Page 42 of The Dead of Summer

I can’t feel my legs. They’re beneath me, but it’s like floating in a bath of needles.

I’m being dragged through a flaming courtyard.

Heat sucks the moisture from my mouth, my eyes, and ashes coat my throat.

If Bridezilla is the smoldering pile against the tents, what’s the monster that’s got me by the arm?

“I will not let you brats ruin everything I have worked for.”

Imogen Pfaff has me with one hand while the other hoists, of all things, a metal tackle box.

Is she going on a fishing trip? At a time like this? The pain in my left leg is pushing through the numbness now, making me delirious. Each step puts me closer to blacking out, but I can’t abandon my body now. We had a plan. What was the plan? Where are Bash and Elisa?

Pfaff pushes me toward a group of survivors huddled where Elisa fell, but I don’t see her. I only see a blackened limb jutting from the huddle. It’s still clutching a gleaming metal lighter.

NO.

“Elisa!” I scream her name, but my voice is a desperate rasp. “Elisa, get up!” The fire she created was like the engines of a rocket ship, and she conjured it with her bare hands. The last I saw her, she was engulfed in the blue blaze, all of her blackened by the sudden brightness.

And now …

I finally wrench away from Pfaff. No , I beg Elisa. Get up. Please. Not you. Not you. Pfaff tries to pull me back, but I shove her down. She splays on the concrete and the tackle box spills, sending glass vials skittering. Pfaff crawls after the vials, and I crawl toward Elisa.

Not you, not you, not you.

A gun goes off, and a bullet chips the concrete in front of my face.

“Stand up, Orlando.”

A wet warmth dribbles from a slice of pain on the side of my head. Pfaff has shot through my ear. The world muffles as blood flows into the wound, and as I fight to stand, all I can hear is the gunshot ringing in my skull. The pitch is a C. A little flat.

“Face me.”

I’m sure the next bullet is going to splatter my brain down my neck.

I turn my back on Elisa and the crowd of survivors.

Pfaff’s white lab coat is filthy with ash and blood.

A portion of her scalp has been peeled back with burns, exposing angry pink skin.

She clutches several glass vials to her chest. They swirl with iridescent fog.

“You’re not going to get away with this,” I tell her.

Pfaff squints, and I think maybe she hasn’t understood me, but then she laughs.

“You don’t even know, do you? All your sneaking around, and you still have no idea what this all is, do you?

Not everything we don’t understand is bound to be evil.

The world is much bigger than that. The ocean is much deeper than that, and I’m afraid you’re out of your depth, Orlando.

It’s time to let the adults do their work. ”

Now Pfaff addresses the crowd behind me.

“Do not panic. The navy has sent a hospital ship to aid the people of Anchor’s Mercy in our time of need. Transportation boats are ready at the AMIOS docks, and I’ve already called for reinforcements to escort the survivors. If you stay calm and follow my instructions, you will be okay.”

By now the fires around the courtyard have exhausted themselves into glowering, scarlet coals.

The faces of the people watching waver in the heat.

I think I know these faces. They are neighbors.

Teachers. Friends. Guests. Drag kings and drag queens.

But if they listen to Pfaff, they’ll simply be test subjects.

“The hospital ship is a trap,” I shout. “It was circling the island days before the outbreak. They knew this would happen. They cut off our power. Isolated us! And if we leave now, we’re never coming back to Anchor’s Mercy. That ship will be our graveyard.”

Pfaff’s laugh is not amused. “Now is not the time for baseless conspiracy theories. Don’t give in to fear and distrust. There is no cure for this plague, but you will be safer with the full force of Easter Energy protecting you from those monstrosities .”

“They are people . They sing, they dream, they listen!” The heat in the air is nothing compared to the power I feel within me.

Gracie wasn’t a monster. She was herself right to the end.

Scary Mary, too, and who knows how many others?

But why do some people hold on to their lucidity while others are subsumed into the organic abominations of the reef?

I think I know, but it takes facing a reality I have made myself sick rejecting since the moment Gracie got her diagnosis.

There’s no time for denial now, and no reason.

Gracie is gone, but because of her Anchor’s Mercy might be saved.

“This island is making us sick. It always has.” I raise my voice like I’m Willy calling on a crowded bar to sing along.

“We’ve known it for years. How many fundraisers have we attended in the offseason?

How many funerals? And people say nothing is wrong, but we all know better.

We all feel it. You all knew my mom, Gracie Jo Veltman.

You’ve all listened to her play, you’ve all heard her sing. ”

A few people are nodding. I bite through my fear to say what needs to be said.

“She was … already sick when she got infected by the coral, and it couldn’t colonize her. She wasn’t a monster. She was my mother, right until the end. She is living proof that we can survive this.”

Pfaff’s voice has genuine curiosity. “Are you saying the people of this island have a natural resistance?”

“No.” I turn on Pfaff. If ever there was a time to shine, it’s now.

“The resistance is unnatural. A poison you’ve denied for decades.

But the Cnidaria , the coral, it needs a healthy host. It can’t thrive in a body that’s already sick.

And we—everyone from this island, who drinks this water and builds a life in this sand—are sick. Isn’t that true?”

“He’s right!”

Bash pushes through the crowd, trailed by the reaching arms of his family. They try to drag him back, but he stands tall, letting everyone see him. Murmurs fill the courtyard.

“Is it true?”

“How can we be sure?”

“Who do we trust?”

Pfaff raises her red notebook and adds her own voice to the chaos. “The infected are not human. Once exposed, it’s only a matter of time before an individual is colonized. Do not listen to this boy! A few outlier cases prove nothing.”

The discussion cuts off when the busted metal doors of the courtyard are wrenched sideways, and a squad of white-armored soldiers rush in. They keep their guns up, aimed at the survivors, and soon they’ve got me and Pfaff surrounded.

“Director Pfaff, your time is up,” the leader states. “Our orders are now to prioritize your evacuation to the Embrace . A helicopter is waiting. You are to come with us. Now.”

The survivors are starting to panic again. Some pull toward the soldiers, others pull away. I’m losing them.

“I’m not done here,” Pfaff says to the leader. “I need to have a test population. I was clear about that.”

“Plenty have already been loaded onto the Embrace , ma’am. We’ll get the rest soon, but right now our orders are to secure you, specifically. And the samples, of course.”

I try to capture the attention of the crowd, but now the panic is in full swing.

“Don’t get on that boat!” I scream. “We outnumber them, we can overpower them! You have to believe me! Believe us .” I think it’s working. I see people stepping forward, not to flee but to fight. The soldiers notice the shift, too, and they tighten around Pfaff.

“Enough of this.”

I turn to Pfaff just as something splashes me in the face. Something cold. It’s a second before I realize it’s the vial of fog, and by then it’s already in my mouth.

“NO!” Bash bursts from the crowd, but Pfaff steps into his path with another vial uncorked and raised. People drag Bash back, away from me. Why? I spit the fog from my mouth until the taste is all gone. I hold up my hands.

“I’m okay!” I laugh. Pfaff has just given me the exact moment I need to show what I’ve discovered. “See? I’m totally fine—”

Something kicks in my stomach. A stabbing spasm that forces me to draw a ragged, involuntary breath, and I feel the length of my throat fill with slickness. My lungs light up in my chest like I’ve huffed pure ethanol, but the taste is mellower, brighter, inviting, invasive.

Fuck.

I beg myself to stop breathing, to stop letting this thing into my body, but holding down the urge to cough feels like hugging red-hot coals to my belly. I embrace the pain and let it focus me, and gradually the cough subsides. I can still taste the fog, but I think … I think I’m okay.

I stand up, and I smile.

“See? I’m living proof.”

But that’s not what comes out my mouth. The moment my lips part, a clear sludge slithers down my chin and chest. Tears, too, thick and heavy. I catch them in my hands.

FUCK.

I look up, humiliated and scared and desperate for a friendly face.

“Bash? Bash? I’m …” I pull at the sludge filling my mouth, feeling it flex deep down in my stomach.

“I’m here, Ollie. I’m here.”

But Bash is so far away from me, wavering like he’s underwater.

Or am I underwater? I feel like I’m sinking fast, each thought a slow bubble bursting up and away from me with reckless buoyancy.

I try to hold on to myself, but my fear has softened into a remote sense of wonder.

How strange , I think, looking at the tears webbing my fingers. And how lovely.

Pfaff’s voice is gritty and harsh, piercing the submerged veil around my mind.

“This is the fate that awaits all those who choose to stay. If you want to live, I suggest you cooperate with the soldiers from the Embrace . They will be here momentarily.” Then, to the guards, she says, “Tell the cleanup crew that I want Orlando Veltman here tagged with the rest of the test subjects. His theory intrigues me. If he doesn’t turn, we’ll want to know why not. ”

I begin to hear it all as music. The footsteps rushing past dance on my nerves. Where is everyone going? Are they leaving me behind? It’s hard to remember what’s happening. I have to fight. These people are counting on me to show them this can be survived.

“Please! Give me a chance!” I beg. “I’m still me. I’m still Ollie. O-L-L-I-E! Gracie’s kid! I play the piano at Singing House!” Another mouthful of slime chokes me. I tear it out of me, feeling its elastic tendrils wrench from my sinuses. “This is my home .”

I am screaming. I am drowning. How do I make it stop?

How do I take a breath? How do I survive?

Since the moment of the outbreak at the Last Hail Mary’s, I have imagined this exact moment, when the sea finally flows into my lungs.

How can one person fight the entire sea?

My mind races through lessons Gracie taught me long ago about what to do if I’m ever caught in a riptide.

Stay calm , she would tell me. You can’t outswim the tide. All you can do is float long enough to be saved.

I find my heart beating beneath my soaked shirt.

I listen to it, counting out the measures of my death.

1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3. I stretch each beat until I finally feel it slow.

1 … 2 … 3. 1 … 2 … 3. The drowning feeling doesn’t let me go, but it does slow down, and I feel the fog clearing from my mind.

I’m doing it , I think. I’m floating. I’m going to survive.

The joy of this realization is overflowing.

“I’m floating! I’m floating!” I wobble to my feet, to show that I am, in fact, floating.

But why are people screaming? Can’t they see I’m floating?

They back away from me as I reach for them.

Not like my neighbors at all. People are kind on Anchor’s Mercy, quick to hug, slow to let go.

I smile big and bright, reaching out, but they do not reach back. They are not smiling at all.

They are scared of me.

Oh.

An ugly feeling spreads through my euphoria. Not sadness and not fear but shame. I was wrong. I’m drowning , I think as I feel gravity pulling me down. I let it. I fall, but I never feel the pavement catch me. I plunge inward, leaving the flaming red world behind as I’m swallowed by endless blue.