Hot Zone (4 page)

“I thought that if I saw you it might go away.” He shook his head like a dog. “But it never goes away. It just gets worse and worse!”

I was sweating now underneath my coat. Not so much at what he was saying, but at his movements, which were sharp, disjointed and wrong, somehow. My hand found the buckle, and I slowly pushed it in, feeling the belt loosen. My heart was starting to beat faster in a response to the danger he seemed to exude. My other hand was near the door handle already, but I didn’t want to set him off.

“I thought it would go away,” he said, looking straight ahead out the windshield. I felt the car start to move again as he let up on the brake. He hit the steering wheel again, and this time I noticed that the hand that had been fisted in his hair had tufts of his hair still in it.

He had pulled the hair right out.

I realized with a cold thump inside that Eddy was not sane. I grabbed the door handle and pulled it as I let the seatbelt retract. Eddy turned on me and simply roared. The door swung open and I tried to scramble out but was so very surprised at Eddy’s animalistic sound that I stumbled and fell.

The car was still trying to make some headway through the snow; I could hear one or more of the tires slipping. Eddy tried to come after me, but was stopped by his seatbelt, which he had fastened automatically. I sat on my butt in the snow and stared into the car as he fought the seatbelt as if he had never seen one before, as if he were a wild animal incomprehensibly strapped down.

The snow melted into my black tights and my short, patched denim skirt, shocking me out of my stupor with its icy chill. Snow trickled into my mid-calf dress boots. I pushed myself to my feet, feeling uncharacteristically strong and even fierce.

Eddy had managed to pull himself from the seatbelt without unbuckling it. He followed me across the passenger seat and out the open door, still making inarticulate sounds of rage.

“Eddy, stop!” I bellowed, surprising myself. Eddy was surprised too, and actually stopped, blinking and frowning at me. I decided to press this advantage. “Get back in the car and just go!” I said firmly. “Now!”

For a moment I thought he was actually going to do it. He even turned his upper body as if his head, at least, wanted to do as I demanded. But whatever was running Eddy now was not his thinking brain. He turned back to me and his hand flew at me so fast I didn’t even know he was going to hit me until I felt the blow.

I am a nice Midwestern girl, and never ever in my life had I been struck like this. Oh sure, I’d had kiddie fights, and my mother had once lost her temper with my bratty teenage self and whacked me on the cheek, but that slap felt like a feather next to this one. My head rocked back and I tasted blood in my mouth. My face seemed to go numb. Again, I was on my butt in the snow, only this time, an enraged man was screaming insults at me.

I couldn’t understand most of what he said—maybe I was too stunned by the blow to the head he’d delivered, or maybe he wasn’t understandable. I heard him call me a bitch, a whore, and assorted other nasty names. But he was also crying, and shaking his fists, and saying things that sounded like a terrified child.

The car, which had been patiently spinning its wheels in the snow, had reached pavement now, and made that high
rurrring
sound of tires struggling for traction on asphalt. Eddy turned to the car, actually cocking his head to the side like a playful puppy. He fell silent, and I realized this might be my only chance to get away from him.

I rolled and lurched to my feet, heading for the bluff that sheered away from the picnic area. It was protected by a railing to keep innocent kids from falling over the edge. This is the flat part of Minnesota, mostly, but even here we have our hills, and erosion and time and who knows what had made a sharp drop of at least twenty feet, followed by a more gradual drop. I thought, I guess, that I could somehow make it down the drop in the snow, and Eddy would give up and leave.

I ran to the railing and put one foot on it, looking at the drop and wondering if this was a good or suicidal plan when I heard another vehicle. I stopped, one wet leg on the railing, and turned.

Eddy was looking at the new vehicle too. He hadn’t moved from where he’d been standing next to his car, and I wondered if he even noticed I had gone.

The other vehicle was actually a truck, I saw now. It rolled in slowly but surely, its snow tires crunching on the snow. I almost cried with relief as Tucker Anderson, who had sat next to me in my high school Chemistry class, leaned out the opening window. “You folks stuck?” Then he grinned as he recognized me, and probably Eddy as well. “Hi Madde. What—” He didn’t get any further as Eddy turned and ran at me.

I let out a small scream, and Tucker, who apparently had realized something was wrong, threw the truck in park and leapt out. He ran towards where Eddy was nearing me. I had turned and was about to jump when Eddy’s arms came around me and we both—Eddy and I—sailed over the edge of the railing and fell.

I think I believed I was going to die as I fell, but very quickly we landed, Eddy on the bottom, and the breath whooshed out of me. I saw stars as I struggled to move away from him. I heard cursing, and snow came tumbling down as Tucker half slid, half fell down the embankment after us. I managed to extricate myself from Eddy, who was lying still in the snow, just as Tucker reached me.

He looked at my face and then at Eddy. “You okay, Madde?” He touched my cheek, his fingers coming away bloody. “Did he hurt you?” I couldn’t answer. Eddy’s words floated into my mind—
it’s all too much
.

Tucker now leaned over Eddy, who still hadn’t moved. I held my breath as he examined him, afraid Eddy would suddenly wake and attack us both. I suppose I shouldn’t have worried. Tucker was built like a linebacker and could probably handle Eddy easily. Tucker rose. “He’s breathing but seems to be out cold.” He looked back at the embankment and pulled out a cell phone. I looked at it stupidly. I had forgotten I even owned a cell. He dialed 911 and waited.

I heard his conversation with the 911 people dimly as I started to shake. I hadn’t really felt any pain until now. I guess I had been flying on adrenaline. But now I realized my headache had never really gone away. My face and jaw were throbbing painfully, and I had hurt my wrist as we fell. I was covered with icy half-melted snow and was freezing. I wrapped my arms around myself but never took my eyes off Eddy, who still hadn’t moved.

Finally Tucker touched my arm and I jumped. “Hey,” he said soothingly, “it’s okay. There is some kind of problem, and no ambulances available. They want us to bring him in to the emergency room if we can.”

I just stared at him. No ambulances? Was he crazy? Who ever heard of there not being an ambulance available?

He started towards Eddy and I grabbed his arm. “No, don’t touch him!” I sounded hysterical, and tried to order my thoughts and lower my voice. “He hit me. Something is wrong with him, Tucker. He was acting crazy.”

“I know, Madde, but they said they don’t even have police available right now.”

“How can that be?”

Tucker shook his head, repeating, “They said there’s some kind of emergency, and everyone is busy. The woman hung up on me. I don’t know what the hell is going on.” He hit one button, apparently dialing someone on speed dial. He spoke into the phone. “Yeah, I need you to come up to the picnic stop at the top of Chicken Hill. There’s trouble.” He listened, his face creasing with worry. “How is that possible?” Pause. “Just get in your car and come up here. You know Madde Moreton? She’s here, and her boyfriend is here too, only he’s hurt and ain’t moving. The hospital says I got to get him there myself, and I’m not sure he won’t wake up any minute and start being crazy again. Just come up here!” Tucker slid his phone shut with finality.

He turned to me, and I stared at him wonderingly, thoughts crowding for attention in my brain. The Tucker I had sat next to in Chemistry was not very bright, was in fact considered “slow” as we called the kids in special education. He hadn’t had the same requirements as the rest of the class. The purpose of his being there was more to mix with the ‘normal’ kids. He’d always been strikingly handsome in a boyish way with broad shoulders and stunning midnight blue eyes, but was known behind his back, and sometimes to his face as ‘big, dumb Tucker.’ He was easily confused and deliberate, thinking each possibility through before speaking. Who was this decisive man?

He didn’t seem fazed by our sudden role reversal—he being the smart one while I stared at him like an idiot. “Madde, can you make it back up to my truck?” I looked at the hill. If I just walked laterally about thirty feet, there was a more gradual way back up that wound back to the top of the hill. I could do that. Tucker was taking off his coat. He offered it to me, and as my overworked brain struggled to absorb this, he put it around me. “Put this on. Go back up to the truck and get in. The heater should be running.” He gestured to Eddy, who was moving his arm. “Lock the doors, just in case, but I don’t think Eddy is going to feel like much for awhile. I’ll stay with him until Dale—he’s my brother, you know, gets here.”

I put my arms in the sleeves of Tucker’s large coat and fought down the shakes. I gave Eddy another look and started back up the hill to Tucker’s truck, a journey that seemed to take hours but only took maybe ten minutes. I got in and obediently locked the doors, turning up the heater as high as it would go. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed Meri. I wasn’t sure what I was going to say, but as I heard her voice, the whole story came tumbling out, along with some tears.

By the time I had rehashed the story for Phil, Dale had not only arrived but had helped Tucker bring Eddy back up the hill. They put Eddy in Dale’s old rusty jeep, and Tucker came back over to me. Eddy seemed to be only partially conscious, and it took both men to hold him up. I had seen Dale before, and knew on some level that he was Tucker’s brother, but he was not someone I really knew, nor anyone I wanted to know. Where Tucker was built, Dale was slender. Where Tucker was gorgeous, Dale was mousy looking. He had not attended high school here in Catfish but had gone to a “kicked-out-of-school” residential facility of some kind. He was a couple of years older than Tucker and me. The rumor was that Dale was bad news, although he had been quiet enough since returning to Catfish.

Tucker had shut off Eddy’s car and pocketed the keys. He came over to me and got in the driver’s side. I had moved over to the passenger side as he approached. “Is he hurt bad?” I asked him, not sure what kind of answer I hoped for.

“He must have hit his head on a rock when he landed; he’s bleeding like a son-of-a-bitch,” Tucker said. “But don’t worry, head wounds do that. They’ll fix him up at the hospital.”

I shook my head, “It’s more than just his head. Tucker, he was like a different person.”

Tucker put the truck in gear and drove easily out of the picnic area. “Yeah, well, that’s the thing, ain’t it? See, Dale told me that there’s some weird shit going down around here. People just freaking out or something. A clerk at city hall shot a bunch of people this morning. Some people in the crowd committed suicide all of a sudden.”

“What? Why didn’t I know this?” I knew we had been watching the news earlier, but that had been national news, and Catfish Lake didn’t rate on programs like that, even if there was a shooting.

“If you went out of town the other way, you might have missed the cars and police and shit,” he said.

Now that I thought about it, I did remember seeing several cop cars on our way out of town, but I had been too wrapped up thinking about Eddy’s silence. We were nearing town now, and suddenly a teenager came flying out of a house and ran into the side of Tucker’s truck, making a hollow banging noise.

Tucker stopped and exited before I even realized what had happened. “You okay?” he was asking the teenager, who was sobbing. I recognized Sommer Griffin, the daughter of Susan, who had briefly worked at SuperSubs. Susan herself came running out of the house. “Oh my God! Is she hurt? Did you hit her?”

I sprang to Tucker’s defense. “She ran into us, actually.”

Tucker was still holding on to Sommer, whose voice was rising from a tortured cry into a scream. “I can’t do this!” she howled to the sky. I noticed she had on an overlarge shirt and shorts. No shoes or socks, but she didn’t seem to feel the cold. Susan tried to touch her, and Sommer hissed at her like an angry cat. “It’s hurts! Please, I can’t do this!”

My head seemed to throb as if in sympathy. I rubbed my temples absently, trying to think of what to do.

Suddenly Sommer gave a huge twist, and Tucker lost his hold on her. Sommer fell to the ground and rolled, coming up running like a frightened deer. She ran down the middle of the street, then veered and ran between two houses. Susan called after her and ran off in the same direction. Tucker had started after her at first only to turn and come back. “Get in the truck,” he said tersely. I jumped at the tone of his voice but did as he asked, only to wonder if he was going crazy too.

He got in the truck but didn’t immediately start driving. “Okay. You live over Henry’s Bar, right?” I nodded. “Here’s the plan. I’m taking you back there, and you’re going to get in the apartment and lock the doors. Don’t leave.”

“Why?”

He gestured to the street. “Look around you. It’s like we’ve been attacked, only this time whatever it is makes people go crazy, not die.” I thought of the bodies in the video from China and my breath froze in my throat. “Do you need to go to the ER?”

I shook my head.

“Look, Madde, maybe I’m overreacting, then there’s no harm in doing what I ask, right?”

I looked at Tucker with his open, fiercely attractive face. “No.”

“If I’m wrong,” he added, putting the truck in drive and continuing towards Henry’s Bar, “then you can laugh at me and call me paranoid.”

I suddenly thought of the times I had laughed at him in high school. I hadn’t been a cruel kid, but I had been less than stellar. Rather ironic that he was protecting me now. We reached home, and he saw me to the door, ignoring the crash of two cars down the street. “Remember what I said,” he repeated as he delivered me into the arms of my roommates. “Lock the doors and don’t let anyone in. I’m going to see if I can get some more information on what’s happening.” He gave me his cell phone. “Put your number in my phone, and I’ll let you know what I find out.”