By Way of Autumn Read online

  Josh pulled away and I felt compelled to tell the guard, one of the few people in town I didn’t know, that, “Josh was dropping me off. He’s not volunteering. I don’t want those people to go without help.”

  The guard looked at me. He was about the same age as Josh. “They won’t. Josh will get them. I know him. He’ll feel guilty and get them.”

  “As long as he gets my kids home first. Could you ...” I asked, gesturing to the car seat. “It’s really heavy. He’s injured and I don’t want to move him.”

  “Sure.” The guard took the seat and led the way into the emergency room.

  There weren’t many people there. Which was a good sign. It was dark sans a few emergency lights and lanterns.

  I approached the main counter, and the car seat was placed on the floor by my legs. I felt bad, looking down to the little guy. He was sad, not feeling well, and I was certain like any child, he just needed to be held. But to me, he must have been injured because any child his age would be fussing to get out of the car seat.

  “Tess,” Carol, my neighbor was working as the admission’s nurse. She said my name with shock. “You okay? The baby okay?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. We were coming back from seeing Nicole and we passed an accident. It was horrible. I found this little guy in his car seat. His entire family was … you know.” I paused. “He was thrown. He’s not crying, but I’m certain he’s hurt. He’s conscious and not screaming.”

  Carol came around from the counter. “I suppose you don’t know his name.”

  “No, and he hasn’t talked.”

  “Probably shock. Scared.” Carol crouched down before him and checked him out.

  “Carol, what’s going on? Do you know?”

  She shook her head and stood. “No, no one does. This all just happened about an hour ago. I mean the loss of power.”

  “Did your phones go down first?”

  “No. In fact I was on the phone when it all hit.”

  Hearing her say that caused me to pause a moment. My phone wasn’t working before the power went down. Confirming my original suspicion that two things had occurred and I was close to the first.

  “They’re saying …” Carol stood. “It was an EMP. But no one has been able to pick up any news, not from what I heard. Again, I’ve been here. I think his little arm may be broken.”

  I whined out a compassionate ‘aw’. I felt really bad for him.

  “I know he’s not your responsibility, but can you stay with him until we look at him and figure out what to do with him?”

  “Sure. Not a problem.”

  Carol lifted the car seat. “I’d take him out, but let’s see what Dr. Stanley says.”

  I cocked back. “Dr. Stanley? He’s here? He retired last year.”

  “He came in. In case we needed him. We did.” She led the way to the back. The injured toddler totally jumped the line in the ER.

  She brought us into Room Four.

  I thanked her as she closed the curtain, and I faced the baby. “I’m sorry you’re sick.”

  His little lips puckered and he started to cry. “Mommy.”

  “I know. I know.” I moved closer, stroking his face. “It will be all right. I promise. You will get better.”

  He repeated ‘Mommy’ again and again. It hurt to hear him say that. Yet, he was speaking.

  I did the soothing ‘shh’ thing, then asked. “What is your name? Do you know your name?”

  He nodded.

  “What is it?”

  “Yee-am.”

  “Yee-am.” I blinked. “Yee-am.” The fast opening of the curtain caused me to jump. I spun to see Dr. Stanley standing there.

  He wasn’t old by any means. He retired young when the insurance companies started dictating what he could do. He was one of the last of his kind, a single doctor practice.

  His blonde and gray hair was combed neatly. He seemed comfortable working, not stressed or rushed. “Tess,” he said. “What’s going on?”

  “Accident on the road. I brought in the only survivor. I couldn’t do anything for the others. Poor family is still up there. Just laying there.”

  “I’m sure authorities will get up there,” He said. “So you have … oh my God.” Dr. Stanley walked to the bed. I guess I was blocking his way. “This is the Sanders child.”

  “You know him?” I spun around.

  “I should. They moved in the house next door to mines about three months ago. New in town. Surprised you didn’t see the welcome on the church sign.”

  “I did. But I hadn’t met them.”

  “Poor thing,” Dr. Stanley said. “I can’t remember his name.”

  “Yee-am.”

  Dr. Stanley grunted at me. “Liam. Good Lord, Tess has it been that long that you don’t remember child talk.” He reached to unfasten the seat.

  “He was thrown,” I said. “I found the car seat on the side. I didn’t want to move him in case he was hurt bad.”

  “Good thinking, but I think this little guy’s injuries aren’t life threatening. Just a gut instinct. His angels were watching over him.” He undid the fastener. “How are the kids? Tag? Jeff? How are they handling this?”

  “Handling what? No one knows what is going …” And then I dead paused. Just stopped cold.

  Jeff. Nicole.

  It hit me.

  I was so engrossed in all that was happening, I didn’t think of them. I totally forgot Jeff was teaching out of town. Worse part was both he and Nicole were west, same as that fireball we had seen. That thought alone, immediately made me sick.

  NINE – REAL WORLD

  It was time for reality to hit me. I knew what I saw, experienced, and then I was so focused on getting home I didn’t think about the bigger picture. Sure I asked, but I accepted the general consensus answer that no one knew.

  Dr. Stanley said he was certain Liam had a broken arm. He didn’t appear to suffer any serious damage, but they wanted to keep him in the clinic and watch him for a few days.

  Then what?

  His family was dead.

  “They have family in Texas,” Dr. Stanley said. “We’ll reach them when the phones get back up.”

  “Will they?”

  “I’m certain.”

  I said goodbye to Liam and told him that I would be back to check on him, as I was leaving, I paused in the room. “Doc, if it was some sort of bomb, is my baby gonna be okay?”

  “I don’t think it was a typical bomb, if it was a bomb at all. But that baby is fine. It has the best protection.”

  “What about radiation.”

  “If there was radiation, it’s way out there.”

  I accepted that answer and took comfort in it and headed back home.

  I’d be lying if I said I didn’t hope Jeff was home. I did. The entire walk there I kept thinking that whatever occurred, it happened early and he never ended up leaving.

  He was sitting at home with the kids; that was what I believed.

  I ended up walking the entire distance home, it was uncomfortable, the heat increased and I could feel the sun beating on my skin. A couple blocks from home that kidney stone loosened back up and I could feel the cramping knot hit my back.

  My street was a community of its own, a tight knit family and as soon as I turned the bend for my street, I was spotted and everyone flocked to me as if I were a celebrity.

  They engulfed me and bombarded me with questions.

  “What did you see?’

  “I wanted to ask the kids, but I didn’t want to scare them?’

  “You saw something.”

  “You came from the west.”

  I couldn’t answer, the questions rapidly fired at me. My line of sight drifted to Sam. He was in his yard, wearing some sort of garbage bag looking outfit that covered him from head to toe. He also looked as if he were searching for metal.

  “What is Sam doing?” I asked.

  “Being nuts,” one of my neighbors said. “Come on, Tess. We can’t wait
for Josh to get back. He’s been running your vehicle like an ambulance.”

  Swell.

  Del Bender broke through the circle of people. He was with my neighbor from across the street, Larry.

  Del said, “Tess, we’re glad you made it back. What do you know about what happened?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing. None of you know?”

  Del replied, “No even crazy Sam hasn’t heard anything on the multitudes of radios he has. At least he says he’s not heard anything.”

  Larry was a bearded man who looked like a mountain man. When actually he was the mailman for twenty years. He said, “We’ve been in the dark, literally. All we know is the town went into full emergency lock down mode.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “It means,” Larry explained. “That deputy Bill Stevens came though here with a bull horn and the old squad car telling us until we knew what happened, we were under a martial law of sorts.”

  At that moment, Sam came into the circle and removed his gas mask and then hood from his body suit. “Clear. No radiation. None that I’m reading.” He indicated to the contraption in his hand. “Doesn’t mean it will stay that way.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Del snapped. “What radiation? There wasn’t a bomb?”

  “How do we know?” Sam said. “Power went out. In fact, transformers sparked, that tells me it was an EMP.”

  Del waved him off. “Doesn’t mean a nuclear explosion. Could have been a fancy EMP type of bomb by the terrorist.”

  People in the circle scoffed audibly at that suggestion.

  Sam added, “Okay, well what about the nuclear reactors all around Los Angeles? And us. They shut down that fast, there’s been no cooling the rods, and radiation could and will escape.”

  “I’m sure they have backup,” Del said. “Things will be back on line. Nothing exploded.”

  “Not true,” I said. “Something did. At eleven, our phones had power but no signal. An hour and a half later, we had stopped to switch drivers and that’s when it happened.”

  Everyone’s voice merged as one.

  Del held up his hand. “What happened? Then there was something?’

  “Explosion. Fire. The sky lit up. I mean bright white. There were no winds. But I saw a fireball in the distance.”

  Larry asked. “Fire ball or mushroom cloud.”

  I shook my head. “Fire. Mushroom. I don’t know. We ran for cover. But it looked like the sky exploded.”

  Del grunted out and tossed out his hand. “Goddamn North Korea.”

  “We don’t know,” Larry said, “But I can find out. First light I’ll take the plane out. Fly out far enough to try to see. West? Is that right Tess?”

  I nodded.

  Sam spoke up. “What about radiation? You could be exposed if there’s radiation.”

  “Chance I have to take. We need to see. If there’s no news, we have to find out ourselves.”

  “How you gonna do that?” Del asked. “With Sheriff Stew having us on lockdown.”

  “He’s not shooting down my plane. And I’m damn sure he wants to know too.” Larry said.

  “Still not convinced it was a bomb,” Del stated.

  My head spun. The voices flowed together in logical argument. Bomb. No bomb. Meteor or comet. Alien invasion. The theories flew along with more questions for me. I tried to answer theirs, now it was time for them to answer mine.

  “Stop.” I lifted my hand. “Has anyone seen my husband, Jeff? Is he home? Do you know?”

  I wanted someone to say ‘yes’.

  But Del didn’t give me the answer I wanted to hear. “Sorry, Tess. I watched him pull out just as the sun came up.”

  “Shit!” Sam blasted. “Shit!” He stepped back.

  I looked at him curiously. “Sam?”

  “Shit. The sun.” And on that, saying no more, Sam spun and hurriedly ran back to his house.

  TEN – COOL

  Despite the fact that Del told me Jeff had left, I was still hopeful, that somehow his car just died a few miles up the road, and he returned home. That wasn’t the case when I walked in the door.

  Julia had closed the blinds to keep the coldness in, there were no lights, and I started to get worried. I went into survivor mode. Not that I am all that much of a survivor, but I do have that little door that opens up when something goes wrong. Three years earlier when we experienced an earthquake, I swore we would never be in that position again. At least I would try not to. We had no electricity, no fresh water, our food supply was limited to what we could get at the grocery store, with cash. The Sheriff was tough, laying down the law on how much someone could buy. If he hadn’t, many would have gone without, because so many people went into hoarder mode.

  Not that I stayed in complete stock, but I had a shelf in the pantry just for emergency situations.

  When I walked in my home, I was ready to engage with what needed to be done.

  Julie seemed glad to see me. Though I wasn’t gone long enough to be missed. She rushed to me and said, “How is the baby?”

  “He’s fine. They are keeping him.”

  “Then what?” Julie asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Are we taking him?”

  “I doubt that. I’m sure, before long, the phones will be up, and they’ll find his family. Dr. Stanley is working the emergency room, and knew the baby. His name is Liam. So I’m really sure, it’s just a matter of time.”

  “And he’s not too hurt?”

  “No, thank God.” I said. “Where’s Tag?”

  “He’s playing with his Legos upstairs. I left a little bit of the blind open so he could see. Mommy, it’s still really hot. The thermometer out back says it’s eighty-nine.”

  “I know,” I said. “But the sun will go down soon and the temperature will drop. I hope. “

  “What about the food?” Julie asked.

  “Exactly what I was going to talk to you about. Come with me” I led the way into the kitchen. “I’ve been thinking about it. Grab a notebook. We’re gonna do an inventory, start keeping track of everything we have, everything we use. We’ll start separating the box goods, canned goods, and then we will determine what will last the longest.”

  “Do you think the lights will be out that long?”

  “Let’s not count on them coming right back. That way we’re ready if they don’t. Remember the earthquake? I wasn’t ready. I thought the power would be back on in a day, if that. But it wasn’t. We went a week without lights, and were scraping the peanut butter jar. I said never again. I meant it.”

  “What about the stuff in the freezer.” Julie asked.

  “We have the grill. We’ll fire that up and cook what we can and that’s what we eat first,” I said. I started opening the cabinets for a full and good view. It was then I realized I hadn’t gone shopping at least in a week. “Julie,” I said. “Do me a favor, go and get every battery out of every device that you can find.”

  “Good idea mom.”

  I was even proud of myself. I was sounding kind of savvy about survival. But I wasn’t. I just kept going back to that day, that week, without power and the following month that left us with limited resources when the earthquake hit.

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  By the time I started really organizing the items, Tag reminded me that we had not eaten yet. I planned to start the grill and make that package of hot dogs that was in the refrigerator. All perishable items would have to be eaten first. I figured the items in the freezer would last until they defrosted and then I would have to clean them out. However, with the way the weather was holding on, it was midsummer, the things in the freezer would thaw rather quickly.

  Once Julie returned and could keep an eye on Tag I went outside to cook. They only took a few moments and while cooking them I realized how hungry I was. We devoured the dogs.

  After lunch, I examined the batteries Julie gathered. She had them in a plastic bag and set them on the counter
. She tossed a few strays down stating she wasn’t sure if they were any good.

  Then she said something that clicked with me, “batteries will be hard to get. If the power stays out for too long, people will kill each other over a single battery.”

  Kill each other.

  In that instant, following her comment, I was thrust into an instant panic. Out of survival mode sort of and into panic mode. When faced with extreme situations, people will take extreme measures. Suddenly, I started thinking about my neighbors in a different light. The people in our community. I knew them. A little differently at times because I knew them from the view of a grocery store checkout woman. I had worked at Monroe grocery store in town since we moved to Falcon’s way. I did so up until I got pregnant with Baby X. I knew what people bought. I knew the shoppers that went once a month at the beginning of the month, I knew those who didn’t buy much, and only went when they needed something. I knew those never bought enough food and those who bought too much. I knew those people and when they would run out.

  Del’s wife Mary was always in the store. Of course, no matter what she came in for, two of the items always included a pound of margarine and bottle of ranch dressing. I suppose coming in three times a week and getting margarine and ranch dressing she was either making some sort of bizarre recipe or has some sort of fetish for buying them. I imagined she had an entire cupboard filled with ranch dressing.

  Mary and Del would not be desperate. I believe with how wonderful a cook Mary is she sure could find a way to survive on margarine and ranch dressing.

  Melissa Owens was another story. Her husband was constantly out of work from being fired or drunk on the job. Melissa always told me her marital woes while I was ringing her up. She also purchased her groceries with checks. No one used checks anymore. Mr. Monroe would always hold her check for a day or two, instead of using automatic authorization, which told me Melissa pushed the envelope of living paycheck to paycheck. She never bought extras. In fact, she got barely enough. How much more food she could have gotten for the kids if she didn’t have to buy beer for her husband. He wasn’t a nice man. What would he do when they ran out of food? Nothing himself, but I could see him sending Melissa to our house to cut our throats for a box of cereal.