The Week
The Week
Eva Brooks
It’s Monday.
She rolls out of bed with her 6:00 alarm and drags herself into the bathroom before she can complain. She yelps when she gets in the shower, but if she uses hot water she’ll be in there for a solid hour.
She toasts her bagel and watches the news with the volume low to not wake her roommate. There’s some sort of virus epidemic going around, but she hasn’t flown to or from Europe recently, so she’s fine. She brews a cup of coffee once she finishes her breakfast, and she slips out the door.
She boards the 7:10 train out to the suburbs. She’s lucky that her school starts at 8 every morning even though the train ride ends up taking so many stops that it’d be faster to drive. She likes the peace and quiet.
She walks quickly after the train stopped to Rockefeller Elementary School, where she teaches second grade. She remembers wanting to teach at some point, but she can’t quite remember why: the kids are cute but rowdy, and she teaches well but can never seem to be engaging enough. It’s only noteworthy when she monitors the lunch room. She does it every Monday. It’s always loud and chatty, but it would be bearable, if Peter, the other second grade teacher, wasn’t there, that is.
“Hi, Ms. Monty!” Peter sneaks up behind her.
“Oh, hey there, Mr. Varnes.”
“Nothing like a lunch rush, huh?” Peter claps her hard on the shoulder and puts his hands in his khaki pockets, smiling.
“Yeah, it’s something…”
“I shouldn’t have signed up for Mondays. I’m not ready for all of this stress yet.” Peter laughs and leans up against the brick cafeteria wall. She agrees that he shouldn’t have signed up for Mondays, but for a different reason, so she doesn’t say anything.
“Hey, did you hear about the secret virus that’s been spreading around?” He fake shivers. “Weird stuff.”
“I don’t know why everyone’s so up in arms about it. I mean we don’t know what it, like, does. Shouldn’t they inform the public instead of making everyone scared?”
He blinks, then nods. “True…” he scratches his beard, and she thinks he’d finally leave when he helped a kid open his pack of fruit snacks. But sadly, he turns right back.
“Have you gone anywhere in Europe lately? Know anyone who has?” he says, trying to casually prop a foot on the wall and looking like he was modeling shoes.
“No, I’ve never left America and my family doesn’t travel out of Minnesota. My roommate was in Italy for the holidays, but she’s fine.”
He purses his lips. “Gotcha.” A kid comes up to him and tells him he has a bloody nose. Peter gasps and takes him to the nurse’s office, and that lasts the rest of the lunch period.
She gets through the afternoon and is back at home by four. Chloe is sitting at the computer shoving Cheez Its in her mouth as she walks in.
“Hey, sweet stuff,” she calls over the metal music blaring.
“Hey, Clo.”
“Are we still on for tomorrow?”
“Yeah, yeah, it’ll be fun,” she tells herself. She hates going out, but Chloe doesn’t make dinner on the nights she goes out and she can’t cook to save her life. At least her friends are kind.
She likes Chloe, even though she’s so… different. Chloe is a freelance artist, so she covers the rent and internet bills and cooks food in exchange for living there. Chloe’s good for her because she helps her get out of the house for things besides school, where she doesn’t ever really talk to anyone.
Dinner is fresh cooked, homemade pizza. She scarfs all the food down (it’s so warm and gooey and sweet). It’s 9:26 when she finishes her school work for the week, and she changes into her pjs and brushes her teeth as quickly as she can. She can’t help but wish she wasn’t just so tired. She wants to feel energized and happy about life. She feels so… disconnected, she guesses. As she flops into bed, she stares out at the stars through her window, sighing. She just wants… a bit of change, she supposes.
It’s Tuesday.
She can already feel the tiredness creeping in behind her eyes. She groans as she gets out of bed and slips into the shower. The weather’s gone cold again.
She spreads some jam on a piece of toast and takes a bite. Chloe is already up and eating a bowl of Lucky Charms, doodling something on a notepad that looks suspiciously like a pin up.
“Morning, sleeping beauty,” she sing songs, uncapping a bright pink sharpie.
“Morning.” She starts making her coffee.
“Hey, Scotty’s is closed because the owner got sick, you wanna try this new Italian place in Little Italy?” She thinks about it, but it seems like the perfect change.
“Yeah, that sounds really fun, actually.”
“Great!” Chloe smirks and starts coloring in some boxers. She slips out the door and gets on the train.
Class goes well, but in the middle of history, Peter comes up and raps on the door.
“Hi, kiddos!” He says, beaming.
“Hi Mr Varnes!” The kids cheer. She cringes. Peter’s the popular teacher, even if he’s newer than her, since he’s the only male teacher.
“I’m helping out the office with…” he jerks up some papers. “...these forms about an illness going around!”
“Oh, why- thank you- Arnof, would you pass those out?” Her student picks them up and passes them out to the class. Peter has an extra one he hands directly to her.
“Stay healthy, everyone!” He smiles and steps out. She looks down at the form, it’s about the secret virus. It doesn’t give much info, but it lists symptoms as hunger, chills and fever, loss of memory, distracted behavior, and joint and limb pain. She doesn’t like this disease the more she hears about it, but the symptoms aren’t anything she’s noticed in herself or others. She drops the paper on her desk and tells her kids to keep working.
The rest of the day goes smoothly, and she even sends out a few emails. She leaves work around 5 and walks in on Chloe changing in the living room, in nothing but black booty shorts and a lace bra. She gasps and averts her eyes.
“Girl, you gotta knock!” Chloe chuckles as she walks down the hall.
“Thought you would have heard the key.” She throws her bag down by her bedroom door and looks through her closet. She pulls out thigh high boots and a romper, The doorbell rings as soon as she clips on her belt and Chloe squeals.
She walks out to see Chloe, now ready in a spaghetti top. “Let’s hit this town up!”, Chloe cries, kicking the ajar door all the way open.
They get the DiMarios and order, meeting her friend Vanna. The restaurant smells of garlic and carbs makes her mouth water, and by the time they get to their table they all stuff their mouths with bread and salad.
“God, I love Italian!” Vanna cries as her rigoni plate arrives. “These Italians know what’s up, especially the ones over here in this restaurant!”
“Nothing can beat the real deal though” Chloe says, her mouth full with her fifth breadstick.
“You gotta take us to Italy if you’re gonna keep bragging about it, girl.” Vanna lightly shoves her.
“I will!”, Chloe sighs and shakes her head, grinning. “Next time, for sure.”
They pay for the meal and get to the club. She should really just leave after they eat dinner. She hates the club, and it’s not like her party of girls will stick by her to keep her spirits up. She’s stuck at the bar with a glass of Coke Zero, waiting for it all to end, or for the electricity to suddenly turn off. She can see a guy staring her down from the corner of her eye, so she pays her tab and walks outside.
The night air is cool on her skin, the sliver of moon providing more even lighting than the bar. She was glad to go to the restaurant, but this is just more of the same boring crap. She needs something to actually enjoy. She rounds the corner of the club. Maybe she needs a hobby or something, she thinks.
And then she sees it. And then she screams.
She… she can’t describe it. It’s not right, it’s not… it’s not human. It doesn’t look real at all, it looks darker than ink, unlike any animal she’s ever seen. It seems to have too many joints and not enough joints all at once. It makes her think of running, but then it… moves, jankily, like a puppet, over the alley wall and out of sight.
She must stare after it for a long time, because she doesn’t register anything until Chloe shakes her shoulder.
“Rachel, are you okay? You’ve been staring at that wall and- oh my God, were you crying?”
Chloe and Vanna try to comfort her on the Uber ride back, but she doesn’t say much. She keeps crying, and her palms are shaking, but she can’t really process anything.
“You sure you’re good?” Chloe asks in the apartment. “You still seem out of it.”
“Yeah, it was nothing, I’ll be fine.”
Chloe cocks an eyebrow, but pulls her in for a quick hug before saying goodnight. She puts on her pajamas in a daze, like her head is full of static. She crawls into bed and feels her tears hit the pillow.
She doesn’t know why she’s crying. She’s scared, but she shouldn’t be. She just imagined it, it wasn’t there, couldn’t be. She’s better than this. She… must be tired. She needs sleep…
It’s Wednesday.
She still feels shaken from last night, but she forces herself out of bed and to the hot water tap. She isn’t going to let herself get freaked out. She can do this.
Chloe is asleep again when she walks into the kitchen. As she screws her coffee mug lid on tight, she decides she’s not going to worry about that… thing. That might not even be real. She’s gonna have a good day.
She takes the train and gets to school. Two kids are sick, which makes the morning a little calmer and more bearable. They have music right before lunch, where they brush past Mr. Varnes' class. Peter looks at her briefly, but she doesn’t make eye contact. The rest of the day passes without event.
At the end of the day, she checks her email, hoping the parents followed her up about that math. There’s no response, but there is an email from another parent, one of the ones with an absent kid.
“Ms. Montagram, I got the letter from school about the secret virus going around. Just last night, Gina has reported having her arms and elbows hurt and has been eating up the whole fridge. Should I take her to a doctor? Is she safe to go to school? Please email back as soon as you can. Mrs. Rodriguez”
She feels a pit in her stomach, a little ball of dread. She doesn’t know how to respond. She leaves quickly. She feels satisfied with her answer, but her stomach stays in knots all the way home. Why is there no info about this disease? It is secret indeed.
When she gets home, Chloe has ordered Chinese. She is eating two batches of orange chicken whole-heartedly and talking animatedly about a deal she got with an indie publisher.
“Hey, uh…”
“Oh sorry, I’ve been rambling, huh? What’s up?”
“I’m just… well, have you heard about this secret virus going around?”
Chloe shrugs. “Yeah, seen it on Twitter a lot. Why, you think you caught it?” She chuckles.
“No, but- a flyer got handed out about symptoms yesterday, and now two of my kids are absent, and I got this email… I dunno…do you think they caught it?”
“If you’re worried, you oughta look it up. Chloe peeks at her from under her lashes, smirking as she pops two pieces of whole chicken in her mouth.
“You’re… right, thanks.”
“No prob!” She starts up to leave, until she hears Chloe clear her throat.
“Yo, Rachel?”
“Yeah?” She turns around and blinks. Chloe’s green eyes are shining- no, glittering- like emeralds. She doesn’t know how, but they suddenly look so… big. She gasps, which makes Chloe blink. They become normal when she opens her eyes again, which makes her blink.
“Oh, nothing. Sorry, forgot what I was gonna say!” She giggles and heads to the computer. She nods, but feels like ice cold water is dripping down her back.
She finishes her schoolwork slowly, but takes a lot of time to stare at the ceiling before giving up and getting ready for bed. Why is everything getting so weird?. If only she hadn’t seen that… thing…
It’s Thursday.
She wakes up, but stays in bed for a bit, staring at the ceiling. This already feels like an off day, and she hasn’t even started yet. She gets in the shower, but lets the water run over her and makes a mental vow: Chloe is right. She just needs to get through today, and then look up as much as she can about this disease.
She takes the last bunt of bread from the loaf. She just went grocery shopping, but she’s gonna have to go again tonight, too. She could have sworn they still had orange juice, and eggs, and fake butter…
She forgot her coffee cup at school, damn it. She heads to the station with a foggy head. She checks her phone as she sits down on the plastic seat. The weather’s had a warm patch, the forecast says it’ll be a high of 61. Outside recess. She gets through the morning, feeling almost zombie-like, but the students don’t seem to notice. Gina is absent, as are two other kids, but the other absent kid from before is back. Did he just have a cold, or did his parents not care about symptoms? Are you contagious without them?
Recess comes, and she finds herself standing outside, watching the playground from the blacktop across from it and a small grass field. The weather wasn’t ready for a warm day, with the sky filled with light grey clouds and the grass all limp and yellow. She sees Peter’s class run outside, and he catches her eye and walks towards her.
“Hey there, Ms. Monty!” He smiles at her, crossing his arms behind his back.
“Hi, Mr. Varnes.”
He stands next to her, also facing the kids. They’re silent for a minute, before she starts conversation back up again.
“You missing a lot of kids today? I have five gone, all of a sudden.”
“I’m missing three. Do you think it’s because of that secret virus going around?” Peter looks to his left and right, and shrugs.
“I think it’s super possible, but I can’t say for sure. It’s also the weather, I’m sure, thawing out and making everyone sick.”
“Do you know a lot about the virus?”
“I check the news when I can. Why, you curious about it?”
“Yeah, I guess I just want to learn about… its effects, or something.”
He hums at her, staring her down for a moment. When he speaks, his voice seems a bit strained. “Are you feeling well? Have you had any of the symptoms?”
“Oh, no, nothing like that, but one of my kids apparently had the symptoms yesterday, so I was thinking about it, and I guess I realized I don’t know much about it.” He smiles at her, but with teeth, which looks slightly friendlier.
“Well, the news seems to have nothing recently. I’d maybe check the library?”
“Oh, that’s a good idea, thank you!”
“Of course!” The bell rings, and the kids start lining back up. He suddenly seems to go serious, staring at her, then slowly bringing his eyes down. She feels a bit unnerved, and is about to say something when he raises his hand and picks at something on her jacket lapel.
“You had some lint there.” He mumbles, looking up into her eyes. His are dark brown, and plain.
“Oh.”
“Yeah, um,” Peter clears his throat and walks away. She wants to run up to him and scream… a bunch of things, but she has to get through the school day.
She gets back on the train and heads back inside without a word. Everything that’s been going on… it’s scaring her to her wit’s end. By the time she gets back, Chloe was asleep, even though it’s only 7:30. She gets into her pjs right away, but then paces her room, really thinking of nothing, but replaying the events of the week in her mind.
One more day. One more day and she can have some time to just relax and pull herself together….
It’s Friday.
It’s 5:23 AM when she checks her phone. She lies in bed, staring at the ceiling with her heart racing. She doesn’t know what to think, or how. Should she run? Should she do more research? There's clearly something in town, but she doesn’t know what to do.
She stumbles into the kitchen without taking a shower. Chloe isn’t up again, and she didn’t go for groceries last night. Damn it. She leaves with an empty stomach and catches a train 10 minutes earlier.
The morning goes fine until the announcement
“Attention all students, due to an in school outbreak of the secret virus, we will be closed for the rest of the day. Your parents are on their way to pick you up. Teachers, please quietly dismiss your students and leave the premises.”
The kids started talking animatedly. For a minute, she just stares back at them even as they ask her questions. But then, she realizes that things are crossing the line. She needs to be an adult and push forward, and if she’s gonna do that, she’ll do it one step at a time.
“Single file everyone. I will escort you one by one to your parents outside. There is no need to talk.”
The kids, for once, remain silent as she takes each kid by the hand and walks them to their families. Her heart is racing, begging the parents to not have glittering eyes or to see any… things… but she doesn’t. As soon as she drops off the last kid, she runs to the train station and booked the next ticket back home. The terminal is packed, so the spread must certainly have thrown things off schedule.
She walks up to her apartment deciding she’s going to shut in and try her best. She opens the door and screams again. God is she sick of screaming.
It’s the thing. It’s in the apartment, and it’s torn everything apart. The table’s been chopped in half, there’s paper everywhere, and deep scratches all over the couch.
She only stands a second before she bursts away, sprinting down the street and screaming at the top of her lungs. She stops after a block and catches her breath, gasping. God, in her apartment? Everything was wrecked now… that thing wasn’t just content occupying her mental space anymore, it had to have every piece of her.
She suddenly realizes that Chloe wasn’t in there. How could she have forgotten? She needs to make sure she’s doing alright, what if that thing attacked her? She heads back up to the apartment, only to see two police trucks pulled up by the front door. Men in black suits are pooling outside investigating the outside of the apartment. They train their eyes on her, but let her walk toward the door.
She opens it and sees Peter. Sure, he’s wearing a suit, and he has dark sunglasses pushed up onto his head, but she could recognize him anywhere.
He looks her way when the door opens and smiles. “Hi there, Ms. Monty.”
“H- hi- what are you doing here? This is my house?”
“Oh, just looking around…” a black box device in his hands beeps, and he looks down at it and frowns, punching a few more buttons.
“For what?”
He looks back up at her, and his face is more serious than she has ever seen it in his life.
“Did you know about the spread of the secret virus in this neighborhood?”
“Oh- is this what this is all about? Of course I've been wondering-“
“Did you experience any symptoms?”
“No, so I already told you I didn’t, I don’t know anyone who has-.”
“Stop,” he snaps, taking two steps forward to stare her down. “Don’t lie to me, Ms. Monty. We see the readings in this apartment and we can tell one has been here.”
“Yes! I saw one- one of the things- it was here.”
“It’s more than that, we can sense someone with the illness being here. Someone with symptoms. Who is it? You know it!”
“No, no I don’t! I didn’t know the symptoms connected-“
“Stop lying!” He snarls, getting in her face and looking her dead in the eye. “Now, I’m only going to ask one more time: Who is it?”
“I… I can’t... I don’t know wha-“ Peter grabs her at the throat before she finishes. She chokes, gasping as he strangles her with one hand a moment, then drags his hand down to the nape of her neck. He digs his thumb into the crevice and she jolts back and punches him hard in his lower stomach. He yelps and staggers back, bending over to clutch his middle
“What the hell?!”
Peter doesn’t say anything, but he peers up a bit, still in his defensive stance. She could see one gleaming brown eye, gazing up at her, the pupil small and darting, but focused on her. Calculating the risk of trying again.
She wouldn’t give him the chance. She fumbles for the doorknob behind her and bolts as soon as it slid open.
She runs for a while, aimlessly trying to look for something, anything. Something to keep her safe, to keep her from thinking. She… she doesn’t know what to do.
Where is she going to go? She doesn’t ask that question until a good amount of running is already done. She sees a taxi and runs to it, waving her arms. It stops, and she ducks inside.
“Where to, ma’am?” The man asks her, looking her up and down.
“Minnesota.” Her brain supplies. He raises his eyebrows, but it takes her a minute to catch her breath and add more. “Twin Peaks.”
He nods. “Might as well escape here too. Have you felt any symptoms?”
“No.”
“Good.” He steps on the gas, and they zoom off. She doesn’t know what emotions to feel first, what thought to focus on, so she focuses on the moving of the road. That’s constant, that feeling of motion. It’s constant enough for her to think about until she falls asleep.
When she wakes up, it’s the middle of the night. It’s all white snow and green trees, the scenery she grew up with but hadn’t seen in years. The driver kept speeding on the empty road, humming to himself.
She realizes that she can’t go back home. What if they were ill? What if they were dealing with the same thing? What if she caught that disease somehow?
“Stop here.”
“Are you sure? We got a while to go.”
“Yeah, stop the car.” He pulls over. She starts to fumble in her pockets for her credit card, but he dismisses her.
“It’s the apocalypse now, sweetheart. I’m not gonna worry about money.”
“Oh… thank you.”
“Stay safe, now.” He speeds away, leaving her in the middle of the icy cold road. She doesn’t know where to go, so she just decides to go forward. This is okay, this she can manage. If she just keeps putting one foot forward, one step at a time, she can do this.
Her feet crunch in the snow and the cold air blows against her face, making her fingers numb. She doesn’t know what she’s doing or what she’s going to do, because she doesn’t even know what’s going on. She needs just a sign, some act of God, that her face will not be numb soon. That her hands will warm up. That her friends are okay. That she’ll be able to- what’s that? It’s an outline of something… big…
It’s the outline of a house. And honest to god house. She whoops into the air, sighing at the open sky, before she starts to run as fast as she can towards the shape, feet flying in the dark. The snow starts coming down faster, sticking to her eyelashes and numbing her hands more, but she wasn’t going to dare to stop.
The house is a big, two story manor. She gently turns the door handle, and it creaks open. The house is dusty and decrepit, the only piece of anything resembling furniture being a huge chandelier on the ground, having crashed down. She thinks for a moment of exploring, but her body doesn’t want to move. She’s exhausted, and cold, and grateful. She walks slowly towards the chandelier, bits of glass crunch under her feet. She sees a spot clear of glass and falls to her knees to lie down.
She lies on her side, shivering, and stares at the chandelier. If her eyes weren’t so tired, she’d cry. God, she’s tired. She’s so tired, and so, so confused. Is this the rest of her life? She would never wish this upon anyone, never could wish for this to happen.
Her last thought before drifting off to sleep was how that was wrong. She had asked for change. And now the question was dealing with it.
It’s Saturday.