Bitter Cold (24 page)

“Listen. We don’t have much time. I’ve got one chance and one chance only to do something good here. It seems all my life, death has been following me everywhere. Now’s my opportunity to maybe make up for some of it,” he looked at Logan. The boy glanced over his shoulder at his dad, saw he’d been spotted, then turned back to his job feeding the flames with the gasoline. “I love my son. He knows this is the right thing. Right now he might not realize it, but he knows. And so do you. We’re all dead already. Face it. There’s only one question. Are we gonna sit back and watch fifty thousand other people die, or are we gonna do something to stop it?”

April blinked. Her breath came out in a slow, gentle fog. She glanced at the black snow. It had advanced close to the top of the icy onramp, practically at the entrance of the bridge, where the propane truck backed up slowly while flashing its hazard lights.

She asked, “What exactly do you have in mind?”

He crossed through the gas island, straight for Evan’s car. “I’m gonna ram that tanker, blow it to kingdom come, and stop that goddam monster in its tracks.”

She walked with him, stride for stride. “Jeff, don’t be naïve. This isn’t the fuckin’ movies. You don’t just ram into a truck and it blows up. You’ll just be a bloody spot on its grill, that’s all!”

“What’s going on, Dad?” Logan came near, sweeping gasoline on the fire.

“Nothing!” Jeff was stern with his son, then he let a smile cross his lips. “Just keep that gas flowing, kid. Don’t worry about me.”

He popped the trunk and found the tire iron. It was curved with the lug wrench on one side and a flat, sharp edge on the other. It would do just fine. He took the tool and knelt under the back bumper. Finding the gas tank within easy reach, he punctured it. Once. Twice. Three times for good measure. Fuel poured out in a rosy pool on the frigid asphalt.

He jumped to his feet and hurried to the driver’s seat. Now Evan stood next to April. He looked stunned.

“I know what I’m doing,” Jeff told them both as he started the car. “Just do me one favor. Keep my son alive.”

Her eyes filled with tears.

“Dad! Don’t do it! Don’t leave me!” Logan dropped the gas nozzle and slipped on the ice. He slid to a stop on his belly, fighting to his hands and knees.

Jeff gave him another smile. “Logan, I love you.”

He punched the accelerator and the Honda jumped over a concrete wheel stop, heading through the parking lot diagonally. Logan ran on an intercept course, screaming, voice cracking.

“DAD!” he fell again and kicked his feet, trying to get up. The slick pavement wouldn’t let him. “NO!”

Jeff felt his heart tearing from his chest. How could a father leave his son? And in a situation like this? That hurt the most. He didn’t want to think about the reality, about the fate he’d just handed his kid. What would happen to him? Eaten alive? The idea ripped his insides into shreds.

What are you doing! Stay and protect your child! He’s the only thing worth fighting for, anyway! Who are these people, these faceless, nameless thousands you want to save? Who are they to you? Nobodies…strangers. They don’t matter. Logan matters. Save him. Save Logan!

The voices almost got the best of him. He wanted to stop. Too late. Decision made. He tightened his gut and filled his lungs.

The flames loomed large in the windshield, resurrecting the desire to stop. It was an unnatural act, to drive straight into a fireball, especially in a vehicle trailing flammable fuel. The hatchback had no trouble getting past the blaze, though, pushing it aside like a curtain. At first he thought his bright idea to create a fuse out of gasoline hadn’t worked. He saw evidence of the contrary in the rearview mirror. A blazing path followed him, right behind the back bumper.

He gained speed on the corner, taking the gas station’s west exit and turning uphill toward the bridge’s eastbound entrance. The snow was still white and pristine along that route, so that’s where he went. The Honda’s front-wheel drive prevented it from fishtailing, but it still slid a little. Not enough to veer him off course.

When the road straightened, he had the propane tanker firmly in his sights. Jeff couldn’t see the driver inside the cab. He could only imagine what the guy was thinking—the town of Rainier, flattened underneath mounds of charred snow, a gas station surrounded by a barricade of flames, a beat-up import speeding right at him and trailing a line of fire. Worst of all, the black snow was now getting close to his truck. That guy had to be shitting his pants.

The Honda shook hard when its tires hit the dark snow. He had a tough time keeping it straight. A loud
Pop!
signaled the end of one of the tires. Then the rest went in a series of small explosions, making the steering even more difficult. Somehow he managed to stay pointed at the propane truck.

A blast from the tanker’s air horn. Rolling on bare metal, pushing the Civic to its shaky limit, Jeff broke into a gritty sneer, bandaged fingers tight on the wheel, jaw becoming a vise.

Behind him, the flame trail cut through the blackness. Wave upon wave of dark snow parted like the Red Sea as the thing fled from the heat, separating with a furious howl from the pits of the earth. The bridge’s steel girders made horrid creaking sounds. Concrete barriers along the roadside cracked and crumbled under the strain.

He held his breath, watching from the corners of his eyes. The creature was all around the Civic, spilling into the snow and ice accumulations on the road, along the narrow sidewalks, on the metal supports. He couldn’t hit the gas any harder, so he willed the car to go faster, pushing his body forward, pressing against the windshield, believing that extra bit of resolve would surpass the mindless, soulless thing he was trying to outpace.

He knew April was right. A head-on collision wouldn’t do the trick. He’d have to hit the truck in the sweet spot—the tank couplings. He got into the far right shoulder. The Honda swiped against the barricade, crushing the passenger door.

It was the widest he could get, still he realized it wouldn’t be enough of an angle. That’s when the truck driver did a miraculous thing. Instead of keeping on a straight, reverse course, he panicked and jerked the wheel. It was an obvious effort to put more distance between him and the crazy fucker careening toward him. Bad move. Jeff now had the perfect approach.

In that last two seconds, before the collision, he relived every moment of Logan’s childhood. The colicky nights when he wouldn’t sleep, the piles of diapers, the tiny fingers and toes, the tickles and the giggles. He saw Logan at three, eating a handful of caterpillars, then at five, learning to ride his bike on the gravel, and having a hell of a time. Then his memory went back—back to before Logan had been born. Emma was there. She blinked at him with those hazel eyes, making him forget about everything. Her eyes could do that, take him away to some corner of the universe where only the two of them existed. Nothing else. No worry. No pain. She smiled at him,
“Tell me you love me,”
her lips didn’t move.

Before he could respond, he went even further back. It was snowing and Eddy was cold. He wanted to build a fire. He was only five. Jeff should have told him no.

THIRTY-THREE

Handwritten message on small brown grocery bag.

Bag found on floor by rescue personnel at Jackpot Mobile One, Rainier Oregon.

I don’t know how much time I have. Events have spiraled out of control. Jeff did what he had to do, but it was horrible. The explosion. How could he live through that? I keep telling Logan there was a chance. We saw emergency vehicles, but it looked bad. Real bad. The only thing I keep telling myself is that it worked. The black snow can’t get to Longview. But now its attention is back on us, and we’re the only survivors left in town. Me, Amy, Logan and Evan. And of course Sadie. She’s a good dog. Saved our asses more than once.

Evan and Logan are doing a good job fueling the fire. It’s the only thing keeping us alive. The monster can’t get through flames. And it
is
a monster. There’s no other way to describe it.

This was all NWP’s fault, and they know it. NWP knew there was a radiation leak from their spent fuel containment casks and covered it up. That was the direct cause of all of this destruction, all of these lives lost. Mark it down.

The storm doesn’t seem to be stopping. We could be digging in for the long haul. Just in case, I want to tell my parents I love them. Ron and Michelle Murray. I love you guys so much. I’m sorry for this. Sorry I couldn’t make it. Oh what the fuck am I saying?

I WILL MAKE IT!

I’ve got to get back to work. That fire’s got to keep burning!

April Murray

February 19, 2007

Handwritten message on basement wall.

Message found by rescue personnel at Jackpot Mobile One, Rainier Oregon.

EPILOGUE

APRIL BIT HER LIP. Listening to Nurse Lain made her want to jab a ballpoint in her own thigh.

“You can go in now,” the nurse whispered. “Just remember, it’s still touch and go. He’s pretty weak.”

Pretty weak?
April thought.
No shit. The guy’s only been in a coma for nearly a year. Not like you people gave him a snowball’s chance.

She and Logan exchanged a terse glance. They’d been getting the same treatment from the hospital since day one. None of them thought Jeff would make it. None. Now that he’d defied the odds and pulled through, they seemed almost indignant about it. The thanks he got for saving the entire population of Longview.

“Thanks,” she refused eye contact with the nurse. She took Logan’s hand and they hurried to room 210 of the St. John’s Hospital Long Term Care Unit. If Jeff was conscious, he didn’t look it. All the bleeping and flashing instrumentation was still hooked up to him. Logan paused. She could feel him tense up the same way he’d done dozens of times. And dozens of times, she would nudge him with a soft, gentle word of encouragement.

Then Jeff stirred. Logan gasped and hurried to his father’s side. April was right behind him.

“Dad? Dad? Can you hear me?”

It was the same question Logan had for Jeff every day. And each day, he’d gotten no response. Until today. Jeff moved his eyelids, then his cheek twitched. April’s heart fluttered when he opened his eyes and stared right at her. She thought the dead had risen. He looked dead. Most of his body had been burnt. Something like seventy percent. Bandages covered the scars, the skin grafts, the melted flesh.

He offered Logan his hand. Logan leaned in and let his dad touch his face. As Jeff blinked away a tear, he looked at April again and opened his mouth. No noise came out, nothing discernible, at least.

“Shhh,” she whispered. “Don’t try to talk.”

He didn’t obey. “You-you did it,” his voice was terribly scratchy. “You kept my son alive. Thank you.”

“No,
you
did it,” she responded. “You stopped that thing. You saved a lot of people.”

“But, that...thing,” he said. “How’d you get away from it?”

She shook her head. “Don’t know. We lucked out, I guess. It got tired of trying to get us and moved on to the hills. Next day, the weather broke, sun came out and the snow melted. The creature just disappeared.”

He blinked a few more times and glanced around the room, at the tubes up his nose and attached to his wrist. “How long?” he managed to cough out the words.

“You’ve been in a coma for nine months, Dad,” Logan held his hand. “Nobody thought you’d make it. But we did. Me and April, we both knew you’d come back to us.”

His cracked, dry lips crinkled when he smiled. It looked painful.

Then the TV on the wall stole his attention. His eyes got huge. April turned to watch. The television news was on, the volume muted. It showed the weatherman, pointing at an ominous radar image. April turned up the sound.

“Expect that cold front to be heading into our area any time, now. With the low temperatures and heavy, dense cloud cover coming, I think we can safely say we’re officially starting the winter of ‘07-‘08 with a bang. Lots of snow. Lots of ice. It could get treacherous out there, so look out…”

She caught Jeff’s stare, then turned to the window. Set against a green backdrop, small, wispy white flakes eddied in the wind.