As soon as the truck rolled to a stop, Cooper leapt from the truck to check on Jake’s condition. Covered in sweat and grime from the shoot-out, Cooper only made it halfway to the room before Angela stopped him with the flat of her hand.
“No. You can’t go in there like this! Go clean up. I know he’s already ill, but there’s no good to come from bringing all of that in there,” she said indicating the grime covering him.
Cooper gritted his teeth and looked at her defiantly. She maintained her gaze and crossed her arms for good measure. Chastened, he cast his eyes down sheepdog-style. He shuffled his way upstairs and took a brief, steaming hot shower. Halfway through, the light went out. The bathroom fan had stopped whirring too. He ventured a dubious hope that it was merely a broken fuse.
He rushed to finish his shower and slapped a white towel across his waist. As he ran downstairs, Angela met him on the landing. He couldn’t help notice her quick appraisal of his mostly uncovered body.
“All out?” he asked.
“Yes, afraid so. Lisa’s porch light that was left on all day is out too,” Angela responded, bringing her eyes to his.
“Damn!” Cooper pounded his fists together. “I thought it might happen, but was hoping not yet.”
“What do you think caused it?”
“It could be almost anything. A burned out generator. A tree fell across some wires. The point is, with less workers—or no workers—showing up, a glitch anywhere in the system can cause the power to go down. Our best hope right now is that it isn’t the entire city and it’s just in our area.”
“I’m going to check on Jake. How is he?”
Her light face grew dark, “He’s showing all the symptoms of the illness. His fever is rising. He’s listless. There is some small hope that it is just a run of the mill fever, but I doubt it. I’m sorry, Cooper,” her hand touched his arm.
Cooper pressed his lips together in frustration, “Alright. I know you’re doing everything you can. I’m going to check in on him. Can you do me a favor?”
“Name it.”
“I have four rain barrels, fifty-five gallons each. Use our hose to make sure that they are all full. Fill anything else you see that will hold water. With the electricity out, I don’t want to risk losing water too. We are gravity-fed here, so we should be OK, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
“Right,” she pivoted on her heel and headed towards the back door.
Cooper tightened the towel on his waist and went in to see his son. Now, he got a view of what Elena must have looked like in the early hours of the sickness. Jake still had his color and he wasn’t bathed in sweat. But, his face was flushed and he looked very, very tired.
Cooper sat on the edge of the bed and felt his boy’s forehead. It was sweaty and very warm. Probably 102 or 103. Jake’s eyes opened.
“Uh, hello, Dad.”
“Hello, son.”
“I don’t think that medicine is working,” Jake said, as if to apologize to his father. His intent expression of regret made Cooper involuntarily choke up. He fought the emotion and won.
He cleared his throat, desperately wanting to say more, “You need to give yourself more time.” Cooper knew his son’s faith in the placebo medicine was his best hope at survival, but he still couldn’t bring himself to lie directly about it. This deft lie of omission was the best he could do.
Throughout his life, each time he had tried to use a lie, even a white one, to make someone feel better or make his own life go easier, he would recall what had happened. Remembering his father’s early death, his mother’s evisceration, and his own suffering as a child, he would choke on the lie. His devotion to the truth was a distinction that often drove a wedge between those around him. He was often mocked for his steadfast adherence to veracity. Sometimes, he’d ponder bitterly. It’s only half principle. The other half was my damned impotence to spit the words out.
Now, looking into his son’s anxious eyes, he suffered that familiar, agonizing, debility once more.
Jake nodded as a smile came back to his lips, “OK.”
“How are you feeling? Do you need anything?”
Jake shook his head back and forth, “No.”
They sat together in silence for a long while, Cooper rubbing his son’s arm or chest for stretches to comfort him. Eventually, Jake fell asleep and Cooper kept watching him. The dread that he was watching his son slowly die, as he had watched Elena, was too much. He wept silently. Bitter, hot tears fell from his cheeks onto his chest and stomach. After a long while, he managed to stop. He dried his tears, and turned to leave.
Angela was standing in the doorway. Her eyes were wet. As he pressed past her, she reached out, grabbed his wrist, stopping him. She squeezed it in comfort. He paused to look at her. She leaned in and pulled him into a gentle hug. He welcomed the embrace and his arms folded across her back. They stood in this gentle clinch as Cooper thought how he appreciated that she wasn’t muttering platitudes like, “He’ll be OK.” He squeezed her a little more tightly, muttered “Thank you,” and then walked back upstairs. She watched him go as sympathy and affection washed over her. After he’d disappeared from view, she took a deep breath, clutched her arms across her chest, and returned to maintaining a vigil over Jake.
Cooper had planned on getting dressed. Instead, he collapsed into his bed, worn out by the day’s shooting and the worries about Jake. His nap was short, but deep. He woke up in the early afternoon, ravenous. With the electricity out, he knew he would need to eat as much of his food as possible, quickly. He dressed in a pair of faded blue jeans, a t-shirt, and an unbuttoned black and white flannel top.
When he reached the stairs’ bottom, he found Dranko in his dining room. He was working the slide on his pistol, ensuring the action was smooth and reliable. He looked up from the oiled metal when Cooper arrived.
“There’s news,” he said dryly.
Cooper was still groggy from the deep sleep, “Yeah?”
“The military has arrived. A company of National Guardsmen has set up operations downtown,” Dranko said, the slide smacking forward with a loud metallic snap.
“A company? That’s barely enough to police a few city blocks, never mind the entire city,” Cooper said skeptically.
Dranko shrugged his shoulders and re-holstered his sidearm, “Hell, I must be getting sloppy. I took it as a good sign, until I bumped into Pessimistic Patty over here.”
Cooper laughed and clapped him on the shoulder, “Alright, you got me there. No, you’re right. It is good news. I’m just not sure it’s good enough for Jake.”
Dranko’s eyebrows came together and his lips straightened, “Right, brother. How is he?”
“So far? As bad as this thing gets,” Cooper’s fingers kneaded his temples.
Dranko put his hand on Cooper’s shoulder, “I’m sorry, brother. I wish I could do more right now, but that’s all I got.”
Cooper’s looked into his friend’s sympathetic eyes and nodded, “That’s enough. Thank you,” he said as he put his own hand on Dranko’s shoulder.
Cooper wrinkled his nose at the pungent smell of meat cooking, “What’s that?”
Dranko jerked his thumb towards Cooper’s back patio, “That, brother, is that woman doing her best Betty Crocker meets Davey Crockett impersonation. As soon as the electricity went down, she’s been out back cooking and smoking all of the meat you had on hand.”
Cooper looked incredulous, “Smoking? I don’t own a smoker!”
“Don’t I know it. She’s barbequing on one Weber and jerry-rigged another to do some smoking,” he folded his arms as if to verify his words.
Cooper shook his head in disbelief. He took one step toward the back patio, but stopped in his tracks when three sharp knocks resounded from his front door. I wonder who that is.