The Infection

“I’m assigning you to recovery operations until the end of your shift, Saslove,” he barked. “Check dispatch to find out where the teams are going tonight. Now get the fuck out of my sight.”

Wendy walked to the police station, dumped her riot gear, and caught an hour’s sleep under a desk. For the next twelve hours, she looked for screamers. Her search team found sixteen, half as many as the night before, and one-fifth as many as the night before that. At six in the morning, exhausted but buzzing with coffee, she returned to the police station and entered Patrol. Some of the cops were gathered around a TV set, shaking their heads. Riots in the western states. A wave of violence spreading inland from the coast. Most of the military and National Guard were still deployed overseas and in disarray from the Screaming, with only some units having been flown back to the homeland. The police was the main line of defense and in city after city, that line was breaking. Not here, the officers swore. They were tired and angry but they were holding their ground and they were not going anywhere unless it was on a stretcher.

“Turn that shit off,” somebody yelled, and they did. The windows were open and a cool breeze wafted through the big squad room. Somebody produced a bottle of scotch and was sharing splashes in Styrofoam cups. “Get ready,” he was saying. “They need you out there. Get ready.” Wendy was bone tired and covered in bruises and her jaw and skull still ached from earlier in the night, when somebody clocked her while her team intervened to prevent the looting of the Whole Foods store.

John-John handed her a cup. “You done good, rook,” he said, winking and punching her lightly on the shoulder. “Keep it up.”

You done good, rook.

She smiled, her jaw aching.

“Throw in a blowjob and he’ll make you Officer of the Month,” one of the patrolmen said, sneering. He flinched as another cop jabbed him in the ribs with his elbow. “What’d you do that for?”

“Lay off,” the other cop said. “She’s one of us.”

John-John had raised his cup and was intoning loudly to all of them, “Sometimes it seems the only time a cop is called a hero is when he takes a bullet. Well, today, we got three heroes. That’s right. But I say you’re all heroes, every day, and especially right now, in the middle of this goddamn apocalypse. So here’s to our guys still in critical condition at Mercy Hospital, and here’s to all of you ugly dicks who won’t give up. You guys are my heroes. Here’s to you, Pittsburgh’s finest.”

She’s one of us.

The cops emptied their cups and held them up for refills. Somebody turned a radio on, trying to make it a party. Everybody stood around awkwardly in their uniforms and Batman belts, holding their drinks. The alcohol burned Wendy’s throat, making her feel alert and loose at the same time. Bracing. One of the communication dispatchers entered the room, blustering, “I need somebody to take a domestic disturbance and everybody’s committed. We’re getting flooded with calls.”

“Give it to the commander,” one of the cops called out, and everybody laughed.

The dispatcher was rifling through his slips. “Sound of breaking glass on the street,” he read. “Man heard screaming in alley.”

The officers chanted, Tell it to the commander! until the dispatcher left, red-faced and roaring. The cops cheered. They were dead tired. They needed a break. Wendy had just finished two twelve-hour shifts back to back. In just a few hours, she and the other police officers in the room would have to pull another twelve-hour shift. Until then, they were officially off duty.

The radio was playing an old song that reminded her of summers as a child. A very old song recorded before she was born. Some of the younger cops were moving to the music, nodding and shifting from one foot to the next, trying to unwind. Wendy could not remember the band but the song took her back to one particular summer when she was ten years old, maybe eleven. She remembered riding a bike down the driveway past her dad, who stood hunched over the open hood of his big police cruiser, working on the engine. Her bike’s handlebars had multicolor tassels that streamed in the wind. She remembered the sound of lawn mowers and the smell of fresh-cut grass. A boy kissed her that summer. His name was Dale. There was a tire swing hanging by a thick rope from an old oak tree in his backyard and he kissed her there. The memory gave her butterflies. For a few seconds, she fell asleep on her feet.

She opened her eyes. Men were shouting in the foyer. Several of the officers looked at each other, some frowning, others laughing. A scream pierced the air. Everybody froze and glared at the doors. More screaming. Stomping feet. The cops bristled.

The Raspberries, Wendy thought. That was the band.