Continued...
"I grew up in Oklahoma. You know, like the musical. O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A, Oklahoma! OK."
The group did not get her reference and in turn were not amused.
"Tough crowd...Anyway, I lived my whole life in that good ole state. That's where I met my husband, had a family..."
Her face turn sallow, her playful demeanor gone.
"Anyway, once upon a time I was an actress. I know, great skill set for the end of the world right? I used to work in a theatre in Oklahoma City. My husband was an engineer. We had a son. Henry."
She smiled at the young boy sitting beside the steely-eyed man.
"He'd be about your age now."
"We're more concerned with how you got here and who you've been working with." The steely-eyed man remarked impatiently.
"I don't "work" with other people too much anymore, comrade. Seems nowadays people are more dangerous than the dead."
"We agree. That's exactly why I think you can understand why we need to make sure you aren't."
"Okie dokie, well I ain't got nothing to hide. How did I get here? I'm not sure to be honest. I just kept going. Going and going hoping that Jesus comes before I go for good. So how ironic is it that your Jesus brought me here?"
Jesus smiled and nodded at her from his place in the doorway.
"For me, it all started the same as I assume it did for you folks. We took off work and stayed glued to the TV waiting for it to pass. I wanted to go to my parents house, but my husband didn't think it was that serious. He kept on taking Henry and his baseball team out to practice as if nothing was going on. Henry just loved baseball. And I think my husband just didn't have the heart to keep him from it. He coached Henry's team.
Her eyes kept drifting off. Someone cleared their throat.
"Sorry. Anyway one night he came home with two extra boys. Max and Lucas. As you can infer, Max and Lucas no longer had homes to go back to. We took them in. A few months later we were still hunkered down at home. Things were bad, but my husband and I had a pretty decent stash that got us by. We were running low on water though, and finally we had to go out. We told the boys to stay put, not answer the door for anyone, etcetera..."
Her expression darkened.
"When we came back...they." She blinked hard. "Pre-teens, am I right?"
Maggie crossed over to her. Touched her shoulder.
"The boys had gone out back to play baseball. When we came home Lucas wasn't there. Max...Max was at the back door trying to get to Henry who was..." She gulped. "He was so hot. His little forehead felt like it could just scald my hand. When we came home he was just lying on the couch. Just lying there so sick."
She took a minute to recover from her quivering voice.
"We used their baseball bats to mark the graves. Jenny, Stacy, and Lucille."
The steel-y eyed man stood up. "Lucille?"
A faint smile crossed her lips.
"Those boys were so goofy. My husband always told them to play like the girl they wanted to marry was watching. Henry loved his bat more than any girl so he named it. Lucille. We were big 'I Love Lucy' people. Henry thought he was so clever because whenever he made a home run he'd holler "Honey, I'm home!" The others boys named their bats too-
"Where's your husband?" The steely-eyed man interrupted.
Her eyes, if possible, dimmed a bit more.
"Dead. I think."
"What do you mean, you THINK?"
"We left home after it all. We just couldn't...anyway he helped scavenge for a group we were with for a little while and he never came back. They told me he was dead. I tried to find him. I even went home to see if he was waiting for me there. He wasn't. Everyone was gone. Even Lucille."
They gaped at her.
Fin.
