by Ginger Booth
“Who is ‘our sponsor’?” Emmett demanded.
He wasn’t happy when I told him the Canadian government owned us now.
And so on. It was a long evening, but eventually Emmett achieved information glut.
At the door, he said, “We just scratched the surface of what you’ve got tonight, didn’t we? I’ll be back, Dee.”
And he was, often.
-o-
“Dee, could we talk?” Shelley asked. She’d come up behind me while I plugged the final wave of cabbage transplants into the ground in April. “Brought you some iced tea.”
“Sure, I could use a break.” I gulped the unsweetened rose-hip decoction she held out, before I took in her clothes. She wore Army fatigues, like Zack’s crew, a pistol on her hip. I pointed to a pink granite boulder on the shady side of the house. To build anything in Connecticut requires relocating some granite. This particular chunk had been dynamite-sculpted with a nice flat shelf, for use as a bench. I waved Shelley to take a seat. “What’s up?”
“I – I want to join the barricades, and work for Zack,” she managed to blurt out. “Trey taught me how to shoot and stuff.”
Shelley and Trey had become a steady item. Trey Cowan, the once-looter we’d found in Adam’s bed, seemed to sleep at Alex’s house nearly as often as I slept at Zack’s. Zack and I didn’t move in together, because I had my gardens and computer office, and Zack had his livestock. But we cooked dinner and slept together as often as his work allowed.
I nodded. Shelley needed an outlet for her rage. “So you don’t want to work on Amenac anymore?”
She nodded, worried.
“That’s fine, Shelley. I’m hardly working on Amenac anymore, either,” I assured her. “If this is what you want to do.”
“You won’t hold it against me? If I quit UNC?”
“Why would I do that? Shelley, UNC is a farce these days. I spend most of my time farming.” After the corporate C-level died in Tennessee, I expected the servers to go dark and the paychecks to stop coming any time now. It didn’t matter. The money wasn’t worth anything. Our data access was now courtesy of the Canadian government, not UNC. Mangal kept his hand in on Amenac and its spin-off sites, working with the few of our people who stayed with it. That didn’t need all of us.
“OK.” Shelley breathed out. “Trey and I will leave as soon as we find a place.”
“Why, is Alex tired of you? He hasn’t said anything to me.”
We exchanged puzzled looks.
“Shelley, you live at Alex’s house because Alex invited you. Not because you work for me. If he’s OK with Trey moving in full-time, that’s great. I’d appreciate it if you chip in some food, though. Otherwise I’m paying taxes to feed you twice.” I grinned to take the sting out of that.
“We will! I’ll ask Alex,” she said happily. “And Dee? Thank you, for everything. It’s not that I’m not grateful, for the internship.”
“I know. You’re welcome, Shelley. The best part of being a supervisor is watching people grow. You’ve grown a lot. And it’s a different world. I hope you’re happy with Trey, here or wherever you land up.”
She smiled warmly. “I am. You look happy with Zack, too. He looks happy.”
I nodded judiciously, then broke into a grin. “We fit. We belong here, and believe in what we’re doing.”
Yeah, that new normal was pretty nice while it lasted. There were more raids to fight off, more people died, we worked hard with little security, and the psycho weather just wouldn’t quit.
But we were happy then.
-o-
“Hey, Emmett!” I called, on my way into the kitchen to grab a drink. He was sitting in my living room when I came home, dressed in olive drab shorts and a gaudy Hawaiian shirt he must have borrowed from Zack. “Want something to drink?”
I’d played hooky that morning. It was a glorious sunny June day, the dry air so clear that the shadows were crisp and dark, making the early summer deep greens and riotous bright flowers glow. We’d been living under a brown cloud of Dust Bowl dirt, that unpredictably erupted in dry lightning, for days. The ozone and static in the air left me edgy and nervous all the time. When it cleared at last into such a beautiful day, I couldn’t resist. I headed down to the beach and paddled a kayak out around the islands for a few hours.
“I helped myself, thanks, Dee,” Emmett replied. His voice sounded raspy, his eyes red and puffy, and he had a roll of toilet paper on the end table at his elbow next to his water glass. I didn’t have tissues anymore.
“You have a cold?” I inquired, plonking down across from him with my iced tea.
“No,” he replied. He fidgeted with his glass. “Dee, I’ve, um…” A tear fell down his cheek.
I leapt over beside him on the couch. I took his hand to comfort him. “Emmett? What’s wrong? How can I help?”
He shook his head, and moved his other hand to hold my shoulder. “It’s Zack, Dee. He went out with me last night –”
“No,” I said.
“We were spotting for an artillery strike, on that pack of vipers in Broomfield –”
“No.”
“The mission was a success. Our artillery took out the survivalist camp. We were on our way out. It was a lucky shot, from one of the stragglers. Unlucky for Zack. He was the only one of us hit. We carried him out, but –”
“No.” I said “No” a lot of times, nearly every time Emmett took a breath. He folded me into his arms. I kept saying “No” into his chest, huddled there shaking.
“I sat with him while he died,” Emmett told me. His voice broke on it. “Tanked him up on oxycontin, and talked. Took an hour or two. He told me a lot of things. I’ll tell you, later, if you want. But he loved you. That’s the main thing. Girl, he really, really loved you.” Emmett was crying, too. He brushed his fingers through my hair as I sobbed on his chest. “I promised him I’d watch out for you and Alex. And I will do that.”
Emmett stopped talking and just held me and let me cry. He didn’t pat me quite the same way Zack would, but it was similar. His slighter, wiry build and twangy accent weren’t the same at all.
For the first time, I couldn’t cry my way out to the other side.
-o-
People lash out in different ways, when they’re broken. I painstakingly dressed the morning of Zack’s funeral in my best little black dress, black fishnet stockings, and spike heels. I had a tacky pin my sister gave me as a comment on losing my virginity long ago, a big red enameled ‘A’ on fake gold. I fixed that above my heart. Even for corporate-Tuesday-in-Stamford, I rarely bothered with makeup beyond lipstick and eyeliner, but I did up my face to go with the nightclubbing dress. I drew a tear on one cheek with black eye pencil.
Poor Alex took one look at this clown getup and ran off to fetch Mangal. Mangal took it all in, and kissed my forehead gently. “I think pearls would go better,” he suggested mildly, and tapped the scarlet A with a finger. I refused. He shrugged acquiescence. He and Shanti flanked me loyally all the way to the church.
Adam came to the funeral, along with seemingly everyone in west Totoket, plus Zack’s fellow community coordinators. Adam wore bright Coast Guard uniform, having accepted a permanent place as a Niedermeyer satellite.
I didn’t know what Niedermeyer’s official role was, but it was irrelevant. Niedermeyer was a power, like Jean-Claude Alarie and Emmett. Their titles revealed little.
Adam tapped my pin. “Is this for me?” he said with a sad smile. He detached my scarlet A and stuffed it into his pocket. “I’ll treasure it. Always.” He gave me a long, warm hug. I was grateful he came. But he wasn’t Zack, and I wanted Zack, and I could never have him again. I went on to accept hugs and condolences from Vito and his wife Brenda next, then others.
Zack’s sister Delilah assured me that she considered everything Zack had, to be mine, except some family keepsakes she wanted. She left me a few photos of Zack as a child, though.
It was all mechanical. I was miserable, just going
through the motions. My inappropriate outfit kept most of the civic association acquaintances at bay. Only people who really knew me came up to share a hug.
Emmett gave Zack’s eulogy. He told a story about when he and Zack served in Estonia, and survived an ambush, and the guilt of being a survivor, the loneliness of going on. That we were all survivors now, all struggling with survivor guilt. That the greatest anodyne to that kind of pain was to celebrate the life of the fallen, and to recommit to doing something meaningful in the world. That Zack had died a happy man, in love with a good woman, seeking to protect those he loved. His last mission was a success, and removed bad guys who preyed on good people. And that was a good death.
-o-
Then, of course, the hard part came. I had to take up my life again.
But I’d gone zombie, like so many before me. I had plenty of helping hands to keep my gardens alive, to help make me get it done. The neighbors all pitched in. They insisted they couldn’t do anything without me telling them what to do. Maybe it was even partly true.
Once they got me moving in the garden, I didn’t stop. The plants were beautiful, and I loved them. I didn’t have to think, I could just be with them. The land, the sky, the sea, the natural beauty of Connecticut, even weird weather, have always given me that gift.
Emmett moved into Zack’s house to supervise Jamal and Delilah taking over Zack’s work. Emmett grew up on a farm in the Ozarks, and easily took over Zack’s livestock. He came by nearly every evening for me to cook dinner for him. He wasn’t much of a cook himself. But he was a good conversationalist while I cooked, and he did all the clean-up.
I told him to go away fairly regularly. He affably assured me that he’d promised Zack he’d look out for me, and he wasn’t going anywhere.
-o-
Alex found a girl in the woods in August, maybe 6 weeks later. Zack had been teaching Alex mushrooming, though the hunting wasn’t nearly as good by the marsh as it was up on Sleeping Giant. Alex brought the waif home to me.
She never spoke. She was maybe 8 years old, with a stomach that looked bloated next to her stick-thin limbs. She went barefoot and her clothes were torn to grubby ribbons. She carried nothing.
I fed her carefully, very slowly at first. I cut away her filthy matted hair, got her clean and clothed, and took her to the doctor. He gave me some antibiotics and de-worming meds for her. Her expression was changeless, huge eyes not expressing interest or pleasure or dislike. She did what I asked her to do, and then stopped, staring off into space.
She slept in my food storage spare bedroom, and was starving when she came to me. But she didn’t eat anything unless I explicitly gave it to her to eat.
Emmett found a giant picture-book of children’s fairy tales for her. Not the Disney-cute versions, but the original horrible stories, that expressed children’s fears in a darker age. He’d read it to her at bed-time. The girl showed no more interest in the stories than in anything else, but would sometimes trace a beautiful illustration with her finger.
Emmett called her ‘Angel,’ and perhaps she was.
She stayed with me a couple weeks. Then one day she was gone when I woke in the morning. No one knew where she’d gone in the night.
After searching for her all day without a trace, I cried on Emmett when he showed up for dinner. Then I got up to cook supper. But instead I started smashing plates and glasses on the floor, caught up in a sudden rage.
Emmett grabbed me. He pinned my arms and carried me and my bare feet out of the kitchen, and sat me on his lap on the couch. He let me give him a few weak punches to the chest, then shut me up with a deep hard kiss.
We made love, hard and urgent, there on the couch. Then, both naked, he tucked me into my bed sheets. When he made to leave, I tugged his arm and pulled him into bed beside me. He settled in, and I snuggled onto his shoulder.
“Angel was a good name,” I told him. “You were good with her.” I accepted, then, that she too was gone for good, beyond my reach.
Emmett sighed, and replied, “My momma used to say that God sends us nothing but angels.”
“Maybe your momma’s an angel. The survivalist who killed Zack was not an angel. I’m not an angel.” I almost added, You’re not, but hesitated. I wasn’t sure I believed that. I was waking up from zombie-dom, and it kinda hurt.
“You find angels better than most,” Emmett contradicted me, “like Vito, or your pal at HomeSec.” He’d wheedled the details of my stay at HomeSec out of me one night. One night out of many. By late August, Emmett had been an evening fixture in my life for nearly half a year. Almost as long as I’d known Zack. “You’re angel enough, darlin’.”
“Like your momma?” I said sourly.
Emmett snorted. “My momma’s a county sheriff,” he said. “She’s tough as nails, and knows a lot more survivalists than we do. Makes a point of making friends with them. You remind me of her that way. I came to Connecticut because she didn’t need me back home. My old pal Zack had a tougher spot here. Momma and I talked it over. Her advice was to come here, give myself some scope, make a bigger difference.”
“What did your Dad say?”
“My step-dad and I shared a farewell joint. He told me, ‘Good luck.’”
I laughed softly.
“Good to hear you laugh again, Dee,” he whispered. He kissed my forehead. “Don’t stop.”
“Did Zack really make you promise to keep me safe? I feel… I don’t know what I feel. Disloyal, I guess.”
“Not exactly. I told Zack I’d watch out for you, and asked if he’d mind if I courted you for myself. He said he wished you had that kinda sense. So sorta, on the whole, I’d take that as his blessing.”
At that, I really laughed. “You know, the night we met, when you sprang me from Homeland? I told Zack you hated me. He said you just wanted me yourself.”
“Oh, I was just ribbing him at first. You’re definitely more my type than his. I love a tough, cheerful, ballsy woman. He used to go for the most tedious, most tiresome, politically correct shrews. I’d been on him about that for years. Delilah is a delight compared to Zack’s women before you. But then, after I saw what they’d done to your pal Tom, and here you came out of HomeSec fresh as a daisy. Had the whole situation under control, arranged your own alternate rescue, and came out handing me demands.” He laughed out loud. “I fell in love with you right then.”
It’s amazing how the word ‘love’ can throw a pall over a conversation. It’s supposed to mean something nice.
Eventually Emmett added, “I think you missed part of that. I didn’t promise Zack to ‘keep you safe.’ I said I’d watch your back.”
“That’s not the same thing?”
“No. You watch another fighter’s back. You cover her blind side, pitch in when she’s overextended. You don’t keep her from the fight. You’ve been grieving a while. But I need you back in the game.”
“I just wanted to be safe.”
Did I really? I had a chance at safety in an ark. I turned it down to grow my own food, risk looters and armed procurement forces, to try and build a Totoket for a new world, to build Amenac to help farmers everywhere.
“You sure don’t act like it,” Emmett replied, confirming my second thoughts. “Death’s safe, darlin’. We’ll all get there, by and by. Life is risky.”
“Yet you’re here to keep people safe.”
“No, Dee, I’m not. I’m here to build a new world order. I’d like a kind world, but mostly it just has to work. The old one didn’t. People like you and me, we have the skills and resilience to keep going. Others don’t. God bless ’em, but I can’t save ’em. Everybody’s got to save themselves.”
I nodded slowly, and traced my hand across his chest. Emmett was a harsher man than Adam or Zack, and a stronger one. As we turned to lovemaking again, slow and gentle this time, I finally let go of feeling guilty over Zack. In truth, I never had anything to feel guilty about. I just loved him, and missed him. But he was gone, and I chose to liv
e. No one could live in this time, this world, without losing people. And sex with Emmett was good, very good.
Eventually Emmett said quietly, “Dee, tonight, having sex, was about choosing life. I’ve wanted to do this a long time. But for it to happen again, you’d need to choose Emmett. I’m not like Zack. I won’t share you with other men.”
“I choose Emmett,” I agreed.
-o-
“I got some interesting news today, darlin’,” Emmett told me, as I cleaned out a winter squash for supper in October.
It was dark and weird outside that night. Dry lightning played scattered peek-a-boo through a towering overcast of cloud and dust, to a running grumble of distant thunder. The electric air left me energized and keyed up. I wanted a better physical outlet than a battle with squash guts. Once I got it into the oven, perhaps.
I cocked an eyebrow in inquiry, and Emmett continued. “The death rate seems to be flattening out, coasting in to about 230 million for the U.S.”
“If they haven’t stockpiled enough food, more will die over the winter,” I replied. “I thought that was the logic of waiting until March.”
“That was the logic,” Emmett agreed. “Screw logic.”
“Oh?”
“Remember your loud-mouth pal, Tom Aoyama? He recruited a team, and set out to try his post-Ebola thing, walking a quarantine line west across Long Island. Looks like he’s proved out his concept. But there’s always been a catch to that. People hear about it inside New York, and flock to Long Island trying to get through. Too many millions to stay in Long Island. It was way depopulated, and the survivors didn’t grow enough food to survive the onslaught. But at least, everyone’s healthy east of the quarantine line.”
“Need more exits,” I said.
“What?”
“You can’t have the survivors all running to Long Island. You need more exits.” It seemed obvious to me. “So, what about screwing March?”
Emmett knew what I meant. “Niedermeyer wants to declare the depopulation phase over. He thinks we can rally people behind the relief of New York. Get people working together to build a new Northeast. He’s made a call for proposals, what to do next. We’re invited to present them at a meeting, a couple weeks from now at the Coast Guard Academy in New London.”
