An Ordinary Epidemic (2 page)

They drove to the school in comfortable silence. Zac was absorbed in his inner world. Just a couple of years ago it was hard to get a word in edgewise but now he kept his thoughts to himself until they were well-ordered. He'd done his own packing and she was tempted to check whether he had the foresight to take a fleece. It had been on the list and he knew it was a few degrees colder in Canberra. It would be a learning experience—no one ever died of getting a bit chilly, although, at the moment... no, they really didn't.

She couldn't help herself. Some things were too important. ‘Don't forget the hand goo.'

‘I won't.'

‘Use it a lot.'

‘I will.' He wasn't really paying attention but she'd said it.

The streets were still empty. It felt odd to pull into a parking space straight in front of the school, as if she were taking something not rightfully hers. Two hours from now the buildings would look the way she was used to, hidden behind double-parked cars as kids jumped out and ran for the gate.

Zac pulled his backpack out of the car as he stood up. He waited for her to come around to the kerb, and they walked together into the bitumen yard and stood side by side. A knot of kids congregated in front of the waiting coach, their high, chirrupy teenage voices drowning out the muted murmur coming from the small clusters of parents. She looked around for a friendly face but, if she was being brutally honest with herself, she didn't really know any of Zac's friends' parents.

Zac stood facing no particular direction, as if he didn't know whether to join the clump of kids or be with her. The two of them were matched in their awkwardness. She wanted to push him towards the group but he had his own pace. His body had started to mature, but every emotion was still expressed, unfiltered, on his face and in the way he stood.

As she stared into the distance, the figure of a woman walking towards her impinged on her thoughts. Someone familiar, someone she had met before although she couldn't quite place where or who. Possibly Daniel's mother, she thought. She hoped. They had definitely met more times than could justify Hannah not remembering her name. The woman came to a stop next to her, and side by side, in the moment before either felt compelled to say something, they looked at the kids. Hannah leant slightly back, trying to retrieve an air gap between them.

‘Is Zac as disorganised as Daniel?'

One right at least. ‘If there are undies in his bag, it'll be pure chance.'

‘This is embarrassing, but I've forgotten your name.'

Thank Christ. ‘Hannah.'

‘Susan.' Saved.

Hannah stared at the gaggle. Zac had moved to the outskirts, watching. She could see him unconsciously matching his body language to the other kids. He laughed at something as the others laughed. The tension in his angular shoulders emphasised their rise and fall. The group had widened, fanned out just enough to include him and while he relaxed a little, he stayed listening, head to one side. Her heart jumped and she realised she was smiling, almost like she was in love.

Susan's hand bumped the back of hers. Cold fingers. The touch was so light that normally it wouldn't register at all. Susan was clearly unaware she'd done it. ‘Isn't it terrible, the news from overseas?'

‘Oh, yes, horrible.' Hannah tried to think of something more salient to say but she couldn't get her mind off the spot on her hand, the spot that had been touched. It could be the cold morning but she felt a lingering sensation of damp. A wet touch would transfer germs better than a dry one. She had to fight the urge to rub the cold away with her other hand. Even if it didn't look strange, it would do nothing but spread the germs.

She edged slightly away. On the net it said that she should keep a metre between herself and anyone else. Surely that wasn't enough. Surely a cough or a sneeze could travel further but it might at least reduce the accidental bumps and incidental spit.

‘What about Thailand? We were there at Christmas. Graeme got sick, Bali belly, and then he dehydrated but the hospital was terrific. Last night, there it was on the news. You could barely recognise it, there were people dying in the corridors. And it was so clean and normal when we were there. We were right there.'

Now Hannah's hand was hanging. She fixated on it, couldn't take her thoughts from it long enough for it to move freely.

There was a wipe in her bag but pulling it out to clean her hand now would seem rude.

Zac had broken away from the larger group. He was chatting and laughing easily with two other boys, then stopped to look around. His eyes landed on her, looking for her. That made her happy. He walked over self-consciously and stood slightly too far away.

‘Well, bye Mum.' He generously allowed her to hug him.

‘Be good, enjoy yourself, try to learn something.'

‘'Kay.'

Everyone else was lining up in front of the bus doors. If he didn't hurry, he would be last and end up next to some kid he didn't really know for the next three hours.

His back was pressed against the glass of the bus window. The boy on the other half of his seat was almost touching him. Another two on the seat in front and two behind. At least five kids within a metre of Zac. His head bobbed as if he was talking animatedly, or maybe laughing. He leant closer to the boy in front to say something, breathing the same air. She had forgotten to tell him about the one-metre rule and, even if she had, there wasn't enough room on the bus to keep his distance. After a moment he settled into his seat again, his forehead rested against the window, looking out.

Although the glass blurred and darkened his image, she could see him, lost inside his head, as she sometimes caught him when he was doing his homework. He looked so capable, suddenly so much his own person, still and grave and true. She had made him and now there he was—complete, whole, independent.

A moment later, he turned back to his friends in the bus, joining their conversation. She followed their eyes to the
teacher at the front as they shuffled in their seats, laughed, looked around. The teacher swung himself into the seat nearest the driver. The bus lurched forward.

The kids, some despite themselves, looked out the windows to their parents. Some waved, some just looked. Zac was still talking to his friends and didn't look back, only raising a hand slightly and giving her his confident smile once the bus had almost pulled away. She stood and watched until they were out of sight.

The narrow school gate was clogged with leaving parents who had stopped in groups to talk. She had to weave through, trying not to be touched and not to breathe too hard.

She skirted a toddler hanging onto the tether of his mother with one hand and smearing his snotty nose with the other. Her heart skipped again. But it was a cold morning—that made noses run. She looked for anything else that might be a symptom, even the memory of a cough or a sneeze. There was no way she would have missed it if someone coughed. The chance that she was looking at the first case in Sydney was miniscule.

Not every sneeze was Manba, that was what she had to keep telling herself. But not everyone who had Manba had symptoms. Any of these healthy-looking people could be in the early stages and you wouldn't know. Or be an asymptomatic carrier.

This was how bad things happened—by ignoring her instincts. If something went wrong, she would always know she'd had a choice to stop him from going. She had to hold herself back from running after the bus.

Every kid did this. All the kids went, the teachers would look after them, Zac was safe. She knew that. She told herself that. But still Hannah felt she had failed him.

It was too late now. It was done.

The cold nip of the car door handle took her by surprise. She glanced at the clock, seven thirty, even though the bus was supposed to leave by seven. Still enough time to get home and get Oscar ready. As much out of habit as anything, she turned on the radio for the news. She felt jumpy, maybe just eager to get home.

There was more traffic on the road now. As she passed Oscar's school, kids were already arriving. A harried-looking father dropped two small girls at the gate of the before-school care centre.

The voice from the radio pushed itself to the front of her attention. ‘...organisers believe they have now identified all attendees. However, a small number have still not been located. The World Health Organisation has offered assistance to any government whose citizens attended the conference...'

The wind had picked up a little, and the kids looked like small blue and white bundles with their arms wrapped around themselves.

‘...on farms all over Britain, thousands of animals have already been put down. Protestors gathered in London are claiming that the cull will do nothing to reduce the spread of Manba without a significant drive to identify wild animal vectors. Wide-scale testing of non-domestic animals in the Manchester area has begun...'

Gwen had asked her yesterday if their cat caught birds. She'd explained that Mr Moon certainly recognised birds as a source of food, in much the same way you might consider a stuffed zucchini flower but if it didn't come out of a can, it wasn't worth his effort. Gwen had looked unconvinced. Hannah hadn't bothered to point out that Manba wasn't bird flu and she should worry instead about whether Mr Moon caught bats.

‘...reports that airport employees are refusing to unload passengers from a plane originating in Bangkok. A short time ago, the Minister for Immigration said a decision would be made soon on whether the passengers will be allowed to enter the country. In the meantime the plane is being supplied with food and water...'

She thought of all those people returning from holidays. So close to being home after such a long flight, but still stuck in a metal tube. Imagine being sent back to a forced vacation in a disease zone. Well, at least it wasn't summer so the plane wouldn't heat up too fast as it sat.

‘...is advising anyone planning overseas travel to postpone their journey. People who must travel are advised to stay away from areas where large groups congregate, including tourist attractions and conferences...'

No one she knew would get sick, she had to believe that. The outbreaks overseas would die out. And everyone would complain about panicky scientists, who would insist that we still needed to be prepared for next time. And that would be it.

Or it wouldn't.

And she was prepared. Except that in three hours Zac would be three hours away and she had no control over Newcastle Hospital, airport security, government policy or viruses.

The news continued—a story about a film star, sport and weather. She switched it off. Zac had left. Nothing on the news made that look like a good idea.

She turned the car onto the paved area in front of their house. She liked the way the house's facade spanned the property, presenting a united front with Gwen's half of the semi. Its thick front door deadened the sound from the street. Even the side passage between their house and Natalie and Stuart's was barred by a tall wooden gate. An unbroken barrier to keep out noise, dust, draft, people and germs.