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“I understand. Could I visit her myself?”

“You really want to do that?”

“Yes. So at least if you choose to discuss this with me, I will understand it.”

“I can arrange that. Thank you, Susanna.” The President got up and escorted her to the door. “Do you mind when we discuss things off topic?”

“Off topic?”

“Like my mother.”

“Absolutely not. You can feel free to talk to me about anything. I enjoy it.”

“So do I. Thank you.”

When she left the room, the President was certain she was the most comfortable person to talk to in all of Washington. Maybe because she was older, or because he admired her so much; he didn’t know why, but she seemed like a soul mate. He couldn’t believe he had blurted out that he wished his mother would die, but it not only felt normal, it was a relief. The President also knew his own personality. If he got used to this, he would never want to let it go.

* * *

Los Angeles was deteriorating. Third-world diseases not seen in the United States in a century were breaking out in various parts of the city. In Echo Park, an underground drinking-water facility had been contaminated by broken sewer lines that were seeping through the aquifer, and three thousand people came down with cholera. In another part of the city thousands of people had developed whooping cough, a bacterial disease of the upper respiratory tract, and that origin was never found.

This once-great city was having a collective nervous breakdown. The people who had not left still numbered in the millions and were staying in broken buildings or sleeping in army tents or in cars. And they began to go crazy.

It manifested itself almost like a bad zombie movie. Each night large groups of people would roam the city. They weren’t part of the Los Angeles gangs that had been in operation before the quake. Those gangs were still there, roaming outside of their territory, looting every store that had anything left to take. But the zombie gangs were something else entirely, just large groups of people who were losing their minds.

It began with them just walking through the city. Walking every night, sometimes singing, sometimes silent. But soon they started breaking into stores and then homes. Bel Air and Beverly Hills, where the mansions had all been destroyed, were overrun by the zombies. The owners of those houses were long gone. When they left they took their valuables, their diamonds and their Picassos, so the zombies would steal a grand piano. Watching a Steinway being pushed down Wilshire Boulevard by a thousand people singing a song no one had ever heard before was something to behold. The cops and the National Guard did nothing about it. They had to keep their priorities straight, and their first concern was violence.

Murder had gone up a thousand percent. Most of the murders were connected to armed robberies—people needed money, and those who had any were at risk. And then there was just plain crazy behavior. Men getting wildly drunk and fighting to the death. It was as if an entire city had posttraumatic stress disorder and no one was equipped to deal with it.

Those who were sent to a facility, as Brad Miller was, were considered the lucky ones, although no one in Pasadena felt lucky. But at least there they were protected from violence.

Brad never understood why he was picked to leave while others were allowed to stay, if “allowed” was the right word. But as time went on he understood. The people in the Pasadena tent were perceived as weaker than those who remained in the city. The very old, the very young, single mothers with babies, people who were disabled, those were who Brad was surrounded by. Men in their thirties and forties were nowhere to be seen. So the tent people are the weaklings, Brad concluded. But he had to admit when he saw the news pictures of the zombie gangs that maybe being weak was a good thing. At least this is better than being attacked by roaming monsters.

Still, Brad knew he had to get out of there. And once again, feeling like Lenny in Of Mice and Men,