The police department had a staff of five, including two patrolmen who served part-time and devoted most of their energies to buying and selling antique guns online. Oleander considered itself a nice town, full of good people, and there wasn’t, in those first two days, much looting or vandalism. But there was more than the police were equipped to stop. Especially since one officer was tasked to spend most of his days driving through town, piping announcements through his rooftop megaphone that were intended to calm the populace. Do not panic. The water is safe to drink. The air is safe to breathe. The soldiers are here for your safety. Do not panic. Do not panic.
It was a phrase that tended to have the opposite effect.
Those who had an in-case-of-emergency bottled-water supply drank only from that. Those who trusted neither the police nor the air donned masks or wrapped T-shirts around their faces when they went outside. Those who depended on constant access to the Internet went a little nuts.
And everyone had a theory:
The tornado had caused a nuclear-reactor leak (though there was no nuclear reactor within a hundred miles of Oleander – “as far as we know”).
The country was under attack.
The government wanted to erase Oleander from the map, just because it could.
They were all unwitting subjects of a psychology experiment.
Possibly an experiment run by aliens.
On Saturday afternoon, two days after the storm, the megaphone message changed, announcing a town meeting. Every household was requested to send at least one representative. There would be free coffee.
There would be answers.
They crammed into the school gymnasium, downed their weak coffee, and waited to be convinced that their world wasn’t broken beyond repair. No one was in much of a hurry to sit down, not before they’d exhausted all possibilities for hugging and weeping and retelling the story of how they’d made it through. It would hurt less once it became a story, something to be remembered and rehashed in a neat linear form. Some tottered on crutches; others brought pillows on which to rest plaster-encased limbs. Almost everyone bore bandages, stitches, burns, or scratches, some badge of honor from the storm. Even Ellie, though the shallow slash on her face had nearly healed.
She and her parents – temporarily reunited by crisis – squeezed into the fourth row. To their left sat Chip Gordon, the high school chemistry teacher known to bump up his salary by making and selling illegal fireworks out of the chem lab all summer. On their right was Rosemary Wooden, older sister of the departed Eugenia, who had always been (in her own estimation) the smarter and (in everyone’s estimation) meaner sibling. Her disposition had not improved with the slaughter of her sister in a drugstore massacre.
Ellie had come to the meeting only because her mother requested it, and when it came to her mother, saying yes was easier. She would have preferred to stay at home, in her room, staring. It was how she’d spent the last two days, staring at the ceiling, trying and failing to regain her purchase on the world. Since the storm, she’d felt like she was living underwater, everything blurry and muffled and slow. Everything except the voice in her head.
Unlike the rest of the world, the voice felt real.
And it knew her sins.
The mayor took the stage. Ellie wondered if everyone else could see that he was trembling, or if it was just her. She’d started to think a lot of things were just her.
He welcomed the town, offered his sympathies for their struggles, promised them that Oleander would band together in this time of trouble. He recited these sentiments in a monotone, reading verbatim from his notes, never once raising his eyes to meet the crowd. He called a line of football players onto the stage, introducing them as the Watchdogs, an impromptu neighborhood watch that would ensure the continuing security and tranquility of the town. Special commendation went to Baz Demming, police lieutenant’s son and star quarterback, whose brainstorm this had been.
The sight of Baz penetrated Ellie’s haze. She could feel his eyes searching the crowd – surely not for her. It had been years since she’d had to worry about that. But they could easily fall on her accidentally, and if they did, she felt as if her skin might literally burn.
That time is over, she told herself.
That me is gone.
The voice knew better.
A screen was unfurled. It lit up, revealing a middle-aged middleman, graying and paunchy and dressed in civilian clothes. He introduced himself as Colonel Matthew Franklin. He didn’t bother to explain how he’d managed to appear before them with all phone and Internet lines down; when it came to its own needs, the government always had its ways.
“I apologize that I couldn’t join you in person,” he said, smiling avuncularly into the camera, “but rest assured that a joint task force of National Guard and FEMA personnel is doing everything in its power to restore… Oleander to the life it once knew.” There was a noticeable pause before he spoke the name of the town, as if he’d needed a whispered reminder from someone off camera. “I’m sure you have many questions about the quarantine” that’s been erected at the town borders —”
It was the first time anyone official had used the term quarantine. Murmurs rippled through the crowd.
“— but I assure you that all measures taken have been for your own safety. We’ve had a bit of an… incident at a facility several miles from your borders, but I assure you no harm will come to you. I repeat, as long as you remain within the town borders, you will be perfectly safe. As soon as the situation has been contained, we’ll restore full freedom of movement. In the meantime, our top priority is your safety. On that you have my word, and the word of the United States government.”
The screen went black. The murmurs rose to a dull roar.
“If it’s so safe, why ain’t he settin’ foot in it?” someone shouted from the back. Someone else cursed the tornado, and several more cursed the government. The surging anger was palpable, and bubbling beneath it was a dangerous current of fear.
“People, people, stay calm,” Mayor Mouse pleaded with the crowd. “You heard the man. Something spilled out there, or exploded, or what have you – nothing those men can’t handle.” He was off his written notes, and out of his depth. “Let them worry about fixing whatever mess they made out there, and what say we worry about fixing our town?”
“How ’bout you fix the damn phone lines!”
“And how much longer am I supposed to go without my TV?”
“My kids are out there – they don’t even know if I’m dead or alive!”
“They’re liars,” said a deep voice on the far right of the room. Scott Prevette rose to his feet, fist in the air. “You don’t clue into that soon, they’ll see us all dead.”
The audience fell silent, hesitant to give its fury full release if it meant siding with a Prevette. But Scott saved them the trouble, striding out of the room, the rest of the family falling in behind him, single file. Jule wasn’t with them, Ellie noticed. She hoped the girl had made it safely through the storm.
The mayor was losing his audience. That might have been the end of it, right there, the death of law and order and the trappings of civility that keep the many subordinated to the will of the few, had the deacon not seized the moment – and the stage. Ellie sat up straighter. She hadn’t spoken to him since the night of the storm. In his presence, there’d been a peace, a sureness, that she had not found since. The town felt it, too; she could tell by the way they shifted in their chairs, stilling their restless mutterings, waiting for him to speak.
“The wages of sin is death,” he boomed, joining the mayor at the microphone. “But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Then, astoundingly – especially for a man who believed humor to be the devil’s favorite trick – he laughed. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not quite ready to meet my Maker.”
More astoundingly, the audience laughed with him.
“The government has forsaken us. Nature has forsaken
us. I’ll admit, I’ve asked myself: Has the Lord forsaken us?” He hesitated, giving the question time to settle over the crowd. Or maybe giving himself time to worry the answer. That wasn’t like him. “I’ll admit, I was angry at Him. I’ll admit, I doubted.” From him, it was the ultimate admission of weakness. That wasn’t like him, either. “But then I thought: What if the storm wasn’t a punishment? What if it was a warning? What if this quarantine is a gift? The wolves are at the door, friends. We know this. But maybe the Lord just installed a dead bolt. Oleander belongs to us now. Imagine it: no meddling outsiders, no East Coast politicians telling us how to teach our children, how to love our wives, how to live. Imagine if we could remake this town into what the Lord knows it can be, a shining city on the hill.”
There were a few scattered amens from the crowd, and more than a few hushed dismissals.
“Never forget, our Lord is a just Lord. And He listens to His people. When God called Abraham in the desert, and warned him that Sodom and Gomorrah would be destroyed, did Abraham let this pass? Did he turn his back on the cities of sin and wish them farewell?”
The nos were cautious at first, then – maybe because it was a good day for shouting – less so.
“He did not!” the deacon boomed. “He pleaded with the Lord: Please, my God, spare these cities for the sake of the righteous yet dwelling within. Why do I remind you of this story? Because Sodom and Gomorrah were beyond redemption – but we are not. Because it takes a brave soul to argue with the Lord, and a truly fierce soul to argue and win. You here, Ellie King? How about you come on up here for a moment?”
Ellie started in her seat, unable to believe she’d actually heard her name. But heads were swiveling toward her, and her mother was poking her, urging her to rise. She climbed the stairs to the stage and took her place beside the deacon. With the weight of his hand on her shoulder, she felt steadier than she’d been in days, rooted to the earth and to the world.
“Three nights ago,” the deacon began, “while all of us were hiding fearfully beneath the earth, awaiting the Lord’s judgment, this young, defenseless girl strode into the storm. She entered the house of the Lord, and there she prayed. Not just for the preservation of her own life. Not for the humble building in which she sat. She prayed for the soul of Oleander. Please, Lord, she cried, do not smite the righteous along with the sinners. Have mercy, Jesus, and allow me to lead my people to salvation.”
Is that what she had done? Ellie wondered. Was that the prayer in her heart as the lightning cracked and the sky fell?
“And the Lord listened. You think it’s a coincidence that of all the churches, only hers was spared? You think it’s an accident that the roof was torn away but the building, and the pure soul within it, were left intact? He removed the roof of His own house, and now that it’s gone, now, now, we look up and we can see. I see a Lord who will reward us for our righteousness, as he punished us for our trespasses. I see a merciful Lord who wants us to repent, and quickly. I see a divine opportunity.”
“I see a fraud and a blowhard,” came a shout from the front row, where, as editor in chief of the local paper, Howard Schwarz had brandished a hastily improvised press pass in order to claim a seat. “You think praying is going to rebuild our houses? Or protect us from whatever’s bubbling up out there? You think it’s ever a good sign when the government cuts off all access to the media?”
“Well, now, I don’t know about that,” the deacon said jovially. “We still have the good old Oleander Post, so things can’t be too dire.”
It punctured the tension in the room and scored him another laugh. Schwarz had taken over the paper three years before, turning what had once been a tired but dignified reporting of Little League scores and pie recipes into a weekly screed against small-town life. He didn’t have many friends left.
“He’s not lying!” a woman shouted from the back of the room. “I saw that girl walking through the storm like a crazy person.”
“I saw her, too!” another cried. “Headed to that church like she was on a mission.”
“A mission from the Lord,” the deacon said. “A mission to save the church, in which she succeeded. And a mission to save the town, in which… well, time will tell, won’t it? Ellie, perhaps you’d like to lead us in prayer?”
She’d never spoken before this many people, and she expected her voice to tremble. But it did not. As if some other voice was channeling through her, the words flowed, steady and clear.
“Lighten our darkness, we beseech Thee, O Lord. And by Thy great mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night, for the love of Thy only Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.”
They listened to her in silence. Most crossed their hands and bowed their heads, but a few stared with naked curiosity, as if she were a strange museum piece – or a holy relic.
The deacon believed that she could hear the word of God, and these people believed it, too. She knew it, the way she knew things now, deep within herself, clear and certain.
Maybe they were right. Maybe the voice knocking around her skull was neither a sign of madness nor the devil’s tease, but the Lord, with her before, with her still. If it taunted her, if it reminded her of all her stumbles and her great fall, then perhaps that was only God’s way of redeeming her inner Gomorrah, reminding her of that which must be destroyed.
As usual, the real action happened in the meeting before the meeting. Mayor Mouse and Deacon Barnes – habitual enemies who could each recognize a situation that required allies – hovered before the computer screen side by side, waiting for the duly appointed representative of the United States government to explain exactly what the hell was going on.
Mouse was already starting to consider resignation, and specifically what effect it might have on car sales. This wasn’t the job he’d campaigned for; this wasn’t the town he’d determined to lead. And he had no doubt the deacon would be more than happy to take the reins in his absence. It was the one thing they had in common: they were both ambitious, not just for themselves, but for Oleander. Sure, the deacon had a stick up his ass and was always harping on some lunatic cause or another, waging his endless wars against science textbooks and drugstore condoms. But at least he understood that the town could be something more. And no one agreed more than Mouse. Why else had he persuaded the previous mayor to lease the old power plant to a nameless consortium that, given its deep pockets and paranoia, was almost certainly a front for the military? Why else had he, as mayor, asked no follow-up questions and granted any permit requested of him? Because his reward was an influx of cash: payments for land use and taxes far higher than they should have been. His reward was a new Oleander, soon flush with prosperity. That was the dream, at least.
This was the reality: a “containment breach.” A quarantine. And only Mouse to blame.
Colonel Matthew Franklin explained nothing. Yes, there was a “situation.” Yes, communications lines would be restored when the government deemed it prudent. In the meantime, deliveries of food and emergency supplies would continue to appear at the border… as long as the mayor kept his people in line.
“And if I don’t?” Mouse said, striving for a boldness he didn’t feel.
“You have two choices, Mayor,” the colonel said. “You can keep your people in line, or I can have my men do the job. I’d rather you save us the trouble. In return, I’m happy to offer you complete autonomy.”
“Complete autonomy?” the deacon put in. “In what sense?”
“In all senses. Think of this as an opportunity. A gift from the United States government to you. Comply with our regulations – which, I should note, you will do, one way or another – and for the duration of the quarantine period, Oleander belongs to you.”
6
SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY
There was a rhythm to life in Oleander in this time, syncopated but steady. Even for those untouched by the storm, there was no business as usual, only business in spite of. Despite houseguests taking refuge on
couches, despite downed phone lines and severed supply lines, there were still cows to be milked and fields to be mowed. The business of nature continued apace, as did the business of those whose job it was to keep the town in business, the mayor and the cops and the doctors and the carpenters and the plumbers all working overtime, as if to compensate for the rest – shopkeepers with no goods to sell, gas-station attendants with no gas to pump, farmers whose herds had taken flight. And then there was the business of recovery: cleaning up wreckage, tending to injuries of body and soul. They were two towns in one: those who bore only a faint battle scar living side by side with those who had been cut down where they stood and now struggled to rise.