Hot Zone Page 6

  Meri asked, “What’s the deal? Not more bad news.”

  “Just listen, and tell me what you think.” Meri and Tucker sat down, and we all watched the TV until the next commercial. I turned to them. “Well?”

  Meri shrugged, rubbing her neck. “I admit it’s a little disturbing, but they’re just being sensationalists. It makes more people watch the program.” She turned to Tucker, sliding her leg under her. “You know, like when the Weather Channel makes every single snow storm seem like the super-killer-storm that may just bury us all, right? It happens all over, and now they’re doing it too.” She motioned at the TV.

  Tucker looked serious. “I don’t like this,” he said.

  Meri looked at me. “Come on! We’re a part of the United States! We have rights!”

  I said, “They were saying that at its worse, the Black Death in Europe only killed thirty percent of the population. They are speculating that this ‘disease’ may kill fifty percent of the people in the affected area.”

  Meri scoffed, “Speculation. You said it yourself.”

  Tucker said, “The CDC is saying that voluntary quarantine might not be effective in such a large area.”

  Meri turned to him. “Now you’re sounding like them!”

  “Meri, I didn’t say it originally, but I am hearing more and more about quarantining the area.”

  “And you think that’s a good idea?” Her eyes were wide.

  “No,” he said slowly. “Well, not yet. We don’t really know what we’re dealing with. Medical authorities, including the CDC, haven’t been able to tell why people are getting sick or why some aren’t affected.”

  Meri looked at her lap.

  The program came back on. We watched. By the time it ended, there was a heavy silence. Meri was the first to break it. “Dear God. They wouldn’t. I refuse to believe it. Most of those quarantine rules were back when people didn’t know better. They wouldn’t do it now.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Tucker said, “but I wonder if you’d say the same thing if you lived in Chicago, where you’d be close enough for possibly ‘infected’ people to drive to in a few hours. Would you want a chance of it spreading?”

  Meri said a bit wildly, “But the officials of the C, um, whatever it’s called—”

  “CDC,” I supplied. “Center for Disease Control.”

  “Whatever!” she snapped. “They said there is no evidence it’s contagious. So all this talk is just crazy!”

  Tucker said, “People get worked up, and I agree with you, programs like this can start a panic. But even if they did quarantine the area, it would only be until they found out exactly what it is that’s hurting us. And they might have figured it out already and we just haven’t heard yet.” His voice was soothing.

  Meri jumped up. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!” I stared at her as she actually stamped her foot in time to the words. She had begun to cry. “Why are we even talking about it?”

  Tucker stood as well, giving me a warning look. “You’re right,” he said with finality. “It’s a ridiculous idea.”

  My hand reached over and surreptitiously pressed the power button on the remote. The TV turned off. Meri again rubbed her neck. “Maybe I’ve been overdoing it,” she said. “I am sort of tired.”

  “Go ahead and take a nap if you want.” I offered, gesturing to the couch.

  Meri started to lie down, suddenly sitting bolt upright. “Oh, God. Am I getting it?”

  Tucker looked at me and I said, “You know, Meri, you could just be getting sick—a good old American cold or something.”

  She relaxed a little. “Maybe. I don’t want to kill you or myself. That’s a good sign, right?”

  I couldn’t help laughing. She relaxed still more. I put a hand to her forehead. “You do seem warm. Want some chicken soup?”

  She made a face. Chicken soup was our little joke. My mom had brought over some once when Meri had had the ‘flu, and she had thrown it all up. “No soup,” she said. “I’ll just lie down for awhile, and when I wake up, I’ll probably be fine.” She lay down and closed her eyes and was soon asleep.

  I was in the kitchen cutting up some raw veggies when Tucker came in. “You know, I think they’re going to do it,” he said.

  “What?” My mind had been thinking about my parent’s house for some odd reason. I had found myself thinking about it all day, off and on.

  “Close the area down. I have watched the news a lot, and that’s what everything points to. The blogs are full of demands to protect the rest of the US from those of us who are ‘infected.’”

  “But it’s over two plus states. How would they do it?”

  He said grimly, “I saw that today the Senate passed a bill giving the President the authority to override state quarantine laws and enact a quarantine by force if necessary. It will go to the House now, but it seems sure it’ll pass.”

  “Just because they can doesn’t mean they will.”

  “Maybe you’re right.” He sighed. “I guess I’ve just got a bad feeling about it.”

  Silence fell only broken by my chopping. “Um, Tucker?” I said after a bit.

  “Yeah?” He was looking out at Meri, soundly asleep on the sofa.

  “Tell me a story.”

  He looked at me, confused, and I laughed at myself. “I just need to get my mind off things. Just make something up. The sillier the better.” The truth was that I was feeling a story form in my mind, and didn’t know how to say that without sounding nuts.

  “Okay,” he drew out the word. “A story.” He thought a minute. “It doesn’t have to be about princesses, does it?”

  “Fine, Mr. Can’t-tell-a-story. Want me to go first?”

  He gave me a mock scowl. “Go ahead.”

  “Once upon a time there were three heart-breakingly beautiful girls who lived in a tower above ye old bar and grille.”

  He laughed, sitting down and getting conspicuously comfortable.

  “And one day an evil witch cast a spell, and many of the town-folk became ill, and some died.”

  “Aww,” he said, “I don’t like sad stories.”

  I put up a finger sternly. “Settle down, you. Now, these beautiful princesses—”

  He interrupted, “They’re princesses now? When did that happen?”

  I ignored him. “Who lived in the dark old tower knew there were trolls living in the town now. The sickness had turned some of the people into trolls. The princesses were joined by a handsome prince who helped them get groceries.”

  Tucker made a show of standing and bowing.

  “But the princesses were afraid the trolls would burn down the tower where they were, so one princess convinced the others to sneak out of the tower and go to the cottage on the other side of the village.”

  “Did that help?” Tucker asked.

  “It did. That very night, a fire was set, and if the princesses hadn’t left, they all would have been killed in the fire.”

  “Darn trolls.” Tucker shook his head. “Can’t trust them. So then what happened? Did the handsome prince set up some kind of kinky harem with the princesses?”

  “No!” I threw a dishtowel at him. I faltered now. The story, which had been floating around my head, was dissipating. “I think he married one of the female trolls and was unhappy ever after.”

  “Ugh,” Tucker said. “Don’t like that idea.”

  I smiled and said nothing. I was thinking about the story. I was also thinking about my parents’ house. “I need to go and check to make sure Mom and Dad’s place is still okay. There’s an alarm system and all, but I promised them I’d keep an eye on it.”

  Tucker glanced at Meri. I shrugged. “Maybe if she wakes up and feels better, I mean. Or, Mr. Prince, I could go alone. Before my rise into royalty, I used to venture out in the village alone all the time.”

  “Yeah, but there were no trolls then. Besides, you don’t want to make the prince feel he’s unneeded and give him a complex.”

  We fell sil
ent. He dipped some carrots into the dip I’d bought and ate them. “Madde,” he said finally, “have you thought about going and staying at your parents’ house?”

  Until he said that, I really hadn’t. I was thinking about their house, but I really don’t remember the thought of going there entering my mind. “It seems silly, but I really hadn’t,” I admitted.

  “Would your parents mind?” he asked.

  I felt a rush of gratitude that he had assumed they were alive and returning. “No, they’d be glad, especially in light of all the stuff that’s happened. But if I went, we’d all go. I’m not leaving Meri and Phil here, and you are welcome as well.” That seemed a little less inviting than I’d meant, so I added, “You can protect us from trolls.”

  He was quiet for a minute. “I don’t mean to sound like a commando, but is it defendable? One thing I like about this place is that it’s on the third floor—not accessible by window.”

  I thought about it. My parents lived in an old remodeled barn. “It has windows all along one side—the south side that faces the lake. But those windows are on the deck, and it can be shut off. There are motion detector lights too, mostly to keep the deer away from Mom’s garden and the flowers.” I paused. “But do you really think that we might be attacked?”

  “No,” he drew out the word, sounding anything but sure. “I was just thinking that with all this crap going on, people might decide to do a little looting.”

  “You don’t loot houses,” I said quietly.

  “No, I suppose not.” He let the matter drop. “What do you say? Shall we move this little campout over to the house?”

  I thought about Meri, who was still sleeping. I thought about Phil, and all our stuff here. There wasn’t really any reason to move right now. Except … except I wanted to go. Maybe I just wanted to be in my home, or maybe I felt closer to Mom and Dad there. But I couldn’t make everyone move just because I wanted my mommy. “I guess we have what we need right here.” I couldn’t keep the disappointment out of my voice, although I’d intended to do just that.

  Tucker was watching me. “When did you come up with that story?”

  “What? Oh, that’s just me being strange. Don’t let it worry you.”

  “I didn’t say I was worried. I just asked when you thought of it.” He sounded as if he didn’t intend to let this go.

  “I’ve been thinking about Mom and Dad’s place all day, all right? I don’t know why, but maybe it’s the gunshots last night. Maybe they spooked me or something. It’s nothing.”

  Tucker was still watching me. “You’re going to think I’m paranoid, but I think we should go there.”

  I hadn’t expected this. “Why?”

  He shrugged, a little self-conscious. “Now that you said that about fire, I just think we should be in a place we could … okay, that’s bullshit. I think we should go because you don’t feel comfortable here.” He folded his arms across his wide chest.

  “I’m fine.”

  “No, Madde, you aren’t. And who’s to say that you aren’t having some kind of premonition?”

  “That’s impossible. Next you’ll be saying that I’m psychic since my illness.” I knew I was being difficult, but I waved my fingers at him. “Oooh. Madde becomes the foreteller of doom.”

  He was immovable. “Is that any different from me suddenly gaining intelligence?”

  His question hung in the air. I didn’t know what to say. I busied myself cleaning the counters, but he waited me out. “Okay, damn it, I don’t know.” I sighed. “Tucker, I don’t know what to do.”

  He gave me a grin. “You know, I’ve always wanted to see the inside of your house. It’s the coolest one around here.”

  I considered him, shaking my head. He tried another tack. “I want to go,” he said baldly. “If you insist on staying here, I’ll stay as well. But I am asking you to help me move everyone to your parents’ house.”

  There it was. Put that way, I was able to let go gracefully. “If that’s what you want, then I’m in.” Now that we’d made the decision, there was suddenly a whole lot to do. We worked together, Tucker and I, and threw clothes into suitcases and a few bags, and Tucker loaded up his truck. It was snowing gently as I put my own suitcase in my car. It was around four in the afternoon now, and the clouds were hurrying dusk along.

  Tucker hadn’t wanted me to drive initially, but had given in on that. We really couldn’t fit everyone in his truck anyway. Meri was awake but obviously not feeling well. We had her sit and rest, so she could help us move Phil. Hopefully Phil wouldn’t make a fuss. If she did, we might have to put this whole thing off until tomorrow. It turned out not to be an issue. Phil was sound asleep, and refused to wake for more than a couple of minutes. I put her coat on over her pjs and Tucker carefully picked her up and put her in my car. He put Meri in the back seat of my little Civic, and she immediately lay down on the seat, her head on the covered bowl of veggies I’d so recently cut up.

  Tucker got into the truck, and we made the short trip over to Mom and Dad’s place. As I drove up the winding driveway, I felt a sense of peace, as if I had come home. And of course this had been my home for years before I officially moved out.

  I skipped out of the car and put in the numbers for the security system. We let ourselves in, and I turned up the heat. In the meantime, Meri and Phil (who was still playing possum) sat on the couch and kept their coats on.

  Tucker unloaded the truck and I opened the bedrooms. The house was too big for just Mom and Dad, and they didn’t use most of it. Dad did pretty well financially, and they both had fallen in love with this house to hear them tell it. Dad was pretty handy, and what he couldn’t do, he hired someone else to do, so the house had some touches that were a bit unusual, including a secret room in the basement off the laundry room that even had a safe room in it. Yeah, Dad had a fear of violence, and we’d always been prepared for the attacks that never came.

  I thought Meri and Phil could sleep in Mom and Dad’s room for now. The bed was big, and there was a couch in their room, so if they weren’t doing well, I could sleep in there and keep an eye on things. I turned on the electric blanket and the TV, then got the girls and herded them in. I helped them into bed (Phil was awake now but seemed quiet and subdued and was docile enough), and went off to help Tucker.

  An hour later, we were relatively snug. Meri was asleep, but Phil was sitting on the bed, not far from me on the couch, eating an English muffin. We were, as usual, watching the news. Tucker was absent, however. He had been prowling around the house ever since we arrived. I had no idea what he was finding—I’d lived here forever, and it was the same old place to me.

  We didn’t keep very well to a schedule since Meri and Phil were sick. Phil (I kept my fingers crossed as I said this, even to myself) seemed to be on the mend, but unlike me, she seemed changed. She was sitting near Meri, sometimes stroking her hair, and singing. Definitely not Phil behavior. And she didn’t talk much. Maybe she was just tired and would get better soon. I hoped so, ‘cause this new Phil was a little creepy.

  So it was midnight, and I’d fallen asleep in front of the TV (and what a gorgeous TV it was). Tucker had reset the motion detectors after finding a manual (good for him, I had thought. I could never understand that stuff), so they came on full blast, but not for anything smaller than a dog. He also made them come on in sections, which gave us an idea where the movement had been detected. Good man. Didn’t want to be freaking out all night because a bat flew by. The deer didn’t like the lights, so mostly stayed away, and as Dad said, if they did show up they were nicely spotlighted for a little nature viewing.

  There were windows in Mom and Dad’s bedroom, but they were high up and not readily accessible. This was because of two different reasons depending on which parent was asked. Mom said that they didn’t want to bring in a lot of cold from the north side of the house (the place was passive solar, and some other environmental crap, but when Mom started to talk about it, I would snore and pretend
to sleep), but Dad? Dad would say that they were crazy in love and things went on in this bedroom that even the birds shouldn’t see. While that response sort of creeped me out, I was so glad they were happy together. Someday I hoped to have the same thing. For now, however, the high windows made the bedroom pretty safe, and the smaller covered windows kept the occasional deer from waking up the household with the motion detector lights.

  Phil and Meri seemed good enough in there. Meri was feverish, but I had finally gotten some ibuprofen down her, so that was going to help. Tucker had fallen asleep in one of the open rooms (like I said, this house would have worked well for a family of ten instead of just Dick and I). I woke every hour or so and checked on Meri and Phil. At around three in the morning I was up with Meri, trying to get her fever down by putting a cool cloth on her head and wondering whether it was too early for more medicine, when I heard sirens. I went, curious, to the big room with its bank of windows facing the lake, and across the lake, the town. I could barely see some flashing lights, or at least thought I saw them. At least the police were still on the job, I thought to myself. Tucker was up now, so I went to bed in my room, and he went on “sick girl watch.” I didn’t think any more about the sirens but went right to sleep.

  Chapter 5: Quarantine

  We slept late the next morning. I grabbed the clock when I realized how late it was, hoping I had misread the numbers. No, it really was ten. I felt terrible for zonking out and leaving Tucker alone to deal with Meri and Phil, especially since Phil was so scared of him. I needn’t have worried, however. Tucker was sound asleep on the couch, and Meri, bless her, was up and making a mess in the kitchen.

  I gave her a big hug and held on until she laughed at me. “Let go! I’m fine. Just a touch of the ‘flu, like you said.”

  I nodded, relieved. “Should you be up, though? Aren’t you tired?”

  “Not really. In fact, I feel pretty good.” She grinned at me. “And imagine my surprise when I woke up here! I didn’t know where I was at first, but then I remembered everything. Guess what?” she said excitedly, hardly stopping for breath. “Phil’s better too!”