Pestilence

37

After speeding away in the jeep, Howie was going so fast that he nearly lost control and tipped over on a sharp turn. He slowed down and noticed the sky. No choppers. He glanced to his daughter in the passenger seat and saw that her hand was on his knee.

“You okay?” he said.

“Yeah. Mike looked after me.”

Howie glimpsed in the rearview. “Thanks,” he said.

“No problem.”

After driving in silence for a few more minutes, Howie realized he was hungry. An Italian place called Cosimo’s was up near the intersection, and he pulled around back and parked in the handicap section.

“I don’t think they’ll mind,” he said, looking at his daughter.

“What’re we doing here?” Mike said.

“You guys hungry?”

“Starving.”

“Let’s go. I’ll whip something up.”

The restaurant was open. They walked in through the front door, and Jessica went to turn on the lights, but Howie told her not to. They would have to eat in the dark.

“See if you can find some candles, though,” he said.

Walking to the kitchen, Howie saw food still out on the tables. A dish of gelato had melted and was soaking the tablecloth. Everyone had gotten out of there in a hurry.

Mike came with him as Jessica lagged behind. The lights in the kitchen as well as the grill and oven were still on. He turned them off and went to the fridge on the other side of the room. Taking out some beef, pasta, and vegetables, he then found the olive oil and cooked macaroni with sauce.

Mike stood in the corner and chewed on some bread with butter. “Where we heading?”

“I don’t know. I was thinking out of the state. See if whatever’s happening here is happening there, too.”

“I heard all the highways are closed. How you planning on getting out?”

“We got a jeep. We’ll fill her up and try the desert.”

“You want to risk driving through the desert on one tank of gas?”

“I don’t know what to do, Mike. I’ve never been in this situation before. If you got a better idea, by all means, share.”

Mike took another bite of the bread. “I was in Iraq.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“No, you wouldn’t. We had taken this small town, called Karim. The insurgents, that’s what we were forced to call them, they had taken the town, and we got it back. It took four days. Two days of no sleep. Some o’ the guys took amphetamines to stay awake, and it did things to their minds. No sleep and drugs aren’t the best solution to anything, but we were young. So we take the town. And we decide we don’t know who’s with them and who’s with us, so we impose a curfew and patrol the streets. Anyone suspected of working with the insurgents was rounded up, and we turned this mosque into like a camp for them.

“At first, the people were happy. They hated the insurgents more than we did. One guy told me they were all Arabians, and what the fuck did he care about Arabians. But after a while, we started acting… different. I don’t know what it is or why it happens, but once you got power over someone, you start treating ’em different. Like they ain’t even human. A lot of horrible things started happenin’, especially with the women.”

He swallowed and placed the bread down on the counter. His eyes were lost, staring into nothing as he spoke, and Howie didn’t interrupt him.

“So after a little bit, the people started fighting us. They thought they’d just exchanged one conquering army for another. And that’s when the suicide bombings started. We took an entire village that loved us and made it so they would rather blow themselves up than live with us. That’s what happens. That’s what’ll happen here, and lots of people are going to get killed.”

Howie didn’t say anything for a while as he coated a pan in olive oil, and then he turned to the stove and fired it up. He didn’t know what to say, so he cooked instead, and Mike went to another fridge down a hallway.

Howie watched Mike go to a metal door with a lock on it, and he searched for something to break it open with. After finding a hammer and other tools in a box, he slammed the hammer into the lock until it clinked to the ground. The fridge was a walk-in and he found some beer and brought out six bottles, placing them on the counter. He popped open the first one and took a long drink.

“Better give me one of those too,” Howie said.