A loud creaking of wood precedes the living room door bursting open, startling her from her seat on the couch. Her hands flail frantically for a moment, the act catching her off guard. Her husband, Markus, rushes into their living room. His shirt is ripped, his hair is tangled and knotted, and he is shaking. Her brow furrows, “Is Markus hurt?” she thinks, but in her startled state no words leave her mouth.
He paces back and forth in the living room, his breathing heavy and deep, the front door hanging wide open. His mouth is moving, but only quick bursts of hot breath are purging forth. Her hands come up to her face and clasp, and her nose rests against them. Her eyes widen, her heart races.
“Markus, what’s going on?” she’s finally able to ask.
Her words snap him back to the present, back from wherever his mind has been wondering. He rambles anxiously, his voice trembles. There is no coherence to his words. After a short moment he takes a breath, trembling more on the exhale.
“Markus!” she exclaims, rising from her seat.
His gaze sways from the floor to her direction, not to her face, but to the wall beside her. His eyes are bloodshot, and his face is flushed and worn.
His head rocks side to side, “It’s here, it’s here.” his words are soft, barely more than a whisper.
She can feel the dread seeping from him, it’s palpable, it fills the air. She shifts uncomfortably, her feet move closer together, her bottom lip curls under.
“We have to get out of here right now!” he mutters, his voice breaking.
“What-what’s going on?”
“It’s here, it’s” -his breathe escapes him for a moment, he sucks in air sharply, again, and continues- “it’s everywhere. They didn’t, they didn’t even warn us, it’s just here.”
“Markus, focus, what’s here? And what happened to your shirt?”
For a moment Markus stares at the wall, at nothing, at an abyss, His gaze cold and filled with worry and his face without pigment, leaving one to wonder if he were visited by a specter. He crumbles down onto the couch, his hands run through his hair, brushing the same spots two, three times, before finally resting on his damp cheeks. His breathing has slowed, but his shaking has only continued to increase. He speaks again, his tone somber and despondent.
“It’s fucking insane out there. We have to get far away from the city.”
Flushed pale, with her chest pounding and her own breathing intensifying, Kyle picks up their son and moves to the center of the living room.
“Baby, you’re scaring me. Calm down and explain what's going on!”
For the first time since he came home he looks her in her eyes, a striking void residing beyond his gaze. His mouth opens but words fail him. Tears gloss his ocular corners, his face has become red and puffy. Composure returns to him for a moment, but his voice quakes with disbelief.
“The virus, they-they lied. It’s not getting,” -he stifles a lump in his throat, grunting softly- “uh, it’s everywhere now. It was all over social media, my phone was blown up about it. Just two days ago they said it was calming, that they were controlling the spread, but they’re not, they lied. I would’ve called but, your phone...”
She grimaces remembering the clumsy manner in which she dropped her phone in the bathtub last night, while trying to select a song to listen to when giving Patrick a bath. They were going to have it fixed this coming weekend on Markus’ next day off.
“It’s rampant everywhere. Every state, small towns, all the major cities. New York, Chicago, Vegas, L.A., Miami...”
She knows the next city. She doesn’t want to hear it, but she knows it’s coming. Her stomach twists and turns, a devious sense of despair running through her gut. Markus fights back tears, but as soon as the word leaves his mouth they stream like a waterfall.
“Nashville.” he says through rumbling vocal cords.
Her knees buckle. She grabs the playpen for support. Nashville is twenty minutes away. Through his sobs Markus recounts what happened to him.
“I had just left work. I was sitting in the car reading the updates until I realized they were all from earlier in the day. Nothing new had been posted anywhere in hours. All the updates said people everywhere were going crazy. There were videos of people hurting each other, pictures of mobs of people attacking others, videos of kids...”
His emptions overwhelm him and he weeps. His sobs echo in his hands. She stands frozen, a whirlwind of terror and confusion consuming her. Markus takes another deep breath, attempting to stifle his sobs. He continues again, his voice hollow and weak.
“I-I didn’t know what to think. I just knew I had to get home. Traffic was really heavy. I was stopped at a light, by the on-ramp, when this car flew off the overpass. It just sailed off the side of the highway, like-like it was supposed to be doing that. It landed on the other side of the road, on top of some other cars, it crushed them. It fucking freaked me out. Everything just-just stopped.”
He takes another hard, tremble filled inhale, wiping tears from his face.
“People started getting out of their cars and approaching the wreck. I got out to get a better view, see if maybe I could help somehow. I watched, not really knowing what I should do. I mean, what do I know about this kind of thing? I’m not a doctor or anything like that. Someone said they saw a person move in the car on top, the one that flew off the highway. They raced over and tried to pry the door open but couldn’t.
“They climbed up and smashed the window in and pulled a young girl out. She was coughing up blood everywhere. She
