by Angie Morel
That’s where hope was. That’s where I needed to be.
“Hope…”
There was an odd vibration in my throat. Closing my mouth, I swallowed. So dry.
And then there was the sensation of water trickling into my mouth. I tried not to panic, but managed to suck in at the wrong time anyway, bringing a mixture of air and water into my lungs. A coughing fit immediately followed. After a couple of minutes the coughing subsided but by then it didn’t matter because all I could focus on was the blinding pain in my head and side. My eyes tried opening to see what was happening, what was causing the pain, but they wouldn’t open, and then it got to be too much of an effort to continue trying.
I was so tired. And I hurt so badly.
One more cough escaped before I sank back into the soft blackness waiting for me. It was a place I didn’t feel pain. I wrapped it around me like a quilt. There were things in the darkness that comforted me. They whispered.
I was aware of two things instantly—one, my head felt on the verge of cracking open, and two, a sharp pain was stabbing me in the side. Moving even a fraction made both of those areas scream at me to stop. Instead of moving, I concentrated on breathing. Each inhale and exhale made the sharp pain in my side more pronounced.
What happened to me? Was I in some sort of accident?
With my eyes still closed, I worked on figuring out basic stuff. I was lying on a hard surface. My head was elevated, on a cushion or pillow or something. There was no sound that my ears could detect, so that gave me no clue as to where I was located.
Okay. Time to open my eyes.
The first attempt was pretty weak, but my lids were gummy and stuck shut. I lifted my eyebrows to aid in opening them, and discovered the source of my head pain. The shock of it ended up popping my eyes open. What the hell was wrong with my forehead?
I attempted to lift my hand to investigate but found it trapped by something. After a moment of panic, I discovered there was a blanket tucked around me like a mummy. Loosening the fabric a bit, I guided my hand out and slowly brought it up. My fingers, gentle as a puff of air, felt above my brow line. A ragged mass of twisted and torn flesh started mid-forehead and continued about three inches to my left hairline. The entire area was stiff and tacky with blood. And extremely tender. Carefully I brought my other arm out from the blanket cocoon, wincing at the sting in my side. I placed both hands on my stomach. Neutral ground.
The surroundings came into sharp focus. It was dim where I was, but there was enough light for me to make out some very strange images. Closing my gummy eyes, I counted to ten before opening them again.
Yep, Mickey Mouse was in an airplane above my head.
Shifting my eyes to the right, I encountered Goofy perched on a pedestal. I stared at him for a few seconds, almost daring him to talk. With careful precision I rotated my head to the left. Donald Duck was waving at me from the wall, and below him, by his webbed feet, stood a little boy. To the side of that…
Wait. A little boy?
Backtracking, I brought my gaze back to him. If my eyes weren’t deceiving me, he was a real boy. A boy wearing a dingy Mickey Mouse shirt and what looked like sweatpants. Matted blond hair stuck up from his head in dirty tufts and I could tell he was staring at me. That was all I could make out as he was a good ten or twelve feet away. However, the distance and murky light didn’t prevent me from noticing one more thing; he had the tense look of a wire pulled too tight—like he might bolt at any second.
Hoping it didn’t look like I was about to throw up from my headache—which was a serious possibility—I gave him a tentative smile. “Hey there.” Wow, had I been gargling with broken glass? Clearing my throat made the pain in my side say hello again.
He dropped his gaze, remaining silent.
“It’s okay, I won’t hurt you.” The second after the words were spoken, something dawned on me.
I didn’t know who the “I” was in that statement.
What was my name? I tried to think past the pain in my head.
Huh.
That’s funny, I thought. Everything was blank. I couldn’t recall who I was, who he was, or how I got here. Closing my eyes, I concentrated. After a handful of seconds, I reassessed the situation. No. No, it wasn’t funny at all. In fact, it was downright alarming. Swallowing down the bitter taste in my mouth, my attention returned to the store and the surrounding Disney paraphernalia, hoping to find an answer somewhere amid all the stuffed animals and costumes and figurines.
Peter Pan. His name came to mind with no problem. Princess Aurora, Captain Jack Sparrow. There were pajamas bearing the face of a smiling snowman. Olaf. In fact, most of the images and characters on the shelves and hangers were familiar. But when it came to me? There was nothing but a big black hole. Frustrated, I strained my brain, hunting for any little morsel of information hiding in there. Not a crumb.
Maybe all of this would start making sense if I sat up. My body was stiff and sore from lying prone on the hard floor, with particular emphasis on my lower back. Slowly rolling to the side, I pushed up to a sitting position, breathing heavy as pain pinched along my mid-section. The throbbing in my head, after brief explosion in protest of the position change, settled into a tolerable tempo after a minute.
I looked over at the boy again. He was still looking down, pushing the toe of his shoe against the carpet. But he had me in his sight. I could tell. He was watching me without appearing to watch me. For some reason this reminded me of something, or someone, but the memory remained out of reach. Okay, enough of this. It was time to fish for some answers. At the very least this boy could tell me how I got here, if not what had happened.
I cleared my throat before attempting to speak again. “So, what’s your name?”
Not a peep. After a few seconds I shrugged. “That’s okay, if you don’t want to tell me you don’t have to.”
His toe was really going to town on the carpet.
“Can I ask you a question, though? You see, I’m having a bit of a problem,” I began, a bit sheepishly. “Uh, I don’t know what I’m doing here, or—and this is kind of funny—who I am, exactly.”
After a few minutes I gave up trying for a response. Either he was really shy, traumatized, or simply didn’t want to talk. Instead, I concentrated on the daunting task of standing. Getting to my knees, I grasped the thick metal bar of the clothing rack next to me before putting one foot and then the other flat on the floor and pushing up. A wave of dizziness hit and then subsided. Still holding onto the clothing rack with my right hand, my left one pressed against my injured ribcage as I waited for the uptick of pain in my head, from yet another change in position, to pass. The pounding eased after a minute or two. Next I attempted a couple of steps. Weak, but doable.
Taking a slow turn around the store, I stopped here and there, pointing at characters, casually asking the boy if he knew them. The entire time he followed at a precise five feet behind me, silent. The short walk was taxing. Making my way to the back of the store, I sat on the edge of a layered stuffed animal display jutting out from the base of a gray and pink castle built into the back wall.
While wandering the store a thought had occurred to me. Where was everyone? It was just me and the boy in the store, obviously—but there hadn’t been anyone pass by out in the mall area when I took my stroll around the store. We couldn’t be the only ones in the entire mall, unless the mall was closed. Maybe it was early in the morning and they hadn’t yet opened. But that didn’t make sense either, because what were we doing here? And the store was a mess. In fact, it looked…abandoned, trashed. The whole thing was strange. I had so many questions for the boy. Hopefully I could get him to talk.
He ventured near, eyeballing me. I patted a spot on the wooden ledge to my left, smiling. A long hesitation followed, and then he relented, sliding onto the four-inch wide surface about two feet away. Yes! We were making progress. Hiding my elation at this small step, I looked away, acting casual. After a handful of seconds
, my body moved in small degrees until it was angled his direction. On my face was an encouraging expression, or so I hoped. “Sooooo, I need to call you something, since you won’t tell me your name. I’d tell you mine, but—hey hey—don’t know it,” I laughed, and then winced. “Ooh, no laughing.”
The boy had a somber look on his face. He remained silent, a tough sell. Time to try a different tactic. Glancing at his shirt, I nodded towards it. “You like Mickey Mouse?”
He looked down and put his hand on Mickey’s face, a nudge of a smile appearing.
“I like him too,” I paused, pretending to ponder. “Hey, I have an idea—how about if I call you Mickey?”
He continued to smile, looking up at me.
“I’ll take that as a yes. Mickey it is, until you tell me differently.”
After resting a bit, I used a mixture of poor mime gestures and words to get the message across to Mickey that I needed to get something to wrap around my ribs. I also indicated the need to clean and bandage the wound on my head. He seemed to understand, leading me to the front of the store. Judging by the way he’d watched while I talked and gestured, I was beginning to wonder if he was deaf and couldn’t talk. Answers sure wouldn’t come if that was the case.
Stepping into the mall, I halted, stunned at the sight. There were dead bodies everywhere. And judging from their charred, disintegrated look, they’d been dead for months.
What the hell had happened here? Had there been some sort of nuclear explosion or terrorist attack that the boy and I had somehow survived, while everyone else in the area didn’t? Sniffing the air, I wondered what nuclear fallout smelled like. The only scent that came to my nose, besides Mickey’s unwashed body, was decomposing flesh. Surprisingly, the odor wasn’t overpowering. It populated the air like background perfume, just strong enough so you never forgot it was there.
“Jesus Mickey, what happened here?”
There was no response, as expected.
When we reached the main level, I was surprised at the lack of dead bodies. It didn’t take long for me to figure out the reason. There were a few stores that had their mall security doors closed. Inside, piles of bodies were visible, carelessly flung atop one another with the cold disregard of genocide.
Which brought about a couple of questions—who had hauled all of the dead bodies in there, and where were those people now? I glanced at Mickey, who had his head down watching his feet move as he walked beside me. Nah, it couldn’t have been him. There was no way a little boy, who probably weighed fifty pounds soaking wet, could muscle the dead weight of grown adults into piles like that. It would take a few people to clear out that many bodies, as well as have enough strength to stack them atop each other.
If there were other people in the mall, I certainly didn’t hear them—or see them.
Whereas the upstairs was carpeted, the main level flooring was a shiny and smooth surface, consisting of large squares done in tasteful neutral colors. Three stories above was a dome made of arched glass. It alternated with thick steel bands and ran the length of the mall. Both the floor and the ceiling gave me a sense of déjà vu.
Mickey led me to Walgreens, so he must’ve understood my needs. There was a bench directly opposite the entrance. Head pounding, pain jabbing the right side of my ribcage, I reluctantly made the slight detour to the bench and sat, frustrated at my weakness. Mickey entertained himself by climbing onto the brick half-wall bordering the steps nearby, running along the top, and then leaping off when he reached the end. He must’ve done it twenty-five times while I rested. If only I had some of that energy.
Finally ready, I got up from the bench and made my way into Walgreens. Grabbing a basket near the door, my first stop was the bandage aisle. Ignoring the dead bodies, I went about placing wraps and gauze pads and sterile solutions into the basket. Next item—pain relievers. Locating the ibuprofen, I snatched a bottle off the shelf and twisted the cap off, dry crunching four caplets.
While roaming the quiet, disheveled store, an uneasy feeling began to grow. Standing in the food aisle, it hit me why. There was nothing left to eat or drink. The place had been ransacked.
Jesus. This was bad. How could I not remember the events leading to a catastrophe such as this? And now, grasping the fact that there was nothing to drink, I became very aware of the dry, gritty, bitterness going on inside my mouth. It also hit me that I was starving. My stomach tightened and grumbled in protest. Food was secondary, though. People could survive without food for a couple of weeks. Not water, though. Couldn’t survive long without that.
Deciding not to dwell on my hunger and thirst, I focused on the last item needed, located in the infant section. A brief surge of hope that somehow baby food had been overlooked flared in the back of my mind. There was none. Shoving aside my disappointment, I grabbed the item I’d been after in the first place. Mickey waited for me at the entrance. I gave him a thumbs-up.
The basket holding the goods was hooked through my arm and got heavier by the minute. By the time we got back to Disney, I swear the basket—and my feet—weighed a hundred pounds each. Breathing heavy, I placed the basket on the floor and carefully sat on the edge of the stuffed animal display, same spot as before. I was exhausted. Dumping my butt off, and then bracing my arms, I slowly leaned back, letting the stuffed animals support my upper body. After the sharp pain in my side eased, I sighed. It was stupid of me not to have wrapped my ribcage before doing this, but I was so tired. Probably not the best choice of resting places either, since it would be tough getting out of the cushy display with my legs draped over the edge, allowing no leverage. But oh, it felt good. So soft.
A little break, I thought, yawning.
Chapter 31
I knew I was screwed the instant awareness hit me. The back of my head had burrowed in at some point during my sleep, making contact with the wooden step that supported the uppermost layer of toys, crimping my neck in the process. And instead of staying beneath me, the stuffed animals had floated up to bob at my sides, like they were trading places, offended that someone dared to nap on them. The hard surface of the display didn’t make my ribs happy at all. After those aches and pains were acknowledged and categorized, I realized the circulation had been cut off from my legs. They were dead weights hanging, and it wouldn’t be fun to wake them up.
Perfect.
Using my stomach and upper thigh muscles, I pulled my legs up slightly, attempting to ease the pressure from the ledge. Pins and needles ensued, as well a warning from my side. I tried using my elbows to push against the softness of Marie, Simba, Dumbo, and numerous other stuffed characters. It was no use, whichever way I pulled, turned, and pushed made my rib injury scream for me to stop. Help was required to get out of this pit, that’s all there was too it. Looking around, I didn’t see the boy anywhere.
“Uh, Mickey?”
A few seconds went by, and then his head poked out from the top of the castle, directly above my head. I blinked at him, and then smiled. That must be where he slept. What a great spot. No one would ever know he was up there. He wasn’t actually in the castle itself, but in the part that was suspended over the pit and dropped down a foot or two from the tall ceiling. The hard plastic that looked like vines and sky must be hollowed out, allowing him just enough room.
“Hey, would you mind helping me up, please?”
His head disappeared and then there was noise coming from behind the wall as he made his way down. The one additional effort to get myself out proved futile. My side definitely wouldn’t tolerate that kind of activity. Instead, I pushed the stuffed animals that were trying to climb on top of me out of the way. Jesus, it was like quicksand every time I moved.
A cramp hit my stomach, letting me know I was past the point of simple hunger. This was ridiculous. I had to laugh, though. Not out loud of course, it hurt too much, but on the inside.
Could I be worse off?
My ribs hurt, forehead was a disaster area, I had no idea who I was or what the hell had
happened to everyone, I was starving to the point of feeling sick, and I had to depend on a little boy to haul me out of a hot stuffed animal mess.
Oh yeah, I was in fantastic shape.
After Mickey pulled me from the Disney pit of hell, it was like he read my mind. Once partial feeling had returned to my lower extremities, enough that allowed me to stand without collapsing, he took my hand and led me the dozen or so feet to the back of the store, making sure to go slow as I shuffled behind him like a decrepit old woman. Letting go of my hand, he picked up a flashlight and motioned me to follow him through the “employees only” door. After stepping through, I watched him aim the beam of light at a shelf with some junk and a large cardboard box on it. He walked over and then waited for me.
When I stood next to him he removed the lid, revealing four jars of peanut butter and some crackers in the flashlight beam. In addition to those delicious things, there were a couple of granola bars, three packages of yogurt covered raisins, one box of Captain Crunch cereal, five foot-long Slim Jims, and a single jar of Gerber baby food. Picking up the jar, I inspected the label. Spinach. Yuck. A person would have to be pretty hungry to eat that. In the back of my mind I wondered how I knew it tasted dreadful. It’s not as if I’d remember eating it as a toddler. But then I forgot all about that when Mickey revealed what was in the next box over. Nestled inside were a couple gallon jugs and several individual bottles of glorious water.
“Oh Mickey I could hug you! And Thank God, no eggs!” I said enthusiastically. My head cocked, confused about the egg comment. Why would I say that? But then my stomach took over and I didn’t care about anything but filling it.