There was no normal childhood for Riley. In and out of offices, each person doing the same tests over, and over, and over. Permanent bruises, rashes, scars remained on her body. She would dream about those years of her life so vividly, that she believed she was reliving the nightmares each and every night. There she was again that night. Riley pictured her 6 year old self being pricked with IV after IV, flushing different liquids into her, testing what she would react to. One seemed to resonate with her more than they thought. The man, she didn’t remember ever knowing his name, walked up to her, using a syringe to take the now infected blood out of her arm. “She’s our new patient zero,” he said, turning to the woman with the clipboard in her hands. “Just what we were looking for,” the woman answered, scribbling notes onto the paper, then rushing out. Riley then saw herself being picked up, put on a stretcher, and wheeled out of the laboratory. The next moment she could remember from that day was waking up in the office of the FBI, her dad watching over her, congratulating her for being strong.
***
Here she was, 20 years later, the new girl, in a small town deep in the heart of Tennessee. She wanted to get as far away from her family and the FBI as she could, and this was the best thing she could think of. She’d been here for only a month, still yet to unpack the piles of boxes sitting in the living room. The only decision she’d made the whole time here was saying yes to the invitation from the cute boy on her block for a date. It had worked out pretty well for her and Jeremy. He had even spent the night last night, and the night before that, and the night before that... She opened her eyes and blinked, zoning back in, and focused her eyes on Jeremy. He was still asleep, breathing his warm breath on the pillow. He slept so calmly, like nothing could ever bother him. She got out of the bed, walked into the bathroom, and stared at her reflection in the mirror. She took her daily dose of drugs, and then walked out of the bathroom, placing the dirty needle in the drawer under her makeup, so Jeremy wouldn’t find it. The last time one of her significant others had found her needles, he ran out of the house thinking she was an addict, and never said a word to her again. Riley could only hope that Jeremy never found her stash, it’d kill him if he came in contact with the virus she shot into her arm everyday.
Riley was used to the way she had been living for the past month. The living room, still dusty and full of brown cardboard Home Depot boxes, remained untouched. She accepted the fact that it probably would never get done, and walked back out to her bed. This was the eighth night in a row that Jamie had slept over. They really seemed to be hitting it off. He had asked about her family, but each time Ryan changed the subject. How am I supposed to tell him that my dad is the reason for all the stresses in my life? she thought as she climbed back in bed, letting her long, brown hair crumple under her head on the pillow. Her arm hurt, like usual, so she popped a few Advil before slipping under Jeremy’s arm to lie closer to him. He moved around, pulling her into his side.
***
When Riley woke up again, it was 2pm. Sunday’s were Jeremy’s day off from his shift at the station. His uniform was lying on the ground, right where he had dropped it on his way to bed last night. He and Riley got dressed, and walked out the door to drive into town. She didn’t get as many stares anymore, everyone here was getting used to the new girl on the block. “My Grandparents used to live here; I couldn’t help but come back,” Riley would say, each time a new person would ask why a city girl like her would be in such a small, Tennessee town. Lie. she knew that not everyone believed her cover story, especially not Jeremy. Jeremy had been there when Agent Thomas walked in the door last Tuesday. More and more questions kept coming up, but Riley was doing all she could to stray Jeremy from the truth. He tried to ask her when they would hang out, casually throwing in a question or two to see what he could learn about his new love interest. She never had anything to offer. She was a very secretive person, naturally. She didn’t want the whole world knowing that she could kill them in a second if they got too close!
***
When Riley got home, she saw three missed calls. She called the number back, knowing exactly who it was. She had seen it one to many times in her life. “Hey, it’s me. Sorry I wasn’t here when you called, I was out,” she said. It didn’t feel like she was talking to a federal agent anymore. Agent Thomas was more like her older brother at this point. “Just calling to check in Ri. Listen, some of your test results came back. We’re having a little bit of a problem. Maybe you should think about distancing yourself from your new friends a little.” Riley was a little unsure of what this meant, but she followed the rules and said she would keep her distance. What they don’t know can’t hurt them. She walked upstairs, got in the shower, then flipped on the TV. “32 new cases of the unknown contagion have now been released, 18 of the victims already dead. This is becoming a global outbreak,” she watched the newscaster say. Riley couldn’t do anything about it. It wasn’t her choice, and there was no way to stop it now. Riley was tired. She had dropped Jeremy off for his evening shift about an hour ago, and was waiting for him to come back before she went to bed.. He had noticed her acting a bit weird the past few days, but wasn’t sure why. Riley made every attempt to keep her cool, fully knowing she could have just screwed up big time. She only missed a few days of her pill, she didn’t think anything would happen…
Dressed in her bathrobe, hair wrapped in a towel, Riley opened the drawer and moved around some of her makeup that was spewed randomly throughout. She cringed as she saw the pregnancy test, sitting in the open wrapper, afraid to look at the results. It had been four days, and still Riley was too nervous to check and see her fate. Will the baby get my disease? Will they be the newest case of my contagion? She reached for it, took a breath, and picked it up. Not pregnant. Phew. She tossed the test back in the drawer, and looked up towards the ceiling. Thank you, God. She shut the drawer and walked back into her bedroom. She had a few hours to kill, so she flipped the tv back on. The new contagion, which wasn’t new to Riley, was showing some pretty distinct symptoms. Rash’s covering large parts of the body, itchy like chicken pox, red eyes, victim’s bruising easily. Riley had already experienced these, a long time ago when she was six. Hers weren’t nearly as bad as the others, though. She sighed, the pit in her stomach getting bigger and bigger everyday. She did breathe a sigh of relief, however, knowing that she wouldn’t be bringing a child into the world with her suspicious boyfriend, and then killing it with her disease. For all she knew, it could kill Jeremy too... She shut her eyes, and fell into a deep sleep. She didn’t even hear Jeremy come in an hour later.
***
When she awoke, she noticed that someone had been in the room. There was Jeremy’s uniform, on the ground. His towel, damp from a shower, was sitting on the edge of the bed next to a bottle of anti-itch cream. Hm...that’s a little weird. Why would he have that? Poison ivy from outside, maybe. She rolled over, and checked her phone. She didn’t have any messages from Jeremy, so he had to have been home. Sitting next to where her phone was on the nightstand, Riley noticed a little bottle of Visine. What the… She sat up and looked into the now dark room. It was 9 o’clock. She had slept right through dinner. Turning the light on, Riley’s heart sank. Heart racing a million miles an hour, she sat up, staring at Jeremy’s lifeless body on the ground at the foot of the bed. He was naked, and covering his body were rashes, everywhere. Without thinking, Riley threw her clothes in a bag, grabbed her medicine, and ran out the door. She got in the car, turned up the radio, and sped down the driveway.