Pandemic House

By Gerry Maddoux

This is a story of fall from grace, ruin, and, ultimately, redemption. It is a story of acceptance, of change, of starting over and trying harder to be a better person. "Pandemic House" tells the story of a misshapen old house in a good neighborhood that has been perverted hopelessly by the addition of an Olympics-class diving platform in the back yard. That setup became a large part of the problem in the previous family. The new family is made up not only of members of the former owners, but other lost souls, too. The children of the former owner trickle back in. Their lives have fallen apart, and they have nowhere else to go. As the virus spreads around the globe and decimates Maricopa County, illicit and illegal treatment goes on, partly by necessity but more because of paranoia. It turns out to be a wonderful thing. Everyone becomes damaged by life. It is the way back that tests the mettle.

An aging oncologist used to really be somebody in the cancer field. He not only practiced but was intricately involved in a startup company that developed a breakthrough treatment for rare cancers. In the process, he accumulated a nice nest egg, only to see it mostly disappear in a wrongful death lawsuit involving this highly successful novel cancer drug. To top it off, his bad temper led him to slug the plaintiff's lawyer on the courthouse steps, which claimed his reputation.

He and his wife sold their house, after being promised an ideal small house in Paradise Valley, complete with gardens. That deal fell through and, as the pandemic came in, they were forced to settle for a much larger house, a strange house with a bad past.

They move in, thinking they'll use only a third of the house. Soon thereafter, however, the place begins filling up with lost souls. As the pandemic ravages the country, everyone in the house learns to cope, manage, and survive unthinkable times while living in unthinkable circumstances. Although the collection of people in the house are far from conventional, you might find that their experience quite like life in your house.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 7, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098396619

Book preview

Chapter I:

The Pitch, February 10, 2020

The realtor in Phoenix called Hack Bartlett’s cell phone very late in the day, exactly twelve minutes before the ten o’clock news was to splash out its latest harbingers of doom. Hack was already settled in front of the television set; it was not a good time to call. But then, no time was a good time to call. He was in a perpetual bad mood. And for a reason.

While he was still viable—6 feet, 170, tanned, sinewy—Hack showed the signs of sleep loss and stress as a cancer doctor, and also of a life well lived in the outdoors, which is to say he had tinnitus, poor hearing and hypertension, and ambled along with a stoop and a limp. His face was leathery and lined. Mostly gone was the anger of yesteryear, which had taken a toll on his finances, not to mention his reputation. Health issues and age had finally claimed his job, which had ripped a chunk out of his soul. In short, he was trying to find himself again, early in the course of a forced retirement, and it wasn’t going so well this time.

Romping in the mountains had saved him before. However, he was past the point of skiing, snowshoeing, or even serious hiking up much of a grade. Still, his walks in the foothills kept him sane, especially during this bleak, wintry period of suspended animation. That and the network news now constituted the bulk of his entertainment, which says a lot.

God knows, the news could hardly be called entertainment these days, but it was becoming more important to stay current. For the first time since 9/11, imminent threat was knocking on America’s door. Hack irritably punched the mute button on the television remote.

Damn it!

You won’t believe it! the realtor gushed, emphasizing every word like a sports announcer. An incredible house has come back on the market.

Since the realtor had skipped a salutation, so did he. You’re on speaker phone, Hack boomed out, holding his iPhone up in the air. Mollie is right here.

Mollie reached over dexterously and put his phone on speaker mode.

Hi there, Mollie! the realtor said, her voice suddenly filling the room.

Hi Roxanne, Mollie returned, smiling. Talk to Hack, he’s the hard case. I’m all ears.

Hack pointed at the TV and rolled his eyes morbidly at Mollie, who dutifully hit the button on the remote control to show closed caption on the screen. He nodded his approval. Holding the remote in one large brown hand, his iPhone in the other, he looked like the perfect old Luddite, unable to use either device but unwilling to turn them loose.

Mollie was fourteen years younger than Hack. They were a study in opposites. Where he was lanky and weather-beaten, she was petite and well-preserved. Hack had a lifelong history of a bad temper, whereas Mollie had never truly expressed anger. She was really something in the same way that Doris Day was—pretty, good-spirited, well-bred, had a fashion sense. Right now she wore a pair of dark grey pleated wool slacks and a black turtleneck. Hack considered her the most beautiful woman in the world.

Roxanne pushed big houses, so Hack said, Fire away, starting with the size.

It’s expansive, she allowed, but it’s also available immediately.

Immediately resonated with Hack. Getting him out of medicine had been like belling the cat. His days of marauding the hallways of the cancer ward or board rooms of biotech startups were over; now he just made a lot of noise without contributing much of anything to the world. For a while now he and Mollie had been camping out and his mood had grown antsy and dark.

He needed a project. Stat! Otherwise, decay would set in. He could feel the dry rot.

Not only had circumstances choked off his work and home life but the polar vortex had slipped its handler and roared straight down through the heartland, freezing pipes, shutting off electricity, killing people. In Santa Fe—7,500 feet, five below zero—it was vicious and unremitting. Hack had been home-bound for four days, nature’s way of silencing a belled cat.

But it wasn’t just the weather system, a sense of uneasiness rode in on the wind. Something was out there: visceral, pulsating, making sleep impossible, playing hell with the liver.

Hack said, Expansive is the part that worries me. How expansive are we talking about?

Eight-thousand, nine-hundred square feet and change.

Sarcasm leaked in, Gee, only three times too big. You’re getting better at this.

She went on defense, The main house is where you’d live. It’s the size you’re after.

What, pray tell, would we do with the rest of it?

Ignore it. Except for the kitchen.

How is that even possible? he asked reasonably. It’s all one big house, right?

It was built in three parts. The Bill Tull adobe, which you’ve been looking for, is what you might call the nucleus of the house. You enter the guest wing through a separate big mesquite door from the courtyard. And what they call the kids’ wing is way off to the other side.

Hack’s voice went up a decibel, You’re pranking us, right?

I’m as serious as a crutch, she responded two decibels up, the way people do. It sits on the best two-acre lot in Paradise Valley. The lot alone is worth more than the asking price.

Then why hasn’t a developer snapped it up?

One of them will.

The news teaser scene on the TV made him ask, Does it have a wall?

Kind of, sort of.

You’re talking like a ten-year-old. What is it, a falling-down wall?

Not quite, she answered in an unconvincing way.

His sigh whistled sibilantly. It made him sound like an old man with a breathing problem.

She took it as a signal to go on. The original house—all adobe, of course—was built in 1972—it was all just desert back then. The owner understood the legacy of a Bill Tull, but then he went through a bad divorce and had to part with it. An oilman from Dallas bought the house in the early eighties and added on a huge guest wing—you know how Texans are about bigger is better. But then he was forced to sell in the mid-nineties, when the price of oil and gas came tumbling down. A plastic surgeon was the last owner, and boy, did he take it to the next level!

Hack proposed, You’re saying he spent a lot of money but ruined the house.

She replied starchily, No, he built a wing for his kids, then enlarged the pool.

Why’s he selling? Hack asked. As an oncologist, he had never had much regard for the synthetic discipline. They all said they were going into it for altruistic reasons—reconstruction of cleft palates and breast cancer scars—but wound up whittling on whims of the flesh.

Tragically, he died, Hack. It was completely unexpected, they say.

In my experience, they’re mostly all unexpected.

I’m sure you’ve seen plenty, working in the cancer field.

With a pang of loss, Hack thought about that: The cancer field.

She said, Ethically, I should inform you that the surgeon died on this property.

A man has to die somewhere, he reckoned. Stroke or heart attack?

An accident is what I hear. She was quick to add, No blood spatters, nothing like that.

So it’s the widow that’s selling? He glanced over at Mollie, who hated morbid curiosity.

A trust. Three exes and three adult children, one by each.

He made a face of disgust. That sounds like one hell of a mess.

Just your modern-day intersectional family, she assured him, right out of Vanity Fair.

He grunted like a curmudgeon, Intersectional, huh?

She went cosmopolitan on him: There’s a twenty-three-year-old son by the surgeon’s first wife, who was an exotic African American, Native American woman—just absolutely drop-dead gorgeous. A twenty-one-year-old daughter by his equally glamorous second wife is going gang-busters in Hollywood. The youngest is an eighteen-year-old transgender child from his third wife, who is the most beautiful and colorful figure of them all.

Hack could care less about it, so he said listlessly, What a pedigree.

Switching to her self-righteous mode she replied, Family is important to us out here.

Hack felt his head begin to throb: high altitude, high blood pressure, or high dudgeon? He opened a bottle of Dasani and drank it down, then cut to the chase, Nine-thousand square feet? Three sections, each different? A death on the premises? Thanks for calling, but no.

She laughed mockingly. Trust me, you and Mollie need to see this. I took one look at the gardens and thought of you.

And then she coughed. It sounded dry and resonant. From deep down.

Hack and Mollie exchanged glances; it was the new reflex, no matter how unfair.

Up to one-half of Santa Fe residents are allergic to juniper pollen, worst in February. Self-designated arbiters of social mores now cough-shamed allergy sufferers. In Kaune’s Grocery, his checker had coughed. Shoppers stared at the poor woman as if she’d broken wind. A once-famous dowager in the check-out line in front of Hack went so far as to say, Please don’t cough on my sandwich, Barbara, to which the crusty checker replied, Don’t worry, Dearie, I’m not going to contaminate your damn Reuben.

Nerves were frayed. Everyone feared that the virus they’d heard about would eventually wash up on these shores. Well, today it had. The law of the jungle had returned in an instant. It was survival of the fittest, even in this peace-loving artsy-fartsy place where most natives didn’t eat meat and had at least one life coach.

Sure enough, Roxanne came back on, My cough is from allergies, not infection.

Hack replied, To tell you the truth, I’m more worried that we’ll still be squatters this time next year than I am about your cough. Except it sounds like a smoker’s cough, so if it is I’d recommend a scan.

It’s not a smoker’s cough, Roxanne said petulantly; he always irritated her.

Have it your way, he replied; he knew a smoker’s cough when he heard one.

After selling their home, Hack and Mollie had moved into her mother’s vacation house. It was to be for a month, tops. Here it was, sixteen weeks along, and there was nothing on the horizon. Still, he usually held his cards closer to the vest, never showed his hand. But things had changed a lot over the last few weeks; this virus threat loomed large. Dread was in the air.

Roxanne had in dismay seen four signed-contract buyers back out today after the networks broke the news about the first confirmed case of the Novel Coronavirus here in the United States. Patient No. 1 was hospitalized in Washington state. Panic had broken out—especially among the Canadian snowbirds who used the Valley of the Sun as their winter playground.

Nevertheless, she was coy and upbeat, Our market is white hot. This house won’t last.

Hack went as low as his mood, I’m sure there’s a lot of pent-up demand for a nine-thousand square-foot house built in so many exciting styles.

Roxanne retorted, There are scads of pro ballers and golfers in Phoenix.

They want modern houses, Hack fired back. Man-caves. Wine cellars. Something not put together by a committee.

There’s a shortage of inventory in Paradise Valley, she warned.

In the land of the giants the small house is king.

You may need to consider a condo, she proffered—not for the first time.

Maybe, Hack agreed. Though we really want a garden.

Like I said, that’s why I’m calling about this house. The garden is out of this world.

So is the size. Besides, I’m sure it’s down at the heel.

It could use some TLC, she admitted, then added, You and Mollie have such great ideas you could put it back to its former glory in no time.

It sounds more like a tear-down to me.

It’s a place to go, she said simply—which silenced him; he’d confessed his inner fears.

In a conciliatory manner, he sighed. Give me a list of repairs it would need.

The pool deck is cracked. And you were right about the wall.

Check, Hack muttered. What else?

The olive trees have been let go, so they’re, uh, unruly.

It was like a parable from the Old Testament, talking about mysterious death and unruly olive trees in the desert while he was belled and exiled, freezing his ass off in the mountains. He asked drolly, Just out of curiosity, how unruly can an olive tree become?

Well, the biggest one—it’s really quite lovely with tons of character—has propped one limb against the exterior cornice of the living room. The plaster is cracked, but it’s not leaking.

He couldn’t keep from asking, You’ve had rain?

Not lately.

Then how do you know it doesn’t leak?

Would you have a little faith! Roxanne scolded. This place has loads of potential.

Potential, he groused. Real estate code for a mess.

But a wonderful mess! she exclaimed; one could well imagine her stomping a foot.

Give me one example of what’s so wonderful about this place, he challenged. Like many doctors, he held a lifelong subscription to the Socratic method.

Like most people put on the spot, she immediately thought of the exact opposite—in this case the pool. But since her father taught her to turn lemons into lemonade, her best effort became, The pool is so dramatic that it absolutely boggles the mind.

I’m not much of a pool guy, Hack replied, but go ahead, hit me with it.

It has a diving platform built to Olympics standards.

Oh, wow, he said unenthusiastically. She knew his age, and that he was beaten-up.

The deep end is deeper than most parts of the San Francisco Bay.

It was like a brain-teaser: How deep is that?

He heard pages being turned. She has no earthly idea.

Shirlene Bledsoe—that’s the owner’s agent—knows all about it. She said the height of an Olympic diving platform is 33 feet. Let’s see, it says here that the depth of the diving well is, hmm, 33 feet as well. She paused to think, then said, I’m guessing it’s a one to one ratio?

Hack knew better. No, that’s twice too deep. In fact, it’s crazy deep.

She responded, I imagine the owner was just being protective of his son’s noggin.

It piqued Hack’s interest; he’d lost a son, which had ruined his first marriage. His son?

The surgeon’s oldest child was a diver. He aspired to become an Olympic contender.

So dad invests half a mil in an Olympics-class diving setup?

Roxanne hit him with positives, The boy was very talented. It’s an impressive pool.

Hack was forming a negative image in his mind. What year was it built?

Let’s see, the Olympics were in China. Sometime before the air in Beijing got so dirty.

The mention of China correlated perfectly with the images on his TV screen. And this was only a prelude to the news. A lot was happening in the larger world, most of it ominous.

Intending to ease out of the conversation, he asked, Did the child prodigy make it?

No, he had a problem that derailed him.

Somehow it drew him in, so he asked, An injury?

Worse, his car struck a young woman and her baby as they crossed an intersection.

The topic had become the tail wagging the dog, so Hack asked, Kill them?

I’m afraid so.

I’m guessing drugs and alcohol were involved. That’s what had taken his son.

No one seems sure, she replied obtusely.

It’s an easy thing to prove or disprove, Hack said, playing the devil’s advocate.

She replied obtusely, He had a level, but it didn’t hold up in court.

Hack sighed. Another doctor’s son bites the dust. Excess. Expectation. Bad result.

It’s a tragic story all the way around, she agreed.

The world is full of them, Hack assured her. He couldn’t help himself from tacking on, Especially in the cancer field.

There ensued an uneasy pause, during which both Roxanne and Hack ruminated.

Hack envisioned an absolute disaster in his mind: small adobe house with Bill Tull charm, ugly big add-on by some brash oilman from Texas, then an even bigger and uglier add-on, complete with toys, carelessly overseen by a never-at-home plastics guy trying to buy his kids’ love for being such a shitty father. What undoubtedly began as a magnificent property had become FUBAR. Not only that, but several families had met misfortune there. Who wants a house with such a sad history?

As a Bill Tull aficionado, the add-ons bothered Hack greatly. There was no way to improve an elegant little Bill Tull adobe. Hack had seen pictures of George Strait’s home designed by Bill Tull outside San Antonio. It looked too big and screamed, I’ve got money! And that was no add-on, it had just run away from Mr. Tull’s spartan scale.

Roxanne didn’t know Hack very well, hadn’t particularly liked him on the three occasions when they’d interacted, and now she could see him scrunched down in Santa Fe, scowling, unhappy, still pissed-off because an authentic, pristine Bill Tull adobe had been promised to Mollie and Hack about four months back, but then the owners—two lawyers and the whole world knew Hack Bartlett hated lawyers—had gotten cold feet. Either that or they’d googled him and decided they didn’t want to do business with a man of his temperament. That house had been just over 3,000 square feet and, in accordance with the mosaic in Bill Tull’s fine brain, form met function in one of the world’s most harmonious architectural-construction marriages.

But the deal had crapped out. And since Hack Bartlett had a temper, he’d erupted in a rage that made Vesuvius look like a piker. He then settled into what promised to be a lifelong funk. He was known to excel in both departments.

After the pause, she said, just to end on a high note, There’s a strong market for a house like this. In her heart of hearts she was now certain she’d never sell him a house.

Really? he asked, looking for an exit also. How long was it on the market? Before?

Because she’d written him off, she replied, I don’t have that information.

Because she’d interrupted his ten o’clock news, he said, No computers in Arizona?

She griped, I can’t believe you’re nitpicking about such a great old desert home.

Believe it, Roxanne. Have to deal with three barely adult children that probably don’t like each other. Sounds like one of them is in a death spiral, and if I’ve learned one thing about people, it’s that they make up their own reality about the past. Then he tacked on, Especially how great dear old dad was.

He didn’t feel compelled to tell her about his own family travails—he and his thirty-year-old daughter weren’t speaking again, and they hadn’t seen each other in over a year. Contrarily, word had leaked back to him that his daughter told all her friends how great her father was—mentioned something about a God complex, which was overused drivel.

Hack’s mind wandered grumpily over to the relatively new concept of intersectional families—to him the Rube Goldberg of family values. He’d argued with his daughter about it, too.

He heard the keystroke of exasperation. He could imagine Roxanne with smoke coming out her ears. It made him grin; he was winning this shootout—ha, another pyrrhic victory.

The realtor coughed, and this time made no bones about it. I hate to admit it but you’re right. This house was sluggish on the market. Three-hundred days on MLS.

Hack chuckled victoriously. We appreciate the call, Roxanne, but I think we’ll pass.

As he said it, he saw Mollie’s face fall in. She’d been hanging on every word. It made him feel guilty; he’d hogged the conversation and hadn’t once asked her opinion.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of a muted CNN. Anderson Cooper was paler than usual, and the visuals were astounding. Squadrons of men dressed in Hazmat suits walked twelve abreast down the streets of Wuhan, spraying every surface.

Closed caption put words to print—Fear walks the streets of Wuhan tonight.

Distracted, Hack muttered, My God, have you seen this stuff from Wuhan?

The realtor in Phoenix informed him smugly, We’re not worried. At his rally yesterday Trump assured us that the dry desert heat will keep the virus from hitting us.

Anderson was wrapping this segment, only to announce the next charming tidbit: President Donald J. Trump was fighting for his political life, on trial in the Senate with Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts brought in to preside over the historic impeachment event.

Hack vetted the news, It’s silly to go after the president with a virus coming in.

Democrats! she said, as if that explained the whole dynamic.

Hack switched channels to Fox News. Tucker Carlson was marveling that President Trump had just banned air travel from China. Despite being on trial for alleged high crimes and misdemeanors, the president was said to be laser-focused on preventing the spread of this scourge to America. Over on the right-hand side of the split screen was a shot of looters and rioters in Portland, threatening to burn the place down.

China and America: one determined to save itself and the other determined to destroy itself. China was after hegemony and America seemed quite willing to piss it away.

CNN and Fox: the messaging from the two news networks made for the strangest dichotomy in modern times. So-called commentators had turned their venues into bully pulpits. They’d shape-shifted until they morphed into political influencers more than news agencies. By now, either network could take the same news and spin the issues in opposite directions.

Hack heard in a six-year-old boy’s ears from long ago: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

The nation indivisible had taken to dividing itself, pitting one faction against the other, in the process unraveling the storied fabric of the flag. One fractious influencer was already talking a second Civil War. This one would be financial: over the cost of energy and water and food.

Hack stood close to the TV screen, to better read the words. The tuning fork of his life, the very essence of