by D. Gideon
“We’ve got about fifteen minutes before the Guard pulls out, and probably less than that before Hinkley’s free to come back up here and charge us with something,” I said.
“One way or the other, all hell’s going to break loose,” Marco said.
I nodded. Sliding the bucket’s handle back onto my arm, I fished around in my pocket and pulled out my flashlight. “Let’s go find Todd, get Mel, and get out of here before that happens.”
Mel came out of the basement in her bra and panties. Her clothes, stuffed into her purse, were held high with one hand. The other hand held her boots aloft. She told us she’d been sitting with her skirt wrapped around her like a robe on top of one of the washers, and that the water had slowly crept up to be nearly waist-high. Another hour, and she would have been sitting in it.
When I gave her Perkins’ cigarette pack and told her what he’d said, she did something amazing—she started crying. I’d never seen her cry before, and was almost convinced I never would. We were standing just outside of the North door, the guys trying to shield her with their bodies and me trying to towel her off, and she was just holding the pack of cigarettes and crying quietly.
“He let me go,” she said, her voice soft. “If anyone found out, he’d lose his job for this, and he let me go.”
“It seems like he cares for you a lot,” I said, dropping the towel into the bucket and holding up her shirt. She wriggled into it and took her skirt from her purse. “He had all of us fooled. Had a bunch of campus police and guardsmen wandering all over campus looking for you.”
“Wouldn’t even let us go eat,” Corey tossed in. “Had Todd bring us some MREs.”
“At least you ate something,” Mel said, still sniffling. She slipped into her skirt, then reached up underneath of it and started wriggling. A moment later she held up her wet panties, considered them for a moment, and then tossed them onto a nearby bush. Turning and seeing my wide eyes, she shrugged. “I’m not walking in wet underwear and chafing up my hoo-ha. I’ll put some on when we stop and I’ve got time to dig them out of my backpack.”
“I didn’t say anything,” I said. She gave me a look, then sat down to put on her socks and boots.
“The gentlemen can turn around now,” she said. “As if you would’ve seen something new anyway.”
Corey turned around and set Mel’s backpack down. Marco stayed looking away from us, head turning and scanning the campus.
“I’ve got to get back inside,” Todd said. “That Hinkley guy is probably going to be looking for me once he finds out you guys aren’t in the room anymore. Take care. Hopefully I’ll see you back here in a couple of weeks.” He slipped back inside with his special keycard after a round of handshakes and thank-yous.
We all looked up towards the sky when a helicopter roared over the building, flying low and going fast. It headed towards the east entrance to campus, then banked hard and headed south.
“Shake a leg, Mel,” Corey said. “That was probably Agent Perkins.”
“Oh. Speaking of—I think he left you something on his business card,” I said, picking up the pack from where she’d set it on the steps.
“Let me see,” Mel said, stretching up to try to see the card. She shook her head when I shone my flashlight on it. “The little dude is something he’s drawn for me for years. I have no idea what that other stuff’s supposed to mean.” She finished tying one boot.
“Hold it over here,” Marco said. I passed him the flashlight and the cigarette pack. He looked at the card for a minute, smiled, and handed them both back.
“It’s an address,” he said.
“Like the one Josh gave me?” I said, looking closely at the card again.
Marco nodded. “It’s an address for a repeater, and a call sign. For a HAM radio.”
Mel stood and stomped her feet into her boots, then lifted her pack and started putting it on. “A ham radio? I don’t even know how to use that.”
“No, but Marco does, and Perkins knew that,” I said. Marco looked back over his shoulder at me, eyes wary.
“He knew an awful lot about you,” I said, my tone accusatory. “Way more than we do, it seems.”
Marco took a deep breath and turned fully to face me. “I’ll answer every question you have, Rip, I swear. I was going to tell you everything next week, if I could convince you to go out to dinner with me. Then I was going to see if you’d go out to dinner with me a second time, or never want to associate with me again.” He shook his head and gave a rueful smile. “I even made reservations already. Then this happened. I’m sorry there are things about me that I haven’t told you yet—haven’t told any of you yet—but once I do, you’ll understand. Right now though, we don’t have the time.”
Mel was adjusting straps. She had her pocketbook slung cross-body to one side, and her laptop bag slung cross-body to the other side. With her chest, it had to have been uncomfortable. She looked up at me, one eyebrow cocked.
I crossed my arms. “Is this going to change my mind about taking you to my house, letting you around my family?”
Marco’s eyes dropped. He blew out a breath and shook his head.
“I don’t know. I hope not,” he said.
The sound of two more helicopters taking off from the stadium filled the air, then quickly faded away. I shifted on my feet. I wanted to leave, but I also wanted this settled before it was too late to tell Marco he couldn’t come with us.
“Let the boy be, Rip,” Mel said. “I heard him make the reservations for dinner. He called and did it on the way here from the airport. Besides, it ain’t like we’ve all laid our souls bare and shared all of our secrets, is it? I don’t think I’ve ever gotten that drunk around any of you.”
She paused for a minute, looking back and forth between us. Then she looked at Corey.
“I haven’t, have I?” She asked him.
Corey grinned and shook his head. “No Mel. Your secrets are still safe.”
“Good. I-“ she started, but the sound of a huge truck driving quickly past the dorm stopped her.
Marco’s head snapped up. “That was the MRAP. They’ve pulled back from the campus entrance. We’ve got to go. Now.”
He dumped the collapsible canvas bucket onto its side, shook the remaining water out with two quick snaps, and stuffed it into the five-gallon bucket on top of the blanket and towel. I reached for the bucket’s handle, but he stood with it and shook his head.
“I’ll carry it. I might have to use it,” he said. I blinked. Why would he need to use my blanket?
In the distance, we could hear shouting and whistles.
“They’re already coming in,” Corey said.
“Am I in or not, Rip?” Marco asked. When I hesitated, he huffed. “Have I ever done anything to make you not trust me? Have I ever not kept my word?”
I blew out a breath and shook my head. He hadn’t.
“Fine,” I said. “We’re heading for the shelter first.” I pointed in the direction I always took when I walked to the animal shelter each day. “It’s only about a mile south down Route 1, on Calvert Road. We can head past the stables and stay on the east edge of the campus nearly all the way there.”
“No,” Marco said. “Head south first, through the middle of campus. We don’t want to get too close to the entrance on Campus Drive. We’ll turn east after we hit the South Campus Dining Hall, and cross over to Route 1.”
He was right about crossing the entrance to Campus Drive. I did it nearly every day without giving it a second thought. Tonight, though, there would be a crowd there. From the sounds of it, one that was already pushing into the campus.
“That’s a better idea,” I said.
Marco nodded and started to step away, then stopped and looked over his shoulder.
“Walk as fast as you can, but don’t run…anything that runs is prey.” He slipped around the corner of the building.
“Prey?” Mel whispered. “Did he seriously just say prey?”
Exchangi
ng nervous glances, we followed.
“I should have expected this,” Marco said. We were at the intersection of Regents Drive and Route 1, but there was an eight-foot-high fence blocking our way. “Otherwise the city people would have been coming in Saturday. They probably had guards walking along it to discourage fence-jumpers.”
The fence stretched into the distance in both directions as far as we could see, following Regents Drive all the way out to Route 1, effectively cutting off Frat Row from the rest of the campus. It was in large panels, with heavy black piping around the edges and some kind of heavy gauge wire stretched across and welded into the piping. At the bottom the piping fit into an upside-down T shape in both directions for foot supports with more wire, extending out about two feet from the fence. It was just like the fencing I’d seen on television when the Pope had come to visit Philadelphia, and again when the Democrats held their national convention there.
“I guess securing their assets didn’t include protecting the frat houses,” I said. “No wonder the guys were telling people to go out the Campus Drive exit and walk down to the pool party.”
“How’d they build a fence so fast?” Mel asked. “There’s got to be miles of it, and I didn’t see it when I came back in Friday night.”
Corey leaned across the decorative low brick wall that bordered campus and tried to shake one of the support poles. It barely moved. “They were probably still putting it up when you came in. They bring in these panels on a truck, stand it up, and it all interlocks together. Goes up fast.”
“You’d be surprised at how quickly a few dozen men can build a mile of fence with this stuff,” Marco said. “They probably had the entire campus surrounded in just a few hours.”
“And they’re just going to leave it here?” I said.
Marco looked back over his shoulder, where we could hear glass breaking and angry shouts coming from the Annapolis cluster of dorms. “They’d have been taking it down and having people rushing in right next to them before they could gather up everyone and leave. Better to leave it up and let it hold off the masses while they exit, stage left.”
When we’d crossed Stadium Drive, we’d seen the taillights of a long line of military trucks heading out towards University Boulevard, on the west side of campus. They’d chosen not to drive through the crowd at Campus Drive. Apparently, there was another exit in the fence across the campus, by the golf course. I wondered if Josh had gotten through there before they put the fencing up, or if he’d had to pass through the Guard’s barricade.
The sound of an air raid siren split the night. We jumped.
“Campus just went into lockdown,” Corey said. We knew the drill; the school made us practice it without warning at least once each semester. When the siren sounded, everyone was supposed to drop what they were doing and immediately run into the closest building available. Once inside, we were supposed to find a room to hide in, lock the doors, draw the shades, and shelter-in-place until an all-clear was announced over the intercoms. The main doors to each building would lock automatically two minutes after the siren went off, and even a student’s keycard wouldn’t unlock it. Someone would have to open the door manually from the inside. Anyone still walking around outside would be “detained” by the campus police and put into a holding cell until the police saw fit to let them out.
Marco stepped onto the brick wall, jammed the toe of his shoe into the fencing, and started climbing. Huffing, Mel reached down and grabbed the bottom edges of her skirt on the front and back. She straightened and pulled them together, tying them in a knot and tucking the knot into her waistband. The result looked like a very poofy set of shorts. She reached up to grasp the fence and caught me looking at her, my eyebrows raised.
“What?” She said. “So I’ve climbed a few fences in a skirt. Doesn’t prove anything.” She lifted herself up onto the brick wall and started for the top of the fence.
“If you say so,” I said, grinning and shaking my head. Marco was waiting at the top of the fence, one leg swung over each side. Corey was nearing the top.
“I don’t say so, my lawyer said so!” Mel called down. “Even though the security cameras showed me starting to climb the fence, they weren’t high enough to see whether I went over it or not.” She swung herself over the top and stopped to negotiate her purse and laptop bag. “Just because I didn’t come down for half an hour, that didn’t prove a thing. I could’ve been sitting on the top of the fence admiring the view. Case dropped.”
I stepped onto the low wall and handed my flashlight up to Marco, wedged the toe of my own boot into the fence, and started up. “No doubt with a little help from your mother,” I said.
“Oh, no doubt,” Mel said. “Couldn’t let mommy’s bid for re-election be tarnished, now could we? Whole thing never even made the papers, damnit.”
“Melanie Rhodes, rabble-rouser and troublemaker,” Marco said with a grin.
Mel pushed off the fence in a move that said she’d done it many times before, and landed with a clang as her boots hit the bracing fence and slammed it into the sidewalk.
“And don’t you forget it,” she said.
“This is creepy as hell. I feel like I’m in an episode of The Walking Dead,” Mel said. “Where are all the townspeople?”
“Some of them are back at the college,” Corey quipped. Mel glared at him.
We were standing under the drive-thru awning of a Bank of America, looking at a nearly-empty parking lot of a little strip mall that all the college students used at least once a week. The heat from the day’s sunlight was still rising off of the asphalt, and the humidity was oppressive.
“It’s so weird to see CVS closed,” I said, wiping an arm across my forehead. “No matter what time it is, you can always come down to CVS.”
“Who cares about CVS? Just looking at Starbucks makes me want to cry. I could really, really use some coffee,” Mel said. She took a few steps forward, squinting. “I wonder if anyone’s broke into it yet?”
Corey turned his flashlight on and aimed it towards the Starbucks. “Looks like the glass is still intact,” he said, clicking the light and turning it off. The northern lights were still so bright that it was like walking under a full moon on steroids.
We had only seen a few people, and they had appeared nervous, looking over their shoulders and hurrying. There were a number of cars parked along the side of the road like always, and most of them had at least one window busted out. One had burned up. Walking by it, we could still smell the chemical odor of a fire extinguisher.
“I’m seriously thinking about going around back and raiding Starbucks’ dumpster,” Mel said. “I know they keep some used grounds by the front door for gardeners, but they go through so much of it there’s got to be some in the trash. I’ll suck on the grounds if I have to.”
“There’s coffee in the break room at the shelter,” I said. “It’s only another couple of blocks-“
“Behind that car. Quick. Quick!” Marco said, pushing us from behind. We sprinted to the nearest car and crouched down.
“You’ve got to give me more warning next time, Romeo. A woman doesn’t run with boobs like these,” Mel said, adjusting her straps.
“Shh,” Marco said. “I saw lights on the trees over there.” He pointed to the next cross-street, where tall trees stood higher than the buildings.
I poked my head above the side of the car door and looked through the glass. Sure enough, I could see red and blue lights flickering onto the trees. They were getting brighter. A moment later, a Prince George’s County police car turned the corner, rolling along at nearly a crawl. A spotlight by the passenger door threw light down the sidewalk, while another mounted in front of the driver’s door lit up the cars in our parking lot. I ducked my head back down.
“Probably looking for looters,” Corey said.
The car’s loudspeaker clicked on, and a recorded message featuring a woman’s voice began to play.
“My good friends in College Park,
this is Mayor Diane Cravette speaking. As of Saturday evening, September First, the City has declared a State of Emergency due to the local power outage. To insure everyone’s safety until the power is restored, I have instituted a city-wide curfew beginning at 8pm and lasting until 7am. The curfew requires that you stay in your homes during the restricted hours. Anyone defying this curfew will be subject to arrest. Breaking curfew is a misdemeanor with a fine of up to $1,000. Please assist our emergency responders, our brave policemen, our firemen, and our power crews working hard to restore the power by staying off of the streets. If you have a medical emergency, please dial 911. Again, a curfew has been instituted between the hours of 8pm and 7am. Thank you for pulling together as a community and working to keep our streets cleared and safe so that everyone’s power can be restored quickly. For more information, please tune your radios to WBAL 1090AM.”
“Do you believe that? They’re working to restore the power?” I said in disbelief. “Telling people to make phone calls and listen to the radio when she knows damn well that neither one are working?”
“Maybe they are working here,” Mel said. “Maybe it was just the campus that got hit so hard.”
“No,” Corey said. “Perkins admitted that the power’s out worldwide. She’s outright lying, trying to keep the people from rioting.”
The police car had worked its way up to the next block, and the broadcast started playing again.
We waited until it was out of sight, then stood and hustled across the parking lot to the front of CVS.
“Stay as close to the storefronts as you can,” Marco said. “Watch for more lights. If that police car comes back or another one circles around, we’ll only have a few seconds to jump behind a trash can or something.”
“We need to get to the shelter fast,” I said. “The sooner the better.”
Across the parking lot, a bottle smashed into the asphalt. We all jumped and turned. A group of two young men and a woman rounded the corner on the other end of the strip mall.