Bart made a large pot of coffee while he waited for everyone to wake up and wander downstairs. Nancy liked to sleep in, so he didn’t expect to see her any time soon. Yue was his morning girl. She’d always been an early riser. Bart was the same way. It’d led to lots of early morning bonding time between the two of them. Today proved to be the same.
“Morning dad.” Yue said walking past him to go over to the coffee pot to pour herself a cup.
“I was wondering if you’d still get up early after all the excitement last night.” Bart said smiling over at this daughter.
“I don’t understand how everyone else can stay in bed. I could smell the coffee all the way upstairs. No way I can stay away from that.” Yue said. She took her coffee over to the sectional and sat down by the end table that had the remote control on it.
“Best enjoy the coffee now. Same with the TV and taking showers. No telling how much longer we’re going to be able to do all that stuff.” Bart said. He walked over and sat down on the other end of the sectional with his steaming hot cup.
“Wow. What kind of depressing stuff did you put in your coffee? I might as well turn on the news since you’re trying to fill the house up with doom and gloom anyway.” Yue said smiling at her dad. She knew for a fact that underneath his gruff exterior he was an incurable optimist with a huge heart.
Yue turned the TV on and pulled up the local news first. Normally the local news would have some stories around topics other than whatever the current disaster was. You could count on them in the midst of a hurricane to break away and bring in a story about someone being sued by their HOA for keeping pigs in their backyard. The days of people caring about HOA complaints must be over. The local and national news channels all seemed to be showing pretty much the same content. The only difference being the local news was listing the locations and requirements for the open shelters in their viewing areas. There was also some new information about a curfew that was going to start being enforced. It turned out there’d been some looting.
“I guess we missed our chance to get in on the looting.” Yue joked.
“I hope not. We need supplies.” Her dad responded straight faced. Yue looked over at him to see if he was serious or not. He nodded his head affirmatively at her inquisitive look. He definitely wasn’t kidding.
“We can’t just go steal stuff.” Yue said. She was picturing jumping out of the car and breaking the glass out of a gas station window to grab all the chips in the front of the store.
“It’s either that or starve to death. This whole thing is moving way too slow. Those people who broke in our garage the other night were the first of many. As this thing spreads there won’t be any more food being delivered. Everybody’s going to hide behind closed doors with whatever they’ve managed to hoard until they’re forced to leave or starve. The only other option will be if those things get in and turn them.” Bart declared. Yue turned away from her dad to watch the news. He was probably right, but it was still pretty early to contemplate diving into a life of crime. She needed to at least enjoy her coffee first.
On the TV the talking head behind the anchor desk was talking about how the military was taking the lessons from other countries and applying them in the USA. The news was showing videos of soldiers with bright lights affixed to their rifles sweeping forward to push back the unseen enemy. Drone video showed the miles and miles of fencing that’d been installed along the border. Every clip being aired implied the United States was prepared to fend off this threat. It was a far cry from the previous videos showing the multitude of disasters at the border.
“What a load of crap.” Bart announced. Yue shushed him as a general came on to explain how they were working to slow the surge of the infected from South America. Video of row after row of tanks heading for the border were shown. The general gave a lengthy explanation on how they were compartmentalizing the defense by leveraging the local law enforcement and National Guard. He talked about how in the different states they were ensuring none of the infected were able to slip through.
“What are you talking about? I think you need more coffee or something.” Yue remarked glancing over at her dad with concern. It wasn’t like him to be quite this negative this early in the morning. He was normally pretty jovial until Drew or LeBron showed up.
“The way the news is starting to show all the same videos. The way the scripts the reporters are reading are all positive and trying to show that we have this under control. They’re trying to get us to think it’s not going to be as bad as we all know it is. Be interesting to see what LeBron can pull up on the world wide web to give us the real story. I was a lot less freaked out before they tried to put a positive spin on it. It means we’re completely screwed and on our own. They don’t want us regular people rioting and screwing up their plans is my guess. Don’t tell your mom.” Bart lightheartedly added that last bit to try and soften the blow. He hated to be so direct, but she was a big girl now. She could take it. He wasn’t going to lie to try to make her
