Burn District 1 (10 page)

“How’d you happen to be spreading, what did you say? Virucides.”

“My dad has a crop dusting business,” he said, his voice weak. “I got my license when I was fifteen. We got a new contract to spray and I got the first job. He’s going to be mad when he finds out I messed up, that I crashed the plane.” I looked at my family, crowded around us. I wanted to tell him what the truth was as we knew it, but wasn’t sure of his reaction.

“Girls, would you mind leaving us alone for a minute?” I asked. Elise hesitated; I could already feel something happening between my daughter and the young man, it was palpable. “Just to give him some privacy,” I said. “I want to tell him what’s happening.” She nodded and left with Carin. They’d wait on the deck, while Steve stayed with me.

Having to explain the situation to Chris after what he’d been through; a plane crash after he dumped chemicals on a neighborhood that incinerated homes and probably a few humans, was forcing me to rethink my own position. Up to now, I know my wife would say I was a Doubter. I wasn’t though. I just didn’t believe that our government could commit a mass murder without more outrage from the people. When did they take control over everything? Where was I when it was happening?

“Chris, tell me what you know,” I began.

“Do you mean about the hurricane virus?” I nodded my head. “Well, they told my dad what we have heard on TV. We’ve been waiting for something to happen here, too. Like, someone to get sick, or the government to evacuate. But the only thing that happened was a town hall meeting.”

“Someone came to talk to you?” Steve asked. “I never heard about it.”

“It just happened. You’re a part-timer, right? I recognize this place. No offense, but high school kids come here to use your fire pit and drink on Saturday night.”

“Thanks, Chris. So tell us about the meeting.”

“I didn’t go. It was for the landowners. They said they needed a local pilot with a plane to spray. If workers and their families stayed inside, they’d be safe.” My heart sunk. I thought of the children who lived there. “My dad offered his company and we were hired to spray on the weekends. Less people on the roads, I guess. No one warned anyone, just the landowners telling their workers to stay home and stay inside because we’d be spraying chemicals.”

Closing his eyes, Chris looked deathly. “Elise,” I called out. She came back

Steve and I made eye contact and shook our heads. We weren’t going to tell the boy what had happened after all. But his story confirmed that the Rumors were telling the truth. “We need to get him to a hospital.” Steve walked around to assist me getting him up.

“They’ll kill me if I go,” Chris said, opening his eyes again.

“What are you saying?” I whispered. “Who will kill you?” But he just shook his head.

“Let’s find an underground,” Elisa said. “Mom will know how to search for one on the forums.” Steve went to the screen door and I could hear him talking to Laura in a low voice.

“I don’t want to turn on the computer,” I said. “We can ask on the way to town. Let’s load him in your truck.”

We hoisted Chris up. He started to argue with us again, but we reassured him that the undergrounds were safe, although we didn’t know that for sure or from what.

Chris groaned as we dragged him out the front door, Laura and my mother clearly frightened.

“Where are you taking him?” Laura asked.

“Do you remember reading about the undergrounds?” Elise asked.

“I’m not sure how to begin looking for one, unless I log on to the internet.” Laura said. We dragged Chris to Steve’s truck and laid him across the cab seat. The smell coming from him was awful; burnt hair, dirt, something else I didn’t even want to think about, like rotten barbeque.

I made a face and Steve caught it.

“Burnt flesh and napalm,” he whispered, closing the door.

Steve pulled out of the driveway and I could see how vulnerable our camp looked. “Maybe we better think about doing a
wagon train in the round
kind of thing,” I said. Steve looked in the rearview mirror.

“Okay, we will when we get back. I was up all night thinking about painting the tops of everything with beige and tan paint.”

“Like desert camouflage?” I thought about what he said. Was it going to get that bad? “I wonder if we shouldn’t push west.”

He shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. “I’ve thought the same thing, but have no idea what our next move should be. I used to be a leader, too, making decisions for my unit. What the hell?”

“Yes, what the hell? Because we don’t know what will happen next.” We road in silence for miles except for Chris’s moans sending shivers up my spine. Every minute or so, just when I thought he’s fallen to sleep, he’d groan. It was unnerving.

“Now what?” Steve said. I looked ahead and there was a roadblock of sorts before the entrance to a small village on the way to Yuma, a rusted out hulk of a pickup truck with a mangy looking character blocking the road. Beyond him, it was obvious the area had recently been hit, smoke rising from blackened structures.

“Oh my god,” Steve yelled, pulling along side of the man. “What’s happening?” The man swept his arm in an arc over the area.

“The town’s gone,” he said, sniffing, wiping his nose on his shirtsleeve. “There’s nothin’ left after Tulip. Nothing much on the way up to Yuma, either. Just the Love’s gas station and about a hundred cars lined up for gas.”

“What happened?” Steve asked again, knowing, but wanting to hear the man say the words.

“Bombs,” he said, sobbing, but catching himself. “Can you smell it? I know that smell from Vietnam. That’s napalm, pal. That’s no virus spray.” Steve looked at me.

“What the fuck?” I said.

“We’ve got an injured man in back. What about the hospital?” There was a small community hospital, more like a clinic, a satellite of the big hospital in Yuma.

“Hospital is gone, but there’s a nurse lookin’ at folk down that road. Keep going straight down Smith Street to the construction trailer and ask for Marybeth.” Steve thanked him and started driving again. It was evident by the time we got within four blocks of the construction trailer that Chris Monroe wasn’t going to get any real medical help.

“This is unbelievable,” Steve mumbled, pulling behind another pickup truck in a long line of pickups and cars, moaning and cries of pain coming from the open windows, the smells of burning
something
strong enough to make me sick. “What should we do?”

“Can you see anything up ahead?” I asked, opening the door to get out and look myself. There was a woman in jeans and a sleeveless shirt with a clipboard standing about six cars ahead of us, talking to the occupants.

“Get back inside, son,” Steve said. I could feel his fear and got back in the truck. “Let’s wait.”

“This is Kelly’s fault,” I said, looking to place blame. “She should have never turned into the neighborhood with my girls in the van.” Steve didn’t say anything, looking at Chris in the review mirror.

“Is he even alive?” he whispered. I turned around in my seat.

“How you doin’ Chris?”

He moaned. “I’m still here.” But he chuckled. That was a good sign. The woman going car to car didn’t waste any time and made it to us within minutes. We weren’t moving though, and cars were lining up behind us.

“What kind of injuries do you have?” she asked without greeting us. She had her hospital ID on. Marybeth Crouse, Critical Care, Registered Nurse, Yuma Medical Center, University of Arizona. The picture on her ID was of a beautiful, smiling woman approaching middle age. The woman standing in front of me was emaciated, ill looking. It was a shock.

“He was in a plane crash, so I’m not sure if he has broken bones. He’s burned,” I said.

“Can I see him?” she asked, opening the door without waiting for an answer. “Stay in your vehicle.”

She asked him some questions, felt his arms and legs, had him move, listened to his lungs, felt his ribs. Getting out a walkie talkie, she asked for something I didn’t catch. Within a minute or two, another woman came with a grocery bag of supplies.

“Can you take him?” I asked. She looked at me with disdain.

“To
where
? The hospital is gone. Take him home with you.” She pulled items out of the bag. “Get him in a shower and wash him off with this. It’s betadine. Dress his wounds with this.” She held up foil packages of something called Xeroform. “Leave this on his burns. You don’t have to change the dressings more than every couple of days. Keep the gauze in place with this stuff.” She held up a roll of fluffy looking gauze.

“This is amoxicillin. Give him one every eight hours until the bottle is empty.” Holding up a second bottle, she continued. “This is Percocet. He can have one every four hours for pain as long as he’s breathing without difficulty. There is no more where this came from so use it wisely,” she said sternly.

“Make sure he’s drinking and peeing. If he stops peeing, there’s nothing more you can do. I heard on the forums this morning the hospitals in Phoenix burned to the ground. Flagstaff is gone. Albuquerque is worse. So unless you feel like taking a chance and driving him further east, you’re his new nurse.” She made a circle motion with her hands, instructing Steve to pull out of the line and go back to where we came from before she moved on to the next car.

“Wait!” I yelled. “Did they say anything about San Diego?”

“Unless you can fly, there’s no way through the mountains to get to San Diego. The Eight and Forty are gone.”

“She means the interstate,” Steve said, disgust clear in his voice.

“Please!” I called out. “What do you mean
Flagstaff is gone
? How can it be gone?”

“Where have you been? It’s anarchy up north. Anarchy. This kid is better off burned; they’re pulling young people off the streets, making them fight each other. Our country’s at war.”

“How do you know this?”

“The forums, mister. Don’t you have a computer?”

“Let’s go,” Steve said, angrily. He turned the truck around and we drove back to the camp in silence. There was no sign of anyone, but when we pulled into the driveway, I could see Laura walk out onto the deck from a mile away.

“We need to do something about this today,” I said pointing to her, how clearly we were exposed. Steve nodded his head.

“Let the women take care of Chris while we secure the camp.”

The others came outside when we pulled up to the deck. “We brought him back,” Steve called out.

Laura put her hands up. “Why? He needs medical care.” Steve looked at me.

“Tell your wife what the nurse said.” He got out of the truck and called for the boys. “Come on men,” he shouted. “We’ve got work to do.”

Laura, Randy and I got Chris out of the truck while I told her what the nurse said to do. “Get him in the shower and dress his wounds, force fluids. There’s nothing else.” I told them about the burns of the little towns on the way to Yuma, the interstates into California impassible and the war in the north. Shocking them all, no one responded.

“We are going to work at securing this place,” I said. “Circle the camp with vehicles until we can think of something else that might work better.” My dad nodded his head. It was on all of our minds. We were susceptible there out in the open. I was glad to get away from Chris and his nauseating smell.

Chapter 10

Laura

I think a person is capable of accepting only so much tragedy at once. I believed what was happening was temporary, or on a smaller scale than it really was. Now I understood it was much larger than I originally thought, bigger then government ridding themselves of the immigration problem. A crazy person was destroying the United States. We had to get some news. If I’d had the time to dwell on it, I’d probably have gone a little crazy myself. But first we had to take care of Chris.

Elise and Carol helped get him into the bathroom that was barely large enough for two. Elise whispered words of encouragement to Chris while she undressed him. I thought of my teenaged daughter caring for a naked man, but she was so professional, I kept thinking if times were different, she’d be going to nursing school soon. She’d volunteered at a nursing home close to our house the previous summer and had loved the experience.

The movement was causing Chris pain, and he cried out in agony. I opened the bottle of Percocet. “Give him one of these,” I said, running water in the common bathroom glass. “It’s for pain.” Elise did as I said and Chris took it without difficulty, Elise holding the glass for him.

“Do you need to go to the bathroom?” she asked. He nodded his head, so we pulled him up off the closed toilet and opened the lid. He was unable to stand, so once again I watched my daughter in action, assisting him. I had to turn my head, a combination of emotions I couldn’t define bubbling to the surface. I could hear him peeing, and that was a good sign.

“I need to keep track of his input and output,” she said. “Could you get me a paper and pen?” I left the bathroom and could hear her telling him she was going to help him step into the tub.

“Chris, if you could stand up it would make this a lot easier,” she said. “You can have a quick shower and then we won’t have to lift you up out of the tub.” I could hear him answer her, and her sweet laugh. Carol helped me gathering the clothing, and I saw that an indescribable emotion, the combination of seeing her granddaughter becoming a woman, and the boy’s injuries had moved her. We embraced, and she moved back to the kitchen to preform tasks that weren’t heartbreaking.

I found the paper and pen and got clean clothes of Mike Junior’s for him to wear, underpants and a t-shirt, sweat pants and socks. Elise had thrown his dirty, burned, horrible clothes into the wastebasket and put it out into the hall. Carol contained it in a garbage bag; hoping getting rid of it would help eliminate the smell.

The sound of the shower running and the murmuring of their voices let me know she was okay. “If you need me, call,” I said through the bathroom door. “Here’s your pen and paper, and clean clothes.”

“Okay, Mom, we’re okay so far. Chris says, ‘Thank you!’” I could hear their voices again, and the relief that she’d shouldered that burden alone brought tears to my eyes. I could do the mundane tasks of caring for my family, but having to nurture a burn victim was out of my realm of comfort. My daughter was becoming an adult, forced to grow up with me assisting by letting her do the work added to my guilt.