One moment Miller was standing behind a tree, watching Ash talk to the woman through the closed door, and the next he was sprawled on the ground, a dozen feet away. He rolled onto his hands and knees, and pushed himself up.
The two structures were gone, pulverized in the blast.
Miller ran out of the woods and weaved around flaming debris as he raced toward the house. All he could think of was Ash. He’d been right there, near the front door.
Miller stopped a dozen feet from where the porch had been. The only things left standing were bits and pieces of the retaining wall around the basement.
“Jesus,” he said.
This clearly wasn’t some accidental gas explosion. It was designed specifically to destroy everything.
He whirled around. The ground was covered with chunks of wood and bent pipes and things he couldn’t even identify. What he didn’t see was Ash or the woman. She had been inside and Miller doubted there was much left of her. But Ash? Miller couldn’t allow himself to think the same.
Starting from where he’d last seen Ash, he began searching. It wasn’t long before he saw the rounded tip of something sticking out from under a ten-by-three-foot section of siding that had been blown from the house.
He grabbed the edge of the wood, and shoved it up. Ash was beneath it, his arms wrapped loosely around his chest.
Miller pushed the siding out of the way and knelt down.
Ash was breathing, and his pulse, though not strong, was steady enough.
“Ash?” Miller said, tapping the man’s cheeks. “Ash, come on.”
His efforts were greeted with a moan, but Ash’s eyes remained closed.
Miller raised his hand to his ear to turn on his radio and call for help, but his earpiece was missing.
“Shit!” he said. It must have fallen out when he was knocked to the ground. “Hang in there, buddy. I’ll be right back.”
He sprinted over to where he’d been. There was enough light coming from the scattered fires that he didn’t have to turn on his flashlight. His earpiece was on the ground, not far from where he’d been thrown.
“This is Miller. Do you copy?”
“This is Christina. Any progress th—”
“I need medical assistance right away,” he said. “At the Drexel house. Ash is down.”
31
After leaving the woman’s house the day before, Brandon had continued east, knowing he would find a highway at some point. By early afternoon, he was exhausted, so he found a spot at the base of a large rock, and crawled into this sleeping bag. When he woke, the sun had already gone down, so as anxious as he was to keep moving, he’d thought it best to stay there for the night.
He had a cold dinner of baked beans and water. Afterward, he lay awake for hours, wondering if he would ever see his family again, before finally falling back to sleep.
It was the noise that woke him, a distant, rumbling roar that he wasn’t sure was real or part of a dream. He opened his eyes, looked around, then sat up and listened.
If the noise had come from the real world, it was gone now.
Just a dream, then, he thought as he lay back down.
He was able to get a few more hours of sleep before he opened his eyes and knew he was done for the night. He retrieved a couple of granola bars and ate them as his breakfast. He put everything away when he was done, donned his pack, and started out again.
Clouds had begun to move in overhead, but in the east, where a half moon had risen not long before, the sky was still clear. Beyond the boulder where he’d been sleeping was a narrow, shallow valley. When he reached the top of the ridge on the other side, he stopped and stared.
“You’re kidding me,” he said.
Below him, less than half a mile away, was the thin ribbon of what could only be a highway. If he had kept going the day before, it was possible he would have slept someplace warm and welcoming.
Walking down the hill, he debated with himself what to do if he spotted a car. His experience with the woman at the house had instilled more than a little caution. Maybe he should just stay in the trees and follow alongside the road to a town. That might be the safest option.
As the sun took away the night and the morning made its slow journey toward noon, it looked like he wouldn’t have to worry about what to do if he saw a car. So far, not a single one had driven by.
Around eleven he stopped for lunch. As he was eating another granola bar, he remembered what day it was. It was his mother’s favorite day of the year, the first to occur since she died.
Christmas Eve.
The tears started before he even knew what was happening, then the sobs followed. It was over twenty minutes before either stopped.
32
When Sanjay regained consciousness, the sun was high in the sky. He started to roll onto his side, but made a poor choice of direction, and momentarily pressed his damaged shoulder against the ground.
He clenched his teeth as pain once more shot down his arm and across his chest. It wasn’t as bad as it had been when the bone was dislocated, but it still hurt like hell. Cradling his arm so his shoulder would remain immobile, he sat up.
The wrecked motorcycle was exactly where he had last seen it, as was, thankfully, the bag with the remaining jars of vaccine. His relief at this knowledge was tempered by the fact he still didn’t know where Kusum and her family were, and now he had no means of traveling around to find them.
He tried to remember where he was when the crash occurred. He was close to their meeting point, wasn’t he?
With some effort, he rose to his feet and looked out at the road. Dirt, rough, narrow.
Yes, this was the road to the place he and Kusum had slept the night before. No, two nights before.
The good thing was, even at a slow pace, he should be able to walk there in no more than an hour. But the location of the crash also meant it was unlikely Kusum and her family were there already. Surely they would have seen the wreckage and found him lying by the road as they passed.
So what should he do? Go to the meeting spot? Or head the other way to the main road? They’d have to come from that direction anyway, so it really wasn’t a choice.
He picked up the bag, slung it over his good shoulder, turned right, and headed toward the highway.
It took Sanjay forty minutes to walk back to where the road ended at the highway. Once there, he found a shady spot from where he could keep an eye out for Kusum, and sat down.
It was eerie how quiet it was. When he was driving around earlier, there’d still been a few cars on the road, but in the first hour he sat there, he didn’t see one.
She’s not coming. The voice was but a whisper in his head.
“She is,” he said aloud. “She’s coming.”
She’s not coming, the voice repeated.
“Stop it!”
He pushed himself to his feet and walked out into the middle of the road. He stared in the direction that led to Mumbai, willing Kusum to appear.
“She’s coming,” he said. “I know she is.”
The highway, however, remained empty.
He staggered back to the side of the road, his body weak from the accident and the walk and the hours spent searching for Kusum. He needed something to eat, something to help him regain strength. He couldn’t recall the last thing he ate, but he knew it hadn’t been much.
Just down the highway was a roadside restaurant. Both the dining area and the kitchen were open air with a simple roof above, made from whatever materials the owners could get their hands on. Like everything else seemed to be, it was closed.