I’m far past the place where I can distinguish what is or is not a silly idea. I just want to say that there’s something distinctly comforting to me in carrying around this old-fashioned room key.
Is it silly? If so, I don’t give a damn. I like the key. I like the bold number of the room on the fob. It makes me think of times that were simple and peaceful.
It makes me think of kinder times, okay?
It has been years since anyone used keys like this. All the new, fancy hotels had key cards. So you know this place is old and probably it wasn’t all that popular. I’d venture that it was cheap, as well. But I don’t care. When I got here, I thought I’d have to sleep in the lobby, and instead, I found room keys, real keys that required no internet and no electricity.
It felt like a small miracle.
Even better–the water runs. Yeah, there’s no hot water, but I’m not complaining about a lukewarm shower. I’m just happy to be clean.
I went back to what remains of my mother’s house to see if I could get a sense of where she and Aaron may have gone. All I know for sure is, they are gone. The car is gone, and there were no bodies in the ruins of the house.
My heart is broken. I wanat my mother. I want my son!
You have no idea, Diary, of what it was like to finally reach the place and find them gone. I had such hopes that all the destruction would be centered on the city and the suburbs would be safe.
There I go, being silly again. Right?
No one was safe. God alone knows what has happened to the world.
Leave it to me to steal a car with no radio. I keep meaning to look for one, but I’m scared. Scared to hear news broadcasts. More scared I’ll hear nothing at all.
There’s a stereo system and a small collection of CDs in the car. A little weird–no one has CDs anymore, do they? But whoever owned the car before it was abandoned at least had decent musical taste.
I say I stole it, but…well, it feels like I did, even though there was no one left to claim it. I haven’t seen another living person in days.
I steal a lot now. No matter how I tell myself that no one owns a thing, it still feels like it to me.
First thing I did was get a lot of meat from the grocery store down the road. Then I took it to the gas station and put it in the ice locker with the dry ice. I also got dry ice to put in my little refrigerator here.
After a couple of days it finally occurred to me that I could get a small generator and run a few things here. So now I have lights and the fridge.
I went in the other rooms–there are twenty–and unplugged everything. Conservation is the key, right?
I’m scared, though. I don’t want anyone moving in on me, you know? Who can I trust? So I only turn on the light in my own room, and I keep the curtains closed tight so no one will see.
I got a small barbeque and charcoal, and I grill meat in the lobby. Weird, huh? I worry that someone might smell my dinner cooking and come here, but I’m more worried about cooking in my room. It’s pretty small.
Every day, I put gas in the car and I drive in different directions, just looking. Sometimes I don’t get far; the roads are so damaged in places that it would be crazy to try driving on them.
I’ve found that a rough drive through empty fields is a better plan sometimes. I keep looking for my mother’s car. I have looked in parking lots. I have looked at houses that still remain upright.
Mostly, I have been afraid to get out of the car when I’m out and about. Getting food and clothes and other supplies is pretty nerve wracking, if you want to know the truth. It’s like, I want to find people, but I’m afraid to find people. The only people I want to see are Mom and Aaron.
Why?
Because I don’t know who did this!
This country has been nuts for a while now, and for all I know, we did it to ourselves. That doesn’t leave me with a lot of options regarding trust, does it?
I mean, have you watched “The Walking Dead”?
Of course you haven’t; you’re a book full of empty pages waiting for me to fill you up.
Well, I have, and you better believe me when I say that there are more people out there not to trust than there are who are trustworthy.
If there are any people out there at all…
That’s a shitty thought.
Look: I crept and crawled my way out of a demolished parking garage. I walked almost all the way to Mom’s before I got the car. I have food and shelter.
I have a cool room key.
I can’t be the only one left alive–that’s ridiculous.
And—while I have no proof of it, I do not believe there are zombies out there, either.
But who the hell knows?
I didn’t believe anyone would actually drop bombs on us, either.
Anyway…
Today I drove out and around this corn field. I didn’t even know anyone grew corn around here! You’d think I’d know things like that. Still, if it keeps growing as well as it seems to have done so far, I will be eating corn-on-the-cob soon.
Anyway, from the place where I stopped driving today, I could see an old barn. It didn’t look like much, but there could be useful things inside. I might go and have a look tomorrow. I wasn’t about to do that today and risk it getting dark before I got here.
I never used to be afraid of the dark.
On the way back, I stopped at a small grocery store, and guess what I found? A chocolate cake! I am going to put you down in just a minute and eat my dinner—a grilled pork chop, potatoes and green beans and a big slice of chocolate cake.
Damn the apocalypse and damn my waistline. I’m going to eat while the eating is good, because I know things aren’t going to last.
Dan was never the sort of man who discarded items just because they were out of style. The radio worked fine, and so it stayed on the nightstand on his side of the bed throughout many years of our marriage.
It wasn’t the radio that finally gave out—it was the electrical cord. Dan took it to his electrician friend, Salvador, who laughed kindly and gave him a friendly pat on the back before recommending that he replace the old relic. “It would cost more for me to try to replace this—with no guarantee it would work—than it would for you to get a new radio.”
Dan came home with the radio, dejected. “I’ve had this since boot camp,” he told me. “The first time I danced with you, this was playing the music.”
My heart gave a little flutter at that—it was a sweet memory that I had tucked away myself and assumed he had forgotten. It was nice to know he hadn’t.
“It’s not like we don’t have the money,” I told him. “If you want to try…”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll put it on the bookcase with the other time machines.”
I smiled. There were items we’d accumulated over the years that were just, frankly, too pretty to throw away, even when they were no longer useful. Dan called them “time machines” because looking at them took us back to the days when they’d been working parts of our household.
The shelf in question was currently home to an old mixer that had belonged to my mother. It was a pastel blue shade popular in the 1940s, and was displayed with its blades and bowls. It, too, had fallen victim to the dreaded worn-out electrical cord.
Also featured was my old portable record player. It had belonged to my father, who gave it to me. My daughter used it for several years. Finally, it began to overheat and smell—to be honest—dangerous when in use; the turntable no longer spun quite fast enough, causing a dragging drone in the songs she was playing. Dan confiscated it, declaring it a fire hazard and relegating it to the “Time Machine” shelves.
She got a new one as a gift—I forget if it was a birthday or Christmas. That was a long time ago.
As I watched him make a space for his beloved player of music and news, I felt bad for Dan. I determined that I would find him a new radio, one that would be simultaneously serviceable, and nostalgic.
It was a bit of a search, but before Father’s Day I received a package containing a vintage-look AM/FM radio. The speakers resembled an old automobile grill. The volume and tuning knobs looked like tail lights. The dial display looked like an old-fashioned odometer.
Personally, I found the looks somewhat marred by the headphone jack—there were no radio headphones in 1955. But overall, I was satisfied with the purchase.
Dan was delighted with his Father’s Day gift. He gave it place-of-honor status by sitting it on the night table on his side of the bed. He plugged it in. “Let’s see how she sounds,” he said, and turned it on.
Hank Williams was singing, his slightly twang-y voice belting out “Hey, Good Lookin’”, much to our delight. There wasn’t much room between the foot of our bed and the chest of drawers, but we managed a dance, anyway.
After listening to a few oldies but goodies, Dan said, “I’ve never heard this station before. It must be new. It’s almost time for the news, though, so I guess I’ll tune in the local guys.”
He turned the dial. Elvis Presley’s rich voice crooned, “Love Me Tender”. Another turn of the dial, and Patsy Cline was walking after midnight.
Dan looked at me. I looked back at him. We looked at the radio. “That’s weird,” Dan said.
Every turn of the dial brought forth songs from the past. Jim Reeves, Eddie Arnold, Perry Como, Loretta Lynn.
“What’s going on here?” I asked.
“Well, honey,” Dan said, “I think you actually found me a real time machine!”
I don’t know about that—we never left the current world. But every night, before going to bed, we danced to the songs of our youth as they floated from the speakers of that radio.
Never once did a song recorded past 1970 play on any station of that radio. No matter the time of day or night, it played our songs.
Time passed, as it always had. Dan became ill and frail. But he loved listening to that radio. When he became mostly bedridden, it played softly, day and night.
Each song held a memory. We talked for hours. We remembered all the good things. Even the harder memories were discussed and let go.
The music played on.
We were listening together the night Dan drew his last breath.
The radio stopped when he did.
A few days later, I unplugged it, believing it was broken.
That was a year ago. Today I took it to Salvador, just to see if it was worth fixing.
He plugged it in.
Switched it on—static. He twisted the tuning dial.
Lady Gaga was belting out “Applause”. The tone was perfect.
“Julia, there’s nothing wrong with this radio,” Salvador told me, frowning.
“That’s what you think,” I replied sadly.
Maybe my daughter would like a new radio. I can’t bear to keep it now.
I’ll be content with the one from boot camp. The one we listened to the first time we danced together. The one on the “Time Machine” shelf.
It won’t play anything now—but I have great memories.
This story was inspired by a Writers Unite! prompt. I highly recommend a visit to this site, where you will find stories by many talented writers.
Monique started cleaning up the dishes and the grill after Margo left the cafe with Devin, Melvin and Junior. She had resisted the urge to run down to the beach and see them off. It felt to her as if doing so would reinforce the feeling that she’d said goodbye to them forever.
That was ridiculous, of course. It wasn’t that far across the reach, and even with Devin’s little outboard motor it wouldn’t be long before the skiff landed at the docks on the mainland.
Barnaby and Elvin took the twins, Paul and Pam, and went down to the beach. Lou Ann stayed to help Monique. Jessica gathered up dishes before leaving with Bill and Vivian to go through the little island village and check on the other residents.
Lou Ann looked up from the tabletop she was washing. “How long do you think they’ll be gone?” she asked, voicing the very question going through Monique’s mind. “I mean, it’s not that far, but…well, I don’t think they’ll just turn around and come back, do you?”
“Margo wants to go home and get her cat,” Monique replied, trying desperately to sound nonchalant. She wondered if the delicious lunch she’d just eaten was going to stay down. Her stomach was in turmoil; she was that tense. “Her boyfriend is away.”
“I don’t know why this is upsetting me. It’s probably nothing.” She went to the sink to rinse her washcloth. “It’s just…it’s so odd, looking out at the beach and seeing…sand.”
That was an odd way of putting it, but it was also true. Summer days were not generally empty beach days. Normally, the sand was covered with blankets and umbrellas and people of all ages.
Monique started washing the plates and silverware by hand. There’d been so few people it wasn’t worth loading up an industrial sized dishwasher. She couldn’t remember ever washing dishes by hand at The Beach Bar, even in the off-season. The locals were good customers in the winter, and on the coldest days you could still expect the flatlanders to ferry over for a drink and a few laughs in the evenings.
Technically, Monique was herself a flatlander—she’d live on the island for a few years, but she wasn’t a native. “Has the ferry ever not come before, Lou Ann?”
“Not that I can remember.” Lou Ann pinched her lower lip, thinking. “Mama’s been here forever, of course. She might know; or Dad.” Lou Ann’s parents lived on the other side of the island. “I tried to call her, but my phone’s not working.”
“Try the landline.” Monique tapped her own forehead impatiently. “Why didn’t we think of that before?Lou Ann went to the end of the bar and lifted the receiver to her ear. Her eyebrows shot up. “Dial tone!” she exclaimed. She punched numbers and waited. Then: “Dad? It’s me. Hey, has there ever been a time when the ferry didn’t show up here?”
There was a pause as she listened to her father talk. Apparently, he had a lot to say.
Monique listened half-heartedly to a one-sided conversation that consisted mostly of “Uh huh,” and “Really?” and “Hmm.” It might have been an interesting monologue, but all she could do was wonder if she might be able to call Margo on her cell from the landline when Lou Ann finished talking. She wasn’t hopeful.
***
Bill and Jessica slowed their pace for Vivian, not so much because she was tiny and therefore short of stride, but because she obviously didn’t see well, and they didn’t want her to bump into or trip over anything. Jessica tuck the older woman’s hand into the crook of her arm, unconsciously leading her in much the same way Melvin Samples had done for his wife the last few years. “Aren’t you sweet,” Vivian said, reaching across her body to pat Jessica’s arm. “It’s the cataracts. I’m scheduled to have them taken care of next month…”
“Oh, that will be wonderful for you,” Bill said, his rumbling baritone alive with enthusiasm. “My mother had hers done, and she sees everything now.”
“Well, that’s the plan,” Vivian agreed. “But…”
“But…?” Jessica prompted.
Vivian sighed. The trio mounted steps to knock on the first of many doors, doing their neighborly wellness checks. “I have a bad feeling about this…situation.”
An elderly woman answered the door. The three visitors tried not to display their relief and failed.
***
Barnaby and Elvin stood ankle deep in the calm waters of the beach, keeping an eye on the rambunctious twins.
Walking down from the bar, they’d noticed a row of beach chairs someone had left unattended. Elvin looked back at them now, squinting. “One good gust of wind, and those are goners,” he declared.
Barnaby shrugged. “Don’t know who they belong to,” he said. “Guess we can take them back to the bar with us in a while.”
“You think they were there all night?”
“I suppose.” Barnaby didn’t care. All he cared about was that Lou Ann and the twins were with him, safe. “It was a quiet night.”
“Yuh.” He shielded his eyes with both hands and peered across the reach. “Can’t see the mainland,” he remarked. “Is that fog?”
“Maybe.” Barnaby frowned. “I don’t see the skiff anymore, either. Do you?”
“Nope.”
They gave each other uneasy looks. It didn’t seem like there had been enough time for the skiff to have gotten as far as the fog bank they believed they were seeing.
“Is Dev’s outboard that fast?” Elvin asked.
“Maybe that fog is closer than it looks.” Barnaby bent and splashed water on Paul and Pam. They squealed with delight and splashed him back.
Elvin kept quiet. Barnaby didn’t talk much, and appeared to be deep in thought—playing with his kids was just his way of taking a moment for reflection. Knowing this did nothing to ease the fear Elvin felt building in the pit of his stomach. He looked back at the empty beach chairs and wondered who had left them there. It was unsettling to see them there, absent the sunscreen-smeared bodies and towels and drinks.
After a few minutes of play with the toddlers, Barnaby straightened up. He flexed his neck and back and then took a good long look across the water.
“Yeah, I reckon the fog is closer than it looks, Devin’s outboard is stronger than we think and they’ve been gone longer than we realize. I haven’t been timing them, have you?”
Elvin thought there were a lot of “maybes” implied in Barnaby’s musings, and they all amounted to nothing more than wishful thinking. But when you came right down to it—what else did they have? “No, I haven’t looked at my watch all morning,” he replied. He grinned, but it felt false on his face. “Cuz I left it home,” he added.
Barnaby let out a laugh that sounded as false as the smile on Elvin’s face felt to him. “Me, too, buddy.”
“They’re probably docking as we speak.”
“I hope so.”
Elvin sighed and looked out across the reach again. “How long do we wait before we officially get scared?”
“Officially?” Barnaby made a few lunging splashes with his kids, avoiding the question for a few moments. Finally, he looked back at his friend. “Dude, I am already scared—officially.”
“Yeah.”
***
Devin adjusted the rudder slightly, frowning at Melvin, who was leaning over the bow of the skiff. “Mel, sit back,” he ordered. “You wanna flip this bitch?”
Melvin glared back over his shoulder. “I ain’t that heavy,” he growled. “We should be able to see the docks through the fog by now!”
“It’s not fog.” Margo spoke so quietly it was difficult to hear her. Melvin sat back, as ordered, and looked at her. “Can’t you smell it?” she asked. “It’s smoke.”
“Ayuh,” Devin agreed. “I been trying to ignore that. Thanks a boatload, Margo.”
“Think nothing of it,” Margo replied flippantly. She sighed deeply, and it was impossible not to notice the shakiness of her breath. “What could cause that much smoke? Do you think it was a dock fire?”
“Mebbe.” Devin and Melvin exchanged meaningful looks. “But we’d have heard the sirens, even across the reach…”
“That’s a lot of smoke.” Melvin stretched himself over the bow again, much to Devin’s dismay. “I think I see something.”
“The dock?”
“No it’s—oh, shit!”
“What? What?”
The little skiff bumped something, turned slightly to the left and bumped something else. Margo leaned over the side and looked down into the water. She screamed.
Bodies floated all around them.
To Be Continued….
The Writers Unite! May prompt led to this 3rd installment. I wonder what will happen next?
The Wild West books are here! Writers Unite! Anthologies Dimensions of The Wild West, presented by Writers Unite! and featuring contributions by several members of the group, including me! If westerns are your thing, you’re in for a real treat!
I have one story in Volume One, and while it is a western tale, it also features a little boy, Charlie, who can see and speak to ghosts.
I have two stories in Volume Two. One is a very short story about a slight misunderstanding, and the other features a character who readers of my novel, Emma: Ancestors’ Tales, were introduced to on a visit to New Mexico. Don’t worry, if you haven’t read the novel, this is a stand-alone story.
The book has stories by many other authors I’ve come to enjoy over the last couple of years. I hope you’ll check us all out!
Mom had a hangnail once; it put her in the hospital.
I know that sounds dumb, but it’s true. She kept pestering it, picking at it and chewing on it before she managed to pull it out of the skin, wounding the crease along her nail bed and cuticle. She rinsed it off and forgot about it.
Until it got infected and swelled up like a balloon, that is.
You ever watch cartoons, where some guy bashes his thumb and it grows into a big, throbbing ball? Mom’s thumb reminded me of that: bulging, red and hot, like it had a fever even thought the rest of her didn’t.
It all happened in the middle of the night, so we had to get security to let us out. Trains didn’t run on our line between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. The underground was gated and locked up during those hours so the homeless people wouldn’t try to get in to loot the kiosks or sleep on the platform.
Joe and Holly’s mom let us out. She was on a night shift, which was weird. She wasn’t actually a security person, and usually works mornings, with my mother, monitoring the rails and trains. “I’ll be back soon, Rebecca,” Mom told her. “In time for work.”
Dad shook his head at Rebecca, and she said, “I’m pulling a double. Dan’s sick. I’ll let Megan know, just in case we need to cover for you.”
“I’ll be back in time.” Mom was nothing if not determined.
Of course, we weren’t back. Jake and I missed school, Dad called in to work for himself and Mom. We were at the emergency room for hours, because the infection cause blood poisoning and she was on an IV getting loaded up on antibiotics.
A doctor numbed her up and then made a big slice in her nail bed to drain the infection. Mom and I were smart—we looked away. There was this noise: “Squelllchhh!” Then there was a terrifically horrible smell.
Jake groaned, “Ook, urk…uuughh!” and threw up all over the floor.
Dad let out a, “Ohhh…”
The nurse said, “Easy, sir, head between—oh shit, there he goes!”
Dad thumped to the ground, passed out.
I looked at Mom. She was pale, and looked horrified.
I looked at the doctor. Her face was mostly hidden by her mask and a Plexiglas face shield, but her eyes were so crinkled up I knew she was laughing. “Men!” she said. “Why do they always think they need to watch?”
It was a long night, and Mom was sick for a couple of days.
Infections are nasty.
**********
At least when he’s sleeping, he isn’t so sad…
I mention this past story because I knew Dale was in big trouble.
We’d been in the high school gym for a few hours; I know, because Jake had had time to roll over and drool on my leg in his sleep. Any other time, and I would have shoved him away, grossed out. But, who cares? It’s a little drool; it’ll dry.
Anyway, Ted had taken Dale into the boy’s locker room and washed out the gash on her leg. He used some disinfectant and put on clean bandages, grateful that they had a first aid kit in the gym teacher’s office. But the wound was swelling, and it smelled bad—I could smell it from the corner where I had tucked myself, my brother and our friends Paul and Julie.
We were between the bleachers and the wall—I guess we felt more secure in the cramped space; I don’t know. Ted and Dale had elected to sit on the bleachers, and had stretched out on the seats to rest. So, it’s not like they were across the room from me, or anything, but still…the smell was strong, and terrifically horrible, just like Mom’s infected finger.
When I started to notice the smell, I got scared. Dale was a big woman, and stronger than anyone I had ever seen. She was brave, too. But even brave, strong people can get an infection, and they can get blood poisoning, too.
And it happened so fast!
My little group was still sleeping, and I didn’t want to disturb them, but I was compelled to get up and check on Dale. So I started inching myself away, out from under and through the bodies of my sleeping companions, careful not to let a head drop on the floor or anything, and careful not to disturb Paul’s dislocated shoulder. That would wake him, for sure.
I suppose by the time I extracated myself, sort of slithering out of the tangled arms and legs, I must have looked like a wriggling snake, scooting along on my back. Finally, I worked myself free, rolled over and carefully stood up.
Dale was still asleep, but she was moaning with misery. Ted was awake, and was sitting with her head in his lap. Her face was a blotchy mixture of ghostly pale, marred by bright red cheeks and chin. She was drenched in sweat. The black and pink striped lip art was gone, and her full lips were nearly colorless.
I inched closer, until Ted noticed me. “Is she asleep,” I asked, “or unconscious?”
Ted gave me an imposing frown. I mentioned that Dale is big, but Ted’s no slouch in the size department, either. I might have been intimidated by that frown once upon a time, but after the day we’d been through, I was over being intimidated by frowns, or size or just about anything.
“She’s infected, for sure,” I added. “I can smell it.”
Ted heaved a great sigh, and brushed hair from Dale’s forehead. “I haven’t tried to wake her up,” he told me. “So I can’t answer your question.”
I nodded.
“I guess I’m scared to find out. You know; if I can’t wake her up.”
I nodded again. I felt pretty useless; nodding wasn’t much help.
I looked around the gymnasium. There were mostly grownups here, but I thought the odds of anyone being a doctor were pretty slim. “Mr. Scott’s a teacher. What does he teach?” I asked.
Ted shrugged. “I have no idea.”
I studied the people, sitting in little groups of two or three on bleachers or at those lunch tables that pull out of the wall. The high school gym wasn’t any different than the gym at our K through eight. I guess school design is pretty much the same everywhere.
I don’t know why I’m going on about the gym. What I was thinking was it would be good—maybe—if one of those grownups was a science teacher. I looked back at Ted and told him so.
Ted nodded. “I’ll go ask,” I said. “And I guess you should try to wake her up. Just to know…you know, for sure.”
I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help myself, and I looked more closely at Dale’s leg. She was wearing biker shorts, and they were torn up on the leg she’d gashed. The area all around the bandages was red, and I’m sure if I had touched it, the heat would have been intense. If there were any red streaks moving up to her hips and belly, I couldn’t see them. Ted could look under her clothes; I wasn’t going to.
But I was really afraid that streaking was there, hidden by her shorts and shirt. I was afraid her wound got too dirty while we were making our way over all the broken-up soil and rubble in the park. I know they washed it up when we got here, but what if it was too little, too late?
That made me scared about the cut on Julie’s head. Grace cleaned that up really well before we retreated to our corner, but—
No, one thing at a time, Stella!
I made my way toward the other people and asked, “Is there, like, a doctor in the house?”
God, that sounded so stupid! Where did I think I was, in the middle of some dumb movie?
Faces turned toward me, but no one spoke up to announce that they had their own private practice in school. Then a woman did speak. She said, “I’m the school nurse. Are you…are you hurt?”
“Not me,” I replied. I studied her. She didn’t look old enough to be a nurse. She didn’t look old enough to be in high school, even. She wasn’t any taller than me, maybe five feet tall, and had huge warm brown eyes and an angelic baby face. “You’re a nurse?”
She smiled, revealing deep dimples in her cheeks. “Hard to believe, isn’t it? Who’s sick? One of your friends?”
I couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed Dale, lying up there on the bleachers with her head in Ted’s lap. They were a little hard to miss. But she had been sitting in a chair facing the opposite direction, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt.
Sort of.
It seemed rather selective to me that she’d turned her back. The thing was, I couldn’t remember if she’d been sitting like that when we came in. My impression was that she hadn’t moved at all in the time we’d been here. And there was a part of me that got it; if I didn’t have to, I would probably choose to sit and stare at the wall and not move anymore myself.
But I had Jake to think about. I might be all he has left in the world; the fates of our parents were unknown and might stay that way.
As it turned out, Mr. Scott taught English classes. Not much help there, in the way of advanced first aid knowledge. But he heard me talking to the nurse, and he got up and went to speak to another man.
The two came over and joined me as the nurse stood up. “Stella,” Mr. Scott said, “This is Mr. Fabio. He’s the anatomy teacher here.”
What luck! “That’s good,” I said. I led them all over to the bleachers where Ted still sat with Dale’s head in his lap.
She looked bad.
The nurse introduced herself to Ted. “I’m Denise,” she said. “I’m a licensed practical nurse—”
“An LPN,” Ted murmured absently, gently stroking Dale’s forehead and barely glancing up at Denise.
“Yes,” she agreed. “This is a little out of my league, but we’ll do the best we can. I would like to move her to my office, though. Can she walk at all?”
Ted did look up then, and said, “I can’t really get her to talk to me anymore.”
I swallowed hard, hearing him say that. She really was unconscious, then. This was bad, I knew.
Denise turned to Mr. Scott and said, “There’s a stretcher in my office. She really needs to be in there—I have all my supplies there.”
“I’ll go get it,” Mr. Scott turned and crossed the gymnasium to another door. He gestured at the two teenage boys as he went, and they joined him.
They returned with a stretcher and some blankets pretty quickly, although it felt like hours to me. I couldn’t stop looking at Dale’s face. It was hectic with red patches and covered in sweat. Her breathing didn’t sound good, either. I was scared.
Mr. Scott and Mr. Fabio unfolded the stretcher and put a clean sheet on the mattress. Then they, and the teenage boys whose names I still didn’t know carefully lifted Dale and they all moved her down the steps and placed her on the bed and covered her. Mr. Fabio used straps to secure her.
“Why is he tying her down?” I asked. “She’s unconscious.”
“She might wake up and try to move,” Mr. Scott explained, giving my shoulder a reassuring pat. “Better safe than sorry.”
I nodded. That was true.
When Denise and Mr. Fabio started to push the stretcher away, closely followed by Ted, I started after them. Mr. Scott reached out and pulled me back. “I’m sorry, Stella. You’re just going to have to wait.”
“But—”
“Safety first.”
I turned to the teen boys. They shrugged at me. “We can’t help,” one said.
“We’d be in the way,” the other added.
I sighed. I wanted to cry, but not in front of guys whose names I didn’t even know.
The first one reached out and patted my shoulder. “You’re Stella?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Patrick. This goon here is Bobo.”
“Bobo?”
“It’s Beau.” He slugged Patrick lightly on the shoulder. “Look, we work mornings in the cafeteria. That’s why we were here when everything—”
“Went to shhh—er. Went to hell.”
I giggled. “You can say ‘shit’.” I told Patrick. “I’m not a little kid.”
“Anyway…” Patrick looked embarrassed. “We’ve been here for hours, and no one has eaten. Maybe we should do something about that. Wanna help, Stella?”
“Okay. Good.”
Something to keep me occupied while we waited to see how Dale was doing would be good. I looked at Mr. Scott, who nodded in agreement.
Weird, how I had already found an adult to seek permission from. What the hell is wrong with me?
I guess I really am just a little kid.
I followed Patrick and Beau to the big kitchen so we could feed people.
My brother and our friends slept on. I kind of envied them.
Previously published on my Vocal Media page. You can find many other stories and articles here.
Sometimes, amid all the rubble and refuse, we find a little treasure.
On this day, my daughter Penny and I had separated from the group and gone over to the next street. There, we found the old city museum, mostly intact. We mounted the crumbling stairs to the front entrance. The doors were standing open, hinges broken.
There was a huge foyer with a floor of cracked and broken tiles. Displays were, fortunately, not kept near the entrance, and I felt a surge of hope as we moved further inside that we would find things well-preserved.
Mosty, that hope proved futile. The place was a disaster area. I sighed and tried to hide my disappointment.
Perhaps there would be something useful…
“What’s that, Daddy?”
I looked back at Penny. She was standing in front of an arched niche. An ancient piece of pottery was neatly displayed there, miraculously unharmed in the midst of the destruction around us. There was a chunk missing from the handle, but I figured it had started out that way. You know, before The End.
“Where I grew up, we called that an olla,” I told her.
She peered up at me quizzically. “An oh yeah?” She looked dubious.
I felt the smirk on my face and quickly raised a hand and pretended to wipe away sweat from my upper lip. “An oyyuh,” I said, carefully enunciating. “It’s Spanish. It means a clay pot of some sort or other.”
“Part.” I answered shortly. It seemed like a ridiculous question, in light of everything.
In the camps, there is real diversity with acceptance that never happened in the world before The End. The only thing that matters now is whether or not you make a good contribution to the well-being of the group as a whole.
Penny gave me a frown that informed me that her thinking was–as usual–ahead of mine. “Well, who cares?” she said. “Who knows if there are even countries anymore.”
See what I mean?
“What countries are you talking about?” I asked, curious. The children have teachers, but I hadn’t taken much interest in whether they were learning world geography or civics.
“Oh, Mexico, Japan, places like that.” Penny dismissed the subject, adding, “If they’re around, nobody cares about anything but clean water and food and a safe place to sleep. So, whatever.”
I couldn’t argue with that, so I kept my mouth shut.
“Did I ever go to the museum before?” Penny asked, running a hand over the side of the olla.
“Not with me,” I admitted. During her early childhood, I spent most of my time deployed to one location or other. “Maybe with Mamma.”
“I don’t remember.” She reached out to remove the artifact, then pulled her hands back. “Is it good for anything?” she asked.
“Yes.”
I recalled for her my years living on the Rez. We would draw water from the mountain streams and fill ollas in the kitchens with it. Sediment would sink to the bottom, and we could dip out cups full of cool, clean water to drink. “The clay it is made of keeps the water cold and gives it a sweet taste,” I told her.
“It’s not very big,” Penny observed, giving it a critical once-over. “We’d have to fill it a dozen times a day if we kept it in the big kitchen.”
“If you want it,” I said, “you could keep it in your room for yourself and your sisters.”
“That seems selfish.”
Penny is so much older than nine. My chest swelled with pride.
“Perhaps we could take it back with us and fill it with dried flowers for the table in the main room,” I suggested. “Sometimes a little decoration is a nice touch, and everyone could enjoy it.”
Penny gave me an impulsive hug. “That’s a great idea, Daddy!”
I relished the hug–Penny is usually standoffish with me.
I carefully lifted the olla from its display niche and set it in the small wagon Penny had brought along. “What else do you think we can find in a museum?” I asked.
Penny shrugged. “Dinosaur bones? We can’t use those for anything.”
I laughed. She was right about that.
“Do you think there was somewhere to eat in here?” Penny moved further into the big, filthy space and slowly moved in a circle, surveying. “Maybe there’s food.”
I nodded. Practical Penny.
And then she saw it–
“Daddy! A book store!”
She was off and running before I could tell her to be careful.
Jenna was startled by the sound of her heel striking pavement. She’d been walking in sand for miles, and had been paying no attention to the changes in the terrain. She’d been softly singing an old tune from some long-gone animated Christmas show: Something about getting home by putting one foot in front of the other foot. “Soon you’ll be walking here or there or whatever the hell and what’s this from and why in God’s name won’t it get out of my head?” She had visions of something, possibly Claymation. Was it Santa Claus? Who knew?
When she lifted her head and really got a look at where she was, she gasped.
It was a train station!
Well, she though, the weird day gets even weirder…
***
She and Ken had started their day enjoying their first vacation in years. They’d woken up in a lovely hotel room, dressed and gone down to the beach with a picnic breakfast.
Strawberries in cream and fresh bagels, boiled eggs and link sausages, orange juice and coffee–all packed into a vintage basket, cozily tucked in with a checkered tablecloth, courtesy of the hotel. It was perfection.
It was short lived.
They had finished their meal and were sharing a lingering, coffee-flavored kiss when the ground beneath them suddenly heaved and bucked, violently pulling them apart and flinging them in opposite directions.
“Jenna!” Ken yelled, regaining his feet and starting to run toward her. Another shock hit the beach, and ocean water roared up and over him in a massive wave as Jenna was crawling back toward him.
“Ken! Ken!” Jenna struggled to her feet. She’d been thrown back just enough so the water didn’t reach her the first time, but the next wave took her down, and then thrust her further up the beach before receding.
When she woke up, she was surrounded by nothing but sand.
Ken was gone.
The hotel was gone. The beach was gone.
The ocean was gone.
“What the hell?” Jenna sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. She looked around. Disbelief turned her face into a reasonable facsimile of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream”, especially once she clasped her face in her hands. It was certainly for the best that she couldn’t see herself just then.
“Ken! Ken? KEN!!” Her screams went unheeded. Even the pesky gulls were gone.
“Am I dead?” Jenna asked aloud in spite of her solitude. “Is this hell?”
That was unreasonable; Jenna was a good person. In fact, she was a very good person. She was a person who ran back into the store if she realized she’d accidentally lifted the pen she’d signed her check with. She had even, on occasion, run in and returned pens that actually belonged to her–just in case.
She fed stray cats and sponsored hungry children in Appalachia.
Her infrequent lies amounted to, “No, your butt doesn’t look too big.”
She couldn’t be in HELL!
Less hopeful, she called again: “Ken? Ken! Where are you?”
Regaining her feet, she was hit by sudden waves of nausea. Unable to quell them, she vomited copious amounts of seawater along with her breakfast. “Ugh!”
She stood, head hanging, hands on her knees.
The sun blazed, stingingly reminding her that she was dangerously exposed to those damaging UV rays. Dressed in a tank top and shorts over her swimsuit and a pair of flimsy sandals, she wasn’t going to fare well in this great sandy expanse.
With the ocean gone and the sun directly overhead, she had no way to choose a direction. She didn’t think it wise to wait for the sun to start its western descent before moving; she needed to find shelter as soon as possible.
She looked around, desperately hoping for a sign of anything familiar. Just when she was certain there was nothing there to find, she saw the corner of the checkered tablecloth sticking up out of the sand.
She moved toward it, fearful and hopeful at the same time. Fearful that she might find Ken; hopeful that the cloth might keep her from burning up like a roasted turkey. She was afraid she would never find Ken, but she certainly didn’t want to discover him buried. She tugged and pulled until the tablecloth broke free, flinging sand everywhere. And something else—she saw it fly off to her right, glinting in the sunlight.
Absently pulling the cloth over her shoulders, she tracked the object.
There it was, half buried in sand—Ken’s pocket watch. He’d removed it from the pocket of his shorts just before he pulled her into that last kiss, saying he couldn’t get it wet when they went in for a swim. It had belonged to his father, his grandfather and his great-grandfather, and was a treasured possession.
Generations of rail men; Ken’s family had followed the railroad from east to west and back again; first building, and then engineering. The reduction of passenger train services had been a thorn in his side—they traveled by train whenever possible. Ken’s route was cargo, but he longed to someday blow the whistle of a passenger train.
“End of the line,” Jenna muttered, gently lifting the watch by its chain. She shook sand from it and held it up to her ear. It was still ticking.
It told her it was just past noon. The sudden upheaval on the beach had been nearly four hours earlier.
“It’s a wonder I’m not a crispy critter,” Jenna whispered, and carefully wound the watch. She tucked it into the bra cup of her swimsuit, near her heart.
She turned in a circle, and then she did it again. Where did everything go? Where were the people? Where was the hotel? Where was the damned ocean?
“Which way do I go?” she whined.
Did it even matter? She could discern her direction when the sun started to sink, but with no ocean, would it matter if she went west or east? North or south? All she could see was sand; everywhere, sand!
Wait! On her third revolution, she noticed what looked like a hill in the far distance.
Something to aim for, at least, she decided. She started walking.
***
As she got closer, over what had certainly been several hours, she could see that it looked a child’s version of a sandcastle, more of a hill with bumps and ridges. She’d kept her eyes on it, and on the sun, determining that she was moving east; maybe more or less northeast.
It made no sense. She could not have been flung that far by an ocean wave—she should have been within sight of water long before her foot struck the pavement.
She looked around, wondering how she could have missed seeing signs that this was near. She realized that the tracks leading to the place came from underground, from a tunnel off to her left, and only the last few yards leading to the station were visible.
She must have been experiencing quite the case of tunnel vision, she thought. The station was very nearly right in front of her, only slightly to the left of where she’d focused her sights. Still, she’d been looking at that sandcastle shape through tears, an effervescent shimmer of brown and gold shades not so different from the color of the station, so she shrugged it off and decided not to be too hard on herself.
The station looked old; wooden planks, shutters, latched doors. She shook her head when she realized she could see the back end of a train on the other side, reflecting it must have come from the southwest.
But, no. The track ended there in a roundabout, and although the train was facing north, there was no way it could have gotten there from a southern track that did not exist. Jenna whispered, “It must have backed in.”
The pavement she’d stepped onto wasn’t pavement at all; sand colored flat stones had been laid on this side, and she could see that the doors on this side had been locked with sliding bolts and padlocks.
She turned and walked along the side of the long building until she reached the end. She walked around the front and mounted a few steps to the board walkway. The wood creaked in some spots as she made her way to the first door.
She hesitated, then forced herself to turn and take a good look at the train.
It seemed impossible. This old, faded station and wood-and-iron track was no place for this train. It shouldn’t have ever gotten here—the track gauge was all wrong for an electric subway train. How in hell did it stay on the tracks?
She slid her hand into the front of her tank and fingered the pocket watch. “Oh, God, Kenny,” she breathed, “what is happening?” She leaned against the door and slid down until she was seated with her knees against her chest. She bowed her head and lightly thumped it against one knee. “I really think I’m dead…and this…is…hell.”
“I don’t believe so.”
The man’s voice startled a cry out of her, and she jumped to her feet.
She hadn’t noticed when the door was pushed open from within. She stood in a defensive posture, fists clenched and raised to waist-height, feet apart, knees bent. Her heart was doing triple duty; she could hear her pulse-beat behind her ears, which quickened her breath.
In the doorway stood a tall young man with a purple mohawk buzz-cut and an eyebrow ring that looked like a trident, a stout older man clutching a hardback book to his chest and a petite brunette with aquamarine, badly bloodshot and teary eyes and skin so pale it looked like skim milk.
The woman spoke. “No need for that.” She indicated Jenna’s raised fists. “We saw you through the glass.”
“Where’d you come from?” Mohawk demanded.
Jenna focused on him. He could have been anywhere between sixteen and twenty-five, but she’d bet he wasn’t old enough for a legal pint of beer. “I don’t even know how to answer that,” she admitted.
The older man snorted. “There’s a lot of that going around,” he said. “You might as well come in. Have some water.”
As soon as the word “water” was out of his mouth, Jenna was moving. She’d used the tablecloth like an umbrella, but knew she’d still gotten sunburned, and she was so thirsty she was near collapse.
“I’m Rebecca,” the brunette told her.
Mohawk took Jenna by the arm, steadying her as they all backed up into the station. “Justin,” he said.
“Jenna.” She cleared her throat. “My name is Jenna.”
“Bart,” the stout man added, tucking his book under one arm and placing a hand under her elbow.
The air inside was cool, and Jenna moved into it gratefully. It was dark in there, but that was probably because she’d been in bright sunlight all day.
“Jenna,” Rebecca said, “welcome to the end of the line.”
“I looked and looked, but I couldn’t find Ken.” Jenna started to cry.
The latch clicked as the door slipped shut behind them.
This is a continuation of The Last Stop on the Line. July 2020 was my last visit to this station. I’m still left wondering what’s inside.
For more great stories inspired by Writers Unite! prompts and more, visit their page here: Writers Unite!
Another rainy morning and I was getting weary of the gloom. It’s wasn’t normal for the area, and it was messing with my mood. I live in the desert for a reason–lots of sunshine and light.
“Feels like we’re back in Seattle,” I groaned.
Ben glanced at me, then looked back at the road. The windshield wipers were having a hard time of it–they’d been so old and dry that they split and after a few swipes they just flapped and smeared across the glass. “Yeah,” he agreed. “It’s been a while since we’ve had to drive in this crap. I’d rather have snow.”
“Bite your tongue!” I cried. “Don’t give it any ideas.”
“Give what?”
“I don’t know–the weather imp?”
Ben laughed good-naturedly, but didn’t look away from the road ahead. People in the desert don’t know how to drive in the rain, especially a rain coming down in sheets like this. “The hardpan won’t be able to suck this up,” he remarked. “Another few minutes, and we’re in for some flooding.”
I leaned closer to the glass, trying to make out the landscape through the water. “Are we going to make it home?”
“No.” He made an abrupt turn off the main street and headed uphill. We hadn’t gone far past the intersection when we heard the rush of water in the street behind us. He stopped in the middle of the road, and we looked back in time to see a pickup being washed down the street. It crashed into a power pole, and the car swimming through the steam behind it crashed into its back end.
“My God, Benny!” My heart was pounding, and I felt my eyes bulging. “We were just–“
Ben put the car in gear and kept driving for higher ground. We were both aware that water could swoop down on us at any second–there was nothing to stop it. Ben was banking on the sewer system–which had obviously overflowed behind us–not filling above us until we were past it.
He made another turn. Water was overflowing sewer drains now, and the street we had just pulled off quickly became a waterfall.
“The cars down there are going to be underwater,” I sobbed.
“So is the house,” Ben added.
“Still want to argue about climate change?”
Ben looked like he might get pissed, but then his features softened and he pulled me close for a quick hug. Then he patted my head and drove carefully down the road to the next intersection.
It, too, was a waterfall. The flood water roared past, pushing its way into the roads on either side and into the yards of the homes on each corner. Ben put the car in reverse and backed up a few hundred feet to avoid getting caught in the current.
We were under a canopy of tree branches, but they weren’t enough to keep us from being pounded by the deluge. I prayed they wouldn’t break off and crash down on us. Ben must have decided the risk was real, and he backed up a little more.
Now all I had to worry about was whether the whole tree might fall. “What’ll we do?” I asked.
Penz-o-Paula 