First Days After

by Jay Vielle

  There was a long pause. Jake just stood there. He was trying to back out of the dark place with everyone watching. Everyone looked at him, then at each other. I realized that everything we had hoped to make of this survival situation was over, and I began to fear what might happen to us.

  “No,” said Melanie.

  “No,” said Robin.

  “I, I guess not,” said Casey.

  “Hell no,” said Longaberger.

  Off to the right, looking very uncomfortable and not saying a word, were Glen Billings, Al DeFillipo, Maureen Kelly, and Jada Allen. By themselves at a table in the cafeteria were the Heffners. A few others stared at the floor near them. No one in the cafeteria spoke. The group in the rotunda where we had entered had divided into two.

  “You’re making a mistake, Wes,” said Jake. “You’re dividing us when we should be together.

  “You are the one dividing us, Jake Fisher,” Wes said. “Your judgment is compromised. You can’t be trusted to make good decisions. You have stolen, killed, assaulted people, even our own people,” he paused, pointing to his rumpled shirt.

  “If we are going to survive this horrible time, we need someone who is trustworthy. Someone who can make sound decisions. Who won’t put us in harm’s way. What we are saying, Jake, is that we don’t want you or your kind around here anymore,” said Wes. Lou looked up sharply, surprise on his face.

  “My kind?” said Jake.

  “Killers, thieves, gang-bangers. It’s not what we want from our new society,” said Wes.

  “Killers, thieves, and gang-bangers. Me? I’m those?”

  “You and your…friends,” said Wes. He accentuated the word friends, and gestured at me and Estela.

  “My friends? Wes, what are you talking about? When we left we were one group all on the same page.”

  “Yes, we were. Then you killed two men, maimed a third, apparently fought and assaulted four more, and stole four carts worth of items from a Wal-Mart,” Wes continued.

  “Wes, are you kidding me? The Heffners were attacked by armed men. No one else wanted to help them. The four men in the Wal-Mart attacked us with guns, knives and bats. One of them was one of the Heffner’s attackers. I am guilty of winning two fights where I was outnumbered. And my ‘friends’ are a high school educator and a Wal-Mart assistant manager. Who the hell is a gang-banger? We’re the only gang around,” said Jake, confused.

  “I’m not going to let you spin this into something it’s not. I’ve talked to the group, and they are very concerned with your behavior. The violence, the theft. It’s not what they want, Jake. It’s not what we want. You said you wanted leadership to be determined by the group. Well, the group doesn’t want you. We don’t even want you here anymore,” said Wes.

  “I teach here, just like you,” Jake said. “This is my home.”

  “You taught here. The world has changed. And this world doesn’t want you in it anymore. It’s time to find a new home.”

  Jake looked around. “Is that right? Does he speak for you? Do you all want me gone?”

  The Heffners stared at the ground silently as if nothing were happening. Maureen Kelly and Jada Allen were starting to tear up. Al DeFillipo looked lost. Estela looked at me. I must have looked absolutely horrified. We had invited this girl back to save her life, and now she was caught in the middle of some kind of bizarre leadership struggle.

  Jake took a deep breath. He turned briefly to Estela and whispered. “I’m sorry I brought you here. I had no idea—”

  “You people are insane,” I yelled. “He’s the reason we’re alive right now.” I looked at the Heffners and pointed. He’s the ONLY reason you’re alive right now! These people shut you outside, and he saved your life and brought you in. How can you go along with this? How can any of you go along with this?”

  “You and your new friend should go too,” Wes said. “You obviously don’t fit in here.”

  “Don’t fit in?” I asked.

  “We’re all good Christians here. We want to do the right thing for the greater good. The decision we made with the Heffners was based on wrong information at the time. We were trying to protect the group. You and Jake wanted to endanger the group. Once we knew that the Heffners were not radioactive, we welcomed them in and apologized. They understand all that now. “

  “I can’t believe what I’m hearing,” I said. “When did all of you suddenly come to this conclusion?”

  “It wasn’t sudden. It’s been here all the time, and as soon as you all weren’t here to bully everyone into your way of thinking, people felt safe to speak their minds. Once we did that, we realized we were all of a different mindset than you.”

  “You’re serious. I can’t believe it. All of you? You all came to the same conclusion as this asshole?” I asked.

  “You all, on the other hand, have brought violence, theft, and murder onto our doorstep. You’re savages. What you did to those poor boys’ bodies outside,” said Wes.

  “The ones who tried to rob and kill us?” I asked. “Jake put them—”

  “I know, he put them on display for any other would-be attackers. Very medieval of him. Everyone here was horrified by that. We gave them a Christian burial after you left. God can judge them now,” said Wes. “Just like he’ll judge you.”

  “My God, you truly don’t get it,” I said.

  “Oh, we get it, Señor Reyes. It’s you who don’t get it.”

  I think I’m beginning to, I thought to myself. I turned to Jake, lost. I shook my head as if to say ‘how did this happen?’ Jake got a stern look on his face and shook me off.

  “Okay Wes. Have it your way. I’ll need about a half an hour to collect my things, then me, Eddie, and Estela will be out of your hair with our ill-gotten gains.”

  “I think you need to leave right now,” said Wes. My eyes bugged out of my head and my mouth dropped. Jake’s eyes glowed and he chewed on his lip for a moment. Then he walked up to Wes.

  “You know Wes, considering for a moment that you have labeled me a pugilist, a thief, and a brutal killer, I’d think twice about ordering me around right now if I were you.”

  “You, you don’t…scare me,” Wes stammered.

  “Well maybe I should. All those people I killed? I wasn’t angry with them. But I’m pretty goddamn furious with you right now,” Jake said, putting his nose up against Wes’ nose.

  Wes’s confident look suddenly faltered and a realization of fear washed over him. He fumbled trying to come up with a response.

  “Well, I think…” he stammered.

  “You know Wes, there are lots of different ways to make leadership changes. Some of them only take a few seconds,” Jake said. He looked around at the faces staring at him. Everyone—even the friendly ones—looked positively terrified of Jake just then.

  “I’m going to get my stuff,” he said. “I’ll try to make it quick. Eddie, get anything you need from your classroom that you want to take with you. Estela, if anyone comes anywhere near those shopping carts of ours, blow their heads off with your shotgun.”

  Melanie’s eyes bugged. Mark’s jaw dropped. Wes looked horrified, and turned to glance at Estela. Estela smiled, and cocked her pump action almost on cue.

  “Keep your distance, Señor. You know how us Mexicans are,” she said.

  I went up to my classroom and snagged a backpack, a jacket, and a few personal things. I didn’t really have much. I’m young. My life was outside the school. I really just worked here. It took me all of about twenty seconds. I went back to Jake’s room and saw him staring at his classroom. His closet door was open. It was packed full of clothes for every possible occasion. His desk had everything in it. This was Jake’s bat cave, his Tardis, his castle. Jake lived here—he only slept at home. The events of the past few days had gone by so fast that it was difficult to process that it all had changed. It wasn’t hard to pretend we were on a Christmas break, or a spring break, and that classes would resume next week and everything would be normal again.
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  Now, staring at his room, knowing he would leave it forever, Jake’s façade began to waiver. He heard me coming and regulated his breathing, but I could tell he wanted to break down. The weight of his wife, Laura, being cut off when the bombs dropped, would have been enough by itself. But the anxiety about his sons, the way he was being ousted here, all on top of him literally having to fight for his life the past two days—I wasn’t sure how he was holding up at all. Now he was having to say goodbye forever to a place that had been his home for decades.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Just, just, finding it hard to say goodbye,” he said. “Been here since the place opened. More than twenty years. Hard to process.”

  “Yeah, it is. I’m sorry, compadre.”

  “Who am I kidding, Eddie? This whole thing’s over. The world’s not like it used to be. We may never have school like this again. We don’t even know what’s out there. Here I am getting sentimental about a room I’ll likely never use again, and we’ve got much bigger problems to deal with now.”

  “Jake,” I asked.

  “Yeah?”

  “Are we gonna be alright?” He frowned a little, then pursed his lips. He was thinking about it, but I admit I didn’t want an honest answer, I wanted blind reassurance. I got it.

  “Yeah, amigo. We’re gonna be alright. I’m a Marine. Adapt, improvise, overcome. You’re with me. We’ll be okay. Better than most.”

  “What are we gonna do? Where will we go?”

  “First, we get our shit together. Then we make sure we have shelter and food for a while. Then I’m going to find my boys and bring them back. I understand if that’s not your quest.”

  “Where you go, I go. My parents were working in D.C. when the bombs hit. I got nothing here. Now.” Jake nodded and shook my hand.

  “Just my luck. On the road again. Me and a couple of señoritas.” I rolled my eyes at him and we walked back to the rotunda.

  When we got there, Estela was standing in the exact spot we left her. Nobody had moved.

  “No, you didn’t,” she said.

  “I did. I helped get this stuff, so some of it’s mine,” said Lou.

  “What you did was tell those gang-bangers that we were in the back, then stood there shaking like a leaf while the rest of us fought them off. You don’t get anything.”

  “The lady’s got a point, Lou,” said Jake, walking up. Lou stared at the ground. “Estelita—ready to go? Push these carts to the back of the school. My truck is parked there. We’ll load up and be off.”

  We three awkwardly walked the four carts back to the other side of the school with everyone watching. As we turned the corner, we heard elevated voices behind us. Then we heard footsteps jogging up behind us. I turned, expecting trouble. Jake, on the other hand, was grinning.

  “Wait, Jake. Wait. We, we don’t agree with them. We don’t want to stay here now. We’d like to come with you, if that’s okay.”

  It was Maureen Kelly. And beside her was the gangly Al DeFillipo, and students Jada Allen, and Glen Billings. I smiled. Estela was guarded.

  “Fine by me, but it’s not my show—despite what Wes might have you think. You need to ask Eddie and Estela. And you need to understand that I am going to drive to southern Virginia and find my sons. If that’s not a trip you want to make, fine, but I plan on leaving soon.”

  “Anything’s better than here, now. If you’ll have us,” said Maureen.

  “Sure thing,” I said. “Estela—son buena gente. Good people.” Estela nodded and smiled.

  We exited the building and pushed the carts toward Jake’s truck. He had climbed inside and tried to start the engine. No sound came out.

  “I was afraid of that,” Jake said.

  “Afraid of what?” I asked.

  “It was the H.E.M.P.,” said Al. “The high altitude electro magnetic pulse. It probably fried everyone’s computers. Nobody’s cars are going to work.”

  “Maybe not nobody’s, but mine is pretty new. It’s reliant on a lot of computers. Not sure where everyone was gonna sit anyway.”

  Jake looked around the parking lot. Near the back was a short school bus. It looked like it was left in a hurry. It was parked oddly, off kilter, and its doors were open.

  “Bingo,” said Jake. He trotted over toward the bus, and as he neared it, he could clearly see the keys dangling from the ignition.

  “Any other day this probably would not have happened, but when World War III begins and the bombs start dropping, folks tend to leave things where they are. Even school busses with keys in them. So today is our lucky day. He hopped in, turned the key, and the engine roared.

  “How is it that the bus works and your truck doesn’t?” I asked.

  “E.M.P.’s affect different vehicles differently. This bus is more old school. Less electronics needed. And the massive amount of metal around the engine makes for a nice Faraday cage.” Al smiled and gave Jake a thumbs up.

  “Yes, it does,” Al said, nodding with a grin.

  “Faraday cage?” I asked.

  “It basically is a shield that blocks electrical impulses by conducting them and grounding them. Most cars do a nice job of that—that’s why people are safe from storms in them. There was an old lady who was scared to death of storms back when I was a kid. She would go sit in her car until they ended. It was a Faraday cage, of sorts. This bus did the same.”

  “That’s science, junior,” said Al to me with a smile.

  We all loaded the contents of the carts into the back of the bus and hopped in. There were seven of us: me, Jake, Al, Maureen, Glen, Jada, and Estela. We had food, weapons, shelter, beds, and tools.

  We also had no idea where we were going and what we would find.

  CHAPTER 8

  I had forgotten how much I hated school busses. Being gay, Hispanic, and probably fairly effeminate as a kid, the bus was the place where I took the most punishment—physically and mentally. Busses are great places to hide abuse. Too much noise for the driver to hear specific conversations. Too much activity to narrow in on trouble. Seats are too high to see a sucker punch. I was on the receiving end of a lot of all of that. Eventually I got through it; and in the end, it probably made me mentally tougher as an adult. Still, it’s not anything I’d wish on anyone, and riding in one again brought back a ton of memories, most of them bad.

  As we rolled on, those memories faded and were replaced by new ones. Creating those memories were the people I was with—some of whom I knew well, while others were truly strangers in all but name to me. No better time than the present to rectify that.

  “Hey Al,” I said. “So, where are you from?”

  “Pittsburgh,” he said. “Western PA, at least. North Alleghany High School, California University of Pennsylvania.”

  “How’d you get here to Emmitsburg?”

  “Recruited. The school district does a lot of recruiting in my area. I’ve even done some myself.”

  “How long have you been a teacher?” I asked.

  “Twenty years. Right out of college.”

  “So, you’re…what? Forty-two?”

  “Forty-one. Graduated early.” He tapped his head and smiled.

  “Science guy, huh?” I asked. He nodded back.

  Though I didn’t know him as well as some of my other colleagues, I knew that Al was one of those “utility teachers” who make themselves vital because they would teach anything. In our business, there are plenty of teachers who can be pretty demanding. They demand which classes to teach, focus tightly on their contracts, won’t do anything they don’t have to do. Al was the opposite. He was on the other extreme. He was devoted to the school, devoted to the kids, and displayed little to no visible ego. He didn’t get caught up in petty power squabbles among the staff or engage in gossip. As I looked around the bus, to the best of my knowledge, we were all like that.

  “Mind if I join in?” asked Maureen. She moved from the back of the bus where Jada was sitting near Glen and decided to lea
ve the younger crew for folks more in her age range.

  “Sure. More the merrier,” I said.

  “What are you guys talking about?” she asked.

  “I was just getting some of Al’s background. I just realized I don’t know him as well as I should, especially now that we’re gonna be traveling partners and all. Do you guys know each other?”

  Both of them smiled awkwardly and their eyes darted back and forth between each other and me. I could tell immediately from looking at them that something had gone on there. Both were suppressing smiles.

  “No way. How did I miss that?” I asked.

  “Miss what?” Maureen asked innocently.

  “You two. Are you an item?”

  Eyebrows raised, eyes darted again, but silence reigned.

  “You hooked up at least, didn’t you?” Al began to blush, and Maureen closed her eyes, chuckled and nodded.

  “How do you do that?” she asked.

  “It’s like reverse gay-dar,” I said. “We can see it on all you straights when you hook up. It’s like putting a black light onto a hotel bed spread. Secret emissions pop up everywhere.”

  Maureen’s face scrunched up like she just bit into something nasty. “Ugh. Nice image,” she said. “You couldn’t come up with a better metaphor than that?”

  I just smiled and shrugged, and Al laughed. “First thing that came to my mind,” I said.

  Maureen took a deep breath. “We both were going through unpleasant divorces,” Maureen said. “One day we were in the teacher’s lounge having bad days together and started talking.”

  “And we all know what talking leads to,” I said smiling.

  “Um, yeah,” said Al. He looked around to the back of the bus to find Jada and Glen riveted to our conversation. Jada was looking at him strangely, as if a bit disappointed. Al looked at the ground, hunched over a bit and nodded.

  “We’re friends, you know,” said Al. “Friends help each other through rough times, that’s all,” he said. Maureen looked at him suspiciously, then turned back towards me.