by John Varley
“Keep your bright side to yourself, all right?” Emily came back at him, miserably. “Until you get it, anyway.”
“It is a bright side, though,” Lisa said. “I can guarantee you that cholera is out there. Also typhoid. Maybe a lot of other things.”
Neither Bob nor Emily commented on that. Lisa was once more in a bad mood, and it was easy to understand why. She had lost a patient to the flu the previous evening, a four-year-old girl.
Everyone was shocked to hear it, and that made Lisa angry.
“People die of the flu, okay? Every year, thousands of them. Usually twenty thousand or more. More children get it, but more elderly die of it. That’s even in a hospital. These children…they’re malnourished. They’re weakened. So are the adults, the oldest most of all.”
“Lisa, no one is accusing you of anything,” her father said.
“I know you’re not. It’s just…I’ve lost so many, so very many.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Teddy was in no shape to scout for them.
The flu hit him hard, with a high temperature and chills that left him shaking. Despite his doctor’s advice he got on his bike and pedaled it around the parking lot while the others were packing. He made it about a quarter of a mile before he lurched off, stumbled over to a curb, and vomited. After that he walked the bike back and was helped into the bus with the other sick passengers.
The healthy ones gathered when they were ready to roll, and hashed out whether they should stay another day or two. Or even three.
“I’m against it,” Mark said. “We know we can’t settle here. We know there are other refugees on the road. Yeah, I said refugees. The only difference between us and those hordes at the Anaheim city limits is we’re better equipped. I figure all those communities south of us are filling up rapidly. They’re going to start shutting the gates, like Anaheim, if they haven’t already. Which means we have to get wherever we’re going as soon as possible.”
Mark’s argument carried the day. They said a few good-byes to people they had begun to see as friends. Addison in particular was devastated to leave a girl of her own age named Guadalupe, who she had grown close to in a short time. And, Dave thought, possibly to her handsome brother, Francisco. But after some tearful hugs and kisses, she boarded the Escalade without complaint.
“Do you think there’s any chance we might see them again, Daddy?”
“I wish I could tell you, honey. You can see how difficult travel is now. But it won’t always be that way. Things will get better, and we may not have to travel too far to find a place.”
“But we don’t really know, do we?”
“No, Addie, we don’t.”
Though Teddy was sick, they still needed someone to scout for them. There were other volunteers to take on the job on bicycles, including Dave, but he knew there was something better. It would, however, require some renegotiation with Addison.
“Daddy, you promised.”
“I know I did. That’s why we’re having this family meeting. Karen, do you want to say anything?”
“Yes, I do. Addie, I’m very impressed with how grown-up you are, even more than you were before all this happened. You never beat me over the head with how superficial I had become, or your father with how obsessed with work he was.”
“Mom, I…”
“It’s okay. I know you had issues with both of us. The only good thing—the only good thing—to come out of this chaos is that it brought our family back together, and made both your parents see what was really important in life. I am so proud of you for not hating me.” Suddenly Karen sounded uncertain. “You don’t hate me, do you?”
“Oh, Mom.” Dave almost had to laugh. Addison had managed to tell her mother that she was being silly, that she still loved her, while still not surrendering an ounce of her teenage sulk over what her father had proposed.
“Good. Because I never stopped loving you. I just stopped showing it. I love you so much that it’s very hard for me to do what I’m about to do…which is to tell you to stop behaving like a little brat, and grow up!”
Addison jumped as if Karen had slapped her.
“You want to be treated as an adult. That means that you have to contribute on an adult level. To all of us, not just me and Dave, but the whole new family. They need scouts. We have scooters. Now, if you’re going to whine and try to hold me and your father to a promise made when circumstances were different…well, I guess you’re just going to have to learn that sometimes promises are broken, because they have to be. Not because we want to leave you, or because we don’t love you, but because this is something that has to be done, whether you like it or not. I don’t like your father going out there alone, and I’m not crazy about doing it myself. But an adult puts all that aside, weighs the options, and does what’s right for everybody, not just for herself.
“So here’s where we stand, young lady. This is going to happen, whether you approve or not. But it would be so much easier if we did it with your approval, and didn’t have to come back to your resentment. Can you let go of it? Can you release us from the promise we made?”
Addison’s chin was quivering, but she was managing to hold back the tears.
“I’m just so scared, Mom.”
“We all are. But I know you’ll be brave. You’ve shown us that already.”
The girl was silent for a few moments, then nodded.
“Do what you have to do,” she said. “It’s all right with me. And I’ll only get angry if one of you doesn’t come back. Then I’m going to be really pissed.”
It was a compromise, but it seemed to work pretty well.
Either Dave or Karen would motor ahead on one of the scooters, leaving the other parent with Addison. When they discussed it before facing their daughter, Dave had suggested they point out that, worst case, she would not be left an orphan. Karen had stepped on that at once, and Dave had quickly seen that she was right. That observation would only emphasize to the girl that every time one of her parents left her, there was a chance that she would have only one parent at the end of the day. Best not to discuss that part of it at all. She was smart enough to understand the risks. Why emphasize them?
Dave took the lead on the first day. He kept his hand on the shotgun at all times, ready to aim and fire in an instant. Or at least, he hoped, faster than whoever he was shooting at. And always, always, he kept in mind that if it were humanly possible, running was infinitely better than fighting.
The first day passed without incident. They were still trying to make their way to the I-5, but managed only to get to Garden Grove at the end of the day. They saw people but didn’t interact with anyone other than to wave at those who waved at them. It was a reminder that, though there were certainly predators out there, the vast majority of people were as decent and harmless as they had ever been.
There was less quake damage down here, but that didn’t mean there weren’t plenty of blocked streets. Usually there were at least a few people still living on those streets, and often they were willing to talk. Dave quickly found that these people were almost always familiar with the neighborhood, which streets were passable and which were not. It saved some time.
Sometimes the residents just stared at him, hands on their weapons, sometimes with a speculative look. In his best moments Dave thought the look said “I wonder if he’s got anything to eat?” In his worst moments, he wondered if their thoughts were more like “I wonder if he’d be good to eat?” He told himself he was just being overimaginative. These people were still a long way from cannibalism. Weren’t they?
In any case, no one overtly threatened him, though he was clearly being told to move along, he was not welcome. One very large man even told him so. Dave just waved at him and accelerated away, his back prickling.
He quickly developed a new appreciation for the work Teddy had been doing. And a new dread of letting Karen do the scouting the next day. But he knew it wasn’t a question of “letting,” and that
she would insist on taking her turn.
Addison was doing her best to look grown-up and unconcerned when Dave returned close to sunset with his last report of the day. Karen had told him that Addison had spent the day almost looking ahead, and had sighed in relief every time they heard the putt-putt of the little Vespa.
“Your old man can handle himself,” he said. “Which means, at the first sign of trouble I run like hell.”
“Just keep doing that, Daddy,” she said, solemnly.
“Didn’t have to run once today. Saw nothing but nice people. I think all the bad guys are keeping their heads down. They’ve found out that solid citizens like us are ready to shoot back.”
“Don’t shoot back, Daddy. Shoot first.”
“No, run first. Then shoot if you have to. But I don’t think I’ll have to.”
Karen didn’t have to shoot the next day, either, but Dave got his first taste of what it had been like for his girls the day before. He was on edge every time she drove away, and almost overwhelmed with relief every time she came back. She made five scouting forays that day, and his anxiety increased with every one. At this rate, he thought, I’m going to see if a man can actually die of worry.
Jenna, sitting up in the back, did her best to keep Dave and Addison’s spirits up.
“Karen’s a fighter, and a survivor,” she said. “I’d be more worried for any bad guys she comes up against than I’d worry about her.”
Dave glanced in his rearview. Jenna was much improved, but she still looked ghastly. Gaunt and pale, with bags under her eyes, she was weak and slept a lot. And, of course, she was deeply frustrated by being unable to be much help.
“Cargo, that’s what I’ve been reduced to,” she said in a moment of self-pity.
“Cargo that’s pretty handy with a shotgun,” Addison told her.
Karen’s last report was that the way was clear down Magnolia Street to the 22 Garden Grove Freeway, which also looked pretty good. The caravan stopped for the night with the freeway in sight. Dave heaved a huge sigh of relief.
The next day Dave easily found a route onto the 22, and they headed west. There was no need to range very far ahead, as the freeway was broad and nearly straight, and the drivers could see almost a mile ahead. The smoke from the fire had blown away, and the air was as clear as it had been a hundred years ago. So Dave hung the scooter from the roof and got in the passenger side, with Karen driving.
They traveled farther than on any previous day, and yet it was not an encouraging day. The freeway was largely intact, with only two fallen overpasses to go around. But every time they left the freeway they encountered roadblocks. They were manned by police in uniforms, or hard-eyed armed men and women. The message couldn’t have been clearer: Keep moving.
At first they stopped and talked with the people at the roadblocks, but they didn’t get much information beyond the very basic lowdown on what they might expect at the next town down the line, and that was never good.
At the Santa Ana city limits Bob talked to the police sergeant in charge of the detachment blocking the highway.
“We’re letting people through if they look nonviolent,” the man said. He looked them over with a critical eye. He apparently concluded that the Marshall/Winston party didn’t pose a threat to his community. But that was as far as he would go.
“By through, we mean through. No stopping in Santa Ana, unless you have relatives here. And we check, believe me.”
“What about the town to the south?” Bob asked him. “Is it Tustin?”
“It was Tustin. They’ve incorporated with us, and we’re all Santa Ana now. They don’t want you folks, either. Sorry about that.”
“What’s south of that?” Karen asked. “Irvine, right?”
“Yep. And I don’t know squat about Irvine.”
“Do you know if they’re letting people through down there? In Anaheim, they were turning them back.”
“Is that so? Didn’t know that. But I know the city council considered doing that, too. Voted down by five to eight, something like that. Come back in a week, they may have changed their minds.”
“We’re trying to get to San Diego.”
“Good luck with that. My advice to you, go back to Los Angeles.”
“There’s nothing to go back to.”
“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just that, far as I know, there’s nothing for you down south of here, either.”
Santa Ana was not entirely heartless, they just didn’t want to accept any new citizens, like so many other cities. But at the next gap in the freeway a small rest area had been established. There were some tents for the ragged and discouraged people there, who numbered no more than thirty or forty. None of them had motorized transportation. Some were pulling wagons or pushing shopping carts with their few possessions.
There was a soup kitchen, and a doctor seeing patients in a white trailer with a red cross on the side. But there was a hand-painted sign letting the travelers know that they were welcome for only twenty-four hours, and then they would have to move along. They would be moved by force, if necessary. No exceptions.
Lisa came back to the group after she had spoken to the doctor.
“That business about ‘No exceptions’ isn’t written in stone, at least not to Dr. Garabedian in there. Though the city council may not know about it. He says he won’t send someone on if they’re desperately sick. He’s kept a few, taking them to his own house. One of them died. From cholera.”
“They’re drinking contaminated water,” Nigel said.
“People don’t have much choice, after a big disaster. It’s happened all over the world, in places like Haiti. I’m not sure which is a worse death, though, dehydration from no water, or from diarrhea.”
“Well.” Bob sighed. “Shall we move on?”
The story continued the same as the day wore on. They made good time, but continued to be unwelcome.
They made it through Tustin to the 55 Costa Mesa Freeway and decided to travel down it. They got about halfway to the 405 and came to another roadblock, this one deadly serious. Abandoned cars had been stacked up and converted into a steel fortress completely spanning the freeway. While they were still a quarter of a mile away there was a gunshot. They stopped instantly.
“I guess it was a warning shot,” Bob said. “If they wanted to kill and rob us, they would have waited until we were closer, right?”
“Makes sense,” Dave said. “I guess that gunshot says ‘Turn around, we don’t even want to talk to you.’ ”
They headed back to the 5. They never discovered whether the roadblock was maintained by the city of Costa Mesa or some independent band.
They reached the city of Irvine that evening. Once more they were not welcome, but were allowed to spend the night in a park the city had set aside for people passing through. They filled up on water again. The next morning they were stopped by Irvine police from cutting wood. There was nothing to do but keep heading southeast on the 5.
When they came to the 133 Laguna Freeway they turned due south and followed it. The land was barren, but after a mile they began to see isolated stands of trees, brown and dry after the long summer. There was no one around to stop them, so they cut down as many as they needed and filled the top of the bus again.
They had hoped to reach the 73 San Joaquin Hills Transportation System, which was a fancy way of saying toll road. It started at the 55 in the north and cut through a lot of unpopulated land like Crystal Cove State Park and Laguna Coast Wilderness Park. Avoiding towns had begun to seem like a good idea.
But it was not to be. There was another roadblock just before the freeway entrance. Someone behind it used a loud-hailer to tell them they had to turn around unless they had relatives in Laguna Beach.
“But we only want to get on the freeway,” Bob shouted back.
“We’ll let you on if you’re going north. If not, Aliso Viejo doesn’t want you, either. You’ll have to go back to the 5 or the 405.”
And that was that. Their only consolation was that the side trip had replenished their fuel, and it hadn’t taken long on the open road, and took even less time on the return.
They rejoined the 405 south to the 5, and made it to Mission Viejo, yet another community with a twenty-four-hour visitor policy. They made camp on a golf course with a dozen other families.
None of their neighbors talked about food, probably because most of them didn’t have any. The temporary guests were being advised to boil their water, and most of them seemed to be doing it.
The soup being doled out was thin and tasteless. The Winstons and the Marshalls ate a cold, meager supper, a few at a time, in the bus.
“We’re not learning much about these towns,” Dave said. “Are they growing crops? Is food coming in from somewhere? Are they eating their dogs and cats?”
“That’s the sort of thing they don’t want us to know,” Rachel said. “If they’re prosperous, they don’t want to tempt the transients.”
“Same as us,” Lisa pointed out.
“And if they’re desperate,” Dave said, “…well, I’m guessing if they were desperate desperate, they’d be confiscating our stuff. I guess that’s good news. Maybe not too many people are starving.”
Mission Viejo was not welcoming of strangers, nor was San Juan Capistrano.
They saw more refugees on the road. There were the inevitable shopping carts, but more and more of them were simply walking, with nothing but their clothes and whatever might be in their pockets. The human tide they had seen going to Santa Monica had become a trickle here, but it was all flowing relentlessly south, toward Capistrano, Dana Point, and the sea. These people were the most destitute they had yet seen. Some of them had stopped walking. They simply sat by the side of the road.
“I can’t take much more of this,” Karen said, as they passed a man, woman, and child sitting in the shade of an overpass.
“I know what you mean,” Dave said. Then, “Fuck this. Sorry, Addison.”
“I agree, Daddy. Fuck this.”
