Chapter 7: The Twenty-Eighth

I did not go to my mother's house on Thursday morning.

At dusk that evening, the county siren on the Bellmont water tower began to wail.

Every phone in my house buzzed at once.

SHELTER IN PLACE. DO NOT BREATHE OUTSIDE AIR. DO NOT APPROACH ILL PERSONS.

Nolan and I stood on top of the first silo with Amos's binoculars.

To the north, a grey line was crossing the Dillard field.

It was about a mile wide, and it moved slowly and evenly over the stubble.

"That's it," I said.

"That's it," Nolan said. His voice was very quiet.

By the time we climbed down, I could hear engines on Tolliver Road.

The first neighbors were already at my outer gate.

There were cars with their doors left open and children in pajamas, and a man carrying a dog under each arm.

They shouted my name, and nobody called me sick.

I opened the outer gate and let them into the lane one group at a time.

Amos came through on his four-wheeler with his old dog riding on the seat in front of him.

A young couple from the rental house came after him on foot, with a baby wrapped in a quilt.

The youngest of the church women came next, alone, out of breath, with her hymnal still in her hand.

She was the one who had checked her watch on Tuesday.