Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy.
A heart condition, usually inherited, causes the walls of the heart muscle to thicken. The thickened muscle disrupts the heart's electrical signal. Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy is the most common cause of heart-related death in people under the age of thirty and often goes undetected. .
John would never forget those words for the rest of his life.
A heart condition.
Medication might have treated it if she'd only known. Surgery could have been successful had there been the chance.
Bitter words repeated over and over by people who couldn't fathom the weight of spewing terms such as 'might have' and 'could have' when the damage was already done. When there was already no way of reversing the outcome. How crushing to have to hear those words over and over.
John had always been the type of person to see purpose and meaning behind events and tragedies if he only waited long enough to see the plot unfold.
John was very wrong in his ideas about how his story would unfold
For months after the death of Harley, John existed in a state of waiting. Waiting for the clock to wind back, waiting for things to make sense again, waiting for Harley to jump out from behind a corner and snap a photo of him looking tragic and then snort at his expense.
About a week after the event John went into her backpack to find all of her photographs. They were important to her and therefore important to him. To his surprise John also found something of which he'd lost and thought he would never see again. It was the picture he had of his son, the one he carried around with him for all those years he'd spent alone, the only remaining photograph of his boy. John couldn't figure out when it was that Harley stole it from his backpack but he was very grateful that she had.
It was months before Rebel stopped waiting for her to come back. He took to sleeping at the top of the stairs in the Mould Loft, gazing down every so often, expecting one of those nights to see her walk in that door and run up those stairs to greet him. He refused to eat for nearly a week after Harley left and no longer wanted to play with his little red ball. Eventually John just threw it away. It was of no use anymore.
All John had left in the world was Rebel and some photographs but he treasured them with everything he had. Treasured them like Harley treasured them.
Eventually Rebel stopped waiting at the top of the stairs every night. John waited much longer.
As the months passed Rebel grew into a big, beautiful dog and John taught him everything he needed to know to survive in the world, plus some cute tricks to show off for treats.
After a year had passed, Rebel displayed no signs that he even remembered Harley anymore.
It was sixteen months before a vaccine was created and ready to be dispersed amongst the surviving uninfected population. Frank, his team of scientists and those who risked their lives in the city to gather the many supplies needed over the course of a year to ready the vaccine were to thank.
Them and Harley.
It was discovered early on that the vaccine, if administered to the infected, euthanized them within a twelve hour window. After this was unearthed an aerosol was created that could be sprayed safely from a distance and plans to mass produce the agent and begin a country wide dispersal via aircraft was quickly devised.
Edvin and Taylor returned home to Wudinna with enough of the vaccine for everyone in the small community, save for Shawn, who by then had already been cast out after the council discovered his proclivities had continued long after his crimes against Harley.
Nora and the children made it to Wudinna together but they had lost Liz and the other four women along the way. Giving birth to a daughter, Nora promised she would never know the details of her conception or of her father.
Edvin was right about Ben not surviving the loss of his son. It was only a few weeks after learning of Robby's demise that Ben suffered a massive stroke and passed away shortly after. Edvin believed with all his heart that Ben's death was caused by the tragedy of losing everyone he loved.
John, he stayed on Plateau.
Wudinna had never really felt like home to him. Harley was the only home he'd known since the virus struck.
Harley.
She was buried under a mature Blackwood Acacia tree on the Northside of the upper Plateau.
The people who lived there visited Harley often, leaving flowers and trinkets and lighting candles for the girl who saved them all with her gift.
John visited her grave at night when the two of them could be alone together. He was meticulous about keeping her memorial clean of leaves and debris, sometimes going back to it several times in a night to make sure it stayed looking beautiful.
Beautiful like Harley.
Two years after the vaccine and aerosol had been developed, the infected population in Australia had been effectively destroyed, and all uninfected survivors had been immunized.
Slowly but surely the cure was dispersed. First to Tasmania then New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, China, India, Russia.
Within the span of thirteen years, the entire globe had been wiped clean of the 2TSE virus.
Harley's story spread from place to place at the same rate the cure spread and everyone knew it was she who saved the world.
Harley's photographs
One more chapter to go.. 🤫