“You’re right about that, at least. If you feel up to it, we’ll go over right now and move all your clothes and personal effects over to the house. With the basement and the shelter, we can accommodate you, the Dwyers, and even my niece and her husband. That was the extent of who I was planning to invite. We have the space, but the shelter might get a bit crowded if we need to go in for an extended stay.”
“Why would we have to do that?” Nancy asked, and I wondered again if she had been watching the news.
“Uh, Nancy? Russia and what’s left of China are at war,” Mike offered, his voice lowered as if that would lessen the impact. “That’s two of the world’s nuclear powers, and they’re going at it pretty hard.”
“Oh, crap,” she muttered. “Why haven’t I seen anything about that on TV? This isn’t some kind of joke, is it?”
I shook my head, realizing that most people without access to our sources of information would be in the same shape.
“Sorry. Mike and I have been listening to coverage coming out of England and some other places. The BBC has tried to cover the fighting, but neither side is exactly allowing reporters to embed with their troops. Anyway, the fighting has been intensifying, and we’re worried one side or the other might resort to nukes if they think they’re losing.”
“Or can gain some strategic advantage,” Mike added darkly. “That’s one of the reasons we’ve been listening to the short wave broadcasts. Trying to figure out what’s happening.”
“Does Wade know?”
“Yeah,” I replied, then went on to elaborate. “We’ve only just now started getting reports, and like I said, all we’re getting is second or third-hand information. And a lot of it is just speculation.”
“Don’t we already have enough to worry about?” Nancy complained, and I realized she wasn’t whining about her own situation. “How can I leave Lisa and go to work with something like this hanging over our heads?”
I laid a sympathetic hand on her shoulder and gave her an encouraging squeeze.
“You do it because you have to, Nancy. We can’t let the circumstances overwhelm us. What you do for the county is important, and we’ll make sure and take care of Lisa to the best of our ability.”
“But you really think there’s going to be a nuclear war?”
I paused, wrestling with my feelings. I’d tried so hard to be positive and encouraging these last few weeks, even while I felt like I was playing the role of Cassandra in a Greek tragedy. What did I really think? That was a good question, and I think Nancy could sense my struggle.
“Yes, I think it is almost inevitable at some point,” I finally managed to say. “With the mass casualties we’ve seen as a result of this catastrophe, and the inevitable climatic changes we’re going to be experiencing, I fear the world’s leaders have descended into the abyss.”
“Jeez, bro, if that’s your idea of a motivational speech…” Mike started, but I shut him down with a glare.
“I owe her the truth, Mike,” I continued, more softly.
“I don’t have a crystal ball, Nancy, but I’ve studied enough of our history to say that we are living in dangerous times. Honestly, I was always hoping if something cataclysmic ever occurred, people would set aside their petty prejudices and work together to protect our civilization. How well do you think we’re doing with that?”
“Not very good,” Nancy admitted without too much argument. Even what the feds allowed on the evening news looked grim.
“Do I think somebody is going to start a nuclear exchange in the near future? Yes. However, I don’t know when or where. Will it be tomorrow or next week? I don’t know. My suspicion is most likely in the next six to twelve months.”
“What…is there something that’s going to happen in six months?”
I paused, not wanting to put my feelings into words, but I could tell Nancy didn’t want me sugar-coating things for her. In for a penny, in for a pound.
“If what I suspect is true, then within that time, if not sooner, world governments will have sufficient computer modeling figures to come to the conclusion that we’re facing a further mass die-off of the human race.”
“Further?”
Thankfully, Mike took over at that point, sparing me from saying the words.
“Nancy, like we were talking about before, a whole lot of people died along with so much of our country’s infrastructure. We don’t know the actual numbers, but some of the groups I’ve been monitoring on the dark web think the initial meteor impact killed upwards of a billion people.”
“A…billion? How is that possible?”
Neither Mike nor I felt like breaking it down by country, but I openly nodded to Nancy to show I agreed with my brother’s statement.
“Look, this is a lot to take in,” I finally said. “And what I’m worried about may never come to pass, but just know that you and your daughter have a place here, in the shelter, should something happen. In the meantime, we still have work to do before this hurricane makes landfall, right?”
The Devil makes work for idle hands, after all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
With the windmills handled, Mike and Nancy headed off to check on the detachable brackets for our solar panels while I went in to make some phone calls. We would hold off on dismounting the panels until later, as they continued to draw in power we would need. During the storm, our only sources of power for the homestead would come from commercial power, then our battery banks, and finally, our diesel generators as a last resort. Since Mike and I figured we would need to replenish our diesel eventually out of bio-diesel production, I wanted to preserve as much of the fuel as we could manage.
Heading into my office to retrieve my charging phone, I saw Marta in the kitchen already involved in a cell phone conversation.
“Look, just finish your loadout right now and then hit the road. So what if Charlie’s boss said he needs to come in? That evacuation notice should be enough to get you all on the road up here. Don’t wait until tomorrow. Just remember, if you leave something behind, don’t expect to ever see it again.”
When I gave her a curious glance, Marta mouthed, “Mary.”
Ah, that made sense. Even if Mary’s school was closed, Charles might be under pressure to stay close to his job. I didn’t exactly know what Charles’s job at the chemical plant might entail, but I knew his degree was in mechanical engineering, not chemical. He was involved with keeping the machinery running, not the processing itself.
“Okay, hun, okay. I’ll let you go. Just remember, if you guys decide not to come up, then you better find a shelter there. Do not try to weather this storm in your home. Forget about the flooding; with the predicted wind speeds, your roof is almost certainly going to turn into a frisbee.”
After a few more seconds of back and forth, Marta ended the call and I could see her resisting the urge to toss her cell phone on the counter.
“Cold feet about leaving?” I asked unnecessarily. I knew Marta well enough to realize she was feeling the urge to spill her thoughts whether I was asking or not.
“Yeah, I guess you could say that. Charlie is worried about work, and Mary is worried about Charlie,” Marta continued after a sigh.
“Apparently, his plant manager is taking a hard line with the employees. They’re claiming the company made provisions for hardening the plant for hurricanes, so he’s insisting all the management or salaried personnel need to stay on site.”
For a second, my lawyer brain kicked in and I marveled at the company’s stance from a liability angle, then realized it didn’t matter. If they ended up killing a bunch of employees with this scheme, they could simply shrug their shoulders and their insurer would be stuck paying out the Worker’s Comp death benefits.
“They’re too close to the coast there,” was all I said. “If this thing comes ashore with sustained winds above one-hundred-and-seventy-five miles-per-hour, it’ll level that place like the hand of God.”
“That’s what I told
Mary earlier,” Marta confirmed. “They should be on the road within the hour, but I understand the highways are already congested. I-45 coming out of Houston is already backed up bumper to bumper, and the state set up the contra-flow lanes three hours ago.”
That reminded me of an evacuation I’d endured years ago, back when we still lived in Houston and Charlie, my Charlie, was just a baby. We’d been ahead of the crowd, living as we did on the north side of the city, and still the drive to Dallas took nearly twelve hours. Twelve hours trapped in a car with my son suffering through a painful bout of teething that had both me and my wife ready to abandon the car to the wailing child. Nothing stopped his crying, and eventually I’d learned to adapt, but I could never manage to tune-out the heart-wrenching agony of my little boy.
We’d ended up fighting our way out of the flow of vehicles at the Madisonville exit, where my wife managed to find the last tube of Anbesol in the tiny convenience store’s healthcare aisle. We’d read the FDA warning about the potential dangers of the active ingredient, benzocaine, and up to that point, Collette and I had maintained the moral high ground of first-time parents and refused to give in to the urge to medicate little Charlie. By that point, however, I later admitted jokingly that we were ready to either offer the baby a touch of the numbing agent or a shot of whiskey to make him stop crying. Collette never thought my joke was very funny, but she also didn’t contradict me when I told that story.
My expression must have changed at the memory because I saw Marta take a step closer, and she laid a hand on my arm.
“Thinking about them?”
I nodded, turning my head away. As time passed, I noticed the painful reminders began to lessen. I no longer even flinched when I heard my niece Mary mention her husband’s name, Charlie, which by pure coincidence, he shared with my son. To this day, however, I could only call him by his given name, Charles. In my mind, there was only one Charlie, and that name still brought a ton of baggage along with it.
“Remembering the evacuation out of Houston, back when…when Charlie was teething. That was Hurricane…wait, I can’t even remember which one,” I admitted grudgingly.
“Happened so many times over the years,” Marta agreed, relief evident in her voice when I decided to share the memory rather than shutting down and wallowing in my grief. “I couldn’t imagine living so close to the coast, even back then. Now, though, I think we’re going to see a mass exodus from the region, what with the weather pumped up on steroids.”
“Speaking of, what’s that little bastard up to now?” I queried, pointing at the muted television screen over Marta’s shoulder. I knew I should have been carrying my NOAA weather radio around while we worked, but when I’d checked earlier, the dedicated weather channel only carried a repeating broadcast that was at least twenty-four hours out of date.
“Like Mike figured, the system was stalled offshore, but the numbers still look unbelievable. And you were right, damn it. Still building up to a Cat 5, even though the maximum sustained winds were confirmed at one-hundred-and-ninety miles-per-hour in the organizing center.”
Holy…almost two hundred miles-per-hour already. I studied the massive blob of slowly rotating orange, red, and violet, marveling at the scope of the storm bearing down on us. Visualizing the spread, I realized this thing’s footprint would stretch from the coast of Florida to the Mexican Yucatan as the system moved deeper into the Gulf. There would be no dodging Hurricane Debbie. Unless something drastically changed, wherever the heart of that mass of swirling purple energy made landfall, everyone within many miles of that vanguard of elemental destruction was going to die.
“I need to call Wade,” I said dully, picking up my phone. As the phone rang, I glanced up and took in the scene being displayed. The television screen looked like a Technicolor Rorschach test as the radar image rotated, showing the extent of the storm cell building off the coast.
“Hey, Bryan, you done getting ready?”
I gave a dry laugh before replying.
“Not hardly, but we’re getting there. Holding off on a few things until the last minute. You need any help?”
“Nah, I think we’ll get it all covered. Got plenty of hands, at least.”
“That reminds me,” I replied. “Thanks for sending us Nancy. That lady works harder than Mike and I combined. Look, I was wondering if you planned to harvest your corn before the weather hits?”
After a long pause, I could hear the deep sigh on the other end of the call before my neighbor answered.
“I don’t see any other option,” Wade finally agreed. “The fields are still wet, but I was thinking about trying to get in there tomorrow. You want me to hit your field, too?”
“Something’s better than nothing, Wade,” I replied, trying to sound encouraging. “Even if that storm slacks off, the wind is likely to blow it all down, anyway.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ll get started at my place around ten o’clock if the rain holds off. Not sure when I’ll be over, but be ready for me after lunch. That sound good?”
Ten o’clock might sound like a lazy man’s approach, but I knew better. Wade got up with the chickens, and he probably got more done by ten a.m. than most folks accomplished all day. No, Wade would find other things to do in order for the dew to burn off the plants.
“You got it, partner,” I responded. I started to disconnect the call, but I heard Wade clearing his throat to continue.
“My thanks for taking in Nancy. I’ve known her a long time. She’s a good person, and that little girl of hers is as sweet as she can be. They’re all the family Dorothy has left, and I’m glad they’re somewhere safe.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I reassured Wade. “Like I said, you have my thanks for sending her our way. She’s the only reason we’re as ready as we are, and she hit it off with the ladies here just fine.”
I paused, not sure I should say anything, but Wade was family too. “Just so you know, the Co-Op has called in all their staff for the storm, so they’ll have her bunking at the old high school gym. And before you say anything, we’re keeping Lisa. She’s better at this farm stuff than half our adults, after all.”
Wade laughed, no doubt amused by my comment about his niece, but also pleased by the praise.
“She’s a hard worker, that one. Never complains, either. I wish my boys were that well-behaved. See ya tomorrow.”
“Later,” I replied, ending the call.
“What’s next on your list?” Marta asked. I could hear the question in her voice, but I didn’t know what she wanted. Which was unusual, since the Marta I knew was miraculously free of games and subterfuge.
“I need to run up to Wilson’s and pick up some things. Nothing critical, but I worry about this hurricane…”
“You think the store might not be there later,” she guessed.
“The thought has crossed my mind,” I agreed solemnly, then continued with more cheer in my voice. “Plus, I can run by and see if Sally Dwyer’s home. I really want to offer them a place here.”
“Oh, Bryan,” Marta declared with a snort of humor. Glancing around, Marta continued, her voice lowered to where only I could hear her. “Everybody sees this dour, stuffy gentleman lawyer persona you push out there. In reality, you’re such a big old softie. You just can’t resist taking in strays, can you? First, Nancy and her daughter, and now you want to help this lady with her disabled son.”
She spoke with such affection, I took a moment to think about her words. Marta, in addition to being my sister-in-law, was really one of my closest friends. She’d also been very tight with Collette, and I know the loss of my wife and son had hit her very hard. They’d made an odd pair, and I remembered teasing them about the country mouse and the city mouse teaming up to go shopping one Christmas. I was lucky I didn’t get coal in my stocking over that.
In a sober tone, I replied to Marta’s insightful comment.
“I…I just know how much Sally loves her son, and after she had that cancer scare, the ide
a of him being placed in a home after she’s gone weighs heavy on her. I think Billy’s actually capable of independent living, but not in what we expect to be coming. They could both be of use around here, and I want to extend them the invitation. Nothing says they would be willing to accept.”
“She’d be a fool not to, Bryan. How much are you planning of telling her, though?”
“Just that we’re making do now, and well positioned to ride out the coming upheaval. Sally’s a smart woman, and I’m sure she knows the worst is yet to come.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
In theory, with the president’s price freeze and rationing plan, diesel fuel was still available for agricultural purposes. This was something the national media trumpeted, and I admit, I was surprised the fuel rationing system was still in effect and seemed to be somewhat effective. At least you could still go to one of the remaining gas stations and get fuel, up to ten gallons, on your ration day.
Bulk purchases also remained theoretically possible for farmers and other commercial users. However, in practice, the military and relief agencies soaked up a considerable amount of the admittedly reduced refining capacity, and what remained only trickled down to the public after being clawed over by the federal departments and the state Department of Agriculture. The sixty-nine cent per gallon National Recovery fee came on top of the extra two dollars per gallon the store owners were authorized to charge. This made Mike growl under his breath, but I understood. That extra two bucks a gallon meant the store owners could, barely, afford to hire armed security to protect not only the fuel but also their businesses. Gas stations that intended to stay in business now featured armed guards on the premises.
Harry Ludlow explained all of this over a cup of coffee as Mike and I sat at his desk and caught up with each other over the events of the last month and change. Harry never did hear from his youngest son, or receive any official word of his fate, but his older son was back in town after evacuating his family out of Denver. His only daughter was more fortunate, since she was able to stay at her home in Charlotte, NC. She worked for one of the banks there, and I didn’t have the heart to tell Harry that her employment was likely only temporary.
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