HUM

by Dan Hawley

  Her eyes were unfocused and distant as she stared at the wall. “In an orange grove. You had a dumb straw hat on.”

  He smiled.

  “And a child.”

  Jason perked up at the sound of this.

  “A child?” he asked.

  “A boy,” she confirmed. “A little boy with little overalls and a little straw hat just like his daddy.” The words flowing from her smiling lips were like music to his ears.

  “Oh, shit.” Jason’s smile was as wide as the room. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” “Yeah,” she mocked, “After just moving to Seattle, I think we should move to Florida, buy an orange grove, and have five babies!”

  Jason rolled his eyes, dropped his hands from the towel, and left the bathroom so Samantha could finish up.

  “I mean, doesn’t sound like a bad plan to me!” he called back as he went to the bedroom to change out of his work clothes.

  * * *

  “Well?” Sam asked. She leaned over and kissed Jason’s cheek on her way past him to the kitchen. “How was your first day?”

  She began pulling food from the fridge and cupboards. Jason sat at the island, scrolling the newsfeed on his laptop.

  “It was good, yeah. Just got settled in and met everyone. William is a bit intense.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, I guess it comes with being a genius or whatever. He just like, stares into your soul, you know? But that’s all good, nice enough guy. Got soaked on my way over there this morning, gonna need some rubber boots!”

  Jason took a sip of red wine and continued reading.

  “Man, this virus is spreading fast.”

  “I heard.”

  “Trump says he’s not worried about it, but the CDC is warning that this thing could get out of hand. They say this coronavirus is more deadly than the regular flu. That even healthy young people are dying.” “That’s a little terrifying,” Sam remarked as she danced around the kitchen, mixing and frying and blanching.

  “All of the cases are here on the west coast. At least our families back home are safe,” Jason said as the screen touched his worried face with an eerie blue glow.

  “Dinner’s almost ready. Want to eat here or in front of the tv?” Samantha asked. “Jay? JAY!”

  Jason jumped sharply as Samantha successfully pulled him from his trance. He blinked away from the hypnotic black writing set against the white screen, looked at his lover, and apologized.

  “Sorry, babe. Got sucked in there. Let’s eat here. No distractions.” Jason closed his computer while Samantha smiled and loaded their plates up with food.

  “Smells awesome,” Jason said as the plate’s offerings wafted up to his nose.

  Samantha topped up his wine glass, filled her own, and sat down.

  “It’s nice to just sit with you; no distractions.”

  He cut his chicken and placed a bite in his eager mouth.

  “How was your day?”

  “It was good, I unpacked more and cleaned. Checked out some job postings and did some yoga. Tried to shower in peace…” she finished.

  “Hey, I wasn’t trying to scare you!” Jason objected. “It’s not my fault you’re such a…”

  “Such a what?” she retorted.

  “Such a…do you hear that?”

  Sam looked around with a puzzled expression.

  “Uhhh, hear what?”

  “It’s that damn hum again. Can’t even enjoy a goddamn dinner in peace.”

  His anger intensified as he jumped up out of his stool and marched to the wall separating the living room and bedroom. He put his left ear to the wall.

  “Jesus Christ. That’s so loud. Like, that’s not fucking normal.”

  Jason took a step back and stared at the wall as if looking at something broken. Something he could turn off or fix to make it stop.

  “It’s not so bad,” Samantha said, “I can barely hear it.”

  “It’s like, the whole place is vibrating. There’s no way that’s ok!”

  Jason’s knuckles turned white as his hands became fists. His jaw clenched, and his teeth scraped against each other.

  BANG! and another, BANG!

  “Jay!” Sam cried out. “What the hell are you doing!?” He struck the wall once more as if to subdue the noise.

  BANG!

  “Jason!” she jumped up and hurried towards him. “Jason?” she said again as she reached out to spin him towards her. He was panting, and a few drops of sweat were streaming from his brow. His wild eyes met hers and his expression softened. His pupils dilated and constricted as he focused on her. His jaw relaxed, and his mouth opened slightly.

  “Sorry, babe. I dunno, was just trying to shake something loose in there or something.”

  “Why did you get so mad, though?” Sam asked.

  “I wasn’t that mad,” he responded, “it’s just, this hum, I hate it. How are you just ok with it? Doesn’t it drive you nuts?”

  “I mostly don’t even hear it,” she said. “You just have to ignore it, Jay. Don’t let it get to you so bad.” “I know,” he said defeatedly and leaned in to kiss her. “Thank you for dinner. I’ll get the dishes.”

  * * *

  “How’s Dad?” Sam asked into the phone.

  “He’s good,” her mother replied. “He’s a bit worried about you, though. We both are. People are talking about this virus like it’s the next plague, and you are all the way out there where it is. You are being safe?” The concern dripped from her words.

  “It’s not that scary, really, Mom. It’s basically just another kind of flu, they say. We are young and healthy. We’ll be fine.”

  Sam tried to reassure her mother, but a pang of doubt marked her tone. “We’re keeping an eye on it; hopefully, it will just blow over.”

  Sam placed her wine glass on the coaster and relaxed back into the leather couch.

  “Tell Denise I said hi,” Jason said as he passed her in his workout gear. He grabbed his running shoes, laced them up, and headed out the door.

  “I’m headed up to the gym, be back in a bit.”

  The door clicked as it closed behind him.

  “Jay says hi,” Sam repeated into the phone.

  “Hi, Jason,” Denise replied. “How is he doing with everything?”

  “He’s good, yeah. Just settling in. I guess work went well today; he met his team. He just went up to the gym here in the building for a workout.”

  “Well, that’s good he’s blowing off some steam. Keeping himself busy,” her mother said. “He can get a little…anxious if he has nothing to do.”

  “Yeah, well, we have a lot going on. Never a dull moment in the city!” Sam said, still a little on edge from Jason’s earlier outburst.

  “I love you guys,” Sam said.

  “We love you too. And miss you like crazy already,” Denise replied.

  “I understand wanting to explore the world and have new, exciting experiences, but I can’t help that I miss my baby. Ever since Toby…”

  “I know, Mom,” Sam interjected. “Thank you for being so supportive. I miss you guys too. It just felt right, you know? To get away for a bit. With everything that happened. It’s like this opportunity came at the perfect time. We’re enjoying it here so far. And we can come home anytime if we want to. Nothing is holding us back.”

  “That’s true,” Denise agreed. “Ok, well, it’s past our bedtime here, gotta get to bed soon.”

  “I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to the time difference,” Samantha said. “It’s so weird, like I’m always running late or something.”

  “You? Late? Never,” Denise joked.

  “Ok, talk soon. Love you.”

  “Love you.”

  Samantha hit end on her cell and put it down beside the glass of wine. She grabbed her glass, took a sip, and cried.

  CHAPTER 6

  Jason awoke to the sound of heavy drops of rain hitting the bedroom windows. Raining again, he thought. Great.

  He
reached over to grab his phone, and quick panic shot up his spine. His hand grasped nothing; he looked over to an empty nightstand. Empty except for the lamp. The deep fear of being late for his second day of work worked him over like a fever. His heart began to pump; sweat began to bead on his forehead. Just then, his alarm broke the silence. Relief and confusion swept over him like a wave. “What the…” he muttered.

  Jason reached down and pulled on the brass handle of the wooden nightstand. Inside were the contents of what should have been on top of the stand. His phone was there, and the book he had been reading before he turned the light out to sleep was too. Even the short glass of water, a quarter full, peered up at him from its odd hiding place.

  “That’s fuckin’ weird,” he said to himself.

  Samantha stirred as she made her way back to consciousness. She rolled over and began tracing imaginary curved lines on Jason’s naked back. “Morning,” she said sweetly.

  “Did you put all my stuff in the drawer last night after I fell asleep?” Jason asked.

  “What? Why would I do that?”

  Sam propped herself up and looked over Jason’s toned back.

  “Your stuff is in the drawer?”

  “I woke up, and the table was empty. Then I thought I slept in ’cause I didn’t hear my alarm. Then the stupid alarm went off inside the table. I opened it up, and fuck me, everything that was on top is inside. How?”

  “Maybe you put it all in there and forgot,” Sam suggested. “No friggin’ way. Why would I do that? My glass? Why would I put a glass of water in my nightstand? Doesn’t make any sense,” Jason complained.

  “Well, you must have done it in your sleep then. Either that or we have ghosts,” Samantha said.

  Jason had already pulled his phone out to silence the offensive alarm. He threw his legs over the side of the bed, took out the other items, and placed them on top of the table. The wood quietly squeaked as he closed the drawer.

  “I must have moved it in my sleep. How creepy is that?”

  Jason gave the table one last look and headed for the shower.

  * * *

  “Parasomnia,” said a voice from the kitchen.

  “What?” replied Jason.

  He toweled off the remaining moisture from his naked body, wrapped the towel around his waist, and left the bathroom. In the kitchen, Sam had her laptop open behind the island while turkey-bacon and eggs bubbled and popped behind her on the stove.

  “Couldn’t hear you,” Jason repeated.

  “Parasomnia,” Sam began again, “is a group of unusual behaviors that can involve talking, walking, or even moving things around while in or transitioning into various stages of sleep.”

  Jason walked over to see the laptop. He scrolled the document briefly and closed the computer.

  “So, I’m just moving shit around in my sleep now. What’s next? Sleep sex?” he asked.

  Samantha turned the oven dials off and removed the pans of food from the hot burners. She turned and grabbed Jason by the towel.

  “Would that be so bad?”

  She pulled him closer as her almond-shaped eyes looked into his seductively. He looked down at her plump lips; soft and supple. He smiled, and his dimples popped on his freshly shaven cheeks. Samantha’s hand came up to caress his cheek, and she kissed him gently. Her hand slowly traced its way down his neck and onto his bare chest. Samantha’s hand continued down and tucked itself into Jason’s growing towel.

  “I mean, yeah,” he breathed. “I’d rather be awake.” Sam kissed him once more.

  “You better get dressed and eat; you don’t want to be late.”

  She gave his toweled bum a playful smack and turned to finish with breakfast.

  “Damnit,” he said as he looked at the stove clock. “Wish I could just stay home.”

  * * *

  The heavy rain had subsided into a fine mist so that when Jason arrived at his office tower, he was not completely soaked from the calves down. He crammed himself into the elevator once more, feeling much like a sardine would, he thought, if it wasn’t dead and had no feelings. There wasn’t much talk from the other elevator occupants this morning, just a heavy kind of silence.

  The elevator ding indicated to Jason that it was his stop, and he thankfully exited the claustrophobic box.

  “Good morning Veronica,” he said as he walked into the main lobby of the office and past the reception desk. Veronica looked up at Jason.

  “Good morning, Intellican. How may I direct your call.”

  Veronica had her blonde hair up into a tight ponytail; a small blue light blinked monotonously from her Bluetooth earpiece. She smiled at Jason.

  “Just one moment, please,” she instructed the caller and patched them through.

  “So you liked us enough to come back a second day?” she asked.

  Jason stopped, extended his security card from the retractable lanyard on his hip, and pressed it against the little black box beside the security door. It beeped and the mechanism inside the door relaxed with a click. He grasped the handle.

  “So far, so good,” he said.

  Jason smiled and nodded as he entered for the second day.

  The main office area was mostly empty of people. Jason watched as the few people that were there dropped their jackets and bags off at their desks and headed towards the common room.

  Jason followed their lead. He removed his coat and hung it over his chair. He placed his leather courier bag on the floor and headed to the lounge to find everyone still and staring at the flatscreen mounted on the far wall. Concerned faces watched the well-dressed news anchor with BREAKING NEWS scrolling along the bottom of the screen in huge red letters.

  “The Centre for Disease Control announced this morning that the Novel Coronavirus, COVID-19, has been labeled a pandemic. Cases are surging across the world, with Europe and the Americas hit hardest. In the U.S., cases are being reported in all states now as thousands of infections have been identified. The global death toll is also rising at an alarming rate. Mass graves are needed to bury the overwhelming numbers of deceased here in Brazil.”

  The television then showed footage of people in hazmat suits standing around with shovels while large machines cleaned out giant holes in the ground. The frame switched to those same holes, now filled with linen-wrapped bodies; too many to count.

  “Jesus,” Jason whispered.

  The news anchor continued, “President Trump is holding a news conference today at 11 a.m. eastern. We will break to that live coverage as it happens.”

  The screen continued its cycle of footage showing mass graves and people in hazmat suits. It showed blurred faces of patients in Intensive Care Units, tubes coming out of everywhere as hospital staff acted in frantic movements to save lives. Graphs and numbers that continued to tick upwards flashed across the screen. Global case count, U.S. case count. Global death toll, U.S. death toll.

  “I heard Canada is locked down already. Everyone told to stay inside except for essential needs,” Jason overheard the short, stubby engineer in front of him say to the woman on his left.

  “How can they do that?” she said. “Don’t people have to work?”

  “Ok, everyone,” a voice said from the door.

  It was William. Even though his dark suit was impeccable, he looked like he had not slept. The bags under his eyes were sagging, and exhaustion seemed to have stifled his usual exuberant energy.

  “Obviously, by now, you have seen what is happening out there. This virus is spreading faster than people thought it was going to, and it appears more deadly as well. This morning the CDC announced COVID-19 to be a global pandemic. The numbers here in Washington state are surging. And while most people who get the virus will recover without issue, there seems to be a high percentage of people who have difficulty beating it. Hospitals are concerned they aren’t going to have enough beds or ventilators for the sick. Our governor will speak sometime this afternoon, when I expect they will introduce a lockdown. China has
locked down, and their numbers have stabilized and are in decline.”

  “Yeah, if you can believe the Chinese,” someone behind Jason said under their breath but loud enough for some to hear.

  William continued, “Parts of Europe like Italy and Spain have also gone into a lockdown. Only essential services are open: grocery stores, pharmacies, and clinics. Those governments have asked their citizens to stay home except for groceries or if they need medical attention.

  “In light of this and in anticipation of the inevitable lockdown here in Seattle, you are all going to be working remotely, starting tomorrow.” William finished his announcement, and a silence deafened the room momentarily. William looked around at his employees. They looked stunned. Then, as if on cue, the voices of almost everyone in the room broke the silence all at once. Everyone was asking questions, concerned and confused. Some were directed at William, some at the person standing to their right or left. Some people asked questions into the ether, rhetorical in nature.

  As the voices swelled to a crescendo, fear turned Jason’s guts into knots. He sat down among his standing peers to catch his breath. All he could think about was how he had moved Sam thousands of miles away from home only to be locked down and isolated.

  * * *

  Samantha read Jason’s text as the news anchor reported in the background. She had been sitting curled up in her spotless white robe all morning, fixated on the television. Her laptop was sitting open on the coffee table, but she was too distracted to continue browsing the job search website.

  She nervously tapped the rim of her coffee mug with her thin gold ring while taking in Jason’s words. Being hypnotized by an entire morning of apocalyptic images had Sam anxious and scared, so she was comforted by Jason’s text. At least he would be there with her. He would just be in the other room, working, but still here.

  She sipped her coffee.

  “Just until this thing blows over,” he had said in his text.

  Maybe a month or two according to the speculation in his office. Samantha placed her mug back down on the wooden table and turned the tv off with the remote. She gathered her robe around herself, stood up, and went to the window. It was overcast, but the full-length window still allowed for a beautiful view of the harbor.