silence, “it looks like the authorities are finally stepping up and doing something. Maybe we can get out of here today!”
“Not to be a downer,” said Ryan, “but there’s still the small issue of us being in the middle of the ocean.”
“Dude,” said Bill, “that’s what they make planes and stuff for. We aren’t in outer space.”
Theo was happy to see that Bill was regaining a little of his former personality. Finding the empty motel room had given him a little hope. Hope is good, Theo reckoned, but escape would be better.
They walked down to the convenience store on Michelle’s quiet suggestion that finding something for breakfast might be a good way to start the day. Theo still couldn’t quite figure her out. Michelle spoke mostly in whispered side conversations with Ryan or Kylee.
For that matter, Theo didn’t really understand the dynamic of the relationship between Michelle and Ryan. Then again, he didn’t understand whatever there was with him and Kylee. Since the world fell apart at the seams the two of them had stood side by side and comforted each other, and they had shared a bed both nights, but that was it. Did that make her his girlfriend? Theo figured the fact that he was even stopping to consider this was a good sign. Maybe a little hope was helping him, too.
As they approached the convenience store, Theo saw two police cars emblazoned with “POLICE” and “Ventnor City” stationed at the ends of the parking lot. The store itself was boarded up and inaccessible. In the lot, a table had been erected and a line of survivors approached it one by one. Behind the table, two men in jeans and polo shirts were jotting down information on legal pads and sending those at the head of the line around the side of the building. Though the men were not in any uniform, Theo observed, the firearms at their sides gave them away as the officers from the police cars.
Ryan approached a couple at the back of the line. Both of them appeared to be in their thirties. The woman’s curly hair was unkempt and she had a vacant look in her eyes. The man had what might be part of a t-shirt wrapped around his calf. The shirt had red blotches staining the cotton. The man’s face was ghostly pale. He didn’t look well.
Ryan chatted with the man for a minute. The woman appeared not to see him there. The man punctuated his speech with wide sweeps of his arm. Ryan nodded repeatedly and, after giving the man a reassuring pat on the shoulder, jogged back to his friends. “So, here’s the deal. That guy, Evan, says that the cops here are rationing out food. They’ve got stuff coming from down at the casinos and all but it’s all under the control of the authorities.”
Kylee scrunched her face. “How did the Ventnor cops get their hands on stuff from AC?”
“Apparently,” said Ryan, “the departments are all combined now. At least until this all gets resolved.”
Bill scowled. His earlier enthusiasm was waning. “I don’t see how rationing out food is helping the bigger problem of getting us out of here.”
Theo had an idea. “Let’s get some food, and then we can go to the police headquarters and see who knows what’s being done.” He paused. “Anybody know where the headquarters is?”
“Not a problem,” said Ryan, his hand going to his pocket. “I’ll just… oh, wait.” He awkwardly crossed his arms, as his natural habit, to research anything and everything on his phone, was broken. It occurred to Theo that he couldn’t remember the last time he had gone without his phone for two days. He could bet it had been even longer for Ryan.
The teens got in line behind Evan and the silent woman and waited their turn. Twenty minutes later, they reached the front of the line.
“How many in your party?” asked the officer on the left.
Theo had to fight the urge to laugh. The idea of the five refugee teens as a “party,” as if they were about to dine at a five star restaurant, struck his weary mind as hysterical.
“How many?” the officer asked again.
“Five of us,” said Theo.
The officer jotted something down on the pad in front of him.
“Round the corner. Next?”
They followed the officer’s instructions. Around the back of the convenience store, they were treated to an orange, a pack of saltines and a bottle of water each. The teens decided to eat on the way to the city.
Theo looked at his “party.” None of them had showered or changed in days. Considering everything they had been through since the night of the disaster, they looked okay. The one thing he didn’t like was how each of them seemed lost in his or her own thoughts. There was no camaraderie, and something in Theo’s mind told him that survival might depend on this little group’s members supporting each other.
Theo turned to Michelle. “So... Michelle, what do you do when you’re not trapped on an island?” Michelle laughed and the others followed. Theo laughed with them. He could feel the mood lifting.
Atlantic City had suffered tremendously from the disaster. It occurred to Theo that the city might have been at the center of the earthquake. Many of the shops and small apartments were in ruins. The casinos appeared to have mostly cosmetic damage.
The city had been packed with residents and tourists two nights earlier. Now the streets were full of corpses, most of who, it appeared, had drowned as the tidal wave had flooded the streets. Some of the bodies were bloody and beaten. Theo felt light-headed as he considered the probability that some of the survivors had attacked the others.
The police were out in force, both in uniform and out. Trucks were being loaded with the deceased on every street. The casinos Theo and his friends passed were barricaded. Among the contingent manning the barricades outside Caesar’s Palace was Officer Menendez. Bill saw him first and waved as he approached.
Menendez looked more nervous than when they had first met him. He recognized the teens and gave them a weak smile. “Hi kids, listen, you can’t go in the casino right now.”
“Why not?” asked Bill.
“There’s some… government meetings, I guess you’d say.” Menendez’s eyes darted away as he said this and Theo wondered what it was the officer was keeping from them.
Theo gestured out to the street behind him. “So we hear all this is under some combined police force. Does that mean that someone is figuring out how to get us home?”
Menendez shrugged. His eyes were doing their nervous dance again. “Beats me. Look, you guys are in a tough spot, no doubt. I’m gonna give you some advice. Stay clear of the city. If you’ve got a place to hunker down, do it and wait til somebody gets you when all this is figured out. This place is wild right now, and dangerous, and the guys in them casinos…” Menendez’s voice trailed off as he looked away.
“What guys in the casinos?” asked Theo.
“Nothing,” said Menendez, “didn’t mean to say that. Now just get out of AC, you got it?”
With that, he turned and walked back to the other officers stationed at the barricade.
“What the hell was that?” Bill asked as the teens walked up to the boardwalk.
“He’s hiding something,” said Kylee.
“Oh most definitely,” said Ryan. “There’s something in the casinos that’s got him spooked.”
“He seems pretty spooked by everything,” said Michelle.
Theo listened in silence as they walked. Despite Michelle’s valid point, he agreed that Officer Menendez appeared to be keeping something from them. He had almost said too much and then pulled himself back at the last second. Still, what did it matter? As far as he was concerned, Theo thought, the head of North Korea could be holding meetings up there, and if the end result was that he got to leave this place and go home, it would be just fine.
The teens spent the rest of the day exploring the island. There wasn’t much to see. Most of the city had remained but Ventnor was just a thin strip that went a few streets into Margate and then ended abruptly. The broken avenue ran straight into the ocean. If there was anything left of the towns and barrier islands farther south, Theo and his friends couldn’t see it.
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The combined police force was everywhere on the island. By late in the day it seemed all the bodies had been removed from the streets and, presumably, from the buildings. More than once, Theo had shuddered as his gaze went out over the ocean and he thought about the likely final resting place of those poor victims.
Dinner that night was fruit, tuna and a bottle of water. Theo wondered how long he and his friends could continue on such a reduced diet. His stomach gurgled as they climbed the stairs back to their penthouse apartment. He climbed into bed and stared into the darkness as he waited for Kylee to arrive. Finally, he felt her climb into the bed next to him.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey to you.”
“Well this was an exciting day.”
Theo smiled. “They just get better and better. Island living at its finest.”
Kylee laughed. Theo wished he could see her face. He shifted over in the bed and extended his arm to the side. His hand brushed her hair and she rolled towards him, maneuvering so his arm was supporting her neck.
“So,” Kylee said, “what are you thinking about?”
“I don’t really know. I guess I’m still wondering why nobody has found us. We haven’t seen one plane, and you know the military has satellites that could find us no matter where in the ocean we’ve ended up.”
“I don’t even know how this makes any sense,” said Kylee. “I mean, how could we be out in the ocean? How could all this land