Isolation (Book 1): Shut In

by Jones, Nathan

  Well, he'd have to keep an eye on the news, make the decision if the unthinkable happened and they were infected with Zolos.

  Although fingers crossed, the next few weeks would be nothing more than a boring wait in the apartment for things to blow over.

  Chapter Four: LAX

  Ellie was tense as their plane bumped down onto the tarmac at LAX. It wasn't the landing, of course . . . it was everything else that could go wrong afterwards.

  “Think we'll finally get to leave the plane?” Hal asked, staring intently out the window at the distant airport.

  “I'd be happy if they finally let us use our phones so I can call my kids,” she replied.

  He turned from the window just long enough to give her a sincere, reassuring smile. “Hey, I'm sure they're just fine. Probably sitting at home fretting for you, and already left a dozen messages to your voicemail asking where you are.”

  “Probably.” Ellie appreciated the reassurance. Hal had turned out to be a kindhearted young man, an unexpected friend during this long confinement on the plane.

  He went back to looking out the window. Or maybe brooding about the people he cared about. “I'm sure all our loved ones are fine,” she said, patting his hand. He just grunted in reply.

  They weren't the only ones fretting. The entire cabin hung heavy with tense silence as the plane inched closer to the airport, and Ellie wasn't the only one who jumped when the pilot's voice abruptly crackled over the speakers.

  “Hey, folks,” he said, sounding tense. Which was understandable; how much sleep had the poor man had during all this? “Got some news from LAX, mostly good, some bad.”

  No bad news would've sounded better when a deadly virus was sweeping across the globe. Especially when the man continued and it turned out the news was more than “some” bad.

  “During the time we were in the air, an outbreak of Zolos was discovered in the luggage retrieval area of the airport. It has now been contained, the remainder of the airport scrubbed as well as possible, so we're going to risk disembarking at a terminal. Your luggage will be manually unloaded and distributed to you there. Once you have it we would advise you to hurry through the airport, ignoring the quarantined area if possible, and leave as quickly as you can.”

  “Why go into the airport at all?” a woman near the back of the plane yelled in a mixture of panic and anger. “Why not just drop us off on the tarmac, and we can leave the airport without going near anyone?”

  There was no reply from the pilot, of course, although a flight attendant appeared to look around worriedly.

  “You want to have a bunch of idiots running around where airplanes and ground vehicles are driving?” a man called back. “They'd never let us do that.”

  “You calling me an idiot for being cautious? Why can't the plane drive to somewhere they can drop us off?” the woman insisted. “Why risk taking us into a place where we can get sick and potentially spread this disease? That doesn't make any sense.”

  “What part of contained did you not understand?” the man shouted.

  The cabin filled with the babble of arguing people. Ellie watched it all, not sure where she fell on the issue. She certainly didn't want to risk being exposed to Zolos, but she could also understand that efficiency wouldn't allow for ideal solutions.

  She just hoped the officials containing the outbreak knew what they were doing.

  None of the airplane's crew had any answers for them, or at least any they were saying. The plane continued on to a terminal as if this was any ordinary flight, the tense silence returning as it carefully moved into place and the accordion connector extended.

  The flight attendants, seeming eager to have some semblance of the usual routine to keep to, made sure everyone retrieved their possessions from the overhead compartments and departed the plane in an orderly fashion. Ellie noticed a few people holding their breaths as they stepped into the airport, although she wondered what the point was. They couldn't exactly keep that up the entire time until they were able to leave.

  Although it was hard to pay attention to much besides the maddeningly calm, soothing woman's voice speaking almost constantly over the airport's loudspeakers. “YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE. A NATIONWIDE STATE OF EMERGENCY IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE REMAIN CALM. ALL ARRIVING AIRPLANES ARE GROUNDED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. PLEASE AVOID PHYSICAL CONTACT WITH OTHER PEOPLE. PLEASE REMAIN CALM. PLEASE EVACUATE THE AIRPORT IN A SWIFT AND ORDERLY FASHION. AVOID CROWDED AND PUBLIC PLACES.

  “PLEASE REMAIN CALM. IF YOU HAVE HAND SANITIZER, GLOVES, OR SURGICAL MASKS IN YOUR POSSESSION, PLEASE MAKE USE OF THEM. THOSE ITEMS ARE SOLD OUT AT THE LAX GIFT SHOPS, PLEASE DO NOT GO THERE SEEKING THEM. PLEASE AVOID BATHROOMS AND FACILITIES UNLESS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY, AND USE THE AVAILABLE TOILET SEAT COVERS. PLEASE REMAIN CALM.

  “YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE . . .”

  Ellie wasn't sure how anyone was supposed to remain calm while being shouted at in a soothing voice about a nationwide state of emergency. Especially concerning an invisible peril that could kill them all, one they had no way of knowing about until it was too late. And even more so when the message was frequently interrupted by things like, “Security to Terminal 3a,” and “emergency services required on the concourse.”

  Since it would be a while before their luggage could be offloaded, she took the opportunity to step off to one side and turn her phone back on. Since the calm, soothing airport voice lady was screaming about this being a nationwide state of emergency at the top of her lungs, it was reasonable to assume that the government no longer cared whether she called anyone and told them what was going on.

  Also she saw a bunch of people wandering around talking on their phones, and there were no grim suited men with earpieces tackling them and confiscating the devices. In fact, it kind of annoyed her that nobody had bothered to inform her that it was now okay to use her phone, considering she'd spent the better part of a day desperate to get in contact with her loved ones.

  Although she supposed it was an understandable oversight, all things considered.

  As Hal had predicted, she had indeed received dozens of calls and there were 31 new messages on her voicemail. Most of the calls were from Nick, one was from the nursing home where her mom was staying, a couple were from friends, and a half dozen or so were work related.

  Ellie fully intended to listen to the messages, but at the moment she wasted no time calling Nick's phone. It only rang once before his familiar, wonderful voice sounded in her ear, desperate with relief. “Ellie! Are you okay?”

  “Nick?” she said, fighting back tears. “I'm fine. Are you guys safe?”

  “We're fine,” he practically babbled. “Me and the kids are all safe. We're okay.”

  “Oh thank God,” she said, sagging back against the wall. “I was so worried.”

  “You were worried?” he shot back with a ragged laugh. “I've been trying to call you all day!”

  As evidenced by the dozens of missed calls. “I know. They made us turn off our phones for national security reasons, probably to avoid sparking a panic.”

  Her ex-husband grunted sourly. “No escaping that now that the word is out. Had a bit of a panic getting the kids home from school, but we're all home safe.”

  Wait, what? “What do you mean?” she demanded.

  Nick quickly explained his day, getting the kids safely home from school and buying enough food for them to wait out this Zolos panic, then locking themselves into his apartment. “We've got plenty for you when you get here,” he finished, then paused uncertainly. “That is, if that's how you want to arrange things.”

  “I don't care, as long as I'm with my kids and they're safe.” Ellie noticed the people around her shifting, turning towards the far side of the terminal, and followed their gazes to where airport employees were starting to bring in luggage. She continued hastily. “I don't have too much time and I want to talk to the kids. But first, I have to know if you're going to be okay until I get there.”

  She heard him draw
a breath to reply, but before he could she continued firmly. “I don't want you to just say what I want to hear, either. I need to know if you're going to be able to handle this.”

  Her ex-husband was slow to answer. Long enough that she wondered if he was going to do exactly what she'd just told him not to. And to be fair, rationally speaking she knew if there actually had been a problem then of course she didn't really want to hear it. What good would it do other than to make her worry?

  But he took the question seriously. “You know,” he said in a low voice, as if worried the kids might overhear him, “for most of my life I've lived with a sense of doom hanging over my head. Like something terrible was about to happen, or already had but I just didn't know it yet.”

  Ellie stared at the phone for a few long seconds. “What are you talking about, Nick?” she demanded, half exasperated, half bewildered. “I've never seen the slightest hint of that sort of anxiousness in you.”

  “Of course not. The feeling was irrational, so what good would it have done to show signs of that sort of dread bubbling in me?”

  Even considering she'd asked him to be honest, this really wasn't what she'd had in mind. “If you're trying to make me feel better by telling me this . . .”

  “I'm just saying, Ells, since I first heard about this possible pandemic that sense of doom has disappeared. Entirely.”

  Ellie again stared at the phone. Okay, now this was getting weird. “Are you saying . . . you somehow knew this was coming?”

  “No, of course not, I just said the feeling was irrational!” he snapped, then moderated his tone with a hint of embarrassment. “I'm saying that when there was nothing to worry about, I worried. But now that we're in the middle of a real disaster, I'm calm and focused.”

  She heard him take a deep breath before he continued in a tone of pure conviction. “Nothing is going to happen to our kids, Ellie. If there's one thing you can be sure of, even if the country falls apart around us, it's that when you make it home they'll be waiting for you, safe and sound.”

  Ellie felt tears come to her eyes. She didn't know if it was because of his reassurances, or from her desperate need to be there for her children when she was half the country away. She sniffled and did her best to fight back the surge of emotions. “I'd like to talk to them now,” she said in a thick voice.

  Nick's tone became lighter. “Well you're in luck, because they're practically climbing up my legs in their eagerness to talk to you.”

  She could freely admit she cried openly when she heard Tallie's and Ricky's sweet voices. Just her luck that the stress and worry of her situation picked that exact moment to smack her in the tear ducts. She kept it together enough to talk to her children, listening to them describe their frightening experiences at the school during the evacuation, and then about staying in the house alone for the first time ever while their dad went to get food for them.

  Ellie wasn't sure she approved of that, although when they told her that Gen and Billy had left she grudgingly admitted that he might not have had much choice.

  She turned as the airline employees called over the terminal's speakers that the luggage had been brought in and was ready to be passed out. “I need to go,” she told her children reluctantly. “I love you two so, so much, and I promise I'll be with you soon. Until I am be safe and stay indoors with your dad, okay?”

  “Okay,” Tallie said, with Ricky solemnly echoing her.

  Ellie reluctantly said her goodbyes, promising Nick she'd call again when she had more time, then hung up. For a few seconds she just stood there composing herself, then she tucked her phone back into her purse, wiped at her eyes, and put on her best business face as she prepared to tackle the challenge of getting home.

  Although she was in a hurry to leave, not just because of the danger of Zolos but to get back to her children, she at least wanted to say goodbye to Hal before she left. He was standing not far away, also on his phone and seemingly coming to the end of his call as well so he could get his luggage.

  “Okay, let me know when you find out anything,” he was telling whoever he was talking to as she approached. There was a pause, then he said. “Yeah, absolutely.” Another pause. “I know. Love you too.”

  The teenager lowered his phone, then looked up and saw Ellie standing nearby. He gave her a weak smile. “My dad,” he said to her questioning look. “He says there's talk that the Japanese government is going to load all foreign nationals onto planes and send them back to their country of origin, or at least any country that will harbor them. Which probably means the US, he hopes.”

  “Is he going to try to come to LA to meet you?” she asked.

  Hal shook his head. “KC, if it comes to it. I need to get back and check on my family, and he said he'd try to meet me there if he could.” He shifted uncomfortably. “Speaking of which, would you mind if I asked how you plan to get there from here?” He hesitated, pride obviously warring with desperation, before taking a breath and continuing. “I'm, uh, kind of at a loss.”

  Ellie could imagine; at his age he wouldn't have had much experience responding when life threw him curveballs. And he almost certainly didn't have the money to change plans on a whim; having his flight home grounded, without the slightest mention of reimbursement from the airline, was probably a huge problem for him.

  “I was thinking I'd rent a car,” she replied. “I was actually going to head to the rental place right after grabbing my suitcase, hopefully before they run out.”

  The young man once again shuffled his feet. “Would you mind carpooling? I can help pay for gas, maybe chip in for the rent. We're headed to the same place anyway.”

  That gave her pause. She liked Hal well enough and he seemed like a nice person, but at the same time he was still practically a stranger. Then again he was also just a kid, and her neighbor, and he needed help.

  And it wasn't as if she hadn't jumped onto the carpooling board in college once or twice to get places, traveling with complete strangers. Those had all mostly turned out very well, and she'd made some good friends on the way.

  Still, she wasn't the type to make rash decisions. “How about you tag along with me to the car rental place while I think it over?”

  “I really appreciate even that.” The teenager nodded towards the pile of luggage. “Should we grab our stuff?”

  Ellie nodded back and walked beside him across the terminal. If she was being honest with herself, she'd pretty much already decided to let Hal come with her. If nothing else, it meant she wouldn't have to travel alone. Especially if the threat of Zolos led to any sort of civil unrest; safety in numbers and all that.

  Especially numbers that were built like a quarterback.

  The baggage was being handed out first come, first served, passengers pointing out their suitcases and other items as airport employees, wearing masks and gloves, slid them across the floor towards their owners.

  It took Hal five minutes to get his suitcase, then they had to wait a few more minutes while Ellie shouted among the crowd to get hers. As they did, the teenager pulled out his phone and made another call. Ellie tried not to eavesdrop on her tentative traveling companion, although it was hard not to since he was standing right next to her and speaking loud enough to be heard over the background babble.

  “Hey, Mom. Sorry I've been out of contact, they wouldn't let us use our phones.” A pause. “Yeah, just checking in to see how you and the kids are doing.” His tone was surprisingly neutral, especially considering he'd been out of contact with his mom for a day or so during a pandemic scare.

  Ellie's heart broke at the thought of Ricky ever talking to her like that, and had to remind herself that she didn't know Hal's situation, or why things might be strained between him and his mom.

  “Good, keep doing that . . . yeah, I'm on my way home now,” he continued. “I'll try to get back as quick as I can, but it might be tough.” Ellie didn't miss the quick glance he shot her way, and resisted the urge to shake her head wryly as he
continued. “Yeah, you can use my place if you need to. Yeah, it's in the same place.” He looked annoyed for a second as he listened. “I guess, sure, take whatever you need to feed the kids.”

  He stressed that last slightly, and as he listened for the next ten or so seconds his face became stony. “Okay fine, whatever. I don't have time for this right now. Yeah . . . yeah. Um look, I need to go. I'll call again when I can. Yes, I will.”

  The teenager hung up with no further preamble, stared at his phone for a second with his jaw clenched, then pocketed it and glanced at Ellie. “Sorry about that.”

  She wasn't sure whether he meant making a call in front of her, or what had sounded like a tense conversation with his mom. She decided to go for the less awkward option. “No problem, I'll probably need to make more calls myself when I can.”

  Hal nodded and faced forward, and they waited in slightly uncomfortable silence until an employee slid Ellie's suitcase to her. The young man made to carry it for her, but she shook her head and retrieved it herself.

  It wasn't a trust thing, she just had no problem carrying her own suitcase. “I've got it.”

  “Okay.” He gave her a smile, his previous easygoing mood making a tentative return. “Just figured playing pack mule might butter you up about letting me carpool with you.”

  Ellie laughed and shook her head. “If it had anything in it besides clothes and toiletries and weighed more than ten pounds I might take you up on that.”

  Now that they had their luggage they wasted no time exiting the terminal, following the signs pointing them to the car rental place. The airport around them was the least crowded she'd ever seen it, which she supposed wasn't surprising since anyone who didn't have to be there had probably left.

  Although she did notice a fairly large crowd around a bank of TVs, those ones airports had to show departure and arrival times. Only these ones showed no departures and only a single monitor for arrivals; the rest had been changed to what looked like a news channel, which is what had drawn the crowd.