A. R. Shaw's Apocalyptic Sampler: Stories of hope when humanity is at its worst

by A. R. Shaw

  “You should teach Bang and the girls too,” Tala said.

  “This boy already knows. He makes his own arrows now,” Ennis said.

  “Yeah, we need to teach them everything we can,” Graham said. Who knows what will happen to them? I was thinking about that this afternoon before the cougar attack. Hell, we need to learn things ourselves, but this is an entirely new world for these kids.”

  “Not only that, we all need to learn how to start growing a garden. I don’t think we’ll find too many vegetables through this winter that we got coming.”

  Ennis was right. “That’s for sure. Maybe we’ll at least come across some canned vegetables tomorrow.” Graham added that to his mental wish list as Sheriff came over and sat next to him on the floor. “How you doing, boy?” he asked as he scratched the dog under the collar.

  “That dog’s got it together more than we do,” Ennis said.

  Tala nodded. “He sure started growling before Marcy and I ever heard the gunshot this afternoon.”

  “He’s a keeper,” Ennis said. “Goodnight, kids, this old man gots to get some sleep.”

  “I’m right behind you, Ennis,” said Graham.

  29

  The Scavenger Hunt

  The next morning Ennis waved good-bye as the group left him and Sheriff behind. Sheriff moaned a little at their departure, clearly wanting to go along. “What’s the matter with you—I’m not good company?” Ennis asked the dog.

  Sheriff stomped his front paws, agitated that he wasn’t invited on the ride.

  “It’s all right, we’ll go get us some fish,” Ennis said, and they wandered off down the trail with Sheriff casting a look back to where the others had gone, clearly worried.

  Ennis had already pulled in two trout when he saw the canoe. Like any old man who’d made it this far, even without an apocalypse to contend with his eyes weren’t very good. So he figured it’d been there for a while before he’d even noticed the thing, breaking its way across the far end of the lake. There were two men paddling. Both appeared bearded, which wasn’t unusual these days, but they also looked fat, and that was quite unusual. Not only that, but something about them triggered Ennis’s long-buried cop intuition. That was a bad thing.

  Sheriff came up beside him and stared out into the distance as he tried to smell them. As if he sensed Ennis’s apprehension, the dog’s hackles rose and he growled low and ominously.

  Sheriff looked up questioningly at Ennis, and Ennis knew he wanted an answer. “Those some bad guys.” As if they’d heard his conversation with the dog, one of the two occupants of the canoe raised his hand in recognition, like one would do in the old days. Ennis did not raise his hand back, hoping they’d get the message that they were unwelcome. He was uneasy about them, but couldn’t say just why. They continued on their route to the other end of the lake, but Ennis thought it wasn’t good, those guys knowing he and the rest were there. Still, he continued to bait his line and cast it out from his spot on the shore, tossing a too-small trout back into the water while Sheriff waded out to watch it squiggle under the water until it faded into the murky depths.

  Graham stopped the Scout outside the post office and checked for predators before he got out. The door jingled from a bell attached to the handle, now a bygone symbol, alerting those no longer in the back to customers waiting for service. It sounded strangely out of place here in this time. Somehow, he still expected to hear a disembodied voice call out, “I’ll be right there.”

  His boots made a foreign sound now on the tiled flooring. He looked at the wall of tiny brass mailbox doors and knew all the previous owners were gone now. He stood still and listened for a minute but heard nothing and smelled only a musty odor. He looked around for any sign of the boy from Carnation but found none. The main door to the postmaster’s counter was locked, and Graham didn’t see any reason to break it open. He could see through the glass, and what lay beyond held no use for them.

  He walked out, having forgotten to check before he opened the door and saw Tala frantically pointing out the window, trying to get his attention. Before he turned his head, he heard what they were concerned about.

  Graham could only later describe the sound as a “gruffling” for the loss of any better word. The sight was much more horrific than the sound though, which froze Graham in his spot. Hoping the bear was as unaware of him as he’d been of it, he moved slowly to his truck door, opened it quietly, and jumped in.

  Tala had made Bang and the girls get down on the truck’s floorboards to stay out of sight. Graham caught her gaze and shared with her the horror of watching the carnage as the bear gnawed at a long dead human, pawing at the old corpse and spreading its spoiled entrails around the sidewalk. It apparently had dragged the individual out of what was once the corner market.

  “Can we go?” Marcy asked in a small but clearly agitated voice. Graham suspected she’d looked, despite Tala’s attempt at protecting the kids.

  “You bet,” he said, and made sure his door was locked before he started the engine, quickly putting it into reverse and moving on. The bear never looked in their direction, being too invested in his current prize.

  Somehow, a week of the relative safety at the cabin had made them forget just how bad it was in the real world. They certainly had their own dangers there, like the prowling cougar, but having not encountered a dead body in more than a week, Graham had allowed himself to relax into a false sense of security on the issue of dead flesh and the creatures that desired it.

  It didn’t take them long to get to the first house they were going to scavenge for useful things. Their earlier, jovial mood had been sunk by the bear incident, so now they were each a little on edge, but Graham had a feeling that it should be that way, anyway; too much complacency and they would slip up and lose someone through carelessness.

  Cascade was a tiny town with only a market and a post office, surrounded by the downtrodden remnants of a long-gone logging industry. Its glory days had been way back during the gold rush and even then, due to the rough terrain, the town didn’t get much traffic. The last decade had brought in a little more wealth in terms of campers and nature seekers, but it remained nothing more than an insignificant town—town being the loosest of terms.

  Graham had planned to take a look at the first house next to the post office and work his way around, but in light of this recent event he adjusted his tactic. Instead, they drove to the farthest point away from the bear and started at what was once the check-in office of the campground. They hoped to get hold of some first aid supplies, especially bandages, as theirs were dwindling.

  The campground office door was clearly knocked off its hinges and hanging partway into the shabby building. Graham remembered attending summer camp here, swimming in the lake, and once or twice he’d come into this building as a boy with a scraped knee or some other ailment. He looked around for signs of danger, and then stepped out of the truck and over to the entrance. The smell hit him first, causing him to wince. Someone had been inside this place. That’s when he noticed the bloody handprints dried on the walls, as if someone had been clinging to the doorframe as he or she was dragged out by the feet. The hairs on the back of Graham’s neck stood on end. Someone had met a violent end here, and it gave the whole place a very creepy feeling.

  He scouted around outside the small building and didn’t see a dead body anywhere, so he wondered where the horrid stench was coming from. He went back in and pushed the flimsy door in midway; it teetered at an odd angle, attached by only one hinge.

  The place had already been ransacked. Papers and useless material cluttered the floor and counter. Then he heard a loud buzzing. Flies; a huge abundance of them. Though the weather had grown cooler, they’d certainly found a haven in here. He peeked in farther and saw what was left of a body. He couldn’t tell if it was male or female, but the thing he did know was that this was a recent kill. This person had been alive in the past week and had not likely died from the virus. It was obvious tha
t animals had taken their share. If Graham hadn’t had already been unnerved, he certainly was now. He wheeled around and vomited at the side of the building and as quickly as possible went back to the truck.

  The kids looked even more scared now, and Tala looked at him inquiringly. “There’s a dead body in there. It smells pretty bad and the place has already been ransacked,” Graham said.

  “Do you think there’s someone else here?” Tala asked.

  “If there is, I don’t want to meet him,” he said.

  “There’s more, but I don’t think I should say. We’ll talk about it later,” he said, gesturing to the back. “I think we should make our way back and start closer to home.”

  Tala nodded; the prior enthusiasm in the truck had already been diminished by the bear, and even more so with this incident.

  Graham knew what his gut was telling him, but he wasn’t prepared for another Campos; that is what he feared most beyond wild animals.

  They all kept a look out for anything unusual that lurked about, but everything about Cascade seemed much like the desolate towns they had driven through on their way here. Cascade had the dreaded bonus of bear activity, however.

  They drove through the loop of the small town and looked at the houses along the way for signs of break-ins. A few stood with opened front doors that they hadn’t noticed before. They wouldn’t bother to check those, but drove farther out to the road by the turn-off, the way they’d come in.

  Graham rolled down his window to listen as they slowly rolled up to a home on the outskirts of town. They drove along the graveled drive and parked behind a maroon Chevy truck. “If we can find the keys, it might be a useful truck to take back,” Graham said to Tala.

  “Yeah, the open bed could come in handy to haul more. We have limited space in this thing,” she said.

  Graham looked around for predators; this was becoming a much stronger habit now. The large house, set back at the end of the long driveway, was more secluded than most. The lime green exterior with white trim harked back a couple of decades or more, as did the split-level design. The place appeared to be well kept. The green front lawns and numerous trees, including a monkey tree located as a hallmark in the center of the front lawn, showed signs of someone who really enjoyed yard maintenance. He could see part of a swing set in the backyard, nicely maintained, with pea gravel bedding and railroad ties bordering the play area.

  “Great—kids,” he said under his breath, and caught Tala’s look of sympathy.

  “All right, guys, this is what we’re going to do. Tala, you cover me. I’ll go up to the door and try to peek in to see if everything looks okay, and then I’ll motion for you to come in,” Graham said. “Make sure you bring your weapons with you.” He thought for a second how ironic it was that in such a short time he’d begun urging children to use guns.

  “Tala will walk you guys in. Bring the bags and boxes with you. If you see any people, hide and let me handle things. If you see any animals, yell. Understood?”

  They all said that they did, and Graham looked around once more and wondered if this was such a good idea after all. Maybe they would just make do with what they had, because this wasn’t worth losing someone. He decided this would be the only house they checked out today because a suspicion that there were other people in town continued to prey on his nerves.

  So far, this morning had carried a blanket of mist, which the lazy sun was just now beginning to burn off. There was a faint odor of what might be spoiled food inside the home and he guessed it would be stronger once the door was opened. He walked past the truck and tried the door handle just in case it was unlocked. It wasn’t.

  Graham moved slowly up the stairs and knocked, feeling foolish, but in case someone was home he didn’t want to get shot at. No one answered, so he tried the door and found that it was locked too. He peered into the side window by the door and could see through the sheer drapes into the living area. From what he could see, it looked tidy enough. Across the room he spotted a sliding glass door through the dining area. He descended the steps and went around back, up a long wooden staircase, and onto the back porch. He looked inside the tidy and well-kept home and saw no living thing apparent. He tried the slider and it moved open a few inches, so he listened for any reaction and heard none as he continued to open it.

  Graham walked onto the rug of the dining room and saw that not only was the kitchen sparkling clean, without a dish in the sink, but a dining table before him was laid out with dishes on placemats and cloth napkins artistically looped through rings. He closed the door and wiped his feet on the doormat, then thought himself foolish for being so polite as he stepped on the vinyl flooring.

  With his rifle ready, Graham quietly looked around the wall that led to the living area, and then followed the hallway that led to the laundry and bathroom combo, where he found the keys to the truck and house neatly displayed on wooden pegs. Then he went out to the two-car garage. A man hung there, dangling from a rope tied to a rafter. There was a pool of liquid that had spread under the overturned stepladder the poor soul had kicked aside. He saw a note pinned to the fellow’s shirt. Holding his breath, he approached closer, pulled the note off the body, and took it back out with him into the light of the bathroom.

  To whoever finds me:

  My wife Camille, son Jacob, and daughter Emily died of the China Pandemic. I find I cannot live without them. Whoever finds me, please bury me with my family in the back. I already dug the hole, so just drop me in there. In exchange, please take whatever you need. May God be with you.

  Marvin Chandler

  Graham wondered how many other people had done the same. He himself had considered suicide after Nelly died, but his dad had made him promise. Now Graham thought that might have been too much to ask of a man, and he could see this fellow must have thought the same.

  He closed the curtains on the sliding glass doors to block the view of the backyard, then walked over to the front door and left it open, letting the others know everything checked out. He motioned for them to come in and, after looking around for predators or other dangers, they closed the doors of the truck silently and moved toward the house.

  “I have to do something in the garage and yard first, but you guys go ahead and start packing. Don’t come out there, though, and leave the curtains closed; we don’t want to attract any attention—from bears or anyone else. It’ll probably take me about twenty minutes, and then we need to get out of here.”

  Tala didn’t question him and closed the door behind the kids. He headed out back to the garage and saw a big orange wheelbarrow loaded with a shovel, hacksaw, and gray tarp situated by the door leading to the backyard, all at the ready.

  “Made it as easy as he could,” Graham muttered underneath his breath. He felt an obligation to honor the man’s wishes, and at least now it didn’t feel like he was stealing the man’s belongings.

  He moved the wheelbarrow over to the body and righted the ladder, then unfolded the tarp under the body and grabbed the hacksaw. As best he could, he positioned the wheelbarrow beneath the hanging man and cut the rope; the corpse fell into the sturdy wheelbarrow in a heap. The stench of rotting flesh became overpowering and Graham rushed to the back door to let in some fresh air. He vomited again, then tried to take some of the unspoiled damp air into his lungs. As he was bent over he heard a meowing, and saw a thin and dirty white cat with blue eyes staring up at him.

  Graham decided it must have belonged to the family. He scratched the cat behind the ears, but it continued to meow at him, clearly hungry. He left the door open to air the garage out and walked over to the stairs leading to the back porch to open the slider. The cat followed him and ran inside the house.

  “Awww . . .” Marcy said and stopped taking cans out of the pantry to come over to the cat.

  “We can’t keep it, so don’t even ask,” Graham said.

  “Sheriff would eat it,” said Bang.

  “Maybe not,” Marcy interjected.

>   “Look, see if there’s any cat food around. It must have been the owner’s. Feed it and let it back out. It’s a miracle it’s survived this long anyhow,” he said. Graham then whispered to Tala, “I have to bury someone out back. Keep the kids from looking if you can.”

  “Sure, no problem. Can we start loading up the truck while you’re busy?” she asked.

  “No, just start putting stuff inside the front door. I want to make sure the coast is clear,” he said.

  Before he could go back to the garage to finish his task, Macy spoke up and said, “Check it out, Graham, I found a calendar!” She displayed it with a wave not unlike like Vanna White’s on Wheel of Fortune. He smiled and returned to his grim business.

  Graham had his gun slung around his back as usual, and he wheeled the corpse out to where the open grave waited. He looked into the hole; other than rainwater and a few fallen leaves, it was clear. He really didn’t have time to make it a more noble procedure, and he didn’t think the guy expected that anyway. It wasn’t difficult. He tipped the corpse, tarp and all, into the grave and began shoveling the mound of dirt over the man.

  Afterward he was sweaty, so Graham rubbed his shirtsleeve across his face. Somehow, the smell still lingered. He wondered when this would come to an end, this staring at graves.

  He put the shovel back into the wheelbarrow and walked it back into the garage. He went inside, washed his soil-covered hands, and saw the water turn gray and then clear again.

  As Graham went back into the garage he noticed a small white Kenmore freezer next to the door to the kitchen and was surprised he’d missed it, since he’d walked right by it when he first came in.

  Bang, with big eyes, came out to the garage and wrinkled his nose at the smell, but all he said was, “There are lots of guns on the bed upstairs, with bullets too.”