Sickness Read online

  I took a bite of my burger and when I looked up, I noticed Freddie’s eyes on me. He started to drum his fingers on the table.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

  I shook my head and he tapped the table at the empty spot next to his plate. How could I have been so careless to have forgotten his drink?

  I pushed myself away from the table and he smiled.

  “That’s right,” Freddie said with a chuckle that boiled my blood.

  I hated that I couldn’t tell him to get it himself. It never was worth the fight. Never. For now, it was just easier to please him at least until I could figure a way to get out of my living hell.

  I mixed his vodka with a splash of cranberry juice and set it down on the table. He didn’t even mutter a thank you, and of course, I hadn’t expected one.

  “So, what’s going on with your mom?” he said swallowing down a large bite of potato.

  I was so shocked he asked, I stopped chewing for several seconds. I hastily swallowed down the bite and put my hands down on the table.

  “I’m not exactly sure,” I said shaking my head. “Polly was there with her and they made her leave. I guess mom had a seizure or something too.”

  “They made her leave because she had a seizure?” Freddie snorted. “All that money just to make her worse.”

  “Well, we don’t know she’s worse,” I said. “In fact, the cancer supposedly had shrunk fifty percent.”

  He nodded. “Guess at least she’s at a place that can take care of her. Polly wouldn’t have known what to do if that happened at home.”

  “If it would have even happened here.”

  “What do you mean?” Freddie asked scraping his plate clean.

  “It could have been the treatment,” I said with a shrug.

  The way Freddie was staring at me with his lips curled up slightly at the ends made me feel like an idiot. “They test that stuff on critters and rodents before they give it to people, you know.”

  “Well, I know but we’re not critters and rodents. Things can change.”

  “It’s the cancer,” Freddie said as if he were certain. “Probably spread to her brain or something.”

  I swallowed hard. He was so insensitive. My shoulders were buzzing and my hands clenched into fists I had to hide under the table.

  I bit my cheek so that I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t worth it. It just wasn’t worth it.

  “Are you going to finish that?” Freddie asked pointing his knife at my plate.

  I shook my head.

  “Mind if I take it?”

  “Be my guest.”

  He stabbed the burger-steak and dropped it down onto his plate. “All you need to do is cut out something from every meal and maybe you’ll be able to fit back into those jeans you wore before you had Madeline.”

  Fire surged through my body.

  Luckily my phone buzzed. I stood and drew in a slow breath. “Excuse me. I need to use the bathroom.”

  Freddie held out his palm as if he were a genie granting my final wish. Jerk.

  Chapter Four

  I closed the door softly and swiped to accept the call. “What’s going on?”

  “It’s bad, Kit,” Polly said. “It’s really bad.”

  I could tell she was shaken. It sounded as if she’d been crying. Perhaps she’d somehow found out about what Hoyt had done and her heart was broken.

  “What’s bad?” I asked.

  “What are they saying on the news? Have you been watching?” Polly asked.

  “Freddie won’t let me,” I said. My heart started to pound hard inside my chest. “What’s going on?”

  Polly gasped. “Oh my God,” she whispered. “There’s someone at my door.”

  “Are you at the hotel?”

  “I am,” she whispered. “They said not to leave. Not to answers the doors. I’m so scared, Kit.”

  My hands started to shake so much I wasn’t sure if I could hold the phone. I felt weak. I probably should have eaten more throughout the day because I was starting to feel light-headed.

  “You’re scaring me,” I said. “Is mom okay?”

  “No,” Polly said sucking in a cry. “She’s gone. They’re all gone.”

  “What are you talking about?” My voice squeaked at the end of my sentence.

  I felt like I was about to pass out even though I had no idea what she was talking about. Polly’s fear was seeping through the phone and into my body.

  “Whatever they gave mom… all the patients… it changed. Mutated. It spread and it’s not contained inside the facility even though some are saying it is,” Polly said. “I could already be contaminated. I was there.”

  “Have what?”

  “Whatever they gave mom!” she said as if she were frustrated with me. “The modified virus somehow changed into something else inside of them. It’s highly contagious and spreading through the city like a wildfire. It’s a war zone out there. You need to turn on the news.” Polly gasped. “They’re still out there. They’re knocking harder. I have to hide. I’m afraid they’re going to get inside.”

  I swallowed and lowered my voice as if whoever was at Polly’s door could also hear me. “Lock yourself in the bathroom. Don’t let anyone in.”

  “I have to go, Kit. I’ll call you as soon as I can, okay?”

  “No!” I demanded softly. “Do not hang up on me.”

  Polly started crying. “They want to infect me. I don’t want to die, Kit. I don’t want to die!”

  “I don’t understand any of this. Why would they want to infect you?” I asked feeling the wrinkles in my forehead.

  “Whatever is inside them is making them do it. They’re not themselves. It’s taken them over,” Polly said stuttering with nearly every word. “It’s so bad. You have to believe me. Listen, Kit, you have to act fast, it’ll find its way to you before you know it.”

  “We’re hundreds of miles away. They’ll contain it,” I said chewing my cheek. “Won’t they?”

  Polly sniffed. “They didn’t. They can’t. Go into town and buy all the food and water you can. And anything else you might need that you can get your hands on. Candles, gas, medicine… do you have a first aid kit?”

  “I… I don’t think so?”

  “Kit, listen to me, you have to go now. If this gets out on the news, everyone is going to panic. There will be competition for the supplies. It’ll be chaos.”

  “Why isn’t all this on the news yet?”

  There was a long pause.

  “Polly?” I whispered. “Are you still there?”

  “Yes, I think they left,” Polly said. “They’re trying to play it all down. But it’s bad. I don’t have much food and water here. There are sirens and lights flashing all over the city. I can hear screams and cries out there from everywhere. People begging for help. It’s awful.”

  “How did this happen so fast?” I asked.

  Polly was sobbing. “I have no idea. I’m so scared. What if I never see you or Hoyt again? And Maddie?”

  Hoyt. The cheating bastard. I couldn’t tell her about what I’d seen, especially not now.

  “You need to go, Kit,” Polly said sucking in a sharp breath. “I’ll call you against when I can. Charge your phone.”

  “Promise me you won’t leave the hotel room,” I begged even though I had no idea how bad things really were for her. Help would come for her eventually, wouldn’t it?

  “I promise as long as you listen to me and go get supplies for you and Maddie.”

  I took in several short breaths. There were no sirens or unusual sounds outside my home. At least not that I could hear.

  “I will,” I said. “That is if Freddie will let me leave.”

  “No!” Polly said sharply. “No matter what you have to go. Do it for you and Maddie. If you have to, wait until he falls asleep and by that I mean passes out.”

  “Okay,” I said. “This just seems crazy. You know that, r
ight?”

  Polly released a crazy chuckle. “Trust me, I know. But I saw them, Kit. I heard them. I saw what happens to them.”

  “What happens?”

  “They shake. They vomit. Then they turn into—”

  The phone went dead.

  “Polly?” I said looking at the screen as if hoping her face would appear. “Polly, are you there?”

  I tried to call her back but it went straight to her voicemail. My fist smacked into my thigh. I wanted to scream but I couldn’t because it would no doubt set Freddie off into a rampage.

  I smoothed my hands over my clothes and looked at myself in the mirror. My eyes were red and glassy. Sometimes, I barely recognized myself.

  If Freddie saw me, he’d know something was up and I wasn’t ready to talk about any of it. Especially since it sounded like my mother was gone. Dead. Just like that. Gone. And I hadn’t even gotten to talk to her.

  I splashed water on my face and patted it dry. My lungs filled with a full breath before I cleared my throat and stepped out of the bathroom.

  Freddie was in the recliner lazily watching some sitcom that wasn’t even remotely funny. “Could you switch to the news for a quick second?”

  “Must I?”

  “For just a second, please?” I said as sweetly as I could manage.

  Freddie groaned but flipped through the stations stopping when he got to a channel reporting on the situation in New York. The reporter was behind a desk, her hair done in bouncy waves that flowered over her shoulders.

  “Damn! Look at her,” Freddie said almost as if he were in a trance. “You should wear your hair like that.”

  My hair was shoulder length and as straight as a box of toothpicks. Curling my hair never worked. It would bounce up around my ears and after ten minutes it would be completely straight again.

  “I wish I could,” I said not caring an ounce about the woman’s hairstyle.

  Freddie grunted. “Go to the salon like other women do. Christopher’s wife runs one just down the road. He tells me you should stop there and she’ll give you a discount.”

  “We don’t really have the money for that, do we?”

  “Probably not anymore,” Freddie said as he shrugged and gulped down the last bit of booze in his glass. He held it out in my direction. “Would you mind?”

  “Sure,” I replied. It wasn’t like I could say no.

  The reporter wasn’t telling us much new. There had been some kind of minor outbreak and they claimed it had been contained. She said that everyone needed to stay indoors and limit their contact with anyone that might be sick. Then she said to wash your hands frequently. Those with lowered immune systems should wear a mask even inside their homes.

  It didn’t sound as if they knew anything about the virus or how it was spreading. If Polly had been telling the truth, and I had no reason to believe she wasn’t, things were far worse than the reporter was letting on.

  I walked into the kitchen, gripping the glass tightly in my hand. Why weren’t they freaking out the same way Polly had been? Maybe they really were trying to make sure that no one panicked because if people did, it could make things even worse.

  I refilled Freddie’s glass and walked back into the living room. Instead of giving it to him, I set it down on the table next to him.

  “I need to run to the store,” I said crossing my arms.

  “At this hour?” Freddie asked.

  “It’s eight. That’s not that late. The store is open until ten.”

  “What do you need at eight o’clock at night?” Freddie asked his eyelids drooped lower and lower with each word. “You can just get it in the morning instead of not looking for a job.”

  I chewed on my already raw cheek. It was surprising how quickly the answer came to me.

  “Toilet paper,” I said. “We’re totally out. I just used the last of it.”

  “Oh, well get some orange juice while you’re there,” Freddie said. “For breakfast.”

  “No problem,” I said grabbing my keys and dashing out of the house.

  Bullshit he wanted orange juice for breakfast. Unless of course, his plan was to mix some vodka into it.

  There were no other cars driving down the dark roads. The street lights were spaced out because the town tried to keep costs low by alternating which ones were on and which were off.

  I hated being alone in the dark but it was especially haunting after having talked to Polly about what she was dealing with. How long would it take for whatever it was to spread to our town? Was that really even a possibility?

  Polly sure seemed convinced that it was. I couldn’t even remember the last time Polly had been that frightened. Maybe she hadn’t ever been.

  She was always the strong one. Polly had been the one to keep our spirits up after mom’s cancer diagnoses.

  After our father died five years ago from a heart attack, she was the one that kept us all from falling apart. My mom had wanted to give up. She couldn’t imagine life without him. I fell into a deep depression, after all, I was daddy’s little girl and with the Freddie and money problems… I hadn’t been sure how much more I could take.

  Polly had taken care of her every need. She’d paid the bills, organized the funeral, hell, she took care of everything and I… I hadn’t done shit.

  Perhaps that was why I gave everything I had for mom’s treatment. I had to feel like I was doing something. If mom would have known any of the money came from Freddie and me, she would have refused to get the treatment. But I hadn’t wanted to lose her. I would have done anything to help.

  Mom was going to help me leave Freddie and get my life together. She tried before but I kept hoping things would change. I was a stubborn idiot. My mom just wanted to get better and then she was going to focus on helping Maddie and me.

  As I walked down the empty aisles at the grocery store, I couldn’t stop thinking about my mom. Was she really gone? Did Polly know for sure? I mean, if something had really happened at the facility that put people’s lives in danger, wouldn’t the news be everywhere?

  I clicked on my phone as I filled my cart with cereal and boxes of oatmeal. I browsed the websites as I continued through the store, stuffing the cart with far more than I could afford.

  Most everything online said the same things I’d heard on the news. There was one site, however, that seemed different from the others.

  I clicked on the link that read ‘Start to Panic - Not Just New York.’ It took me to a strange blog site with a forum of random posts about anything and everything related to current events, politics, and conspiracy theories. The one about the outbreak was full of random posts.

  One post from someone claiming to live in New York said it was bad out there. Another from BabyGirl69 said if you left your house, you’d die.

  I continued to scroll down, passing all the posts that sounded like they came from conspiracy theorists ranting about aliens and apocalypses until one of them caught my eye. It was a post about the facility and that the media was covering up what was really going on. The post specifically named the facility along with all of its sister facilities spread across the country. One of them was located in Chicago, which wasn’t that far away.

  The person who made the post said that all of the facilities were testing a cancer cure on patients. He said it was the first round of a modified virus that had been injected into those that were terminal and that things had gone very wrong. The post had basically confirmed everything that Polly had told me although it said a bit more.

  The man claimed to have worked at one of the facilities and managed to get away before everything went to shit. He also said that we’re all screwed.

  After the cure was injected, it changed. Mutated. Those who’d received the drug got better before things took a turn and eventually became contagious. First, tumors would shrink and then the seizures would start. Shortly after, horrible bouts of vomiting would take over. It would seem like a normal side-effect but eventually, the patient would
begin to vomit green bile. When it turned red, the patient was considered contagious. If you were still with them when their eyes bulged and turned crimson it was too late for you and you should probably blow your brains out.

  After that, several folks were calling him a troll and telling him to get lost. I continued to scroll down hoping to find more posts from him but there wasn’t anything else.

  The post was enough to freak me out. A chill ran over my body and I turned off my phone to quickly finish my shopping.

  My cart was overflowing when I got to the cashier. She chewed her gum as she blinked at me.

  “This is a lot for me to ring up,” she said glancing at the clock.

  “Sorry,” I said forcing a smile.

  “We’re like closing soon.”

  I widened my eyes and clapped my hands together. “Then we better get started.”

  I sent Maddie a quick text as I waited for the cashier to scan some of the items. When it didn’t feel like her and the bagger were working fast enough, I stuffed my phone into my back pocket and helped pack the bags. Neither of them complained about the extra help.

  After I packed everything into my car, I checked my phone again. Nothing from Maddie or Polly.

  Hopefully, Maddie was locked in her room and tucked into bed. I hated even thinking it but deep down, I knew she wasn’t going to be there when I got back.

  Chapter Five

  As I drove home, I could still hear the panic in Polly’s voice. Whatever was happening out there, was serious. And she was frightened and alone.

  If what I read was accurate and it was happening all over the country, it could reach us sooner than Polly had guessed. Perhaps it was already in our little town making its way from person to person.

  I gripped the steering wheel and pressed down on the accelerator. I stared at the road as if it were the enemy. The houses passed by in a blur making the familiar surroundings seem strange… unfamiliar.

  If Maddie wasn’t home when I got there, I was going to lose my shit. I couldn’t help but think it was all some kind of a joke or something that would be explained in the morning.