299 Days: The Collapse

Chapter 54 Don’t Scare the Kids (May 6)

Lisa was all cried out when the sun came up. She physically couldn’t cry anymore. She was a wreck. She hadn’t slept or eaten in at least twenty-four hours.

Lisa’s life was over. Her life was about her kids and husband, and he had left. Bastard.

She didn’t see this coming. It was like he had been hit by a bus. Suddenly he was gone and she was all alone to deal with everything.

She finally looked at a clock. It was 6:12 a.m. Her mom would be awake. Lisa desperately wanted to talk to her mom. They were very close, to the point that people said they were practically clones of one another.

Her parents were living in Olympia now that they were retired. They only lived a few miles away, but it didn’t seem wise to drive over there. The phone would have to do for now.

“Mom, Grant left last night,” Lisa said without crying. Only for a second, though. Admitting this to her mom made Lisa break down in tears again. After a minute of sobbing, she continued. “He killed some robbers. It was self defense. They were trying to attack him and a neighbor with guns and clubs. Then he came home and was acting crazy and said we needed to go to the cabin. He must have PTSD.”

“PTSD?” her mom, Eileen, asked.

“Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder,” Lisa said. “I see it in the ER all the time. After a stressful event, people do crazy things.” Lisa had convinced herself that PTSD was the only explanation for why someone would think they needed to run out to a cabin. The more troubling part, however, was that this hadn’t been sudden; Grant had been stockpiling food and guns, so he had been suffering from some mental disorder before the shooting. Lisa could not figure out what had been driving him to have food and guns out at the cabin. A mid-life crisis? Whatever it was, it was crazy. Full-on crazy. Grant was probably permanently insane. She had married a mentally ill man.

“He just left us here,” Lisa said. More sobbing.

“I’m coming right over,” Eileen said.

“Mom, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” Lisa said. “There has been a lot of crime.”

“Not in our neighborhood,” Eileen said. They lived in a really nice part of Olympia. “I’m coming over to help my girl.”

They hung up and Eileen got in her car. The short ride to Lisa’s house was smooth. No crime, no sign of any trouble. Things were strangely quiet, in fact. Very few cars were out on the streets.

Eileen was in for a surprise, though. When she came into Lisa’s subdivision, there was a man there with a gun. What was that all about? Was he a plainclothes police officer? That was probably it. Eileen wasn’t stupid; far from it. Like Lisa, she had an extremely high IQ. It’s just that, like Lisa, Eileen had never experienced things like violence or the system not working. She was like so many other Americans during the Collapse: smart but completely ignorant when it came to how to stay alive when nothing is working.

Eileen drove slowly up to him and rolled down her window. The man with the gun politely, but firmly, asked her, “What’s your business here?” He could tell that a nicely dressed lady in her sixties in a very nice car was no gang threat. She was probably visiting someone.

“I’m coming to see my daughter, Lisa Taylor,” Eileen said.

The armed man said, “Oh, Grant’s wife. You know Grant saved Ron Spencer’s life last night? Go ahead and go in.” He waved her through.

Grant had saved someone’s life? That couldn’t be the shooting thing Lisa was talking about. Maybe it was. Eileen then thought about the guard with the gun. How strange, she thought. He didn’t have a badge, but he had a gun. That didn’t make any sense. Then again, lots of things lately were not making sense.

She drove the last two blocks to Lisa’s house. Her little girl was there in the doorway crying. It must be because Grant left. What had gotten into him? He seemed like he had a good head on his shoulders.

Eileen spent the rest of the day consoling Lisa. She also spent time with the kids, reassuring them that everything would be OK, and that surely, their dad would be home soon.

It was dinnertime, so Eileen decided she needed to go home and get some clothes to stay over with Lisa and the kids. They needed her. She said goodbye for now and left.

When she was leaving the neighborhood, a different man with a gun was at the entrance. Maybe they were guards, Eileen thought when she saw a second man with a gun but without a badge. He motioned for her to slow down and roll down her window. He realized she was not exactly a gang threat.

“Will you be coming back?” the guard asked. He had a clipboard like he was keeping track of these things.

“Yes, in about a half hour,” Eileen said. “To see my daughter, Lisa Taylor.”

“OK, but be careful out there,” the second guard said. “It will be dark in a few hours. You don’t want to be out in the dark.”

“OK, thank you,” Eileen said. What was that about not being out after dark? Sure, there had been some protests or some political things going on, and some terrorist attack in far-off cities, but that hardly meant that terrorists were out roaming in Olympia at night. She thought the men with guns were overreacting. Maybe the men felt better having their guns. They weren’t hurting anyone, so it seemed OK.

The ride back to her house was uneventful. Few cars were out. Eileen’s husband, Drew, was waiting for her.

“What were you doing out there?” Drew asked her. “Things are dangerous.”

Eileen was a little mad. “I was taking care of our daughter, who needs me,” she said indignantly. What was with all these men being so worried about “danger” out there?

“I’m going back to spend the night with them,” she added.

Drew knew he couldn’t tell her not to take care of her daughter. Besides, Eileen would be driving before dark.

“I’ll come with you,” Drew said.

“Oh, that’s not necessary,” Eileen said. She thought he was overreacting.

“No, I will come with you,” Drew said. He had already loaded his two guns, a duck hunting shotgun and a .357 revolver, and was ready for what might be coming. He had been watching the news all day and knew that things were getting worse each night.

“No!” Eileen yelled at Drew. She hadn’t yelled at him in about twenty years. “Everyone needs to stop overreacting!” she yelled. “Lisa needs me and I’m going. Things are fine. This will all be over soon.” Eileen stormed upstairs to get her things for spending the night at Lisa’s. Drew knew he couldn’t do anything about his wife driving out in possible mayhem. He went back to watching the news. No use even trying to convince her, he thought.

Eileen got her overnight things and left without saying a word to Drew, which was very unusual. On the way to Lisa’s house, there was a car speeding up behind her. It zoomed past her and ran the red light. Crazy drivers.

Eileen came up to the same man who had let her out of the subdivision. He saw her and waved her through.

Eileen spent the evening and night listening to Lisa and doing all the grandmother things she loved to do, like making cookies and playing board games with the kids. She wanted to do all the normal things they loved; this would take their minds off of all the unusual things that were going on. She kept the TV off. There was no need to scare the kids.