Sick

3

That night would be burned forever in Ash’s mind. He knew there would be no escaping it. His wife, his daughter, his son — all dead. But as utterly painful as that realization was, it was actually the good memories that made him want to curl into a ball in the corner.

Wrestling with Brandon in the backyard.

Reading to Josie as she leaned against him, hanging on his every word.

Kissing Ellen. Holding Ellen. Loving Ellen.

There was a trip they had all taken once that started out badly, but it turned out to be the best vacation they’d ever had. He’d been stationed at Fort Irwin then, outside Barstow, California — ironically only about a hundred miles south of Barker Flats. They’d meant to go to the Grand Canyon but only made it as far as Needles, California, when the van they’d borrowed from a neighbor broke down. Repairs would take several days, which pretty much ruled out sticking to their plan.

The owner of the auto shop was a former Marine. When he found out Ash was in the service, he made a few calls and was soon driving the Ash family the forty or so miles to a vacation house on Lake Havasu his brother-in-law owned.

They spent the days swimming in the lake, the evenings barbecuing, and the nights playing games. Ash became the king of Chinese checkers that trip, while Josie was crowned Miss Monopoly.

One day they even rented a Jet Ski, and Ash took turns taking the kids out on the water. Ellen was a nervous wreck every time she watched them head away from shore, but by the end, even she was smiling and laughing. Ash never did get her on that Jet Ski, though. She’d claimed someone had to stay on shore in case something went wrong, but he knew that wasn’t the real reason. She had a fear of water, something she’d had since she was a kid.

He missed that about her.

He missed everything.

Over a week he had been in his cell, a week of talking with no one but the voice from the speaker, and not actually seeing anyone at all. When he woke each morning, he found a day’s worth of food sitting against the wall. He tried pretending to sleep a few times so he could catch whoever was bringing it in, but he could never keep his eyes open long enough. He suspected they were giving him some sort of sleeping drug, either through his food or, more likely, through the air.

The cell that was his world consisted of a cot, a toilet, a sink, and four thick cement walls. The only door was opposite the toilet, but there was no handle on the inside, just a smooth metal surface.

He figured he’d been put in the cell on the chance he’d been infected. It was probably the nearest isolation room available. After all, he’d held his daughter in his arms. Brandon had, too. He’d been healthy when Ash last saw him, but he’d apparently contracted whatever it was before they were taken from the house. So, logically, Ash should be next.

Only, despite the fact that everyone he loved was dead, here he was still breathing.

He felt despair and guilt and loss, but none was as strong as the hatred he felt toward whoever had done this to his family, his friends, his country. There was no way he would ever believe this was not a planned attack. Someone had targeted American soldiers and their families. Families, for God’s sake! Whoever it was needed to pay.

Perhaps they already had. But if that were the case, no one had told him. In fact, no one had told him much of anything.

Each day, the man on the speaker would ask him questions like: “How are you feeling?” “Do you have any pain?” “Headaches?” Or the voice would give him instructions such as: “Stand with your arms out, then raise them above your head,” or “Walk heel to toe across the room in a straight line.” He felt like a drunk.

But when Ash asked questions back, they were ignored, and the anger he felt toward the terrorist who’d perpetrated this disaster started to leak a little toward the voice in the ceiling. He just wanted to get out and bury his family. He wanted to sit by their graves and grieve. It was his right.

“Good morning, Captain,” the voice on the speaker said.

Ash opened his eyes. It was the beginning of his eighth day in the cell.

“Are you feeling anything unusual? Aches? Pains?” the voice asked.

Ash looked up at the speaker. To him it had become the face of the voice. He could almost see eyes now, and a nose. And, of course, the big round mouth.

The speaker had become his own version of Wilson the volleyball from that Tom Hanks movie, Cast Away. Only Wilson had been Hanks’s friend. Ash wasn’t so sure the speaker was his.

He gritted his teeth. “How much longer?”

“Please answer the question.”

“Answer mine first. How much longer until I can get out and deal with my family?”

For more than a minute the cell was silent.

“Are you feeling anything unusual? Aches? Pains?” the voice asked again.

“Go to hell.”

“Captain, you are not at liberty to choose whether you will answer the questions or not. It’s your duty.”

Ash rolled onto his side, as if turning away from the speaker would make it disappear.

As he lay there, he could smell eggs and bacon, and knew a tray with his breakfast was waiting for him by the door. It was the only hot meal he got each day. Lunch and dinner would be in boxes next to it. Sandwiches, most days.

“Are you feeling anything unusual? Aches? Pains?”

The captain let out a snorting you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me laugh. “Unusual? Yeah, I’m feeling something unusual.”

“Please explain.” There was a note of concern in the voice.

Ash just shook his head. If the voice couldn’t figure out there was something unusual about his situation, he wasn’t going to enlighten him.

“What are you feeling?” the voice asked.

No response.

“Captain, please answer the question.”

Ash sat up, suddenly having the urge to eat. He retrieved the tray then returned to his bunk. In addition to the bacon and eggs, there was also a container of orange juice and a cup of coffee. He opened the OJ and downed the contents.

“Captain, if there’s a change in your condition, you need to tell us.”

Ash lifted the plastic top that covered his plate and picked up his fork. He was just about to scoop up some egg when he noticed a small, folded piece of paper tucked under the bacon. He hesitated for a moment, then placed the lid back down as if he’d decided he wasn’t ready to eat yet, and turned his attention to the coffee.

“Captain, are you going to cooperate?”

Ash took a sip of the coffee and made no indication he had even heard the question.

“Captain?”

It was another five minutes before the voice finally fell silent. Still, Ash waited, knowing that after a while their interest in him would wane, and those watching him through the surveillance cameras would no longer be paying as close attention as they had been.

Finally, he lifted the lid off the plate again. This time he grabbed both the piece of paper and a strip of cold bacon. He tucked the paper against his palm, then raised the bacon to his mouth and took a bite. While he chewed, he casually slipped the paper under the blanket.

He ate everything on the plate, even though the eggs had gone rubbery and the bacon had lost much of its flavor. When he was done, he set the tray by the door as he always did, and commenced his daily exercise program.

This consisted of push-ups, sit-ups and running in place, the perfect exercises for the confined man. Outwardly, he maintained an aura of blank detachment, but on the inside he could think of little else but the scrap of paper waiting for him in his bed.

After sixty minutes, he’d worked up quite a sweat. He removed his clothes, then used the cup the coffee had come in to give himself a sink bath. Still sticking to his routine, he toweled off with his shirt and pulled the flimsy cloth pants they’d given him back on.

For the next twenty minutes, he paced the room. This was his cool down, also part of his new daily habit.

As he walked back and forth he began to wonder if he was making a big deal out of nothing. Maybe the paper was just trash, something accidentally dropped there when his food had been prepared. If so, he was getting himself worked up over nothing.

Once his palm touched the concrete wall at the end of his last lap, he returned to his cot and lay down. After a few minutes he closed his eyes, then twisted around so his back was to the vent where he assumed the camera was. As he turned, he slipped his hand under the blanket and grabbed the paper.

Though he kept telling himself that it was nothing, he could feel his heart race as he silently unfolded it. Keeping it close to his chest, he held it out at an angle, lowered his head and opened his eyes.

In the center of the paper, written in pencil, was a single word: