“What?” said Broker’s voice. Like a challenge.
Allen froze, swiveling, looking for-and then his eyes fixed on the baby monitor sitting on the kitchen counter.
“Alphabet board,” said a second voice that Allen recognized as Amy’s.
“Okay,” Amy continued, “I point to a group until he blinks twice, then I tap each letter in the selected group until he blinks again. We write that letter down. Then we start over until we get a word. I’ll tell him to shut his eyes for three seconds to indicate a new word.”
“You mean he can talk to us?” Jolene’s voice.
“Yes.” Amy.
Then the sound of paper rustling. Amy again. “Do you understand?”
Allen put his hand out on the counter to steady himself.
This was not happening.
But it was, because Amy said, “Here we go.”
After a moment.
“K,” Amy said.
“I,” Amy said.
“L,” Amy said. “Four blinks, what do you think?” she asked.
“He means twice.” And that was Jolene.
“Could be,” Broker said.
“L,” Amy said.
“E,” Amy said.
Even through the cheap monitor Allen could hear them breathing.
“R,” Amy said.
Then came some words that Allen couldn’t hear because of static. His cheek was practically on the counter, his ear pressed to the white plastic speaker.
“Keep going,” Broker said. “He hasn’t shut his eyes.”
“Right,” Amy said.
Allen’s hair prickled like needles in his scalp. Hank was
“S,” Amy whispered.
Allen held his breath.
“New word.”
Amy’s voice rasped in the monitor and Allen jumped at the sound.
“N,” Amy said.
“O,” Amy said.
“T.”
. .
“A,” Amy said.
“M”
“Y,” barely audible.
“What?” Jolene blurted. “WHAT?”
Static.
“Shhh, new word,” Broker said.
“F,” Amy said.
“A,” Amy said.
“U,” Amy said.
“L,” Amy said.
“T,” Amy said.
Each letter drove a stake into Allen’s chest.
More static. Garbled sounds.
“New word,” Broker said.
Hyperventilating now, Allen listened to the next word, fully expecting to hear his name. Instead he heard: “Nurse,” which didn’t make sense. Nor did the conversation that followed. But then it did make a kind of sense. They seemed to have reached an impasse. Hank was spent, asleep.
This was more information than Allen could process.
His chest churned from the tug-of-war, from the stomp of fear that shouted
Fight them and survive.
Think. They’re not that smart.
Run.
He did run, but just to move his car up to the road, where he tucked it out of sight on the shoulder. Heart pounding, he dashed into the pines, then came to a halt. He was making too much noise. He looked around, amazed at how ordinary things-trees and leaves and pine needles-had acquired hard, glowing edges; danger did that, etched this new world in sharp relief.
So be stealthy.
Quietly he stalked around the garage. It was suicidal, but he was compelled to face the thing that was coming to destroy him. All he had to do was get up on the deck, peek in the window.
The reflection of clouds in the patio door jiggled. The door opened. Allen ducked beneath the edge of the deck as he heard footsteps walk out onto the deck. A second later he smelled igniting tobacco and saw a nervous cloud of smoke jet above him. He snooped up and saw Jolene smoking a cigarette. Her face was etched, almost metal with resolve. She held a cell phone to her ear. She was pacing, agitated.
And then he heard the phone ring and the urgency in her. “Earl,” she asked firmly. “Can you drive?”
Allen carefully listened to the entire phone conversation. By the time Jolene finished he knew his life had changed and that his entire education and training had prepared him for this particular crisis. To know how to read the signs and act decisively.
He mounted the stairs and watched Jolene leave the studio. Broker and Amy were in the house. He didn’t know where. But, for the moment, Hank was unattended. It was time to take another chance.
He found himself in a totally new place that was also very familiar. Sometimes surgeons were called upon to make fast decisions about who lived and who died.
Triage.
