Poveglia (After the Cure Book 4)

by Deirdre Gould

  She just nodded.

  “If you change your mind,” he said, “I’ll keep a light in the window. It’s the red brick at the end of Preta Street.”

  Sevita shuddered at the image, but smiled sadly at him. “Goodbye, Dan.”

  He raised a hand as he turned away. “Goodbye, Sevita.”

  She had gone home, to her apartment. She was filthy and her clothes were torn. If she let Christine see her like this, she’d panic. Christine couldn’t panic. It wasn’t good for her. It wasn’t good for the baby. The power was still out at the apartment, but it wasn’t an unexpected occurrence in the City after the Plague. Several gallons of clean water were stored under the sink. Sevita found the lumpy candles she and Christine had made. It had been when they had almost nothing. They were trying to decorate the apartment. Chris had brought home three packs of crayons. They were the crummy kind, the ones that didn’t mark well. She and Sevita had spent hours peeling paper labels off the damned things. They’d melted them in an old can on the stove and made the colorful candles. Chris hadn’t let Sevita burn them, saving them for years. Sevita lit the pair with shaking hands. She found a soft towel and the metal washtub where she had cleaned their clothing before the City’s power had restored the washing machine to use. There was a small bar of soap still wrapped in the kitchen drawer. It was one of the complimentary hotel bars that used to be piled by the handful in guest rooms. Christine had given it to her for Christmas. Traded a week’s worth of tokens for it. Sevita unwrapped it. Its scent was heavy and sweet, coconut. It was smooth and soft, instead of the greasy, lumpy mounds they made themselves. She got undressed as gently as she could, trying not to open the burn on her foot or rub any of the fresh bruises on her limbs. Sevita stood in the washtub, carefully pouring the cool water over herself. She didn’t want to get any on the floor. She didn’t want to think that the apartment might rot, the floor falling away after she was gone. She wanted to believe it would stay this way, hushed, clean, sweet smelling, like an old lady’s wedding dress, put away forever. She washed herself slowly, the coconut overwhelming the tang of smoke in her hair. When she was done, she walked to the bedroom closet. She pulled out the bright goldenrod dress she’d worn when she and Christine had been released from quarantine just a few months ago. It was the newest thing she owned and the fine threads glittered in the candlelight. She wrapped her burned foot in a soft bandage, one from Christine’s first aid kit. Then she slipped on the slender sandals she’d used for vacation days, though she knew she wouldn’t be able to walk very far without an ache forming in her feet. She brushed her hair over and over, losing herself in the movement until it lay smooth against her skin. She opened the purse sitting near the bedroom mirror and brought the little candles close to the glass. A few cracked compacts rolled out onto the table. She opened them one by one. She’d given up modern cosmetics for broadcasts years ago. There just wasn’t enough left. Christine kept telling her she didn’t need them, but Sevita secretly missed them. She wore them only on special days. Her first interview with the Military Governor or during the tiny ceremony where she and Christine had married. The night they’d said goodbye to Nella and Frank. Still, there was very little left. A cracked ring of powder in the foundation case, barely enough to scrape up. She felt herself calming as she carefully applied it in the half-light. The dark kohl was next, Sevita still had the last tin her mother had sent from home. It was the last thing she had of her parents. She waited a moment, turning it in her hand, afraid she would cry and ruin it. But she was calmer now, her eyes were dry and tired. It went on smoothly, as if the tin was fresh, newly pressed with that morning’s ghee. Sevita finished by collecting the few stray granules of blush still left in the last compact. She leaned back to look and knocked over one of the candles. Wax spattered over the wood floor as the flame tipped and then went out. She looked at the candle for a moment, lying in a puddle of its own flesh, the muddled colors dim and the rim sunken. She picked it up and set it beside the lit candle. She thought of cleaning up the wax, of kneeling down and scraping it, still warm and supple from the wood. But it suddenly felt like a mark. Like evidence. Like something of her, some action that was hers alone, would stay after she was gone. The broadcast would be shut off, and soon. People would break through the wall where they had destroyed it, maybe in a month, maybe in a decade, but they would come. Those things were big. Too big. They were noticed. People would stop them. But not this. Not a little puddle of wax sealing the dust from her feet onto the wood. No one would touch it. No one would disturb it. It was as good as the grave she wouldn’t get. She did kneel down. She scraped at the wax with the end of a hairpin. The puddle was small, she couldn’t fit much, just: “Sevita loved you.” Then she dated it and stood up. It was time to go, before she couldn’t anymore.

  She had wanted to run to the hospital. A few days earlier, she would have been able to. But now she was clumsy, wrung out and her mind wandered almost constantly. It pulled up images of her childhood, left her standing stock still on the darkening pavement several times, talking to the ghost of her parents in some half-remembered moment. It turned her around, convinced her that the streets she’d walked and biked for ten years were wrong somehow, that they’d moved or that she’d taken a wrong turn. She was out too late and had to hide from the quarantine teams in their glowing yellow suits more than once. When she finally made it to the hospital, she’d stood in the empty lot for a long time, wondering how to get in.

  In the end, she just forced herself to concentrate, smoothed her smoke frizzled hair and tried to walk straight. The receptionist was already gone for the night and with the curfew in place, nobody thought to guard the lobby. Sevita made it to the back stairs without stumbling and then, in a perverse shift that seemed to pay her back for all her care, she went tumbling down them, landing on the cold cement of the basement. She knew that Christine wouldn’t know she was there until Sevita pressed the bright intercom button, so she indulged in a few tired sobs before she got up. For Paul and Tom, for Dan, for Christine, for herself. Christine didn’t need to see her this way. Not while she had to stay locked up in that little coffin, scared to death. She had to let Chris know that it was going to be okay. That she just needed to wait a while. She needed to make it easy for Christine to say goodbye.

  Sevita picked herself up. She shook the wrinkles and dirt from her skirt and carefully dried the corners of her eyes so the makeup wouldn’t run. She walked slowly up to the bunker door, concentrating on not tripping just in case Christine was watching. She pressed the intercom button. “Hello?” she said, “Chris, are you there?”

  Twenty-five

  Sevita’s voice made Christine look up from the half-finished radio. At first, she thought it was her imagination, but a second later, she heard it again.

  “Chris, are you there?”

  She jumped up from the table, her small screwdriver skittering across the Formica. Marnie shifted in her sleep but didn’t open her eyes. Christine was grateful, she wanted to talk to Sevita alone. She jammed her finger into the intercom button. “I’m here. I’m here ‘Vita.” She flipped the exterior camera on. She could tell that Sevita had spent a long time preparing to come and see her. She’d tried to look her most beautiful, Christine could tell. But instead of reassuring Christine, Sevita’s appearance announced just how far the disease had taken hold. The bright yellow sun dress was torn at the hem where Sevita had tripped on it, and it drooped and trailed golden thread over the dusty concrete. Christine didn’t think Sevita had even noticed it yet. Her forearm was covered with dried blood from a deep cut that kept opening and she was limping heavily. Sevita had been obsessive about makeup. In her days on the scav teams, Christine had smuggled home as much as she could. A lipstick tube, even one that had melted or crumbled before it made its way onto Sevita’s little table was the surest way to a grin and a kiss from her, and Christine loved to indulge her even as she teased Sevita about it. It was like a leftover from Before, that obsession. As if Sevita
didn’t believe she was pretty enough without a perfect application of the stuff, though Christine had tried to tell her countless times how beautiful she was. As if she would fail as a journalist without it. The light in the basement was dim and uneven, but Christine could see the dark smudges where Sevita’s hands had shaken as she applied the kohl, and the stray red where the lipstick had slipped or stuttered. The little marks were like fresh wounds to Christine. She knew how hard Sevita must have tried. She had an urge to open the door and reapply the makeup, sew the dress, bandage her arm. She knew it was ridiculous. She knew if she opened the door, the last thing either of them would be thinking about was Sevita’s appearance. But for just a moment, that’s what Christine wanted to do, so they could pretend together. So her wife wouldn’t be embarrassed when she died. So Sevita wouldn’t worry about what people would think of her after she couldn’t help herself anymore. She already can’t help herself, realized Christine. But she couldn’t say it. And she couldn’t run out and fix it. Instead, she said, “Hi gorgeous. You’re a welcome sight.”

  Sevita blushed, pleased, and Christine knew she’d hidden her concern well enough. “Wish I could see you,” replied Sevita, swaying slightly.

  “Nah, my hair’s a mess,” said Christine, trying to keep her voice light. “How’re things out there?”

  “Still okay. You stay in there, though. You feeling all right? The girl still okay?”

  “Just bored.”

  “Bored is good. Bored is safe. The City’s sealed now. Have you talked to Nella?”

  “I’m still putting the radio together. I’ll talk to her soon.”

  “Tell her she’ll have to come in under the streets to get you. No other way now. For everyone’s good. Tell her I’m sorry I left it unfinished.”

  Christine was silent for a moment, trying to breathe around the clog in her throat. “You could tell her yourself, you know,” she said finally, “You could stay here, with us.”

  Sevita shook her head, “Can’t. I know I’m sick. Can’t be in there and infect you.”

  “How could I not be infected if you are? We shared our home, our food, our bed until the other night. If you’ve got it, then I must have too.”

  Sevita nodded slowly. “Hoping you’re Immune. The girl is hoping so too. And the baby. Not afraid of infecting you. Afraid of eating you in your sleep. Won’t be too many days.”

  “Come inside Sevita. I’ll do what has to be done. We’ll keep you safe until Nella finds the cure. You don’t have to worry about what you’ll do, I won’t let it happen.”

  “Can’t do that to the girl. Can’t do that to you either. You’re already going to have a baby to care for and a teenager. Food’s going to run out. Getting out of the City is going to be hard. Don’t need a rabid wife to struggle with too. Don’t want you changing my diapers and tossing scraps to me in a pen or a cell.”

  “I’d never do that to you, ‘Vita.”

  Sevita held up a hand. “I know you wouldn’t. I know. But you’d starve yourself to feed me or put yourself in danger to keep me.” Sevita smiled brightly into the camera. “Do you remember how we met?” she asked.

  “Of course I remember,” said Christine, “I don’t like to think about it, though, you were in so much pain. It was an awful day.”

  “It was the best day. You saved me. And then you loved me, even after you’d seen me at my worst. It’s my turn, Chris. I get to save you. I get to be the superhero this time,” she chuckled. “Can’t be sad, Chris. I get to save the whole world. No better way to go than that. I just wanted to talk-” The basement light stuttered out and Sevita stopped.

  The generator in the bunker was fine, but the camera was only picking up darkness.

  “Sevita, are you okay?”

  “It’s starting Chris. I’ll protect you. Don’t come out. Don’t open the door for anyone but Nella. I’ll come back if I can— I love you, Chris.” There was a rustle as she moved out of the microphone’s range.

  “I love you too,” Christine said hastily, hoping she would hear. She watched the dark monitor until the maintenance man made it down the stairs with his flashlight and started the generator back up with a rumble. Sevita was not there when the lights came back on. The maintenance man looked suspiciously at the bunker, unused to seeing the door closed. He pulled gently on the handle but shrugged when it didn’t open. It wasn’t his job to worry about it. Christine turned reluctantly back to the radio. She sat down at the Formica table across from Marnie. She held out her hand and Marnie placed the transmitter in it without speaking. Christine squinted at the dial and tuned to the channel that Nella had agreed on. She pressed the transmitter and realized she didn’t know what she was supposed to say. She let go for a moment and cleared her throat. Then she pressed the transmit button again. “Nella? Frank? Are you there?” She waited a moment for a response. “Please be there, I need you,” she continued.

  Twenty-six

  “You ready Jenny?” the radio squawked. Jenny wiped her face with a thin red kerchief before tying it around her shoulder length hair. The turbine winked in the floodlights, its dents smoothed and its blades rebalanced. Jenny checked one last time and then jerked the rope around her waist.

  “We should be all—” she started saying into the radio as she was being pulled up. The rope jerked and she stopped, kicking her feet out to stop herself from bashing painfully into the turbine shaft.

  “Hey,” she called, “careful guys.”

  “Can you repeat?” asked the radio.

  “Just exiting the turbine now. We should be good to go in a minute,” she said into the radio. The rope jiggled, but she didn’t resume her smooth upward glide. “C’mon Mike, pull me up. Control’s ready to roll. Let’s get moving.”

  She let her head hang back, listening for a response. The rope was a dead snake. She wiped her sweating hands on her jeans, suddenly not wanting to touch the cable anymore. “Mike? Ben? Did you guys take a piss break or something?” She jiggled the rope. “Pull me up already.”

  There was a low gurgling grunt from above her and she stopped shaking the rope. She waited for a moment. The grunts spilled over into a threatening rumble.

  “Mike?” she said softly, “this isn’t funny guys.”

  The rope suddenly jerked and then yanked back the other way. Jenny was dragged a few feet up, she held her hands out to stop herself from swinging into the cement walls and groaned as one shoulder hit anyway. The rumble stopped abruptly and Jenny stopped the groan with a hand and tried to hold her breath. She bounced gently against the wall, but made no noise.

  “Jenny?” the radio crackled, “You guys ready or what? We got people waiting on us.” Jenny clicked the radio off, but it was too late. The growl above her started again and spiraled higher and louder into a long, drawn-out shriek that echoed painfully around her. She looked up. Something looked down at her. The light from the generator room’s windows illuminated the lip of the hole she was in, but not the something’s face. It was dark, plum-colored, even its teeth were outlined in dark red. Only the whites of its eyes shone like new snow. It snarled and a bubble of bloody spit worked its way out of the something’s teeth and popped. It spattered Jenny’s bandana. The something reached out toward her, twisting a thick arm down the cement, trying to grab her.

  “No, don’t,” she cried and bounced on the end of the rope, trying to get it to loosen and drop her down farther from the blood slimed hand. A smooth band of silver glinted on one of its fingers and Jenny suddenly realized she was looking at her one of her coworkers.

  “Ben, it’s me, it’s Jenny. Who hurt you? Pull me up and I’ll help you. There’s a first aid kit—”

  But the something that was Ben threw his head back and shrieked again. He reached farther, stretching down to reach her. It dawned on Jenny that Ben wasn’t the one who had been wounded. She pushed herself farther away from the wall with her feet, kicking at his hand with one. She fumbled with the radio. There were soldiers upstairs in the control roo
m. She just had to call them and— The rope jerked and her feet slid free. The radio slipped out of her hand and tumbled away, crashing into the metal rods beneath her with a haunting series of chimes. Ben was trying to climb headfirst down the rope. He was drooling, his spittle spraying over her. She huddled around the end of the rope, and her fingers found the locked carabiner at her waist. She looked down at the turbine blades. It would mean a broken leg, but she’d be away from— from whatever Ben had become. One of the soldiers would find her. It wouldn’t take long, they were probably already on their way since she wasn’t answering the radio. She loosened the lock with sweaty fingers, but before she could unlatch, Ben fell past her with a howl. In his struggle to grab her, he’d lost what little balance he had. She watched him land on the steel beneath her. He was still for the moment.

  She looked up. The rope was still again. No guttural noises from above. She retightened the carabiner and began slowly pulling herself up the rope, walking up the cement wall. She approached the lip and had to let her feet fall beneath her, relying on her upper body strength to pull her over the edge. Her arms shook with the effort as her feet slid along the smooth cement and she had a sudden ridiculous flashback to her high school gym teacher yelling at her. Twenty years later and the “coach” still pissed her off. She tried again with a breathy groan and launched herself over, planting shoulder first onto the cold floor of the generator room.

  She pushed herself up on one hand. But where she’d expected the cool, smooth cement, her palm touched liquid warmth and she looked down in surprise. She drew her hand back so quickly that she nearly fell back down into the turbine shaft. She winced and put her hand back into the dark chunks that were puddled around the edge. She tried not to wonder what it was as she hoisted herself all the way out and stood up. She pulled the bandana from her hair and used it to wipe the tacky sludge from her hand. She looked around for the spare radio, but a gurgling rasp made her freeze. A man lay below the winch, her rope tangled around his chest, squeezing him like a toothpaste tube. His stomach was a ragged welt, his skin shredded and inner layers curling back, like a blown tire.