Aurora(11)

Her first step, eighteen months ago, had been to find out exactly what a person would need in the next big emergency. She’d googled “basic home disaster kit” and found hundreds of hits to choose from. The first few were sponsored, overpriced duffel bags jammed with too much of the wrong stuff, but a few links down she found an article with a dot-gov suffix, so she’d clicked on that. The handy checklist seemed to cover everything, not just for another deadly virus but for earthquakes, fires, power outages, even a dirty bomb explosion. Dutifully, she’d printed it out and taped it to the rust-proof black steel storage rack she’d bought on Amazon for $200 and put together one rainy Saturday, just around the corner from the basement stairs.

Aubrey stood in front of the rack now, staring at the two-page disaster checklist, which she’d even laminated before taping it to the support on the right side. She’d gotten off to a great start. The lamination, she felt, was a particularly heads-up touch. One item had been crossed off, the very first on the list: DOWNLOAD THE RECOMMENDED SUPPLIES LIST. There was a neat black line drawn through it, a line so straight and true that it fairly shone with confidence and pride in one’s farsightedness. Yes, she’d done that.

The rest of the list, however, was clean, white, and unmarked. The storage rack itself held precisely one item, or eleven, depending on how you wanted to count them, a cardboard sleeve that had once held twelve cans of Goya Black Beans. One of the cans was missing, and she remembered clearly the day she’d made them as a side dish and discovered that both she and Scott despised Goya Black Beans. She’d only bought them because she’d read they could be stored for long periods of time, but, damn, you could hang on to those eleven cans of beans for a decade and still not eat them.

The rest of the storage rack was unburdened by survival supplies. There was no stored water, no battery-powered or hand-crank radio, no NOAA Weather Radio with tone alert, no flashlight, first aid kit, extra batteries, whistle, dust mask, plastic sheeting, duct tape, moist towelettes, garbage bags, wrench or pliers, local maps, extra cell phone with charger and backup battery, extra prescription medications, sleeping bag, or matches in a waterproof container. There was no anything else from the list at all.

Aubrey stood staring at the empty storage rack in despair.

“That’s pathetic.”

The voice had come from behind her. She turned and saw Scott at the base of the stairs. She turned back, in no mood to be harassed. “I’m aware of that.”

“You didn’t stock up on anything?”

“No. Did you?”

“I’m fifteen. It’s not my job.” She didn’t answer. Scott sensed a soft spot, so he pressed on it. “Did you really need to come down here and look at the rack in order to figure out there was nothing on it?”

“No, Scott, I was well aware there’s nothing on the rack. I came down to get this.” She tore the laminated list off the upright and headed for the stairs, brushing past him. He stayed where he was, staring at the empty shelves.

“I hate those fucking beans.”

“So do I. Are you coming?”

“Where?”

“To the store.”

He turned and looked at her. She was now at the top of the stairs, and he at the bottom. He furrowed his brow. “The thing hits in, what, four hours or something? Do you have any idea how many people are going to be at the store? Do you honestly think there will even be anything left at the store?”

She took a breath, trying to quell the anger that was rising in her, competing with panic as her dominant emotion. “It’s not going to get any better if we wait. Meet me at the car.”

She went upstairs, got her purse, and pulled out her wallet. A hundred and eleven dollars was, frankly, more than she usually carried, and she was pleased she at least had that much. They’d stop at the bank on the way, take the daily limit off her debit card, and put everything they could get at the Piggly Wiggly on her Visa while the machines were still working. Even if they bought every single thing on the list, in double quantities, it wouldn’t last them more than a couple weeks, but there was no point thinking that far ahead.

She scooped up her keys and headed for the front door, pulling her bag over her shoulder. Scott came up out of the basement and drifted toward the TV, which was tuned to increasingly frantic cable news. Scott’s eyes were big, his spiking anxiety belying the adolescent cool he was attempting to project.

Aubrey turned back, picked up the remote, and shut the TV off in the middle of the anchor’s breathless speculation about the duration of the impending worldwide power outage. Scott turned on her. “You don’t think we need to know that stuff?”

She took a step forward and looked up at him. He’d passed her in height about a year ago and she wasn’t used to it yet. At least it was good for her posture. She stood, ramrod straight, and looked into his icy blue eyes, the same color as his father’s.

“No. We don’t. What we need is to get to the store, now.”

He looked at her, his cheek twitching. The kid was practically biting a hole through his face, either in anger or fear. Probably both.

Aubrey softened her tone. “You know, I read once that if you’re sad, you’re living in the past. If you’re anxious, you’re living in the future. But if you’re at peace, you’re living in the present.”