This Deep Panic

by Lisa Stowe

  “He’s our only choice,” Ben continued. “She can’t go with us and she can’t be alone.”

  “I can do this,” Artair said.

  “There’s a billy-club under the front passenger side,” June said. “Lead lined.”

  “There’s no time for arguing, son.” Ben gripped Ramon’s arm. “If we’re going to make it we need supplies. Now, before more people get here. And if it turns ugly in the store, you look to me like you can handle yourself. We need you in there with us.”

  Ramon’s thoughts raced. And then he got in Artair’s face. “You let anyone, anyone, get to my niece and you won’t see your brother ever again. Got it?”

  “Got it,” Artair said, and to his credit the only expression on his face was grimness.

  Ramon waited until Artair was in the truck and the doors locked before following Ben, June, and Alegria as they maneuvered through the obstacle course of the sidewalk.

  At the doors, Ben corralled them again. “Each of you take a cart. Alegria, stay with June. She knows what to look for. Ignore the freezer section. Get canned goods, boxed goods. Camping gear. First aid stuff. Flashlights and batteries. Headlamps. Glow sticks. Anything non-perishable we can use. Fill your cart, get it to the truck and throw it in the camper, then come back for more.”

  “What about paying?” Ramon asked.

  “Son, that’s the least of our worries. I’ll take care of it. Just get going.”

  And they were off, as if in some weird reality television show that featured racing consumers. Ramon quickly lost sight of the others. The aisles were a mess, shelves tilted, scattered with debris, and difficult to maneuver through. Fred Meyers obviously had an emergency backup system though, as harsh light flickered, creating weird shadows that moved around him. He encountered a few people, but most of them didn’t seem to know how they even got there. Some realized what he was doing, though, and it seemed to wake them up. He saw a few going for carts and knew the trickle would soon be a flood.

  The pharmacy was open but no one was manning the counter. Half of the ceiling had collapsed and rain splattered onto linoleum. Ramon vaulted the counter, almost landing on a woman. He twisted at the last moment, grabbing the counter to keep from stepping on her.

  “Sorry…” His apology faded.

  She was maybe in her forties, tall and slim, with cropped dark hair and wearing a pharmacist’s coat. Shelving that held prescription bottles had collapsed across her. Both her legs canted at unnatural angles, broken in multiple places. Bone shards slit through skin and her slacks were soaked in blood that no longer flowed. She stared off into a distance she no longer saw. A pill bottle rested, empty, next to her open and slack hand, on the floor.

  Ramon backed away. There was nothing he could do for her now.

  He rubbed the bruised ache in his side and then grabbed a handful of plastic shopping bags and started filling them. Any medication that sounded even vaguely familiar, he took. Back out in the main part of the pharmacy, he threw the bags in his cart, then added vitamins, bottles of electrolyte water, bandages, and cold medicine. He barely registered what he was doing, simply going row by row and taking anything he’d ever needed in the past. He almost passed one aisle and then remembered his nieces. He doubled back and took boxes of tampons and pads. Multiple sizes. He had no idea what teenage girls used.

  When the cart was full he simply jogged outside, past a young woman standing at a cash register. Ben was talking to her.

  “You got to take this cash young lady, because we don’t want to steal. But you also need to get out of here. Fill your car with supplies. Don’t worry about this here job. It’s going to be dangerous for you to be here much longer. Do you hear me?”

  When Ramon came back, she was gone.

  In the camping aisle he filled the cart with sterno cans, propane bottles, a camp stove, waterproof matches, a whistle, a compass, space blankets, sleeping pads, tarps, rope, dehydrated food.

  And so it went. Fill the cart, run outside, throw everything in the camper, run back in. He lost track of how many times he passed Ben and June with full carts. How many times he pushed aside people standing with glazed expressions. How many times he pushed aside someone reaching to take what he picked up.

  Alegria had one of the smaller carts and pushed it one-handed. It wove back and forth but her eyebrows were drawn down in deep determination. Ramon chose to smile at her instead of telling her to take it easy, knowing she wouldn’t listen.

  He couldn’t remember what he’d already grabbed and what he still needed. He tried to be methodical, but the store was slowly filling up with people doing the same thing. And as more people came in, his level of panic grew. He didn’t want to miss anything. He didn’t want strangers to get something his girls might need. What if he forgot something vital?

  It was a surreal nightmare of need and greed, of fear and something almost like a feeding frenzy. One of those dreams where you just keep running, and wake up exhausted. Protein bars. Granola. Bags of chocolate because Alegria loved Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. Peanut M&M’s for Marie. Plastic wrapped bundles of kindling. A heavy winter coat for him. Boots. At one point, back at the truck, he asked Artair what size clothes and shoes he wore, and then grabbed what he could find.

  Finally, Ben caught up with him in the sporting goods aisle where they were both started on fishing supplies, ammunition, and guns.

  “Make this our last load, son,” Ben said. “The camper’s getting full and there’s too many people in here now. Won’t be long and it’s going to turn ugly.”

  “June and Alegria?”

  “Already told them. They headed out a few minutes ago.”

  Ramon nodded, taking a rifle and a shotgun and working them into the pile in the cart.

  “We’re as stocked as an army,” he said, pulling knives out of the shattered display case. “What do we need with all these weapons?”

  “What we don’t need we can barter,” Ben said. “If things get back to normal fast, then we can return it.”

  “But you don’t think it will,” Ramon said, pushing his cart toward the doors.

  “No, I don’t,” Ben said. “I’ve been in quakes before, but never one like this. Even the bad one up in Alaska back in the ‘60s wasn’t this bad. Mayhap the devastation reaches farther than we think. Months before things get back to normal.”

  The weight in Ramon’s chest agreed with the prediction. This was not just a trembler that shook people up and reminded them they lived in a fault zone. This felt like all those apocalyptic movies come to life.

  “I can’t thank you enough,” he said. “For helping me, taking us along.”

  Ben waved a hand in the air as they came out into the parking lot. “Gives me someone to help haul June around. Getting hard for me to lift her.”

  At the truck, Artair stood by the open door of the camper, shoving in the last of the things June and Alegria had brought out. If they had taken the time to carefully pack things they might have fit in more. But there was no way that could happen now, so things were tossed in, shoved in, wedged in.

  The parking lot didn’t seem any more chaotic then when they started their mad shopping spree. People came out carrying plastic bags, some wandering away on foot, a very few filling cars and trucks like they were doing. A very few.

  “No one wants to admit it’s this bad,” Ramon said.

  “No one ever wants to admit things are out of their control.” Ben slammed the door of the camper and reached into a pocket. “No one ever does.”

  He pulled out a package and a pocketknife, cutting open plastic around a large padlock. He put it in place on the camper door, and then handed Ramon one key, keeping the other for himself.

  “What next?” Artair asked.

  “Now we go east,” Ben said. “Get to the clinic. Get Alegria’s arm looked at and make sure Marie is okay. And then keep going east. Out of the city, the crowds. Away from Monroe. All this flat farmland.”

  “What?” Ramon aske
d.

  “Puget Sound,” Artair said. “You think the earthquake will send a tsunami?”

  “A bad one like this?” Ben asked. “Sure as shootin’.”

  Ramon shook his head. “Can’t worry about that right now. Let’s get out of here.”

  But at the door to the truck, all three of them just stood and stared.

  June, Marie, and Alegria were eating ice cream. Small pints of Tom and Jerry’s. With plastic spoons. June waved hers.

  “I thought I said stay away from the freezer aisles,” Ben said. “Nothing perishable.”

  “We did.” Alegria balanced her pint on the pillow supporting her arm. “Until the last trip. And then I said I was hungry and June said it was all going to melt anyway so we might as well have a treat and I saw Moose Tracks and that’s Marie’s favorite and I thought it might make her feel better.” She stopped talking to take a bite. “We got you some, too.”

  “How’d you know what flavors we like?” Artair asked, one eyebrow up in bemusement.

  “Oh, we got a variety,” Alegria said. “This is so cool. Mama never lets us eat this much ice cream.”

  “There’s a reason for that,” Ramon said as he climbed in the back seat next to the girls. He shook his head as his niece offered him a pint of dark chocolate with cherries.

  “It’s going to melt,” Alegria said, waving it under his nose.

  He gave in and pulled the top off, suddenly too exhausted to argue. June, grunting with effort, pushed herself across the front seat to sit next to Ben and Artair climbed in next to her, slamming the truck door. June handed Artair a pint of ice cream and the young man stared at it as if it was alien.

  Ben turned around in the front seat, holding a spoonful of what looked like strawberry ice cream. He gestured at Marie with it. “How you feeling there?”

  “I have a headache,” she said.

  “Sleepy? Nauseated? Dizzy?”

  “No, nothing like that.” Marie spoke carefully, as if thinking through each word, or as if guarding her thoughts. “But everyone is kind of glowing. Like they have halos. It’s beautiful.”

  Ramon’s stomach did a slow roll of anxiety. How bad was a head injury when you started seeing auras? He pushed her hair back from her face, clueless what to do.

  “You tell us if you start feeling worse,” Ben said. He looked around the parking lot and then met Ramon’s eyes in the rear view mirror. “We need to move on out of here before this parking lot is jammed and we’re stuck good. Buckle up and hang on.”

  Ramon saw the tension in Artair’s shoulders. The kid had to be worried sick about his brother. Ramon didn’t know what Artair would do once they reached Sultan. Index was further east. Ramon wanted to come back this way after getting medical treatment for the girls. Try to find his brother and sister-in-law. Yet Artair had helped with Marie. He deserved hope.

  “I agree with Ben,” Ramon said. “Get to the clinic. And get out of the cities. Maybe there will be fewer people, a little safer. Maybe find a place to camp, hang tight until things clear up. Until the National Guard or something gets things back in order. Maybe someone can get Artair out towards Index.”

  “There’s our plan,” Ben said, starting the truck. “Clinic, then out of the city.”

  A loud explosion shocked them all, rocked the truck. Ramon twisted to look out the side window and saw a ball of flame roll up from a car at the edge of the parking lot. A group of people, generic in the shadows, danced, fists to the air.

  “Time to move,” Ben said.

  Ramon saw the glint of tears in Marie’s lashes. He put a hand on Ben’s shoulder. “Wait. I want the girls safer. Not by a window.”

  When they pulled out, Alegria was up front between June and Ben, and Marie was in back between Artair and Ramon. It wasn’t much, but it made him feel like they were a little more secure.

  The black night was turning charcoal with dawn as they inched out onto the street. Ramon tossed the barely touched ice cream out the window.

  Maybe they were overreacting. Maybe by tomorrow night the police would have everything under control. He and Ben would sheepishly return all the stuff to the store and apologize. He’d go back to machining, to trying to forgive his brother. Back to the things that had seemed important hours earlier.

  Ramon briefly closed his eyes that burned with fatigue. But then he heard the muffled sound of another explosion.

  Maybe they were over reacting.

  But maybe they weren’t.

  13

  Ethan smelled something metallic. A scent so strong, so wrong, he could taste it on the back of his tongue, in his throat. A scent he was familiar with. But remembering why was too hard.

  There were other smells in the darkness. Things that reminded him of terror, of a past that lived in nightmares. Urine. Sweat. Vomit.

  In a different lifetime, he would be up and in action. But now the memories and the smells were just another weight on him. It was simpler to remain still, to slide once more into sleep.

  He didn’t have to close his eyes. He’d never opened them.

  When he did open his eyes later, there was no change in the total darkness. No light to orient to. He vaguely remembered an awareness of smells, and those were still in the air around him. Along with higher, cleaner scents. He drew in a deep breath. Christmas.

  Why would he think about Christmas? He waited a long moment before realizing it was the strong resin scent of tree sap.

  And now there were sounds coming into his slowly reawakening brain. Soft shufflings, faint moans. Someone cried, the sobs muffled. And someone was having problems breathing. He heard the labored, wet panting several feet away.

  What the hell was going on?

  Ethan tried to move and pain was the bright light he needed to bring him into full awareness. His breath caught on it, and he stilled, evaluating. Something he was good at.

  He thought he was lying down but the angle seemed wrong. One leg was twisted underneath him, but as he tentatively tried to straighten it, he could tell it wasn’t broken. He felt deep bruises, wetness on his side, his cheek, his hand. But knew nothing was fatal.

  He knew fatal. He’d seen fatal.

  He shifted again and dislodged something that rattled against metal.

  A school bus. That’s where he was.

  The environmental science class. The overnight fieldtrip to Silver Creek. They’d made it to the old town site in time for lunch. No one complained about the drizzly rain. Everything had gone well. Ethan shifted again, slower this time, allowing the pain to tell him where his injuries were, to aid him in regaining a sense of what had happened.

  He remembered hanging around the next day, kids wandering around, taking time to pack up their tents and gear, heading back down the trail in the afternoon. Rowan lingering, sketching Jumpoff Ridge above them.

  He remembered the hike back out. Payton injuring her ankle. So she said anyway. It allowed her to lean on Zack, the rock climber, who had pulled out a cold pack and massaged her ankle. Jennifer, a bookworm always in Zack’s shadow, had helped and been oblivious to Payton’s manipulations.

  Ethan flashed on lecturing Payton. Something about hiking boots instead of ballet slippers. Payton had been offended. Spike told Payton she was stupid. Payton cried. Ethan reprimanded Spike. Again.

  So the hike back out took longer than it should have. It was late afternoon, almost early evening, by the time they came out at the trailhead to where the school bus waited. Val had been sleeping. She’d had her ugly pumpkin orange wool coat pulled up over her face and the kids laughed.

  Ethan remembered being nervous about Val. About the road that switched back and forth and was rough in spots. He wasn’t sure Val could manage it in the dark. He’d offered to drive. She’d been pissed.

  Had she driven them off the road?

  Sounds were coming back now. Screaming, tearing metal. Had they rolled?

  Of course they had. That explained why he was all twisted up and stuck. Adrenaline kicked
his body in gear.

  The kids.

  He shifted, pushed, shoved, pulled, until his arms were free. He raked a hand over his face, feeling the stickiness of clotting blood. Where was his pack? It had been at his feet, but had it stayed there? He maneuvered until he felt the rough material, and the relief was so strong it nauseated him.

  Tugging on the pack frame, he inched it forward until he was able to reach the pocket where his headlamp was. As he stretched for the pack, sharp hot pain sliced into the calf of his leg as the muscles gripped in cramps. Ethan sucked in air, his jaw clenching. He managed to shift until he could reach his leg, massaging the charley horse until the pain ebbed to a dull throb.

  When he could breathe again, he pulled a headlamp out of his pack. And with a click there was light. He slipped the headlamp on and fingered his scalp, finding a shallow cut that still oozed a little blood. He aimed the light over his body and saw a cut on his bicep that had bled down his arm and hand. The blood was dry though, and the cut shallow.

  With the bright beam of the headlamp came a sense that he was back in control. Even though he saw only chaos, at least he could see. He coughed to clear his throat.

  “Rowan O’Reilly.” Ethan’s heart thudded with a sudden fear that none of his kids would answer, that he’d lost them all, the lives he held in his hands.

  No response. He spoke again, louder, forcing his voice into ‘teacher’ mode.

  “Rowan O’Reilly.”

  “Here,” came a faint response. Automatic, the habit of roll call kicking in.

  “Zack Swenson.”

  “Here.” His response was closer, clearer.

  “Payton Lang.”

  “Here.” Her voice shook distinctly.

  “Michael Bangor.”

  “Bitchin’.”

  Ethan scowled, but now wasn’t the time to take issue with Michael. The overweight young man tried too hard to be cool and only succeeded in irritating Ethan and alienating the other students. Ethan continued, going down the list from memory, calling out the kids he’d come to know. And some to even like. There were a few gaps. No answer from Jennifer or Amy. A few kids barely able to respond. His gut clenched. He had to get out of this bus, assess the injured, figure out how bad things were, figure out a plan.