as she cried into it, her body shaking, nearly convulsing with the crying.
But the two hands helped.
One a little bigger. One a little smaller.
She waited until she could take one, two, three breaths normally, without any more moans, or shivers.
Almost normal breathing.
And she turned back to her two kids, their hands still in place, resting on her.
* * *
Kate and Simon both had tears in their eyes, and once again she was reminded that she had to be strong for them.
I’m all they’ve got, she thought.
She reached up and took a hand of each.
“Okay,” she said taking a breath. “I’ve been thinking. I made some decisions.”
A squeeze to their hands.
“We’re gonna go on. We’re going home.”
“But—is it safe?”
She looked at Kate. If anything, she needed her daughter to understand, to be with her on this.
“I don’t know. But I know we can’t just stay here. And how safe is it out there, wherever all these people are going? Besides—”
She lowered her voice. An instinct, she thought. And she had the sudden awareness that she didn’t want anyone to hear her next words.
She labeled the feeling, accurately she hoped …
Paranoia.
“Like I told you. In our house, there’s gas. Lots of gas. And food. Your dad, he stockpiled so much. And—”
Her voice even lower.
“Weapons.”
“But … but we have guns,” Simon said.
A smile. “Yes, Simon. We have guns. Some ammunition. But who knows—we may need more. And we could always trade them.”
Kate added her support. “Guns … are a good idea.”
“As I said, lots of stuff—things we might need.”
She took a deep breath as if the air would help her keep standing.
“So we go. We see what’s happening. Maybe our development is okay. But either way, we can get all those things.”
Christie saw Kate look away, then back.
“Yeah,” Kate said. “It’s what we should do.”
What we should do.
Like they were a team.
“But—” and now she fixed her mother with her dark blue/green eyes. “Mom. You can barely stand. You need rest.”
“I—I don’t think we should wait, Kate.”
The word. Rest. The very sound of it was irresistible.
“You can’t just keep going on, Mom. Especially—” she saw Kate look to Simon, measuring her words, taking … care.
“—when you don’t know what we’re gonna face.”
“But I think we need to go now. If things—”
“A nap, Mom. Just a little sleep.”
Kate’s eyes showed her worry. The fear totally clear.
She doesn’t think I can do anything more, drive, face what’s ahead.
Sleep.
Can I afford to sleep?
And in this place? She’d been told that lights were on their way here, but what if they didn’t make it?
“Okay, But just … a little sleep. Forty-five minutes. No more.”
She looked up at the sky, the sun having turned the area a golden yellow.
And Christie thought: what would it be like after just forty-five minutes?
Will I even be able to move?
But Kate nodded. Accepting the offer.
“And you—?”
“We’ve slept, Mom. During the drive. We’ll stay by you.”
Christie slipped off her watch and passed it to Kate.
“Forty-five minutes. 5:15. Got it?”
Kate took the watch, gave the face a glance, and slid it into her pocket.
“I promise.”
Christie turned back to the car and popped open the rear door.
She crawled into the backseat, pulling the door shut behind her.
A last look at the window, at Kate and Simon looking at her, then she laid back, face resting against the material of the backseat, closed her eyes, and—instantaneously—everything vanished.
10
Kate and Simon
Simon turned away from the window and started walking away.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Simon kept walking. “I dunno. Not just going to stand here. That’s boring.”
Kate hurried to catch up with him.
“Okay.”
Now he stopped. “You’re going to walk with me, follow me?”
“I told Mom we’d stay together.”
“I’m not going anywhere. You don’t have to babysit me. I’m not two!”
“I told Mom—”
He turned and started walking away quickly, making loops and curves, forcing her to follow his crazy path.
He’s so annoying, she thought. Doesn’t he know I’m the big sister, and I have … have—
Responsibilities.
As Simon performed his dumb loops, he kept saying things.
“You want to follow me, follow me.”
Then:
“Bet you think just because you shot one of them, that makes you something special.”
Kate thought about that.
It did make her feel weird every time she thought about that.
But—weird wasn’t the word. Like she had become someone else. Like who she was before last night had disappeared.
Amidst her fear, the horrible sadness, the worry, she had become a different person.
Maybe—she expected Simon to see that.
Then another thought: maybe Simon was different too. Or perhaps he would have to become different.
She ran to catch up to him, and pulled on his shoulders.
He shook her hand free, and turned to her.
“What?”
His face looked rigid, lips closed.
For those seconds, Kate didn’t know what she was going to say. And then—she did.
* * *
“Simon—Dad’s dead.”
Kate watched Simon freeze.
“Dad’s dead—and Mom needs us.”
And—so fast—Simon raised his hands, balling them into fists, and began pounding her, the fists landing together, pounding her repeatedly.
But Kate didn’t feel them, she just kept looking at Simon’s face, the tears again, his lips tight, but trembling as if they needed to say something, wanted to say something that would make her stop … make her take those words back.
Then—when he had raised his hands for yet another blow—Kate quickly reached up and grabbed his wrists, taking care to use just enough pressure to hold him but not … but not—
(Not cause any more pain. No. He’s had enough pain.)
And in that same move, she pulled him close, her hands freeing his arms as hers went around him.
And he sobbed into her.
Didn’t pull away.
Didn’t do anything but let her hold him tight as he cried.
She had this thought:
Have I ever hugged my brother like this?
And surrounded by the cars, the people milling about, talking to police, they just stood there, brother and sister.
* * *
Somehow they both knew it was done.
Kate released Simon, and when he stepped back, she could see it was over. The crying, the face so tight it looked as if it might explode.
Kate spoke first.
“I’m going to go wait by the car. Till it’s time to wake Mom.”
Simon nodded.
Kate nodded back, and then turned away and started for the car.
To find Simon walking beside her.
“I thought you were going to walk around, explore?”
A quick look and she caught him shake his head.
“No. I’ll stay with you. By the car.”
“Okay,” she said.
In minutes they were back, sitting on the ground.
Kate looked at her mother’s watch.
And they waited.
* * *
Until Kate heard a car engine start.
She opened her eyes.
Opened her eyes!
She had fallen asleep.
And she felt Simon leaning into her, also asleep.
She dug out her mother’s watch.
Nearly an hour and a half, twice the time her mother had wanted to sleep.
Kate scrambled to her feet, taking note of the nearby car pulling away. People leaving. The sky, now a deeper blue.
She popped open the door.
“Mom. Mom!”
Her mother didn’t stir. Kate reached in and gently gave her mother’s shoulder a shake. Then another.
She saw her mother’s eyes open slowly, so reluctant to open.
“Mom. It’s later than you wanted.”
The eyes slowly coming awake, looking at Kate.
Kate had a thought about what this was like, now, for her mother. Only from her sleeping in the car, she knew what it was like to wake up and have everything different.
“What—?”
The eyes, the face, remembering as it all came back.
“What time is—?”
Kate handed her mother the watch.
And as if it had electricity running through it, her mother’s look at the watch face made her sit up in an instant, moving quickly out of the backseat.
* * *
Christie shook her head.
Kate expected her mother to say something like … “How could you?”
Or: “I depended on you.”
But she said nothing, and that silence was even worse.
She saw her mother look around.
“People are leaving.”
Kate nodded.
“About an hour or so left of daylight.”
Then her mother took a look at the circle of cars, this camp of cars and people.
Now with fewer people.
When she had finished, she turned back to Kate.
“And no lights. They said lights were on the way. But they’re not here.”
“Maybe they’re still coming,” Kate said.
She saw her mother look at Simon, following every word.
Knowing that her mother would be careful with what she said.
“Maybe. Then again, maybe not.”
She took a deep breath.
“We still got some daylight. To get back. Right?”
Kate nodded.
Less light than we would
have had … if I had stayed awake.
She tried to push the guilt away.
It happened, she told herself.
She made a silent promise to herself that something like that wouldn’t happen again.
Her mother depending on her. And letting her down.
“So we go, okay?”
Kate guessed that her mother left unsaid the idea that staying here, even with police, in this open area, without lights, might be a bad idea.
Then:
“You guys set?”
“Yes,” Simon said.
His voice so … formal.
Like responding to a question in class.
Then Kate answered: “Yes, Mom.”
Not knowing whether she was set, or if this was a good idea, or anything.
The three of them got into the car.
Kate started for the back.
“Kate, stay up front.”
A bit of that guilt faded.
And Kate got into the front passenger seat as Simon shut the back door. Her mother started the car, and joined a line of cars leaving the area.
All heading in the opposite direction they were … as they got back on the road.
welcome home
11
Fires
Christie stopped the car at a hill that overlooked the flat plain of their development, a once-empty space filled with wild grass and dumps, transformed into an inviting development of rows of houses, all with identical lawns and backyards, all safe behind the fence that promised not only deadly electricity but also 24/7 guards.
She stopped and looked out at the whole expanse, the curving roads, the houses—and her heart sank.
Because amidst the houses, she saw smoky plumes, some rising from homes—or so it seemed at this distance—others rising from the middle of the roads, from jumbled piles of—
What? Why would people put piles of … stuff in the middle of the road?
But she could guess.
There could be only one good reason you would do that.
To keep something away.
Her gaze drifted away, to the west, the sun nearly down, the sky still a cheery blue.
She thought:
Twilight. But not for long.
It would be dark in—what?—an hour. Hour and a half at most.
She felt immobilized. What to do? Where to go? How long could she just sit here, on this hill that led down to the development before—
“Mom?”
Christie turned to Kate.
“Yes?”
As if she didn’t know what her daughter would ask.
“What are we doing here? What’s wrong?”
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