CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Cathy shivered, lying atop Joshua. Soaking wet, she huddled him close for warmth. The lake had fought against them all night and the next day, tossing and drenching mother and son but not drowning. Caught in a current that raged more like a river, she had worried away the night, certain they would perish before the first sunup. Somehow, her prayers were answered and both lived to watch the strangest sunrise ever imagined.
The sun, once a yellow fireball promising warmth against a cool blue sky, was filtered behind an orange haze that dimmed its glow and offered no hope. Black clouds clung to the ominous sky, threatening rain but only offering ash. The soot that fell stank of singed animal flesh and pine tar, residual of the fires raging on the horizon.
Too weak to struggle with the cinderblock still cuffed to her ankle, Cat felt compelled to remove the burden. Pulling her body into a sitting position, she angled the block by sliding it against the side of the boat, scraping the aluminum as she moved it in place beneath her heel. In her other hand she held Clint’s pistol. Pressing the muzzle against the chain as prisoners did in countless movies, she told Josh to move back. This will work, she promised herself. It worked on the rope when I… A sob caught in her throat—something Clint’s memory didn’t deserve. When I killed him, she finished in her mind. With her ankle clear of the bullet’s path, she turned toward her son. “Look away,” she warned, “and hide your eyes.” She waited until he was clear and then pulled the trigger.
The chain held, deflecting the bullet and merely chipping away the cinderblock. Pain ripped through her calf as shards of concrete entered her leg like shrapnel. She cried out, wincing from the sting as the wound bruised around a weeping and jagged cut. Stupid! That was stupid, she told herself, rolling her body over to comfort Josh, now terrified by the sound and sobbing for his mother.
“It’s okay,” she promised. “Shh, Momma’s here.” She urged him not to cry, but couldn’t help but add tears of her own.
She willed her heartrate to slow, examining the wound carefully. I’ve had two years of nursing school, she reasoned. I can treat this. It was bad, worse than it looked given the filthy water in the boat. Infection, parasites, amoebas, and foreign debris, she calculated were the biggest dangers. A new concern popped into her mind. Radiation.
She remembered the brilliant flashes of light witnessed the night before. What had those been? The first few had been high in the sky, large like a starburst or something you’d expect to watch in a space movie. The others, coming hours later, were low on the horizon and ominous, exploding in every direction. She had watched a lot of movies growing up, and she worried they had been nuclear missiles. Was it the Russians? Maybe the Chinese, she considered, or the North Koreans?
Unfortunately for Cathy, the only knowledge she had of radiation was from movies. How soon does it start? Are we already screwed floating all night and day on this lake? A book she read in high school jumped to mind. Alas, Babylon, it was called, chronicling people’s lives following nuclear war. Didn’t they have time? Depending upon where they lived, didn’t some people have days or weeks before the fallout? She knew weather affected the dispersion of radiation, and she thought again about the blasts. Most had been in the north and east.
Looking up at the sun she guessed it was afternoon, meaning the boat was heading west. She dipped her finger in the water and held it aloft, feeling for the winds. They blew from that direction. That’s good, isn’t it? Less cities than in the east. Josh had quieted by now, and she raised her head to see where they drifted.
“Hey there!” a voice shouted. They were close to shore, about thirty yards or so, where a man stood peering directly at them. “You in the boat!”
She tried to sit up, slipping in the cold water. She raised her head once more and watched the man jog along the shoreline.
“You need to get off the water,” he warned. “It isn’t safe outside!”
“We don’t have oars,” she yelled. “And the engine doesn’t work!”
“Then swim ashore! But hurry! You need to come indoors before the radiation drifts our way!”
Radiation. His words echoed her earlier thoughts. So it was nuclear war. “We can’t! My son can’t swim and I…” She looked down at the cinder block shackled to her leg. “I can’t swim, either!”
“For heavens sakes! Then why the hell are you in a boat?” The man looked around, searching for some way to reach the tiny vessel. He finally gave up, slipping out of his shoes and splashing hurriedly into the lake. With little effort he swam with the current toward them. She quickly propped herself up, feeling around for what was left of the anchor line. The rope was just long enough for the man to grab ahold and tow them ashore. As he approached, she tossed it to his waiting hand. He wasted no time in swimming the way he’d come.
The return trip was much more harrowing for their hero, struggling to guide the boat without drifting too far from his starting point. The man struggled when the current eddied around him, pulling him the opposite direction and taking the metal boat with him. Eventually they reached shallow water and the man stood, splashing and running as he dragged the mother and son to safety. Exhausted, he collapsed on the shoreline, grassy and covered with a thick coating of gray ash. Beyond that were trees and steep embankments, tall hills that funneled the lake into a wide river.
He paused only long enough to catch his breath, then rose to his feet. Still panting he insisted, “Come on. We’ve got to hurry. We may have been contaminated already!”
When Cathy did not follow, he approached the vessel. She pointed down at her leg and he understood. With gentle strength he held out his hand and helped her to stand, holding the cinderblock as she stepped into the water. With one hand he held the brick and with the other he dragged the boat and Josh fully ashore.
Stolen story; please report.
His eyes lingered on the concrete anchor chained to her leg and he said, “I’ll ask about that later. You hold his,” he handed her the weight, “and I’ll grab your things.”
Cathy looked around. She had almost forgotten the things the man called hers. He lifted Josh and set him ashore, then pulled Clint’s heavy bags and set them next to her son.
“That’s gonna be a problem,” the man said, picking them up. “I can carry these, but you’ll have to manage with that ball and chain on your own.”
She nodded. “I’ll manage.” She managed to lean just enough that she could hold the open end of the cinder block and take normal steps, waddling to keep up as the man led them to his waiting shoes and socks.
He was older, in his late fifties, Cat assumed. His beard was tightly cropped and tidy, with splashes of gray that crept into his raven black hair. His eyes were kind and voice gentle. His accent suggested rural upbringing.
“Name’s John,” their new friend said. “John Klingensmith. My wife heard the gunshot and saw your head bobbing in the boat. She hollered for me, and I ventured out to try and get you ashore.”
He took a step and recoiled in pain, a twig having cut his toe. He turned to Josh. “Son, I need you to be a big man for your mom and me. We’ve a steep climb and I’m not getting anywhere in this forest barefoot. Head down that shoreline and retrieve my shoes and socks?”
Josh looked to his mother to confirm that’s what he should do and she nodded. He hurried away.
John took advantage of their sudden privacy and turned to give the young mother a stern look. He looked like a father rebuking a rebellious teen or a teacher an unruly child. “I took a chance and I need you to understand that. We may all now have radiation poisoning.”
With eyes down she muttered, “I’m sorry,” sincerely meaning her words but still processing the situation. “I didn’t mean you harm. We had a long night and…” She cut off when she looked back into his face, the kindness having returned and his featured softened.
“I don’t regret helping you, ma’am. Please don’t get that mistaken. I’m merely saying that I took a chance and now we both have to clean up before we go inside.”
“Clean up? I don’t even know what happened.” She searched her thoughts for any rational explanation. “I saw the explosions but I’m so confused. Was it a nuclear attack? Those were…” she broke off, visions of mushroom clouds swimming in her memories.
“That it was,” he confirmed, “but I don’t know about war. Our power went out before the blasts. Whoever attacked may have detonated EMPs before the strike.”
“What are EMPs?”
“Electromagnetic pulses from a nuclear burst in the atmosphere. High altitude blasts could have wiped out the power grid of the entire Ohio River Valley.”
“I saw three blasts in the sky about twenty minutes before the explosions.” She paused. “Wait, did you say, Ohio River Valley? Where are we?”
“That swath of a lake there used to be the Ohio River and our house up on this hill overlooks Andyville. Everything underwater was farmland until this morning. I’ve never seen so much water.” He pointed south and east. “Over that away was Fort Knox, about thirty-five miles as the crow flies.”
“Wait,” Cat paused, feet frozen with disbelief, “Kentucky?”
“Yes, ma’am.” With a raised eyebrow he asked, “Where’d y’all put into the river?”
Josh returned carrying a pair shoes and the man pulled them on, not bothering with the socks he shoved in his pockets. He started moving immediately.
“We didn’t,” she said, forcing her feet to follow along and keep up with his strides. “We were on Lake Huron. There’s no way we were washed all this way!” She suddenly recalled the fierce shaking and the rushing waves during the night. Realization hit her gut like Clint’s fist. “The earthquake?”
“That’s my guess,” John agreed. Before the power went out there were several reports of quakes all around the country. California had the Big One and just before the outage Jenn saw a report that Yellowstone blew.”
Cathy finally understood the ash falling like snow from the sky. “Yellowstone would take out the entire Northwest!”
“Damned right about that. That’s the only reason I ventured out. As long as the ash is falling, I’m certain the winds are coming in from the west and keeping the radiation to the east. But that won’t last long and we need to clean up and get inside before things change.”
They topped the hill to find a beautiful white and blue farmhouse with the classic wraparound porch. A brightly painted red barn stood just north of the house. A black trash bag sat on the steps and he paused to retrieve it. Pointing to the barn he said, “There’s running water and soap in there and I’ve got tools to get that thing off your leg. We all have to shower before heading into the house.” He hefted the bag. “Jenn put out some clothing, so after you strip those off put ‘em in the bag.”
The barn wasn’t what Cathy expected. Instead of haylofts and animals it opened into a workshop full of presses and table saws. She paused to admire the craftsmanship of a beautiful rocking horse, sanded and ready for paint. “You made this?”
“I did. I’m retired from teaching at the college, so I tinker here and there, making toys and crafts to sell at the market.”
“This isn’t tinkering,” Cat argued, “this is art!”
John laughed. “The true artist is Jenny. Wait until you’ve seen the magic she works with a brush.” He handed her a pair of safety glasses and dug in some tools, retrieving a metal saw. After stuffing wadding between her skin and the cuffs, he raised it up to cut the metal. “I’m sorry ahead of time if I nick you, I’ve never done anything like this before.”
He slid it back and forth, and Cathy flinched as the wadding rubbed against her wounds. It hurt like hell, but it eventually cut through.
“The shower’s in there,” he said, pointing to a small bathroom. “It’s small but the two of you will fit.”
“How do you have running water?” she asked.
“Our wells are natural springs, and a ram pump sends it up here. Don’t worry, the water’s clean, even if the pressure’s low. Rinse well and hurry so I can as well.”
“Thank you,” she said, choking a grateful sob.
“Don’t mention it.”
Once inside she rinsed Josh thoroughly, instructing him to put on his clothes and to face away. Only then did she strip and step into the shower. The water was cold but not as frigid as the river the night before. It smelled a bit like sulfur and tasted like metal, but it did the job to wash away the radiation. If only it could cleanse the memories of the night before.