Under the Dome

There was a stone-flagged patio with a barbecue on it. The barbecue was neatly covered with a green tarp that said THE KITCHEN'S CLOSED. Beyond this, on the edge of the lawn, was a redwood platform. On top of the platform was the Freemans' hot tub. Twitch supposed the high privacy fence was there so they could sit in it naked, maybe even pitch a little woo if the urge took them.

Will and Lois were in it now, but their woo-pitching days were done. They "were wearing clear plastic bags over their heads. The bags appeared to have been cinched at the necks with either twine or brown rubber bands. They had fogged up on the inside, but not so much that Twitch couldn't make out the empurpled faces. Sitting on the redwood apron between the earthly remains of Will and Lois Freeman was a whiskey bottle and a small medicine vial.

'Stop,' he said. He didn't know if he was talking to himself, or Mrs Clavard, or possibly to Buddy, who had just voiced another bereft howl. Certainly he couldn't be talking to the Freemans.

Henrietta didn't stop. She walked to the hot tub, marched up the tyvo steps with her back as straight as a soldiers, looked at the discolored faces of her perfectly nice (and perfectly normal, she would have said) neighbors, glanced at the whiskey bottle, saw it was Glenlivet (at least they'd gone out in style), then picked up the medicine vial with its Sanders Hometown Drug label.

'Ambien or Lunesta?'Twitch asked heavily.

'Ambien,' she said, and was gratified the voice emerging from her dry throat and mouth sounded normal.'Hers. Although I'd guess she shared it last night.'

"Is there a note?'

'Not here,' she said. 'Maybe inside.'

But there wasn't, at least not in any of the obvious places, and neither of them could think of a reason to hide a suicide note. Buddy followed them from room to room, not howling but whining deep in his throat.

'I guess I'll bring him back t'house with me,' Henrietta said.

'You'll have to. I can't take him to the hospital. I'll call Stewart Bowie to come and get… them.' He hooked a thumb back over his shoulder. His stomach was roiling, but that wasn't the bad part; the bad part was the depression that came stealing into him, putting a shadow across his normally sunny soul.

'I don't understand why they would do it,' Henrietta said. 'If we'd been a year under the Dome… or even a month… yes, maybe. But less than a week? This is not: how stable people respond to trouble.'

Twitch thought he understood, but didn't want to say it to Henrietta: it was going to be a month, it was going to be a year. Maybe longer. And with no rain, fewer resources, and fouler air. If the most technologically hip country in the world hadn't been able to get a handle on what had happened to Chester's Mill by now (let alone solve the problem), it probably wasn't going to happen soon. Will! Freeman must have understood that. Or maybe it had been Lois's idea. Maybe when the generator had died, she'd said Let's do it before the water in the hot tub gets cold, honey. Let's get out from under the Dome while our bellies are still full. What do you say? One more dip, with a jew drinks to see us off.

'Maybe it was the plane that pushed them over the edge,'Twitch said. 'The Air Ireland that hit the Dome yesterday.'

Henrietta didn't answer with words; she hawked back and spat snot into the kitchen sink. It was a somehow shocking gesture of repudiation. They went back outside.

'More people will do this, won't they?' she asked when they had reached the end of the driveway.'Because suicide gets in the air sometimes. Like a cold germ.'

'Some already have.' Twitch didn't know if suicide was painless, as the song said, but under the right circumstances, it could certainly be catching. Maybe especially catching when the situation was unprecedented and the air started to smell as foul as it did on this windless, unnaturally warm morning.

'Suicides are cowards,' Henrietta said. 'A rule to which there are no exceptions, Douglas.'

Twitch, whose father had died a long and lingering death as a result of stomach cancer, wondered about that but said nothing.

Henrietta bent to Buddy with her hands on her bony knees. Buddy stretched his neck up to sniff her. 'Come next door, my furry friend. I have three eggs. You may eat them before they go bad.'

She started away, then turned back to Twitch. 'They are cowards,' she said, giving each word its own special emphasis.

5

Jim Rennie checked out of Cathy Russell, slept soundly in his own bed, and woke refreshed. Although he would not have admitted it to anyone, part of the reason was knowing Junior was out of the house.