Page 38 of Wait For Me

She hesitated with her foot on the brake. Just around the back of the store was a quarter mile road to the gate. Normally she’d drive up without hesitation, show her ID card, and be let in. But if the situation was the same as the main gate, she didn’t want to plow into a group of people with no way to turn around.

Guess I’m walking. She backed into an empty parking space and killed the engine. Her hands shook as she tucked the stupid pink pistol into the waistband of her jeans. She was only going to get a closer look, see what was coming before she dove headfirst into it, but she glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was watching and popped the hood to Old Blue to disconnect the battery just in case.

The smoke was worse up here and it burned her eyes as she jogged across the broken glass that crunched under her worn sneakers. She kept herself pressed against the side of the building, staying in the shadows until she had no choice but to leave the safety of the structure and dash across the alley. Her fingers twitched, reaching for one of her children out of instinct and a moment of panic made her heart flutter. They’re safe. You’ll be right back.

The squeaking wheel of a broken grocery cart sounded from her right. She ran for the cover of the green dumpster up ahead. An old man with leather skin and only a few whisps of white greasy hair on his balding head pushed the metal cart filled with trash bags out of the alley. He looked at her with hollow eyes, working his toothless jaw but saying nothing as he continued forward. Tessa watched him go and felt whatever hope she had slip further out of reach.

Not again. Outside the gate it was as if a tent city had sprung up in the middle of the road. Dozens of bodies pressed together in the sticky heat under tarps and ripped up tents left wide open to catch the slightest breeze. Beyond them, the gate was barricaded off. But a uniformed Marine was on the other side of the fence, patrolling the line and watching the crowd. If I can just talk to him. She took a step forward, leaving the safety of the dumpster without a plan.

A rough hand grabbed her elbow and pulled her toward the unwashed face of a man with bad breath and a gold chain on his chest. His beady eyes stared straight into hers. “You got an ID card?” he hissed.

“Get off of me.” Tessa shoved him back. His grip tightened on her arm as she glanced to the gate. They were within earshot, if she screamed the guard would hear it.

The man knew it too and twisted her around, slamming his meaty palm over her mouth and pressing her back against his chest. “We’re going somewhere to talk. Don’t make a scene.”

Tessa chomped her teeth into his flesh and threw her head backwards. The sickening sound of crunching bone reverberated through her head as his nose crushed against her skull.

“Don’t touch me,” Tessa screamed, fumbling for the pistol as the thug staggered back.

He raised his hands in the air, looking past her to the gate, while blood poured down his face. “I didn’t mean any harm.” Her fingers connected with the frame of the pistol just as the man took off running down the alley like a rat.

She let it go and pulled down her shirt to cover it, holding her arms over her chest and sucking in shaky breaths. This is a mistake. But the gate was less than a hundred yards away. She moved forward slowly; her eyes wide as she watched every person on the street with a hawk like intensity. Her kids needed her to come back home. She wouldn’t be caught off guard again.

Each step she took, she scanned her surroundings watching for someone to come out from the makeshift shelters. She assessed their clothes, their body movements, and stole glances over her shoulder to make sure no one was coming at her from behind. Dirty faces watched her back, disinterested like they’d been seeing the same scene for a while and nothing could surprise them anymore. But despite the smell of trash and sweat, not all of them looked homeless.

A young woman clutched a Coach purse to her chest as she sat in the shade staring despondently at the gate. Well fed children clung to a woman’s floral dress. Aging men with button down shirts and veterans’ caps on their heads gathered together with Styrofoam cups over a Coleman grill and a pot of coffee. Closer to the gate was a group of people hopelessly waving their ID cards in the air. Tessa avoided that crowd and slipped behind the brick wall with the “Don’t Drink and Drive” sign tacked to the mortar.

She stumbled through the brush coated with remnants of plastic bags and waterlogged paper under the palm trees, working her way to the chain link fence where the guard was sure to patrol. Every sense was heightened as she scanned the overgrown lot waiting for someone to attack. Her heart beat faster at every snap of a twig. The weight of the pistol was reassuring, but she didn’t dare pull it out yet. Not when she was so close to getting an answer.

She laced her fingers through the fence and the cold metal instantly enraged her. This stupid thin wall, the military base behind it, the thing that took away her husband and wasn’t giving him back even as the whole world fell apart. It was all right here behind a chain link fence and there was nothing she could do about it.

“Someone tell me where HM2 Ward is.” She grabbed the fence and shook it as hard as she could, feeling the metal vibrate down the line with the force of her pain. Every moment spent waiting, every heart-breaking move, holidays and birthdays missed, all the tears her children had cried, and every fear that was bottled up from these past few days and the years before it burned like a gaping wound as she screamed, “I want him back!”

She could feel herself losing it; control, sanity, her voice as it tore out her throat. They were going to rush her with weapons drawn, force her to her knees in the dirt. She knew it, but she didn’t care. As long as they told her something in the end.

“It’s not worth it,” a woman’s voice spoke from somewhere to the right. Tessa spun around, her hand already on the pistol. “I screamed until my voice was raw and they couldn’t tell me anything more. When the sun sets, they’ll send out their next humanitarian push. It’s better to ask your questions then.”

“Where are you?” Tessa stepped back from the fence as her eyes darted around the overgrown stretch of weeds and trees. She wasn’t careful enough. I don’t think I’m strong enough for this. She forced away the self-doubt and held the pistol in her hands as she tried to pinpoint where the voice was coming from.

“You can shoot me if you want.” The voice was barely a whisper. Tessa turned to the side, her gun trained on the palm tree shedding its bark and the shadow it cast on the ground. The woman peeked around the tree trunk with big brown sunglasses hiding her eyes. She gathered her trench coat around her and sighed. “I’m not sure I’m surviving this anyway.”

“Surviving what?” Tessa lowered the pistol a fraction of an inch.

“The end of the world as we know it,” the woman almost hummed the words. Okay. She’s weird. But the woman didn’t seem like a threat.

Still, she didn’t put away the gun. “What were you saying about humanitarian pushes?”

“They move a unit out at sunset and sunrise to distribute bottled water and some food to the people hanging around outside the gate. I walked here and made it too late last night, but they were out first thing in the morning like I was told.”

“Is it just for the locals? Are they letting anyone in?” Tessa spoke too fast, needing to know every detail of what was happening.

“It’s for everyone.” The woman shrank back against the tree, hiding her body in the shade again. “I mean, they aren’t requiring IDs for the aid they are handing out if that’s what you’re asking. They are keeping a running tally of who’s outside, but only sponsors, you know, active duty, are being escorted through the gates. Dependent IDs, Veteran IDs, they’re all being told to wait unless they have a sponsor with them.”

Tessa touched the wallet in her front pocket. She was only a wife, a dependent, and that’s what her ID card said. Her husband’s career was his own and she never had a problem with that, right until the moment where the supposedly family friendly military would deny her entry onto base if he wasn’t with her.

She took a step back and tucked her pistol into her waistband, glancing at the gate and the world that was hidden behind it. All of this was a mistake. She needed to get back home to her kids. “Do you know by chance if the USS McKinley made it home from deployment?”

“You too, huh?” The woman’s voice cracked as she started to cry. “They are saying it hasn’t and they haven’t been in contact with any ships. No one has any word on returning troops or if they’re even coming back at all.”

---