by Josh Vasquez
“Son, I love you.”
I nodded again, told him ‘I love you too’ and turned to leave. Now I knew something was wrong. My Dad wasn’t one of those Dads who hid their emotions or feelings from his children. He was always telling us how much he loved us and how much he loved our mother. I had it good. I knew a lot of kids whose families weren’t like ours. But it wasn’t the fact that he told me he loved me. It was the tone in his voice. I had never heard that tone of voice in my Dad before, and hearing it, sent shivers racing down my spine. The tone I heard was fear.
***
“Why are we leaving? Why do I have to pack? I don’t want to leave. Are Opie and Millie coming with us?”
My sister was asking a thousand questions, questions I didn’t know the answers to.
Why were we leaving? Why did I have to keep my gun close by? Why was Mom crying?
“I don’t know, Hay. Just pack your stuff like Dad said. We’re going out to the cabin,” was all I could offer.
It seemed to do the trick, because she continued to pack and babble on about something. Her voice became cloudy though, and very quickly, my brain toned her out. I went into my room and began to empty out my drawers and closet into my Florida Gators suitcase. I didn’t pay much attention to what I packed, but rather just stuffed equal amounts of shirts, pants, underwear, and shoes. We had some clothes at the cabin, so I wasn’t too concerned with outfits.
I glanced over at Hailey, who is laying out individual outfits across her bed. I yelled for her to hurry up. She huffed something and picked up her pace only slightly. My alarm clock said it was a quarter after four. I finished packing in fifteen minutes. My football grabbed my attention, but I remembered my Dad saying, “No toys,” and that I have another football at the cabin.
I walked back into Hay’s room, and she was still pulling out her outfits. She looked at me and gave me another “Aunt Laura” look that asked, “Well, are you going to help me or not?” It made me smile.
“Does it matter how your clothes go in the suitcases?” I asked, as she raced between the closet and her bed.
“No, bubba. Just, can you, can you keep them together?” she insisted.
“Sure, Hay.”
It took us another fifteen minutes to finish packing my sister’s things. She wasn’t too thrilled about the whole “no toys”-thing, despite the fact that she could bring a few. She stuffed a couple of coloring books into her suitcase and some crayons into its front pocket. She stared for a minute at the line-up of stuffed animals spread across her bed. After a Moment or two of serious contemplation, she finally decided on a pink bear. I felt a little bad for her. Her stuffed animal collection was always growing, and now, it had to be reduced to one single bear.
“C’mon Hay,” I said, ushering her to her bedroom door.
She started to cry.
“What’s wrong?”
She sniffled and tried to stop the sobs long enough to respond.
“I, I just, I just feel like I won’t ever see my room again.”
Her words floored me a little. The thought that we’d never come home again never even crossed my mind. Dad only said we’d be gone for a few weeks, but we were packing like we were never coming back. I only thought Hay was crying because she had to leave her toys behind. She is just like Mom and Aunt Laura. It doesn’t take too much to get tears out of our girls. They were all highly emotional.
One look at her face is what changed my mind. Her cheeks were red and her nose runny. This was not fake crying, which I have seen plenty of. No, these were her genuine tears.
“Hey,” I said, as I wrapped my arm around her. “It’s all gonna be okay. We’re just going for a little while. We’ll be back.”
“But why, Bubba?”
I paused.
“I don’t know why, but Dad wants us to. We need to just trust him, okay?”
She nodded and wiped her snot on her sleeve.
“That is so nasty,” I said.
She giggled and proceeded to try to wipe it off on me. I quickly grabbed her bags and ran. She chased me down the stairs. For a Moment, everything seemed normal, like we were just messing around and having fun. Dad was standing near the bottom of the steps. For the first time this afternoon, he smiled.
“Be careful you two. You don’t-”
There were a few knocks at the door. After a second’s pause, it opened. It was G-Dad, G-Mom and Aunt Laura.
“Oh my goodness! Traffic was terrible!” G-Mom said.
“Well, I’m glad y’all got here safe,” Mom responded.
They talked for a few Moments about the traffic. It was normally busy this time of day, all the people leaving work in the city and heading home. They made mention of a few news reports, but then started doing that thing where they pretend not to talk about certain stuff in front of me. It gets kind of annoying, because I know they’re hiding things from me.
“Have you heard from Josh yet?” My Dad asked after a Moment of silence.
Aunt Laura shook her head no.
“Not yet,” she said.
My Dad began to pull on his goatee, something he does while he thinks.
“Well, we should start to pack up what food we can,” he finally said.
They began to shift into the kitchen, when Aunt Laura’s phone rang.
“It’s Josh,” she said excitedly. “Hello? Hold on, I’m going to put you on speaker!”
She pushed a few buttons on her phone.
“Hello? Can you hear me?” My uncle asked through the phone’s tiny speaker.
“Yes! Yes, we can hear you! Where are you?” My aunt responded.
There was a brief buzz of static.
“Work sent me to Brunswick late in the day. Had to pick up-FZZT- ladders and to-FZZT- no reception and trying to-FZZT- safe but-FZZT- will be on the way soo-”
The phone went dead.
“Hello? Hello?!” Aunt Laura screamed into the phone.
Nothing.
G-Mom and G-Dad moved over to her and held her as she began crying. We stood there, soaking in the silence. My uncle worked for a plumbing company where he delivered supplies to the job sites. He had to drive out of town a lot of times, sometimes to the other side of Georgia. From what I could understand from the phone call, he had to leave late this afternoon, putting him in Brunswick, Georgia right now. He was about an hour south of us.
“It’ll be ok Laura,” I heard my Mom say. “If anyone knows what to do now, it’s Josh. He’ll get back to you.”
“I know,” she said through sniffles. “I just wish he was here. And I wish we were all at the cabin.”
“Ok then,” my Dad said. “Well, let’s get started packing. The sooner we finish that, the sooner we can get out of here.”
***
Everyone was quiet as we packed the vehicles with the food and supplies. We had our SUV, and G-Dad brought his pick-up truck, so there was plenty of room for cargo. Mom and G-Mom worked in the kitchen, packing up food and cooking utensils. I carried the boxes out to G-Dad who was cramming them into every nook and cranny he could find. Hailey was coloring at the table, out of the way, but I noticed that Dad and Aunt Laura had slipped away from the rest of the family.
After taking a box outside, I went back in and said I had to go to the bathroom. Mom nodded and told me to hurry. I went towards the bathroom, but kept going and went into my parent’s bedroom. I heard voices in their bathroom.
Aunt Laura and Dad were talking quietly.
“Josh probably will assume we went to the cabin, but just in case he comes here to check and see if we’re here, this note will point him in the right direction,” I heard my Dad say.
“Yeah, I know he will probably come here first before heading out west or trying to head in town,” Aunt Laura answered. “At least to see if we made it out. With the house empty, he’ll know where to go next. What’s the safe passcode?”
“3836.”
“Got it. You think-”
She paused.
> “You think he’ll use it?”
“I doubt it, but I’d like for him to have the option, just in case he gets in trouble.”
“Yeah… trouble…” Aunt Laura trailed off.
“He’ll be fine, Laura. He’s probably already got his hands on a machete. Heck, I’m surprised he doesn’t already walk around with one!”
I heard her laugh half-heartedly, which I felt was my cue to walk into the bathroom.
“Do you have any boxes I can take?” I asked nonchalantly.
“No, CJ. We’re good in here. C’mon let’s go finish in the kitchen,” my Dad said, pulling me out of the bathroom.
I had enough time to catch a glimpse of the note they were talking about. Written in lipstick on the mirror was:
Gone to cabin.
Safe code: 3836
I love you
Ps- don’t leave me to do this by myself
Don’t die on me
What? Don’t die on me? I thought. What does she mean?
My brain began to race. I had no idea why everyone was so worried and talking in ways where I couldn’t understand them. I had no idea why we were packing everything up and leaving to go to the cabin. I had no idea why I was carrying my gun around and I had no idea why Aunt Laura was afraid of Uncle Josh dying.
And why do they keep saying they wish he were here? That’d he know what to do?
Uncle Josh was good for a lot of things, don’t get me wrong, but they were mostly related to video games or movies. If I ever needed to know where to get a certain Pokemon, Uncle Josh was the guy to go to. But serious things? The only serious thing I ever heard my uncle talk about was the Bible.
My Dad looked at me. He knew that I was trying to piece things together, despite how much I tried to play it off. He could always see right through me.
“What’s going on Dad?” I asked, very cool and grown up-like.
The adults all looked at each other. I could tell they were “telepathically” arguing about whether to tell me or not. My mother’s and grandmother’s eyes both screamed no, while G-Dad simply shrugged. My Dad looked back at me.
“I’ll explain once we’re on the way, Son. Promise.”
I nodded. My father always kept his promises. I’m sure there was a reason why they weren’t telling me. A reason on why they were acting all weird. I went to ask when we were planning on leaving, but didn’t get the chance to, because a gunshot was fired in the distance. Another two shots were fired, then silence.
***
“What was that?” Aunt Laura asks, as everyone move towards the back door.
“Sounded like gunshots,” said G-Dad.
Dad turned to me.
“Keep your sister in the house, CJ.”
He then turned back and walked outside with the others. I looked at Hailey, who was still coloring and now had her headphones back in. She didn’t hear the gunshots. As if she knew I was thinking about her, she looked up and smiled, but went back to coloring.
Dad said I had to keep her in the house. Ok, done. I crept closer to the back door to try and hear what was going on out there.
The adults were all standing at the bottom of our driveway, which sloped at almost a forty-five degree angle down away from our house. I could see one of our neighbors talking with Dad. He lived next door to us on our little circle. From where I was standing, I could barely make out what they were saying. I edged a little closer to the door, trying my best to stay out of sight.
“Did you hear it?” The neighbor asked. “Where did it come from?”
“I don’t know,” Dad answered. “But it sounded close.”
The neighbor mumbled something, but I still couldn’t hear him from my closer position.
“I don’t know,” I heard Dad say again.
He went to say something else, but was interrupted when another man walked out from behind a house on the far end of our circle. He was holding a police-special style revolver in his right hand.
“Don’t worry y’all! I got ‘em! Sorry for all the alarm,” he yelled.
“What do you mean? Are they here already?” Our neighbor asked.
His question and this new man’s arrival seemed to agitate the small crowd of neighbors who were now gathering near the end of our driveway.
“No, I think it was just one of them. Must have wandered into the neighborhood somehow. Not sure how he got past the Parkside though,” the man with the gun answered.
Our neighborhood was split into two sections. Parkside was up near Highway 21 and was called such because the neighborhood clubhouse and park was located within it. Our half of the neighborhood, Lakeside, was filled with tiny little lakes scattered around the landscape. The neighborhood wasn’t split like this on purpose though. It was originally supposed to be developed more, but was never completed. Dad said when the housing market dropped (whatever that means), the plans to build more dropped too. Which was a bummer, because there were plans to build a grocery store and a shopping center towards the front of the subdivision. It would have been cool to ride my bike up there and get a snack or something. I inched closer to try and hear what exactly wandered into our neighborhood.
Maybe some kind of animal, I thought. No, they keep referring to them in the plural.
“What are we going to do?” Someone asked.
“I’m getting out of here.”
“Me too!”
Everyone started talking about leaving and arming themselves with guns and other handheld weapons. My thoughts on the probability of it being an animal were now very low. Unless of course, it was a pack of rabid bears or something. But I seriously doubted it was a pack of rabid bears.
I noticed Ms. P standing at the edge of the group. She was dressed in a bathrobe and slippers. Her hair was dry, so maybe she was fixing to get in the shower when all the commotion started. She noticed me staring at her and forced a smile in my direction.
Ms. P often would look in on us for my parents, whenever they would go out on dates. They still felt I was a little too young to stay home and watch Hailey, so she was kind enough to check on us. A lot of times she’d come over and play games. She was young and pretty, and well, I didn’t really mind her coming over. She smelled nice too.
The man with gun raised his voice, breaking up my thoughts about Ms. P, and tried to speak over the murmuring of the crowd.
“Everyone, calm down! It was just one of them for crying out loud! We’re not even near the city!”
The crowd seemed unsatisfied with the man’s words. It really only seemed to stir them up more. My Dad raised his hands, trying to quiet and calm everyone down.
“Listen everybody,” he said. “We all need to go back to our homes, secure them and sit tight.”
Sit tight? I thought. That’s not what we were doing. Why would he tell them that?
“If you have firearms,” he continued. “I’d suggest you keep them loaded and close by you. If you don’t, I’d recommend you find any type of hand tool, such as a hammer or crowbar. We don’t need to panic; that’ll only cause us more trouble. If everyone keeps a cool head about this, we can all get through this safely. Now everyone go home.”
The crowd swallowed what my Dad said much better than the other man’s words. He gave my Dad a smug look and walked back towards his house. One by one, everyone went back towards their homes. Our neighbor gave my Dad a head nod and walked back to his house. Once everyone was gone, Dad motioned for the rest of our family to follow him back into the house.
I darted back into the kitchen and quickly sat at the table next to Hailey. She looked at me strange, wondering why I was sitting so close to her. Her music was still going strong. I gave her a smile, to which she mouthed, “You’re weird,” and went back to her crayons and paper.
The adults all looked more worried now than they had been all afternoon. Dad was pulling on his goatee again.
“What do we do Chris?” G-Mom asked, her voice somewhat shaken.
Without any hesitation at all, D
ad answered her.
“We leave. Now.”
***
Everyone began to feverishly gather the remaining things to put in our cars. Hailey was prepping our dogs for the trip. She struggled to get Millie, our Siberian Husky, into her kennel. Millie was nearly as tall as Hailey, which isn’t saying much given Hailey’s “vertical handicap.” Opie, a Boston Terrier and Hailey’s dog, eagerly waited at her side. Opie has always been extremely loyal to Hailey, even going as far as allowing himself to be dressed up in pretty pink princess clothes. I didn’t really care for either of the dogs, but I had to feel sorry for Opie sometimes. He was a good and loyal dog.
Dad broke my attention when he shoved a box in my hands. He pointed his elbow in the direction of the cars, indicating for me to follow him outside. Once our cargo, the last of the boxes, was secure, he turned and looked at me. I could tell he was sizing me up again. I tried my best to hide my confusion and uneasiness.
“Look son,” he started gently, a change in his whole demeanor from this afternoon. “This is going to be hard to explain and maybe even hard to understand, but what is happening and why we are leaving is-”
Dad was cut short by the quick popping of gunfire behind us. We spun around quickly to see the same man from earlier who fired his pistol. He stumbled back out from behind the far house, tripping over his feet into the cul-de-sac and falling to the pavement. He scrambled clumsily to get back on his feet, but was unable to do so. If he would have used both arms, maybe he could have gotten up, but he kept his gun pointing shakily in the direction he came from.
A group of four people walked out from behind the house. Their pace was slow and their footing seemed equally unsure. From the distance I was at, they all seemed to be in a daze, but were focused intently on the man with the gun.
He began firing into them.
The only time I’ve come close to seeing people shot was in movies or the online shooters I played with my uncle. This was nothing like that. As the man unloaded the rest of his gun into the approaching people, I could do nothing else but stand there with my jaw dropped. It all happened so fast, but almost seemed to slow down in time.
