200 Miles to Liberty

by P. A. Glaspy

  “No, I’m sure they don’t. We’re under orders from the Chief of Staff of the Army to —”

  “How’d you get orders?” the man asked, interrupting her. “No power, no phones, no faxes, no radios, no way to communicate. How do we even know you’re really National Guard? You could have picked those uniforms up anywhere.”

  “We have ID we’d be happy to show you.” Stacy started to reach for her wallet.

  “Stop! No sudden moves! Come forward slowly and keep those rifles pointed down. We’ll do the same as long as you do.”

  Stacy looked to the man on either side of her as they had both stepped up to flank her and gave them a quick nod. They advanced slowly together, rifles pointed toward the ground, thumbs still resting on the safeties. Two of the men at the barrier started toward them when they got close.

  “That’s good right there. Now, let’s see that ID, nice and slow.”

  The three soldiers pulled their wallets out and flipped them open to show their photo IDs. The man who had been doing all the talking looked them over then looked at Stacy. “I guess you’re legit. It’s alright, fellas,” he called out over his shoulder. Reaching a hand toward her, he went on. “I’m Barry. Barry Broome. So, how did you get the orders? Maybe in that nice operational Humvee back there?”

  Sensing possible danger, Stacy shook his hand and replied coolly, “Yes, they were delivered in person. We really need to get through here. Why do you have the road blocked anyway? You’re not robbers, are you?” Her thumb went instinctively back to the safety of her rifle.

  The man chuckled. “No, we haven’t robbed anybody, though some of us have been robbed. We set up security points here, at Claremont Road and down Claremont to Mattawang Drive. We’ve got about fifty homes in this area and a pretty close community. Some boys from Kendall Park thought we’d be easy targets for smash and grabs. They busted into a few places on Arrow Head Lane before we could get security organized.”

  “Seems like you’ve got that handled,” Stacy commented, relaxing a bit.

  “Like I said, we’re a close community. Block parties, neighborhood watch; many of us have lived here for years. We’ve pooled our resources of food. Well, most of us. There’re quite a few folks in here with pools, so we’ll have water for a while. We’ve also moved families in with others to share work and save having to try to heat so many homes. The ones with wood-burning fireplaces are packed and stacked. We’re just hoping we can ride it out together until we get help from the government. What are they doing about this, do you know?”

  Stacy shook her head. “No, we haven’t heard anything about that. The man who came in the Humvee left D.C. early Sunday morning. You said most of you were working together. Why not all?”

  Barry shrugged. “Some are scared no help is coming and don’t want to share the food they have. No biggie. It’s their choice. So, what’s so important in D.C.?”

  “I’m sorry, I can’t say anymore. The orders are classified. We need to be on our way though.”

  “Right, right. Go ahead and send one of your guys back and tell them to come forward. We’ll let you pass. Speaking of pass, you’ll need this to get through the other side without any problems.” He handed her an index card with the word “Pass” written on it with his signature. “Just hand it to the guys at Claremont Road and tell them Barry said Christmas is coming. That’s the pass code for today.”

  Stacy took the card and looked at Barry with renewed admiration. “That’s pretty tight security. Where’d you learn how to do that?”

  He smiled and replied, “United States Marines, Ma’am. Gunnery Sergeant Broome, retired.”

  She returned the smile. “Thank you, Gunny. Semper Fi.” She turned to head back toward the Humvee.

  “Be safe, Lieutenant.”

  Once they passed the next checkpoint, where the sentries’ alarm at the sight of their rig gave way to surprise at the valid pass and code, they didn’t have any problems continuing down South Middlebush. There were houses here and there, but most of them weren’t facing the road. They got to a section that was tree-lined on both sides and Hutch stopped again. Everyone got out and stretched their legs while Damon and the Guardsmen talked.

  “We’re coming up on Kendall Park. From here to Highway One, it’s pretty densely populated. We could run into all kinds of trouble.” Hutch was talking while Damon studied the maps.

  Looking up from them, Damon replied, “Let’s put someone in the turret. Hopefully that will deter any carjacking wannabes.”

  “Agreed. Light, you get in the turret in the Humvee. Perez, I want you on top of the camper. We won’t be going fast enough for you to come off. Manning, you and Thompson be ready to pop screens out of the windows back there so you can get your rifle barrels out. I hope we don’t have to shoot, but I want everyone to have a clear line of sight if we do. Damon, you drive, I’ll ride shotgun.”

  “Do you really think all this is necessary, Major?” Tanner asked. “Surely they wouldn’t attack or try to commandeer a military vehicle.”

  “Yes, Sir, they would. It happened to me on the way up. It’s two days later. It’s going to be worse now.”

  Tanner shook his head. “How desperate they must be to attempt something like that.”

  Damon shrugged and said, “What would you do to try to take care of your family, Sir?”

  Tanner replied, “Anything. Everything.”

  “Exactly. Just like them. Let’s get ready.”

  Chapter 2

  “Ethan?” The surprise in Joel’s voice was mirrored across the faces of his family.

  Amanda leaned over to Will and whispered, “Who’s Ethan?”

  Will replied in a louder than needed tone, “The sperm donor for my nephews. No one that matters.”

  Carly looked at Elliott. “What is he doing here? He’s not staying.”

  “Carly, this is Elliott’s house. You don’t have the right to say who stays here,” Lauri said quietly.

  “Fine. If he’s staying, we’re leaving.” She turned on Ethan. “I guess I should have figured you’d do something like this. The world goes to shit and you’re looking for someone to take care of you, right? Figured your dad would know how to make it through so you’d come here. It’s so like you to show up on someone’s doorstep, expecting them to help you —”

  “Aren’t you doing the same thing, Carly? You came here looking for a place to stay, too!” Ethan barked at her.

  “We were invited!” she screamed back at him. “Since no one has heard from you in years, I’m pretty sure you weren’t!”

  “Carly, Ethan, please stop,” Elliott said. “We all need to sit down and talk this over calmly. Let’s all go inside. We can work this out.”

  “There’s nothing to work out, Elliott. If he stays, we’re leaving. Boys, get your things.”

  “And go where, Carly?” Joel said. “We have nowhere to go.”

  “We’ll go back home. We can figure out how to get water. That’s all we needed, right? We had food, heat … we just needed water. We could get it from the pond.”

  “We can’t go back, Car,” Will replied. “It’s going to get bad there, really bad. All of my visions involved city streets and neighborhoods like ours. We have to stay away from anything like that.”

  “Well, I can’t stay here with him. I won’t.” She crossed her arms and glared at Ethan. A thought crossed her mind and she asked Elliott, “How long has he been here anyway?”

  “Since Sunday night. He was already on his way here before the pulse hit. He walked five miles from where his car stopped.”

  Will laughed. “It took you all day to walk five miles? I walked fifteen that day and still got home before dark. Still underachieving, I see.”

  “Lay off him, alright?” Cameron shouted. “He’s dying!”

  The stunned silence that followed was deafening. Ethan looked at his youngest son with a small, grateful smile as the rest of the group’s faces held varying degrees of shock.

 
“Bullshit,” Carly finally said. “That’s just his latest lie to get what he wants, and that lie is so you, Ethan.” The hatred was pouring off of her in waves. “How sad that you would treat your father that way, though. Make him think you’re dying —”

  “It’s the truth, Carly. I have pancreatic cancer, like my mom had. I’ve only got a few weeks left.”

  Carly stared at him then. She could see that his face looked sunken in, how his clothes hung on his body. She let her arms fall to her sides.

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear that, Ethan. No matter how much I despise you, I wouldn’t have wished that on you.”

  Ethan nodded but didn’t reply. Elliott spoke up. “Can we just go inside? I’d like us all to sit down and talk this over. We can unload your things in a little while.” He looked at Carly in particular. She rolled her eyes.

  “Fine. Let’s go in. I need to pee anyway.”

  They filed into the house. Amanda and Will were bringing up the rear. She leaned over to him.

  “Exciting family you have here.”

  He shook his head. “You have no idea.”

  Once they were inside and settled around the table with hot drinks, Joel shared his story of how things were going downhill quickly in their neighborhood. Elliott nodded, telling them about his own neighbors visiting and how ill-prepared they were, especially for people who lived outside the city. Will told of his trek home and meeting Amanda on the way and the other stranded people looking for someone to help them as they couldn’t understand what had happened. Ethan’s story was short, since his walk was along Portersville Road, which was mostly farmland. Carly was staring daggers at Ethan the whole time. It didn’t go unnoticed — by anyone.

  Finally, Ethan barked out, “Enough already! Go ahead, Carly! Get it off your chest so we can move on and figure out where to go from here.”

  She jumped at the raised voice directed at her. “Don’t yell at me! I haven’t seen you for ten years. Forgive me for being in shock over you sitting here across the table from me.”

  “Sorry, but I’m pretty sure there’s knife wounds in my face from the looks you’re giving me.”

  Cameron snickered and Amanda hid a grin behind a manufactured cough at Ethan’s retort. Carly gave Cameron the “mom” look, and he quickly averted his gaze to the cup of hot chocolate sitting in front of him.

  “Aaron, Cameron, I think you should go in the other room while the grownups are talking.” She looked at each of her sons in turn. Cameron started to stand but Aaron stayed where he was.

  “I’ll be eighteen in a few days, Mom. Cam isn’t a little kid anymore either. You can’t shield us from what’s happening, and you can’t leave us out of anything. Pap told us that we’re going to have to grow up and work together, protect each other, and learn how to get by in this new now. If you and Dad need to —”

  “Dad? Did you just call him Dad? You don’t have a dad! He may be your father, but he is not a dad! A dad is there for you whenever you need them. He teaches you how to do things. He goes to your football games and piano recitals. Ethan gave up the right to be called Dad when he left us — when he left you!” Ten years of pain and resentment were spewing forth in Carly’s words.

  Aaron nodded slowly as he replied, “Yep, you’re right, Mom. He threw us away. And I agree one hundred percent with what you said. The thing is, he can’t take back what he did. He can’t undo the past, and he doesn’t have much future left. So, I’m giving him the chance to do as much good as he can in the few weeks he has. It’s mostly for Pap’s sake, to be honest. But a little bit for me, too.”

  Carly sat staring at her oldest son. She looked from him to Ethan and back to Aaron. She opened her mouth, as if to speak, then closed her lips into a thin line when Lauri reached over and laid a hand on her forearm. After a moment, she said, “Fine. Call him whatever you want to. Just don’t expect me to like it.” With that, she got up from the table and went into the living room.

  Everyone sat in silence as they watched her leave. Finally, Elliott said, “We might have to rethink the sleeping arrangements with two more than I was planning when everything went down, but we should be able to work it out. We’ll put the boys and Will in the third bedroom. We’ve already put the bunk beds back together.”

  “And, apparently, I get to sleep on the floor,” Cameron interjected. “Sometimes being the youngest ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

  There were grins and giggles around the table as Elliott went on.

  “You’ll survive, Cam. Carly and Amanda can have the second bedroom, but they’ll have to share the bed. That leaves Joel and Lauri in my room, and Ethan and I will take the couch and recliner in the living room.”

  Lauri was poised to speak as soon as she heard her name and jumped in when Elliott paused. “Absolutely not! We will not put you out of your own bed, Elliott. I won’t hear of it!”

  Aaron turned to his grandfather with a smirk. “Told ya so, Pap.”

  Elliott leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “My house. My way. End of discussion.”

  Lauri was still shaking her head. “No! It isn’t right. I can’t —”

  “Thank you, Elliott. We truly appreciate it,” Joel said, cutting his wife off. When it seemed Lauri would continue, Joel held his hand up and said, “Not now, honey. We’ve got more important things to talk about.”

  “What could possibly be more important than Elliott giving up his bed to us?” she cried.

  Slipping his coat back on, Joel replied, “Figuring out where we’re going to put everything we brought. Boys, let’s get the car unloaded. It may take us until dark with all the clothes your mother brought.”

  They unloaded bags for an hour. When they finally got down to what was on the bottom, Elliott’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Where in the world did you get all these guns and ammo, Joel? I know you didn’t have them already.”

  As they carried everything inside, Joel told him about Teddy. Elliott nodded solemnly and replied, “I guess there will be a lot of folks like that. No way to get the medical supplies they need for treatments and such.” Checking that Ethan wasn’t around, he lowered his voice and went on. “I’m afraid we may have a bad situation with Ethan real soon. He tries to hide it, but I see the pain in his eyes. He smokes marijuana for it, and he says it helps, but it won’t help at the end. They had my wife, Judy, almost in a coma with morphine, and she was still in agony. It’s going to be rough on everybody. You can’t hide that in a house this size.”

  Joel stopped and turned to Elliott. “We’ll deal with it. We may have to send the boys out on chores or something if it gets too bad. It’s hard enough on them not having seen him for all these years. To watch him die now may be too much for them to handle.”

  “It may be too much for me, too,” Elliott said, with a tear slipping down his face.

  Laying his arm across Elliott’s shoulder, Joel replied, “We’ll be here to help you through it, old friend.”

  Elliott smiled and wiped the tear from his chin. “Thank you, buddy. Now let’s get this loot inside and see what you brought.”

  The bags of clothes and linens had been spread throughout the bedrooms. The bags of guns had been deposited in the living room floor. Cameron was down there with them peering into the duffel bags. When his grandfathers came into the room, he looked up at them, eyes wide.

  “Pap! Look at all this! I thought you had a lot of guns. This is enough for an army!”

  Carly walked in from the bedroom just then. “Cameron Elliott Marshall! What do you think you’re doing? Get away from those guns this instant!”

  Cameron jumped at his mother’s raised voice. Aaron, who was sitting on the couch behind his brother, leaned over and whispered in his ear, “She used all three names. You’re in big trouble, bro.”

  Cameron jabbed his brother in the shin with his elbow. Turning his attention to Carly, he said, “Geez, Mom, we’ve already learned about guns. We’ve taken them apart and cl
eaned them. Pap took us plinking and it was awesome!”

  “Plinking?” Carly asked with a confused look.

  “Target practice,” Elliott replied. “They’re both good shots and are still learning about guns.” He stared pointedly at Cameron. Cameron looked down at his hands.

  “Well, I’m still not comfortable with them handling guns. Surely out here in the country we don’t have to worry about people attacking us or trying to steal our stuff.”

  Elliott shook his head. “We may not have as many people around as you did in town, but we still have people who weren’t prepared for this. We can help anybody who needs water; but beyond that, we may be tightening our own belts before we can plant in the spring. We won’t be able to share our food, and we probably have more than most people out here. Plus, I’d bet good money folks in town will start making their way out of the city when it gets really bad.”

  “It’s already really bad, Elliott. They’ve looted the stores, and a cashier was killed at Kroger! I mean, how much worse can it get?”

  “Are you forgetting those guys on the road, Carly? What do you think they would have done to us, especially you and me and even your mom if we hadn’t been able to defend ourselves?” Amanda interjected.

  Carly seemed to consider what Amanda had said. When she realized what Amanda was referring to, she exclaimed, “Ew! Gross! No way! I’d never do that!”

  Amanda cocked her head to the side. “How would you have stopped it?”

  “Well, I …” she hesitated to look for the right answer. “I don’t know, but I’d do something. I wouldn’t just lie there while —”

  “Back to my question. How would you — no, how could you stop it? You aren’t strong enough to fight off an attack by a guy, Carly. I’m sorry you have such a fear and aversion to guns; but unless you want to be raped or murdered, or both, you’d better get past it. Quick.”

  Amanda leaned over and looked into the bag sitting beside Cameron. She pulled out a pistol, checked to see that it was unloaded, and held it out to Carly. Carly looked at the gun then Amanda. “I’m sure I don’t need to carry one of those things in the house. I don’t even know how to shoot it.”