Autumn in the City of Angels

by Kirby Howell

  On the nights I didn’t read with Rissi, we’d plan evenings of entertainment for one another. It was nice having something to look forward to. Ben and I took turns choosing movies we grew up with. Rissi would dramatically roll her eyes when we began quoting our favorite scenes, which reminded me of my best friend Sarah, even down to her chestnut hair.

  Once in a while, though, I caught Ben watching me. I usually pretended not to notice and casually moved out of his line of sight. It bothered me to think he might be developing feelings for me, and I felt guilty because I couldn’t return them. Ben was a great guy, loyal, steady and intelligent... and I totally wasn’t attracted to him in any way.

  It wasn’t long before I found myself picking up my iPod again to resume my project of listening to every album three times. I gave it up the first few months Ben and Rissi were here, but with Ben’s extra attention lately, I found myself retreating to my room or the terrace more often to listen to music, getting lost in the melodies and pulsing percussion. If I limited our idle time together, it might help dissolve his feelings.

  In my moments of solitude, however, my own emotions got the better of me, and I daydreamed about the boy who saved me from The Front. I had no idea what made me continue to have dreams about him. His prolonged absence sat like a lump in my throat, and I wondered what kept him from coming for me.

  I found comfort beside the lemon tree on the roof at night. Something about the promise of blossoming citrus fruit soothed my frayed thoughts and seemed to help me regain focus. I stared up at the deep black sky and picked out a single bright star to concentrate on. I imagined a little planet orbiting it, and on that planet was another girl like me. On her planet, there was no plague. Her parents were asleep in the next room. Tomorrow she would go to school and see her friends and teachers, turn in homework, come home and walk the dog. I ached to believe there was still a place untouched by the Crimson Fever. It gave me hope to believe such a place existed.

  One similar evening, four months after Ben and Rissi moved in, I was listening to my iPod in my room. The weather had been insanely hot and dry, even for September, and the Santa Ana winds were merciless. This year, it was as if they were trying to blow away what was left of the human race. I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew, Ben was shaking me awake. I slipped off my headphones and looked at the clock. A quarter after midnight.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Nothing. Well, not right now anyway. You should see this.”

  Ben led the way up to the terrace, and I immediately smelled the smoke. I cleared the top steps and paused, staring, my heart sinking. Glowing patches of orange spread across the Santa Monica Mountains to the north. The hills divided the Westside from the San Fernando Valley. The Hollywood Hills to the northeast, peppered with their extravagant homes and tangled roads, were awash with flames as well, the smoke blotting out the sky.

  I covered my mouth and nose with my hands, trying to get a clean, deep breath. Even though the fires were still about ten miles away, the wind was blowing toward us, causing the ash to drift down on the terrace. A sudden hot gust of wind drove the ash into a drift against the glass wall.

  The giant plumes of smoke hid the few stars that had begun to be visible as the city fell into disrepair and lights burned out. There used to be far too many lights in Los Angeles to make out any stars at all. In fact, the sky never got completely black; it only darkened to a light shade of lavender. Now the stars were gone again.

  “It’s like snow in your hair,” Ben said, as he pulled a lock of hair over my shoulder. I was too mesmerized by the distant fires to respond. I stepped away from him and toward the north-facing balcony.

  “How did there get to be so many so fast?” I wondered aloud. Then it occurred to me, “I guess there’s no one left to control any of the wildfires anymore. I suppose this whole area used to be desert. It’s like the earth is reclaiming Los Angeles.”

  Ben came closer to me and rested a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll be all right. There’s too much cement between us and the base of those mountains. Nothing for the flames to feed on. They won’t come this far south.”

  I sighed and looked sadly across the city, paralyzed by its emptiness and powerless to stop the greedy flames burning through its heart. “I supposed mudslides will be next. And they’ll be bad too.” Mudslides were just another of the seasons in Los Angeles. During the fall, wildfires burned away vegetation that clung to hillsides, leaving them bare. When the rainy season started after the New Year, there was nothing to hold the earth together, so great slabs of mud broke away and slid down the hills like brown, slimy avalanches, crashing through houses and burying roads.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Ben said quietly, and his hand closed around mine. But instead of comfort, I felt anger. Probably because I’d been silently letting fear settle in my chest. I thought I was doing a good job hiding it, but he’d just called my bluff.

  “I’m not afraid!” I shot at him. I couldn’t think of anything to follow that, so I pulled my hand out of his and started across the terrace to go back downstairs and inside.

  Before I reached the door, I heard his steps behind me. He grabbed my arm and spun me around. One of his arms snaked around my waist and pulled me against him. I gasped and pushed my hands against his chest, but he held me too tightly, and his face loomed in front of me. His dark eyebrows furrowed behind his glasses, and he looked as if he were trying to see into me.

  “Don’t be so difficult. I’m just trying to help.” He paused. “I guess... I just want to... to comfort you. Why won’t you let me?” His face inched closer. His fingertips touched my cheek. I didn’t move, unsure and feeling panicked. My heart thumped painfully in my chest.

  When his lips touched mine, something rebelled inside me, and I suddenly hated that he wasn’t the boy from the alley. Where was he? Why hadn’t he come for me? Why wasn’t he the boy giving me my first kiss? Anger coursed through my arms, and I pushed him away.

  Surprised, he let go of me. He looked different to me suddenly, younger than me, even though his birthday was a month before mine. We stood three feet apart in our pajamas in the drifting ash and hot gusting wind, before I turned slowly and descended the stairs.

  Once inside, I walked quickly to my bedroom and shut the door behind me. I stood huddled against the door for a moment, a fist pressed hard against my mouth. What had come over him? Why did he kiss me? What made him think he could do something like that? He had ruined everything. It would be awkward now. There would be this silent grotesque elephant in the room with us when we tried to go about our days, clearing apartments and surviving.

  My eyes stung with dryness, and my heart still beat too fast. Adrenaline pumped through my veins. I felt like running. I heard a door click shut, and I quietly opened my door a crack. Ben moved through the dark living room. He paused in the weak moonlight coming through the window and pulled off his glasses, cleaning them on his shirt briefly before going into my dad’s office. His door clicked shut and no light appeared on the floor under the crack. I stared at the darkness for a moment before shutting my own door.

  My fingernails dug into my palms as thoughts barreled through my head. He better not be wallowing in self-pity. How dare he wreck the simplicity of our three-member family?

  The smoke clinging to my pajamas burned my nostrils, and I ripped them off suddenly, threw them into a corner, and stood there in my underwear and tank top, shaking. I crossed the room to my mother’s stand-alone wardrobe. I opened the door and let the smell of her wash over me. I kept everything in here just as she’d left it and moved my own clothing into the walk-in closet. I loved having this one unspoiled part of her left just for me. I leaned forward, slipped my face in between the hanging silks and chiffons. Her scent was warm and possessive. If my idea of home had a smell, this would be it.

  Home. Mother. Oh God, please. My face crumpled, and my knees gave out. I pitched forward into her hanging clothes, grabbing at her blouses
and dresses, smelling of gardenias and dusk. I fell to the closet floor, pulling some with me. I toppled amongst her shoes; stinging eyes squeezed shut, mouth frozen open in a silent “O.” They were out there somewhere, their lifeless bodies, still and cold, and they would never be coming home again. I curled my legs inside the wardrobe and pulled the door closed, shutting myself away with her memory.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The fires burned for three months. When the wind wasn’t too strong, we kept one of the umbrellas up on the terrace to keep the ash from falling on us while we maintained surveillance. Sometimes we had to sweep a path, and other times, we had to shovel it so we wouldn’t have to wade through the drifts.

  On the days the Santa Ana’s blew hot and strong, we didn’t go up to the terrace at all. The swirling bits of ash burned our eyes and made breathing difficult. On the days we spent indoors, we played games with Rissi. Her favorite ones usually involved imagination. I often thought if I were her age, I’d imagine myself out of here as often as possible, too. Maybe that’s why Ben and I played along so often without complaint.

  I’d moved the lemon tree inside to sit beside the kitchen windows, safe from the ash-filled air on the other side of the glass. The clouds lying like a blanket over the Los Angeles basin had made the daylight feeble anyway. The months were difficult for us to get through, but we had each other, even if mine and Ben’s relationship was somewhat altered.

  Since that night when I rejected his kiss, Ben no longer seemed to follow me around. The movie nights were a thing of the past, something that died with the summer. He seemed to have double the amount of projects to work on. He’d started stocking a spare room with extra supplies we didn’t use every day, or things he thought might become useful like sleeping bags, tents, batteries, blankets and canned food. He spent an excessive amount of time in there, organizing and categorizing items. We hadn’t spoken another word about what’d happened that night on the terrace. So on the morning of December 31, I was unnerved when Ben asked if I would come into his storeroom to talk. On edge, I followed him.

  Pretending not to be fazed, I wandered over to a stack of magazines and started flipping through them, searching for something to keep my hands and eyes busy. I looked up at him and found him staring at me, eyebrows slightly raised over his thick glasses, his eyes sad. My eyes flicked back down to the magazine. I was startled to see my mother’s holly green eyes staring back at me from the glossy pages. Red, curly hair and her characteristic half smile. She was wearing a dress the shade of emeralds in sunlight and was carrying an Oscar. I could practically smell her.

  Without closing the magazine, I dropped it back into the box. My mother’s green eyes still glowed at me from the darkness. I looked up at Ben. “What’s up?”

  “I wanted to talk to you away from Rissi. I didn’t want to scare her.”

  My stomach jumped. “What’s wrong?”

  “We’re almost out of water. Drinking water. The Sparkletts water jugs have been great, but even with it being rationed, we’re going to be running low very soon. And I think we need to do something about it sooner rather than later. We can’t keep waiting on the rainy season. It’s almost January and it hasn’t started yet. We should make a decision.”

  We finished clearing apartments a month ago and were going back to look for things we might have missed the first time, but so far our second sweep had proven mostly unsuccessful.

  “We’re going to have to go out then,” I said.

  Ben nodded slowly. “I’m not going to tell you not to go, because I know you’ll just argue with me.”

  Anger flashed in my eyes, and I pursed my lips. “You know, I’m quite capable –”

  Ben interrupted me, annoyed. “Yeah, I know. But would you believe me if I told you that’s not why I want you to stay here? The Front won’t hesitate to hurt us if they catch us. We’ve seen it. We’re all Rissi has.”

  I looked away from him. “But you said they weren’t in this area anymore.”

  “I said I hadn’t seen them lately. But they’re still out there. Their radio broadcasts are proof of that. And they still use the warehouse as one of their bases.”

  For the first time, I noticed the radio in the corner was broadcasting The Front’s propaganda. Ben thought it was necessary to monitor the recorded feeds, saying it was important to know one’s enemy. The messages were monotonous, but the looping broadcasts were occasionally broken up with a live transmission from Karl. It chilled my blood to hear his smooth voice.

  I couldn’t stand to listen to it. After getting an up-close and personal tour of who The Front truly was, it gave me the creeps to listen. It was all talk, no music. They were still trying to persuade people to come out of hiding and join their group. Even though we knew it was mostly lies, Ben listened for any new information. We learned they’d grown much bigger since my encounter. They occupied several warehouses throughout the city now. I imagined they were all like the one I’d been in, stuffed to the gills with supplies.

  I sighed and said, “Well, I’m still coming. We can cover each other’s backs, and Rissi will be safe by herself here for a few hours.”

  Ben nodded. “I figured I couldn’t talk you out of going. Stubborn ass.” He smiled at me in a way that let me know I hadn’t really upset him. “So let’s prepare a strategy today and go tomorrow morning as soon as the sun’s up.”

  A bright red color in the corner caught my eye. I walked over to it and picked it up. It was a Molly American Girl doll still inside its box. I smiled and looked at Ben over my shoulder.

  “Rissi’s birthday?” I asked.

  He nodded. “I found it in an apartment a couple months ago.”

  I admired the doll’s chestnut hair, which was so much like Rissi’s own curls, and smiled. “She’ll love it,” I said, thinking of how loud Rissi would squeal when she saw the pristine new doll. “Molly’s her favorite.”

  We left the storage room and found Rissi watching a movie from inside a tent she’d made from couch cushions and tablecloths. The tent had become a permanent fixture in the living room. There were times when I envied her small, safe space. Occasionally I’d squeeze in it with her to play and sometimes even fell asleep there.

  As I stooped to pass a small not-so-hot mug of tea to Rissi, I heard a strange pattering noise, and Ben called my name suddenly. My stomach flopped, and I quickly stood up. Ben was standing by the window in the kitchen, looking out. I peered through the windows myself but only saw the dull gray haze of ash and smoke clouds. But then, my ears focused on the noise, and my eyes refocused on the clear liquid streaks appearing on the windows.

  “It’s raining!” I heard Rissi exclaim from beside me. She scooted out of her tent to stand beside me. I felt her small hand hook into the back pocket of my jeans, and she rested her head on my waist. I brushed some of her whisper soft hair off her forehead with my fingers.

  “Maybe it’ll rain enough to put out the fires,” I heard Ben say from the kitchen. Maybe, I thought. The Santa Ana winds blew themselves out earlier this month, and the heat finally broke, though the hills still smoldered and smoked. I heard some banging noises from the kitchen, and Ben passed with a large pot.

  “Maybe we won’t have to go tomorrow! I’m going to see if I can catch any clean water,” he said.

  Rissi resumed her movie, and I sat back down at the kitchen table and waited. Transfixed, I watched the ash running down the windows in streams until I realized I was cold. I went to my room and dug through a dresser until I found my dad’s old college sweater and tugged it over my head. On my way back to the living room, I grabbed a sweatshirt for Rissi from her room. I pretended to stalk her like a lion outside her tent, and she glanced nervously at me and tried to dodge my arms as I grabbed her. She squealed as I bundled her into her sweatshirt. Ben reappeared, his hair and glasses spattered with water and soot.

  “Well, that’s it for the rain right now,” he said.

  “It stopped already?” I asked, disappointed.<
br />
  Ben grimaced. “Yeah. Maybe we’ll get some more. It’s gotten cooler though.” He brushed the withering leaves of the lemon tree as he passed. “It’s probably been too hot for this tree of yours to produce any fruit, but I swear I smell it sometimes.” He smiled, shaking his head. “If it stops raining ash, we can put it back up on the roof. It could use the sunshine.”

  I smiled at the thought of clean air and sunshine in the near future. I loved what the rain did after a long period of dryness. How it washed the air clean and made the hills sparkle. After three months of gray clouds and ash, rain was a very welcome change for the New Year.

  Ben sat down at the kitchen table across from me and began to clean his glasses meticulously. I watched him until he was done and then tipped my mug to him. “Happy New Year, Ben.”

  He slowly smiled at me and clicked my mug with his. “Happy New Year, Autumn.”

  The next morning, the rising sun woke me early. I looked out the window and was pleased to see patches of brilliant blue sky. The air already looked clearer. The hills to the north were black as tar from the fires, but I reveled in the fact that I could see them perfectly.

  Ben set out pots and pans on the terrace, just in case a shower happened overnight, hoping we wouldn’t have to venture into the city. We allowed a few more days to pass, waiting for more rain, but the air continued to be as dry as kindling. The next day, we decided we had to go out and search for drinkable water.

  I was nervous about going out again, and I saw fear in Rissi’s eyes as well. I knew she was scared to be alone. I made faces at her over my bowl of instant oatmeal until she started laughing and began to eat her breakfast.