No Safety in Numbers

  “Would your dad really follow some random kid he doesn’t know home to use his CB?”

  Ginger wilted. “I guess not.”

  The CB squeaked. “Who am I calling?” Darren asked.

  “My friend wants to talk to her dad,” Lexi answered.

  Ginger said the number.

  “It’s ringing,” Darren said.

  When the line picked up, Ginger began dictating to Darren. There were several minutes of back and forth establishing that this call was for real, and then Ginger sobbed to her parents about how she was fine and that they all couldn’t be trapped in here for much longer because the government people were curing everyone.

  “Curing everyone?” Darren said.

  “Yeah,” Ginger said. “Tell my dad the security situation is some disease, but they’re curing it and then we can all go free.”

  The icy fingers of the oil slick strangled Lexi from within.

  “How do they know there’s a cure?” Darren asked.

  “Is that my dad asking or you?”

  “Both.”

  “Lexi said.”

  Silence.

  “He’s not buying it,” Darren said.

  Lexi grabbed the CB from Ginger. “Make him buy it,” she said. She felt light-headed, her heart was racing.

  “He hung up,” Darren said.

  “Call him back!” Ginger wailed.

  Silence. “The line’s busy,” Darren said.

  Ginger flung herself into the pillows and sobbed.

  The mall speakers announced Lights Out and they were shrouded in darkness. The fake candles flickered, throwing huge shadows against the shelves.

  “You still there?” Darren asked.

  “Where else am I going to go?” Lexi said.

  “So you’re really okay in there?”

  At least he thought to ask. “Yeah, I’m fine. Everything’s fine.”

  Silence. Ginger sobbing.

  “Well, I was in the middle of a game.”

  “Oh.” Darkness. Someone snuffling in another aisle. “What game?”

  “Just some Halo.”

  “The regular guys?”

  “Some new kids. I’m sniping the shit out of them. They have no idea what they’re doing.”

  “Sounds boring.”

  “Nothing else to do.”

  Lexi felt a sob catch in her throat. “Well, I’d hate for you to let those noobs off the hook because of me.”

  “Like I’d ever. Radio me again?”

  “Yeah,” Lexi said, knowing she would not.

  “Hang tough, my sister,” he said.

  “Yeah. Hang tough.”

  She turned the CB off and fell back into the pillows. She stared at the flickering shadows until her tears blurred them into nothing.

  M

  A

  R

  C

  O

  Marco staked out the Apple Store all morning watching for the girl in the hoodie, aka the senator’s daughter. Shards of glass were embedded in the carpet outside the store; spilled dirt darkened the fibers in the rug near one of the large potted plants and the tree in it stood at an odd angle. Still, someone had done a good job cleaning the worst of it up. You could almost pretend there’d been no riot here last night.

  The girl in the hoodie never showed, so there was nothing to do but retreat to the restaurant. On his way back, Marco noticed other changes brought on by the riot. There were now guys in hazmat suits roaming the halls with riot shields and long poles that looked like cattle prods. He was not sure this was the wisest decision.

  As if reading his mind, a group of kids jumped on a hazmat cop from behind. The cop began whacking at them with the shield and cattle prod. Then a kid got the prod away from him. Two other hazmat cops appeared and Tasered the kids, dropping them onto the tiles. One cop retrieved the pilfered Taser from the boy’s limp hand.

  Marco wasn’t the only one watching. Some adults cheered. A few carried mops or wore gloves—evidence that at least some people had volunteered for the government’s Cleanup Crew. A group of kids whispered conspiratorially.

  Marco guessed that it would take twenty-four hours, maybe less, for the government to realize that the hazmat cops just provided the assholes with a target for all their pent-up rage. By tomorrow, the asylum would once again belong to the inmates.

  To avoid running into any more mini-riots, Marco took the service elevator up to the Grill’n’Shake. Josh was manning the host station when Marco emerged from the back, wrapping his apron around his waist.

  “It’s ten to twelve, Ensign Cohen. Lunch rush, ahoy.”

  Josh continued to roll silverware. “You want to get the Enforcer or do I have to?”

  The Enforcer was how they’d come to refer to Mr. Seveglia. He’d taken over running the bar after the bartender, a college girl named Heather, started coughing into the drinks. Once relieved of duty, Heather had taken off. No one had seen her since.

  “I’ve got it,” Marco said, returning into the maze of the dining room.

  Mr. Seveglia looked worse than he had this morning—Marco hadn’t thought the man could look any more ticked-off than he had when they made the announcement about the free food giveaway. “It wasn’t bad enough they locked us in here,” he’d said, “but they take away our ability to do business as well?” Now he looked kind of sick and crazy in addition to ticked. The glare from the computer screen gave his skin the pallor of moldy bread.

  The Enforcer didn’t look up from his screen. “We’ve run out of Onion Explosions,” he said. “Wings will be next.”

  Marco wasn’t sure what the man was getting at. “That’s terrible, sir,” he said.

  “Terrible is only the beginning of it, son,” he said. “The free food is apparently disgusting enough that we still have customers, but they’ll feel a financial crunch soon enough and then they’ll eat what the Feds give ’em.”

  “No way,” Marco said. “People have credit cards.”

  Mr. Seveglia tapped the screen. “We’ll run out of food in two days anyway. Then what, my boy?” The Enforcer ducked his head and coughed violently, then pulled out a tissue and blew his nose.

  Was the suggestion here that Mr. Seveglia was planning on closing up shop? Marco would not let that happen. Could not.

  “The halls are not safe,” he began. “I’ve been sneaking out there, trying to learn what I can about this security situation.”

  “Oh yeah?” Mr. Seveglia said, then gulped down what looked like tea.

  “People need a place to eat. The government might be handing out food, but they’re not handing out tables, and the food court’s run by gangs at this point. Why not let people use the restaurant? It could be a safe haven for families. And maybe they’d still buy drinks.”

  Mr. Seveglia coughed again. “I like this thinking,” he said. “What else you got?”

  Marco groped around in his brain. “The bathrooms!” he said, the gears really beginning to spin. “The crews the government tried to pull together to clean the main johns have done shoddy work at best. If we keep ours clean, we can charge people—”

  “A buck?” Mr. Seveglia was looking livelier by the second.

  “Too much,” Marco said. “It has to be a token, something people won’t care too much about. A quarter.”

  “Like they’re feeding—cough—the meter.”

  “Exactly.”

  Mr. Seveglia stood, clapped Marco on the shoulder. Marco wished the man wouldn’t touch him; the Enforcer had just used that hand to wipe his running nose. Marco couldn’t afford to get the cold that was going around.

  “We’ll stay in business yet,” Mr. Seveglia said, gulping down the last of his liquid. “Time for lunch, eh?”

  Mr. Seveglia steered Marco out of the office, locked it behind them. As they walked toward the front, Marco saw Shay standing near the host station.

  She was okay.

  She had come back to him.

  To thank him for helping her get insuli
n for her grandmother? She should have known no thanks were necessary. But it was a nice gesture. Marco paused to look in one of the tchotchke mirrors that adorned the walls of the Grill’n’Shake. His hair wasn’t terrible. His face—well, what could you do?

  He turned, ready to welcome her, sit her down, maybe join her for a quick lunch before things really got going at the restaurant, and saw that she was not alone. She was here with that douche Ryan. From the way she leaned toward him, Marco knew that they were more than friends.

  She was not here to see him. Probably had forgotten his existence entirely. Probably wouldn’t recognize him if he walked right up to them and offered them a table.

  Fuck her.

  If she wanted the tall, dull, and handsome ignoramus, she could have him. Marco didn’t need her. Didn’t need anyone.

  He caught up with Mr. Seveglia, careful to hide behind a column as he passed the front, shielding himself from the happy couple.

  “I have another suggestion,” he said.

  Mr. Seveglia ducked under the counter and into the center of the ovoid bar. “What’s that?”

  “No teens,” he said. “Keep the place family friendly.” He pointed to where Shay and Ryan waited for Josh. “Starting with them.”

  “Teens are really the worst customers anyway,” Mr. Seveglia said, wiping down the freshly washed glasses. “Kick them to the curb and put a sign out. We’ll bring in the good people—the drinkers.” He winked.

  Mr. Seveglia was a sick bastard.

  Marco told Josh the new plan and instructed him to start with Shay and her boyfriend. He suggested Josh bring the grill cook, Jerome, out with him for extra muscle. Then Marco got the sandwich board sign from the janitorial closet and wrote: “Families Welcome! Bring Your Food to Us! We’ll Provide the Fun!” It sounded like the kind of thing his parents would have liked.

  He was reminded that he hadn’t spoken to his family today—he’d been calling home every morning before his mom left for her shift and when his dad would be in from the night cab run. Marco picked up the phone in the back of the restaurant near the kitchen and found the line dead. So he was truly alone now. Not that it changed anything. Marco was good at alone. He was a survivor. He’d make it through this.

  R

  Y

  A

  N

  Awesome. It was the only thing running through Ryan’s brain. Awesome. Awesome. Who cared that they got shut out of the Grill’n’Shake? Just the sight of Shay—skimming a paperback down the aisle from him, his paper flower tucked behind her ear—made him smile. She was the most beautiful person he’d ever seen, and it wasn’t just her body (which he wanted, even now that she’d put back on the flowy overshirt). Her light shone on everything around her. The mall was beautiful. He was the guy he’d always wanted to be. Dangerous things were made safe. He could pick up a book and not be afraid to say he didn’t get it. When he asked who Jane Austen was, glancing at the book she’d been flipping through, she tapped him on the head with Pride & Prejudice and told him to educate himself. Then she held his cheeks in her palms and asked him what he’d been doing all these years in school anyway.

  “Football,” he’d answered.

  Jane Austen was hard. The sentences were long and the story seemed to be about a bunch of girls who wanted to get married. Not exactly the kind of stuff Ryan would have picked up on his own.

  “You like this book?” he asked Shay, walking toward her.

  “Everyone likes that book,” she said. She glanced at where he’d stopped reading. “See, it’s actually really funny. Here, Mr. Bennet just played a trick on his wife by going to visit this new guy in town when he’d sort of tortured her by saying he wouldn’t go.”

  “Why didn’t she just go herself?” The whole thing seemed way too complicated, and he was only on chapter two.

  “A lady can’t just run up to any old gentleman and introduce herself!” she exclaimed in that stuffy British voice. Ryan had the feeling he’d be doing a lot better in English if he had someone like Shay to study with.

  Shay pulled a book called The Chocolate War off a shelf. “Here,” she said, taking the Austen from his hands. “This is about surviving an all-boys school. There are even football games in it.”

  Now this seemed a little closer to Ryan’s corner of the universe.

  Ryan bought himself the book and Shay bought how i live now. “I feel like I need to read this again,” she said.

  Ryan noticed that she said again, meaning she’d read the book before. He was hanging out with a girl who not only read books, but read them more than once.

  They stepped out of the bookstore and Ryan wondered what he should suggest doing next. He had spent his last five bucks on the book, so any options that cost money were out, but he didn’t want her to go. He’d left Mike and Drew in the morning allegedly to find a phone so he could call Thad, but had found Shay in the food court instead. Seeing her, he’d forgotten all about the phone, Thad, everything. But all that came rushing back to him when he saw his two friends tromping down the hallway. The palm tree was instantly reminded of its roots.

  “J. Shrimp!” Drew shouted, holding his arms out. “We’ve been looking all over for you.”

  Mike eyed Shay in a way that made Ryan uncomfortable. “Who’s the lady friend?”

  Ryan took Shay’s hand. “She’s my girlfriend,” he said.

  Shay looked up at him with a smile that made everything else in the universe seem dull in comparison.

  “I’m Shaila Dixit,” she said, holding out her free hand.

  Mike shook it. “A little formal,” he said. He looked at Ryan, smiled, and let go of her hand. “But any friend of Ryan’s is a pal of mine.”

  “Dude,” Drew said, “tell him. We have ten minutes.”

  Mike gave Shay the once-over again, then pulled them both into a corner. “We caught up with some boosters who saw the game Sunday,” he said. “They’re planning an escape through the garage. You in?”

  Ryan’s first thought was, Yes, of course. But then he remembered that escaping would mean leaving Shay, maybe forever. He hadn’t even known her full name until she’d said it moments before. How would he ever find her again?

  “Come with us,” Ryan said, taking her other hand.

  “I can’t leave without my grandmother and sister.” Shay seemed suddenly more nervous, like she’d just remembered that she had a grandmother and sister.

  “Fine,” Mike said. “Bring the old lady and the sister. If she’s cute she can ride in my car.”

  “She’s ten,” Shay said, frowning.

  Ryan squeezed Shay’s hands. He didn’t want her to frown. “Meet me in the parking garage,” he said. “Promise?”

  Shay smiled again and Ryan had to press his lips to hers, drink her in before she was gone. It was like kissing a star: He felt her light inside him.

  She pulled away, slowly. “I’ll be there as soon as I find them.” She squeezed his hands and ran down the hall toward the escalator.

  “Let’s move,” Mike said, pushing Ryan toward the elevator.

  There was a little TV screen in the elevator, which someone had tuned to the local news station. As the three rode to the parking garage level, the news lady yakked about nothing.

  “We have former police chief Patrick MacNeil in the studio. Is it true, Chief MacNeil, that given the length of the confinement and blackout of communication from inside the mall that this is not a hostage situation, but more likely a dirty bomb, and, if so, is there any danger for the surrounding community?”

  The feed cut out.

  “What the…?” Drew said, banging on the screen.

  The elevator reached the parking level. The doors opened and the screen switched to say “Have a Nice Day!”

  “Must have just been that channel,” Ryan said.

  “First the phones, now the news,” Mike said. “You see a pattern?”

  “Shit,” Drew said. “A fucking bomb.”

  “It won’t matter o
nce we get out of here,” Mike said, stepping into the gloom of the parking garage.

  Three older guys, some who looked older than Ryan’s dad, stood under a fluorescent light near a red Suburban. Mike walked up to one and shook his hand.

  “Mr. Reynolds,” Mike said, “this is Ryan Murphy, the kid I was telling you about.”

  Mr. Reynolds had slick silver hair and a tanned face. “Saw you play Sunday,” he said. “Fierce like your brother, eh?”

  “Yes, sir,” Ryan said.

  Something about Mr. Reynolds’s smile and the way he said fierce, as if anything less than fierce was wussy, made Ryan nervous.

  “What’s the play?” Drew asked, smacking his fist into his hand, which was Drew’s “ready” pose.

  Mr. Reynolds patted the side of the Suburban. “This here is the play.”

  The plan was to get as far from the main exit ramp as possible, then gun the Suburban’s engine and fly into the metal-mesh security gate that had been pulled over the parking garage’s opening. The mesh was covered over on the outside by what looked like a giant garbage bag. Mr. Reynolds figured that the gate couldn’t stand up to a beating from his truck. He expected to blow through it and drive his way to freedom.

  Ryan glanced at the central pavilion, where the escalators to the first floor were. How long would it take Shay?

  “Are we all riding in the Suburban?” one of the other men asked. He glanced at a nice Audi coupe parked two aisles over. “I’d hate to leave her here.”

  “No, we caravan,” Mr. Reynolds said. “I checked out all the windows I could find to gather intel on what we’d face beyond the doors. There are only a couple of police cars on the mall grounds, aside from the big tent where those medical guys in the suits are working. But it’s the wall they’ve built around the grounds that I’m worried about. They’ve got a perimeter established to keep the press back.

  “If we’re in a couple of cars going through the gate, though, we can split up on the outside. With more targets, they’ll have a harder time stopping any one of us. I think that’s our best shot at getting out.”

  The plan sounded solid—excitement buzzed through Ryan. He checked the pavilion. Still empty.