by Tim McBain
OK, not literally. But it was a close thing.
My eyes went wide, and I stared at her for a long time.
“That’s not fair.”
“You’ll get over it.”
“But you can’t just volunteer me for something without asking! That’s not volunteering. That’s forcing.”
She closed her eyes for a long time and got those two pinched lines between her eyebrows.
“If people only ever did the things they wanted to do, nothing would get done. That goes for this camp, and it goes for society at large. You always complain about me not treating you like an adult? Well, this is part of adulthood. Doing a task you’d rather not, because it simply needs to be done.”
I couldn’t think of a retort that didn’t sound snotty and immature, so I stomped out of the tent instead. In lieu of slamming a door, I shoved the tent flap aside as brusquely as possible.
It doesn’t really have the same effect.
I went to the catalpa tree. Where else?
I hunched there with my back against the trunk for a long time, probably an hour, just gazing into the corn-abyss. Watching the tassels sway in the breeze. Almost as good as TV. Not.
The way the light wavered on the green of the leaves kind of put me in a trance, so I didn’t even hear Max until he was right next to me.
“Hey, smartypants.”
“Hey,” I said.
“Nothing to read?”
“Nah, both my phone and e-reader are dead.”
“You didn’t bring any real books?”
“Nope.”
“Unfortunate. And poor planning on your part. When the world is ending, it’s important to make sure you’ve brought sufficient reading material.”
“I’ll make note of that next time,” I said with a wry smile.
He is the only other person here that jokes about the end of the world. I made a crack around Breanne once, and she totally freaked out.
“Why would you say that?” she asked with maximum incredulity.
And of course, my mom is the same way. But she always tacks on, “I don’t understand why you have to be so negative all the time.”
“You’re alright and everything?” he asked.
“Yeah, why?”
“I don’t know. Last night was kind of… intense,” he said.
I wasn’t sure if that was meant to include our possible-almost-kiss or not. The more time that passes, the more I think maybe that was all in my head.
“And I know that some people were a little freaked out after the meeting this morning.”
“Right,” I said, plucking a blade of grass from the ground and wrapping it around my finger. “Well unless they got forcibly signed up to work in the plague tent, I’d say they should all quit their bitching.”
A series of wrinkles formed on Max’s forehead. “You?”
I nodded.
“My mom volunteered the both of us. She didn’t even ask me.”
“That sucks.”
I was still playing the blade of grass, but I could feel him watching me.
“You’re scared you might get sick?”
“Wouldn’t you be?”
He ran his fingers through his hair.
“Yeah. I probably would. But if it makes you feel any better, I know at least a dozen people that have been taking shifts in the quarantine tent, and none of them have gotten sick.”
I stopped fingering the piece of grass and glanced up at him.
“Really?”
“Yep.” He made a fist and nudged me in the arm with it. “So did I cheer you up?”
For some reason that made me smile.
“I guess so.”
“Good,” he said and got to his feet. “I have to get back. Top’s having a little contest to see which one of us can get a vehicle back in working order the fastest.”
“What do you win if you’re first?”
“One week off duty.”
“Stop it, now. You’re making me jealous.”
“Hey, that’s a big deal, in case you didn’t know. It means I can sleep in. It means Bennett can’t assign me on shit-burning detail. That alone makes it more than worth it.”
I held up my hands, fingers forming Xs.
“I’ll keep them both crossed for you, then.”
“Thanks, Hedy,” he said. Then he reached out and squeezed the top of my skull, like he was an old man checking a cantaloupe or something.
I swatted at him.
“See ya,” he called as he started back toward camp.
“Later,” I said.
Damn him, Kel. Damn him straight to hell for being so adorable.
Crap. My mom has informed me that our shift at the quarantine tent starts in fifteen minutes. Gotta go.
Your BFF, who might very soon be bleeding from the anus,
Erin
Erin
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
1 day after
Kelly-
People continue to trickle out of the city. The traffic isn’t quite as constant as it was yesterday, but there’s a steady ebb and flow.
You’re probably wondering how things went in the quarantine tent. Well… it actually wasn’t so bad, aside from the lingering feeling like I’m coated in plague dust.
We have to go through all these layers of plastic sheeting to get inside. And then there’s a changing room (more like a bunch of sheets hung up) where we change out of our clothes and into scrubs. Then we put on isolation gowns and masks and gloves.
There are fifty-or-so patients in the quarantine tent. They keep them heavily sedated… I don’t know if that slows the progression of the disease or something. Maybe it’s just to keep them comfortable while their insides liquefy.
I thought the six hours would go by at a crawl, but there’s always some task that needs doing, so it kind of went by in a blur. It’s the exact opposite of normal camp life. Outside the quarantine tent, I spend almost every minute trying to figure out how to occupy my time so the minutes don’t feel like hours.
My mom and I have another shift tonight. I guess the night is a lot less hectic, but I’m sure there’s still plenty to do.
But enough about that. The best part of today happened around noon. I was lollygagging around the catalpa tree, killing time.
“Miss Lamarr,” Max said as he approached. “I’ve been trying to wrack my brain for any famous botanists, but I don’t know any off the top of my head.”
“I’ll forgive you. This time.”
He had one hand behind his back.
“I brought you something.”
“What is it?” I made a show of trying to peek around the side of him.
“Close your eyes, and put your hands out.”
“Alright, but I better not open my eyes and find your balls resting on my palms or something gross like that.”
“Now you ruined the joke!”
“Shut up and give it.”
I made impatient grabby motions with my hands. Whatever it was landed with a slap in my outstretched fingers. It was flat and smooth and had some weight. I knew exactly what it was, of course. I opened my eyes.
It was a book. Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz.
“I forgot I had that in the bottom of my duffel. I finished it a while ago and yesterday you said you hadn’t brought any non-digital books with you, so…”
“This is awesome. Thanks.”
“You’ve never read it before?”
“Nope.”
“Well, it’s a good one. Maybe my favorite book of all time. You have to let me know what you think.” He scratched the side of his chin. “In fact, I’ll expect a daily book report from you.”
I ruffled through the book pages with my thumb. “What’s it about?”
“I can’t tell you. You have to read and find out for yourself,” he said.
One of the cars idling on the highway blared its horn, drawing our attention. For a while, we watched their slow crawl over the asphalt.
&nbs
p; “Where do you think they’ll all go?” I asked.
One of Max’s cheeks twitched.
“I don’t know. But I know one thing. They can’t come in here.”
I fixed my attention on him.
“What does that mean?”
He had a twig in his hand, and he started poking the end of it into the dirt.
“I mean they can’t come into our camp. We’re at capacity. When I worked the guard post this morning, I had to keep turning people away. One lady tried to bribe me with like a thousand dollars in cash.”
I watched him excavate a miniature trench in the soil.
“Well… maybe there are other camps out there.”
“Maybe. I hope so. I felt like a real asshole sending them away. Some of them were dubious-looking characters for sure, but a lot of them just seemed like normal people. Families with kids.” He let out a breath, and his shoulders slouched a little lower. “But orders are orders, and Sgt. Grantham said no one gets in.”
He looked so depressed. I decided a change of subject was in order.
“How’s the contest going?”
Judging by the groan that came out of him, I’d picked the wrong topic.
“Not good?”
“The work itself isn’t so bad. Frustrating sometimes, since it’s all trial and error. But no matter how much I want to give up, after fifteen minutes of sulking, I always go back. I guess I’m kind of obsessive that way.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“We’re in teams,” he said. “And I got stuck with Bennett.”
I made a fart sound with my mouth.
“He’s fanatical about winning, but that doesn’t mean he helps at all,” Max complained. “Like yesterday, Jimbo and I were under the hood, elbow-deep in this ancient F-150, and Bennett walks up and starts demanding we drop whatever we’re in the middle of to try the stupid idea he saw one of the other crews experimenting with. An idea, I should mention, that both Jimbo and I knew wouldn’t work, which was why we hadn’t bothered trying it in the first place. But he’s an E-5, so…”
“An E-5 is a sergeant?”
“Yeah.”
“And that means he can boss you around?”
“Pretty much.”
“Why don’t you become a sergeant? You’re way smarter than he is.”
That made him chuckle.
“Well, first of all, I don’t have enough time in service.”
“Oh.”
“Second of all, you don’t just become a sergeant. You have to try for it. Go in front of the promotion board and whatnot.”
“And that would be like… volunteering? Which you never, ever do?”
He aimed a finger gun at me.
“Bingo. Besides that, you have to prove that you have the leadership skills and that you’re worthy of the extra responsibility.”
One of my eyebrows quirked up.
“So how the hell did Bennett ever get promoted? He doesn’t have any leadership skills.”
For some reason that really set Max off. He laughed so hard he bent at the waist, gripping his sides. I was dead serious, though. Maybe that made it funnier.
It took him a while to catch his breath, and when he finally did, he said, “Man, I needed that. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” I said, glad that I’d cheered him up after all. “But I wasn’t trying to be funny.”
“I know,” he said. He stared at me for a second. “And I don’t totally disagree. Although Bennett does at least have a knack for ordering people around. Nobody really questions him, either. Maybe that’s ultimately what they’re looking for in a sergeant. Not someone everyone likes. Just someone everyone listens to.”
“I guess that makes sense,” I said. “In a fucked up kind of way.”
“Also, the Bennett you and I see is a different Bennett than Sgt. Grantham sees. He might be sneaking out to party in the woods when he’s off duty, but when he’s around camp, he’s got his boots shined and his shirt creased.”
“So you have to like bossing people around, and you have to be a phony?” I mused. “No offense, Max, but you’d make a terrible sergeant.”
He grinned over at me and said, “None taken, Hedy.”
You know, it’s funny. I don’t know if he’s ever called me by my real name. Is that good or bad?
It’s almost dinner time. I’m gonna go wash my hands three or four more times before I eat just to make sure I’ve got all the plague juice off.
Your BFF, who is so far not bleeding from the anus,
Erin
Erin
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
2 days after
Kel-
We had the night shift in the quarantine tent, but I think I already told you that. It’s a little easier because most of the meds and stuff are on a daytime schedule. They try to let the patients sleep as long as possible without interruptions in the night, I guess. So even though it was just three volunteers (me, my mom, and a lady named Trish), two registered nurses (Lisa and Richie), and Dr. Kaiser, we had more time to sit and rest our feet.
Speaking of my feet… You know how older people always complain about their feet hurting? I always thought that was some kind of cop-out. Like when my dad didn’t want to go sledding with me when I was a kid, he’d say it hurt his back. I thought it was just one of those excuses they use to get out of something they don’t want to do.
Well, I am here to inform you that feet can indeed hurt. And I’m not even talking about blisters or anything like that. The bones, man. And the muscles and the tendons and whatever else. They are killing me.
But I’m getting sidetracked. Oh boy, am I ever.
The stream of people leaving the city had waned some by evening. The automobile traffic was just a stray car here and there. Now it was mostly people on foot. On bikes. I even saw a few people on skateboards and one older guy with a wheelbarrow. Most of them were loaded down with backpacks full of stuff.
When I passed the gate on the way back from dinner, I saw some of them, pleading with the guards. They clung to the perimeter fence, fingers clutching at the wire mesh like bird claws. I heard one of them — a middle-aged man — saying he didn’t want to come inside, he just wanted some food for his daughter. I could understand then why Max felt so guilty about turning them away. They seemed so desperate.
I couldn’t stop thinking about them while I worked that night, helping Richie set up the medication cart for his next rounds. But I think what I told Max has to be right. There must be other camps out there being set up for these people.
About two hours into the shift, the six of us took a break. I notice they stagger the breaks on the day shift, but I guess things are more loosey-goosey at night.
Lisa and Dr. Kaiser smoked cigarettes, which seemed odd to me. A doctor and nurse, smoking?
My mom usually complains about being that close to cigarette smoke, but she didn’t utter a peep about it. The adults made small talk, and I hung off to the side, not really listening. I admired the last threads of pink clouds as they dimmed on the horizon and the on-and-off blink of the fireflies.
The two smokers finished their cigs and went back inside, but my mom, Trish, and Richie were still chatting away, so I stayed, too.
Distant shouts echoed from the other side of camp. No one really paid any attention to it, because the wind often carries various sounds of camp life to the quarantine tent. But this time something else came with the noise. A strange yellow light that undulated from behind the faraway tents. It got brighter, and brighter until we could see the flicker of flames at the peak.
Something was on fire near the front gate. The breeze changed direction, and then we could smell it. The smoke was so acrid I could taste the bitterness of the ashes on my tongue.
“Wonder what that is,” Richie said.
And then I heard a strange, faint metallic tinking coming from the south end of camp. It was just past twilight. I spun in a circle and faced the gap in the fence I kn
ow so well.
Dark shapes were flitting through the fence and into camp. I tugged at my mom’s scrub top, but she and Richie were having a discussion in hushed tones I hadn’t been paying attention to.
I watched the people breaching the perimeter and kept yanking at her sleeve. I know that’s a weird word to use — breaching — but that was what kept echoing in my head as I watched.
Finally my mom swung around.
“Erin, I’m having a conversation!”
“Mom, look.”
My arm swept out to point at the infiltration happening at the fence. I could see my mom follow the invisible line beyond my finger. She squinted. Looked confused for a moment. And then the same realization that hit me, hit her. That there was a reason people were sneaking in through the back.
And then we heard the gunshots. Automatic rifle fire, again, from the front of camp. And then what I assume was the return-fire of handguns.
My mom was the one grabbing at my clothes now, pulling me back to the entrance of the quarantine tent.
“What’s happ-”
She shushed me and propelled me through the layers of clear plastic. Richie and Trish brought up the rear.
“Did I just hear gunfire a few seconds ago?” Lisa asked, tugging at the stethoscope around her neck.
“I think so,” Richie answered. “And something is on fire toward the front end of camp.”
“We need to hide,” my mom said, glancing back at the entrance to the tent.
I knew she was remembering the dark shapes we saw outside. But the two nurses didn’t seem to hear her.
“Shit. I bet some idiot knocked one of those tiki torches into a tent. I knew that’s what would happen as soon as I saw them lighting those babies up all over camp.”
Voices were suddenly audible from just outside the tent.
My mom’s fingers wrapped around my arm and yanked me away from the door. From behind us, I could hear the telltale swish of plastic sheeting being pushed aside.
“But what about the plague?” a man’s voice asked.
“We’ll be in and out. Hold yer fuckin’ breath if yer that worried,” a gruffer voice said.
The men were loud. Or maybe they seemed extra noisy because we all tend to talk just barely above a whisper in the tent to avoid disturbing the patients.
