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“We went through classes and certification. I have all his vaccine paperwork and his ID card. That’s all I’ve ever needed when I’ve flown with him before. I don’t understand why he’s not allowed this time. Can’t you make a note on my boarding pass or something?”
“Ms. Hylen, if it were up to me, I’d allow him on the flight. I have a dog too. I completely understand. But our hands are tied right now. You need a doctor’s note for a service animal to be allowed on these flights. They’ve even been calling and confirming some of the doctor’s notes. If this were any other time, it wouldn’t be an issue. But these aren’t normal circumstances. The process is stricter than usual. I’m sorry.”
She was the fourth person I’d talked to from the TSA over the past three days, and by far the nicest. While they all sympathized with my situation, they’d said the same thing. The protocol was very strict and was double- and triple-checked along the way. There were no exceptions.
“Thank you for your help. I appreciate it.”
The service agent paused before dropping her voice into a whisper. “Just get a note from a doctor however you can, okay? Don’t wait too long. There are still plenty of seats available on the last two days of the evacuation.”
When I hung up the phone, I took the last bite of my lunch and checked my texts. I hadn’t gotten replies to the numerous messages I’d sent asking if anyone knew a doctor. I tried calling, but none of them answered. I left pleading voice messages and anxiously waited for someone to call me back, but no one did. My mom continued to call everyone in her phone book, too, and we were hopeful when my uncle remembered he had a pharmacist friend. He’d passed along my info. My phone’s ringtone jolted me awake around midnight after I’d passed out on the sofa.
“Hi, Karis. This is Aaron. Sorry it took so long to call you. We’ve been swamped at the pharmacy with the testing stations. Your uncle gave me your number. I understand you need a doctor’s note?”
“Yes, I need one for my service dog stating he is providing me with a medical service. Is that something you could do?”
“Unfortunately, no. I wish I could help, but a note like that needs to be signed by an MD. My stationery has RPh in my title, and that would be a huge red flag. I know a doctor, but he’s a by-the-book kind of guy. I don’t think he’d write a note without seeing your medical records.”
Defeated, I thanked him and crawled into bed. The next morning, I called Mom to let her know about the pharmacist. With our last hope gone, we decided I should take things into my own hands. I only had a few more days left to make it out of here. I googled “doctor’s notes” and found one from a doctor here in NY that I could work with. Luckily, working in graphic design gave me a thorough knowledge of Photoshop. I manipulated the document and changed it to my name and today’s date, giving epilepsy as my medical condition. My perfectionism made me zoom in and check every letter and number for signs that it’d been Photoshopped. I printed it out and looked again for any flaws, but I didn’t think anyone would be able to tell it was a fake. They’d only know if they made that call to the doctor, which was a risk I was willing to take at this point. I just hoped the agents would be too busy and stressed out to bother making that call. By the time I was finished, it was two o’clock, and I went back online to book another flight. But when the page came up, it said there were no more flights available. Fear raced through me. Dammit, she said I had a week! I quickly called the customer service number.
After listening to hold music, nineties lite rock, for thirty minutes, I was finally connected to an agent. “Hi, I tried to book a flight with my barcode, but it says there are no more flights available. How can that be? I was told just yesterday that there were open flights on the last two days of the evacuation.”
“I’m so sorry about that, ma’am. We’ve been forced to close flights early because the virus is spreading faster than they’d anticipated. Late last night, the timeline was moved up a few days, and the final flight is leaving tonight. They announced it on the news this morning.”
I’d been too focused on the doctor’s note to watch TV. “Oh my god. Is there any way you can get me on that flight?” My hands started shaking.
“Last time I checked, there were no seats, but let me check again. What’s your name and phone number?”
After giving her the necessary info, I said, “I’ll have my service dog with me too. I have the required doctor’s note and his ID card.”
The sound of her nails tapping on the keys came through the line. Then she exhaled and said, “I’m sorry to say this, but the flight is already overbooked. They had to move some passengers from the later flights onto today’s flights. I can put you on the waitlist, but you’d be number thirty-two on the list. Chances aren’t good.”
“Oh, come on! Clearly, they need more flights if there’s a waitlist,” I argued.
“That’s not up to us, Ms. Hylen. These are the only flights I can book for you.”
“Is there anything you can do to get us on a flight today? Please. I’m begging.”
“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do. I’ve placed you on the waitlist. You’ll be notified if a seat opens up.”
“But what if—”
The click of her hanging up interrupted my pleas. I threw the phone on the table and dropped to the floor, hugging my knees. I was angry at myself, at the TSA, at the woman who’d told me I had a few days left, and at whoever had started the epidemic in the first place. My body shook as I cried and pounded my fist on the hardwood floor. I thought about every opportunity I’d missed, everything I should have done differently.
But after the shock wore off, I knew it was pointless to go down that road. I was stuck for the time being, so I had to come to terms with that. I called my mom to tell her the bad news. She cried and cursed my decision to wait. I let her rage for a few minutes before she finally calmed down.
“So what’s your plan now?” she asked, her voice raw and rough.
“I guess I’m going to stay in my apartment until something changes.”
I hung up, feeling beaten. I put on my thick down coat and went up to the roof to clear my head. My thoughts were starting to jumble. I sat on the wide ledge with my legs out straight and laid my head against the old chimney that led to my living room. A few minutes passed before I heard a woman crying. Her moans and wails pierced the air, and it was quiet enough that I heard her struggle to catch her breath, shouting “no!” every few seconds. I pulled my head up and listened. I couldn’t tell where she was, and I didn’t know why she was crying, but it didn’t matter. I was suddenly a part of her suffering. There was so much emotion in her sobbing that I felt it pulse through my veins.
At some point, my breath caught in my throat. Tears slid down my cheeks, and I whispered, “I’m so sorry,” over and over. When the woman quieted and my cheeks were dry again, a dim light clicked on in a window across the street. I looked closer and noticed it wasn’t a light but the faint glow of a television. I pulled my legs from the ledge and went back downstairs.
The next couple of days passed in a blur, and it was pretty rough trying to keep myself occupied without going crazier than I already was. One morning, I looked through an old photo album and found a picture of my college soccer team, the Ladyhawks, at Disneyland after a tournament in LA. We were huddled around a smiling Mickey Mouse, grinning as one teammate slyly grabbed Mickey’s crotch. I chuckled at the photo, remembering what a great time we’d had on the rides and stuffing ourselves with junk food. What was the crotch-grabber’s name? Sarah? Samantha? No, it was Stephanie! I looked back at the photo and tried to remember every name. I wrote their names next to their faces on the photo. I recalled all but two, who I’d guessed were Kayla and Marie, though I knew that wasn’t right. They’d been freshmen when I was a senior, so I hadn’t known them well.
After I put the photo back in the album, I sat back and looked around for something else to do. The Hellraiser DVD on the bottom of the stack in my TV stand sparked a clear memory of watching it huddled up with Christian under blankets on my couch. I shook my head and pushed all the disappointing men in my life to the background. I had more troubling things to worry about, but I had to imagine I was a lot better off than those who hadn’t been in a self-imposed isolation when the virus hit. I laughed at the notion that the past few months had conditioned me perfectly.
It also helped that I loved my apartment. My parents’ house had white walls everywhere. I called it “the house of no color.” I’d begged them every year to let me paint my bedroom or any room—even the garage would do. Finally, during my sophomore year, they allowed me to paint my room an equally boring beige.
In direct response to my upbringing, the minute my roommate had moved out, I’d painted each room a different bold color. My living room was a loud yellow, bordering on neon. The dining room was an intense shade of red, called “Sashay,” that I’d found in the discount pile at Home Depot. My kitchen was a bright, warm gold. I’d painted the hallway dove gray in an attempt to lead guests into the color show beyond. My bedroom and bathroom were varying shades of blue, which I’d read produced a feeling of tranquility. It was liberating to finally have color in my life. And by New York standards, my apartment was pretty big. In the old buildings, not many people had a separate living room and dining room, but I did. And even though the bedrooms and bathroom were a bit small, the rest of the place was spacious, giving me plenty of room to roam around. It was one of the perks to living in an outer borough.
With pen and paper in hand, I mapped out a daily routine. It made the empty days much more bearable if I had a purpose. I took my temperature first thing every morning before taking Zeke to the roof. Then I had coffee while he had his breakfast. Since I had no idea what obstacles might stand in my way at some point, I thought it would be good to keep in shape. If I had to run for any reason, I needed to be able to do it. I hadn’t worked out in over a year, and the ten pounds I’d put on over the past three months made it slow going at first. I spent fifteen minutes running and, as I petered out, walking up and down the four flights of stairs in my building. Then I moved on to crunches, push-ups, and squats, finishing with several plank positions I remembered from the Pilates class Lori and I used to take on Sundays before long, boozy brunches at our favorite French place, Café Henri.
I staked out two hours every day to watch the news and scour the internet for more information. I was also trying to find out if there were others like me, who weren’t sick but for some reason decided to stay—I couldn’t be the only one. Recent searches confirmed there were others, more than I would have thought. There was no laundry in my building, so on Tuesdays, I washed my underwear for the week in the sink, and Thursdays were for a large wash of everything else in the tub. I used the old clothesline outside to dry my clothes. I usually got bored by two o’clock. The rest of my day was consumed with trying to find some way to fill the time and attempting to drown out the sounds of glass breaking, screams, and thumps from outside. Most of the time, I could place what the sounds were, but sometimes it was an ambiguous creak or vibration.
At four o’clock, I went up to the roof and hung out with the girls. While they were sad for me because I didn’t get out, they were ecstatic that I was still around to play with them. They thought I’d made the right decision to stay in the city with Zeke. After that, I would make dinner and read or watch TV with Zeke curled up next to me on the couch.
Luckily, I had bought all those extra bags of dog food. There was enough for a few months if I cut each meal down a quarter cup. Zeke’s pot belly made me think I’d been feeding him too much anyway. I also knew that I needed to ration my own food. I didn’t know how long my stash would have to last, but I assumed it could be quite a while. I cursed the days I’d spent rashly eating more than I needed because I’d assumed I would be in California soon. I worked out how much food I had left, stacking the cans, bags of rice, and pasta in rows and dividing the total by days. I only had enough for a month at most, even after strictly rationing. Then a thought popped into my head. I could go into the other apartments and take all my neighbors’ food, which could potentially keep me going for a while longer. If anything, I was sure I would run out of alcohol before food—what a sad day that would be.
On Christmas Eve as I watched the news, there was a breaking news conference. The president was about to speak. This was the first time he’d addressed the nation on the outbreak. He walked to the podium and looked gravely into the camera.
“Good afternoon. The NOS-9 virus that has devastated the Eastern states over these past few months is at epidemic level. We have formed a special committee to organize medical care, supplies, and evacuation of uninfected survivors. Our first order of business is to set up a border, spanning north to south, from western Minnesota to eastern Texas, essentially cutting the United States in half. We’ve sent teams to the public to test every resident and are confident that there are no infected cases past this point. This border will be staffed with armed forces, a medical team from the CDC, and temporary housing. Because we don’t know how long it will take to find a cure or vaccine, our first priority is to stop the spread of the virus.
“We have arranged a number of flights to transfer those who are not infected out of the Eastern states and into the Western states. In the coming weeks, government officials and police forces will also be evacuating. For those of you who did not make it onto one of these flights or have chosen to stay, be aware that there will now be a state of martial law in these regions. While a small military team will set up patrolling stations in each state, there will be no police presence. Because of how deadly this virus has become, we cannot offer protection or help to anyone who has chosen to stay within the infected border. We urge everyone to be civil and to not engage in acts of looting or violence. However, we understand that without a police presence, these instances may occur. Your best course of action is to remain inside your home. If you are in need of food or supplies, log onto the website before the end of the week and register your address. We will be sending supplies to as many people as possible before the final evacuation. We are allowing a small group of workers to reside in each state in order to maintain electricity and water supplies for the time being.
“We are working on a cure and a plan for the country to move forward during this crisis. Our hope is to devise a system that allows uninfected survivors who can make it to the border into the Western states safely. While we understand how dangerous this prospect is, it is the only salvation we can offer at this time.
“There has been increased speculation about the government’s involvement and knowledge of the virus. I would like to put all questions to rest by being completely transparent. On November fifteenth, we received an anonymous message threatening to attack New York City with a biological weapon in the form of a virus. Our government receives anonymous threats on a regular basis, and it’s our job to determine which are credible and which are not. Because of the nature of this message and the details involved, it was determined that this message was at an elevated threat level. We can’t be certain if any threat is real or a hoax. We can only decide which threats to take seriously, and about ninety-five percent of those turn out to be fraudulent. Any message of an elevated threat level or less automatically goes into a monitoring mode. A message deemed high threat or higher goes into an action or evacuation mode. While we do our best to accurately determine the validity of these claims, at best we are only guessing.
“On the night of November fifteenth, the body scanners at airport security checkpoints were activated to begin temperature testing everyone flying out of New York City and Newark as a part of the monitoring process. About a quarter of those flying out tested positive for a fever higher than ninety-nine degrees. As a precaution, we then quarantined these people until we could be certain that they were not infected with this so-called virus. Unfortunately, that did not turn out to be the case, as these people have all tested positive for the virus. Reports began coming in from other states of the virus beginning to spread. It is our belief that the virus was released sometime shortly before the threat was delivered to our government, allowing a small number of infected travelers to make it out of New York undetected. These people have all been identified and quarantined. We then broadened our testing and were able to ascertain that the virus had in fact started in New York and was slowly spreading across the country. At that point, we were able to increase the emergency to a high threat level and inform the country of the outbreak. We regret that we were unable to accomplish this sooner and save more lives.
“But we must move forward now with hope and determination. We are working around the clock to find a cure and to help those infected and uninfected. I have great confidence in our medical teams and our people to come together and fight this virus. While we are in a time of crisis and uncertainty, I look to our community to remain strong, to help one another, and never to give up hope.”