Krisis (After the Cure Book 3) Read Free Page A

lowered his voice. “Let’s say we continue this way, and let’s say we are very lucky in this bad new world we live in, and we manage to survive for forty more years. So will Charlie. You said he’s a healthy kid other than the brain damage. And his hands. Let’s say we can continue to keep him healthy. We’ll find antibiotics for when he bites himself and prevent him from dying in agony from sepsis. We’ll start tying him to a telephone pole in the street on sunny afternoons so that he can run and exercise. That way he won’t develop seeping bed sores or atrophied muscles when his room gets too small. We’ll sedate him every night and brush his teeth and scrub him and change his diapers so he doesn’t wallow in his own filth. Day after day for forty years—”
    “Stop!” cried Ruth, “Stop it! I would do it all for him. Every day. I knew what I signed up for when we adopted him.”
    A wail of rage tumbled down the basement steps. Charlie had heard them and was awake. Bill swiped the back of his hand across his eyes as the scream renewed itself.
    “I know you would Ruth. I would too. But we became parents in another world. We could do all those things and more, but it will never take away even a fraction of his misery. Listen to that. That is his entire existence. How can you bear to see him in such anguish every day? Even if you could stand it, what would happen to him when we die? There isn’t any institution to take him to when we get too old to care for him. There’re no other relatives to take over. He’ll starve to death. Alone, chained up, his brain still a lost little boy’s. He’ll suffer for days and days before he finally dies. Is that what you want?”
    Ruth just sobbed, clutching his hand.
    “I worry about it every time we leave him,” Bill continued, “every time we go out to get supplies or medicine, I think, will this be the trip that kills us? Will my little boy be here abandoned and starving or freezing when the generator dies? Will someone break in and hurt him or— or eat him? I can’t do it anymore,” Bill’s voice broke and he dropped his head into his hands.
    After a moment, Ruth said, “You’re asking me to murder my child.”
    “I’m asking you to help me stop his suffering.”
    “There could still be a cure out there.”
    Bill let go of her hand. She crossed to the incubator and pulled out the plate. She didn’t even need the microscope. The bacteria had swarmed over the filter disks in milky gray clumps. The medication didn’t even slow them down. Bill could already see the despair in her face. He stood up and walked over to her. He took the agar plate from her hand and put it on the counter. “We’ve done everything that we can do. There’s nothing else to try. It’s time to let him go,” he said.
    “Maybe I just need to try a larger dosage.”
    “The dosages you tried were already too large for a child.”
    “Then I must have contaminated the samples,” she cried, and picked up the plastic plate again. “It’s this house! I can’t keep the lab sterile. Everything just seeps in here, no matter what I do.” She flung the bacteria into the trash barrel. She picked up a glass beaker and flung it too. Bill grabbed her arms and wrapped her in a hug.
    “It’s over Ruth, there is no cure . There’s nothing else to try. We can’t go on this way. It’s time to let him go.”
    “Not today. Not yet,” she cried.
    He pulled back from her for a moment. “The longer we wait, the more dreadful this will all become.”
    “Please, I just need a little more time. To get things ready. To do it right.”
    Bill shook his head, his bristly beard scraping through the hair on the top of her head. “We’ll just keep putting it off.”
    “I can’t Bill. He’s our baby. I can’t.”
    Bill was silent and the distant shrieks from Charlie poured into the lab, filled the quiet with misery. At last Bill sighed and gently pushed Ruth away. “It took me a long time to