The World Itself Departed

by J. B. Beatty

  “And suddenly my life changed. I had to stay indoors. I had the mother of all helicopter mothers. Sports were out, social life was out. When it got really bad before we figured out my meds, I had to be home-schooled. My mom’s bad enough as a mom, but as a teacher? It was pure misery. I even thought about killing myself.

  “It took a couple years to get the meds right. It’s all about controlling the symptoms since there’s no cure out there. And not too many people are looking for a cure. There’s not much money for it. Yeah, tell me about it. Breast cancer, meanwhile, is rolling in the dough. I hate pink.

  “Mom finally got me to sign up for community college. I get a job as a server at a restaurant, just a few hours a week. I tell her I need to be socialized. Just like we did with our puppy. A few years later, when I turned 21, they put me behind the bar. I loved it right away. Guys would hit on me, really hit on me aggressively. And then I would tell them about my disease and you could practically feel their penises wither. I mean, serious testicular shrinkage. I felt like a human cold shower.”

  I must have grimaced.

  “No, really, it was a good thing. For the first time in my life I felt like I had power. I became the Bartender from Hell. Because, no offense, most guys are tools. And they know how to be sexual aggressors and they know how to be condescending—I would get one or the other depending on whether they knew about the Lupus.

  “Tending bar was my Fight Club. I learned how to humiliate the aggressive jerks and how to wrap the condescending bastards in so much guilt they would flee our little bar and run home to their TVs to console themselves with duck-hunting-bastard shows.

  “No, I don’t hate men. Just most men. The ones that were in my group, after the flu outbreak, they were good guys who would—and did—do everything they could to save my life, time and again. I would have died for them.

  “We had a good leader. Kind of like a Rick Grimes, but he didn’t mumble and fall into trances of stupidity so much. He was a retired postal delivery guy, which turned out to be tremendously advantageous in a world where everything goes kaput.… Yeah, except the Internet…. But he knew where we could find anything we needed.

  “We had one other young person, a guy, who was sick. He was 32 and had some sort of problem with a leaky heart valve. Maybe that hurt his immune system, I don’t know. That’s my theory. We got attacked by a swarm in the night and we were running to shelter and I lost him. The next morning I found him dead. Not a scratch on him. I think he had a heart attack.”

  43→HOW THE THREE PINES SHAKE

  “M

  orning, sunshine,” I tell her.

  Maggie gives a sleepy smile back. “My hair?” she asks.

  “It’s good. Lustrous and full-bodied, just like in the shampoo commercials. What conditioner do you use? I want it.”

  The morning is overcast but light still beams through the window, though the opening is much smaller since RIP reinforced it with bricks.

  “You ready for a move?” I ask her.

  “So today is the day for that? A move to the dungeon?”

  “It will be safer. We’ll all be able to sleep at night.”

  “I want sunlight. Homer wants to go outside.”

  “I’ll bring you up every day to soak up some rays. Him too. And if that’s not enough, I’ll steal some pictures of sunlight from an art gallery.”

  “I’d like that,” Maggie says.

  The rest of the moving process goes well. We have all of our bedding and supplies in the bunker before we start moving Maggie. She is mostly fine walking, though she leans on me going down the stairs. RIP and Justin move ahead of us, carrying her mattress after having earlier taken down her bedframe.

  Her IV stand is already in her room, and Carrie is moving things around, trying to make the space comfortable. She has a long way to go in that department, since the room has all the natural charm of an Army barracks.

  I encounter Carrie in the hallway. She is staring up at the fluorescent lights, not moving. “Are you okay?”

  She startles. “What? Yes, I’m okay… I’m just… This place is amazing. I truly feel safe here. It’s been a long time since I could say that. This is wonderful.”

  “We did get lucky. Now we just have to get it stocked for the winter. It would be nice not to have to go shopping every couple days.”

  “Yeah, I just… I guess I should tell you that right now, I don’t feel comfortable about going out there. Not just yet.” She suddenly looks like tears may happen. I reach out, meaning to touch her arm but she faintly pulls back. I do as well.

  “That’s perfectly understandable. You’ve had a rough ride lately. We’re fine with you staying in as long as you need to.”

  “I’ll help out with whatever you need,” she reassures me. “I’m actually a decent cook.”

  RIP pulls open the outer door and looks in. “Hey,” he says. “I’m about half done outside. Got the van hidden nicely under a tarp, with some pine boughs over it. Easy to spot from the ground, but I’m hoping it won’t be noticeable from the air.”

  “What about the truck?”

  “That’s next. Figuring that we’ll use that more in the winter, I’m going to stash it in that garage. First I’ve got to tow that old junker out of there. Shouldn’t take too long. Then, I hate to say it, we probably need to plan a supply run. Get some meds for you” —He looks at Carrie—“and keep loading up on food.”

  I twist my face in thought. “Do you need a hand with the truck?” I ask.

  “Pffft. I got it. Be back in a minute.”

  I call after him: “Can you take Maggie’s dog out?”

  He stops but doesn’t turn around. Like he’s thinking of an objection. Then he heads into Maggie’s room and I hear him say, “Come here, boy.”

  He disappears carrying the dog, leaving the door open a crack.

  Carrie looks back at me. She seems to carry a little bit of the awkwardness of simply being new to our group. “Well,” she says. “I can work on organizing the kitchen and the food pantry.” She heads in that direction.

  I know I have work to do as well. Most of the stuff we brought into the bunker is jammed in boxes, which are jammed in random places just about everywhere. We had tried to aim stuff for the rooms we would eventually need them to be in, but being in a hurry made a mess of that.

  One of the things that disappears in an apocalyptic setting is me time. Really. You get into a mode where survival is your only concern. And the bonds with the people who have helped you survive become so all-encompassing that your top priority is taking care of their needs. I was not even close to being that kind of human being before this all happened and it amazes me that now I wouldn’t think twice about helping one of the others if they needed any little thing. This is the bright side of global apocalypses that hardly anyone ever mentions. But then, hardly anyone’s alive anymore…

  This moment now is one that may stay with me. We have plenty of boxes to unpack. We have rooms to organize: food, tools, clothes, etc. We’re even going to have an armory to stash all of the weapons we have accumulated—that’s going to be RIP’s job. But right now, I actually feel like I can slip onto one of the bunks with my Moby Dick book and disappear for a while. Carrie and RIP are both busy doing their things, and Justin is administering another chemo treatment with Maggie. And so I find my book, and curl up to read about a shark massacre. Life is good. For a few minutes.

  I feel it before I hear it. The bunk jolts. The Earth moves. The explosion shakes everything. The air is sucked out of me. I roll to the floor, stand and grab onto the end of the bed. I move to the door and clutch the doorframe. Smoke and dust billows from the outer door. I run to it and the heat hits me. I cover my face. As I get closer, I see flames. I want nothing more than to turn back. Behind me, I hear a cry. Ahead of me, there is fire, smoke, rubble and daylight.

  “Where’s RIP?” I hear. I need to get him. He’s up with the truck. I try to push the door open enough to slide through but my ef
forts fail. It’s blocked by rubble. It burns my hands. The inferno has devoured the building. I want to find RIP. I want to rescue him and get him back to the only safe place in the world. The fire roars but above it I can hear the deep drumbeat of a helicopter.

  I cannot get to RIP. They can. I lean against the door and push. My arm is burning. I gag on the smoke and dust.

  Justin yells, “Shut it.” I look back at him. With my foot I clear some of the rubble that has fallen in. I pull on the door and he helps me. It nearly closes—I have to sweep more shattered concrete out of the way. Then it shuts and the sound is dampened. The roar sounds distant. I turn the wheel, my fingers blistering. I feel it latch.

  Justin runs to me, pulls me away. He guides me through the smoke and to Maggie’s room. He opens the door, pushes me in, and shuts it again behind him. “RIP,” I say.

  “We have no way to help him right now,” he says, holding my arms and examining my hands and my shoulder. He digs on the shelves and brings back a spray that he starts applying to my blisters. He carefully starts wrapping my hands. He is silent. I look to Maggie, but she is out. Perhaps she slept through it all. I hope so. Then I remember Homer went out with RIP.

  I shudder, but then we feel a second explosion, a second missile. The bunker barely shakes this time.

  When Justin finishes dressing my wounds, I stand. He embraces me tightly. “Motherfuck,” he says gently. When he lets me go I walk to the kitchen and I find Carrie cowering on the floor against a cabinet. I go to her and this time I hold her and she does not shrink away.

  She gazes at me with wide eyes. “They found us,” she says.

  44→THE LIVING GULFS OF DOOM

  We wait hours. Then Justin checks my bandages. And he helps me dress. He puts a bulletproof vest on me. He loads up a small backpack with ammo. He makes sure I have a knife attached to my leg, a rifle over my back, a handgun holstered at my side, and a flashlight attached to my jacket.

  “It has to be me,” I say, but I don’t even put a question mark on it. There’s no way Mr. Claustrophobia is going up the escape tunnel.

  He looks back at me without expression and sternly warns me to come back as soon as I’ve found RIP. “Anything else can wait until morning.” He adds quietly, “The dog can wait.”

  I start the climb. My pathway is tight with all the things I have attached to me. I open each hatch and find they slide shut and latch behind me. I am afraid that I can’t get back but I remember RIP telling me that they open from both sides. The darkness of the tunnel swallows me.

  I pass through hatch after hatch and after a few I see that another is unexpectedly looming just a few feet away. It’s at the end of the tunnel, in the ceiling above a ladder, rectangular with large hinges. Beyond, I am sure, it is the night.

  I ready myself, for the hundredth time feeling for my knife on my leg. I flick the safety off my guns. I breathe deeply and for just a moment, I wonder “Why me?” Anyone who knew me before would never have tabbed me as the man for a dangerous mission. That was before. And it was not that I changed. My entire world changed.

  I pull on the latch and something gives a little. I push up on it and it barely moves. I get up close to it so that my head is bowed and my shoulders can push. I try again. It goes up a few inches—now it doesn’t feel so difficult. Yet I start to realize that this hatch is probably 10-inches thick. Heaver than hell, but I am getting some kind of hydraulic help from the hinge mechanism. The only reason it’s not opening easier is that it must be covered with years of dirt and detritus from the forest. Finally, I see the darkness of the night beyond. I push the hatch until the opening is about 20 inches. I turn off my flashlight and try to let my eyes adjust to the night. I don’t want to attract any attention until I am in a position to defend myself. I pull myself out of the tunnel.

  Suddenly I am concerned about shutting the hatch. Will I be able to open it again? I push away the dirt and pine needles layered atop it and find a lever. With it, I can raise or lower the hatch. I can’t find any electronic mechanism, but I fear that if I shut it solidly I will never be able to open it. My friends would be entombed forever. In daylight, I can take a better look at the situation. For now, I wedge a fallen branch under the hatch so it doesn’t lock.

  I stand. It is a dark night with no stars visible because of the overcast clouds. I stay in one place, listening. In the far distance I hear a distant, almost musical tooting. An owl, perhaps. My eyes don’t pick up any landmarks, and I realize I will need some way to find my way back to this spot. It’s something we did not even think of beforehand. I take off my pack. In addition to ammo, we packed some medical supplies in case I need to stabilize RIP when I find him. I find a bandage wrap and tear off a few feet of it, tying it to the end of the branch I have wedging the hatch open.

  I see a glow ahead of me, over the crest of the hill beyond the trees. I approach it, taking care to make as little noise as possible. It takes me 10 minutes to cover perhaps 100 feet. Seems like it, anyway. It’s not like I’m looking at a watch. I keep looking behind me so that I can visualize my path back to the hatch. And there’s the feeling I have that I am not alone. Almost as if eyes are upon me. If this were a movie, I’d call that foreshadowing. But I’ve had that feeling every time I’ve been outside in the darkness since the world ended. It’s probably just me getting the willies, as my grandfather used to say.

  Eventually I see what is giving off light—embers still smoldering. I nearly trip on a metal beam of some sort and realize it is the radio tower, now collapsed. I follow it to what used to be the fence around our enclosure. When it toppled it crushed the barbed wire fence. I step over it. Then I follow the fence line so that I can get a feel for what happened to our fortress. I’m just not able to make out what I am seeing so finally I switch on the flashlight. I put it in my left hand, my pistol in my right. If someone’s going to see me, they’re going to see me. If I have to defend myself, I have to defend myself.

  As I point the light, my mind has difficulty comprehending the view. All landmarks have been destroyed. None of our structures are left standing. The main building has collapsed into the basement, with smoke rising from the bent beams and shattered cinderblocks. Faint flames lick out from underneath some of the concrete.

  The garage is a pile of debris, some of it still glowing from the heat. The front gate is open, and standing in it is what must have been the rusted truck with the snowplow. I see the plow off to the side. The truck is on its side. Ahead, beyond the gate, I see the twisted, blackened wreckage of our newer truck. I approach it slowly, fearful of what I may find. It has been ripped asunder by a powerful explosion. I scan it carefully—the scorching has consumed all color, and perhaps all of the blood I am afraid to see. I find nothing.

  Toward the other side of the road I see more metal, and an axle connected to a wheel. I approach and my foot kicks something that’s softer than a rock. I close my eyes, brace myself, and look down. It is a leather hiking shoe. RIP wore it. His foot is still in it, with torn tendons and bones emerging from it. I turn away from the gory sight but still my insides churn and I vomit on the road, the acrid smell filling my noise as my throat burns. I wipe my mouth and breathe with my hands on my knees.

  He could still be alive, I tell myself. He might still need me. I stand straight and raise the flashlight again. Along the edge of the lane I see a figure no bigger than a road-killed racoon. I walk toward it because I see fabric. His flannel shirt. It is torn, but it still shelters one of his arms. Spread away from it is a trail of blood and more parts. He is gone, I tell myself. There is no putting him back together.

  I gulp. I cry. I realize that I am completely exposed on this dirt road, my light shining, outside of the fence, with no one covering me. And I don’t care. Without RIP, we are without our practical mind, the guy who knew a little bit about everything, “Enough to get things done,” as he would say. We are in serious trouble and right now I don’t care if something happens to me.

  I hear
movement in the woods. It jolts me out of my self-pity. At first, I hope that it’s Homer. I call to him. Nothing.

  I tell myself it’s probably a possum or some kind of animal scavenger that was attracted to the smell of a meal. I shine my light in that direction but see nothing. In a way that’s reassuring, because nothing means nothing. But if it were a racoon or a possum, I would have seen eyes glowing back at me. So, nothing might mean something. I back away, and then start walking almost sideways, keeping an eye behind me and looking ahead constantly as I make my retreat.

  For a moment, I think I should gather up his parts, protect them from the animals, give him something resembling a respectful burial. But I remember Justin’s warning, to come back immediately once I found RIP. I had found him, but I had nothing to bring back except grief. I quicken my pace, back round the ruins of our fortress, back over the crushed fence and along the toppled radio tower.

  Again I feel as if eyes are studying me. But in the terror of the night I am a quivering mess of paranoia. I turn off the flashlight, so that if someone is out there, they don’t have such a helpful beacon to our escape hatch. And though I want to run to the hatch and dive in toward safety, I force myself to walk slowly and quietly, keeping all my focus on my ears. If someone’s out there, I want to hear. The pistol grip is wet with my sweat and my hand hurts from clutching it so hard. My hand is shaking and I take my finger off the trigger because I don’t want the gun firing by accident.

  I leap when the owl calls again. I can’t help speeding up a little. I just want light and safety. This darkness is every nightmare that has ever left my heart frozen in fear. I need to escape. But where is the hatch? Where is the branch? Where is the bandage I tied to it? I see nothing like it. The trees I tried to memorize now all look alike. I break my own vow and flick the flashlight on. Then I see it, not 20 feet away, the bandage dangling from a branch. I turn the light off and step in that direction. Though I am careful, I find the edge of the hatch by inadvertently kicking it with my foot. I crouch down and feel for the edges, pulling the branch out.