After the Birds
Chapter Four
Remerton
NY, USA
2024
Andrea
Andrea stands by the window looking down at the street. Before everyone became ill, she used to enjoy watching the world from above. Now she studies the piles of dead birds, cars left every which way, and she’s amazed at the lack of people. She fiddles some with the masking tape mom has attached in three layers along all the window frames. The virus, if that is what it is, is airborne, Mom says. Dangerous to inhale.
It doesn’t matter when Andrea tries to explain that
she held Hadya and Ayesha on the bus and that they coughed right in her face.
She still didn’t get sick. Andrea isn’t allowed to go outside anyway. Mom says
she might be immune, but they can’t know for sure. The day after Andrea was at
the mall with her friends, mom came home from work with as many grocery bags as
she could haul on the bus. It was mostly canned goods, dry milk, and stuff like
that. Though, she had bought three boxes of Cheerios too. She says Andrea must
ration them since they won’t be grocery shopping for a while.
Mom calls Theodor, Andrea’s little brother, several
times a day. He’s staying with Antonio, his dad, in the east part of Remerton
and he’s been there for two weeks now. Normally he only visits his dad every
other weekend. According to mom, it is safer that Theo stays where he is, but
Andrea hears mom crying in the nights and knows she worries and misses him. So
does Andrea. She usually thinks her six-year-old brother is something of a pain,
but he’s just a little kid and he’s bound to be anxious without mom. If he’d
only been home when all this happened, they could have been there for each
other.
Theo’s small for his age, but quick, and doesn’t
comprehend the danger of going outside. What if he wants to go out and play and
sneaks out when Antonio’s asleep? His dad is pretty laid back, and rather lazy.
Andrea used to think that was a good thing since he hardly ever said no to
anything when he lived with them, but now, when you must be tough enough to
enforce the rules, a parent needs to be more like mom. Vigilant.
A distant, sharp bang makes Andrea jump. She thinks it
comes from the right, farther up the street. She wants to go out on the balcony
to get a better view, but mom will be furious if she tries.
“Did you hear that?” Mom comes into Andrea’s room.
“What was that?”
“Don’t know. It came from there.” She points toward
the square. “It was really loud.” Andrea hears more bangs, and she spots a group
of people running around the corner. Some are pushing shopping carts in front of
them, running so fast, they lean forward, looking like they’re going to fall
over. Others are hurrying along, carrying stuff. “Mom! Have they stolen that
stuff?” Andrea turns to her mom and finds she’s gone pale.
“This is what I was afraid of.” She hugs Andrea from
behind. “This is one of the reasons you can’t go outside, even if you are
immune. They warn about looters on the news, and the information broadcasts.
It’s dawning on people how serious the situation is. I mean, really fucking
serious. Then they panic and act like this.”
Mom hardly ever curses. She doesn’t want Theodor to
learn such things from her or Andrea. To hear her swear now, and how her voice
has assumed a low and dark tone, frightens Andrea more than the looters.
“But we’re safe up here, aren’t we?” Is it just Andrea
who’s trembling? It might be both of them, which isn’t so odd. “They won’t use
the elevator and come up here?”
“No, of course not. They’ll bring what they took back
to their own families, or wherever they’re staying.”
As if to prove Mom wrong, there’s a knock on the door.
No, more like a pounding. Mom grows rigid and holds Andrea closer. It is as if
they created the noise by talking about the raiders below, like challenging
fate. “Who can that be?” Mom’s eyes are wide.
“Some neighbor, maybe?” Andrea holds mom’s arm in a
tight grep as they go out in the hallway. The door is locked in two different
ways and Mom has taped the edges closed. “Don’t open,” she says, even if she
knows Mom wouldn’t even think of it. But what if it’s someone who needs help?
Mom’s a nurse. Don’t nurses have some legal obligation to help out? Andrea isn’t
sure.
Mom presses her body to the door and looks out through
the door eye. “It’s too dark in the stairwell. Only some daylight from the
window. I can only see a shadow.” She steps back and places her arm around
Andrea’s shoulders. Then there’s a new pounding on the door, five loud bangs
that makes Andrea’s chest tremble. “Hello? Who is it?” Mom asks and she’s making
her voice determined and stern. The only response is a murmur coming through the
door.
“Who’s there?” Mom asks again, now with more concern
in her voice. “Stop banging on the door and tell us what you want.”
“Open up,” the person outside says. It’s impossible to
make out if it’s a man or a woman. Andrea doesn’t think it’s a child, though.
“No, I won’t. We’re not letting anyone in.” Mom’s
voice shakes, but she manages to sound assertive.
Andrea sobs. Two weeks and the only communication
they’ve had with the outside world has been through their cell phones and from
the media. Nobody has knocked on their door until now.
“Please,” the voice says. “Open.” The voice is not as
pleading as the words. In fact, it sounds only creepy.
“No. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you want.
We won’t open.” Mom is beyond pale now. She’s chalk white and her lips are
trembling. “Go back to your family. It’s not safe being outside.” She turns to
Andrea. “Can it be a neighbor? The code lock on the front door worked last time
I was out.”
There’s another banging on the door, but this time not
as hard and sort of further down, as if someone smaller and weaker is trying to
help. Or someone ill, who’s slid onto the floor. Andrea’s heart nearly stops
beating. “It’s not Antonio and Theodor, is it?” She whispers the words as dread
fills her.
“Not, of course it’s not. They’re barricaded in his
condo. I talked to them half an hour ago.”
Andrea remembers and realizes that it’s her fear
making her brain conjure scenarios. There’s no way Antonio could have taken
Theodor across Remerton in such a short time span. Public transportation is
cancelled, and Antonio doesn’t have a car, only a bicycle, same as Mom. How long
would it take to cross Remerton on a bike with a six-year-old clinging to his
back? She wants to ask mom, but before she has the chance, a loud enough bang to
be a boot clad foot kicking it, hits the door.
Mom and Andrea stagger backward. They stare at the
door and Andrea envisions how it gives in, even if she knows it’s the reinforced
type. Whoever kicked the door might have a sprained ankle for their trouble.
“Stop it!” Mom cries out so loud, her voice breaks.
“Go away!”
Andrea is crying now and slides down against the wall.
She has happened to yank down her favorite purple down jacket and now curls up
under it, shaking all over.
A cry in the stairwell makes Mom crumble next to her.
Without a word, Andrea holds up the jacket and makes room for mom under it. They
sit there, close together and covered by Andrea’s jacket, listening to running
feet, shouts, and screams. Occasionally, someone bangs on the door and pulls at
the handle.
“They can try, but it won’t do them any good,” Mom
says through clenched teeth. “I have never been so happy that salesman talked me
into getting a metal security door.”
Andrea remembers this. When Antonio lived with them,
one of mom’s and his big fights happened when mom had ordered the door from the
same salesperson that installed the door eye. Antonio had accused Mom of being
easily persuaded, not to mention paranoid. Mom had defended herself with that
she now could work the evening shifts knowing that her children were safe. As
she now stares at the door, Andrea knows Mom was right.
“Does Antonio have a steel door?” Andrea knows she’s
worrying her mother with her questions, but how else can she find answers to
them?
“He lives in an old, listed building. I wouldn’t think
so. But Antonio takes care of Theodor in the same way that I take care of you.
We’re not letting anyone in. He objected at first when I told him to go to the
store and get supplies. He wanted to take the bus to the closest supermarket and
stock up, but I told him how many contagious people he could encounter,
statistically speaking. You know Antonio. He muttered, but he listened to me
eventually. Perhaps he heard how frantic I was for Theo’s sake. Now, afterward,
Antonio realizes I know what I’m talking about. Better late than never, you
could say.” Mom chuckles, but it doesn’t sound as if she finds it humous. “At
least he’s on the third floor.”
Andrea shudders at the thought of how people living on
the ground level are faring. Are desperate people throwing stones through their
windows to get inside and steal what they have? Or worse?
She doesn’t know how long they’ve been sitting on the
hallway floor under her jacket. The stairwell has been quiet for a while now.
Andrea’s stomach churns. She’s hungry.
“Sounds like we need some soup, perhaps?” Mom pushes
off the floor. She pulls up her jeans that are riding lower on her hips than
usual. She’s thinner, which normally would have pleased Mom to no end, but it
doesn’t matter now. She reaches out her hand and pulls up Andrea. “Tomato soup
or beef barley soup?”
Another thing that doesn’t matter. “Tomato soup,”
Andrea says, mostly to please mom. It’s as if offering Andrea a choice, even if
it’s only between two kinds of soup, makes mom feel better.
“Tomato soup and hard bread. Or maybe we should make a
feast of it and put those half-baked frozen buns in the oven.
Andrea brightens. She hasn’t had a soft break for over
a week. Mom hadn’t bought any when she stocked up. She did get dry yeast and
flour in case their isolation became longer than she expected. Luckily, they
have two propane burners on the stove. In case there’s a blackout, Andrea knows
how to make dough, flatten it, and fry it in the cast iron frying pan.
Andrea puts the oven on, and mom sets the table in
front of the television. It never used to happen before, but eating at the
coffee table is a necessity. Mom wants to check out the news cycles and Andrea
needs to be where mom is when it goes dark.
The cable networks still broadcast different tv-shows
and reality shows, but the PBS channel broadcasts the information available
about the virus. Different experts make statements. The president did is as well
during the first week, but the foreign minister has taken over. Apparently both
the president and the vice president are ill. The same goes for the Speaker of
the House.
On the Internet, you can read tons of stuff on social
media. Facebook is all about who is ill, who has died, and Andrea has cried and
written RIP on too many celebrities’ Facebook and Instagram accounts. Now she
opens her tablet and watches the latest on her feed while mom watches her
channel.
“Oh, my god,” Mom says and drops the spoon into the
bowl of soup with a splash. Red dots form a pattern on mom’s light-blue sweater.
“What?” Andrea looks up at the wall mounted TV.
“The president is dead.” Wide eyed, mom lifts the
spoon for the second time but lowers it back into the soup. “They have even
stopped counting all the dead. They’re just running a list of famous names.
A glance at Facebook shows very few updates. It is the
same with Instagram and Tumblr. X is still active. Perhaps people are too sick
to type? Or dead? Andrea looks for her closest friends and sees that Ebba has
shared a status twelve hours ago. The net must be seriously lagged. Andrea is
sure that update wasn’t there three-four hours ago.
_________________________________
Ebba Stein
12 h
It sucks to be on the second floor. Dad has boarded up
all the windows.
He even took off the countertop in the kitchen and nailed it across the balcony
door.
Mom and Dad are mostly lying in bed, watching TV.
Thank god I have my tablet. How are you all doing out there, gang? Text me.
_____________________________
“I’m going to try and call Ebba.” Andrea gets up and
moves out into the kitchen and sits at the table from where she can still see
mom. She clicks the miniature picture of Ebba. No signals go through until her
fifth attempt. It takes a while, but just as Andrea think’s all she’ll get is
the voice mail, a woman answers.
“Andrea?”
“Yes, it’s me. Is Ebba there?” Andrea pulls up one
knee and leans her forehead against it.
“Yes…but she can’t talk on the phone. Not now. I mean,
not yet. She has a bit of a cold.”
A cold? Andrea begins to tremble again. “Is it…the
virus?” She’s afraid to ask and anxious about the answer.
“The virus?” Ebba’s mother, Bethany, laughs, but her
voice has an undertone of hysteria. It sounds as if she’s about to lose control.
“No, not at all. She’s got sniffles and she’s a little warm. You know, like kids
can get.”
“But it can be the bird virus too. Is Ebba’s dad
there?” He ought to be as he boarded in the whole family.
“He’s with Ebba. She wants her dad with her.”
“Please. Can I talk to him? Just for a second? Mom can
give good advice. She’s a nurse, remember?”
“Well…” Bethany draws it out and it sounds as if she’s
pushing back a chair.
Andrea hurries back to the living room. “Mom. I think
Ebba’s sick and it’s as if they’re not getting it.” She holds out her cell and
swallows hard when she puts it on speaker.
“Hello?” Mom says. “Bethany?”
“This is Carl. Bethany is… upset.” The male voice
sounds shaken, but not unhinged.
“Is Ebba sick?” Mom puts her arm around Andrea. “Can
you tell me about it? What are her symptoms?”
“She started coughing this morning. Half an hour
later, she developed a fever and began to feel weak. We put her back to bed and
gave her paracetamol. It took down the fever a little, but it has never gone
below 101,5.”
“And now?”
“She’s sleeping. Or she’s unconscious. We’ve placed
her safely on her side and propped her up with pillows because her chest’s
rattling. Some mucus. Maybe because she’s too weak to cough.”
Mom closes her eyes hard. And a solitary tear runs
down her cheek. “It sounds worrisome, Carl. How are Ebba’s sisters?”
“Ebba’s sisters are in college in Rhode Island. Mary sometimes goes to Paris as she’s a model. Living life, as Ebba says.
Linda,our middle girl, has started coughing, and we don't know how to help her.
We haven’t been able to reach Mary
in Paris for three days—so we just don’t know. She was on her way home, but as
you might have heard, they closed the borders all over Europe a week ago and so
we hope she can call us soon.” Ebba’s dad coughs.
“Are you ill too, Carl?” Mom asks, and her voice is
soft and comforting, like it is when Andrea or Theo are sick or hurt.
“It started like a tickle in my chest half an hour
ago. Damn contagious, this stuff, right?” He coughs again and, in the
background,
Andrea hears Bethany say something in an irritated voice that she can’t make out.
“I can’t help that I’m coughing,” Carl says. He sighs.
“Bethany can’t quite cope with it all and who can blame her? Two of our girls
are ill and now I’m coming down with this crap too, apparently. She has no
symptoms at all, and it makes it worse for her. Like some sort of pre-survival’s
guilt.”
Andrea tries to understand what he means. Perhaps what
Ebba’s mom fears most of all is being left behind, alone.
“Andrea is so worried about Ebba. After the twins
died, and we lost touch with Molly, it’s understandable that she wants to know,”
Mom says gently.
“Of course.” Carl’s voice is sad. “Andy? I want you to
know that Ebba always says you’re her best friend. She loves your entire little
gang, but you and she have always been extra tight. You were real heroes when
you helped the twins and Molly. You and Ebba are so tough. You can do anything,
Andy. Never forget that.”
Andrea understands that Ebba is dying. Her dad would
never talk like this, speak for his daughter, unless he knew Ebba would never
get the chance to say it herself. He probably thinks the words about hers and
Ebba’s friendship help. The stuff about them being heroes after their shopping
trip to the mall is a bit much, but perhaps not. Maybe not everyone would have
dragged their sick friends along and carried them all the way home.
Anxiety hits when she remembers how she almost started
to cry when petite little Moa began coughing even before they got off the bus.
She had managed to walk on her own while Ebba and Andrea took care of Haya and
Ayesha. Andrea would never forget the expression on Nadira’s, the twin’s mom’s,
face when she saw the condition her daughters were in when they came home. She
called an ambulance but found out that all emergency vehicles were unavailable
and that it would be better if she drove her daughters directly to the hospital.
Later, Andrea found out that when they arrived at the
clinic, it was so full, they were told to go to a school near the hospital where
they were setting up triage and lots of beds. The school quickly became
overwhelmed when sick people arrived in droves. Nadira and her husband drove to
several different places and in the meantime, the twins died in the back seat.
Moa proved to be stronger, or perhaps she lived longer because nobody dragged
her from place to place, desperately trying to get help. Three days after she
became ill, she passed in her sleep, her mom said. And now Ebba… Andrea rubs her
eyes and barely listens to Mom speaking with Carl. He coughs more often and
eventually they disconnect.
“It doesn’t look good, but I think you realize that.”
Mom cries quietly. “They’re faced with every parent’s worst nightmare.”
“I’m the only one left,” Andrea whispers. “I have no
idea how any of my classmates are doing. Maybe it is just me…out of everyone.”
“Shh. Come here.” Mom wraps a blanket around Andrea,
and they refocus on the TV.
It looks strange. A reporter is standing in an
intersection, dressed in a hazmat suit. Armed guards, dressed the same, surround
him.
“I’m standing here in the center of Remerton, and the
city looks deserted. Behind me I have Parade Avenue, and in the opposite
direction I see East Street. Five city buses have come to a full stop in the
center. Two buses have been set on fire, and you can see for yourselves that
someone has vandalized the rest. The shops along these streets, normally filled
with customers, have all lowered their security gates and are closed. It’s been
like this for over a week. We saw a few people earlier, most of them on the way
to the pharmacy in the next block, from what I could tell. The pharmacies
quickly ran out of all their over-the-counter medication against fever, pain,
and cough. The news has also received information that the pharmacies eventually
were coerced into handing out prescription medication.” The man flinches when
there’s loud bang. The guards form a ring around him.
“Looters are becoming increasingly brash. They seem
equally interested in TVs as in food. The latter is understandable, but what
someone would want with a seventy-inch TV at this time, when they risk their
health in the process, does simply not make sense.
A group of people dressed in dark hoodies, young men,
from what it looks like, rush into the frame from the right and launches at the
reporter and the armed men. Shots are fired and the image sways wildly when the
whoever is behind the camera either is attacked or perhaps trying to escape.
Andrea and Mom hold on tight to the edge of the
blanket and Andrea can hardly believe what she’s witnessing.
“What are they doing, Mom?” she asks, panic rising and
filling her chest. “Wha-what are they doing?”
“We’re switching channels,” Mom says quickly and
reaches for the remote.
“No, no. We have to see what happens,” Andrea says and
tugs at mom’s arm. “We need to know. If we have to tell someone about this one
day, we have to know.”
Mom looks at her, her eyes dark and wide. “My
sweetheart,” she says, and new tears balance at the top of her eyelashes. “My
brave girl.” Then Mom leans back, pulls a pillow close and hugs it. When Andrea
wants to hold her hand, Mom shakes her head, then raises her arm to cover her
mouth.
And coughs.
Continued behind door 3
Any feedback is most welcome! --- Threads
@redheadgrrl --- fanfic@gbrooke-fiction.com