Redaction: Extinction Level Event (Part I) Read Free Page A

in her direction, but not the one she wanted, no needed, to see. Her heart rate kicked up tempo.
    “Aunt Mavis?”
    Her ears pricked at the sound of her name. There—behind the glass divider—Sunnie waved her pale arm above her head.
    With a roll of her shoulders, Mavis released the tightness that stretched across her back. It had been silly to think the girl would get sick and die in minutes. Silly. Her stomach roiled as she waded into the seating area. Dodging around a man unstrapping a toddler from a high-chair, she passed a couple absently stuffing fries in their mouths. While their fingers fumbled on the tray for more, their attention jerked from child-to-child-to-child. Eyes never resting on one face too long, never ceasing, never finding the one they desperately wanted to see.
    Never.
    Their raw grief zinged through her like she’d touched a live wire. Muscle turned to rubber and her knees shook. Loose fries tumbled across the paper covering the tray.
    No, not never.
    Ghosts returned in a familiar smell, a burst of laughter, and the unguarded moments of sleep.
    Metal squeaked before a yellow bucket bumped against a bench, jerking her away from her thoughts. With her back toward Mavis, the employee swished her mop from side-to-side.
    “Excuse me.” Mavis stepped over the darting mop, and her loafers squeaked on the wet tile. Reaching the table, she plunked down the tray and collapsed on the burnt-orange bench. The vinyl sighed as it adjusted to her weight. Snatching up a napkin, she swept the white granules strewn across the table into a neat pile and caught them in another napkin, folded the bundle and chucked it in the trash can near their booth. People needed to be more careful with their spilled salt.
    Sunnie’s lips quirked. “What? No bleach wipes or hand sanitizer?”
    Clearing her throat, Mavis dusted her hands on her pants. She loved her niece, but God, kids could be such a pain in the ass. “No. With things back to normal, it’s time to let our immune system meet a few harmless bugs.”
    She brushed her hand over the tabletop. Good. Nothing sticky. She drew the line at sticky. There was a reason icky rhymed with sticky.
    “The bug that caused the Redaction wasn’t harmless.” Sunnie set her packet of hand wipes on the table, tugged one white cloth out, and then ran the damp towelette over her fingers.
    Mavis wrinkled her nose at the alcohol smell. How long before she could have a drink without thinking about the Rattling Death? “That was an aberration. Most bugs are harmless, especially the ones you’ve just killed off with that wipe.”
    “Geez.” Sunnie dropped the towelette. “Wash your hands, don’t wash them. Do this, don’t do that.”
    Proper washing involved soap and hot water, not a wipe. Not that she’d tell her niece. Obviously, this outing was stressful for her, too; she just hid it better. Mavis ripped open a packet of ketchup and squirted the red contents onto the paper tray liner.
    “Can you believe that?” Sunnie snatched two fries from the tray and dunked them in Mavis’s pile of ketchup. Her head bobbed toward the flat-screen TV in the corner above the booth behind them.
    Mavis stabbed her straw into her milkshake. She never listened to the news anymore. It was too depressing. “Let me guess, another suicide-by-cop.”
    So many couldn’t face the empty silence, yet lacked the will to end their own lives—especially when the police could do it for them at the price of waving around an empty gun.
    Cheeks bulging with fries, Sunnie shook her head.
    “Suicide-by-bridge? Building?” Using her teeth, Mavis ripped more ketchup packets open. Boy did that sound cold. True, but cold. Suicides hit the ten-percent mark last week. The head-shrinkers predicted the number might rise to twenty-five percent by the end of the year.
    Almost as deadly as the flu.
    “No.” Sunnie raised her soda toward the screen.
    Mavis pushed a pickle further under her bun. “What