hair, over-doing it. “It’s okay. It’s going to be fine; it was just a small one. It’s perfectly normal.”
“The ground moved,” she sniffled. “It’s not supposed to.”
“I know.”
Beth was born and raised in Washington State, moving to California for UCLA, for Hollywood. She wasn’t born here, growing up with the regular rumblings, under the ever-present threat of the inevitable, mythical, horrible Big One.
That was one concept he certainly wasn’t going to share with her now.
“We can’t live somewhere where the ground moves,” she said. “We have to go, we have to get out of here. Someplace where the ground is
… is… grounded.”
“We can’t afford to go any where right now,” he said softly.
“As soon as we have the money, we’ll go,” she sniffled, lifted her head, and looked him in the eye. “You promise?”
“I’ll get a reader job tomorrow.” He kissed her and pulled her back down to him, knowing she’d forget about it in a day or so.
“The ground isn’t supposed to move,” she said again.
T here had been more earthquakes since then, but like most people who lived for a while in LA, she got used to it. Even joked about it, in that blase way Californians do, as he knew she would. But she wasn’t fooling him. She never could completely hide the fear in her eyes. Marty wondered what her eyes looked like now and quickened his pace.
It had been a long time since he told Beth that he loved her. Oh sure, he’d said it, in that rote, “good- morning, how are you?” kind of way. But he didn’t say it with feeling, not so she understood he needed her more than air. He knew he’d been withholding it and he didn’t know why. And now, more than ever before, it was important to him that she knew that yes, he loved her.
Above him, an enormous flock of birds flew towards the sea, the world for them unshaken, safe. The air would never fail them, would never fall out from under their wings.
The ground isn’t supposed to move. Everyone knew that. It was arrogance, and more than a little stupidity, to stay in a place where it did.
But what was Hollywood without arrogance and stupidity? You couldn’t manufacture dreams if you weren’t willing to live in one yourself.
Welcome to the flipside of the dream, asshole.
Now that Buck was gone, that little voice was back; not that they were all that much different. At least this one didn’t have a gun.
You promised her you’d leave and you didn’t. Just another broken promise in a pile of ’em, isn’t that right, Marty?
Beth didn’t really want to leave LA any more than he did. Their careers were here. And the more time that passed between quakes, the more abstract the threat became.
It wasn’t abstract any more.
Home. He had to get home. But at the rate he was going, it would take him a week. It was already half-past three, and he was only four miles west of downtown. The Cahuenga Pass was about five miles northwest. He had to make better time or he wouldn’t get to the valley by dark-and he certainly didn’t want to be here when the sun went down.
His shoulder throbbed, his shirt sticking to his gunshot wound, becoming part of the scab. Marty could feel blisters rising on his heels. His entire body was drenched with sweat, making him stink even more, which he didn’t think was possible without decomposing. He could only imagine what the smell was like without the protection of a dust mask.
He walked briskly up Beverly Boulevard, which no one would ever confuse for the western end that ran through the center of Beverly Hills. While the other end was paved with upscale boutiques, fancy restaurants, and pricey antique stores, this stretch catered to an entirely different clientele. Emilio’s Discount. Pepe Ranchero. Mercado Latino. Catalina Carniceria. Not merchants that usually came to Marty’s mind when someone mentioned Beverly Boulevard.
Marty glanced down the residential avenues that branched off the boulevard. The streets were lined with classic Victorian, Craftsman, English Tudor, and Spanish colonial houses with broad front yards, that would fetch upwards of $2 million each if they were in Beverly Hills, Hancock Park, or Pasadena. But these streets were ceded long ago to the tide of immigrants from Mexico, South America, and Asia who didn’t have the means to maintain the properties in their original style and grace.
Long before the earthquake, decades of neglect, economic hardship, and destructive improvements had taken their toll on the homes. Whatever architectural charms they once had were lost to iron-barred windows and cut-rate remodeling, cyclone fencing and junked cars parked on dead lawns. The once elegant porches were cluttered with old couches and Pontiac bucket seats, or closed in with chicken wire, transformed into open-air storage units.
Marty’s Calabasas neighborhood would never end up like this. It was against the rules of his gated community. No additions or remodels were permitted without the approval of the architectural committee, which never approved anything. Flowers planted without the consent of the landscaping committee were immediately yanked out of the dirt. Cars not garaged at night were ticketed. Basketball hoops, motor homes, and boats were forbidden.
That was how you maintained property values. Put a wall around it and appoint committees.
But in this neighborhood, just a few miles west of downtown, it was hard, except in extreme cases, for Marty to discern what was earthquake damage to these homes and what was just lingering wounds.
Whatever their state of decay or damage, the houses now shared one thing in common. They were all empty. Entire families had fled their homes, dragging their TV sets and stereos, mattresses and clothes, iceboxes and recliners out onto the streets, setting up encampments in their front yards. They built impromptu shelters, stringing blankets, garbage bags, and tablecloths from the roofs of their cars to the tops of their cyclone fences, covering the sidewalks underneath with bedding.
Marty averted his gaze, afraid it would be met by one of the sad eyes in those shabby shelters, and he definitely didn’t want to be drawn into anything there.
People were already mobbing the handful of small, earthquake-ravaged “Mercados” and “Supermercados” along the boulevard, picking through the rubble, searching aisles strewn with spilled and splattered merchandise for any surviving canned foods and bottled water.
As he passed the stores, he was stunned to see that the people, despite their desperation and fear, were still dutifully lining up at the registers to pay for what they found, fought over, and wrestled out of their neighbors’ hands.
Marty didn’t share their desperation, he still had enough food and water in his pack to make it home, where he and Beth had plenty of supplies stashed.
For a brief and satisfying moment, Marty once again felt like he’d conquered the quake with his cool head and superb preparation. The only itsy bitsy problem was the walk home. But in a few hours, that would be behind him and he’d be firmly in charge of the situation.
The important thing now was to learn from his recent mistakes and stick to his plan. Think only of getting home as quickly as possible. Think only about Beth and how much more she needed him than anyone else along the way.
Just ahead, beyond a curve in the boulevard, Marty could see a column of dark smoke. As he approached, he saw a fissure in the asphalt, a geyser of fire shooting out of it, flames lashing the buildings on either side of the street. All that was left of one blazing structure was its quirky, retro sign-a smiling cartoon character in a tuxedo, waving a chastising finger at a cockroach, distracting the insect from the mallet hidden behind his back.
The character seemed so familiar. He was trying to place the image when a dead bird smacked into the street at his feet. Marty looked up and saw two more birds plunging right at him.
He jumped aside, but it was futile. It was raining dead birds. The entire flock that had flown over his head moments ago were falling out of the sky all around him. They hit his body like baseballs, pummeling him to the ground.
And then he knew where he’d seen that cartoon character with the mallet. On the side of an exterminator’s
