“No, uh-uh,” a voice from the crowd call out. He thought it was Chuck Danley.
“What’s the purification process?” Sarah asked, shifting in her seat. Freddie thought she sounded nervous, as though she suspected something was afoot.
“We have a small treatment facility on the north end of town,” Townsend said. “It runs on wind and solar, but we did have a electrical backup in the event the other power sources failed for some reason. The backup failed when the power grids failed, but it’s still operating. I’d been checking it every day before my little episode.”
“And I assume it requires maintenance,” Freddie said.
“It’s been pretty reliable.”
“Everything requires maintenance,” he said. “If we don’t stay on top of it, it’ll fail when we need it the most.”
“I’m also concerned about defending ourselves,” Freddie said. “We’ve been lucky so far. Tell me more about this attack.”
An uncomfortable silence descended on the room. Chins dropped, eyes watered.
“They came at us one evening,” Charlotte said, breaking the silence. “By chance, I was with Jeff and a few others down in the police armory, taking inventory. There were only about ten of them, but they really got the jump on us. They were just shooting anyone they found. We came up behind them and killed most of them. Two escaped.”
“Where’s the armory?”
“In this building,” she said. “Basement.”
“It’s going to be important for all able-bodied adults and older teenagers to become proficient with weapons,” Freddie said.
“Is that really necessary?” someone asked.
“You tell me,” Freddie said. “How many did you lose in the attack?”
He let that sink in for a bit. As he looked out over the crowd, something occurred to him. This wasn’t your ordinary town. Many of the people who lived here were soft. Book smart, engineers and computer nerds. They’d run their power plant and the few supporting businesses. Probably had no idea how lucky they’d been to repel the first attack.
“We lost a dozen people!” Kate Crawford said.
“I grew up in rural Georgia,” Freddie said. “We teach kids about guns about as soon as they can hold one. So, yes, I think it’s necessary and smart. We’ve got to stop thinking like we used to. This isn’t the same world anymore. No one is coming to protect us. And there’s nothing to stop someone else from trying to take Evergreen.”
The crowd was quiet now, juiced with a healthy dose of fear. Then he struck.
“Mayor Townsend, may I speak freely?” Freddie asked.
“Please,” she said.
Everyone, already locked in silence, looked at him. What he was about to do was tricky on a number of levels and could backfire at any moment.
“I’m really worried by what I’ve heard here today,” he said. “I’ve come to love this place and the people in it. But I’m worried we’ve fallen asleep at the switch. I think we’re headed down a very dangerous road.”
He paused again.
“I propose that we elect a new mayor.”
Chatter erupted across the room, a wild mixture of gasps and whispers, cheers and a few boos, sweeping through the crowd like a wave. Freddie breathed a sigh of relief, having had no idea how this would play out and even less confidence it would work.
“Second!” a woman’s voice called out.
“Second!”
“Second.”
On and on the seconds came, little explosions. The mayor started at each one, like rabbit punches.
“Hey, wait a minute!” Adam called out. “Plague or not, she’s still the mayor of this town.”
But Freddie raised his voice. He might not have been as smart as Evergreen’s resident know-it-all, but he was sure as hell louder than the son of a bitch.
“Any opposed?”
“Nay,” a few voices rang out, but they were small and tinny in the meeting room.
“All those in favor of electing a new mayor, say ‘aye’.”
The room virtually exploded.
AYE!
“All opposed?”
A few nays skittered about the room like lost birds.
Freddie stood, rearing up to his full height, leaving no doubt as to who was in charge of the meeting. Then he leaned over and planted both hands on the table. He made a point to flex his forearms, popping the veins, his biceps straining the fabric of his polo shirt.
“Gwen, Evergreen thanks you for your service.”
Her eyes were red with tears. She scanned the crowd, as though looking for a friendly face, and Freddie was pleased to see no one making eye contact with her.
“You’re making a big mistake,” Adam said, standing up to face the crowd.
“Is that right?” Freddie said. “You know better than all these people?”
That shut Adam Fisher, M.D., right down.
“What do we do now?” someone called out.
“We elect a new mayor,” Freddie said.
“I nominate Freddie,” Chuck Danley said, pointing at Freddie. “Freddie, uh… I’m sorry, man, I just realized I don’t know your last name.”
Freddie smiled thinly. Even this part had been planned.
“It’s Briggs.”
“Briggs? The football player?”
Freddie felt himself blushing.
“Yes.”
“Freddie Briggs was one of the best defensive players of the last fifty years,” Chuck exclaimed to the group. “He played in the Super Bowl a couple years ago!”
This sent murmurs through the crowd. During his NFL career, Briggs had learned that Americans had always been more impressed by celebrity and athletic prowess than almost anything else. He didn’t think that had changed much yet in the wake of the plague. That wouldn’t always be the case, but for now, it was still packing the same punch.
“I second,” Robin Swanson said, and Freddie felt warm and icy cold at the same time.
“I nominate Dr. Fisher,” said a woman named Donna Tanner. She’d been married to a plant engineer and spoke with one of those precious Southern accents that reminded you of sweet tea and cucumber sandwiches and cotillions.
“I second,” said Jeff, the man who’d thrown Adam and Sarah in the jail cell.
“Gentlemen,” said Gwen, “do you accept the nomination as mayor?”
Fisher glanced at Sarah, who nodded, and in that moment, Freddie hated him. He knew Adam would get nominated, but he thought if the good doctor had any integrity at all, he would decline the nomination, seeing as how his focus wasn’t necessarily on the town.
“Yes,” Freddie said. “Yes, I do.”
“I accept,” Adam said.
Freddie’s core burned like an overheating furnace, his growing rage its coal. Didn’t they see that Adam and his search for Rachel was the way of the old world? The old world had brought nothing but plague and death and misery. It had been a weak world, run by weak men. And Adam wanted to take them down that road again. Didn’t they understand they needed to stop thinking old-world thoughts, stop pretending like everything was going to be OK? Even if Adam found Rachel, no, especially if he found her, then they would think that everyone was entitled to a happy ending. In Rachel, in the promise of Rachel, they saw their own families and loved ones who had been lost to the plague. It was this pathetic hope that left them soft, that blinded them to the way the world really was.
“Are there any other nominations for the mayor of Evergreen?”
No other names were put forward, and they closed the floor to nominations. Townsend, in her last official act as mayor, picked Charlotte, Pankaj Shere, and Michael Stills, the editor of the local paper, to serve as an ad hoc election committee.
“Now then,” Michael said. “I don’t see the point of a drawn-out campaign or anything like that. Let that be our first gift to this new world.”
Nervous laughter bubbled from the audience.
“I’d like to say a few words,” Adam said, stand
ing up.
“The committee just said-” Freddie said.
“No, this is too important,” Adam snapped back. “If we’re going to start with a new mayor, the people have a right to hear what we’re all about.”
Dammit, Freddie thought.
The committee huddled together briefly.
“Three minutes each,” Charlotte said.
Adam stood, his hands clasped together.
“Everything Freddie said is right,” Adam began. “The truth is, we’ve all been in a state of flux the last few months, living off the forward momentum of the world as it used to be. And trust us, Evergreen seemed so magical when we got here, a place immune from the horrors of the outside world. But that may not last. As you said, we’re not the first group to find this place. We probably won’t be the last.
“But the truth is that I have hope. I have hope of a bright future for all of us. That we can find new happiness, new peace together. Even if that means saying goodbye to the old world. I’m ready for it. I’m ready to go forward with each of you. Thank you.”
Healthy applause filled the chamber as Freddie scrambled his thoughts together. A lesson from his father, dead a decade now, popped into his head. Keep it simple.
Fuck it, he thought. He’d done what he needed to do, said what he needed to say.
“Freddie,” Charlotte said. “Three minutes.”
“I think you all know my position,” he said. “Think about who’ll be here for you one hundred percent. Who won’t be distracted by other issues. That’s all I have. Thank you.”
#
Pankaj cut out makeshift ballot slips from Freddie’s notebook and passed them around. Adam, still reeling from the shock of what was happening, watched the others scratch out their selection. Football star Freddie Briggs. That was why his name had been so familiar to Adam when they’d met in St. Louis. A man accustomed to winning. A man accustomed to having things go his way. And Adam had been so blind to it. He felt like such an idiot!
How long had Freddie been planning this coup? There was no doubt he’d felt slighted by the deference the others had shown Adam during the last two months. Was this how he planned to rebuild his image? Did he really want to be mayor, or did he just like the idea of being mayor? He’d had some good ideas, he’d come to the meeting prepared. Maybe he should concede the election to Freddie.
Because Rachel was still out there.
Rachel.
Rachel.
The search was morphing into a desperate, pointless exercise. The search for Bigfoot. The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It was late November now, and they’d crossed off seven of the search grids. The odds he would find Rachel had always been slim and were now sliding toward none. It was maddening to know she was probably alive. The itch he couldn’t quite scratch, growing worse with each passing day.
If only Nadia could remember anything about where she’d been. A landmark, a billboard, even a description of the terrain, a river or peak. He didn’t feel bad about being mad at her because he kept it bottled up, locked away in his mind’s maximum security prison. No one needed to know he hated her for making Rachel seem so close and yet so far away. He didn’t even know if he was looking in the right place. He could look for the next fifty years and not come within a hundred miles of her.
Then Adam had a terrible thought, a sudden realization. It was his obsession with Rachel that had left him blind to what Freddie had been doing. Was Adam shorting these people because of it? These people were here now, and they needed someone to lead them. They needed someone to help care for them. He wasn’t sure if it made him feel better or worse, but the fact of the matter was that he had the ideal rèsumè, the skills, knowledge and experience for a post-plague world. Could he in good conscience keep putting his impossible quest ahead of the others?
He suddenly remembered Holden Beach. The place hadn’t crossed his mind since his desperate escape during those horrifying days in August. What did it look like now? How long before the ocean ate the beach away, before the homes began to crumble into the waves? Had sand blown across Ocean Boulevard and covered it like a blanket? If a hurricane blew ashore with no one there to see it, did it make a sound? What world did Rachel belong in? The Holden Beach he’d arrived in? Or the dying one he had escaped?
Holden Beach was two thousand miles and a lifetime away. Evergreen, this little corner of Oklahoma, was the here and now. The people in this room with him were the here and now. It went beyond simply being the right guy for the job due to his medical training. They needed to look out for each other because the very act of being alive now was so rare. And for all they knew, they were the final act in humanity’s long play. If that were the case, then they should protect what life was left at all costs, go out with some class.
And that’s when it hit him.
He shouldn’t concede the election to Freddie.
Because Rachel was still out there.
Freddie couldn’t become the mayor of Evergreen because Freddie had no Rachel.
Freddie had no hope. These people needed hope. Adam didn’t know what would become of the power plant or even the human race itself, but if they didn’t have a little bit of hope and love and friendship and the solidarity of breaking bread together, then what the hell were they living for? And he had hope. He believed it in his core that Rachel was still alive. And he’d keep looking for her until his dying day. It would be the fuel to power his work here. He could do it. He could give himself entirely to both missions, to lead these people while he looked for his daughter. He could do it.
He wrote his name on the sheet and handed it to Charlotte, who was collecting the ballots in her Oklahoma State baseball cap. How primitive this was, Adam thought. It was emblematic of how lost they all really were, this messy cleaving to the old ways. He didn’t have the first clue if they were being faithful to the rules of parliamentary procedure, but the fact was, he didn’t suspect it mattered all that much. It was the form, not the substance, guiding them along, making them feel like they were getting their lives back on track.
Then he reclaimed his seat in the second row, which, he noticed, was now empty. He glanced across the aisle and saw Freddie’s row had emptied out too. Freddie’s elbows were on his knees, and he was chewing a stubborn fingernail. He wanted this badly, Adam could tell, which in turn, made Adam want it badly as well. As important as he felt it was that he be elected, part of him felt it was equally important that Freddie not be.
“The committee members will, uh, move over to the mayor’s office to count the votes,” Charlotte said firmly. Her eyes swept across the audience, almost daring anyone to challenge her plan. She was a strong girl, very strong. As long as she was part of the town’s future, perhaps things would be OK, even if Freddie became mayor.
The crowd devolved into chatter as Charlotte and the others exited the room. Adam could feel his heart slamming against his ribcage, an angry animal struggling to escape; his right leg pistoned up and down, a throwback to his days at the office, when he’d grow bored and frustrated with the mountain of government-mandated paperwork he needed to fill out. He placed a hand on his knee to stop its manic pulsing. A deep breath, a good long one, and he glanced over his shoulder at his fellow Evergreeners.
The crowd, which had drifted to the back of the room, was deliberate in its avoidance of the two candidates. They had broken up into groups of four and five, whispering, casting curious looks at Adam and Freddie, talking about the future. Adam could divine several emotions from the tone of their voices. Fear. Excitement. Curiosity. A sort of wide-eyed, can’t-wait-to-see-how-THIS-turns-out-ness about it all.
Thirty minutes later, Charlotte, Pankaj and Michael returned, their faces blank and stony, the way a jury might look before sending a defendant to the gas chamber. They took their seats at the dais, Charlotte in the center chair. As they settled in, the others rushed to reclaim their seats.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Charlotte said. “We counted the votes three
times. First, we counted and verified ninety-six votes were cast.” She looked at her fellow committee members. “Do the other committee members agree with this report?”
“Yes,” Pankaj said.
“Yes, agreed,” Michael said.
“We then placed the ballots for each candidate into two separate piles and counted them individually, again counting them three times.”
“Agreed,” both Pankaj and Michael said simultaneously.
“The results of the election are as follows,” she said, staring straight down the middle of the aisle, not making eye contact with either candidate. “Adam Fisher received fifty-one votes, and Freddie Briggs received forty-four votes. One ballot was cast blank. Adam Fisher has been elected mayor of Evergreen.”
As the crowd erupted in applause and catcalls with a few boos mixed in, Adam felt a huge surge of adrenaline rush through him, like he’d touched a live wire. Part of it was relief, stemming from his lifelong aversion to losing. Adam Fisher had done very little losing in his life, and he hadn’t wanted to start today. But laced in there was a tincture of regret, thrown in like a last-second spice. An hour ago, this hadn’t even been on his radar, and now here he was, the duly elected leader of this ragtag group of survivors. Even in his brief tenure as the nominee, it had been a theoretical thing, big picture. But now it was crashing down on him in a very real way. But, he decided, he wouldn’t have it any other way.
Someone had to do it.
And he didn’t trust anyone else.
A loud noise startled him, and he looked over in time to see Freddie storm from his seat, knocking over half a dozen chairs as he did so. His jaw was clenched so tightly, Adam thought his teeth might shatter.
Without a word, Freddie burst through the hearing room doors and into the night beyond.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Just once in his life, Adam wished he would follow his gut at a time his gut was telling him something valuable. It never seemed to go his way. Either he misjudged what his gut was saying, and the decision backfired on him, usually in spectacular fashion, or he’d ignore a hunch, that niggling feeling deep down that told you you were right and end up in the very same spot. For example, just this morning, he’d woken up feeling gloomy, cranky, out of sorts. He’d worked seven days straight learning the ropes as mayor, and he had planned to spend his off day searching for Rachel.
The Immune Box Set [Books 1-5] Page 37
