The Cost of Living (2 page)

STUART

SUNDAY 10 MAY – 1:14am

So the others
are in bed but there’s no point me going up yet. I know I won’t sleep. Gabby
went up early but I stayed down to watch a film. I sat through the whole thing,
but didn’t take any of it in. Too much on my mind.

What
we saw in the supermarket was shocking. Sickening. There’s been reports of
similar things on the news over the last few days, but seeing it in the flesh
like that was so much worse.

What
we get on BBC and SKY is the safe, sanitised, watered-down version of events,
the bits they want us to see. We’re spared the gory details, and because it’s
what we’re used to, we don’t question it. They show endless footage of wars,
but you hardly ever see any blood. You see all those cities in ruins, buildings
crumbling, desperate people searching through the rubble... but you’re always
watching it from a safe distance. You can’t smell it. You can’t taste it. You
can’t
feel
it. All that changed today.

We
didn’t think anything of it when we saw the first reports. Just one or two
cases... nothing much in isolation. There’s a new disease doing the rounds
every couple of months, and for all the panicked predictions, they never seem
to amount to much. There was Swine Flu a few years back, Bird Flu before that,
and then there was that virus they found buried in the Siberian permafrost that
had been dead for thirty-thousand years but which some dick in a lab managed to
bring back to life. But this season’s killer syndrome of choice is different.
It came after the annual flu surge and caught everyone unawares. Seems it was
something in this year’s mutation of the flu that opened the door to this new
germ. The first epidemic paved the way for the next.

But
back to the news...

I
was sitting here with Gab and I remember the bulletin clear as day. They were
talking about how this particular infection strikes its victims all of a
sudden. It literally knocks them off their feet. One minute they seem fine,
half an hour later and they’re flat on their backs in the middle of a
supermarket aisle, apparently out for the count.

And
this is where the TV version of events differs from what we saw today.

On
the news they talked about infected people’s salivary glands working overtime,
constantly dribbling and drooling, some kind of involuntary reaction after
they’ve lost consciousness. But I don’t know... that’s not what I saw today. I
mean sure, she lost consciousness, that much was obvious, but it’s what
happened next that doesn’t tie up. She attacked that poor shop girl and she was
doing everything she could to get spit all over her. She was definitely
conscious, and she was definitely hurling or drooling or whatever,
over
the girl. It was controlled, it was violent, and it was frightening as hell.

It
doesn’t add up.

And
now I’m left sitting here on my own in the middle of the night, sleep the very
furthest thing from my mind, thinking
why are they lying about this?
Don’t people need to know? If these sick people are out on the streets,
shouldn’t somebody be telling us or doing something about it?

It’s
probably just me, blowing the whole thing out of proportion.

I’d
like to know what happened to the supermarket worker who got caught today,
though. Maybe she’s all right tonight, maybe she’s out drinking with her
friends, trying to forget about the day from hell she’s just survived.

But
what if she isn’t?

And
what about the woman? Did they restrain her? How many more people could she
have drooled over on the way from the supermarket to the hospital?

STUART

TUESDAY 19 MAY – 10:54am

I have the radio
on as I work. It used to be a distraction that got me through the tedium of the
day, now the work’s the distraction. Concentrating on the stuff the boss tells
me makes it easier to block out everything else. See, I think something big’s
going on here. Part of me thinks I’m wrong because no one else seems to be
reacting, but then I look at the facts and I know I’m right about this. See, I
think this should be the main headline, but they’re treating it like an
afterthought, squeezing in a mention between the local news and the weather
reports.

I
know I’m coming across like a conspiracy theorist here, but the mainstream
media changed the way they talked about the infection a few days ago. I can’t
help thinking they’re trying to make it look like less of a big deal than I
know it is. They’re still talking about isolated cases and extreme reactions,
but if you dig a bit deeper and start looking at the unofficial news –
people’s Facebook timelines and tweets, all that kind of stuff – it
paints a very different picture.

I
can’t do it here on the office computer, but I can see stuff on my phone. You
look at some of the crank sites (at least I used to think they were cranks),
all the sites for Preppers and the like, and they’re all full of it. They’re
all saying the exact same thing. They’re reporting huge numbers of cases. Well
huge by comparison to the ten o’clock news, anyway. I found this report from a
kid in Aberdeen. Something like what happened to the woman in the supermarket
happened to a friend of his, apparently. How much of this was bullshit I don’t
know, but it made for pretty disturbing reading. He was talking about his
friend having gotten sick after one of his sick relatives (who subsequently
died or disappeared, I’m not sure which) had coughed up gunk all over him. He
dropped in the middle of the street without any warning. A few minutes later
and he was up again, literally spewing bile over anyone he could get close to.
He puked up over more than ten people before anyone could stop him. Just one
sick kid.

Thing
is, if this is as bad as I’m thinking and this is how this infection spreads,
then what’s happening is scattershot, isn’t it? One infected person could
contaminate a whole street if they’re not stopped and sedated in time.

I’m
finding gaps in explanations, holes in stories, unexpected spaces where there
should be information. And no one else is questioning it.

Right
now, all this is little more than gossip. No one’s sounding particularly
worried, and that’s strange in itself because people are usually happy to
panic. Christ, I remember what happened after nine-eleven. I was on work
experience in a law firm in the middle of the city centre, halfway up a twenty
storey building. The days and weeks after the attack people were talking crap
about how
friends of friends of friends
had been approached by an
Arabic-looking
gentleman
at the train station, warning them to stay out of city centre
high-rises. I remember the mild panic when someone spotted a plane circling,
but it was just a light aircraft. If you looked close enough, you could see a
TV logo painted on its tail. It was a bloody weather forecaster doing circuits
for local radio, nothing more sinister.

People
don’t ever stop and analyse. They either ignore what’s in front of their noses
or jump to conclusions and make assumptions without realising what they’re
doing. Why would terrorists launch an attack on our office, for Christ’s sake?
Hardly a key tactical target, was it? And would anyone really have been so
inspired by what they’d seen across the Atlantic as to want to fly a small
plane into the side of a building in Digbeth? I doubt it. People can be so
bloody stupid at times.

Now
it’s the reverse, though. Now I think something
is
happening, but people
have got their heads buried in the sand because that’s easier than facing up to
what might be coming.

This
started overseas. South Sudan had a head start on the rest of the world for
once. On the radio now there’s a report from the UN where some specially
convened meeting is discussing sudden huge rises in the rates of infection in
other parts of Africa. And my colleagues are still casually talking about the
football and who got voted off the latest shite reality TV programme last
night, because what’s happening
over there
, isn’t happening
over here
.
Not yet. Not in the same kind of numbers, anyway.

But
if you look back at reports from those other countries, I think you can see a
pattern emerging. It all started the same way. I think it’s only a matter of
time.

STUART

WEDNESDAY 27 MAY – 8:35am

Today’s the day
it changed. Today it stopped being something on TV I can just switch on and off
when I feel like it. What’s happening out there is serious, the implications
vast. I’ve tried to keep it from Gabby and the kids because there’s nothing
they can do. I’ll try to preserve their normality for as long as I can but, if
I’m right, in the next few days their world will inevitably begin to fall
apart.
Everything
will start falling apart.

I’ve
been scouring the dark recesses of the Internet again, looking for information.
Gabby thinks I’m looking at porn, because every time she gets close I shut the
laptop case fast. I wish that was all I was doing.

I’ve
found a link to a load of footage from South Sudan and other countries nearby.
I’ve seen whole swathes of land left desolate with just the infected left there
to roam. In one clip, it was taken live on a phone and streamed elsewhere, some
guy stumbled into a village where there were twenty or thirty of them just
drifting, looking like they were in some kind of trance, a weird malaise. But
then, when they saw the guy who was filming, they stampeded after him, racing
with each other like they all wanted to be the one to infect him. I was shaking
when I stopped watching, because I know that’s coming over here.

It’s
not just Africa now. Parts of Russia are the same, and India and Pakistan too.
Now it’s spreading across Europe, though you wouldn’t think so if all you
watched was the mainstream media. The rise in case numbers in those regions has
been exponential, and I can’t see how anyone thinks they’ll get this situation
back under control. It’s just a question of time.

Gabby
thinks I’ve got an off-site meeting this morning. There is one, but I’m not
going. I’ve got more important things to do. I know she’ll be out all morning.
I wait until she’s taken Nathan to school, then head out myself. Just have to
hope that the schools are open and that they’ll be okay. I’d rather we were all
at home together, but I need the space. I need to do this.

I’m
a few steps ahead of the game. I’m still questioning myself constantly, wondering
if I’m overreacting, but I know in my heart I’m not. See, I’ve always known
this part would be key to surviving the shit that’s about to hit the fan. Most
people are still going about their day-to-day business like nothing’s changed,
and I almost envy their ignorance. There’s no avoiding it, though. Something
terrible is coming.

I
drive to the wholesalers we use at work and start doing the thing I’ve always
dreaded. I’m stocking up for the apocalypse. Part of me feels like an idiot,
like I’m the one who’s got this wrong. I can see people looking at me, thinking
I’ve lost my fucking mind, but all I have to do is picture the faces of my wife
and kids to keep me focused and on task. They’re all that matters. The lad on
the till looks at me as if I’ve gone crazy. Who knows... maybe I have?

I
load everything into the back of the car, then go straight back in again for
more. This time even more of the staff have clocked what I’m doing. None of
them are completely stupid, they’re just not ready to accept that their old
lives are coming to an end and that a much more uncertain future now lies
ahead, if any future at all. This time as I work my way around the warehouse, I
know they’re all watching me. Half the staff are thinking
look at that
fucking idiot
. The other half are thinking,
should I be doing that?

I
have to move fast. The development is at its quietest at this time of the
morning and I reverse onto the drive of our house and unload everything into
the garage, satisfied there are no prying eyes watching. It’s almost too quiet.
There’s a guy in one of the small terraced houses across the way who says
goodbye to his girlfriend then acknowledges me, but other than him I don’t see
anyone else. The development’s only two-thirds built, but it doesn’t look like many
of the builders turned up to work today.

Now
I head straight back out again, this time to the DIY store. It’s no good
getting in all those supplies and not taking steps to make sure the house is
secure. I buy sheets of plywood, fencing, padlocks and chains, industrial-size
containers of bleach and other cleaning agents. The teller puts everything
through. She’s polite enough, but I can tell from the look in her eyes that
she’s uneasy. Does she know what I’m doing? The combination and quantities of
stuff I’m buying is a dead giveaway. She knows the axes aren’t for cutting down
trees, and this black rubber sheeting’s not for lining a fish pond.

I
get everything unloaded with just a couple of minutes to spare before Gabby
gets home. It’s only taken just over an hour. I’m still putting the last of it
away when she pulls up on the drive with the kids. She doesn’t have a clue why
I’m here. ‘What’s wrong, love?’ she asks me. ‘Aren’t you well?’

‘I’m
fine. How come you’re all back?’

‘Not
enough teachers at Nathan’s school so they closed it. Never mind that, Stu, why
are you home? Don’t tell me they’ve made you redundant? You said there was a
chance...’

I
shut the front door. Nathan goes up to his room. The baby’s asleep and Sally’s
immediately occupied by the TV, so I sit Gabby down in the kitchen and try to
tell her things how I see them. ‘I think this is bad, Gab, really bad.’

‘What?’

‘The
sickness. I think it’s a lot worse than people are letting on.’

‘Come
on, Stu... are you for real? Something like this happens every few years. A
couple of weeks time and it’ll all be forgotten and they’ll be onto the next
health scare. Honestly, love... this isn’t like you. You’ve been working too
hard. Do you need to take some time off? Maybe we should—’

‘There’s
nothing wrong with me, Gab. For the record, I hope you’re right. I hope I have
got this wrong, but I don’t think I have. Watch the news, read between the
lines... they know what’s coming, they’re just not saying. They don’t want
people panicking.’

She
closes her eyes and shakes her head. What’s she thinking? Does she believe me,
or does she think I’ve lost it? Is it easier to believe that than accept the
truth? ‘You’re wrong.’

‘I’m
not.’ I slide my laptop across the table towards her. ‘Here, have a look. You
have a look at what’s happening in Russia, then go back a couple of weeks and
see how it started there. Look at South Sudan and South Africa. Look at Chad
and Nigeria. It’s the same bloody pattern. A few isolated cases – like
that woman in the supermarket, remember? – then more and more. Then it
all changes in a couple of days. It spirals out of control.’

‘But
it’s not out of control in Russia.’

‘Just
look at the news, Gab.’

She
does what I tell her and her eyes widen when she sees the reports I was looking
at earlier. Hundreds of cases have become thousands overnight. Maybe it’ll be
hundreds of thousands by this time tomorrow. Maybe it’ll be more.

She
shakes her head, shuts the laptop, and slides it back my way. ‘This doesn’t
prove anything. It’s just scaremongering. I’m more worried about you than
anyone in Russia, love. I think you’re putting yourself under too much stress.
You’re starting to sound paranoid.’

‘I’m
not paranoid. This is real, I know it is.’

She
gets up and walks over to the kitchen window. She sees the pile of papers I’ve
left on the counter; the receipts from this morning. She starts leafing through
them, and I know exactly what’s coming next. ‘Stu... what the hell have you
done?’

‘What
do you think?’

‘I
think you’ve blown our food budget for the next three months. Christ, love,
we’re struggling enough as it is. You’re the one who’s always lecturing me
about the cost of living, and you go and do this?’

She’s
doing this on purpose, because fighting with me is easier than facing what’s
coming next.

‘We
need to talk about this, Gab.’

‘Damn
right we need to talk. Bloody hell, when I think of all the grief you’ve given
me since we moved... all that bullshit about tightening our belts and cutting
costs... then you go and do this? I give up. And you still haven’t answered my
question, why aren’t you at work?’

‘That’s
not important. What’s important is trying to—’

‘Not
important! What if Ray finds out and you lose your job? What happens then? What
happens if we can’t pay the mortgage and feed the kids and... and why are you
looking at me like that?’

‘Sit
down again, love, please.’

She
refuses. I make her a coffee. Her face is streaked with tears. She dabs at her
mascara with a tissue. ‘I think you’ve gone crazy. Absolutely bloody crazy.
It’s just a flu virus.’

‘It’s
more than that and you know it. The flu virus is a red herring, I told you that
the day before yesterday. It’s because of the flu virus that so many people’s
immunities are low, and that’s why it’s spreading so quickly. The hospitals are
overcrowded... the whole health system is stretched to breaking point. Take
Sally’s booster jab, for example. When was the last time a routine appointment
like that was cancelled?’

‘Never,’
she admits, thinking it over. Then she turns again. ‘You’re making huge assumptions,
though. Just because it’s happening in other countries, doesn’t mean it’s
necessarily going to happen here...’

‘It
already is happening, love. Have you seen the news this morning? It’s the exact
same thing. Same as India. Same as China and Russia. And there are reports from
the US and Canada too... They said it would never happen there, remember? As
recently as last week they were saying they had it all under control... now
look. There’s no reason to think it won’t happen here.’

‘But
they said we were safe. They said it wouldn’t happen here. They said they’d be
able to contain it and because we’re an island they said there’s no way it
could—’

‘We
talked about this. It’s always the same. What were the people on TV supposed to
say before today? The truth’s unpalatable sometimes, but we have to stay
positive and look on the bright side here, love, because—’

‘There’s
a bright side?’

‘Yes,
there’s a bright side. We’re ready for this and we’re together. I’m going to do
everything I have to do to keep this family safe. I won’t let anything happen
to any of us.’

I
wait for her to say something, but she doesn’t. She knows I’m right. She starts
crying. I take her hand and hold her tight, then show her the garage. It’s
piled high with stuff, and for a second the sheer amount takes even me by
surprise.

‘Jesus...’
she says under her breath, and I explain.

‘Enough
food to keep us going for a couple of months if needs be. Medical supplies for
every eventuality. Water purification tablets, cleaning products, disinfectants,
detergents... everything we’re likely to need and a lot more besides.’

‘What’s...’
she starts to say. She stops and composes herself. ‘What’s all the wood for?
What are you making?’

‘Not
making anything. It’s to help secure the house if we need to. Strengthen the
windows and doors, that kind of thing. We might need to keep people out as well
as keeping us in. I told you, I’m not taking any chances, Gab. You four are all
that matters to me.’

Back
to the kitchen. Sally appears from out of nowhere, face full of snot. I grab a
tissue and wipe her clean. ‘Hungry,’ she says.

‘I’ll
get you something,’ Gab tells her. Sally watches as she makes her a Marmite
sandwich.

‘Mummy
sad?’

Gabby
wipes her eyes. ‘Mummy’s okay,’ she says.

‘Mummy
sick?’

‘No,
Mummy’s fine.’