The Hush

Chapter 1

Jenna
It started with the news. The threat of war. What's new though? Isn't there always a threat of war in society? It's simply unreasonable to expect that everyone will get along, so war is and has always been a threat to any culture.
Sure, some of the population believed it to be true, others swore it was merely media propaganda. But us, we knew... We knew the truth. It wasn't just a war or even a third world war. It was to be the very war that changed the world as we knew it. A nuclear war. Our own kind, our trusted government, was planning to exterminate all life on our planet to satisfy vendettas that had nothing to do with us civilians. I'll never forget when my father came home that day. I was just a young girl of seventeen and had no idea that my life was about to change forever.

"Rebecca! Rebecca, where are you?" he shouted, barreling into the living room, failing to even shut the front door. His briefcase was tossed carelessly onto the foyer floor, his keys dripped blindly on the coffee table. His shout for my mother was an urgent plea. Something was wrong.

We had four days to prepare for the shock of our lives. Four days before all the countries in the world blasted their neighbors with over nineteen thousand nuclear warheads. My father said that statistically, more than eighty-five percent of the world's population ended fatally, the other remaining survivors would likely have died in the nuclear winter from burns due to thermal radiation. Truth be told, I don't exactly understand what thermal radiation is, so when he speaks about it I nod and remain mute. Honestly, what is there to say?
Preparing for isolation below ground was longest four days of my entire seventeen years of life. It's rather selfish of me to complain though, because we were lucky. We had time to get ready, years to collect supplies and food and we had my father.
For as long as I can remember, my mother has reminded us that we are a family of privilege. She'd say it when my sister or I would ask when our father was coming home. He was rarely there with us, but we were to be thankful regardless because everything given to us in our lives was due to his sacrifices.
Sacrifices... the word fits, but really understates all that my father did for us. You see, before he was a protective agent of the CIA, he was of the highest ranking military officers in the United States Armed Forces. After ten years serving as a protective agent, he became the principal military advisor to the President, the secretary of defense and the National Security Council. His job required unreasonable work hours and he was forever on-call, but he did it for us. That's what my mother always said.
He guarded our family just like he guarded our country. He was firm, but compassionate and gave us all that he had. We were blessed to live in McLean, one of the most affluent neighborhoods in the united states and probably the wealthiest in Virginia. We were safe, stable and wanted for nothing – except attention from him.
Now our lives are different. We have our father's undivided attention at any time, day or night, because his loyalty to the United States Government ended the day our world was littered with radioactive bombs, whipping out entire cities as if they never existed.
We've lived in this bunker for so long that I'm not sure how many years have actually. My sister, Millie, used to keep a calendar up and mark the days, but after a while it was just too depressing. I stopped looking at it after I turned twenty-two.
"Jenna, could you come over here please?" My mother calls my name from across the room.
"Sure," I answer her. "I'll be right there." I set down my notebook, letting my finger trail across the picture of Sam pasted on the front. My heart still bleeds for him, every single day.
I join my mother in our kitchen.
"Hey," she breathes, frazzled. "Your sister is upset. Do you think you could go talk to her?"
"She doesn't want to talk to you?"
She shakes her head, "No. You know, adolescent hormones and puberty," her smile is weak. "She'd rather talk to you."
I shrug, "Alright."
I walk across the room, to Millie's room. We call it a room, but it's really just an area of the shelter that we closed off with a sheet to create privacy. None of us actually have rooms in this prison.
"Hey Millie," I lean against the steel wall. "What's up kiddo?"
She cuts her eye at me, then lets her brown hair fall over her face. "You know I hate it when you call me that. I'm not a kid."
"Well, don't behave petulantly so often and you won't be called one. What's up with you? Why'd mom send me here to talk to you?"
She pulls her legs up, resting her chin on her knees. She looks to frail like this with her stomach resting against her thighs. There's barely any meat on her tiny little bones. She's in that awkward stage, all lanky legs and long arms. I wonder what she'd look like if we were out in the real world, not eating rationed food.
"The silent treatment?" I chuckle. "Come on skinny-minnie, talk to me."
"Skinny-minnie?" she mocks me curtly. "You're one to talk. Look at you. You're just as skinny as me and shorter." She groans. "God, can't you ever just call me by my freaking name?"
"Fine, Millie, what is wrong with you?"
She still doesn't answer and I'm getting irritated. I'm not keen on the theatrics. I know she's bitter and bored down here, but we all are. Behaving this way only makes it worse for everyone.
I shake my head, annoyed, then leave her in her pubescent solitude. I won't beg her to speak to me. I head to the other side of the shelter, towards my room, stopping briefly back at the kitchen area to speak to my mother. "I tried," I mutter. "She doesn't want to talk to me either."
She nods, her eyes weary. "Thanks for trying. Dinner will be ready in a half hour."
"Thanks," I walk into my room, closing the curtain behind me. Sitting down on my bed, I look back at the picture of Sam. Anger stings me, so I turn the book over.
The truth is, I'm just as bitter as Millie. I loathe being down here in this jail cell, surrounded by the bleak grey walls and abhorrent lack of privacy. I will forever be in my father's debt for saving all of our lives, but I can't escape feeling stifled and miserable. There isn't any color down here. We can only listen to music on rationed time, just like food, because one day, we will run out of our resources.
I shake my head, laying back on my bed and staring up at the grey steel ceiling. The scared part of me can't even think about what happens when our resources run out but the broken part of me would view that as an opportunity to find Sam. I'd give anything to know if he is okay.