Даниэла Стил - Neighbors

“Both bridges are closed,” she announced, as Meredith and Daphne walked in. “It was an 8.2 quake. There’s a lot of damage downtown. People are still stuck in elevators. It looks like a total mess. Half the streets are impassable, and there’s been a lot of looting South of Market. The hospitals are jammed.” Meredith had heard that the death toll was over three hundred the night before, thousands of people had been injured, and many were still trapped and buried under their homes. Emergency services were working overtime. Additional trained personnel had been flown in from other states, and volunteers and civilians were helping to dig out survivors. “The National Guard was called in to control the looters. Jack says we need to keep the gates locked,” Debbie said with a severe expression. With Meredith’s sudden spirit of generosity toward her neighbors, she and Jack were both afraid she’d try to bring more in, or throw open the gates.

“My daddy didn’t come home from the hospital last night,” Daphne said in a soft voice, her eyes big in her face. “My mommy was afraid our house would fall down. And Will said it would blow up if Daddy didn’t turn off the gas.” The news had reported fires raging all over town, and with water mains broken, the firefighters couldn’t put them out. The fires burning out of control were what had caused most of the damage in the 1906 quake, and could again.

“Your daddy must be very busy at the hospital,” Meredith said.

“He fixes broken arms and legs,” Daphne said proudly, as her mother and brother wandered into the kitchen. They both looked sleepy and tousled, in oddly assembled outfits, but clean clothes. Tyla had been annoyed to realize that the only shirts she’d brought for herself had short sleeves. She usually wore long-sleeved ones, and she had absentmindedly grabbed Will’s soccer uniform, which he was wearing to breakfast.

“Debbie, do you think we can manage pancakes?” Meredith asked.

“Sure,” she said, setting out places for four at the kitchen table as Tyla and Meredith chatted. She noticed an ugly bruise on Tyla’s upper arm in the short-sleeved, plaid shirt she was wearing.

“Ouch, that looks nasty.” It was about the size of a salad plate. “Did that happen last night?” Meredith asked her. It seemed dark purple to be that fresh.

“I…I don’t know…I fell in the garage a few days ago, I slipped on some oil, it might have happened then,” she said vaguely, as Ava walked in, in bright pink exercise clothes, fresh and wide awake. The top looked more like a sports bra and her midriff was bare. She was in perfect shape and her muscles taut.

“Can I grab a cup of coffee?” she asked cautiously, her dark hair piled on her head. She was incredibly sexy. “I usually go to a spinning class today. I guess everything’s going to be closed for a while,” she said, as Debbie handed her a mug of coffee, and Meredith poured two, for Tyla and herself. Tyla was a pretty woman, but her style was plain.

Debbie had set out orange juice for the kids. Will drained his, and Daphne offered Martha a sip before she drank hers. Meredith smiled as she watched her, and they all sat down at the kitchen table. Ava poured herself a bowl of granola, when Meredith showed her where it was, and all Tyla wanted was a piece of toast and her mug of coffee. Debbie was using an electric stovetop to make the pancakes, since the gas stove and ovens were off.

They talked about the damage in the city, as the two kids ate their pancakes. And halfway through the meal, Andrew walked in, wearing scrubs, looking exhausted.

“I’ve been up all night,” he said, as Debbie handed him a mug of coffee, and he sat down at the table with the women and children.

“Breakfast?” Debbie asked him, and he shook his head.

“I ate at the hospital cafeteria before I came home. I just stopped at the house. One of the beams in the dining room is on the floor. I don’t think there’s a dish left in the kitchen, and there’s a tear in Will’s bedroom ceiling. I called our insurance adjuster, and all I got was voicemail,” he said, stretching his long legs out ahead of him. He glanced at his wife’s arm, and gave her a glance when he saw the bruise. “Why are you wearing your soccer uniform?” he asked his son, “there won’t be a game today.”

“It’s what Mom brought me to wear,” he said in a small voice. His father didn’t look like he was in a good mood. He was tired after the long night. He’d been at the hospital working nonstop for twelve hours.

“I have to go back at three o’clock. We’re all working double shifts. Half the people in the city must have broken something last night,” and many were still buried. An apartment building in the Sunset had collapsed, emergency teams were still digging people out, and people who had left their offices late were still trapped in elevators all over the financial district. “They’re estimating it will take five or six days to get to everyone downtown. And one of the bridges in the South Bay collapsed, they’re still pulling people out of the water, but they’re taking them to Stanford Hospital in Palo Alto, and Alta Bates in Oakland. We’ve got more than we can handle now.” They’d had emergency drills for an event like this for years, but once it happened, it never went quite as smoothly as they hoped, or the way it had been planned. He spoke to his wife in a low voice. “I don’t see how you and the kids can move back in until we get the mess cleaned up and some of the damage fixed, I don’t have time to pursue it, and all of the contractors must be closed. But all the hotels are jammed, and a lot of them don’t have power yet.”

At the hospital, they had emergency generators, but even there, there were areas that were dark and they couldn’t use. They’d had to send the last wave of injured to SF General and UCSF. They were over their maximum limit of patients they could deal with now, and people were still showing up in droves. It was going to be a very tough few weeks for health professionals all over the Bay Area. They were bringing in nurses from neighboring states, as fast as they could get them, and a flock of doctors from L.A.

He was still describing the situation to them when Joel Fine walked in, and the two men exchanged an appreciative glance. They had hit it off from the moment they met. Joel didn’t greet either of the women, nor the two children, and started talking to Andrew as soon as he sat down, while Meredith watched them, and Jack showed up to help his wife in the kitchen. The two employees looked somewhat sullen, and anything but pleased to have a house full of guests, due to their employer’s largesse, inviting neighbors she didn’t even know to come and stay. And none of their houses were sound enough to move back into yet, and wouldn’t be for some time.

Peter and Arthur Harriman walked into the kitchen as the others were finishing breakfast, and Debbie collected their plates and put them in the sink, grateful that the dishwasher was running, thanks to the generator. She felt like she was a one-man restaurant serving all of them. And if they stayed, they’d expect lunch and dinner too. Every restaurant in town was closed. And so were most of the grocery stores. Luckily Debbie had just done a massive grocery run right before the earthquake. And from her youth, she was good at making food stretch. She guessed that with canned and frozen food, as well as fresh, and a huge amount of pasta, she would be able to feed the whole group for several weeks, not that she wanted them to stay. But she could provide meals for them if they did. And all around the city, restaurants were giving away free food, before it could go bad. And a few generous grocery stores were open and doing the same, with frozen and perishable food.