The Days After (Big River) Read online

  Later, after Allie was asleep, Angel made some coffee, took a mug up the steps to the man at the helm. The worried mother leaned over the rail and watched the swirling wake behind the boat. She sipped her own coffee, looked and listened for the dinghy to come. Clay, at the wheel of the boat, watched with even more fretfulness than the woman at the rail.

  ***

  Penny and Jacob

  Dead in the water, that was the phrase that popped into Louis's head. Hours down river in the small dinghy, creating distance between the small craft and the Annie Belle, so far, not one thing made him believe that whatever event happened earlier in the day, was anything less than catastrophic. He carefully kept the boat chugging down the center of the wide river. The banks that lined both sides of the river maintained the appearance of a frightening old disaster movie. The noise, the smoke, the panic drifted out across the river like a physical cloud. Even on the water, a great majority of the boats, barges and ships, the big fancy yachts and cruisers floated without control on the undulating brown surf. The more he saw, the more the fear twisted his gut for his family, for Penny and Jacob. The cell phone was useless, no signal, no service...no good. He kept one hand on the handle that guided the small motor and the other on the .38 that he had stuck in the waist of his jeans.

  Finally, he was within a mile or so of the area where he and his family owned a small frame home. The home sat on a street of neat houses, crowded on narrow lots, only a couple of blocks from the riverfront. His eyes searched the shored up bulkheads, he needed to find a place to secret the boat as best he could. Near his neighborhood, he squeezed the dinghy up between a tall charter fishing boat and an old pontoon barge that looked like it had not been used for years. Although, people wandered in the vicinity, no one actually stood on the boats or looked his way. Quickly, he tied off the boat. On the old barge a raggedy tarp lay in a pile on the deck, he pulled it over the dinghy, hoped that it wouldn't be noticed. He pulled himself up and over the side of the barge and hit the shore running.

  A few people tried to talk to him, one of his neighbors even grabbed at his arm and said, “Louis! Hey man, do you know what's going on?” He did not stop or slow down.

  “Sorry, I don't know. I have to get to the house,” he yelled back over his shoulder.

  All the shades were drawn on the two visible windows, Penny's freshly planted flowers dotted the front of the gray sided house with color. Just as Louis fumbled with his key in the door, it swung open and his petite wife grabbed him, the signs of tears on her face. “Are you okay, Sugar?” He hugged her to him.

  Before she answered, Jacob walked into the living room and chattered excitedly, “Hey, Pop! You're home...I told Momma you would get home...boy, somethin's really goin' on out there, isn't it Pop? Course, Momma wouldn't let me go outside...” Eight year old boys are easily excited.

  The father laughed at his son, “Yes, Jacob, something is definitely going on.” He gave him a quick squeeze and said, “I bet there is still some tea in the frig, would you get your pop a glass, please? Be careful, don't make a mess in your momma's kitchen.”

  “You bet,” he moved towards their bright kitchen.

  Penny's worried expression confronted him, as soon as the boy left the room, “Louis..?”

  “I don't have time to explain. Actually, I'm not sure that I can explain, but something is all haywire. I brought the dinghy, that's how I got here. We need to leave here, Penny,” he said.

  “But, why...leave? Where will we go. Leave the house? Won't they fix this... I don't know, Hon. Wouldn't we be safer here at home?” She tried not to cry. Penny, not a weak person, usually handled problems with calm and logical determination. Once, when Jacob stepped on a nail, about two years ago, she stayed cool as a cucumber and jerked him up, dashed to the emergency clinic with him. Louis drove but he admitted later, he about fainted and was so relieved when she really took charge. She recognized that this was no average problem, as the day went by with no change, fear had set in.

  He continued firmly, “I want you to go and pack up at least three or four changes of clothes for all of us. Be sure and get Jacob's allergy pills, as a matter of fact, throw all of the aspirin, cough syrup, everything out of the medicine cabinet in a bag. Use those duffel bags, not the suitcases. Don't plan on being back here for a while, understand?”

  She stood, confused for a moment. Then the pretty little lady, with skin a shade lighter than her husband's and straight black hair that was pulled back from her face with a colorful scarf, straightened her back and walked into the bedroom. She slipped out of her soft skirt and pulled on some jeans. The skirt got stuffed into the bottom of a bag that she pulled from under the bed. She gathered their clothes as her husband had asked.

  Jacob handed his father a glass of tea with a few ice cubes in it. Louis smiled down at him, “Thanks, son. Listen, I need your help in the kitchen. First, would you get that big laundry bag and bring it with you.” In the kitchen, they stuffed all the extra food from their cabinets that they could, into the bag.

  Penny tugged a large duffel bag and a smaller one full of medicines into the living room. She opened the coat closet and took out three windbreakers and Jacob's rain boots and stuffed them down into the already full bag. As the boys came in from the kitchen, she pulled the quilt from the back of the sofa and rolled it up. It would not fit in the bag, but she gave Louis a determined look and stuck it under her arm.

  He removed a shotgun from the top of the coat closet and a couple of boxes of ammo. “Get these bags to the front door,” he said. He went through the kitchen and out the back door to a small shed, rolled a red wagon from the metal building. They didn't own a boat, usually fished right from the nearby shorelines. He often tied off a large heavy duty tube with a bottom built in and handles, let Jacob float around and play from it. He pulled the tube out, flipped it on top of the wagon. He locked the back door and the shed, but something in him said that locks would soon not be any use. At the front door, they loaded the bags into the wagon, tied the tube on top and walked away from their home, towards the waterfront. Jacob bounced with excitement, Penny stoically followed with her arm encircling her quilt, walked with his shotgun down at his side and pulled the wagon.

  It was getting late in the day and Louis wanted off the land, yet he wondered how precarious traveling up river in the little dinghy might be. No lights on the dinghy and he knew the river would liquid blackness. They reached the old barge and Louis checked their surroundings again. He herded Penny and Jacob down the dilapidated pier to the barge that tilted heavily to one side. The boy jumped right on, Penny stepped on and balanced herself. She questioned her husband again, “Louis, what are we doing? This isn't ours...this thing is half sunk.”

  Louis threw the big tube and the bags over onto the deck of the barge, left the wagon on the pier. Weathered storage benches lined one side of the barge, he opened them one by one and dug around. Mostly spiders and small critters inhabited them, finally he found two old life jackets. Mildewed and stinky but they would do. Penny wrinkled up her nose and shook her head, “Oh, no, I'm not putting that thing on my body.”

  “Look, sweetie, we don't have any time for arguing. It is not that long until dark. It will be black as the bottom of a well out on the water. I am hoping the river stays calm, in any case, this is not going to be a smooth ride and we have a long ways to go. I don't know how far ahead Clay has moved the Annie Belle. You and Jacob are going to need the life vests. Oh, damn, I should have told you to bring some jackets, it's going to be damp and chilly out there,” he said in frustration.

  Penny reached in the bag and brought out the wind breakers. She put one on her son and laced up a vest on him. She frowned at the smell and repeated the process on herself. Louis smiled at her, kissed her forehead and put his wind breaker on. He reached over the side and pulled the rotten tarp off of the dinghy, it still bobbed in the water. There were only two bench seats in the boat, between the back seat and the motor sat three six gallo
n cans of gasoline. No way the small boat would haul all three of them and the gear. He helped his small wife over the side of the barge, down onto the boat seat, handed her a battery lantern and the .38 from his waistband. He insisted that she learn to use a gun. She knew how to shoot the pistol, though she had little practice or necessity to test herself. Jacob climbed down and sat in the bottom of the boat on his mother's precious quilt. Mother's mouth opened just slightly, she didn't voice an objection.

  “Jacob, you are going to have to sit still, you can't be bumping around, understand?” said Louis.

  “Got it, Pop,” he nodded. With the naivety and excitement of a child, the boy thought this was a big adventure.

  Louis handed the bag of medicines and half a dozen bottles of water to Jacob and told him to hold on to them. He put the large duffel bag of clothes and the laundry bag of food onto the big tube and tied them down with nylon rope. The loaded tube plopped into the river behind the barge and he tied off a rope so it wouldn't float away. With care, he slid the shotgun over into the back of the dinghy and climbed down himself. The boat swayed and sunk a little deeper into the water. He pulled on the starter rope of the motor, it sputtered and didn't start, then a loud voice drifted down to them. In the waning daylight, he looked up the crusty side of the tall charter boat and the outline of a man hung over the side. “Hey dude, where are you going?”

  Louis jerked on the rope again, this time the motor chugged and sputtered and started. He said loudly to Penny, “Pretty soon, you'll have to hold that lantern and shine it in front of us.” He eased the boat out of the tight slip. At the end of the barge he untied the rope of the tube and tied it to a big eye-hook mounted beside the motor. He moved away from the barge. The man ran to the end of the big boat and high above them, he shouted again, “HEY! I said where are you going?” He shot off a flare that lit up the water as it arced and dropped into the river with a fizzle, right in front of the little dinghy. This brought a squeal from Penny, she shakily moved her hand to the pistol and Louis guided them away from the shore to the center of the big river, as fast as the dinghy would move. The sound of the man's curses and shouts slowly faded behind them.

  By instinct mostly and following the dim pool of light in front of them, the father tried to keep them steady in the main waterway. The water sloshed against the shallow sides of the boat and the tube rode their wake with bumps and jumps. He told Jacob to get another flashlight out of the medicine bag and help shine some light around them. Afraid they would run up on something before they spotted it, Louis proceeded with extreme caution. They had only been in motion about thirty minutes, when Penny shouted back to him, over the engine, “Louis...I see something. There's something in the water right up ahead...slow down, Hon.”

  He idled the motor down, a dark outline of an object floated in the water. “Jacob, put your beam over to the left, lets go around this.” To his right, a long flat barge stretched, no light came from it and he could barely make out the crates stacked up high. He guided them in a wide arc away from the object and the barge, tried to be careful not to swing out too far towards the opposite shore. As they eased past the object, Penny's hand went to her mouth. Her light slid along a body turned face down, it drifted on the rolling surface. Long hair splayed out around the head, a blouse ballooned out and a skirt was not covering much. Two tiny turtles rode along on the body's back. Louis caught the grisly scene in the light of his wife's lantern.

  Immediately, he diverted Jacob and said, “Hey, son, over here boy...shine the light over to the left.”

  When they were past and the object was again swallowed in the inkiness, Jacob jerked around, “Dang, I missed it. What was it Pop?”

  Louis said, “Nothing much, son. It was just some junk, a log or some such.” He was glad that the night masked the sick look he knew adorned his wife's face.

  Hours dragged by and the night seemed endless to Penny. The wet made it feel cold, her arms ached from holding the light and there had been no sight of the paddle wheeler. The boy fell asleep on the damp quilt in the bottom of the boat. She tied off her lantern to the front of the boat and took the smaller flashlight to throw a light where her husband needed to see. They weaved and twisted up the waterway, avoided crafts and objects in the water. No more bodies, that she saw, it sickened her to remember the one they had passed earlier. The sounds that drifted out from the land, did nothing to reassure her. Screams and shouts echoed across the water, a time or two, gun shots. Her weary mind wondered what really happened, there had been no time to discuss that with Louis. She loved and trusted him very much, she knew eventually they would talk.

  He and Clay had been friends since long before she met and married him.. She trusted Clay as much as her husband and Jacob loved him. A thought came to her mind of Clay's brother and how he believed in the doomsday stuff. Could this really be what happened? She was pulled from her thoughts when Louis asked her to shine the light over to the side. Thank god, a slight pink strip of light glowed in the east, at least it would soon be dawn. Her stomach tightened with another thought, Do I really want to see what is in the daylight? If they could just catch up with the Annie Belle, they would be okay. Louis and Clay would take care of them.

  Chapter Two

  The Crew

  During the dark night, they passed by the luxury hotel where the tour group disembarked only hours before. Only a few dots of light sparkled in the multi-story building. The little dinghy with it's load in tow, only moved about twelve miles an hour, the consistent movement forward managed to get them up river over sixty miles from home, by the time the sun rose on the eastern horizon. Louis knew that Clay would go as slow as he thought he could safely move. He and Penny were both exhausted, he hoped that they would soon catch up with the paddle wheeler. Some granola bars and bananas that Penny gathered at the last minute, had to do as breakfast, with a bottle of water each. The light exposed more disorder and mayhem on the shore and on the water, than they wanted to see. Even Jacob seemed to fall into a stunned silence. The family huddled in the their small spot of safety, Louis never stopped to investigate or answer any call outs, he just doggedly pursued the Annie Belle.

  ***

  On the big boat, Clay slept with his eyes open, hands on the wheel. The paddles slowly dipped into the water and the vessel crept along. In the very first light, Angel brought him coffee, he jumped at her touch. It was obvious he couldn't go much farther without some rest. “Clay, you are exhausted, isn't there a way we could stop for a while? I am sorry that I can't do more to help. Maybe Louis will soon catch up.”

  Clay looked around at the land on each side of the river. The river was wide here and they had moved away from some of the more populated areas. A bit of a sandbar and a little island lay ahead. He took a sip of coffee, shook his head and tried to keep alert. Actually, not much activity right near the shoreline and there was much less water traffic. He judged it safe to anchor for a short while, maybe his friend would be able to catch up. He had confidence in Louis, no matter the difficulty, he would get his family and find him. He had known the man since they met several years before at the community college. He was smart and competent. The thing that they instantly found in common was their love for the river. While Clay never quite finished and got his engineering degree, Louis stuck with school, not wanting to disappoint his father, he planned to be a CPA. After Clay got the opportunity to buy the big paddle wheeler that his own dad had worked on for years, it was not long before his friend joined him in the operation of the tour boat. He still did some annual taxes for extra money and took care of Clay's book keeping. The captain was as generous as he could afford and anytime they had a special charter or party, he shared a percentage with his good friend.

  His eyes stung, he desperately needed to close them and sleep for a bit. Angel stood beside him and looked out at the morning mist rolling off the water. He spoke with a voice hoarse from weariness. “Angel, do you think you could help me lower the anchors?

  �
�I will do what I can, if you will just tell me where to go and what to do,” she answered.

  He pressed the button that would halt the paddles and Angel followed him down to the lower level. He walked her to the bow anchor and showed her how to slowly lower it, then he moved to the aft to lower the back anchor. Inside the downstairs cabin, Allie sat at the bar, her short legs dangling from the stool and ate a bowl of cereal. “Good morning, Captain Clay,” she said in her sweet little girl voice.

  Clay forced a smile and said, “Good morning, Allie girl.”

  He motioned for Angel to come and sit down at a table. “Angel, do you know how to use a gun?”

  “I took some classes.” He seemed a bit surprised and she gave him a slight grin, “I do live alone, you know. I have a .380 in my purse. I can't claim to be expert with it, but I know how to use it. Years ago, when my parents were still alive, I used to tag along with my dad, he loved to hunt the bayous. Back then, he taught me to shoot a .22. It's been a very long time since I hunted, though.”

  The captain, too tired to think about it, was relieved a little. “Did you get any sleep?”

  “I curled up with Allie and slept for about five hours. I am good.” she answered.

  “Good. If anyone approaches the boat or if you feel that anything is not right, you come wake me. I am going to lay down on the bunk for a while and try to get a few winks. You'll need to walk around outside the cabin and maybe even go up top every once in a while, keep a constant eye out,” he said.