Mrs. Latham’s voice was honey-smooth, like a kindergarten teacher. Her brown hair was cut in a chin-length bob, and she wasn’t old enough to have gray roots. “I want to talk to you, Beth, about some of the upsetting things you’ve dealt with in the last year. I’d like for you to tell me which ones stand out as the most important ones in your memory.”
Beth didn’t know where to start. “Finding my teacher and her husband dead, I guess. Deni disappearing. Little Sarah getting kidnapped. Dad getting shot.”
“Do you have a problem reliving the events in your mind? Playing them over and over?”
“Sometimes. I try not to think about them, though. Sometimes I can’t control it. I have dreams about them.”
“You want to tell me about those dreams?”
Beth really didn’t want to. She was tired and jumpy. She still wasn’t sure she hadn’t been followed over here. “Do I have to?”
Mrs. Latham exchanged looks with her mother. “Of course not. Only if you want to.”
“I don’t.”
“Okay.” She said it like it was just fine with her. “Beth, sometimes traumatic events can create lasting effects in our bodies. Do you have any physical symptoms? Stomachaches, dizziness, sleeplessness?”
“Headaches,” she said. “I have headaches. I have one right now.”
Mrs. Latham seemed glad. She made a note of it, nodding. Beth looked around the room, trying to focus on the way she’d decorated. Ben was clearly the star of the home. There was an entire wall devoted to his T-ball career, a picture of him with a red, white, and blue Uncle Sam suit on. School portraits from preschool to third grade.
A piano sat against the wall, the primer music open to “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” And over the couch was a framed mural that Ben must have painted. Either that, or it was by one of those crazy earless painters who made millions from their colorful blobs creatively slathered on canvas.
Mrs. Latham put the notebook down. “Beth, let’s get off the subject of the bad things that happened and just talk about you. What do you want to be when you grow up?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Well, you’re a very good playwright, a great director, a great actress. Do you see yourself doing something in the performing arts?”
Beth shrugged. “Not really. I think I’m over that.” From the corner of her eye she saw the shadow of someone walking past the window. She jumped.
Mrs. Latham looked out. “That’s just my husband, Beth. Did he startle you?”
Her heart was racing. “No. I’m okay.”
“She’s very jumpy,” Kay said. “Lots of things have been startling her lately.”
Mrs. Latham studied her. Beth imagined her turning pages in the textbook of her mind. “Page 133, ‘Patient Jumping Out of Skin.’ ”
“Beth, are you expecting something bad to happen?”
Beth brought her gaze back to the counselor. “Maybe.”
“Tell me about that.”
She’d said too much. “Bad things do happen a lot.”
“But aren’t you excited that the Pulses have ended? Don’t you look forward to having electricity again? Technology? TV?”
She wished they could pull the window shades. Perspiration was breaking out on her face, prickling under her arms. “Yeah, I guess. If they ever do happen. But that’s a long way off.”
She felt bad for the counselor. She was probably frustrating her. But she feared if she spoke too much, she’d start crying. And then she couldn’t stop.
“I like your haircut,” Mrs. Latham said. “It’s pretty. It looks nice on your face.”
Beth touched her hair. “Thank you.”
“Do you like it?”
She hated it, almost as much as she hated the reason for it. “Not really. It’ll grow back.”
“Why’d you cut it?”
She looked at her mother. Had she discussed this with Mrs. Latham beforehand? Her mother clearly thought it was a symptom of her going off the deep end. She wondered if Mrs. Latham’s textbook had a chapter for random haircuts.
“It was hot,” she said. “It always looked stringy and dirty.” There. That sounded normal, didn’t it? Did she sense in her words that she was trying to disguise herself so a killer couldn’t find her? Maybe Mrs. Latham wasn’t that tuned in to the human mind.
Mrs. Latham finally sent her outside to wait for her mother. Beth figured she was boring her to death. She sat in the shadows of the garage, watching the street for the killer who might be looking for her, trying to figure out which house she lived in. By now, he may already know.
Maybe she should go to the police. Maybe if she did, they could find the killer and lock him up before he came for her. Then again, maybe he hadn’t come because he was a man of his word. A killer with a conscience. He’d said that he would only kill her and her family if she talked.
Her silence could be saving her life and the lives of those she loved.
And no amount of counseling could change that.
INSIDE THE LATHAMS’ LIVING ROOM, KAY WIPED TEARS. “I’M sorry she wasn’t more forthcoming. I know you didn’t get much from her.”
Anne looked at her notes. “Actually, I got more than you think. Kay, I think your concerns about post-traumatic stress disorder are well-founded. Beth is showing several of the symptoms.”
“She is?”
“Yes. She has physical symptoms, a sense of gloom, she’s unable to think about the future because she seems to have the sense that she won’t be here. The dreams she has of these traumatic events, her inability to concentrate or focus. Her jumpiness, as if she’s living in a state of fear. Lack of interest in the things she used to be interested in. Detachment from the excitement over the Pulses ending.”
“So what can we do to help her?”
Anne closed her file. “Kay, this is considered an anxiety disorder, so there are some medications that might help her. Dr. Morton could take my recommendation and put her on something if we decide that’s the best approach. But first, I’d like to have a few more sessions with her alone. See if I can get her to talk about the things that have traumatized her, and maybe we can retrain her thinking so that she can cope with these things. Meanwhile, just reinforce her confidence in her skills and her talents, invite her friends over to get her mind off these events, try to get her to loosen up and have fun.”
“Okay, I’ll try.”
“And try to get her focused on the future. On the rebuilding and the good things she has to look forward to.”
Kay wasn’t quite satisfied. “What about her cutting her hair? Would PTSD make her do that?”
“It could, though I can’t quite put together why she did that yet. Maybe she just wanted a change.”
“Not like that. Not my prissy little Beth. To just chop it off like that, without any warning . . .”
Anne thought that over. “It is disturbing. I’ll keep trying to get to the bottom of it. But PTSD does sometimes cause strange behaviors.” She looked at her calendar. “Why don’t we get together next week?”
Kay made the appointment, then walked outside, wondering if she was doing the right thing. Did Beth really need counseling? Did she need medication? Or simply more prayer? Maybe she just needed for Kay to spend more time with her.
The idea of taking a job with the recovery team fled from her mind. No, Beth needed her. And so did Logan and Jeff.
She found Beth sitting in the garage, staring out at the street. The dismal look on her pale face only reinforced what Anne Latham had said.
Beth needed help. And Kay would do whatever it took to get it for her.
TWENTY-SIX
DOUG HAD RESISTED KAY’S DESIRE TO USE SOME OF THEIR precious cash to buy instant coffee, but she had won, and as he sipped it at the kitchen table early Monday morning, he remembered what a luxury it was. He had to sip it black, since he’d put his foot down about buying sugar, but the scent and taste and warmth on his tongue brought back memories of life before th
e outage. Would life really go back to normal?
Sleep was a rarity when he worked the night shift at the sheriff’s department, then got up to chop wood, hunt, and work in the garden that would help feed them for the next few months. And then there were his sermons that had to be composed, and people in his church who needed attention and care. In his spare time, he worked on converting the engine in his Expedition, anxious to get it running again when he had fuel to put in it. There was so much to be done and not enough time.
It was five a.m., and no one was up yet, so he sat under the light of an oil lamp, trying to formulate what he was going to say to Craig about finding a place to live. The young man had made no effort to find a place yet.
Eloise’s house sat empty, completely furnished. When she died, her son had encouraged Doug to rent it out if he wanted. The neighborhood did use her backyard for raising rabbits, and someone had stolen siding off of the back of her house, since lumber was so hard to come by. But other than dust and cobwebs, the interior of the house was in good shape. He would have to be firm with Craig and insist that he walk over with him to look at it.
He heard someone coming down the stairs and looked up to see Craig, fully dressed and ready for work, carrying a big bag on his shoulder.
“You’re up early.”
Craig’s eyes looked sleepy. “Yeah, I wanted to be ready for my first day of work today. There’s an awful lot to do.” He looked around the kitchen. “Is that coffee I smell?”
“Yeah, want some?” Doug got up and got the pot he had boiled over a fire on the grill outside. He got Craig a cup and filled it.
Craig took it and breathed in the scent. “Wow, this is great. Just what I need. I miss Starbucks.”
“Yeah, me too. So what have you got in that bag?”
Craig took a seat at the table and set the bag in another chair. “Plans and schematics and pages of documents I’ve been reviewing about the power substations, the refineries, and the strategic petroleum reserves. That kind of thing.”
Doug was fascinated. “I can’t even imagine overseeing something like that. I’d be completely overwhelmed.”
“I am, a little,” Craig admitted. “But we’re taking things a step at a time. The first job was to find a place to set up our offices. Saturday one of my team members found and rented the building that Champland Insurance used to have.”
“I know that building. Over by the conversion plant?”
“That’s right. Since we’ll be working closely with the plant, it was convenient. We got it complete with all their office furniture.”
“So I guess Champland Insurance won’t be bouncing back.”
“Not anytime soon. The insurance industry bottomed out after the Pulses started.”
“So where are you going to start with the recovery?”
Craig sipped his coffee. “Actually, the recovery effort has been going on since the Pulses began. Several U.S. departments have been working together with the White House to do as much advance rebuilding as possible.”
Doug heard his bedroom door, off the kitchen, open. Kay came out in a pair of shorts and a T-shirt and padded barefoot into the room. “Morning. You guys want some eggs?”
“Sounds good,” Doug said. “Craig was just telling me about the recovery. That the work started at the beginning of the Pulses.”
That got Kay’s attention. “So they’re all ready to get the power turned back on?”
“Well, not exactly,” Craig said. “After the Pulses ended, Congress called an emergency session to implement funding for the recovery teams and approve plans for rebuilding. Once that was done, the recovery teams started work on getting the power trucks running, so they’d be ready to move when we were ready.”
“What about fuel tanker trucks?” Doug asked. “You can’t run the power trucks if you can’t transport fuel.”
“Exactly. They’ve been converting the fuel tanker trucks. Our goal is to get fuel in here so we can black start some of the power generators.”
Kay cracked some eggs into a bowl and stirred them up. “What is black starting?”
“Good question,” Craig said. “Frankly, I’d never heard the term before a year ago.”
“I know what it is,” Doug said, glancing at Kay. “Years ago, people who’d studied electromagnetic pulses recommended that changes be made within the power industry, so that in the event of a nuclear bomb in our upper atmosphere or an E-bomb that caused an electromagnetic pulse, there would be a way to generate electricity. Who would have predicted that we’d have millions of EMPs and that it wouldn’t be man-made? That it would have come from a star?”
“No one. But fortunately, the power companies did listen to the recommendations, and they divided their power grids into islands, so that if one area went down, the others could keep going.” Craig took a roll of paper out of his bag and unrolled it on the table. “Here are the ones in this area.”
Doug leaned forward, studying the map.
“Each one provided electricity for local load areas,” Craig went on. “Black starting those islands meant using small generators to jump-start larger generators. Those could then start the main power station generators.”
Doug nodded. “And the generators that will black start them require a lot of fuel.”
“Yes,” Craig said. He was clearly in his element, and Doug couldn’t help being impressed at his knowledge and passion for his task.
Kay stopped stirring and came to the table.
“The problem was that it isn’t just electricity that has to be restored,” Craig said. “Every silicon chip within those stations has been destroyed. So before we can even get the system black started, we have to do some significant rebuilding of the control circuits within the stations themselves.”
Kay looked crestfallen. “That could take forever.”
Craig smiled. “Not quite. But it’s an overwhelming job for all of us leading the recovery. It’s the first time in the history of the country that the government has been forced to deal with disaster in every county of every state simultaneously. It’s not as if people from the north can rush down and help the ones in the south, like they often do after a disaster. And no other countries are any better off. Everyone is struggling. The only ones who aren’t are the ones who don’t depend on electricity. The Amish, for instance. They were all set up for something like this.”
“I used to think they were crazy,” Kay said. “But now I think they’re brilliant. They didn’t miss a beat after this disaster, did they?”
“Nope. They went right along with all they were doing. And they became the experts that society looked to to learn how to do things. Up in Pennsylvania, they actually began doing workshops to teach people how to live. They’ve been a big help to people in that area.”
“So how are you going to get fuel to black start those stations?” Kay asked. “Is it even possible?”
“Yes, we have strategic petroleum reserves that have almost a billion barrels of crude oil stored. The mechanical pumps to get it through the pipelines have been rebuilt, so they’re ready to go. But first, we have to get the refineries back online.”
“Oh, my word,” Kay said. “There are so many steps. I’d go crazy if I were you.”
“Yeah, it’s tough. I’m more of an instant gratification guy. It’s going to take truckloads of patience to work my way through this. But we’ll do it one step at a time.”
She set down the bowl of eggs. “And you’re in charge of all this?”
“Not completely. We have teams in every region, with state directors. I’m one of a handful of people in charge of the central Alabama region. It’s a real team effort. We have to get the power to the refineries so they can refine the crude oil. Alabama’s resources will first go toward powering the refineries in Saraland, Mobile, Atmore, and Tuscaloosa. Saraland has the largest capacity. They produced 80,000 barrels a day before the Pulses. They’ll be first to get their power on.”
Doug looked up at Kay
. “So that means we’ll have to wait a lot longer.”
“Maybe not too much longer,” Craig said. “But there are a lot of unknowns right now.”
Doug smirked and winked at Kay. “Want to move to Saraland?”
“I also have to hire people to recruit and hire all the workers, assign them to areas where their experience and expertise can be used, and coordinate the labor. So tell everyone you know that we’re hiring. We’ll set up tables at the next FEMA disbursement in a couple weeks to hire people. But we’ll be starting to hire even today. We’ll make sure it’s in the papers, so word should get around quickly.”
Kay got the eggs and started for the door to cook them on the grill. “Trust me, word will spread like wildfire. This is America. People will want to help.”
“The power companies will be hiring back all their employees, so those already trained will be higher up in the hierarchy, and the newcomers will work under them. It’s funny. The blue-collar workers are the most valuable people around right now. White-collar folks are pretty much useless.”
“Tell me about it,” Doug said. “Not a real high demand for stockbrokers these days.”
“What about the mechanics and engineers you’ve already drafted?” Kay asked.
“They’ll be at the forefront of the recovery. Especially the engineers and electricians. We’ll leave the mechanics in the conversion plants to keep converting vehicles that we can use. We’ll add to that carpenters and construction workers, architects, communications workers, computer techs, and a whole host of occupations that will help us recover. Even if the applicants are not experienced, there are things they can do to help with the effort. We’re also getting the National Guard units involved. We’re fighting a war here, but this time it’s not against people.” He finished his coffee and gave Doug a look. “You could come to work for us, Doug. You too, Kay.”
Doug leaned back in his chair. “I’m pretty busy with the sheriff’s department, not to mention preaching.”
“But are you getting paid?”