The Survivor Chronicles: Book 1, The Upheaval (3 page)

She knew, without even having to look, that it was seven nineteen. It would be exactly seven twenty when he stepped outside that front door. It always was. She waited, listening as the door opened and closed behind him before she started her day. Walking into the kitchen she rinsed her coffee cup and placed it in the sink. The dishes could wait till later.

She jogged upstairs, pulled out her workout clothes and quickly slipped them on. This was her favorite part of the day, the simple hour she had to herself to walk down the beach and savor in the beauty that the rest of the world had to offer. An hour in which she could remind herself that not everything was awful in life, and that there were good things out there, just waiting for her to discover.

She was making her way back downstairs when she felt the first tremor, a small shaking. Rochelle’s fifth grade picture rattled beside her on the wall. She clasped the railing tighter as the photo continued to shake. It broke loose and plummeted onto the stairs. Mary Ellen jumped back as glass shattered around her feet.

“What the…?”

The question broke off as the world settled around her again. She’d felt a tremor last year, but not this much, and at the time she’d written it off as a passing train until she’d heard about it on the news. There was no denying this though. It was obvious that she’d just experienced some sort of earthquake. She’d heard of the New Madrid fault line, knew that it would affect them if an earthquake was large enough, but something about this just didn’t feel right.

Not like she was an earthquake expert. She’d spent a summer, when she was eleven, visiting her aunt and uncle in San Francisco but she’d only experienced one small tremor while there, and her aunt had insisted that it had actually only been a passing trolley. As she got older Mary Ellen suspected her aunt was right, and that she had simply wanted it to be an earthquake so she would have something exciting to tell her friends about after the summer.

But now? Well, now there was no denying what she had just felt.

She waited breathlessly for a minute, but it seemed that the world had settled back into place and the small tremor had been an isolated incident. She stooped over and began to carefully gather the larger pieces of glass within her cupped hand. She had just placed the last piece into her palm when the world seemed to drop out from under her. She cried out as she was violently thrust to the side.

She felt glass slice into her hand; blood flowed forth as her shoulder bounced into the wall and the shattered pieces scattered again. Instinctively, she put her hand out for balance but it was already too late. Slick from the blood, her hand slipped awkwardly and she was thrust forward as the world lurched once again. Tumbling out of control, she ricocheted down the stairs and off the wall before crashing into the back of the couch.

She moaned, her body aching and throbbing as she tried to right herself. From somewhere deep in the house a loud crash reverberated. She suspected the bookcase that Larry had complained about had just toppled over. At least now the top of it would be easier to dust, she thought to herself. Somewhere closer, another crash and shattering glass. For the first time since it began, she didn’t feel just confusion, but actual fear. She realized that she had to get moving, that she’d die in this place if she didn’t.

Her hand continued to leave a trail of blood as she ran, one she was dimly aware Larry would later berate her for. The glass in the grandfather clock in the corner shattered, blowing outward with a force that seemed entirely out of place for an earthquake. Stumbling and staggering, she made her way to the front door and flung it open.

People were emerging outside. Some were screaming as they fled the deathtrap their houses had suddenly become. Others had fallen to the ground, seemingly astounded and lost as they stared at their tumultuous surroundings. Mary Ellen tripped down the outside stairs, fell to her knees, and forced herself back to her feet. Her heart hammered, she could barely get air into her lungs as her body became coated in a thin sheen of sweat. It seemed as if the shaking had been going on for hours, like it was never going to stop.

Something broke, or at least that’s what it felt like to her. A cracking, like an eggshell against a bowl, seemed to slash through the air. She stood, frazzled, stunned; unable to move as she somehow sensed a rending deep within her soul. A long, sad breath escaped her, and for some inexplicable reason tears suddenly sprang to her eyes.

And then, finally – thankfully – it was over. The enshrouding silence that ensued was almost as overwhelming as the quake had been. Then car alarms began to blare, dogs barked riotously, and an anguished scream pierced the still air. Mary Ellen fought the urge to cover her ears as that scream caused her bones to tremble.

She couldn’t breathe as she stumbled down the last few steps onto the sidewalk. Her neighbor, Mr. Shandling, was just emerging from his house. In his seventies, he was a kind old man, with smiling blue eyes, and a quirky sense of humor that Mary Ellen adored. She didn’t get to talk with him much, as he had worked mostly the same hours as Larry. And seventy or not, Larry didn’t like her talking to any man. But Mr. Shandling had retired from his job last month, and at least three times a week now she found herself drifting over to his garden to share coffee and chitchat, as he pulled weeds and admired his tomatoes.

He looked disorientated now as he blinked at her from behind the lenses of his glasses. Blood was trickling from a cut in his forehead; it had turned some strands of gray hair pink and ran in a perfect line down his nose. “Mr. Shandling!” Mary Ellen called out, terrified for him and his safety.

Gathering her scattered wits, Mary Ellen forced her trembling legs to work properly as she ran toward him. He turned to her, seeming dazed and disoriented as he blinked at her. “Mary Ellen?”

“Yes.” She arrived at his side. “Are you okay, Mr. Shandling?”

His hand went gingerly to his forehead. He seemed amazed as he pulled it back to examine the blood coating his fingers. “I think so,” he muttered.

It wasn’t the best of responses, but at least it was a response. She needed a towel, or something to wipe the blood away so that she could see the wound better. She was grabbing hold of his arm to steer him back inside when the barking that filled the air stopped. Bewildered by the sudden reprieve, she lifted her head to warily take in her surroundings. It was still loud, still unbelievably chaotic as people cried, screamed and carried on. Then the howling began.

As one unnerving unit, every dog within earshot let loose a series of cries that caused her heart to stutter. She heard birds shrieking, but when she tilted her head back the sky remained clear.

“What the…” Mr. Shandling broke off as a frantic woman raced across the yard toward them. Mary Ellen recognized her from the neighborhood, but they’d never really spoken before.

“Your husband,” the woman panted, pointing frantically toward the end of the street. “I called nine one one, but all the circuits… There’s no phones. Your husband...” she trailed off. “You have to come. Hurry!”

A cold chill crept down Mary Ellen’s spine. Mr. Shandling’s hand enfolded hers. “Go. I’ll be fine. Go on,” he urged.

She reluctantly released his surprisingly strong, weathered hand. She ran beside the woman, her heart hammering not so much with apprehension, but with a certain excited expectancy. It made her wonder just what kind of person she really was. They passed more people stumbling numbly around. On her left, a house had half collapsed. Outside, a woman was on her knees in the front yard crying loudly for her cat. Holes had opened up in the ground, appearing as if out of nowhere in peoples yards and the street. There was steam rising from one of them, but Mary Ellen didn’t begin to guess the source.

At the end of the road she spotted Larry’s new, shiny black Mercedes embedded in the trunk of a tree. Judging by the tire marks in the road, he had swerved to avoid one of the larger holes in the road. Cautiously, breathlessly, she approached the driver’s side door. The air bag had deployed, but it hadn’t done Larry any good. She stood, gaping and confused, as she stared at the broken body of her husband. The right side of his face had been crushed by a severed tree branch that had plunged through the roof of the car, impaling itself in his leg.

Six years.

It took her a moment to realize that she wouldn’t have to wait those six years, to realize that what she’d be waiting for, the moment she’d been calculating, was now.

She was free. She thought she should be more upset. After all, they had been together for fifteen years – half of her life – but all she felt was a sense of lightness as the severed bonds of oppression and unhappiness fell away from her. Free.

She lifted her head, inhaling sharply as she tried to retain control of her swaying emotions. The street was a mess, people were everywhere, emergency vehicles could be heard in the distance, but she saw no way they would be able to make it past the collection of hole-filled road, wrecked cars, and traumatized people. She stumbled backward as the first bird plummeted from the sky, knocking a man to his knees as it struck his head.

A strangled cry escaped her. The neighbor woman seized hold of her arm, pulling her back as more birds began to fall. “Run!” she cried.

Mary Ellen didn’t have to be told twice; she turned and immediately bolted back toward her home. Mr. Shandling was waving and shouting at her from beneath the shelter of his porch roof. Mary Ellen ran as fast and relentlessly as she could, with only one thing on her mind:

She had to get her daughter.

CHAPTER 3

Riley

Foxboro, Mass.

7:22 A.M.

Riley jogged backward as she called to her softball team to keep up. They were slacking, and she didn’t care how hot it was already. They needed to get their butts in gear if they were going to make it into the tournament finals next week. Last year she wouldn’t have cared about slacking. In fact, she probably would have been in the back of the group along with her friend Carol, snickering and complaining about the run. But now she was going into her senior year, and she’d already been elected Captain of the team. These were going to be the first games with her in charge, and she’d be damned if they were going to fail under her watch.

“Come on, guys! My grandmother can run faster!”

There was a collective series of groans. Carol stuck her tongue out and made a sour face. Traitor, she mouthed.

Riley grinned, and had just started to laugh when she was suddenly thrown off balance and knocked back. She bounced on her butt across the sidewalk, a groan swelled up her throat as her bruised ass protested the jarring impact. She suppressed it only because she was humiliated by her unbelievable – and uncharacteristic – clumsiness. She must have tripped over a crevice in the sidewalk, or perhaps a stubborn root that had somehow worked its way beneath the surface, as was common in this area.

Yet even as those thoughts ran through her mind, her body continued to process a variety of other stimuli. The ground was vibrating beneath her fingers. She hadn’t noticed it at first because she had been so startled, but she felt it now. There was a tingling working its way up her hand, into her arms, and pulsating through her chest.

Carol stepped forward, her hand out to help Riley up, but she then froze. Carol’s eyebrows drew together in confusion, her mouth parted as her eyes lifted to scan the street, then the treetops. Riley went to push herself up when she realized what had caused her to fall. It had been a tree root, but this one had not worked its way beneath the surface of the walkway, it had ripped its way up from the maple that had tipped over in the yard next to her.

A young boy raced out the front door, his mother close on his heels as he bolted into the front yard, screaming incoherently. Riley was screaming without even realizing it, and then she realized that she wasn’t actually making any sounds. Not out loud anyway. Instead, there was a silent cry echoing loudly in her head that she could neither drown nor release.

Then the real screaming started, not the panicked shrieks reverberating through her head, but agonized screams that left Riley numb inside. She felt a fracturing somewhere, perhaps in the deep recesses of her mind, she didn’t know. But what she was seeing – what her eyes were trying to process – couldn’t be real. It just couldn’t, she insisted internally.