The Great Silence

by Emery C. Walters

  No. Nope, not at all. My mind went back to the boy, Burk. What an odd name. Maybe it was a family name or a nickname. What did I really know about him? I hadn’t even seen him naked, not that I’d mind. Whew, it was getting warm in here! He was such a nicely built young man, accent on the young, and man…I wonder, no. I said I wouldn’t bother him in that way. But what if he wanted…what if there was just the two of us, or were just the two of us? What if, crap, now my lap was disturbing the cat, after all.

  I almost jumped off the chair when he spoke beside me. “Success!” Poor cat was caught between him and a hard place.

  I almost laughed. “What about him, my neighbor, Mr. Um…?”

  “Let’s just say I hope you weren’t too fond of him. Here, should we hide these? Tomorrow, we can figure out how to use them. I raided his stash of ammo, too. Gosh, I’m tired, and I want to cry, but I’ll settle for a hug instead.”

  Hauling the cat with me, we moved to the couch, sat beside each other, and cuddled. I felt so safe with him there, for some strange reason, that I started to doze off.

  “You stay here,” he said quietly. “I’m going to go raid his pantry. He won’t be needing any of the food he has there. He doesn’t have any other pets, does he?”

  “Other?” I asked, rousing. “Just the one dog, Muttsky.”

  “Not anymore.” Burk sighed. And he sniffed, wiped his nose, and glided back out the door.

  Feeling useless, I limped into the hallway, scooted down the stairs on my butt, and started hunting around the storage room for empty boxes. I felt unsettled by his need for fast action, but didn’t see any reason to stop it either. At the work site, when I’d gotten beaten up, nobody stepped up to help me, and here, I was grateful to have this healthy young person to run all over and do the things he felt needed to be done. I’d read some science fiction, too, and you either assume the shit has hit the fan, or you get hit. Under my wisdom, however, I was glad that, so far, all our intense and fretful actions were done in private, or at least would never come to light among the living.

  Burk filled up box after box, just stacking them in the kitchen. When I scooted back upstairs, he was putting ammo in one of the guns. He must have seen my jaw drop, but he said, “Not to worry. I’m just going to the pharmacy down the street. Need anything?”

  After he left, I sat at the kitchen table with my head in my hands. I was hurting; all my bruises were screaming at me. I noticed some of what Burk had brought needed to be refrigerated, so I worked on putting that away. Then I made as much ice as I could and dragged the picnic cooler out of the pantry. That might extend things a bit if the power went out. This was getting serious, yet I wanted to ignore the whole thing. I deliberately left the TV off and stayed away from the computer as well. Yes, I had a few friends and some family to worry about, but maybe I’d do that later. There was no way I could help any of them now anyhow.

  I realized I hadn’t heard any aircraft for quite a while. The sky had not been this quiet since 9/11, when the only plane in the sky had been one solitary jet returning to the naval air station on Whidbey Island. I wondered if there were any submarines out, like in Nevil Shute’s book On the Beach. Was it better that our air was still breathable, and nothing had happened to the planet but a great and possibly overdue cleansing of its human population?

  To keep the what ifs out of my mind, I started organizing the pantry and making room for more supplies.

  Chapter 3

  I was sound asleep in the living room when Burk returned. I had Paris on my lap, and Felicia was stretched out on the floor. I’d heard her make a weird noise earlier and been afraid to look. I woke to Burk rubbing my arm and pressing his cheek to mine.

  “Wakey, wakey, old man,” he said. “I believe I have bad news about another of your cats. Is that why you’ve been crying?

  My heart warmed to his presence and broke apart at the same time. Paris was still asleep on my chest, her butt in my face, of course. She was purring. I managed to say, “Bye, Felicia,” like it was a time to be funny, but what else can you do? That was my British father in me, stiff upper lip and all that.

  “I’m taking her outside. I’ve been stashing pharmacy crap in the back bedroom. I have a lot to tell you, but it can wait ‘til morning, well, proper morning.” He yawned and bent to pick up my number two cat.

  “What a pretty shade of blue,” I whispered to myself, not really looking at my formerly white cat draped limply over Burk’s arms.

  As he stood to leave, Burk quoted, “We’ll always have Paris,” turned, and left.

  Paris continued to sleep, and I hoped that what Burk said would remain true.

  * * * *

  I woke in the morning to the smell of coffee and bacon. I guessed we still had power. I was still dressed and had no memory of going to bed. I found my way to the kitchen, and there was Burk cooking happily, singing “As Time Goes By” from Casablanca. I fell into a chair, half amused and proud, and half worried sick.

  When he joined me, with both plates full of food, Paris sat on the third chair, sniffing the delicious aromas. Burk smiled. “I worked up an appetite yesterday. I figure I’m due to crash soon, emotionally, you know, but let me tell you about last night, first. I’m not as happy as I seem to be.

  “There were plenty of people out and about, but mostly turning blue and, ah, losing body fluids shall we say, not to be gross. Some fell down right where they stood. There were a couple of car crashes. Where the hell did people think they’d get? Maybe some got away, I don’t know. I hope so. Inside the pharmacy, it was quiet. I didn’t understand until I remembered seeing a Stop-n-Rob across the street and a liquor store beside it. The mobs were over there. There were only two other people in the pharmacy, and one of them was quite ill. The other was a woman who was dressed as a man, for survival, I figured. Good idea. She was quite young, and I left her alone. She, too, was gathering supplies. We even shared a few.”

  Broadway: how I loved this area, with all its eccentricities and queer people. “What did you get?”

  “What didn’t I get! Drugs and bandages and alcohol wipes and protein bars. Soap and Imodium and other OTC crap. Cat toys and catnip and candy bars. I watched the girl grab chocolates and tampons and magazines. She looked at me, raised one eyebrow, and shook her head. I lost track of her, but when I was done, I staggered out of there like a drunken Santa Claus with a couple of huge bags on my back, arms, and hands. I wished I’d taken the car, but it wasn’t possible, with wrecks here and there and bodies in the road and people milling around everywhere.”

  I pushed a piece of bacon toward Paris. “Catnip?” I asked, unable to take it all in.

  “Yup, and I didn’t have to take my pistol out once. When I go back later, I might. Anyone who’s still alive is getting violent. Everyone is scared. Maybe it’s good it’s so quick, with no time to take action or panic, like driving hundreds of miles or killing your neighbors.” Burk stopped eating, swallowed what he had, and ran into the bathroom, where I heard him being sick.

  I realized I loved this boy like he was my own family, and, in fact, he may be all the family I had now, and me, his. This time, I was the one taking the other to bed, knowing he probably wouldn’t remember. When he was settled, I went back to the kitchen, where Paris was on the table, eating leftover eggs.

  I wondered about the girl and hoped she was all right. Thinking about her made me want to go see for myself, not necessarily to look for her, or others, but just to get out and help. I wasn’t used to being helpless, and since my leg was better and my bruises mostly just for show now, I decided I would go shopping myself. However, I wasn’t exactly in my twenties, and I didn’t want to take a gun. So I sat and thought.

  I got a couple of steak knives, a box cutter, and a pile of bags, and decided that I’d go the back way to the rear of the local hardware store. It involved an alley, several back yards, and if I took some wire cutters, the store’s fencing should not be a problem. The only problem would be if there was an
yone there, either an employee, an owner, or some vicious shoppers. It reminded me of the old days when I was a kid, when all we ever played was cowboys and Indians, until the science fiction movies came out, and then it was cowboys and aliens.

  I left a note on the kitchen table, “back soon,” and slipped out the back door.

  It was so quiet out, and so peaceful. It wasn’t raining, not even sprinkling. The baseball diamond across the street was empty except for a dead dog and two bodies. There were also several dead dogs in the back yards I passed, which was sad, but there were probably dead owners inside, too. I couldn’t dwell on it. Nobody was shooting at me, so that was good, right?

  I cut the fencing and entered the hardware store’s yard, where they stored all the big things like generators and wood. The back door was unlocked, which was lucky, because I hadn’t thought about it. Inside was torn up some, but not drastically so. I wondered what people had taken. Hell, I should have made a list. I started in a back row, just looking and waiting for ideas. I started filling bags with locks and tools I didn’t have. I only had the usual ones that one’s father and grandfather had had, and a bench in the basement with a vise and a rack behind it. I didn’t need screwdrivers or wrenches. I couldn’t carry wood or glass panes, though spares would be handy if we were ever attacked. I took boxes of matches and other fire starters. In the camping aisle, I found things you could never have too many of: flashlights, bulbs, and batteries for instance. I followed the aisle and found work gloves and bags of rags and water filtration systems. I shoved in MRIs by the handful and picked up a couple of handheld GPS units. Why not? To fill the bags, I threw in books of how-tos and where to camp ideas. I felt we should come back later and pick up some of the bigger items; a tent, sleeping bags, who knows what. Just in case we ever had to leave the city.

  If I hadn’t been so scared of getting caught or attacked, I would have really enjoyed myself. It was like every little cowboy bad guy’s dream come true.

  On my way back, I saw a couple of police in their cars, but they kept on going and never even looked at me. I heard sirens and, in the distance, gunshots. I walked home faster than I had come. When I went into the basement, I made sure I locked the door behind me. I dropped the bags and checked the garage doors, too, making sure everything was locked up tight. I wondered if that had been police in those police cars, or just some random guys who had found them empty and taken them for a ride.

  Climbing the stairs, I felt pretty good about my adventure, and some confidence in myself came back that I hadn’t realized I’d lost when I was beaten up overseas. I didn’t hurt much either, so that helped. I was smiling when I walked into the den to find Burk walking around with his phone to one ear, his other hand running through his hair.

  I almost said, “Boo,” but he heard me and turned around.

  His face was a mess; tears and dried snot (ugh, I know), and his nose red from crying. “Jesus!” he shouted, throwing his phone across the room where it landed on the couch, scaring Paris. “Where were you? I thought you were dead or kidnapped or something! Don’t you ever do that to me again!”

  I can’t tell you whether my confidence, happy mood, or heart broke first. I was filled with despair, then shame, then guilt, then love. I stepped over to him and put my arms around him, not sure if that’s what he needed, or if he’d lash out and smack me one first. I knew what I hoped, though, and my dick was agreeing with my mind. Even though I’d promised, well, promises could be broken right? But I had legitimately scared him, and now was not the time.

  Down, boy, I told my dick, not that it ever listened to me, but, sheesh, holding this morsel of manliness, now weeping like a boy with a scraped knee, crushing him to me, wishing I were twenty four again, too.

  All I could do was apologize as often as I could get words out of my mouth. As he calmed down, I did take advantage and kissed everywhere I could reach, all over his face, nose, eyebrows, and was aiming for his lips when he shuddered and drew back.

  “You scared me, man! All I could think of was you, this old crippled man, helpless out there, leaving me here all alone!”

  “What do you mean, old and crippled?” I asked, my heart sinking. Is that how he saw me?

  “Well, you are! You can barely walk, you don’t know how to take care of yourself, you couldn’t bury your own cat, and you left me all alone like some John Wayne type hero!”

  “You think I’m old and helpless, do you,” I stated unwisely, asking for trouble.

  He nodded, but then he ruined my anger by pouting. I couldn’t stand it. Of course, he was right, I was two times his age. In dog years, that was fourteen times his age. I snorted. I couldn’t help it. I started to laugh.

  His eyes got big and round, and then he narrowed them into a steely stare. Back in the old days, out on the playground, he would have been saying, “Do you feel lucky, punk?”

  Oh, wait, that’s too recent. I couldn’t stop laughing. I put my arms up, still playing a game he had no idea even existed. Old, was I? “Shoot me,” I stammered, but it came out like “Shit me!” I cracked up even worse.

  He just looked confused. Then the corner of his lip twitched, and he started to smile. You could tell he didn’t want to, but he did.

  Chapter 4

  We decided this called for a drink. I had forgotten about the well-supplied liquor cabinet I had inherited along with the house, and, of course, had added to it. Though, going to the liquor store for more was probably a bad idea. If we ran out, we could always steal more from the neighbors. Gotta be some silver lining to the clouds, if you look hard enough.

  We were sitting in the den on the couch, together, with the bottle of red wine on the table in front of us, both holding expensive-looking goblets with too much wine in them to be classy. They had come with the house, too.

  “I do apologize,” I said. “It just seemed like a good idea at the time. I was so sure I’d be back before you’d wake up, and I did leave you a note. I won’t do it again.”

  “If you do,” he said, lifting his glass in a toast, “leave me a time and a detailed map!”

  “We should go back and get some spare glass and wood and tents,” I offered.

  “We should bury the neighbors, too, but I don’t know if that will happen,” Burk added seriously. We both drank to that.

  “What a great night to have a fire in the fireplace. If we had one, which we don’t,” I said. “You know, I don’t know anything about you, or your family, where you’re from, anything.” I turned so I could face him. Really, I never wanted to look away from him, but I was trying my best to not be a typical lecherous old man.

  “I grew up in New York. My parents had scads of money, so they sent me to private schools, academies don’t ‘cha know, shit like that. I guess it didn’t take. As soon as I found out I was gay, which wasn’t a particularly wonderful evening, closer to rape than mutual discovery, well…” He winced, and I instinctively grabbed his hand, which he let me hold.

  “Anyway, when that happened, my parents found out about it, blamed me entirely, and yanked me out of school and sent me to a military school, which was probably a mistake. As soon as I could, I joined the Navy and spent three years as a sailor, and let me tell you, there’s plenty of dick to be had on an aircraft carrier. I loved the work as well, don’t get me wrong, and that’s when I decided to either become a pilot or a flight attendant. Flight attendant won because my eyes weren’t good enough for pilot school. Or I didn’t suck the right dick, I don’t know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so blunt.”

  “You have every right to your opinion and are probably more right than you think.”

  “It, um, sucked after a while.” He laughed at his own joke and took his hand out of mine, but used it to refill our glasses. “I’ve never been in a relationship that lasted longer than a weekend. Yet.” Paris jumped up on his lap. He started to stroke her. “I had a dog. I miss that old mutt. Now tell me about you.”

  “Speaking of old mutts.” I laughed. �
��Not much to tell. I grew up in a small town in Connecticut, learned to swim in the ocean, missed out on college because I had an older brother my parents called the smart one, so they sent him. I got interested in music just to piss them off, I think, but I really loved it. When I accidentally outed myself at fifteen, they stopped the music lessons. They gave me a gym membership instead, and there I found another love, karate.” I flexed a muscle. “I’m not completely helpless, you know.” I winked.

  Paris suddenly stopped licking her butt and jumped onto the coffee table. Burk grabbed the wine bottle, and I tried to see what she was staring at. There was a darker spot beside the desk, at least, I thought there was, and then it moved. Not so much moved as darted, and Paris leapt off the table and was in hot pursuit. A moment later, she returned with a tail hanging out of one side of her mouth, proud and haughty as she jumped up onto my lap and dropped her prize in my crotch.

  It was only a mouse, half-dead at that, and I should have whimpered out a mouse-sized noise, but I screamed like a little girl and jumped up and onto the couch, holding onto the back with one hand, and my glass of wine with the other.

  Burk, that bastard, snorted with laughter and actually gasped out, “Tee hee” several times, I shit you not. Then he guffawed and got out, “Don’t spill that. We don’t have much more!”

  As my heart slowed down, I considered dumping it on his blond, curly, little pointed head, but restrained myself and drank down a huge gulp instead. “I wasn’t scared,” I got out.

  “Maybe not, but you’ve insulted your cat! Now come on, come down from there, it’s all right. Paris has it again and is stalking off to the kitchen with it.” He helped me sit back down beside him, though I would have preferred to be on his lap. “We need to bury those neighbors soon, and if the hardware store has traps, we’ll start setting them out. Those fuckers can carry diseases, you know.”

  From the kitchen, we could hear faint crunching sounds. I wondered where the little bastard would barf it up later. As I considered that, I patted Burk’s arm.