Avery woke early and didn’t see Tristan in her room, so she rose on her own to use the bathroom. She found a toothbrush and paste left for her on the sink and made good use of them. Then she washed her face with the small bar of soap and brushed her hair. The grogginess was gone, and she felt stronger, more awake and clear headed. She returned to her room as a person entered and left a breakfast tray, which contained scrambled eggs, toast, two sausage links, and coffee with small creamer pods.
After eating as much as she could, Avery stretched, stood and turned on the news again. Restlessness and anxiousness kicked in. She wanted out of the hospital. She needed to be home with the kids and her mother. It was great that Tristan had been so helpful, but they weren’t his responsibility. As she stared out the window, a lot of what they discussed yesterday was floating through her mind, and she was busy sifting through it all trying to make sense of it and wondering if some of it was a dream. The city seemed so still. Normally at a hospital this large, there would be cars coming and going, people in suits walking up and down the sidewalks to get to where they needed to be, at this hour especially. Eight a.m. around any hospital was a bustling place to be.
Her doctor came in an hour ago to give her a clean bill of health. She remembered him from yesterday and that she had felt afraid of him. She knew why that was now. He reminded her of her father. Avery crossed her arms and pressed the fingertips of her right hand into her temple to relieve the pressure. She couldn’t deal with that right now. All she could do was pray someone would find him and take her father to one of the medical sites where he could get treatment. He was not a violent person. He was kind and gentle, scholarly, an academic.
The door behind her opened and startled Avery.
“Hey there,” Tristan greeted, carrying two travel mugs. “Got you some coffee. It’s better than the stuff they serve here.”
“You’re back,” she said. Avery didn’t want to admit that she was a little scared he wouldn’t be. She didn’t want to have to call her family to pick her up. Her mother was probably already out of her mind with worry.
“Of course, I am,” he said as if he were surprised she’d ask. “I’m here to spring you,” he joked and handed her a mug that she recognized from home. “You ready to get the heck outta’ here?”
She nodded. “Oh, yes. More than ready.
“Doc said if the situation were different, he’d keep you at least three more days, maybe more. But, lucky for you, we’re in the middle of an apocalypse, and they need rooms.”
“Yeah, lucky,” she puffed air through her nose.
“How ‘bout a shower and some clean clothes?”
She threw her head back dramatically and said, “Yes, please.”
He smirked. “There’s a cord in there to pull for help…”
“No, won’t need it,” she warned and held out her hand. “I’ll be fine. I feel pretty good today actually.”
He seemed disappointed by this. The look on his face, fleeting as it was, felt off somehow. He recovered quickly and handed her a stack of clothes and clean white hospital towels.
“Thanks,” she said.
Avery showered and after, felt a bit tired. That didn’t matter to her. She just wanted out of this hospital and back home with her family where she belonged.
Tristan was sitting in his usual chair next to the bed when she came out dressed in the clothes he brought her; khakis that were loose and baggy now, coupled with a white stretchy tank top, warm pale blue cashmere cardigan, and his leather jacket.
“I had that dry-cleaned,” he said. “It was the last thing I’m sure that dry-cleaners ever did. I drove by it a few days after your accident to pick up some supplies at the store across the street and saw it was closed, boarded up.”
She looked out the window, “Is that what’s going on out there? Where are all the people?”
“That’s what I was trying to explain, Angel,” he said and rose to cross the room and stand next to her. Tristan rested his hand on her shoulder. Then he led her to his chair and instructed her to sit.
“Socks, shoes,” he indicated the ones on the ground. “I’ll dry your hair for you. It snowed once while you were under. It’s been a lot cooler than it was before you came here.”
He used a blow dryer on her hair, surprising her at the good job he did of it. When he was done, Avery asked him, “If I’m immune now, does that mean my family would be, too? From the first version, at least?”
“No,” he answered. “There’s no rhyme or reason to this sickness. Some people recover. Some don’t.”
“Hm,” she mumbled, and Tristan handed her a mask to put over her face. He pulled one on, too. “I thought I was immune.”
“Just in case they’re not as smart as they think. Ready?”
She nodded.
Your chariot,” he said and pushed a wheelchair toward her.
“I can walk now.”
He shook his head and closed the footrests. “Hospital policy. You have to be wheeled out. Normally they’d have an orderly do it. Or a nurse. They’re short staffed, so they said I could.”
“You sure have a lot of clout around here,” she commented and sat in the chair. He opened the footrests again and placed one of her feet at a time on them.
“Never underestimate the power of donuts. And, I wanted my fiancée taken care of,” he joked, still squatted in front of her. His hand was on her knee. “Ready?”
She barely got off a nod before he pushed her from the room. They passed a cart of empty breakfast plates, a few nurses, a nurse’s station, and a vending machine hall.
“Hold up,” he whispered and punched in a code on a nurse’s cart.
“Wh…”
“Shh,” he urged and kept moving in a fast and sneaky manner as he pulled some bottles of medicine from her cart. Then he opened another drawer and took at least five bottles before shutting the drawer again. “Let’s go.”
A nurse came out of the next room and said, “Hey, there’s our star patient!”
“Hey, Bea,” he greeted her. “Left some fresh donuts at the station for you girls. You take care now, ya’ here? Remember the stuff I told you.”
“I know, Tristan. And thanks for everything. You kids look after each other. I’ve never seen someone so in love, Miss Andersson. Take good care of him.”
“Oh, um…okay,” Avery whispered, unsure of herself as Tristan pushed her wheelchair again. She was so confused. What did that nurse mean? ‘So in love’? Instead of speculating on that part, she asked him, “Tristan, what’s going on? Did you just…steal?”
“Shh, just offer friendly nods, and I’ll keep walking,” he said, his slightly gruffer tone coming back. Had that all been an act?
She did as he said, and Tristan led her out of the hospital to his truck parked right at the door.
“Thanks, Pete,” he said to the older gentleman and shook his hand. Avery looked at their hands and saw something was passed from Tristan’s to the man. Maybe it was a tip. But that didn’t make sense. Nobody was allowed to park right at the door, and you didn’t tip hospital personnel.
A helicopter followed by two more flew low over the hospital startling her.
“It’s okay, Avery,” Tristan said at her side, taking her arm and helping her out of the wheelchair. “The choppers are just doing patrols. It’s normal. Don’t worry.”
He helped her into the truck, fastened her belt for her before jogging around front to hop in his side and pull away.
“I can’t wait to see my family,” she said out loud and mimicked Tristan as he removed his mask. She noticed he used hand sanitizer from the console, too. Avery caught sight of something in there but didn’t press him for information.
“If you’re tired, you can take a nap on the way,” he said.
Avery shook her head. “No, I feel fine. Thanks, though. And…thanks for everything you’ve done for me, Tristan. Really. I mean it. You-you went above and beyond. I don’t know how I can repay you.”
“Chocolate cake,” he said easily.
Frowning, she asked, “Chocolate cake?”
“It’s my favorite.”
“Chocolate cake it is,” she agreed with a smile. It felt good to be out in the sunshine again and out of that stuffy hospital. “Where is my car? Or, gosh, my phone or my purse?”
“I salvaged what I could. Your phone was trashed. I can’t get you a new one now. Stores are closed. But your purse is at the house.”
“Thanks. Again,” she said as he pulled away from the hospital’s extensive maze of roads and property. As he drove through the streets, Avery couldn’t help the overwhelming feeling that came over her. Many homes had boarded up windows, signs of ‘keep out’ staked in their yards, and burned cars sitting right on their lawns. Tristan even had to steer around several that were in the middle of the street. Once they left the district, she saw even more of the same. “Aren’t we going to the freeway?”
“It’s closed. They don’t let anyone on it.”
“Really?”
He looked over and took her hand. “It’s okay. One good thing is that I’ve had to learn my way around the area finally.”
“Huh,” she remarked with a light smirk that betrayed her nerves.
“If it’s too much, don’t look out the windows. You’re waking up from the world being normal to this. We all saw it fall. I know this is a lot to process.”
Avery nodded. That was an understatement. She couldn’t look away, though. Many of the buildings and businesses looked either looted, burned, or were also boarded up like the homes. Somewhere a few blocks away, something must’ve been on fire because dark gray smoke rose in the sky.
“There’s a lot of that around,” he told her.
“It’s so…it’s,” she just couldn’t finish. There were no words to describe what she was seeing. It didn’t even look like the same city anymore. As he veered around objects in the roads, abandoned cars with their doors open or the occasional person who would pound on his truck as if they wanted him to stop, Avery just stared with wide, frightened eyes.
“Don’t worry,” he said and gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “I’m packin’.”
“Packing what?”
He lifted the hem of his sweatshirt to reveal a flat, rippled abdomen and a pistol. “Tonight, I’m taking Abraham to my base. My L.T. and I had a long talk last night when I went out there.”
“About you not retiring?”
He chuckled. “Not about retiring. Not exactly. But he and I are going to take whatever’s there. The guns, maybe even a Jeep. Four by four vehicles are eventually going to be needed to get around. The roads are going to get bad this winter without road crews clearing them. In case we need to go out, that is.”
“Of course, we would. And what do you mean…” Avery stopped. This was all so confusing. “Are you staying on your base and not going home to your family? Is that what you mean?”
“Not exactly,” he said and was quiet for a while as if contemplating saying more. She sat still, as well, giving him space as he navigated them onto the state route finally that would take them back to her home. They passed three military vehicles which looked in a hurry by their high speeds. Tristan also sped, swerving the occasional broken-down vehicle or RV alongside the road until they were out in the country, through both small towns and so close to home. However, he pulled onto the wrong road.
“Hey, this isn’t my road.”
“I know,” he answered and kept going. Then he turned onto a gravel road. Avery started feeling apprehension crawling up her spine. She sat more forward in her seat as he pulled onto a rutted, farmer’s access road that was overgrown. On three sides were fields of corn but woods out his side of the the truck.
“What’s going on?” she asked as he put it in park and got out to come around to her side.
Tristan opened her door and said, “Come with me, Angel.”
“Why? Where? What are we doing here?”
He held out his hand, and Avery hesitantly took it. “You trust me, right?”
She nodded but wondered if that was smart. She didn’t know Tristan that well. And yet, she did. Somehow, she felt like maybe she knew this man better than anyone else she’d ever known. So, she placed her hand in his, prayed he wasn’t about to do something horrible to her, and took his help getting down.
He led her past his truck and into the woods on the other side of his truck. They didn’t walk far, maybe twenty yards, but it felt like ten miles. There was a fallen tree by a stream.
“Sit with me,” he encouraged and sat, which Avery copied.
“What’s going on? Is it safe here from…those…”
He nodded and took her hand again. It felt strange holding hands with him, especially with that huge diamond settled like dead weight on her left finger. Tristan stroked his thumb over the top of her hand.
“You asked me a lot of questions when I first met you,” he said and swallowed hard. The sunlight was streaming through the trees and felt warm on her skin and softened Tristan’s hard angles. It was chilly, fifty-one according to the dash in his truck a moment ago, but it was still better than the stuffy, manufactured hospital air. “I didn’t want to answer you.”
“I know,” she said.
“I was a patient of your mother’s, so it felt weird telling you anything about myself. I thought you probably figured I was a freak.” She shook her head. His lips tightened into a thin line for a moment. “Plus, there just isn’t anything good to tell. Not to someone like you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He blew hard through his nose and grinned. “I’m not like you, Avery. You’re a really good person. I mean, like really, really good. A damn angel. Everything about you is just so damn good and innocent. And I’m just not.”
“That’s not…”
He put his finger to her lips. “Shh. Let me explain.” Avery nodded. “My whole life up until the moment I met you was basically shit. I spent my youth fighting, living in an abusive household with an alcoholic father, and was bounced around in foster homes. When I was seventeen and couldn’t take it anymore, I made my old man sign me up for the Army, and he did. Well, just about outta’ boot camp, I was recruited for Special Forces. No, that’s not the normal way it goes. But the Army’s real good at finding people like me.”
“People like you?”
“Killers, people with no moral conscious that would hold them back from doing what needed done,” he explained, making her gasp. “I told you I was an engineer because the thought of you knowing the truth was too much for me to consider. I didn’t want you to know that much about me. Nobody does, not even Spencer. That’s why I didn’t have girlfriends, nothing long-lasting, no women beyond one night. Not ever. None of us in my unit did. It was pretty much a prerequisite not having a family.”
“That sounds lonely.”
He shrugged and shook his head as his mouth pinched upwards. “Nah, not for people like us.”
“Why were you seeing my mother?”
“Couple of my buddies got killed. I started having nightmares. It wasn’t really a big deal. I coulda’ went right back in, but they sent me home for a six-month stateside leave, so to speak. A mental health day.” He chuckled, but Avery could see his pain. “Before I met you, I never cared what the hell people thought of me. It didn’t matter.” He paused again. “I wasn’t an engineer.”
“I gathered as much.”
He nodded. “I know. You’re too damned smart.” Avery offered a slight grin. “I’m a part of a unit called the Sweepers.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Well, we go in and sweep up whatever messes the government wants cleaned up. If a CIA agent gets in trouble, they send us. If a mission goes bad, we go in and fix it. Someone needs assassinated? That’s us. We were a ghost unit. Only about sixty of us total.”
“Like Special Forces guys?”
He shook his head. “Nah, no official titles, no awards and citations. Everything was under the table. We were trained on computers, languages…”
“You speak other languages?”
“A little here and there. Nothing that you’d probably even know. Lot of third world useless stuff.”
“Oh,” she whispered as he continued to strum his thumb over her skin. “Tristan, I wouldn’t think any less of you for any of that.”
“I know,” he said, his voice going higher in pitch and cracking as he smiled. “Isn’t that a thing, too? Crazy. This homeschool, gorgeous, kind and generous girl in Ohio thinks I’m some sort of good guy.”
“You are a good guy. Look at what you’ve done for me and my…”
He held up his free hand to stop her. “Don’t. Don’t do that. I’m not worth your praise or effort, Angel.”
“But you are. And your training in the military is what’s helping you now. And me, for goodness sake!”
He paused for a long time, and she watched a muscle in his neck flex a few times as if what he was about to say was painful to get out. “I left it all for you.”
Her eyes widened, and she stuttered, “Y-you did?”
He nodded and hit her with a direct blue gaze. “Yeah, I’m done. I’m out. I’m never going back. I’m going to be with you now. Doesn’t matter in what capacity. I’m going to take care of you. I’m going to take care of the kids, too.”
Tears welled in her eyes, and Avery whispered with emotion, “Tristan…” She couldn’t catch her breath. Nobody had ever offered something so poignant and self-sacrificing to her before. He was literally giving up his career for her.
He cupped her cheek. “You need me to survive this, but I need you to live. I feel like for the first time in my life like I’m finally awake, like I’m finally alive. I’ve never felt like that before.” He shook his head as if confused by it all, too. “I think I was walking around in a red haze of hatred for so long that when I met you, it kinda’ freaked me out. That’s why…that’s why I was an asshole sometimes.”
“It’s okay. I understand.”
He grinned lopsidedly and looked like a little boy. It was the first time he ever looked vulnerable. “I knew you would, Angel.”
How’d they go from sort of being friends to ‘Angel’ and holding hands. “Will…Tristan, will…” she asked softly and leaned closer, begging to be even closer to him.
“Yes, I will kiss you, but not right now. I want to. Trust me I want nothing more. But, Avery, I’m not done.”
Her cheeks pinkened.
“I love it when you blush,” he commented with a smile this time. He was so different than he used to be only nine days ago.
“Sorry,” she said and looked down at her knees instead with embarrassment. He tipped her chin up and cupped her cheek before letting his hand fall away. Avery didn’t have a lot of confidence in her thoughts right now but asked anyway. “Is that why you’ll be staying on the base? So you can be close to us?”
He shook his head.
“Oh,” she whispered.
“I’m living with you,” he clarified. Avery’s eyes jumped to his. “Yeah, I moved my stuff in a few days after your accident. It’s better this way. I need to be there to take care of you guys. I can’t do that from the base, and it’s all but evacuated now anyway. Plus, it’s too far away. Soon, gas could run out. I need to be close.”
“Wow, really?” she asked with shock. “What did my mother say about that? Of course, she’s practical, so…”
“Avery,” he interrupted her. The look in his dark blue eyes changed, and the intensity scared her. He shook his head.
“What?” she asked quietly. Goosebumps ran up the backs of her arms. “Tristan, what is it?”
He ran a hand over his face and got up. Then he knelt in front of her on one knee. It looked like he was about to propose marriage for real this time, but by the severity of his stare, she knew that wasn’t it.
“Avery, they’re gone,” he said softly.
“What? Who? What do you…”
“Your mother. Cyrus, Faith, Joy,” he said their names.
Her head swam with information, so she shook it once to clear it. “Wh-what…what do you mean? Where?”
“The day after you were in the accident, your sisters passed away,” he told her and took both of Avery’s hands in his. She continued to shake her head. “Your mother was sick the night I brought you in. They’d already set her up in a bed. She was upstairs with the kids. Was in a coma by morning. She went faster. Four days. They said they thought it was because…”
“No!” she blurted and hit him in the shoulder with the pad of her balled fist. “Stop it.”
“Because of the stress she was already under with the kids. She never knew about your dad or the girls. Or Cyrus.”
“Stop. Shut up, Tristan,” she said, tears running unbidden down her cheeks in steady rivulets like rainwater streaming down a windshield during a storm. She shoved at him and hurt her stitches. Tristan snatched her wrists and held them down between them.
“Cyrus passed the day after the girls.”
“No!” she screamed to the sky. Avery continued to try and hit him, but Tristan squashed her gently against his chest as she cried so hard she thought she might pass out.
He just kept murmuring things into her hair, “After I told them I was your fiancée, they let me be with them. I spent my time either with them or you. I…I didn’t leave them alone. I was there for each of them when it was…their time. I stayed and held their hands.”
“No,” she whimpered helplessly and hit his chest weakly.
“I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. We’ll get through this. The other kids are still okay. We’re gonna take care of them together. I’m not leaving you. I’ll never leave you, Angel.”
After a long time, her body sagged limply against his. She knew now why he hadn’t actually answered her directly last night at the hospital about her family. She also understood the sympathetic sad looks she kept getting from the staff. They must’ve known.
“Shh,” he cooed. “I’m right here, okay? We’ll get through this together. I’m not going anywhere.”
Five. Five of her family members were gone. They’d all been alive nine days ago when she’d wrecked. Now, all that was left was Ephraim, Kaia, Abraham, and Finn. They’d gone from a family of ten to one of five in the matter of a week. Her body felt exhausted and spent.
“We’ll take care of the kids, protect them so this doesn’t happen again,” he promised, this man who’d stepped in when no one else could, this man who said he was no good. He pulled back and wiped her tears with a wad of tissues. He knew this was coming. Then he gave the pile to her to blot her face and nose. Tristan unzipped his hoodie and pulled it around her shoulders, which left him in only a flannel shirt and t-shirt beneath it. “I’m not going anywhere now, okay? That’s why I discharged. I’m staying with you. We’ll figure this out together. I can even stay in your apartment.”
“No!” she said and clutched at his forearm, her nails biting into his flesh beneath the shirt.
“Okay, I’ll stay in the house. No worries. I’m not going to leave you, Avery.”
“The kids know?”
He nodded, “Yeah, I told them. The kids are handling this about as well as you could expect. It’s been hardest on little Finn.”
It was so weird hearing him speak of her family as if they were his, too.
She nodded. “Where are they? Their…bodies? Was there a funeral while I was…”
“No,” he shook his head. “No funerals. Nobody gets a funeral now. It’s too much for the funeral homes to handle. They were cremated.”
She cried again for another few moments. Not even a grave marker to remember them by.
As if reading her thoughts, he said, “Abraham and I made crosses and carved their names in them. We staked them in the ground by the fence. The one separating that farm from your property in the backyard.”
Avery reached up and cupped his cheek. She whispered in a croak, “Thank you.”
“We should go,” he said and stood. “The kids are anxious for you to be home. They need you.”
She nodded and stood on shaky legs. Then she almost passed out. Tristan lifted her gently into his arms and carried her back to his truck as if it were such an easy task. Once in it, he fastened her seatbelt and kept his hand on her thigh.
“I know this is a lot. Just try to breathe. You’re gonna be okay. You’re a fighter, Avery Andersson. You’re my angel. You’re going to survive this. I promise. And the kids need you. I need you, too, okay?”
She didn’t feel like a fighter. Tristan surprised her by pressing a kiss against her forehead before shutting her door. Then he drove slowly the rest of the way so she could collect herself. He drove them home, to their home now.