Fallout (12 page)

Dad stops his tiger prowl beside Mom's bunk. “I won't hear another word of this. I said over my dead body, and I meant it.” He faces Mr. McGovern. “Have you lost your mind, talking like this in front of these children? In front of this woman?” He gestures to Janet. “In front of your own daughter?” He gestures to Paula.

“To quote Charles Darwin, ‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It's the one that is the most adaptable to change,'” Mr. McGovern shoots back. “It looks to me like we can either adapt to the reality of this situation or starve to death.”

“We're not going to die,” Dad counters. “As long as we have water, we should be able to survive until the radiation levels go down.”

“You hope,” Mr. McGovern grouses.

Dad gives him a stern look. “Yes, Herb, I do.”

Early each morning, the newspaper boy tossed the paper onto our driveway. Normally Dad would pick it up and read it on the train to the city, where he worked for an insurance company. But lately he went out before breakfast and brought it inside to read with Mom. Sparky and I would come into the kitchen, and they'd be sitting at the table with the paper open, coffee cups in their hands, and serious expressions on their faces.

When I asked what was going on, they either said “nothing” or gave some vague answer about the Russians and Cuba. And Mom would almost always add, “It's nothing you should worry about.”

One night when Dad came in to kiss me good night, I asked, “What if the Russians attack when you're not home?”

“You'll have to go into the shelter without me.”

“But what'll happen to you?”

“There are lots of shelters in the city. In the basements of buildings and the subway.”

“So we could all meet again after the war?”

Dad nodded. “That's the plan.”

That was good news because it meant the only times Dad might have a problem was when he was on the train going to and from work. “So if they drop the bomb and you're at work, after the war should we come to the city, or will you come back here?”

Dad ran his tongue over his front teeth and thought. “Things in New York could be pretty chaotic. You should stay out here.” He got quiet for a moment. “You and Edward riding your bikes to school every day?”

I looked down at the bedcovers. A few weeks before, Dad had made us promise we would.

“I thought we agreed,” he said.

“Sparky quit after the third day, and I don't like riding all the way there alone.”

Dad looked off. “Well, I guess I can understand that.”

“So what do we do if there's a war and we're at school?”

“Try to get home as fast as you can.”

The next day after school, I laid a wooden yardstick end over end, marking yards in chalk on the sidewalk in front of our house. When I thought I had enough, I went back and started counting them. “One, two, three.”

“Seven, six, eight, twelve,” Sparky began spitting out numbers until I forgot where I was. I shook my fist at him. “You want to get hurt?” He backed away and I started over, numbering each yard with chalk. I'd just finished marking off fifty yards when Ronnie and Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? came by.

Ronnie looked at the yardstick and the chalk numbers going up to fifty. Then he saw my stopwatch lying on the grass. He turned to my brother. “What's he up to?”

Sparky shook his head like he wasn't allowed to say, which was what I told him if anyone asked.

Ronnie popped a few Sugar Babies in his mouth and smacked his lips. “Man, these are good.” He held the bag out to Sparky. “Want some?”

Five seconds later, Ronnie knew exactly what I was up to: trying to see how long it would take if I had to run all the way home from school.

“Scott, anyone ever tell you you're crazy?” he asked.

“Yeah. You, about a thousand times.”

“Make it a thousand and one,” Ronnie said. “You're crazy.”

“Thanks.”

“What's the point?” he asked. “Didn't you see those pictures of Hiroshima? All those burned-up and deformed people. Why would you want to be around for that?”

“It's better than dying,” I said, not because I was really sure that it was, but because it was the only answer I could think of.

“You know about radiation poisoning?” asked Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? He was in the smart class at school and never got into trouble. And he was nice. Not brownnose-teacher's-pet-nice like Paula, but nice and polite in a sincere way that made everybody like him. And if that wasn't bad enough, he was a good athlete who could throw and catch and run really fast. The only thing wrong with Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? was that there was nothing wrong with him.

“A little,” I answered.

“What is it?” asked Sparky.

“It's from the radioactive fallout,” Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? explained. “After the mushroom cloud, dust and ash float down out of the sky, and it's full of radiation, and when you touch it or breathe it into your lungs, it makes you sick. Your hair falls out and you throw up and —”

“Ahhhhh!” Sparky let out a cry and ran toward the house with his hands over his ears.

“Did I scare him?” asked Why Can't You Be Like Johnny?

“He has this thing about throwing up,” I explained. “Even if you just mention it, he starts to cry.”

“Sorry, I didn't know,” Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? said. And the thing was, he wasn't just saying it. He really was sorry.

Ronnie pointed at the fifty yards I'd marked off. “You gonna try it?”

I gave him the stopwatch, then crouched down like a sprinter, pressing my hands against the rough concrete. “Anytime.”

“Ready . . . set . . . go!” Ronnie yelled.

I took off as fast as I could. When I'd passed the fifty-yard line, I stopped and bent over with my hands on my thighs. “How'd I do?” I panted.

Back at the start line, Ronnie shrugged. “How would I know?”

“Didn't you time me?”

Ronnie looked down at the stopwatch. “Is
that
what this is for?”

“Very funny.” I walked back to the start line, took the stopwatch, and gave it to Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? “No tricks, okay?”

Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? never played tricks on people. Once again, I crouched down. “Anytime.”

“On your mark, get set, go!”

I went.

“Seven point four seconds,” Johnny called out after I'd passed the finish line.

Still breathing hard, I took out a piece of paper on which I'd prepared some calculations. There were 2,640 yards in a mile and a half, and divided by 50, it was 52.8. If you multiplied 52.8 by 7.4 seconds, you got 390.72 seconds. “I can make it home in about six and a half minutes,” I said.

This was good because there might be things I'd need to do before I went down into the bomb shelter. Like go into my room and get the latest
MAD
magazine if I hadn't finished reading it. And get the Halloween candy if Mom had already bought some. After all, Halloween was less than two weeks away and it would be a shame to see all that candy wasted.

“What about Sparky?” asked Ronnie.

I hadn't thought of that. Sparky was slower than me, but not that much slower. “I think he'll make it in time.”

“Can I see that?” Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? gestured for the pencil and paper. I gave it to him and lay back on the grass and looked at the clouds. Today they were thin and wispy, but I was thinking about a mushroom cloud. The only picture I'd ever seen of one had looked dark gray and ominous and was no doubt filled with radioactive fallout.

“You do what we talked about?” Ronnie asked while Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? was busy scribbling on the paper.

“Huh?”

“What we talked about after I pulled the thing that snapped? And then we ran behind Old Lady Lester's house?”

I shook my head.

Why Can't You Be Like Johnny? looked up from his calculations. “What are you talking about?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“You could always look at your father's
Playboy
s,” Ronnie said.

“I don't think my father has any,” I said.

“All fathers have
Playboy
s,” Ronnie insisted. “Look in his closet. If they're not there, look in his dresser drawer under his shirts.”

“Does your father have
Playboy
s?” I asked Why Can't You Be Like Johnny?

He shook his head and circled a number on the paper. “I hate to say this, Scott, but it's going to take you a lot longer to run home from school.”

“Why?” I asked, unsettled by how he'd stressed
a lot.

“The fastest man alive can run a mile in about four minutes. Even if he could continue at that same pace for
another
half mile, which is doubtful, it would take
him
six minutes.”

“Uh-oh.” Ronnie grinned. “You're probably about a thousand times slower than the fastest man alive. If they drop the bomb while we're at school, you'll never make it home in time.”

This was really bad news.

“I'd look for those
Playboy
s if I were you,” Ronnie said.

The talk of making people leave the shelter has stopped, but it doesn't feel like it's over. A little while ago, after they fed Mom, Dad put his hand on Janet's shoulder as if to reassure her that nothing bad would happen. I guess as long as we're hungry, what Mr. McGovern said will probably be in the backs of everyone's minds.

In the meantime, we have to adapt to less and less privacy. When someone has to go potty, two people hold up a sheet. It's not just for the person who's going, but for the rest of us, so we don't have to watch.

When Sparky and I go, Dad reminds us to use as little toilet paper as possible. The way he says it makes me think he's trying to remind the others as well, because he can't really tell Paula or Ronnie or the other grown-ups what to do. But with ten people, the toilet paper seems to go fast no matter how careful we are.

We quickly get used to the potty noises that made us giggle up there. If a kid in class farted, everyone would laugh and titter. But down here no one cares anymore.

Dad and Janet take Mom to the toilet bucket often in case she has to go. They turn her on her bunk so she doesn't get bedsores. Now and then Dad crouches in front of her and speaks, but he gets no reaction.

Sometimes Sparky sits next to Mom and holds her limp hand. And once in a while, he'll reach for Janet's hand. When he does that, you might catch a frown on Mr. McGovern's face. Ronnie keeps pressing his fingertips under his nose and sniffing. Paula picks her nose but tries to hide it. Mr. Shaw sticks his finger in his ear and rotates it, digging out wax. Maybe they've always done these things in public and I just never noticed, but now there's nothing else to notice. There's no outside, no windows, no TV screens. Nothing to look at but each other. There are a few books and magazines, but if someone uses the flashlight to read them, there's no light for anyone else. We take turns resting on the bunks and sitting on the floor and at the table. We've played about a million games of checkers and Parcheesi and Sorry! and Go Fish. When no one talks, we listen to the groans and cries of empty stomachs.

And I can't help wondering if we've even been down here for three days yet.