One Second After (11 page)

Liz looked at him appealingly. John took it in, looked around, a book and magazine rack by the counter. Nothing he could use. The cooler for beverages, however, was about twenty feet away.

He backed over to it, not many had hit here yet, reached in, and pulled out a liter bottle of Coors beer. Makala was looking at him with disgust, not understanding what was happening.

Liz, coming up to the counter, tried to confront the belligerent customer, extending her hand for him to calm down.

“Listen, damn it. OxyContin, you hear me. I'll take thirty and you can call my doctor once the power comes back on and he'll confirm it.”

“Sir. Please leave this store.”

“That's it! Both of you bitches, get out of my way.”

He started to climb over the counter, Liz backing up.

John was up beside him and slashed out, the bottle smashing across the side of the man's head, shattering.

As he started to collapse, John pulled him back from the counter, flinging him to the ground, and for good measure stomped him in the solar plexus, doubling him up.

The man was on the floor, keening with a high, piercing shrill. Everyone else stood silent, stunned. John looked over at Liz.

“Sorry.”

He actually felt embarrassed by what had just happened. He had broken a societal taboo; folks around here did not go around smashing beer bottles across a guy's head, from behind, in the local pharmacy. John almost expected an alarm to go off, the police to come barging in. . . . There was only silence except for the pitiful cries of the man on the floor.

Still silence. John looked at the others lined up. Several turned and fled. One woman was shaking her head.

“Is this how you treat strangers in this redneck town?” she snapped. “I'll be damned if I ever stop here again.”

She stormed out.

He recognized one of the men. Pat Burgess, a Baptist minister, part of his Civil War Roundtable club.

Pat nodded.

“Good work, John. Sorry, but with my heart, I'd most likely pitched a coronary if I had taken him on.”

It snapped John out of the momentary haze, the shock, back to the reality
of where they were and what had to be done, for that matter what he was here to do.

“Pat, can you see to him? Get a belt or something and tie his hands first. Maybe somebody can look at his face and see if I cut his eye.”

“You did, you goddamn bastard. I can't see! My lawyer's going to rip you an extra asshole!”

The man started to scream again and John tapped him with his shoe. He cringed, falling silent.

John leaned over.

“Listen to me. You threatened these women. One more word and I will cut your eyes out,” John said, and the man fell back to crying, clutching his face, blood leaking out between his fingers.

John looked back at Liz, then stepped around behind the counter.

“Liz, can we talk for a moment?”

“Sure, John.”

He motioned to the back corner of the pharmacy area and the two went into the locked area and half-closed the door.

“Thank God you came in, John,” Liz whispered hoarsely. “I've had three like that already. We bluffed the other two out, but that guy was crazy. Most likely addicted. Doesn't travel with any in case he ever gets stopped, and his supply is at home.”

“Look, Liz, I need a favor.”

Liz fell silent, the look of gratitude disappearing.

“I think we got a bad situation,” Liz said quietly. “Don't we?”

“I won't lie to you. I think we do.”

She looked back towards the counter, the line of customers, more coming in and queuing up.

“I've been here all night,” she said wearily. “I live in Asheville, nothing was moving, I was hoping Jim might come to get me, but he hasn't shown . . .”

Her voice trailed off.

“How long before the electric comes back on?”

“I don't know.”

“How long?”

“A month, maybe a year or more.”

“My God,” Liz sighed.

“Exactly, and you know what I am asking for.”

“John, I have exactly forty vials in stock. There's one other kid in this town with the same thing your girl's got. Over a hundred adult diabetics with varying degrees of insulin needs.

“I've had four folks down here this morning already asking for extras. I can't give them out, John. I'm responsible to everyone here, not just Jen. . . .” She hesitated. “Not just you, John.”

“Liz, we're talking about my daughter, my little girl,” and his voice began to choke.

She pointed towards the neatly arrayed cabinets with medications.

“John, I've got hundreds of people I'm responsible for, and if what you said is true a lot of them will die, some in a matter of days. We just don't keep that much inventory in stock anymore. None of the pharmacies do; we rely on daily shipments.”

“There won't be daily shipments for quite a while, Liz.”

“Then my patients with pancreatic enzyme disorder? They don't take their pills daily they die. If what you told me is true, Mrs. Sterling will be dead within a week. . . .” Liz's voice trailed off and she stifled back a sob.

She took a deep breath and looked back up at him.

“Severe hypertensions, arrythmias, we got five people on antirejection drugs for transplants. Jesus Christ, John, what do you want me to do?”

He hated himself for doing it, but now started he couldn't stop.

“I lost Mary already, Liz. Please, dear God, not Jennifer, too. Not that.”

He lowered his head, tears clouding his eyes. He wiped them away, struggling for control.

He looked back into Liz's eyes, shamed . . . and yet, if need be, determined.

Liz looked straight at him and John could see that her eyes were clouded as well.

“It's going to get bad, isn't it, John?”

He nodded his head, unable to speak.

Liz continued to gaze at him, then sighed, turned, and opened the refrigerator. She pulled out four vials, hesitated, then a fifth.

John struggled with the horrible temptation to shove Liz aside, reach in, and scoop all of them out. The temptation was near overpowering.

He felt the touch of a hand on his shoulder and started to swing, wondering if somebody was pushing their way in. It was Makala. She gazed at him and said nothing.

Liz quickly closed the refrigerator, opened a cabinet, took out a box of a hundred syringes, then bagged the vials and box up, wrapping several extra layers of plastic around the package.

“Maybe I'm damning myself for doing this,” Liz said quietly. “That's five for you; there'll be five for the Valenti boy, and one each for the remaining thirty that come in here.”

“That's fair enough,” Makala whispered.

Liz looked at her, didn't say anything, then turned away.

“Stop at the cooler; there still might be some ice there. Grab up whatever candy bars are left as well. Go straight home, John. They should be kept stable at forty degrees; every ten-degree increase cuts the shelf life in half. So go home now. Once you run out of ice, try and find the coolest spot in the house to store them.”

“Thank you, Liz. God bless you.”

“Please leave, John. I got a lot to think about, to do today.”

John nodded, still filled with a sense of shame.

“You want me to stop at the police station and bring someone back?”

Liz shook her head. “I'll send Rachel into town to get some help. She rode her bike in here, so she can be there nearly as quick as you.”

Liz then opened a drawer in the locked room and pointed down. Inside was a .38 Special.

“It was against company policy, but my husband insisted I keep it here. You know how he is, ex-ranger and all that. I'd have used it if you hadn't showed up,” and her voice was now cold. John wondered if he had tried to shove Liz aside, would that .38 have come out? From the look in his friend's eyes, he knew it would.

“Some advice, Liz.”

“Sure.”

“Get out of here.”

“You know I can't do that, John.”

“I mean once it starts to run short. Load up what you think you'll need for you and your family; then get out. When you start running out, it could get ugly.”

She looked up at him and smiled, all five foot two of her standing with shoulders back.

“Jim taught me how to use that gun,” she said. “I'll see things through.”

John squeezed her shoulder.

“God bless you,” and he walked out. The line behind the counter was growing. There were several nods of recognition; some were silent. Apparently everyone in line knew what had just happened with the bloody man whom Pat had thoroughly trussed up with, of all things, a roll of duct tape.

One woman saw the bag John was carrying.

“Matherson, isn't it?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

She looked past John to Liz. “What did you give him back there?”

“Just some syringes for his little girl, that's all, Julie.”

“I don't want to hear tell of any special treatment going on here, Liz. If so, I've been a customer of this firm for twenty years and let me tell you I have a list here. . . .”

John went down aisle four. Surprisingly, there was a whole stack of one-pound Hershey bars, and without hesitating he scooped them all up and dumped them into the bag. The high-school-aged girl behind the counter saw him do it, not sure what to say as he walked by.

“Don't worry. Liz said I can take them now and pay later.”

The girl nodded, his action setting off an argument with a customer who had no cash and wanted cigarettes.

Outside John opened up the ice cooler. There were still a dozen ten-pound bags inside. He unlocked the car, opened the back door, and went back, pulling out four bags and tossing them in, went back again, and started to grab four more, then hesitated, looking at Makala.

He took just two, closed the lid, tossed them in the car, and slammed the door shut.

John got into the car, took a deep breath, started it up, and lit another cigarette.

“That'll kill you someday,” Makala said quietly.

He looked over at her, unable to speak.

“You did the right thing. And so did Liz. Any parent would have done the same.”

John sighed.

“Remember the old movies, the old cartoons from the Second World War. All the stuff about food hoarders.”

“A bit before my time.”

“Hell, I'm only forty-eight; I remember 'em.”

She didn't say anything.

“Your girl has type one diabetes, doesn't she?”

“Yes.”

“You better get home now like Liz said.”

Makala reached over the backseat, and he felt like an absolute bastard, for he found himself looking at her as she stretched, dress riding up to midthigh.

She caught his eye as she pulled a bag of ice over, and said nothing as she broke it open. She dumped the box of syringes out of the plastic bag and then gently laid the bag containing the vials atop the open ice.

“That should do till you get home. Don't pack them inside the ice; they'll freeze and that will ruin them. Try wrapping insulation around the ice, but keep the top open and have the vials on top. That should keep them at roughly the right temperature. Stash the remaining ice inside your freezer; that's the best-insulated place for them.

“With some luck the ice should last you up to a week.”

“I don't know how to thank you enough,” John said.

“Well, helping me find some food might be a good starter,” she said with a smile.

“I know where there's great barbecue.”

“Sounds wonderful.”

He pulled out of the plaza and headed back towards town.

“Hope you don't mind a personal question?” she asked.

“Go ahead.”

“Who's Mary?”

“My wife.”

“How long ago?”

“Breast cancer, four years back.”

“I'm sorry.”

“It's OK,” he lied. “She left me two beautiful girls.”

“I could see that last night. I kind of suspected your younger was diabetic. In my business you can spot it. That's why it didn't bother me too much when you took off like you did. Stress is bad for her situation.”

“I know. Again, I'm sorry about running out on you like that.”

She smiled.

“Oh, there was a truck driver there, a regular white knight. He finally
beat the crap out of the drunk, then walked us ladies down to the motel.”

She hesitated.

“You kind of surprised me, the way you took that man out in the drugstore.”

“You figured I was running out at first, didn't you?”

“Well, to be honest, yeah, I did.”

“I didn't, though.”

She chuckled softly.

“You sure as hell didn't. Bit underhanded maybe, but you settled it.”

“If you must fight, fight to win,” John said quietly.

“You know you got a cut hand, don't you.”

He looked at his right hand, and for the first time the pain registered. Part of the broken bottle had laid a deep slice into his right forefinger clear down to the crease with his thumb.

Damn, it suddenly hurt like hell.

“Pull over; let me look at it.”

He drifted to the side of the road and came to a stop. She took his hand and gently spread the wound open; now it really hurt.

“You'll need stitches. Ten to twelve from the looks of it.”

As she examined it, blood dripped onto her suit.

“Be careful, your suit,” he said.

She ignored him.

“I don't have anything sterile on me. You should stop at a doctor's.”

“Later. I want to get the medicine home first. Besides, the doc is most likely swamped right now.”

As he spoke he nodded towards the road.

Maury Hurt's World War II Jeep was coming down off the exit ramp of the interstate, four people piled in, one a child with shoulders hunched over, pale faced, gasping. Lying across the back of the Jeep was an elderly woman who John could see was already dead.