Family

by Matthew Costello

Like a wolf pack.

  And she remembered something Jack had said so many months before, the night the Paterville Camp had been attacked, when the Can Heads broke in.

  These Can Heads seemed to hunt in a pack.

  Predators working together.

  And Jack, having dealt with them for so long in New York, said that was new.

  And what would a wolf pack do but follow the fleeing, terrified herd of humans, maybe pick them off one by one?

  If that was true—and she felt guilty at thinking this—that could be her family’s good luck. This small village and its surrounding woods and fields could be clear.

  They came to yet another small cul-de-sac.

  Three houses around a small circle where people probably once let their kids bike safely, the dead end keeping cars away.

  Two of the houses on the circle were dark; Christie easily spotted the damage: blown-in windows, smashed doorways, charred walls.

  But the third… at the top of the circle.

  A light on at the door. Then, an interior light, maybe from a kitchen.

  “Hang on,” she said to Kate.

  Kate slowed, a bit less jerkily now as she slowly became used to driving.

  “Is that one okay, Mom?” Kate said.

  “Not sure.”

  Christie kept looking at it, the bushes outside dappled with snow, clumps of dirty snow on the lawn.

  But the windows looked intact. The door, not broken in.

  Then, “May just be all right, Kate. Let’s take a look. Pull up, into the driveway. Is…”

  She turned back to her son. But Simon was asleep, flat on the back seat.

  He may have acted like being pounced on by a black bear was “no big thing.”

  But there he was, asleep, tuned out.

  Coping, she thought.

  “Okay,” Kate said.

  And she slowly pulled closer to the house, then up the slanted driveway that would put the car only feet from the doorway.

  Kate stopped the car.

  Christie took a breath.

  Time to take a look…

  CHAPTER 21

  The House

  Christie let Kate and Simon stay in the car, engine off, doors locked, while she went to the front door.

  Locked, of course.

  Which was a good thing. The door locked… might mean that someone could still be living here.

  On that off chance—such a weird idea—she pressed the buzzer, which worked. She heard the near-absurd sound of deep chimes for the doorbell, as if Big Ben was tolling inside.

  She waited, giving her kids a look, a smile. Then she rapped hard on the door.

  Then again.

  And the idea that someone was still here faded.

  The house had been—for some unknown reason—spared.

  But like the rest of the battle scene that was this town, it was abandoned.

  Now, she thought, how to get in?

  Until she felt a tap behind her.

  She gasped, her nerves compete on edge.

  To see Kate.

  “Mom, can I help?”

  Christie shook her head. “No. You should stay in the car, with your brother, and…”

  Then, standing in the small pool of light made the doorway light, she nodded.

  We’re together, she reminded herself.

  “Okay. It’s locked. I’m guessing any back door will be as well.”

  “So how do we get in?”

  “We could… well, I saw it done on TV… break the glass, unlock the door from the inside.”

  But Kate looked at the nearest window.

  “Pretty cold, Mom. We’d have a hole in the window.”

  Right, Christie thought.

  She wanted to find a place that was intact. Maybe not a good idea to start putting holes in it.

  “Right.”

  She bent down and looked at the lock. “I saw your dad do something once. We came in our back door, didn’t have a key. He slipped in a credit card…”

  Credit card, she thought. Everyone had them. Now—how useless.

  “…between the door and the frame. Could use it to get the lock open.”

  “Think that will work here?”

  Christie was aware how cold it was getting. Been chilly all day, but the car had a heater.

  But standing here, night falling, it seemed to grow ever more frigid. If they were going to get in, they better do it soon.

  Then, “No. This has a dead bolt. No credit card can open that.”

  “But the back door?”

  Christie turned to her daughter.

  That could be a different story.

  Heavy lock for the front. A kitchen door, though… could maybe just be a simple, door handle lock.

  “Worth a try, Kate. Either that, or we’ll just have to smash one of the windows.”

  She looked over to the car where all seemed still, Simon still sleeping. Then a glance out to the dead end street, the nearby houses.

  All quiet.

  “I’ll do it,” Kate said.

  “No, it’s tricky, Kate, I think—”

  “Have you ever done it, Mom?”

  Christie shook her head.

  “And with all that snow you’d have to walk through back there…”

  The logic… irrefutable. Christie nodded.

  “Think I still have a card or two in my purse.” She sniffed at the cold air. “Souvenirs.”

  Kate smiled.

  With every day Kate becoming more her partner in this, less a daughter.

  But no, never less a daughter. But clearly something more.

  Kate hurried back to the car for her mother’s wallet.

  Then Kate took the card after Christie described the process as best she could.

  “And Kate, if the lock is like this one, just come back. Don’t keep fiddling back there in the dark.”

  Kate nodded. “I will…”

  And then her daughter turned and dashed toward the back of the house.

  Christie waited, standing in the chill, surrounded by dark, wondering how Kate could manage the trick of springing open the back door.

  Even if it could be done.

  The seconds turning into minutes, and that anxiety, that fear that always seemed right at the surface, started to take over.

  She realized that with every day, with the three of them together, she couldn’t stand not being able to see her kids.

  Every moment.

  To protect them.

  And maybe—she thought—protect me.

  Then, a light went on in the back, then another in the hall!

  Christie looked at the small, door windows, a trio of them, each no bigger than a paperback novel, as she saw Kate rush to the front, stopping only to throw the switch on a table lamp.

  Then, the snap and click of the front door being unlocked.

  And she saw Kate grinning.

  “I did it. It was cool. Just like you said, I worked the card in and out, and finally the door… just slid open.”

  Kate held the door open so she could walk in and then handed her the now mangled credit card.

  “‘Course your card is bit messed up.”

  Christie smiled at her. “No worries about that. Thing’s pretty useless these days…” She took the card. “…except for opening doors.”

  She looked around the living room, seeming as if its owners had gone on vacation, the place left all neat and tidy. The air, chilly—but whatever fuel the boiler still had, the thermostat set low, was keeping the edge off.

  Lot of houses around here would have run out of fuel.

  And water pipes would explode, those interiors turning into bizarre frozen caves.

  But for now, this looked like a home.

  She looked at Kate. “Want to go get your brother? Bring him in?”

  Christie knew she still needed the cane. But today was better than yesterday, and if she got some rest, took care of the wound again…

  Tomorrow will be
even better.

  “Sure. I’ll go get him.”

  Christie about to say, Be careful.

  But those words no longer were needed as Kate raced out to the car and her sleeping brother.

  CHAPTER 22

  Jack

  Simon had opened the can of peas and then passed the can to Kate, who dumped the peas into a pot. Like the boiler, still enough gas coming from somewhere—propane, maybe lines from the street?—to actually cook them.

  Though Christie felt so hungry, she could have eaten them cold right from the can.

  Kate stirred them.

  “Think I should open a soup as well?” Simon said.

  Peas, Christie thought.

  Not much of a dinner.

  “Really hungry, Simon?”

  “A bit…”

  She looked away, thinking. Then back to him, “Do you think you can see how you feel after eating this? We want to make all those cans you guys found last.”

  “Sure.”

  Kate turned to her. “How do you know they’re done?”

  “Hmm?”

  “The peas. When they’re cooked?”

  Cooking was never much of a deal back home. So much processed stuff that Christie just heated things up, except for those occasional times when Jack brought home something special.

  A scrawny chicken he picked up from a thankful butcher who insisted he take it.

  Or some steaks that a family he helped gave him.

  Steaks. Seems like a lifetime ago.

  “Just have to be warmed up,” Christie said. “Probably good now.”

  Kate nodded, and then her daughter started opening drawers and the cupboard below sink.

  “Need one of those thingies…”

  “A colander?”

  “Yup. Got to be—ah, here it is.”

  She watched Kate pull out a big metal colander dotted with holes. How many spaghetti dinners had that done service in?

  Spaghetti. Meatballs.

  Now wouldn’t that be something?

  Kate poured the peas into the colander over the sink, then took a spoon and ladled the vegetable into three small bowls, each with an ornate flower design running around the edge.

  Dinner was served.

  *

  Christie looked at her kids, scraping their bowls, Simon with a green tinge around his lips, having eaten those peas so fast.

  She had suggested opening a second can, just eating half. Something to celebrate their “find.”

  And also she wanted everyone to linger at the table for a bit.

  “Your dad…” she said.

  The words halting, catching in her throat. But she had thought about this, the importance of doing this.

  “He was not a veggie guy.”

  Her kids both looked up. Christie kept a smile on her face. “In fact, he hated peas. ‘Mushy little bowling balls’ he called them.”

  Simon nodded. Kate seemed to be weighing Christie’s words, perhaps even wondering why.

  Why talk of our Dad?

  He’s gone. We’re alone.

  Why bring him up?

  “When we first met, I was teaching, and of course you could get anything and everything to eat. But he liked his steaks, lobster, and—once in a while—fish, fried flounder.”

  A nod from Simon.

  “How did you meet?”

  Christie turned and looked right at her son, thankful for the question.

  “Believe it or not, the school I worked in… most schools maybe… had a day where those people who were called—are still called maybe—’first responders’ came to the school. Police. Firemen. EMT people—”

  “EMT?” Simon said.

  Still nothing from Kate, her eyes still seeming to say, why are we talking about this?

  “Emergency Medical Team. Ambulance people. They all came, talked to the kids, the classes. Had the police cars there, fire trucks, ambulances.”

  “And Dad saw you?”

  Christie nodded, smiling. “Guess so. I was teaching older kids then… Middle school. They didn’t care about the special ‘guests’ in their uniforms, the trucks. They stood around, mostly talking to themselves. But your dad, he stood by his squad car. I saw him. He saw me.”

  So hard, this, she thought.

  “And he walked over and said… something like… ‘they don’t seem too interested.’ I started to apologize for my students. I mean, kids that age. Well, you guys know…”

  Did they? Did they have any awareness of just how self-centered kids that age can be, how long they stay that way?

  The world revolving around them.

  Of course, that world was gone now.

  “But he stopped me. And he said, ‘Kids, well, they’ll be kids.’ He asked how long I had been teaching there, did I like the school… you know, just conversation.”

  Finally Kate spoke up.

  “And you liked him?”

  She turned and looked right at her daughter.

  A small laugh. “Did I? You bet. A handsome cop.” Another laugh, and this brought a smile from Kate. “What’s… not to like?”

  “Then what?” Simon said, completely hooked on the story, this epic of when his parents first met.

  A tale probably every kid wants to hear… since—for all of them—that’s where it began.

  “Oh, a bit more chatting, then I was about to herd my class back into the building when he reached out and—God, I remember it like it was yesterday.

  And that is so true.

  “He touched my elbow. Just a tap. ‘How about dinner some night?’ he said. ‘Randazzo’s in Sheepshead Bay. Ever been?’ I hadn’t. And your dad said, ‘Let’s change that.’”

  She took a breath.

  “We went out for dinner…”

  “Have I been there?” Simon asked.

  Christie took a breath, the story about to shift, jump years. “When you were a baby. Yes. We went back again. Before all this. You must have been a one-year-old maybe?”

  Then, slowly… Kate spoke, “I remember that. There were all these boats, and before dinner we walked past them. I remember the smell, all the fish they caught, and people buying them, bunches of them.”

  “Yup. That’s right. The fishing boats in Sheepshead Bay. So many fish.” Christie laughed. “And right—it did smell.”

  Then—and Christie thought she might crumble at this as Kate spoke, “I remember I couldn’t see one boat, just docking… everyone gathered around at the end, and you had Simon in a stroller, and, and… Dad picked me up. Right on his shoulders. So now I was taller than everyone. I could see the whole boat. All the boats. It was like I was flying.”

  Christie saw that Simon had his eyes locked on his sister, picturing that moment that he could not remember.

  But nonetheless, he was there.

  Kate laughed. “He said to me… Dad said… ‘You’re as light as one of those fish there.’”

  And Christie could picture it as well. The sunny day, changing to dusk, the feeling that for their young family this day was perfect.

  She didn’t tell her kids that later…

  …when they got home, and she gave Simon a bottle, and Jack read to Kate, and all was quiet, that she remembered that they made love.

  As if that was the only way to end this perfect day.

  The pain of that memory… now so terribly bittersweet.

  So, she let the moment and the memories begin to fade.

  After all they had been through these past days… weeks…

  Months.

  …she had felt it was important to summon the spirit of their father, their funny father, their handsome father, their brave father who saved them all.

  And then gave that responsibility over to her.

  Her kids grew quiet. Maybe they sensed that the memory had to fade like smoke, a wonderful fog lifting.

  Until she then started talked about plans.

  For this very night.

  “So, I will keep watch while you guys
get some rest,” she started. “I can—”

  Kate interrupted her.

  “Mom, you’re the one that needs the rest. I mean, you just left the hospital.”

  And Christie did feel completely exhausted, the idea of some bed upstairs, waiting… nearly irresistible.

  “I’m fine. I can always sleep in the car tomorrow. Any problem along the way, you can—”

  But Kate shook her head.

  “Mom…” her voice strong, a reminder of what her daughter had been through, what she had done already.

  A reminder that the three of them were… yes, a family, but also a team.

  “I can stand first watch while you sleep.”

  Simon chimed in. “And I can do it too. I can watch.”

  She smiled at them. She thought of arguing, telling them that no, she’d do it. That she’d be fine.

  But one look at Kate’s face showed that the argument would not go well.

  “Okay. Kate, you can take first watch, then wake me and I—”

  “No,” Simon said, his voice surprisingly strong. “She can wake me. I can go second. Maybe let you sleep all night…”

  Then Christie matched her tone to theirs, even as she was losing this debate. “Listen. All right… I can do a third watch. Okay? We all get some rest. We’ll need it. But…”

  Here she looked at the front door across from such a cozy living room.

  “Each of us has to be super-alert. Listen carefully. Anything happens, anything strange at all, wake all of us up. I can set an alarm with my phone—least it’s good for something. Three hours each.”

  Then she looked at the two of them.

  “That sound do-able?”

  They both nodded.

  And though Christie worried about their ability to stay awake and alert, she knew that she herself would struggle with it.

  It wasn’t the best plan to get through this night.

  But it was a plan.

  Maybe it would be quiet.

  The hamlet of Stormville certainly seemed deserted tonight.

  Then, “Peas all done?” she asked.

  “Yum,” Kate said. “Still some in the can.”

  Christie laughed. “Okay, Kate, Simon and I will go find some beds. You—well, guess, you’ll sit here. Keep your gun close?”

  Again, no need for that reminder.

  And Christie looked above the fireplace mantel. She saw—inches above the layered stone bricks of the fireplace—an empty rack for a rifle, the weapon now long gone.