The Fierce Reads Anthology(33)

“Mom, Parker and I have to go,” I said.

“What?” she finally responded. “Where…where are you going?” Her voice dragged, weighted with the antipsychotics and anti-anxiety medications I’d procured for her through less than legitimate means. Even if I could get Mom an appointment with one of the overburdened doctors in the city, they’d just give me prescriptions I couldn’t fill. Pharmacies had been looted within the first days after the quake. Supplies of food, water, and medications were trickling back into the city by air, but with most of the freeways shut down, and the trucks that did make it in being looted, there wasn’t enough to go around.

When the quake hit, there were nineteen million people living in the greater metropolitan area. The population had thinned since then. Those who could manage it had abandoned the city like the proverbial sinking ship. But there were still too many people to feed and medicate. Even counting the private jets celebrities loaned to aid organizations, there were only so many planes and helicopters available to import goods. Supplies were divided up for the area hospitals and clinics and consumed as soon they left the trucks. If the trucks made it from the airports to their drop-off destinations.

The only option I was left with for getting Mom’s meds was the black market. I knew I was buying the same pills that were being stolen, but I couldn’t afford to care. My moral compass didn’t point the same direction it used to.

“Mom,” I said again. I could tell she was having a hard time focusing on me. Half her attention was on the window and half on Prophet. “Parker and I have to go back to school today. But we’ll come straight home after. You’ll only be alone for a few hours.”

A look started to surface on Mom’s face. Terror at the prospect of being left alone in the house, with rioting and looting still going on throughout the city, water and power and cell service still unreliable.

Mom twisted her hands together in her lap, like she was trying to mold them into some new shape. “What if someone tries to get in while you’re gone?”

“I checked the doors and windows. Everything’s locked up tight. No one’s getting in.” It was a good thing I’d checked the windows again this morning. I’d found the one in the garage unlocked. It was a small window, but someone could squeeze through if he or she really wanted to.

Mom unraveled her fingers and parted the blinds again. “There was a boy watching the house earlier. A boy your age with glasses. I’ve seen him before. I can’t…can’t remember where. He saw me looking and he went away. I know him from somewhere, Mia. I know him, but I can’t remember.” She pounded both fists against her temples so hard I jumped. “I don’t understand why you both have to go. Can’t one of you stay here with me? I don’t want to be alone in this house with him out there watching.”

I didn’t want to tell her why it was so important that both Parker and I return to school, why it couldn’t wait another week. We were down to our last cans of food, and the few schools that had reopened not only offered free lunch, but the kids who started attending classes again got priority aid. Parker and I would each receive a ration of food to take home with us for every day we showed up.

This was not about education. It was about survival.

Mom’s fists were curled against her temples, her body hunched like she was bracing for impact. Was there really someone watching the house, or was she seeing things again?

“Mom…Mom, I need you to take your pills before we leave.” Xanax for anxiety. Thorazine for the hallucinations and flashbacks. Ambien at night to make her sleep.

She pulled her chin against her chest. “I already took them.”

“Are you sure?” I sounded patronizing, but Mom hardly ever remembered to take her pills. Most of the time she hardly seemed to remember her own name.

She gave me a sharp look. “I’m sure,” she said.

A soft knock at the open door. Parker poked his head in, his thick, straw-colored hair, still wet from the shower, hung in his eyes. The water was on today. That had been a relief. I hadn’t taken more than a handful of showers since the quake, and I didn’t want to return to school smelling like one of the Displaced.

Parker went to Mom, put his arms around her. “Love you,” he said. “We’ll be back before you know it, okay?”

Mom tensed at his touch. Parker released her, trying not to look hurt by her rejection, but I knew he was. Out of the two of us, Parker had always been the sensitive one. “Empathetic” was the word Mom used to describe him, but it was more than that. Parker didn’t just empathize. He was a “fixer.” When someone was hurting, he tried to find a way to make them better.

But Parker couldn’t crack the wall Mom had put up around herself, and it was killing him. Mom’s rejection wasn’t personal, though. At least, that was what I told myself. But she didn’t like people to get too close anymore. Every day she seemed to fold more tightly into herself, growing smaller and smaller, as though she were still being crushed under that fallen building.

“I’ll wait in the car.” Parker avoided my eyes as he walked past me, but I saw they were wet, and I felt emotion close my throat.

When he was gone, I went to Mom. I wanted to hug her, too, even though I knew she would be as rigid and unresponsive as a twist of wood. But more than that, I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her and demand she come back to us. We needed her.