Summer Lane - State of Emergency

“It took everyone by surprise,” Chris replies.

The rain starts to fall harder, making my crappy day even crappier. The only thing I have going for me is my waterproof jacket, but I’m still cold enough to freeze upright.

“I’m going to need more water,” I say. “I’m getting dehydrated.”

“Open your mouth,” he advises. “It is raining, you know.”

I wrinkle my nose.

“Yeah, I noticed that.” I stick my tongue out, catching a few raindrops. “Hey, we should try the radio again. Maybe we’ll get a signal down here.”

Chris shrugs.

“Go ahead.”

I stop and pull the radio out of my backpack. It’s waterproof, so the rain won’t ruin it. After a few minutes of cranking — and wondering why Chris doesn’t offer to do it since he has muscles the size of tree trunks — I flip the radio on.

The first three stations are dead — not even static. The fourth one has a flickering voice we can’t make out. The fifth one is a recitation of the same audio loop I heard up at the gas station in Santa Clarita. Emergency camps in Elk Grove, Bakersfield, San Jose, Fresno, etc.

I turn it off.

“Great. All the radio stations are down,” I say.

“They’re just looping the same audio,” Chris muses. “Which means there’s nobody there anymore. As soon as they lose power wherever the emergency broadcast center is, it’ll go out, too.”

I sigh.

“That’s cheery news.”

I shove the radio back into my pack, disappointed. I’d hoped to hear a radio announcer saying something like, “Check it out, folks! The world is back to normal. You can all come home and watch TV now.”

Fat chance.

We keep walking. I follow behind Chris with my mouth hanging open half the time, trying to get some of the rain on my tongue. I probably look like a lunatic, but I’m thirsty so I don’t really care.

“We’re going to run out of food and water before we reach Squaw Valley,” I say at last, having avoided the subject for about twenty-four hours. “You know that, right?”

“I know.”

“Then we need to stop at one of those emergency camps,” I reply. “There’s one in Bakersfield. That’s only about forty miles from here.”

Chris shakes his head.

“No,” he says, his voice firm. “Going into a camp like that is not a good idea. Besides, there are more than enough grocery stores and restaurants to raid at this point.”

“But why not try the camps? They’ll have supplies. Clean clothes. Real food.” I shiver. “And probably space heaters.”

“Bad idea,” he insists. “The less people know about who we are where we’re going, the better.”

“But they can help us!”

“No, Cassidy. It’s not safe.”

I kick a piece of trash across the freeway, finding it very difficult not to jump on Chris and literally knock some sense into his head. What does he have against getting a little help? Is this just a guy thing?

“Who put you in charge?” I demand. “Last I checked, I’m the one who gave you a ride in my Mustang.”

“Last I checked, I know more about surviving in war zones than you do,” he replies, nonchalant. “Which is pretty much where we find ourselves, little girl.”

Little girl? Oh, no he didn’t!

“You do not tell me what to do,” I say, angry. “I don’t care how many years you were a Navy Seal. I want to go to the Emergency Camp, and I’m going. You want to bypass it? Fine. I’ll go by myself.”

He stops, pushing stray hairs out of his face.

“Have it your way,” he answers, prowling ahead. “I don’t give a damn.”

I glare at him, my mind made up.

If he doesn’t want to cooperate, he doesn’t have to.

I’ll just be an army of one.

Long story short, it takes us about two and a half days to get to Bakersfield. By the time I drag my sorry butt to the other side of the city limit line, I’m willing to take anything — even a skateboard — over my aching feet. I’m soaked to the bone, freezing, starving, half mad with dehydration, and the headache I had in the Grapevine is back in full force, slamming against my skull like a sledgehammer.

As for Chris, he and I went for about twenty-four hours without speaking.

Well, I guess I went without speaking while he carried one-way conversations. Anyway, by this point we are both so hungry and cold that Chris has agreed to scope out the Emergency Camp — but only on the condition that we don’t show ourselves unless we’re positive that it’s safe.

Whatever. I’m turning into an ice cube so I don’t care anymore.

Bakersfield is basically a big flat city in the middle of a desert. Today there’s not a soul in sight, but I’ve gotten used to the absence of people over the last four and half days. We take an off ramp into the heart of the city, right where there’s a big blue and yellow sign that says Bakersfield . Everything is flooded with water. Any buildings that I see have the windows punched out. All the restaurants and grocery stores are especially ravaged.

Other than the deserted landscaping and abandoned city, I can look out to the left of the freeway and see big open fields. John Wayne’s oil fields, my dad would always tell me if we drove up north on the freeway. Apparently the big man with the gun made some extra cash drilling for oil out in the middle of nowhere.

Typical cowboy.

“Where is it?” I ask, confused. “Where are all the people?”

“If there’s a camp here,” Chris observes, “it should be near the city center…maybe.”

He doesn’t look too sure. We walk down a curving road that goes right underneath the Bakersfield sign. After a few hundred feet we come to a cluster of hotels and restaurants. I almost scream with surprise.

There are people everywhere!

Big chain link fences are surrounding the entire shopping center, marked with signs that read EMERGENCY RELIEF CAMP . Men, women and children are sitting around the edges of the fence, most of them wearing garbage bags to shield from the rain. There are military trucks parked on the asphalt and officials wearing black uniforms standing around the buildings.

“ This is an Emergency Camp?” I say, disbelief flooding through me. “Everybody here’s wearing garbage bags!”

“Those are ponchos, actually,” Chris corrects, a wry grin on his face. “And don’t move. What do you see there?” He points to the outer edge of an old motel. An official is standing next to a soldier in a light blue uniform. Both of them are armed.

“What are they armed for?” I whisper.

We sink back into the shadows of the trees, watching the camp through the leaves. “Good question,” Chris says.

I spot an elderly woman moving around the parking lot, fenced off and guarded by the black uniformed men. There are stockpiles of supplies. Some people are climbing up and down the outdoor stairwell of the old motels. Others are milling around the fast food restaurants.

“This is weird,” I say.

“This is wrong,” he replies. His hands tighten into fists beside me, and I can feel his entire body tense. “Follow me.”

I do, even though I have no idea what he thinks he’s going to do. As far as I can tell, there is no ENTER HERE sign anywhere around the camp, and there’s certainly no Red Cross truck. Something is seriously whacked.

Chris leads me through the park across the street from the shopping mall turned relief camp, pausing behind a parked car on the curb. We kneel beside it and, since it’s almost nighttime, stand up and approach the fence. My heart starts beating faster, even though I couldn’t say why I’m getting anxious. I just am.