Page 7 of Evolved

“I’ll tell you when the time is right,” Gran says cryptically. “I wouldn’t ask it, dear friend, if it wasn’t essential.”

Gina reaches across the table to squeeze her hand briefly, looking to me, her eyes so full of sorrow my heart clenches.

My friend.

Gran shifts focus. “Knox, you have a family of your own.”

“I do,” he says. His parents retired in California. He also has a sister in Texas, where he grew up, and a brother in Georgia. “They don’t need me.”

“You’re sure?” Gran asks.

“Positive.” His battering ram eyes shift to me. “My place is with you.”

Gran’s hand settles on my arm in silent acknowledgment. She knows I have no one else. It’s been the two of us since my mom left when I was a baby, and her husband, my Uncle Harry, died a decade ago. I tear my gaze from Gina, and remind myself I’m not emotional. And she’s a smart woman. She’ll isolate and she’ll be fine and so will I.

“I’m staying.” I busy myself lifting my tea so I won’t cry.

Gran and I don’t cry.

At least not in front of each other.

“With this great cataclysm will come a great opportunity. The clearing of a slate. It will take strong leadership.” She looks around the table at each of us in turn. “The lines of succession are clear but meaningless at this degree of fatality, as are the contents of the Doomsday Protocol since hiding in bunkers would only spread more disease. Any senator or congressperson left alive can and probably will make a claim,” she says, taking a peanut butter fudge cookie from Knox’s cookie box and taking a tiny bite. “Once the dead have died and chips have fallen, the greatest threat to humanity will be other humans. I intend to hold this building.”

How, I want to ask.

She’s in her sixties.

She weighs less than a hundred and twenty pounds.

She has a bad kidney and needs pills and a dialysis machine or she gets loopy.

She just described chaos, and she thinks she can hold it, lead it?

With what army?

My phone pings, interrupting my thoughts, and instantly, so do Gran’s and Knox’s, a chorus of chiming.

I reach reflexively for my phone, and at the same time, they reach for theirs.

Together, we all read the text that came through from Wendell Crandall, Chief of Staff to the president.

“The President just died,” I breathe, turning toward Gran.

She knew before the rest of us.

That's why she called us here.

“Whatever happens,” she says firmly, lifting her chin to expose the soft, thin skin of her neck. “We are the leadership of this country and will protect it, and the constitution, with everything we have.”

Gina buries her face in her hands.

Knox shifts in his chair, and his foot bumps mine under the table.

I want to argue.

But I know better.

“Excuse me.” I push away from the table.

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