So, when the sheriff’s car pulls up their drive on a bright morning, Charlotte isn’t surprised. It’s been a few days and he’s due. With a pat on Scoot’s flank, she leaves him and races to the house in time to see that his normal relaxed posture is entirely absent. He looks grim.
He stops telling her mother whatever it is he’s saying when Charlotte reaches them, then sighs. “We should talk alone, Tabitha.”
Tabitha merely hooks an arm around Charlotte’s shoulders and says, “Let’s go inside, get a cool drink, and we’ll see.”
They do, but Charlotte senses the tension in the air. Whatever the sheriff wants to say, he doesn’t want to say it in front of her. “I can go,” she offers.
Tabitha has clearly been considering this, because her answer is immediate. “No, I don’t think so. Whatever it is, it can’t be more than we’ve already talked about or imagined in the privacy of our own heads.” She looks intently into the sheriff’s eyes and says, “I got word about what happened in Taylorville.”
“You did?” he asks, clearly surprised.
Tabitha points over her shoulder in the general direction of one of the houses in the distance. “Larry told me when I brought him some squash.”
Charlotte is confused. What happened in Taylorville? Her mother hadn’t said a word after she came back from her visit. She hadn’t even seemed like anything was wrong at all.
“And does she know?” he asks, nodding at Charlotte.
“No.” Her mother sounds guilty. Brushing a hand down Charlotte’s hair, she says, “I should have told you. Do you remember when we discussed what could happen if certain kind of men decided they didn’t like the idea that they no longer had access to a woman?”
Charlotte blushes, but she remembers. She’d thought of it herself. She’s fourteen, but not an idiot. She nods.
“Well, something like that happened in Taylorville.”
“Someone kidnapped a woman? Or…” she trails off, not wanting to use the word rape.
Her mother and the sheriff share a glance full of meaning, then she looks at Charlotte again, her gaze intent. “They tried, but then something happened. The woman they tried to take died.”
“They killed her?” Charlotte asks.
“No, they didn’t. They didn’t even get her to their vehicle, from what I understand. Apparently, someone tied her up and carried her out and by the time they put her down, she was dead.”
“I don’t understand. I mean, she survived The Dying, right? Was it like that, like the ones at the beginning?”
Tabitha nods. “Exactly like that.”
“Oh.”
Her mind racing, she tries to put all the pieces together. So far, no one has died that she knows of since those first days. No one except for an old lady that might have died of a heart attack. They’d all begun to think it was over in this area, that they were being spared what rumor said was going on elsewhere.
Apparently, that isn’t the case at all.
“What does that mean?” she asks, looking from her mother to the sheriff.
Sheriff Dewalt toys with his glass of tea, then smiles at her a little sadly. “Did your mom tell you about the survivor’s list?”
Charlotte nods, not sure what this has to do with her question. She’d been sleeping during the first visit the sheriff made to the house, but afterward, her mother had shared the details. The day after The Dying started, law enforcement had been directed to send lists of those who had died. Almost immediately, the order had been rescinded, and a new order came directing them to instead send a list of survivors.
The sheriff hadn’t done that simply because he was swamped by the disorder brought in the immediate aftermath. Car crashes and fires had taken up all his resources. The sheer number of women who died while cooking or driving had ensured there was a mess to clean up that lasted days. That ignored order had been supplemented yet again in the days that followed.
He’d let her mother know the details, so she could decide for herself how she wanted to proceed, but he’d felt something was wrong with the order. They wanted too many details about the survivors for it to be a simple list of who remained. He’d shared those worries with her mother, who had, in her turn, shared them with Charlotte.
It had felt like a screening, rather than an accounting. Instead, he’d reported no survivors found. If those in his area wanted to report themselves, then they were free to do so, but he wouldn’t make that decision for them.
Her mother had agreed. Since then, they’ve been living in the unaccounted for middle ground, known to be alive locally, but not beyond.
The sheriff gives Charlotte time to think her thoughts. When she looks up, he says, “We’ve received additional orders since then. And it may have to do with what happened in Taylorville, but also may impact any decisions you and your mother make. I’m doing the rounds and telling all the survivors.”
Her mother squeezes her hand, then says, “Go ahead and tell us, Sheriff. She’s old enough to understand. Her life is as much at stake as any other.”
He clears his throat, takes a sip of his tea, then speaks. “What happened in Taylorville is happening everywhere. It’s worse in the cities, but the recent reports indicate that’s simply a matter of more females being found. Population density. Apparently, Washington D.C. had a lot of survivors.
“At first, they thought it was because so many people worked in secure buildings away from windows, but it’s not that. It was only that there were so many people living in one area. What happened with that woman in Taylorville happened to almost all of the women rounded up in that area. Some immediately, but more and more as time wore on. The local government put them into secure buildings to protect them, but…well…”
“They didn’t let them leave?” Tabitha offers.
“Yes. They started going quick after that, but some didn’t.
