The Alliance

by Jolina Petersheim

  It’s about the biggest contradiction you can imagine: this redneck Rambo, who’s bent on blasting anything that moves, confined to the rules of a community that doesn’t want us to hurt a fly. But I know why Charlie stays, and it’s not only because he thinks he’s the ringleader of our rough-and-ready militia. It’s because he has no one else around here, not even a dog, and surviving can be a lonely business when you’re doing it by yourself. I know because after I came home from the desert and cut myself off from the rest of society, that’s exactly what I tried.

  “Jabil gonna meet us at the Suburban?” Charlie asks. The same question he’s asked and I’ve answered about a thousand times. I’m starting to think it’s a nervous tic—a way to fill up the stagnant air until we get moving again. Over at Field to Table, I hear Henri slam the Suburban’s hood. He crosses over to us, wiping grease from his stained hands. I notice a gold wedding band gleaming against the grime, but he’s never mentioned a wife. I guess some people might be grateful for the separating effects of the EMP.

  “Everything looks good,” he says. “But it’s been hot-wired, so the ignition’s ripped—”

  Charlie interrupts, “I know about hot-wiring.” I look over at him and raise an eyebrow. Despite his bandolier of bullets, shining like the pirate caps on his back teeth, and camo bandanna, Charlie reminds me of an overeager Boy Scout, not someone who skulks around town, hot-wiring vehicles. He acknowledges my look and shrugs. “I read about it somewhere.”

  It wouldn’t surprise me a lick if Charlie’s one of those eccentric geniuses who has the social skills of a hermit but who could’ve invented the lightbulb if Thomas Edison hadn’t gotten to it first. I’m grateful he’s taken a good look at the map. If we lose it, maybe his photographic memory can recall where we’re supposed to go—and more importantly, where we’re not.

  About halfway up the lane, I spot two people walking. I shade my eyes against the sun and see that it’s Leora and Sal. A ring of turkey vultures rises above the field behind them, like Gothic versions of Icarus, trying to reach the sun. With timing so perfect it must be calculated, Jabil comes out of the dawdi haus right when they’re passing by and nods stiffly as their paths overlap. Leora nods too. Even from here, I can see the tension swaying between them like a massive heat wave. I’m not going to waste my energy trying to figure them out. It’s none of my business what they do.

  “Hey, Jabil,” I say as he mournfully watches Leora enter Field to Table with Sal.

  “Hey, yourself.” Jabil gives me a look that reminds me of his uncle.

  “Well—” Charlie claps his hands and smiles—“everybody’s here. Good. I’ll drive, Moses can ride shotgun with me. Jabil?” He nods at Jabil, who appears annoyed by Charlie’s enthusiasm. “I want you to guard the back.”

  The skin pulls tight across Jabil’s cheekbones. “I can’t ‘guard’ anything. You know that. And besides, I’m not going along because I want to; I’m going along to ensure that you all honor the community while you’re out there.”

  Charlie snorts. “Somebody got his suspenders in a knot.” But I cut him a glance and he looks ashamed, or as ashamed as someone socially impaired like Charlie can. Switching tactics, he says, “I guess—uh, you can ride shotgun with me, and Moses can guard the back. I mean, really guard it. We gotta be smart here, guys. No doubt the town’s got plenty of weapons in the wrong hands, and I bet even decent people are getting desperate enough to do things they normally wouldn’t.” But his flashing pirate’s grin contradicts his warning.

  Charlie gets into the Suburban and cranks the engine. Jabil takes off his hat and ducks down low before maneuvering his lanky body into the passenger side. I open the back hatch and climb in, place my revolver crosswise on my lap, and see that an AR-15 is already propped in the corner within reaching distance. The interior smells of sweat and gore. The sagging ceiling’s tacked with a constellation of pushpins. But the Suburban runs like a top, and not only does she run, the tank’s almost full of gas, which is a priceless break.

  Charlie shifts into reverse and then drive, directing the Suburban’s dinosaurian body out past Field to Table and toward the gates that are being guarded by Henri and Sean.

  Nobody in the community is coming out to wave good-bye or wish us luck—not even Leora, which surprises me somewhat, considering how eager she was for us to obtain ammunition. Part of this might be because it’s still so early and—besides the few women who have been up since before dawn, packing supplies at Field to Table—nearly everyone’s in their kitchens cleaning up breakfast or out in their barns doing chores. But I have to wonder if the other reason they’re not saying good-bye is because we’re not the good guys going off to war and we’re not the bad. Our survival instincts have mixed black and white until our consciences are color-blind to anything but the indefinite shade of gray.

  I am about to turn around to peer through the windshield when Sal comes out of Field to Table and stands in the center of the lane where the weeds need cut, watching us with her legs firmly planted and her left hand making the sign of the cross. It’s a gesture I saw my devout mom do all her life, but it seems out of place on Sal, and not only because she’s using the wrong hand. She doesn’t seem the type to rely on anything other than herself, and she sure doesn’t seem the type to pray for others. Yet I shouldn’t judge. Over the years, I’ve seen self-proclaimed agnostics hit their knees and pray with the fluency of longtime disciples when faced with a life-and-death situation. Maybe Sal’s trying to comfort herself the best way she knows. Or maybe she somehow knows about my Catholic background and is trying to comfort me.

  Before my first deployment—back before I witnessed such carnage and began to believe we’re all just an accident of physics—I too tried to imagine something greater than all of us, and I prayed with a zeal my mom would’ve been proud of . . . if she’d known. I went so far as to get a cross tattooed on my chest, hoping that when God saw my broken body sprawled on the parched mosaic of the desert floor—struggling to take its next breath—he would notice that symbol of consecration, more than the blood on my hands, and draw me close to himself.

  But then, I wasn’t the one who died. Regardless of the number of my deployments, and no matter how many close calls I had, I was never the one who died. Aaron was the same. It got to where our comrades started treating us like talismans and felt invincible if we were around. “Moses and Aaron gonna lead us out of captivity and into the Promised Land,” they joked, slapping our Lightweight Helmets before climbing out of the Humvee, like we basketball players used to slap the locker room beam before running out for the big game.

  The point is, I couldn’t protect them. We couldn’t protect them. Instead, too many times they were felled while we remained standing and walked away unscathed—men who had wives and children at home and, some, newborn infants they’d only seen through Skype—which seemed unfair, since we had nobody back home to mourn us but our parents and grandpa.

  Then that changed. A black cat crossed the road. A mirror broke. Salt spilled. A rosary bead slipped through my mom’s fingers. Something. And the protective membrane rent. My brother was felled, and I remained, disoriented and bloody, but—miraculously, cruelly—alive.

  I can feel my lungs compressing, and when I look down, my fingers are wrapped around the gun, knuckles ridged and white. I’ve carried a gun since I’ve been home, something tangible in place of my intangible faith, but I haven’t used one in a year. The thought makes me sick.

  I consciously relax my hold and look away from the lane and out through the windshield. Henri, up on the scaffolding, jerks back on the bolts and pulls the counterweight to open the gates. Sean leans down and smacks the roof, the unexpected jolt making memories rise like bile in my throat. I turn around to face the smudged glass of the hatch, trying to breathe through my nose without making it obvious and to focus on anything but my panic.

  Refugees are camping in the field across the road, probably waiting until the soup line starts up again,
so they are going to be disappointed when it doesn’t. Still, there are not as many as there were two days ago, and I wonder if the blood marking the gravel outside the community has made everyone pass over us like the death angel passed over the Israelites’ hyssop-swiped doorposts in Egypt. Who knows what kind of rumors have been circulating about what happened that day the boys were shot from our gate. I hate to admit it, but if the refugees fear us, it may be a good thing since we will soon be unable to feed ourselves—not to mention the strangers who expect to take from us and then continue on their journey.

  The groups of people cluttering the main road now part around the Suburban like two halves of the Red Sea. It’s clear from how little attention they pay to our vehicle that it’s not the first working one they’ve seen since the newer ones shut down. Their soiled clothes blur into the surrounding landscape as Charlie presses the gas and we pick up speed. It’s impossible to count the magnitude of their numbers, but I know they can’t all be Liberty citizens trying to escape.

  They must be making their way from the various smaller towns that dot the countryside, hoping to find some help and safety in the larger county seat. But having reached their destination, it is obvious that they can see the best thing is to keep moving. This may also be true for the Mt. Hebron community, despite its pretense of self-sufficiency and the fortified wall, which could be breached far more easily than any of us are willing to admit.

  Along the road are suitcases of all styles, shapes, and hues. Most have been ransacked and are yawning open—the unwanted contents spilled across the grass. I see a guitar case covered in concert decals and a jogging stroller, the wheels intact, which causes me to pause and wonder what happened to the child. I see Jabil looking at the stroller as well—his profile ashen. He presses his thumbs against his temples as if to ward off a headache. Having been sheltered inside the community, he must find it horrific to imagine what choices other people have faced.

  I call up to him, “It’s harsh, isn’t it?”

  Jabil nods. He puts his hat back on and folds his arms, as if embarrassed I saw how that empty stroller affected him. But he should know I am being affected too. Adrenaline surges through my veins at a faster rate the closer to our destination we draw, as I anticipate someone attempting to hijack our vehicle around every turn. But Liberty, which was teeming with life three days post-EMP, is a ghost of its former self. The buildings have been gutted of every usable resource. The road is strewn with a confetti of refuse. The Dairy Shack has been burned to the ground, smoke wafting into the air from the center of the blackened pile of ash.

  Jabil spreads the map across the dashboard and traces his fingers down the blue and red veins of the city. “Where do you want to go first?” he asks.

  Charlie says, “Armory,” and meets my eyes before rolling his in the rearview mirror, as if saying that was a stupid question.

  Jabil looks over at Charlie looking at me, and though I know he must feel slighted, he makes no comment. He simply measures the space and says, “It should be a few blocks from here.”

  Charlie turns the wheel, navigating down the streets. The leaden sky presses down on us like a weight, the gray swatch tapering out to the gray asphalt, as if we’ve been decimated by nuclear fallout rather than an EMP. Up ahead, we see someone—more of a ghost clad in rags than a man—dart around a large building resembling a civic center and then enter through an emergency exit. Charlie maneuvers his rifle and awkwardly angles it out the window. Jabil takes a small Bible from the pocket of his pants. The image of them sitting side by side would be comical if our situation weren’t so grim.

  I listen to the sound of the tires rolling over asphalt, the inhalation through everyone’s nostrils with no audible exhalation, making it seem that the air itself lacks the ability to sustain life. My hair stands up on end, and I wonder if it’s because we are in immediate danger or if it’s because I am expecting, at any moment, to be fired upon.

  Charlie motions to the building. “There must be something good in there.”

  “You’re kidding me, right?”

  He shrugs, already making his way up the sloping drive, the structure’s corrugated roof glinting. “I could take ’im,” he says.

  I keep my mouth shut, since he’s the one driving and wouldn’t listen to me anyway, but it seems pretty stupid to enter a building we know is occupied simply because it might have something we want. This thought process reminds me of those two high school boys who tried penetrating our gate, which doesn’t bode well for our reconnaissance mission. A small black-and-white dog comes trotting down the center of the street, still wearing its collar. I can tell by the way it’s reacting to the sight of our vehicle that it’s been abandoned. In a few weeks, maybe less, that dog will starve to death or, worse, become a starving person’s next meal.

  “Anything back there?” Charlie calls to me.

  “Nope. Nothing but a hungry-looking mutt.”

  “Good. Who’s staying with the truck?”

  Jabil says, “I will.”

  I look at him, wondering how he’s going to protect himself and the vehicle without a weapon. “Take this.” Jabil eyes my gun that I’m trying to pass over the seats. “Just take it,” I say. “You don’t have to shoot it, but the sight alone might give you an edge.”

  Jabil takes my gun, holding it by the barrel as if it can shoot by itself. Charlie drives around a landscaped stand of trees and parks next to a storage shed behind the center, where the Suburban will hopefully remain out of sight of anyone patrolling the street. He switches off the engine, but neither he nor I make an effort to get out. “Well.” Charlie clears his throat and fidgets with the keys. “I reckon we’re not gonna find out what’s in there just sitting in the truck.”

  The two of us exit the vehicle and walk in silence up to the building, which is elevated above town, providing a rather unsightly widescreen vista of the destruction and desolation of what was once, no doubt, the beautiful town of Liberty. My chest tightens as I pause in front of the national and state flags, flapping in the same gusts of air twirling the litter in the streets below, and I see that someone had the forethought to lower them to half-mast. I am surprised the flags haven’t been stolen for cover, or for spite, since our government has failed its citizens—or at least the citizens of Montana, since we don’t know how far the tentacles of the EMP have reached. But perhaps even mendicants have their looting limitations.

  I continue walking, keeping the AR-15 ready and my head down low. Charlie is ahead of me by about ten steps. We move around the side of the building, searching for the emergency exit the man used. I glance over my shoulder at the Suburban. Jabil is sitting on the passenger side. His straw hat blocks the upper part of his face so that I can only see the firm set of his jaw and mouth. In front of me, Charlie’s boots clang on the metal steps as he goes up to the door, propped open with a tennis shoe. An invitation or a lure. Either way, not a good sign.

  Before opening the door, Charlie pauses just long enough for me to know that most of his machismo is for show. Without thinking, I pad up the steps as quietly as possible and slide in front of him. I can tell he’s scared. I’m scared too, but I’ve been trained to master fear and use it to focus instead of letting it master me.

  I ease in through the propped door and hold it open for Charlie with the side of my shoe. I shoulder my weapon, my eye taking everything in across the iron frame of the sights. The hallway’s white tiles are illumined by the sunlight streaming in through the sparsely placed windows. The space itself is musty and rank. If someone’s living in here, I imagine they feel safer with the windows shut. Humans tend to revert to their basest—almost childlike—instincts when faced with insurmountable fear. I’ve also noticed that those who most fear losing their lives usually do. Maybe this is why I have lived through so many deployments: I don’t fear dying, so death does not come for me.

  Seeing nothing of alarm or interest, I turn and start making my way down the hall. I hear Charlie trudging
along behind, as light-footed as a gamboling bear. There is no use telling him to be quiet, so I just keep moving. A row of rooms, apparently offices, are on our left. To our right, on the wall, numerous iconic national images hang, set off by heavy gold frames: the Empire State Building, the White House, the Statue of Liberty, Mount Rushmore, and the three New York firefighters raising the flag in front of the remnants of the World Trade Center . . . all such symbols of national pride. The irony of it does not pass me by, for who knows what has befallen these symbols now.

  I stare for a second and then shift my eyes to the left again, peering down through the row of offices. Most are locked when I try the doors, and then I see that the fourth has been jimmied with a crowbar. I push the door with the barrel of my gun, scanning behind it and the desk before stepping inside. The desk drawers have been dumped onto the floor, documents and papers crumpled and stamped with shoeprints. On the desk are three framed photographs. The first is a picture of a family on vacation, all lined up against a backdrop of snow in thick winter coats and clutching skis. Next is a picture of them at the beach: same people, same blond hair, but now all tanned and lined up against a backdrop of water. The last picture—a 4×6, like the rest—is just of the parents twenty or so years ago. They’re holding each other close and smiling, like they can never imagine anything going wrong in their picture-perfect world.

  “See anything?” Charlie asks, poking his nose around the door.

  “Not much. I’ll be right there.” For some reason, I can’t leave without turning all three pictures facedown, as if I’m closing the eyelids of someone who’s died. Then I pull the door behind me, and we continue walking down the hall. I peer through the rectangular window on the left side of two huge wooden doors. Basketball nets and the polished gleam of the court make it easy to discern that the space is a gymnasium. I take a breath and push the right door open.

  Immediately, I know the bathrooms along the back wall are the source of the horrible stench that hit us as soon as we stepped into the building. The trash, sleeping bags, suitcases, and clothing strewn in front of the bleachers reveal that many people were using the civic center for shelter and therefore were probably also using the toilets as if they still flushed.