Usually, a green light flashed at him when the car started up and his phone connected to the Bluetooth. Now, the light flashed yellow. With a frown, he pulled out the key fob from his pocket and held the angular piece to the button. The button flashed green, indicating the key was near, but when Matthew tried to turn the car on, nothing happened. “C’mon,” Matthew said, pressing the button again. “You have to be kidding me.”
“I’ll go check it out.” David laughed, opening the truck door to get out.
“There’s no way,” Matthew said, holding the fob closer to the button, only now, no colored light flashed to even indicate the key was present. He didn’t hear any clicking or whirring indicating that the system knew he was in the car. He followed his father out of the cab and popped the hood.
David lifted the hood up and hooked it open. Matthew bit back the admonishment to be careful. Ever since his heart attack, his father had been sensitive to Matthew’s hovering. David poked at the looping wires bundled along the engine, checked a few things that Matthew had no idea what they did—a master’s in business did not a mechanic make.
“What’s it look like?” Matthew asked.
“I can’t see anything wrong,” David said slowly. “Probably left an interior light on that drained the battery. Happens to the best of us. You’re low on washer fluid.”
“What should we do?” Matthew looked around and saw that despite the exodus of people from the shop, a lot of cars still filled the parking lot. “Call a tow?”
“If you have signal. Honestly, we should go back inside and see if anyone can give us a jump.”
“Good idea.” Matthew smiled at his father. “I’m sure someone will help us out.”
David patted Matthew on the back, and together they turned to head back inside Wilson’s Antiques.
2
Heading back into Wilson’s Antiques was like stepping into a completely different store. Before, customers milled about, the soft tones of the oldies played through the store speakers, and everyone offered a hello or close-lipped smile when you passed them. Now, abandoned baskets clogged the walkways, items lay askew on their shelves, the music had been cut off, and people stood clustered in tight groups, all in a state of high-strung irritation. Some had their cell phones out, focused intently on the screens, asking each other if they’d turned their devices off and on.
Matthew ignored David’s anxious look and decided to approach two women talking in angry, hushed whispers to each other.
“Excuse me,” he said, and the two women glared at him through narrowed eyes. “I’m looking for some help. My truck died, and I wondered if you’d be able to help me jump it.”
“You’re not alone,” one of the women said, pushing her thick-framed glasses up her nose. “My Prius is completely dead too. I can’t even get ahold of a tow truck to help me. We can’t help you.”
“Do you have service?” her friend asked, holding her bejeweled phone out to him. For a moment, both women looked at him with hope.
Matthew shook his head. “I’m sorry, I don’t.”
They turned away from him with a glare of displeasure. “Sorry,” the bejeweled-phone owner said, her tone conveying she was anything but. “Like I said, we can’t help you.”
Matthew shot David a helpless glance. He moved to ask another group, getting the same brush-off: Nope, can’t help you, sorry, too bad so sad, we don’t even have service why do you think we could help you?
Finally, he approached a cowboy standing near the cash register. He'd ask everyone in this store if he had to—at some point, he was bound to find someone with a soft spot who could help him.
“Hi, sorry to bother you,” he began, “but my truck died, and I wondered if you’d be able to help me jump it?”
The man turned to him, cowboy hat cocked over his head. “Mine, too,” he said. “Can’t get out of this godforsaken place, either. I think most everyone in here is stranded. Cars won’t start. Phones won’t work.”
Matthew hid a disappointed sigh and took a moment to really take in the scene around him. The store had the energy of an irate hornet’s nest ready to explode. Another woman looked close to tears. “I just want to get home,” she shouted to her friend. Matthew had been so focused on finding help, he hadn't really considered the oddity of everyone's electronic devices being unavailable. He shook off his unease. After all, losing power and cell service wasn't unusual. It was simply annoying.
“There’s no way this is just a power outage,” the cowboy drawled, tapping the counter with the tips of his fingers. “You’re not the only ones with car trouble. My truck won’t start, same as everyone else here. This feels like something happened, you know? Something bad.”
David sidled up close to Matthew. “I wondered that myself, actually.”
Matthew gave his father an incredulous look. He’d been suspiciously quiet as Matthew had tried to find help, growing more reserved the ruder people became. “You did?”
Uncertainty crossed David’s face. Uncertainty of Matthew. “I don’t live under a rock, Matt. The news has been talking for weeks about cyberattacks happening all over the country. Attacks that have been happening for months. Allison ranted about Facebook and the Tumbles and that tweeting website—”
“Twitter, Dad. Twitter and Tumblr.”
“—Twitter being down for days. Called it a ‘blackout day.’ She said some anonymous hacking group was responsible, trying to prove that they could easily overthrow corporations simply by overtaking their platforms. Then there was that senator who had his confidential information leaked. Patton told me how his teachers were shocked that we could see everything he’d
