Rough Road Ahead (In Progress)

Chapter 25

    

      ****

            The next few hours passed like a blur, a strange mix of colors and thinking combined. I wasn't comprehending anything that happened in those minutes, those hours, those days, or so it seemed I sat there. The floor was cold, my butt was beginning to fall asleep from sitting on it for so long, but I continued to stay where I was. Finally I felt a hand on my back, looking up my mind steadied its self, "Iris?" Brad's voice asked. I took a deep breath.

            "Brad?" I asked, and then I felt his arm wrap around my back. He was sitting next to me on the ground and something metal was touching my lip.

            "It's me." He said finally, "you have to eat something." He seemed genuinely concerned.

            After a long pause my mind cleared and I looked around, my eyes examining the white room that suddenly seemed so much smaller than it had before. People were everywhere, I realized, kids screaming, mothers and fathers gathering around the beds. "What happened? How long have I been here?"

            "I don't know, the CDC people just started brining people in. I think this virus wasn't contained to just us, wherever Max and your mother caught it from these peoples loved ones must have caught it from too. I think they are looking for the origin. They were asking people where they had been in the past few days, weeks, but it seems pretty vague at the moment." He forced a smile, "you have only been sitting here for a few hours. But you have to eat." He picked the spoon up from a plate or fried veggies and made air plan noises as he pushed it towards my mouth.

            I pushed it away playfully, "I'm not hungry."

            "Come on, Iris, don't make me beg." He gave me puppy dog eyes, a small smile behind them.

            I laughed, throwing my head back and he shoved my open mouth with the veggies. "Damn you!" I smiled. "So where is dad gone to? Did he hear the news?" My eyes wandered around, but I couldn't see him. There was six other people crammed in the small room. Two elderly women that looked to know one another, a young mother with two small kids. The one looked to be five, the other maybe three. There was also a man that appeared to be in his late fifties. He was clad in a business suit and a tie, probably an important man, I thought. My father would get along with him, I knew that much.

            "I don't know." Brad shrugged, "after you sat down all these people came in and I haven't seen him. Probably the washroom." Brad guessed.

            I stood up and Brad followed me with the food, making plane noises as I went towards the washroom, "Dad?" I called as I knocked on the door.

            "Don't come in here!" He yelled. I tried to open the door, but it was clear he had his back to it, keeping it pressed closed.

            "What's wrong?" I asked, suddenly worried. This was bad, I knew it. "Daddy?"

            "Get the CDC, get them now!" He protested, his back pressed harder into the door.

            "Ok." Brad voiced behind me, "I'm on it." He put the food on the ground running for the phone. In a minute he was back and the same older man came in with the hazmat suit. He walked forward, pushing me out of the way of the door and asking my father to open up. He refused.

            "Why not, sir. We need to remove you for the rest of these peoples safety." He said, his voice monotone.

            "I just can't. You have to trust me. You can't open that door." The hazmat suit man insisted and after pressuring for a few minutes, my father gave in, letting the door slide open. When he was visible I saw that his entire arm was skinny and the same red dots were covering it, the small little rash spreading farther and farther up his body. This wasn't the worst of it, his arm was moving, but it didn't look like it was him moving it. It was snapped in half, the broken half waving round and round, trying to break free. Once he saw the hazmat suit man, the hand went crazy, my father holding onto it, restraining it, stopping it from moving. "Hurry!" My father yelled and me and Brad stood out of the way as my father stood up, his hand breaking free of his grasp and hitting the CDC man in the face, trying to grab off his mask, but my father restrained his arm again, holding it close to himself as he walked for the door, the hazmat man stopping people from getting too close.