Squeezing the dregs from the packet, I optimistically pray that the last few drops of ketchup, now added to the alleged omelet, will make it more enticing. Or at least somewhat closer to edible.
Addy and Ash have been poking at theirs with their forks in a desultory way, but very little seems to have made it from the holder up into their mouths. Thankfully they’re tired enough that they don’t have the energy to really complain, at least, not to their usual Olympic standard level. There were a few minutes of whining after the first mouthful, and then despondency set in on realizing there really wasn’t an alternative. I watch them moving the food around the containers without putting any in their mouth for a while.
“She’s got it then?” I jump slightly at the voice. When I turn around I get to observe as another woman approaches our little site. “She’ll feel amazing in a month. We all did. I bet she feels like a dumpster dived take out right now though,” she says, grinning. “Dana,” she adds, sticking out her hand.
“Hi? I’m Erika, that’s Caitlin, Ash, and Add— Uh—” I stop, grimacing and cursing my exhaustion. “I mean— Uh.”
Shit, maybe I should have given completely fake names? Maybe she’ll hand us straight over to Homeland Security before we’ve even escaped the darn the state. Maybe I've just terminated the trip through exhausted stupidity
She glances at the two kids, raises a lone eyebrow as she looks at Addy, and looks back at me. “Oh, don’t worry about that honey. Not here. Well not with me, anyhow.” She directs her smile first at Caitlin’s sleeping form, then back at the kids. It fades almost instantly. “Shit darlin’, you’re not feeding those poor suckers MREs?”
“Yeah. It’s all we’ve got.” I say, warily.
“Gimmie ten. Put that garbage down, honey.” She taps Addy’s hand. “Lemmie bring you some real food.”
True to her word, about ten minutes later she returns carrying a folding chair in one hand, and, impressively, in the other, a stack of four plates. The top one of which is heaped with scrambled eggs, some sort of fried canned meat, and bread. I watch her warily as she opens the chair and drops it with a practiced flick of her wrist. “Help yourselves, y’all look too thin anyhow,” she says.
“Um, hang on kids,” I say, staring at the woman. ‘I just—”
“Sweetheart, if we all wanted you to be dead you think we'd bother poisoning you? You’d’ve been dead before you woke up. If we wanted to capture you, you think we’d drug you? You're surrounded, honey. You ain’t going nowhere unless we let you. Daring, by the way, parking yourself in basically the worst place to escape; parking up in y’all’s fancy truck without checking who was around you and without any security. No honey, you’d’ve been fucked if we actually wanted to hurt you. So y’know, eat the darn breakfast, it’s better’n whatever that’s meant to be.”
“I was kinda tired.” She raises that damn eyebrow at me again. “Point understood.” I say, turning to the kids. “Go on.”
Addy and Ash dive in like they've not been fed for years. Dana smiles, and passes a plate over for me and Caitlin.
“You should make sure she eats,” she says. “It really takes it out of you,” she adds, sighing.
“Don’t you want to avoid—” I cast my eyes over to Caitlin.
“Ha. No point. We all got it. Place like this we all work together to keep it going. Keep an eye on each other, too. Which is fine and great and all until something like that hits. That thing ran through us like shit through a tin horn.
“No one got it twice, though. It did lose us more’n half our men.” She leans in and whispers, “Between you and me some of ’em were not as much of a loss as some folks would have you believe.” She sits back again before continuing. “And those that didn’t die,” she briefly crosses herself, “boy howdy are they different now. We went from a cult to a convent.” She offers a bleak laugh.
“Uhm, sorry.”
“Why’re you sorry, hon? It’s not like it’s your doing, is it now.” She leans back, pulls out a vape pen and draws on it long and slow. “So…” She pauses, looking at the truck. “I see that shiny ass fucker, an’ I think to myself you’re out here on some fishin’ trip. Lookieloos wanting to trade info to the cops — or worse — for a reward. But Wanda says she thinks you’re alright. She thinks you’re runnin’ away from somethin’. An’ you know what?” She takes another slow drag. “I think she’s right.
“Leastwise that means you won’t be deliberately bringin’ the cops down on us.” She stares at me with intensity. “But if you’re runnin’, I’m thinkin’ the cops might be after you already.”
I chew the meat longer than I need to, giving myself more time to answer.
“I don’t think there are cops after us,” I say not so much skirting the truth as wholly avoiding the region the truth’s in. “Technically, this is a work trip for me, and Caitlin’s employer’s closed right now,” I say, wondering why the fuck I’m sharing this much with her. “So she’s free to take the trip with me.”
“Sure, sure,” she says, sounding anything but. She chews on the thoughts for a while, continuing to watch me distrustfully. Finally she settles; kicks her feet out and leans back, smiling. “Okay. Good. We had some asshole roll in here — he’d been on the run from down near Artesia — cops chasing him half the time. Damn fool near got us all killed.
“We’re far enough outta town they don’t give much of a shit what we do so long as it’s quiet. Too much effort to pull us all in. But someone rolling in hot like that? It get’s ’em all steamed up, they come in here thinking they’re all Harvey Whitehill, guns blazing. Mind, since they heard about the virus they’ve kept well clear.” She hops up almost as suddenly as she dropped into the chair. “Well, y’all bring those plates back to twenty-two. Don’t worry your pretty little heads about washing ’em. You need anything before you head on, you let me or Wanda know, we’ll try and get you squared away.”
She scoops up her chair and turns to go, then briefly turns back.
“Oh, if you’re traveling far, you might want to talk to Wanda anyway. Miller, so-say, is giving his address today. Back from party island for real this time. Knowing that man, whatever he announces, it’s gonna be something dumb. Bless his heart.”
#
“It’s time. Back in the truck,” I say, giving her a nudge.
“I don’t wanna,” she declares. Despite the scratchiness, she manages to make her voice as whiny as possible.
I roll my eyes.
“I know you don’t wanna. None of us wanna, but you gotta.”
“But Erika,” she says dragging out the final vowel, looking pleadingly at me. “I’m comfy.”
“Oh god. Don’t,” I say laughing. “The kids’ll hear and then they’ll think it’s funny and we’ll have them doing more whiny voice.”
“Spoilsport.” Caitlin says, sucking down more Gatorade. She points at her throat.“The spray helped. Thanks.” She eases herself out of the chair and stands, brushing my arm with her hand after she does so. I can’t quite decide if it’s affection or an accident. “Thanks for getting us this far, too.”
She leans on me as she walks to the truck, slowly lifting herself into the seat. “Stop blaming yourself,” she says, abruptly. “I know I was blaming you — I still find it hard not to — but this,” she mimes the whole of everything, “it deserved to fall. It deserved to be destroyed. And if not you, someone else would’ve done it. And maybe they'd have done it differently. But they wouldn’t have maybe saved Addy in the process, and hell, there's no way this falls without trauma.”
“Maybe they wouldn’t have killed so many people as I will have,” I mutter.
“Don’t. That lot out there, they’re killing people every day. At least people might have a chance with this. Humanity’ll work it out,” she says, leaning the seat back. After a moment watching her, her breathing slows. Needing rest after the exertion of getting all of thirty feet. It’s reassuring, I guess, that she’s still upright. “Hey, Erika,” she says quietly, as I turn to collect the last few things. “You said— you said that the virus could mutate?”
“Yeah. I mean…” I glance around, check that we’re alone. “I did my best to make it so it won’t reproduce well if it does — at least — it shouldn’t. It should break if it mutates in any really significant way. At least, that’s the plan. But these days I don’t think I was maybe as clever as I thought I was.” I slump slightly.
“You did say you made some pretty sketchy decisions.”
“Yeah.” I lean on the door, waiting. Caitlin’s obviously got something she needs to get out, so I just quietly watch the dust and ash occasionally tossed up by the wind. Apparently the last wildfire was long enough ago that the camp’s had time to recover, but the ash is mixed in with the sandy dirt and it’s just… stayed. It makes the whole place seem monochromatic.
“I know Addy’s might’ve caught it already. Ash too.” She says hesitantly, her voice trembling. “They’ve might've caught it and it’s just in that bit before you show symptoms. Asym—something?”
“Asymptomatic,” I supply, cautiously.
“Yeah. God. I was so angry — I still am angry — that you could have given it to them… But then it turns out I’m the one who brought it home.” Tears steak down her cheeks, she grabs a Kleenex and mops at them. “I’m the one who—”
“You can’t blame yourself,” I say, taking her free hand. “First, if they do catch it you don’t know it’s from you. And even if they did catch it from you, you couldn’t have known.
“It’s not your fault, Caitlin. And, I mean, if we’re playing a round of Blame Olympics—”
“Don’t. I know. I know haven’t fully forgiven you yet either… It’s a ‘both and’ thing.” She laughs bleakly. “But I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s all I’ve thought about all morning. And what if… What if it’s mutated? What if what you did to stop it mutating wasn’t enough?” she whispers, glancing around her. “What if I give her a garbage version and it doesn’t work right and she doesn’t get to be like you?
“Erika, what if I hurt her more.” She pauses, takes a breath, rubs her throat. “Shit. How often can I use the spray?” she says, after a painful swallow.
“Three times a day. It’s really not meant for—”
“Yeah, I know, I know. You told me at great length. It’s pain relief but I’m still not meant to talk a bunch. I get it. But, Erika, I wish we could know that what they catch is…safe, or effective, or…I dunno, the least bad it can be? But we can’t do that, can we?”
“Caitlin, what are you asking me.” I say, quietly.
“This country? It would’ve killed her.” She nods at Addy as we glimpse a flash of her, covered in dust, running about with other girls from the site. “Probably would’ve destroyed Ash too.
“Eventually, however much work we did to prepare them, they’d end up meeting the same bigots we have, only the a-holes have worse laws on their side. Our kids’d have bigger walls to scale to get anything. And they’d know it’s not fair — but what are you gonna do? They probably won’t even have a chance to vote by the time they’re old enough — not if this all survived.”
“Moms! Soozy said she’s got a pet lizard and she said she’ll show me!” Ash runs up, panting and startling us both. “I know you said we have to go, but can I go look? Can I? Can I? Can I?”
A second later another girl, similarly sweating and filthy, arrives. “Hi!”
“Uh—” I manage.
“Which plot is it,” Caitlin says, more usefully.
“Five.” She points back the way we came.
“You can go look,” Caitlin says, “But you need to be back in ten minutes.” She glances at me for confirmation.
The girls run off laughing excitedly with Soozy punctuating her fading descriptions of the lizard and its house with emphatic gestures.
“Fuck,” I exhale. “That was too close.”
I check through the stark burned trees and stumps for Addy and her new friends, they’ve set up some game which involves a ball and— anyway.
“Caitlin?”
She fiddles with the seatbelt, opens and closes the glove box, rifling through the contents, doing anything that avoids eye contact. She watches Addy for a while; Addy’s flickering in and out of view between the trees, from behind the rocks. I can hear her giggling.
Outside from the constraints of this garbage country she’s so alive.
When Caitlin finally turns to me, she still can’t meet my eyes. When she starts to speak, it’s so quiet that I think I’m imagining things. “You don’t have any left, do you? Any virus that you know is… That’s not mutated.”
I think of the small nasal spray tucked in the bottom of my bag. Wrapped in tape. Wrapped in clothes, too. The last thing I produced before I left the lab. Enough to ruin thousands, possibly millions of lives. And maybe now to make sure two people get the best shot at survival.
“Shit. You do!” Caitlin says, reading my face before I’ve managed to come up with an answer. “You made more,” she says, her eyes returning once more to Addy.
“Yeah.” My voice feels like I’m the one infected. Like I’m raking it out across the burning hot ash that once covered the landscape, the trees; that scarred the ground around us. “I made some — before we left — in case…” I glance out towards Addy. “I thought…”
“You thought it might be safer if you gave her — maybe gave all of us a clean dose? One that’s not been through however many people.” She runs her finger idly along the edge of the center console. “When were you going to…?”
“I hadn’t decided whether I should even bring it up. Not that I would do it without asking, obviously,” I add on hastily, suddenly fearing misinterpretation. “Just, it’s insane. Or it seems insane. I can’t tell anymore.
“I only did it to myself because—
“Because I—”
Eons pass as we stand there, a sudden gust kicking up the sand and ash. Shrouding us in a dusty haze.
“Because you…” she says, gently.
“Because I didn’t care,” I whisper. “I couldn’t see a minute ahead. I just existed. And so…” I trail off to nothingness again.
“But you can now?”
“I can, and I’m terrified.” I say. I can see Caitlin fading. She’s poured all her energy into this one conversation.
“That’s why we have to do it,” she says decisively, before dropping back fully onto the seat with a grunt. “They’re going to get it either way. This way we have a tiny bit of control. Maybe they already have it?” She rubs her knees, stretches, groans again in discomfort. “But maybe they don’t? At least this way we know.”
“But…” I say. The impossible to forget taste of my tongue stuck to a cockroach littered carpet. Of waking in agonizing pain, unable to scream. The wrenching nausea of crawling, desperate, from the vile pit of the floor to the filthy abyss of the bathroom.
Memories of day after day passing by with my only thought being please just let me die.
The bag that contains the spray contains every vaguely safe pain receptor blocker I could clone. Anti-inflammatories, anti-emetics, anti-pyretics, steroids. There’s the boxes with IV fluids, IV nutrition, IV start kits. It’s why we’re living off MRE’s. It’s why we left behind so much of our lives. Because there’s also an entire fucking mobile army medical unit for three patients shoved in the back of the pickup.
The sweat running down from my hairline has little to do with the temperature.
“But what if they get too sick. What if I can’t look after them?” I say.
I’m almost certain Ash will be fine. Almost certain she’ll be miserable, but she’ll survive. Addy though? Her body’s still constructing itself. It’s not yet fully settled. Will her transition be better or worse than mine? Better, surely? Less to undo. Less to transform. It makes sense that it should be less traumatic.
But I don’t know. I don’t have any data to back it up.
“When we get into Oregon, if they get sick there’ll be actual doctors, actual nurses. Not just me.”
“Will there?” Caitlin says. “Won’t their hospitals be overwhelmed, too?”
“Damnit.”
“You think they’ll have caught it by then, anyway?”
“Yeah.” I say, despondent.
“Well — probably we should give it to her sooner then.”
“Today?”
“You think they’ll show symptoms before we get there?”
“Not from this. But, if they’ve caught it already.” I shrug.
“Then yes, today. Is it an injection? A spray? What?”
“A spray. Like the flu vaccine.”
“Good,” she says, necking another dose of pain killers. “Then I can do it while you’re driving us.”
“You shouldn’t have to—”
“I’m not going to let you do this.” Caitlin says. “This is Addy’s best shot at survival in this f’ing world. And I figure it’s the safest choice for Ash. If you did it you’d just be punishing yourself for your choices. Sweetheart, I’m not going to let you use our kids to self-harm.”
“But what if something happens?” I ask, unable to say the words outright.
“Then it will be both our faults. Or maybe none of our faults.”
#
“Kiddos! Time to go.” I say, scooping up the chairs, and shouting in the general direction I last saw them running with other girls from the site.
“Hey! Oh no! Sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you!” I smile as Wanda gets closer. “So, Dana said you were giving your kids MREs,” Wanda says, dubiously, as I shove the final two chairs into the back of the truck.
“Yeah, we — we had to leave in kinda a hurry.”
She glances at the neatly stacked and very full back of the truck, at the tail end of the ambulance gurney that’s just visible through the tailgate, then looks at me skeptically. Despite that, she still lowers the box she’s carrying on the tail gate. “You got a cooler somewhere in that shiny-ass truck of yours?”
“Yeah,” I say, catching a glimpse into the box where a couple of boxes of cereal and a gallon of milk sit alongside a box of eggs and some kinda ham.
“Right, well, no kids leave here eating God damned MREs”
“But, Wanda, you all need this, surely?”
“We have enough. And we share what we have. Anyway, we have our ways. Be safe!” She smiles enigmatically before she starts to walk away.
“Hey, Wanda?”
“Yeah?” She stops, turns back to face me.
“The kids here — when they caught the virus. How did they do?”
Wanda studies my face for a moment. “The younger girls mostly shook it off like a cold,” she laughs, but it sounds strained. “Not like us olds, it was lousy. Even for the women.”
“What about…the boys?”
She glances at Addy and Ash. “Not so great. We kept ’em hydrated, seems to help. You really want an IV for ’em if you can. And give ’em lots of protein — same as ’most else virus-wise. We tried antivirals for ’em — didn’t do shit, to be honest. All but one uh, boy, survived.” I watch her adjust her T-shirt sleeves and fiddle with the hem for a moment. “His poor mom. I don’t think she’s ever gonna— But he didn’t— He wouldn’t let us help him. Said he didn’t want to become some… Anyway.
“Seems to be worse the older the boy is. Teenagers, they had it rougher than the younger kids. The baby didn’t barely seem much worse’n teething. Mind, we’ve only got one of them here.
“Funny thing is, the men? If they don’t admit they feel better after, fuck ’em. They look and move like they’re years younger. And they’re all in the same boat as us girls now. Mind, we’re gonna need to source a shit ton more tampons soon.” This time she really does laugh.
“Oh my God,” I say, looking at the girls when they run up, panting. “Please, Wanda, tell me there’s some kinda functional shower or a giant bucket I can dunk these two in?”
“You can come on back to mine. We’ve got a water recycler. They can get…cleaner.”
“Thank you,” I say again, in relief. “Thank you. Again.”
#
“You can take as long as you want.” She says to the kids, shutting the door to the camper and dropping onto a chair outside, under the shade of a tarpaulin. “You want anything to drink while we wait? Coke? Ice-Tea?”
“No, I’m okay.” I say, itching to leave.
“Sorry she’s having such a rough time.” Wanda says waving at the truck where Caitlin’s sleeping. “Some women get it rough.”
“Hopefully she’ll get the worst of it over quick.”
“So — I don’t need to know where you’re going. Dana said she’d told you to talk to me, though, so I’m happy to give you any information I can — either just in general or something specific.” She studies me as I debate. “Oh, you know about the fires?”
“More wildfires?” I say, with a sigh. “Shit, I don’t need to remove more sites—”
“No, honey. There’ve been two refinery fires. Big ones. Both across in Texas. Hang on,” she glances at her phone, “Galveston and Port Arthur. Liberty Fuels is blaming the workers. Says the second shift never showed at either site. Port Arthur — that was last week. Sounds like the vent stack overflowed. Massive explosion — so that site’s offline for a long time. Don’t know about Galveston yet.”
“Well, shit.”
“Yeah, sorry. I hate to, well, pour gasoline on the fire of bad news, but apparently Garyville and Baton Rouge couldn’t get their staff in either. They’re closed right now.”
I squeeze my hands into fists, tuck them under me.
“Maybe you could pick up one of those old Lightnings? That topper might fit?”
A sharp laugh escapes my mouth. “We’re already pushing our luck. We don’t need to stand out anymore than we already do. Parking up to charge — if we can find a charger that’s not trashed — isn’t going to do us any favors with being inconspicuous.” I realize how irritated I sound. “Sorry. I shouldn’t be taking it out on you. I guess we’ll just — take it slow. Pray the gas stations don’t run dry before we get to…”
“Where you’re going.”
“Yeah.”
We sit in silence for a while — Wanda gets up and grabs a coke, offers me one again, and then — eventually — I show her the route.
“Yes, there. They’re good people.” She says, pointing. “No, definitely not that one; that one the America Youth took over last month; that one’s a mine now…” She rattles through all the nearer stops, only slowing as we get further out of state. “If y’all are willing, message me here, and I’ll reach out to our network, see what I can find out for y’all farther out.” She pauses, chewing on her lip before she makes the offer, “I know it ain’t the Waldorf-Astoria here, but you can stay, as long as y’all pull your weight.”
I take a moment in the shapes place before I reluctantly admit that we can’t stay, no matter how much it feels like we could. It’d be easier, so much easier.
But.
“It’s too close,” I say. “And the kids? They need to be somewhere — somewhere better. Damn,” I add, checking my watch. “We really should be going.” I stand up, open the camper door. At first I think it’s Ash, but it’s Addy. Ash has clearly shown her how to wrap the towel around her chest, the twist holding it in place. In the background I can hear Ash’s shower still running. “Come on, you two, I need you both in the truck in like minus five minutes.”
“Okay mom.” Addy says, quietly.
“Can you let your sister know?”
“Yep.” She says, walking over to hammer on the door.
“Thank you. Again.” I say to Wanda. “All this, it means a lot.”
“Good luck, Erika. I get the impression y’all are gonna need it.”
#
I tap channel select a few times, taking my eyes off the road just long enough to find the touch-screen button each time. Careful to very visibly keep looking forward as much as possible, lest I’m pulled over for driving while brown, with the pretext of distracted driving.
“…nerative Rock an hour of all—ing us in studio today is Pastor—oakesperson for the DOE said that the strategic oil reserve is inaccess—adio de samba generada por IA—mns from the…”
When I finally find KSFV, and the NPR announcer shares that the White House press conference will begin shortly, I feel Caitlin tense.
“Do you have to listen to that?” she rouses herself briefly from her recumbent position to mumble her complaint. “You know his voice is like nails on a chalkboard.”
“I just wanna know how bad it is. I'll turn it down though, hopefully you can get back to sleep.”
I turn the volume lower, to the point the presenter's voices are almost asmr, and wait. Eventually the pundits reflexively stop mid-sentence and cross fade to the tail end of polite applause from the mixture of journalists and staffers in — presumably — the Oval Office.
“Citizens, our homeland, the greatest country in the history of this world, is under attack. Around a month ago we first saw the signs of an attempt to destroy our Godly community. We saw a disease spreading through urban areas, a disease that at first, appeared to prey on the weak.”
“He sounds weird.” Caitlin turns the radio down lower. “Like, he’s off. More off than normal.”
“Maybe? It might just be compression. You know how shit music sounds on this since they added all those hundreds of AI stations. And it’s not like we listen to him often…”
“Yeah… True,” she hesitates, places her hand on leg for a moment. “Still. He sounds weird. Although,” she drags out the central vowels, coughs a little and rubs her throat. “He still sounds like an a-hole, though.” She shuffles herself in the seat, props her head against the window, and gently swipes my hand away from the volume control a couple of times before allowing me to touch it. She glares at me, then at the radio before closing her eyes.
“…fforts of CDC director Zachary Greenfield, it is spreading beyond the genetically inferior and into our communities. It is time that we recognize this for what it is, an attack on our people, our families, and our traditional way of life. It is a national emergency, and we can, and must take the any and all steps to protect us.
“Starting immediately, highly miasmic areas will be defined and quarantined by Homeland Patrol. Officers will monitor borders, and a strict curfew in those areas will start tonight.
“By strengthening the economy into the best performing economy we’ve ever had, we primed the free market to rapidly bring us the ability to detect those carrying this weakness. Multiple corporations have stepped forward with offers to provide systems — and these testing facilities will be rolled out to each miasmic area as they become available.
“Until then, these areas will remain fully quarantined.
“However, we are setting up mobile hospital sites around the United States. Once they are ready, and staffed with teams to properly manage these cases, we will start moving infected individuals to these locations. In this way we will protect our citizens, reduce fiscal impacts, and limit our most important citizens’ exposure.
“Unfortunately, while Zachary attempted to manage this situation, it seems to have been beyond his capabilities. So, this morning I made the decision to relieve him of the leadership role he has held within the CDC.
“You may know that I have just returned from the home of my close friend, a man who has been steadfast in his support of this, the greatest nation. When he first heard of the virus that has been released within our beautiful republic, he immediately reached out. He told me that he suspected that he knew who was behind this evil.
“I remind you now that less than a decade ago, Democratic presidents still allowed anyone into our heaven-favored land. Since I was appointed my team has labored to undo this genetic aberration, this weakness that the elites encouraged to spread to our people. But, that wasn’t enough for the liberals. No, they also allowed people who did not share our beliefs to infest our nation.
“The man who created the virus that threatens all that we hold dear, Dr Tavish Shah, is just one result of these choices. A man who has defiled our nation because he is so angry at the true American man’s rightful place at the head of our society.
“He is a man who has attempted to destroy all that we have built together.
“Him, and men like him, would defile our traditional family values.
“These vermin were given the privilege of staying here. Gifted the chance to be a part of our great project. And what have they chosen to do? Contaminated it with Communist thinking. Sullied it with their disgusting gender ideology. Liberals invited these betrayers here. They try to bring down our men and confuse our women. They try to destroy our natural understanding of the proper roles of each biological sex.
“We all know that men and women are different. That men and women have different needs, desires, strengths and weaknesses. Since the beginning of time men have been built to lead. To hunt, to gather, to make decisions so they can provide for their families. And women have nurtured, cared for, and raised the next generation. Raised them to follow the correct path forwards through life. Relied on their husbands to help them navigate the challenges that raising a family can bring. It is the natural order of things.
“Since before I was appointed, I have worked to strengthen our greatest success, our project of Liberty Through Strength. Of purifying our great nation. That’s why this past week I visited with one of our countries greatest men, Oaklen R…”
#
It’s twenty-seven long miles until I see a decaying McDonalds. I’ve covered the distance at exactly fifty-five miles an hour. Not a mile an hour less or more than the posted limit, the whole time I’ve been watching the odometer, counting the minutes, waiting for somewhere to let out my anger. I’ve been crushing it all down, holding it within me.
They've been no cops so far. In fact there’ve been no cars for the last hour. And now, there’s just empty desert road in my mirror and out as far as I can see. So maybe I can let some of it escape here, lose a little control for just a minute. Locked in spirals of thought, I almost miss the turning.
The tires scream as I yank us off the road and into the empty lot. I’m certain though, that without an outlet, I’ll do something more stupid. Red ABS and traction control warnings flicker angrily, and some driver-monitoring system whines that it’s going to deduct points from my safety score as I judder the truck to a halt. Given the patches of sandy gravel I slid over it’s unsurprising that we land up diagonally across the lines. I direct my hatred at them for a bit, faded as they are.
Flickering thoughts of whether I should bother to move the truck, to straighten it up dance through my brain. Maybe I should make it look less like I just plowed into the lot of this abandoned fast food place with the care and attention of someone on meth.
But I can’t.
I can’t think of anything else but Miller’s cozy little chat on Rue’s fucking island. Miller as a guest of Oaklen fucking Rue. Of course.
Of fucking course he was.
My mind’s inundated with images of Miller being served drinks by Rue’s captive — women? Laughing and drinking and fucking doing whatev— Well, let’s be honest. Miller fucking. I only heard stories, rumors, little fragments of evil. I mean, there are probably cis women trapped there too, probably. Not really Rue’s speciality.
And now? Oaklen Rue’s calling the shots with Miller, the federal government behind him, and he’s set them, and every asshole informant in this shitty country on me, and so on our family.
On our kids.
The instant someone makes the connection.
My eyes flicker back to Ash and Addy, their faces pale in the mirror.
I realize I’ve just been sitting here — who knows how long — skin stretched white over my knuckles from gripping the wheel. My face in the mirror, grim; eyes glinting with barely suppressed fury.
Fuck.
“Sorry. I needed a quick break,” I mumble.
“Erika?”
“Mom?!”
“Really, I’m fine,” I say, my voice tight, “I just need a minute.” I yank the door open and jump out; find myself pacing around the scattered boulders at the edge of the lot, tracing and retracing lines of footsteps in the sandy dirt. After a few circuits of one of the dead trees that litter the curb I decide to find a place where Caitlin, Addy, and Ash’s eyes aren’t following me anxiously.
I round the building, broken glass littering the walkway; seats, tables and ordering posts wrenched from inside hanging out of the windows. I start off walking but arrive at the back at a near sprint, sliding to a halt in the sand and trash.
Behind the restaurant, safely out of view, I shove my arm as hard into my mouth as I can and scream. It’s tempting to bite down, let the pain bring me back, but that would leave too obvious a mark.
Tears squeeze out of the corners of my eyes, I swipe them angrily away but they just keep coming. Through the haze of tears I try and find a something sharp enough to dig into me. Something that won't leave an obvious mark. Cause pain I can center myself with. But there’s nothing that’ll work. Nothing that’s not beyond filthy, anyway.
I close my eyes, try to breathe, but the air feels thin. It feels impossible to fill my lungs. Anger drains away and in its place is despair. My body stops fighting gravity and I drop down into the grime and sob.
“Erika?” Caitlin’s voice is gentle, but she sounds rough. I’ve made her have to get out, get round here. I’ve made her have to rescue me, again.
I look up; Addy and Ash are supporting her and their fear etches itself into my core.
Shit.
“Sorry. Uh.”
“’C’mon back to the truck, sweetheart.”
“Mom?”
I gradually push myself to sitting, dust off the worst from my T-shirt, and then my shorts, and stand almost as unsteadily as Caitlin. Ash steps across the gap toward me, and for a moment I let her hold my trembling arm while I try and regain control. While I shove everything back in to a box in the corner of my mind. I can’t deal with this now, and hopefully enough is out that I can keep it controlled.
“What’s going on mom?” Addy asks, her voice shaking almost as much as I am.
I frantically scrabble through the speech, try and find an excuse for my behavior. “The things they’re doing — to stop the disease spreading? They’re just using it as an excuse to hurt people. To grab people like — well — like us, and take us away from everyone else. I know we can get to Mary-Annes, but sometimes it’s hard to believe.”
I gaze out across the scrub, across the desert, through the heat haze and at the distant plateau. How the hell are we going to do this?
#
Food has helped, a bit at least, and Caitlin's quiet reassurance has kept me feeling less out of control. I’ve stared at the map, and together with Caitlin we've picked our destination – a couple of hours shorter than we planned, but she says I need the break.
“Hey kiddos,” Caitlin says after we’ve eaten. “This thing I've caught, the virus, we think you're going to catch it so—”
“Oh don't worry about that,” Ash says, startling us both. “The girls at camp said we've caught it.”
“What? Why?” I say, turning to face them.
Ash and Addy squirm so they're each facing out the windows and pull up their shirts.
No, now there's no air.
There's no air in the truck at all.
I try and swallow or move or breathe or speak but I'm utterly frozen, staring at their backs covered in tiny red dots.