Final Chaos

8

“What have you done?” cried Judy in a high-pitched voice.

Tim lay on the floor. Blood stained his shirt. His head was tilted to the sky. His mouth was open and his eyes were lifeless and open. His hand still clutched the knife.

Jim said nothing. His heart was pounding. His body was filled with adrenaline.

He’d never shot anyone before. He’d never even brandished his revolver until today. He’d gone to shoot at the range, and that was about it. Sure, he’d been hunting once or twice, but that was different.

He’d never even hit the birds he’d been aiming at.

The revolver was still in his hand.

He put it back in its holster and rose slowly to his feet.

His back felt stiff, and there was pain in his lower back from falling onto the hardwood floor.

Judy had moved to the opposite corner of the room. She cowered there, her body shaking. She stared at Jim with an expression of intense fear, as if she didn’t recognize him.

There was a phone there on the wall, and she grabbed it, clutching it.

Her fingers frantically moved across the buttons.

“It doesn’t work,” said Jim, speaking calmly. “Look, Judy, I was defending myself. And you. You saw it. He attacked me with a knife. He was trying to steal your provisions. That’s as good as killing you. Now, where’s Aly?”

Jim felt himself coming back down from the intensity of the shooting. And his mind turned immediately to his wife.

“Aly!” he called out, pointing his mouth in the direction of the stairs. “Aly! It’s me, Jim!”

If Aly was upstairs, wouldn’t she have heard the gunshot?

Maybe she was upstairs, terrified.

“Aly! It’s OK! You can come down.”

“She’s not here,” said Judy, her voice shaking.

“What do you mean she’s not here?”

Judy just shook her head. Her fingers were again moving across the buttons of the phone.

“I always knew you were no good,” she said. “But I never thought you’d come to this. Shooting a poor boy like that… It was just some cans and water… It wasn’t like he was trying to take my jewelry.”

“Your jewelry!” said Jim, raising his voice. “This is more serious. Don’t you realize what’s going on?”

It was a dumb question. Obviously she didn’t realize what was going on. She was still trying to contact the police.

There was a loud knock at the door.

Jim ignored it.

But the knock continued.

“Jim!” It was Rob’s voice.

Jim crossed the distance to the door rapidly and threw the door open.

Rob rushed in, his face sweaty, looking worried and frantic.

“There’s a whole lot of people out there, and they’re all starting to get…” But his voice trailed off as his eyes fell on the body on the floor.

“Self defense,” said Jim, simply.

Rob didn’t seem to know what to say, so he did what he often did, which was ignore the situation and plow on ahead.

“The people outside,” he continued, breathlessly. “They’ve surrounded the car. I don’t know what they’re going to do. They think we kidnapped the woman in the back of the car.”

With the mention of a woman in the car, the terror on Judy’s face doubled. She audibly gasped, and clutched the phone even harder. Her eyes darted between Jim and Rob, and her body looked frozen, petrified.

Jim said nothing for a moment. His mind was racing.

There was no time to waste.

And he needed to find his wife.

“Judy,” said Jim, speaking in as calm of a voice as he could muster. “This was self defense. He was coming at me with a knife. And we did not kidnap anyone. We’re trying to take her to the hospital. The phones are all down and this is a very serious situation. I’m trying to find Aly so that I can help her. Can you tell me where she is?”

Jim stared at Judy and waited. Something seemed to be happening with her, as if she was struggling between two choices. Clearly, she didn’t want to believe reality. She didn’t want to admit to herself what was happening. She wanted to stay in the safe confines of how she’d always believed the world really was.

The room itself had never seemed so bleak. Blood from the corpse was starting to leak onto the hardwood floor, and there was a stench that meant Tim had evacuated his bowels.

“I thought she was with you,” said Judy, in a voice so quiet Jim barely heard her.

“She’s not with me,” said Jim. “Do you know where she might be?”

There was no point in yelling at her or demanding that she tell him. She either would or she wouldn’t.

Jim found himself involuntarily holding his breath.

Rob’s ragged out-of-breath breathing seemed to fill up the otherwise quiet room.

“He said she was arrested last night,” said Judy, gesturing to the corpse.

“Arrested?” said Jim.

Judy nodded.

What in the world would she have been arrested for?

But Jim knew it didn’t matter.

He didn’t have any other leads on where she might be. The only other places he could check would be her work, and possibly a friend’s house. But those were unlikely.

“You’re sure that he said she’d been arrested?”

Judy nodded again.

Jim couldn’t think of any reason that Tim would have wanted to make something like that up.

And stranger things had happened.

“OK,” said Jim. “We’re headed to the police station. Let’s go.”

He stared at Judy.

She didn’t move.

“Come on,” he said. “You’re coming with us.”

She shook her head, with the rest of her body frozen.

“Judy,” said Jim. “Things are going to get really bad really quickly. With the power out, and no communication, people are going to start panicking. We need to get out of Pittsford and out of the entire area. Somewhere where we can ride this out.”

But she wasn’t budging. And just continued to shake her head.

What should he do?

Part of him wanted to just grab Judy and take her in the car.

But who knew, really, if where he was headed was any safer than her house.

And it wasn’t his style to take people places against their will. No matter what the circumstances.

Once he got Aly, he’d have to come back. Surely her own daughter would be able to convince Judy to leave.

“We’ll be back,” said Jim. “I’m going to find your daughter.”

Judy said nothing.

“Come on, Rob.”

He’d come back for Judy. And for the supplies.

He took one last look at the body on the floor before walking through the front door.

A crowd had gathered around the Subaru wagon in the driveway. Their heads turned as Jim and Rob appeared on the front steps.

“There he is!”

One member of the crowd didn’t turn her head. She was busy smashing a rock into the back rear window of the Subaru. Apparently she was trying to break the window.

“They think we kidnapped that woman,” whispered Rob.

They had to get out of there. And fast.

Jim didn’t like the idea of Aly stuck in a holding cell at the local police station.

He’d do what he had to do.

Once again, Jim drew his revolver.

He pointed it towards the sky.

He had no intention of shooting anyone else.

Not right now.

But he could use it as a threat.

The crowd fell silent when they saw the gun.

“Back away from the car,” shouted Jim, in a loud, commanding voice.