Everyone was helping out of the goodness of their hearts. All doing their parts to save a spark of humanity.
Yet, no one knew what was beyond our country. Was it worldwide or just us?
Madison mentioned it had to be global, there was no way, after all these days that some other country wouldn’t have come in to help. Maybe they did and we just didn’t know?
Though some of our questions were answered, most we’d learn in bits and pieces. More information the more we traveled. For the time being we were stalled at the plane, waiting on the truck to come, healing, gathering strength while physically and mentally in the dark.
NOTEBOOK – Day Seventeen
Hey gang,
Today I found out I missed a day. I don’t think I miscounted, I think I just missed it. My God has it been two and a half weeks since we spoke? Three since I saw you? It seems like forever. Tonight I am safe, we are learning more people survived and that’s a good thing. We’ll be getting help soon. Help to get home to all of you. I keep saying we, I know, I think my new friend Madison and her family will be with us. We all have so much to offer each other and I don’t know how far I would have made it without her.
I learned something else today. No one really knows what happened, at least not on this side of the country. It is a bunch of, ‘I heard, she heard, I saw, I think’ I hope you have answers, I really do. This is driving me nuts.
I also had my first cup of coffee in weeks. My head is buzzing. How funny is that?
Nineteen – Decisions
The Sky Blue Airline Jet that parked on the highway was a stopping point. In the two days we were there, not another survivor emerged. Doug said that was normal, he had gone as many as four days between survivors before us.
It was a different feel. No longer striving to move forward to survive, no longer an essence of the unknown. Although the exact schematics of the events weren’t known, at least we had a general idea of what caused all the damage.
Ruth was getting better. She slept a lot, Anna told us that was to be expected. However, perky Ruth probably would return by the time we reached Hilltop.
We were resting, waiting for the truck and thinking ahead. Doug and Bill both had told us things change daily. Information from the east travelled by way of messenger until that messenger reached a point where they could begin a series of radio relay calls. Unfortunately signals didn’t go more than a few hundred miles after Texas, even less in New Mexico. So something that was decided on a Monday could take as long as a week to reach Doug, especially since he relied on the information to come with the truck.
He expected one day that truck would come with no information and just pack them up and move out.
We would be better informed once we reached Hilltop. I anxiously waited to go, hoping that when we got there we’d find out that a more organized plan of evacuation and exodus was in place. Something initiated by the government, or what was left of it.
Doug believed that was happening. He only knew Major Graham’s side of the story. That the major activated his National Guard unit by pretty much going door to door of the homes of those who were in his unit. They created a chain reaction, each person then going out and getting more soldiers together.
Anna was part of that reserve unit. She said a little less than fifty percent showed up, but their families volunteered. The force was pretty big in Hilltop, diminished in size by the amount of scouts they sent out and members, like her, that went to transitional camps.
I believed we were told all that we could be told by them.
While taking a moment not to worry about driving and finding a way through rubble, I got to know Madison better. Alicia was the name of her daughter who passed away a mere three years earlier.
Her husband Bruce was a mechanic, who actually started out as a real estate agent. I didn’t ask how he made such a switch in careers.
She had two sons. Caleb, who was nine and Bad Bruce, who was eight.
“Bad Bruce?” I asked.
“Well, I hate the Big Bruce Little Bruce thing. And forget Senior and Junior. I figured good and bad, since my husband is a good guy and my son is just… bad.”
Mischievous was more like it. She shared stories of them, as I did about my family. We made a pact that while traveling north we would both start from the beginning, sharing stories of our lives, each year of our lives, until we arrived. It would pass the time because we both vowed, that unless we were told with a hundred percent certainty that our families were evacuated, that we, despite the odds, would look for them, no matter what the outcome.
TWENTY – LAST ON LEFT
Not just physically before my eyes had everything transformed, but internally as well. I went from being trapped in a pocket to finding my way out. When you focus on one thing, nothing else exists. You tend to miss a lot.
Sitting in the back of the truck on those hard bench seats whipped not only by cold air, but by a chilling reality of the world.
There was no color. None at all.
As we rolled down the highway we were encompassed by a cloud of dust stirred up by the wheels of the fast moving vehicle.
I watched a desolate world through the slats of that truck. Madison and I were the only ones back there. Ruth was up front with the two soldiers that arrived.
I didn’t get their names or even speak to them. They brought boxes to Doug, spoke to Anna and escorted us to the back of that military truck.
All the items we lugged with us before we arrived at Doug’s were gone. Buried in ash when we left them at the perimeter. We now traveled with minimum belongings. I at least had my backpack from the first plane.
The trip to Hilltop took all of an hour and it was evident that we had arrived because suddenly some color came back. The noon sky still looked like an early evening summer storm was brewing, but there was very little ash on the road or buildings we passed.
We stopped not long after arriving and the second we began to climb from the truck, a buzz filled my ears, like a pressure. It turned into a hum, then a vibration and suddenly the ground shook. It wasn’t mild or a tremor, it felt like a ride, bucking up and down, left to right. The side grates on the truck waved as if they were going to crack and a chorus of screams flowed our way. I held tight with closed eyes, begging in my mind, “Stop, please stop.”
I swore I even held my breath.
When I opened my eyes, I saw the horrified look on Madison’s face.
“Don’t have a panic attack,” I told her.
She shook her head. “That was really long.”
“Tell me about it.”
One of the soldiers opened the back and extended his hand to Madison, helping her down. Then he aided me.
“We’re taking your friend to the medical tent,” the soldier said. “You can find her there.”
And then he walked away.
“Wait.” Madison called out, nearly following him. “Where is…”
She stopped.
It was when I joined her that I saw what rendered her speechless. A huge camp was set up on the street. I couldn’t see how far it extended. There was a degree of chaos as people tried to straighten things and pick up items after the quake.
Someone moved us out of the way and a school bus rolled by slowly. I looked up to the windows, to the people inside, the nameless faces that went by. One image, one person was forever embedded in my mind.
A little girl, her hair dark, her face tiny and petite. She pressed her hand against the window looking at me, so helpless and lost.
I watched her until I couldn’t see her any more.