Evergreen (Book 5): The Nuclear Frontier

by Cox, Matthew S.

  “We just totally clicked,” said Darci. “He says performing used to be his passion and reason for living, but now, it’s me.”

  “Are you sure he’s not just acting?” Harper grimaced.

  “Yeah. He didn’t start off hitting on me or anything. We were both having a blue day.”

  Harper took Darci’s hand. “I didn’t know you were depressed.”

  “Pff. Come on. Everyone died. I ended up in a hell camp for weeks. I’m not as tough as you, Harp. Besides, I was depressed for years before the war. Why do you think I started doing drugs so young? Just trying to escape.”

  “Sorry. You seemed normal from the outside. Nice neighborhood, great house, good Dad. I’m sorry, it just didn’t seem like you’d have any reason to be sad.”

  Darci stooped forward, head in both hands. “Harp, depression isn’t ‘being sad.’ It’s brain stuff out of my control. People can be depressed for no damn reason anyone can see. My mom had it, too.”

  “I never met your mother.”

  “Right. Most of my friends didn’t. She, uhh…” Darci exhaled. “She killed herself when I was seven.”

  “Oh my God,” whispered Harper. “I’m so sorry. Always thought she had cancer or something.”

  “She dropped me off at my grandparents’ house, said I was going to spend the day with them, and she’d see me later.” Darci twirled a lock of black hair around her finger. “I figured she’d pick me up after lunch. Maybe after dinner. Never knew ‘later’ meant in the afterlife. Dad never told me how she did it. My head’s full of all these ‘could be’ images. No one knew anything was wrong with her. She didn’t say a word.” Her voice faltered. “Mom kept up a smile for the world to see, but it was all an act.”

  Harper rubbed Darci’s back. “I’m sorry.”

  “She left a suicide note. All it said was, ‘This is no one’s fault but mine.’” Darci exhaled as if breathing out a deep hit from a joint. “Look, it’s ’Nee’s birthday. I don’t want to shit all over it.”

  “Don’t feel that way. Like you said, it’s not just being sad. Talk to me whenever you want about whatever you want, okay?”

  Darci glanced sideways at her for a second, then smiled. “I would’ve told you the truth a long time ago, but I didn’t want to make you cry. You’re so sensitive, I thought it would mess you up for good. Letting everyone think Mom just got sick years ago ended up being the lazy way out.”

  “Maybe it would have messed me up if you told the old me.” She laughed mirthlessly. “I’m actually kinda worried because I’m not having nightmares about shooting people.”

  “You’re a lot tougher than you think. I’d never have survived watching people shoot my dad right in front of me.”

  “Survived might be a strong word there. I’m coping.”

  They sat in silence for a while, listening to the kids playing out in the yard.

  “Okay, enough.” Darci took in a deep breath. “It’s Renee’s birthday. Let’s try to stay upbeat for her. She’s been a little off lately.”

  “Yeah. Everyone’s going to be a little off on the first birthday they have where most of their family is gone.” Harper idly swished her feet back and forth over the rug. “We just gotta be there for her, yanno.”

  “Right.”

  Grace arrived, carrying a box.

  “Oh, crap.” Darci flailed her arms as she struggled to get up off the couch. “Damn. This is getting serious. In another month, I’m going to need help to move.”

  “You’re not at all that big yet.” Grace laughed.

  “Yeah, but I’m a twig.” Darci headed for the door. “Be right back. I forgot to get her a present. You okay watching the little guy for a few minutes?”

  “Sure. I think Lorelei stole him though. Might be tough getting him back later.” Harper laughed.

  “Hah!” Darci rushed off.

  Harper sighed out her nose, got up, and moved to stand in the back doorway, watching the kids kick a ball around the yard. Becca, Eva, Mila, and Christopher had arrived at some point over the past few minutes.

  Ack. Good thing we made a big cake.

  Cliff and Carrie showed up a short while later, soon followed by Renee.

  As soon as Renee walked in, Cliff deadpanned, “Surprise.”

  “Thanks, guys.” Renee smiled. “Surprised, not surprised.”

  “Since it’s a birthday and all, figure it’s a worthy occasion for coffee.” Cliff headed into the kitchen and opened a high cabinet.

  “Whoa, we still have some?” Harper gawked at him.

  “Yeah. Like three bags… been saving it for important occasions. Damn shame the stuff won’t grow in this climate. Might as well use it before it goes bad.” Cliff grabbed a bag.

  “It’s already gone bad,” whispered Grace. “Coffee doesn’t last for a year.”

  “Didn’t they build a greenhouse at the big farm?” asked Renee. “Aren’t they trying to grow coffee in there, and like oranges?”

  Harper headed for the living room where her friends congregated.

  “Trying is the operative word.” Cliff glanced at her as she passed. “It’s stale. Stale and bad aren’t the same thing. As long as it ain’t furry, it’s good to drink. Hell, considering this is the last coffee I’m likely to ever see in my lifetime, I’d probably drink it even if the beans got furry.”

  Harper, Grace, and Renee all shivered.

  Darci swooped in the front door carrying a box, did a pirouette, and handed the box to Renee. “Happy birthday, ’Nee.”

  “Aww, you didn’t have to get me anything. We’re grown-ups now. Birthdays aren’t about presents.” Renee laughed. “They’re about sitting around, drinking wine, and complaining over getting old.”

  “That doesn’t start until thirty.” Carrie laughed.

  Darci wagged her eyebrows. “I would’ve gotten you a bob as a gag gift, but there are kids here, and well… no batteries.”

  “Bob?” asked Harper before it clicked, and she gasped. Battery operated boyfriend.

  Renee didn’t react much. “Damn. I could’ve really used one.”

  “It’s not battery operated,” deadpanned Darci.

  Grace got the giggles, her face reddening. “You did not give her a dildo for her birthday.”

  “Wow…” Harper couldn’t help but laugh at the concept of Grace, who’d grown up extremely sheltered, knowing that word. “I’m not sure I dare ask how you know what one of those things is.”

  “Even the former princess made friends at school.” Grace fussed at her hair. “No way would my parents let me have an actual boyfriend, so I had to… take matters into my own hands.”

  Harper gawked.

  “Gotcha.” Grace pointed, laughing. “My mother would’ve sold me to a convent if she found one of those things in the house.”

  Renee opened the box and looked in. “Oh, sweet! This is way too big for me though.”

  “Oh. My. Gawd.” Harper looked away.

  “Chill out.” Renee pulled something out of the box.

  Grace and Carrie burst into laughter.

  Harper risked a peek, relaxing once she realized Renee held a Funko Pop doll, not a sex toy. “All those things look the same to me. Who is it?”

  “Jayne from Firefly.” Renee hugged it, then hugged Darci. “Thank you! He’s adorable.”

  Darci smiled. “You’re welcome… wow the weird stuff they decided to bring back from Walmart, right?”

  The kids came in from the backyard, finally noticing Renee’s presence.

  Lorelei led the charge, first into the living room. “Can we please have cake now?”

  Harper laughed.

  “Might as well. Went to all the trouble of making it.” Carrie headed for the kitchen, retrieved the cake, and carried it out to the dining room table.

  As with Lorelei’s birthday, they lit one candle—which remained lit for less than a minute before Renee made her wish. No sense wasting a candle when the lights worked. Cliff distributed the pot of c
offee he made among small mugs so everyone who wanted got a fair portion. A few minutes later, Logan arrived, looking exhausted from a long day at the farm. He’d apparently rushed right over without going home to clean up. Fortunately, the weather had become a little cool, so he didn’t smell. Without a word, Cliff handed him a mug he’d set aside.

  “Thanks.” Logan sniffed. “Oh damn. I haven’t had this stuff in a while.”

  “Yeah. Same here. Been two whole months filled with indescribable suffering,” deadpanned Cliff.

  Conversation over cake and coffee—Harper figured it had been too long since she had coffee because it didn’t taste stale at all—generally involved Renee and her efforts at making clothing. At least she appeared to enjoy doing it. She joked about being happy not to have the pressure of studying for college or getting accepted by a school good enough for her to get a serious job in the fashion industry, then working her ass off chasing deadlines with the constant threat of being fired for small errors. She’d always daydreamed about going into fashion, but hated the high-pressure world of it.

  Renee seemed a little somber, certainly the least enthusiastic she’d ever been for a birthday before. Of course, their crew came up three short. Christina’s random giggling never went off in the background. Andrea wasn’t there to constantly crack jokes or trip over things. Veronica didn’t once say ‘the hell is wrong wit’ you’ or end up laughing so hard at something Renee said she couldn’t breathe. The absence of their three other friends made the ‘party’ feel more like a wake. Harper didn’t mention them, fearing it would kill the mood, but the way Renee and Darci acted, she figured they also thought about the others.

  Grace, who they’d only met after arriving in Evergreen, didn’t know anything about their old hangouts, habits, jokes, or the life they had before the world burned. Harper simultaneously envied and pitied her. The girl used to live with extremely demanding, controlling parents. Sure, they’d been ‘kinda rich,’ but Grace had zero freedom, not even to make decisions about her own future or education. They’d even decided on her college major for her.

  How bad does it have to be for nuclear war to kill your parents and you feel relief?

  Harper couldn’t even imagine having zero love for her parents. As far as she’d come to understand, Grace didn’t hate them as much as had no feelings toward them at all beyond a sort of ‘ugh, go away and leave me alone’ distaste… plus a healthy amount of fear. She’d never have defied them when they’d been alive.

  She’d been so messed up, she didn’t even realize the world stopped. Thought she’d get in trouble for missing school.

  “Hey…” Darci nudged Renee. “You okay? Seem a little down.”

  “Yeah. I’m dealing. I got all the sobbing out of my system when those creeps had me locked in a room. Being here is about as awesome as it can get. Only thing better would be a rewind button for time and no war.”

  Darci looked at her small coffee cup. “Yeah. Need something a little stronger than coffee, but gotta be good for at least another like six months.”

  “Welcome to the start of birthdays sucking.” Cliff held his mug up in toast toward Renee. “It’s all downhill from eighteen.”

  “Not twenty-one?” Carrie clinked her mug with his.

  Harper, Darci, and Logan joined in as well. Renee passed on the coffee, but she clinked her water glass.

  Cliff raised both eyebrows. “No drinking age anymore. Suppose eighteen doesn’t really matter much, either.”

  “Doesn’t matter how old you get, cake is awesome.” Renee smiled. “Birthdays are only going to start sucking when we run out of cake mix.”

  Carrie chuckled. “We already did.”

  “But…” Renee pointed at everyone standing around eating. “Cake?”

  “Yes.” Carrie folded her arms. “Believe it or not, people made cake before Betty Crocker.”

  “How?” Renee stared at her like an Amish seeing a car for the first time.

  “Wow.” Madison whistled. “Holy blonde moment, Batman.”

  “Augh!” screamed Jon, overacting anguish.

  Everyone looked at him.

  “Little young for a moment of sudden existential crisis.” Cliff stuffed a forkful of cake into his mouth.

  “Jon?” asked Harper. “You okay?”

  He grinned. “Yeah. Maddie just made me think about my comics. I used to have a lot of them. Like a serious lot. Some collector ones. No, I don’t want to go back looking for them. Just being funny.”

  “You could always draw new ones.” Harper patted him on the head.

  “Ooh.” Jonathan lit up. “Yeah!”

  “Sounds fun.” Grace bit her lip. “But is it really practical now? I mean, it takes a lot of time to learn how to draw.”

  Cliff wagged his fork at her. “People need art and entertainment. If we don’t have a reason to smile anymore, what’s the point of surviving, right?”

  “Maybe he does it in his spare time?” Carrie scratched her head. “People have to be alive to enjoy art. Survival’s gotta come first.”

  Darci flailed her arms. “What the hell is it about art? Why does everyone always act like it’s not a real job or real career?”

  “Hate to say it, but nothing’s a ‘real job’ anymore.” Cliff sectioned off another bit of his cake onto his fork. “Which might actually be a good thing. An artist contributes to the overall health and wellbeing of the town. At least now, they don’t have to worry about money for food or rent.”

  “Seriously, though. How did you make this without mix?” Renee nibbled on a bit of cake. “This is cake, right?”

  Darci held her plate up to eye level. “Looks like cake. Smells like cake. Must be cake.”

  “Honey…” Carrie put an arm around her. “We need to spend some kitchen time together. Since I’m kinda-sorta your mom now, I should get to work.”

  Cliff seemed to be forcing himself not to eat his entire piece in four bites. “This is the best cake I’ve ever tasted. A lot of stuff we had—like cake—simply became easier and faster to produce with technology, but was possible before. Except for weird crap like dinosaur-shaped pasta.”

  Everyone laughed.

  “It’s probably the first sign of the downfall of a civilization,” muttered Cliff before eating his second-to-last bit of cake.

  “What is?” Harper raised an eyebrow.

  “Dino pasta.” Cliff exhaled, acting overly serious. “When the vast resources of a first world nation have the spare time to make little noodle tyrannosaurs and triceratops, it’s a giant red flag resources are being misallocated.”

  Harper nodded. “Right. Didn’t you say sneakers with lights in them heralded the downfall of civilization?”

  “Them too,” mumbled Cliff around the last of his cake.

  The kids ran outside to play again, tossing their plates and forks in the sink on the way.

  “Should start up a betting pool. How many minutes can they go unsupervised before there is screaming, crying, an explosion, or spontaneous unexplained streaking?” Cliff chuckled.

  “Bad bet.” Harper headed for the back door. “Because I’m not leaving them unsupervised.”

  Renee, Darci, Grace, and Logan followed. They sat around the back porch talking, mostly about random things like being bored, missing movies or television, and so on.

  “They say people back then had lots of kids to increase the odds of a few living to adulthood.” Grace scratched her head. “I think they had lots of kids because there wasn’t anything else to do for fun.”

  Renee laughed.

  “Truth.” Darci patted her stomach. “The universe is cruel.”

  “How so?” asked Renee. “I mean, beyond the obvious. What do you specifically mean?”

  “This baby exists because of weed, but I can’t have weed until I hatch.”

  Renee and Harper chuckled.

  “You jonesing for it?” asked Logan.

  “Not really. I miss feeling relaxed more than being high. Not su
re they’re different.” Darci chuckled. “But I can’t exactly feed a baby pot-laced breast milk, so I might end up being sober way longer than is healthy for people I interact with.”

  They all laughed.

  Harper leaned against Logan. “People back then must have come up with some way to entertain themselves other than constantly having sex. I mean, no one in those days had the time to invent dinosaur-shaped noodles.”

  Mila punted the ball across the yard, trying to score a long-distance goal. Elijah strayed into the path and ate it square in the side of the head. Despite it being a relatively soft blue ball and not a legit soccer ball, it still knocked him over sideways.

  He wailed.

  “Ack! Sorry!” yelled Mila.

  “Screaming!” called Cliff from inside the house. “Twelve minutes. Longer than expected.”

  Elijah scrambled to his feet, dodged Mila’s attempted apology hug, and ran straight to Darci, wailing.

  Cliff poked his head out the door. “Any blood?”

  “Nope,” said Harper. “Ball upside the head.”

  Mila, holding the offending rubber orb, approached the porch. “Sorry. Didn’t see him.”

  “It’s okay, kiddo.” Darci patted the boy on the back. “I saw. Just an accident.”

  “Fuzzy!” yelled Lorelei.

  Harper’s blood practically froze in her veins. She looked left toward the girl’s voice, dreading what she’d see. Please be a rabbit. Please be a rabbit.

  A black bear poked its head over the rear fence, sniffing at the chicken coop.

  Lorelei waved. “Hi, Mr. Bear!”

  “Don’t eat those chickens!” yelled Madison. “They’re not food chickens.”

  Time seemed to grind to a standstill. Harper gripped the .45 on her belt, unsure if it would be effective or simply piss the bear off. Shooting a bear in front of Madison would not go over well either, but she’d rather deal with an upset sister than a mauled one.

  Everyone stood still—including the chickens. A moment later, the bear lost interest and dropped out of sight behind the fence.

  The kids all continued staring at the fence where the bear appeared for another two minutes. All at once, they seemed to forget entirely about the bear and resumed playing their odd version of soccer—except for Madison, who went to comfort Rosie and Mr. Cluck.