Pestilence

59

Sam checked her watch, and it read 9:00 a.m. The nurse usually came at around ten. The maids came twice a week, and a physical therapist was over twice a week to take her mother out for walks and to exercise on the equipment in the basement.

“There’s a spare room over there,” Samantha said. “You have your own bathroom. We’ll go tomorrow and try and find you some new clothes.”

“Where’s my dad?” she asked.

Samantha locked eyes with her. The girl’s light-blue eyes were full of confusion and fury. She already knew where her father was; she had known it the moment she’d woken on the plane to the awful suction of an open door and didn’t see him there. But Sam guessed she needed to hear it.

“Your father is gone, Jessica. I’m sorry. He passed away to save the rest of us.”

She nodded, glancing down at the floor. “What about my mom?”

“I don’t know. There’s no communication in or out of California, so I don’t know what’s happened to your mom. But we’ll look for her today, okay?”

She turned without saying anything and went into the room Sam had pointed to. Sam waited a few moments and then poked her head in. Jessica was on the futon, curled up in a ball, and staring out the window at the sunlight that was flooding the street. Sam wondered what she could say to make it better, to ease her loss. But she couldn’t come up with anything. Jessica hadn’t just lost her father. Everything she had ever known was gone, and she would never get it back.

None of them would.

Samantha collapsed on the couch in the front room, her face in her hands, and cried. When she finished, no tears were left. She thought of Duncan and the sweet way he would text her with funny photos to make her laugh.

She was grieving, though she didn’t recognize it as such. He would have asked her to marry him soon. Neither one of them had had any doubt about that. It was only a matter of finding the perfect moment. But it had never come. Instead, she was left with memories and a cold, empty feeling that the way her life was supposed to turn out had not materialized. Though she wanted to believe that, to revel in her grief, a part of her told her she would have said no, and it made her feel guilty. At least, she thought, Jane and her family had made it out.

“Are you okay?” Jessica was standing there.

Sam wiped the tears away and said, “Yeah.”

“I don’t think I can sleep.”

Sam patted the cushion on her couch, and Jessica walked over and sat down as Sam put her shirt to her face and cleaned off the salty tears. She wrapped her arm around Jessica, and they leaned back on the couch. Before they had a chance to say anything to each other, both of them were asleep.