cares what he thinks? Michael told himself. He still felt a little sheepish, though, as he finished. He told Hank that they’d gotten low on food in the cabin, had heard Safe Zone announcements on their car radio. But by the time they’d backtracked on the roads they’d come to the cabin on—the only country roads Michael was familiar with, and the only interstate entrance he knew how to reach—the towns were all deserted, the interstate ramp impassable because of abandoned cars and barbed-wire blockades.
“And we had to play ‘Siphon the Gas’ a lot!” Patrick added.
“And you made it without a fortress and a bizagillion guns. It is impressed upon me that you are impressive,” said the girl. “I’m Holly, by the way,” she informed him.
“Patrick,” Patrick said, surprising Michael with his boldness, however small.
She grinned, so wide it was actually a little big for her face. But yeah, wow: cute. Undeniably cute.
“And this cabin was . . . where?” said Hank, nodding eagerly to his notepad.
“Is it cool if I ask why you’re taking notes?”
“Orders,” Hank said as if it should have been obvious.
Orders from whom?
Michael told Hank it was near a popular (if isolated) ski resort in the northern part of West Virginia. “Canaan Valley. You know it?”
“I’m from Atlanta. No clue, champ.”
“Sorry, slugger,” Michael said. The gently ribbing joke was for Patrick, but Holly chuckled. Hank’s pen paused; he looked confused.
“So, you’re at the cabin,” Hank said, returning to his notes, “you leave; after a while, things get worse. And you didn’t see the army or any of the search parties until a couple days ago, just before you were rescued. Right?”
Patrick looked up at Michael.
Hank thinks I saw a search party. He must have talked with that captain from last night, Michael instantly understood. And giving an answer to Hank’s question would only spiral to more questions about the soldiers: questions that would require more lies.
And man, I’m done with lying.
“Hey, I’m sorry. Just, do you mind a bunch if I ask a couple things?” Michael said. He really was burning with the questions that had been pulsing on the edge of his thoughts since . . . well, since he saw that first dead Bellow shambling toward him on Halloween. Except, he wanted to be careful about what he said around Bub.
“Where were you guys when you first got . . . pulled into this?” Michael asked. Hank began to speak up, but Michael, worried he might swing the subject back to the soldiers, added: “Bobbie?”
Bobbie’s calm, thin smile did not falter, but he thought he saw something painful pass behind her eyes.
“Well. I don’t know if it’s my favorite story,” she said. “But they do say a person never forgets where she was when poor President Kennedy was shot. Or when those planes hit the Towers. So I guess I’ll remember it forever, whether I want to or don’t.
“I was with my husband, Jack. We were playing rummy on our airplane trays. Things had gotten so bad near our home in Tennessee; the government began emergency flights to Safe Zones. One hundred and ten souls on board our flight to Charleston. Everyone on the flight was supposed to be well; the pilot snuck his wife on, and she wasn’t.” Quickly, Bobbie said, “And you, Henry?”
Hank sighed through his nose, as if he was bursting with other things he’d rather discuss. “In Atlanta. School. Came here when the action started. Our dad”—he indicated himself and Holly—“came up to help right after the Zeds were first on the news. Like a lot of people did. He brought us.”
Michael felt a momentary—and immediately embarrassing—happiness, finding out that the guy Holly was sitting next to was her sibling.
“So there are . . . uh, Zeds, you called them, in Atlanta, too? And Tennessee?”
“There weren’t at first. It seemed to start somewhere in West Virginia, actually. Now? Who knows, man. Government shut down internet and phones in the Safe Zones almost right after the Zones were set up.”
“Why?”
“’Cause the only way they could keep things under control—make everyone come to the Zone—was to control what people knew about what was going on,” Holly said. “‘Information is power,’ etc. It kept people calm. That was a good day or two, ha-ha.”
There was something in her tone Michael couldn’t quite read. It sure wasn’t amusement, though.
“We don’t even friggin’ know for total-sure where the first case was,” Hank said. “Some places were worse than others—it was bad here—but there was so