by Ryan Schow
Ben stared at him for a long time, but Earl didn’t flinch. So he took them off, stared at Earl.
“No, man,” Earl said, studying him the way you’d look at an inanimate object during a quality control inspection. “They won’t recognize you.”
“But you did.”
“I had an idea this was coming,” Earl said, stepping around a pile of bodies, stacked and burnt, but not to a crisp.
The fact that in this eight foot heap of carcasses Ben could still see greyish-pink patches of skin told him people were still dying by the day, and that the dead were still being attended to by the living. Ben hated the body burns, and that smell of cooked humans. This was the worst part of this new world.
“What do you mean you had an idea this was coming?” Ben asked.
“Yeah, man,” Earl admitted. “A lot of us could see it.”
“How?”
“What I didn’t tell you was I watched every rally you were at, every interview you did, all the press conferences. Plus I had my ear to the ground, you know? I’m one of those guys who listened to the independent press. All those nut jobs talking about government takeovers, the deep state, all those guys talking about the coup—turns out they were right. And they’d been warning us about AI for years.”
“I always wondered about those guys,” Ben muttered.
“We became a divided nation,” Earl said. “The war on truth did a number on everyone. Folks didn’t know who to believe or what was real, and they didn’t have the time or the inclination to do their own research. So they just took what they could get in the way of ‘truth’ and the hate began to lodge itself in their brains, in their bones, right down into their souls. If I would have watched the mainstream media, I would probably hate you, too.”
“I wouldn’t blame you if you did,” Ben said.
“Never-the-less, those of us who saw some kind of uprising, some sort of insurrection, we felt you saw it, too. You were the first real President we’ve had in our lifetime, and they tore you to shreds in the press because of it. But we believed in you. I believed in you.”
“Well a boat load of good that did.”
“You came back here, didn’t you? I mean, this place meant that much to you, right?”
“I did, but I’m not here to lead anything.”
“You couldn’t stop this, Ben. I already told you that before. No one could.” There was a heaviness in Earl’s eyes Ben understood. The man was genuine. With his widowed expression, his piles of concern, even all his heaped-on praise, Ben felt fortunate to have met the man. “It’s time for the past to die, and for you to find a new way to live.”
“I’m not sure how to do that,” Ben admitted.
“Join the crowd,” Earl said with a smile and a pat on the shoulder. “We’re here.”
Ben looked around at almost a dozen roads converging into a wagon wheel like roadway with a circular park of overgrown grass and tall trees as the inside of the wheel.
“This is Dupont Circle,” Ben said.
“You know it?”
“I do.”
Earl pointed to an eight or nine story white building and said, “This is where we’re staying.”
“Your people have the entire building to yourselves?”
“When you think about how many people have died in this town, you could pretty much pick your own building and it’d be yours.”
“How many of you are there?” Ben asked.
“Twenty-five, maybe thirty. Most of us have penthouse views, so I hope your legs still have a little more juice in them.”
“I walked here from Pennsylvania,” he said. “These legs still have plenty of juice left in them.”
They walked inside the New Hampshire Ave NW side of the hotel, passed a few guys with guns who stood to greet Earl and measure up Ben and Daisy.
“He’s good,” Earl said to the men. “He’s with me. The dog’s fine, too.”
They both looked at each other, then back at Ben and said, “Yes, sir.”
They got to the stairwell and Ben said, “Yes, sir?”
“Yeah, I sort of put this place together. I brought in the first settlers, if you will,” he said with a quick laugh. “Then they brought in a few and so on. We’re not big, but we’re tight.”
“Tight enough for security?”
“They’re not usually there. In the days sometimes. But mostly not.”
“How come?”
“Some people are still hanging on to the old world. Those guys were private contractors. Blackwater types.”
Ben nodded his head. He got it. If man had no purpose, he’d continue to mire himself in the past, in all the problems he couldn’t solve.
They got to the top floor where Ben caught his breath and said, “Why did you choose the top floor?”
“Penthouse suites. Outdoor balcony. Long view of the city from up high. I’ll show you. When you see the views and the space, you’ll understand.”
Earl came to a door, stopped.
The electric keycard mechanism was broken and he gave two knocks, paused, then gave three more knocks followed by a long pause and one more. Something behind the door lifted and a woman opened it up with a smile. Then she saw Ben and she stiffened slightly.
Ben had his glasses off and he was afraid of being noticed, but she didn’t remain rigid for long. She relaxed into a smile and opened the door wide. Inside was a gorgeous suite with seven adults in various states of relaxation.
Ben offered a hesitant, but congenial smile. The group greeted him warmly. Then they saw the dog and everyone got giddy. Daisy responded with a smile and a fiercely wagging tail.
“She likes you guys,” Ben said, cautiously.
Two of the girls started baby-talking Daisy, which she loved, then they began showering her with all kinds of attention and love. To Ben it was like seeing strangers embrace your children in a way that makes the kids feel good and the parents feel even better. Everyone craves acceptance, even in the apocalypse. Dogs like Daisy were no different.
“What’s her name?” one of the women asked.
“Daisy.”
“Daisy you are about the most beautiful little doggie I’ve ever seen!” the woman squealed. Daisy gave a little bark and the dog’s version of a smile.
Earl began introducing Ben to the others. There were two elderly men Earl said were long time family friends—Buck and Chappy. Then he introduced the three women. The one leading the charge to make Daisy feel welcomed was Tammy, Earl’s sister, and the other was Claudette, Tammy’s best friend, an interesting looking woman with a German accent.
“And Tammy’s other best friend, because you can’t have just one, is Gisele.”
This young woman had Ben’s attention the second he walked through the front door. Gisele was a lovely red head with curious eyes and an intoxicating smile. She stood at the other end of the large suite with two boys, both in their late teens, maybe even early twenties.
“Hi,” he said.
“These two troublemakers are my younger brothers,” Gisele said. “Chip and Tristan.”
Both boys said hello and then Earl said, “This is Ben. He’s from Pennsylvania.”
“What are you doing out here?” the old guy named Chappy asked.
“Had no where else to be,” Ben replied. “Thought I’d visit some of the nation’s monuments, see which were still left standing.”
“I found him at the White House,” Earl said.
“What’s next for you?” Gisele asked, her voice a bit timid, her blue eyes sparkling, but almost shy. He knew the look. It was the same look his wife gave him when they first met. He wasn’t sure if he liked it, or hated it.
“I don’t know,” Ben admitted. “I’ve seen what I came here to see, but really, I think…well at least this was what Earl and I were talking about, it’s people who now matter in this world. Not necessarily locations or destinations.”
“Maybe your destination was here and you just didn’t know it yet,” Gisel
e said, to which her two younger brothers snickered. She turned red in the face and smacked one of them.
Earl saved her by saying, “I promised you a view. Come take a look.”
Earl walked Ben to the balcony overlooking Dupont Circle, specifically the park below. Ben counted ten roads converging in on one giant circle of a park. The grass was clearly overgrown, but the trees were full of leaves and beautiful from up high.
He stood in front of the railing looking out over the city from nine stories up. He saw many high rise buildings crossing the landscape for as far as he could see, many of them shelled, the glass blown out, more than a few of them sitting in rubble. The green tops of the trees poked out here and there, flourishing, and it made him think of what this place would look like in a hundred years. It would be overgrown, weeds and plants pushing up through the cracks in the concrete, enveloping the long forgotten cars, all along the sidewalks. The bodies piled on the sides of the road and burned would just be ash, or mounds of weeds with corpse flowers or whatever the hell it was that sprouted up from the soil of the dead.
“It’s beautiful if you unfocus your eyes a bit,” Gisele said, standing next to him. “For a second, you think it could be like it always was. And if you train your eyes to see only the green parts of the city, then you get a chance to feel that beauty, too.”
“Where are you from?” he turned and asked Gisele. Earl smiled, then went back inside to where everyone was fawning over Daisy.
“Here.”
“What did you do here?” he asked.
“Low level staffer,” she said, holding his eye. “I was on my way up the ladder when all this came crumbling down.”
“Do you mind if I ask how old you are?”
“No.”
He waited while she just looked at him, not really fearless now, but not close enough to where her brothers could make fun of her ogling the new guy.
“Okay,” he relented, “how old are you?”
“How old do I look?” she teased.
Judging by the game, he’d put her in her mid-twenties. “Twenty-seven?”
“Why not twenty-six or twenty-eight?” she asked.
“Because twenty-seven is my lucky number,” he said, adjusting the brim of his hat.
“Is it really?”
“No.”
Now she laughed and said, “Well you were close, for whatever it’s worth.”
A few more people joined them on the balcony. Earl brought him a glass of water, which he took but didn’t guzzle on account of him not being alone.
Claudette said, “Where in Pennsylvania did you live?”
He looked at Earl who gave him a look and so he said, “I was in Raven Rock, just north of the Maryland border up Hwy 550.”
“You walked here?” Tristan said. Ben hadn’t seen him come out.
“Yeah.”
“Both of you?” Tammy asked, now interested.
“I found Daisy in Frederick. She’d been…left by her owner.”
“Did she have food and water?” Gisele asked.
Daisy now joined them on the balcony, all her introductions made. She pressed her ribs against Ben’s leg, let him know she was there beside him.
“No,” Ben said. “She was staked out back, nearly dead.”
He could feel the air of injustice for the dog circulating. It was the same thing he felt when he first saw her, and the same sick feeling he had when he shot the owner.
“So the owner just left her there? Or did he die?”
“No,” he said. “He came back.”
“And he didn’t want her?” Tristan asked.
“He did,” Ben said.
“But you took her anyway,” Gisele said, smiling because, what girl doesn’t love a good animal rescue story?
“I did.”
“What about the owner?” Chappy asked. Now they were all on the large balcony, and he got the feeling they spent a lot of time out here.
“He didn’t make it.”
Now things got really quiet. He’d said too much. Or maybe not. He let himself look out over the city, getting lost in the landscape, feeling the feelings of being near people when it had been so long since he’d had any kind of decent interaction with anyone.
“Well some people weren’t meant to survive this war,” Tammy said. “Certainly not animal abusers.”
“Agreed,” a few of them muttered.
“Did it bother you to do that?” Tristan asked. Clearly he’d never killed a person before. “Not letting that guy live, I mean?”
“I served overseas, so I saw a lot of action. Part of you becomes numb to the horrors of war, at least until you’re out of the kill zone, but then the nightmares come, and you grow numb to those, too. So no, it didn’t bother me. And every time it feels like it might, I look at Daisy and remind myself I saved a life that day.”
“Awe,” the girls said at once, causing him to smile.
“Of course, she saved mine a time or two as well,” he said, scratching behind her ears, Daisy’s favorite place.
They talked a bit here and there, then Earl offered to find him a room on the next floor down where a few rooms were available. It was comfortable, and clean, but as he stretched out on the bed with Daisy at his side, he wondered if this was the place for him. These were nice people, good people, and he could tell Gisele was beyond interested in him, but did he want to be a part of something just yet?
He didn’t.
Absolutely no way.
He thought about Earl, about what the man had asked him, about how he stopped him from putting all this pain to rest. And then he thought back to Gisele: her playful flirting, how life seemed to just be life for her.
For Ben, the idea of flirting with another woman seemed like an affront to his wife, a woman who already suffered too much for his decisions. Would getting together with a girl half his age be any kind of way to honor her memory?
As he lay there, contemplating this uncomfortable turn of events, he decided that he’d leave that night. They were all on the top floor anyway; he was one floor down. No one would notice him sneaking out in the middle of the night.
Then someone was knocking on his door. He opened it up to Earl who said, “Sorry about Gisele. She’s young, and she’s got no idea what you’re going through.”
“We are the secrets we keep,” Ben said. “And like you said, she’s young.”
“Yeah, well she’s not usually like that.”
“How is she?”
“Quiet,” Earl said. “She lost her husband the first day. They were newlyweds. Tammy saw it happen and it sort of…well, it damn near wrecked her. I can see how it makes you feel, and I know how I feel about the matter, but there has to be more in this world than just surviving, don’t you think?”
“I guess.”
“C’mon, man. Don’t say you guess. That’s a cop-out and you know it.”
Shifting from one foot to the other, his mind squarely on leaving this place and these conflicting emotions behind, he said, “I don’t want to survive, Earl, and you know that. This is a minute-by-minute journey I’m on and if not for you, it would’ve already been over. All this unrelenting agony in my head, that would be over, too. So right now I’m not living for me, or you, or people like Gisele. I’m living for Daisy. I don’t have much to offer, but she’s going to get all of it for as long as I can give it.”
Earl did what Earl seemed to do best: he backed off, gave Ben his space, then offered a nugget of perspective.
“Tell me a little more about Gisele,” Ben said. “Since you’re here and since you brought the subject up first.”
Earl smiled.
“Gisele didn’t speak for five weeks. Not one word. She got down to nothing in terms of her weight and her health, but then she started to come out of that fog. We all have our ways of dealing with loss, be it family, lifestyle or country. But there was a light in that girl’s eyes today that we haven’t seen since this happened and that can’t be a coincidence.
So maybe you want to brood, and mope around, and push the world away—and I wouldn’t blame you, not one bit—but at some point in time you’re either going to kill yourself and rip all that love Daisy has for you away, or you’re going to have to forgive yourself for all the things you couldn’t control and move the hell on. But by that time, you might not meet a girl like Gisele, or have company like ours. By that time, many windows will have closed and all you’ll have is more regret.”
“What are you saying?” he asked.
“I can see it in your eyes, how damn restless you are. It’s like you can hardly wait to bolt, and I’m here to tell you, don’t. Give it a few days. Try it on. What do you have to lose?”
“I’d tell you that you don’t understand, but I know you do.”
“I do.”
“Then you know what I’m feeling,” Ben said.
“Yes. Which is why you need to come to dinner. On a minute-by-minute basis, dinner will always factor in. So let us make you a meal, and let Daisy have the interaction she’s clearly been enjoying, and then stay the night. Just once. Just give yourself that break.”
Finally, Ben said, “Okay.”
“Good. Now come help with dinner. No one eats for free around here.”
Chapter One Hundred Fifty-One
Ben had to admit, dinner was delicious and he was about as relaxed as he’d ever been. And thankfully, Gisele seemed to be treating him just like she was treating everyone else. So maybe she wasn’t interested in him the way he thought. Perhaps it was just a reaction to not having been around people socially for a couple of months now.
Either way, they closed out the evening on the patio with a small fire in a fire pit overlooking a city that was so black it seemed only the sky had survived. Gisele asked if he knew the night sky and he said he was a junior astronomer in his youth.
“What was that, about a hundred years ago?” she asked, nudging him with her shoulder. He hadn’t realized how close she’d gotten to him, but they were looking into the sky together, talking constellations and planets and satellites.