Since the landing at the top of the stairs had dried out, Erika laid the last tablecloth she had on the landing and began to empty the contents of the purses. The first one she picked up was a black leather bag that had one large pocket for all its contents. First, she took out the wallet. She was riddled with guilt about going through somebody else’s things but figured that it didn’t matter now anyway. She opened the wallet and looked at the California driver’s license inside. It had belonged to Kelly Burns, a sixteen-year-old girl who had just gotten a car and a job at the restaurant as a busser. She had a hundred dollars in her wallet, and Erika took it. She also found a pack of rolling papers and took those out too. She threw the wallet in the watery depths when she found that there was nothing else of use in it. Even though Kelly was not legally old enough, she had developed a habit of smoking, and Erika removed a full pack of Marlboro Reds from her purse. The rest of the contents had little value right now, so she just threw them in the water.
Erika continued emptying the contents of the other purses in the same fashion. She would check the ID, remember the person it belonged to, look for valuable items, then throw the unneeded things into the water to meet the same watery fates as their owners. It was a solemn event, but she had found five hundred dollars, five full packs of smokes and two half packs, six lighters, a knife, some mace, a pair of sunglasses, and four books of matches. The last purse she had to clean out was her own. She pulled out her own wallet. She rubbed it slowly like a genie lamp to relinquish all its memories. She thought of her mother-in-law, who had bought it for her. Her in-laws had been vacationing in Washington when the quake hit, and Erika wondered if they had felt the effects of it. She opened her wallet and looked immediately at the picture of her beloved Vince. It was a picture from the year they had gotten married. Vince stood regally in his black dress shirt, and his loving eyes glared into her soul. I will make it home, I will make it home, was the only thing Erika could think of. But as Erika turned the page to reveal the picture of her son and her mother, she wept huge tears of pain.
“I will make it home! I have to. I know they are alive. I can feel them pleading with the Lord to allow me to come back to them, and I will. I always said that if something happened to our fragile environment, I would survive. I read all those books about herbal healing, hunting, survival techniques, and martial arts: all to learn how to survive if I had to, and now I do. I have to pull it together, get what I need to get to land, and get the hell out of here.”
She closed her wallet and continued cleaning her purse out. She emptied out old receipts and shopping lists; she would need to make room for more important things now. She opened the last pouch and saw her slingshot. It was a weapon not commonly used, but Erika had trained herself proficiently with it. Erika also had her hunting knife there because she had gone out looking for a pesky raccoon that had gotten into the chicken coop at her in-laws’ two nights in a row. The circular metal ball thrown with the slingshot had not proven fatal, but that pesky raccoon would definitely think twice about bothering those chickens again. Along with the slingshot, she noticed an unused tampon. She did not need it now, but Erika had never kept good track of her cycle. It was often unpredictable and could be delayed when she was under stress. She wondered when it would come. This made her think about future supplies for that certain female problem, and she was relieved when she found a big box containing smaller boxes of the protective cotton in the cabinet. She took out five boxes. This many boxes could last her at least five months, and she said a silent prayer that she would not need that many before she hit land. She figured that once she reached shore, she could buy more and would not need such a large supply.
All the purses were now empty, and she began packing. She thought that if she could get the door open all the way, the raft would float out the door. She dragged the raft back up the stairs to the landing. She could stock it there, and then when she opened the door, the shelter would fill with water, and she could just float out. Erika put the crate of fruit onto the back of the raft and then two purses full of oats, already mixed with dehydrated milk and nuts with the dried fruit. She decided it would be best to put everything into crates so she could wrap the sides, and attach it to the raft so it would not fall off. She put all the remaining water on the raft, along with more knives, and extra clothes. She also loaded on one of the extra outdoor table umbrellas. She brought Tupperware bowls and cut the sides off a square Tupperware container so it could be attached to the pole and used as an oar. She packed all the candles and reached for the first aid kit.
She had ransacked the kit since she had been there and realized there wasn’t much of use left. She had used the entire bottle of antiseptic and the tube of Neosporin on her burns. She still had half of the bottle of Tylenol, and there were still some gauze left so she took them out. But then she changed her mind. The first aid kit was plastic, maybe waterproof, and it would probably float if it ever fell in the water. So Erika threw out the empty items and put the gauze and Tylenol back into the kit. Even though Erika had studied a little about herbal medicine, she was not confident enough with it to know what she should use for which ailment. She didn’t have a book or anything with her. She grabbed some spices that she thought would be helpful and packed them into Ziploc baggies before putting them into the first aid kit to make the most of any available space.
Erika continued pillaging the cupboards. She packed a medium and small sauce pan into one of the wooden crates that she had hooked to the craft. Erika had attached the crates to the craft in a sort of U fashion. This would give her an area to sleep, an area to row in, and plenty of storage space. Erika constructed the paddle for the craft by removing the hook from her PVC pipe and attaching the square Tupperware piece that she had cut to it. It would not be ideal, but it would have to do. After she had her raft loaded with everything her brain could imagine she would need, she decided to refine her attire one more time. She had removed the top half of her cellophane-and-duct-tape suit so her hands would be free to work, but she could no longer afford this luxury. She remembered the new burn on her neck and knew she would need to protect her head as well.
She thought the hooded sweatshirt would work well as upper body and head protection. Over the sweatshirt, she wrapped cellophane. Then she wrapped the duct tape over it to complete the suite once again. Except, this time, she tucked her hair into the hood of the sweatshirt and duct-taped as much of her head as she could without covering her eyes, nose, or mouth. She would probably pull her eyebrows off when the tape was removed, but if it would keep her alive long enough to reach land, it was worth the loss. Finally, she put on the sunglasses she had found to protect her eyes and put the rubber gloves back on too.
She was all ready. One last rummage through the cupboard assured her she had packed everything she could. She looked over the raft and decided it would be wise to cover the tops of the crates for the initial launch. When she was through, she had a half of a roll of cellophane and one roll of duct tape left. The most dangerous part of the launch would be getting the door open again. She would have to trust that her suit would protect her, because it would take everything she could muster to budge that door. She remembered that the table was what helped her push the door open last time, and she would not be able to set it up the same way this time. She decided she would have to wedge herself in between the raft and the door and push on the side of the table. It gave her a smaller area to push on, but, hopefully, it would work just the same.
In position, with the door loop in hand, and her legs bent for pushing, she decided it was time. Erika pushed, and as the door opened, the water flooded in, but this time it did not burn. Her suit held, but she did not know how long it would hold out for. She used all her might and forced the door all the way open. The raft was beginning to float, so she climbed aboard quickly. The force of the water wanted to push the raft down the stairs, but the slope of the ceiling and a strategically placed oar prevented it. Soon, she forced the raft out th
e door.
Chapter 4
Erika's eyes winced in the daylight. After all that time in the dark with only a candle to light the way, the sun pierced her pupils and made them water even with the protective glasses on. When her eyes adjusted to the blast of sunlight, Erika could not believe what she was seeing. The buildings that had once towered above the city in every direction had been pummeled into piles of rubble. Some of them had been sheared right in half by the rapidly moving water. Debris floated all across the surface of the sludge that had formed when the water crashed into the toxic substances that humans used to sustain life. The cars that had once congested every street were smashed into more piles of debris surrounding the building shells. The people that had filled the city with the noise of life were all gone. Erika was thankful for that. She could not imagine the scene that had played out here all the while she was trapped in concrete below. The capital city of California had been blasted with green, slimy water spanning as far as the eye could see. The smell of urban life was gone and the stagnant, toxic stench of the ooze was all that remained.
Erika was thankful for the sunglasses she had found in one of the purses. They softened the extreme sunlight and through the glare, she could see the familiar peaks of the Sierra Mountains in the distance that always welcomed her home. They were there in the east, standing gloriously above the sludge. She started paddling her vessel toward where the freeway that she had driven so many times before to get home used to be. It was difficult paddling with only one PVC paddle in hand. The craft was awkward and wanted to veer left or right depending on what side she was paddling on. As she neared the area where the freeway should have been, she noticed that it was easier going, almost like there was a current flowing down the freeway. She just hoped it would be flowing in the direction she needed to go. She finally made her way onto Interstate 80, or what she thought was the freeway. It was hard to tell with the amount of rubble that had gotten moved around, but she did see what looked to be like freeway overpasses strewn about on either side of an alley. To her dismay, the current was flowing against her. She should have known. None of the forks of the American River flowed up to the mountains; they ran down from the mountains to the ocean. Even though the rivers had been inundated with toxic sludge, it was still these same rivers acting as a driving force and moving all this water around.
The flow of water made it even more difficult to maneuver the bulky craft, and the sun beat down upon Erika. All of her struggling to paddle the raft against the current and her cellophane-and-duct-tape suit intensified the heat; she was feeling rather faint. She quickly remembered the outdoor umbrella that she had laid across the crates on the back of the raft. She grabbed it and set it up to shade her from the heat. Much to her surprise, even though the current was going the opposite direction that she wanted to go, the wind was not, and it caught at the umbrella. Erika quickly realized the implication of this and used some of her last roll of duct tape to attach the umbrella as a sort of sail to catch the wind and help move her along her desired path. The wind in the umbrella also helped to stabilize the craft, and Erika found that if the wind was constantly pulling the craft to the left, she could just paddle on the right and the raft would be balanced. It was much better than rowing a couple times to the left and then a couple to the right.
Erika’s first night on the craft was awe-inspiring. The sun blazed red, orange, and pink as it dipped out of sight beyond the horizon of destruction to the west. Then a beautiful crescent moon peeked up over the mountains. The stars twinkled like diamonds in the sky, and Erika was taken aback by their beauty. She couldn’t figure out why they looked so bright and then it dawned on her. There was no light on the Earth. She scanned the horizon and did not see one light anywhere. The city used to look like a sun lying in the mountains at night. The light dimmed the stars and made them dull. Now the stars were back in their full glory, and they were awesome. Erika saw the Milky Way as bright as the first settlers of this place had seen it so long ago. The darkness made Erika realize how tired she was. She had spent all that energy on her escape and then the very last of her strength paddling. The lack of calories finally caught up with her, and she dozed.
Erika woke up very distressed. She did not remember where she was. She was on her craft but there was no sun overhead. She felt the craft bumping against something. It was dark and for a moment she thought that she was back in her concrete cell, but it was not the deep dark of that hole: somewhere there was sunlight shining. She sat up quickly so she could assess the situation.
“I must have fallen asleep and the current took me. But where did it take me?” As she looked up, she quickly realized what had happened. “I’m in a building! The current must have pushed me in here.”
Her craft had been bumping against the wall of the building that was still holding back the flood waters, and a roof was overhead. She was in a pile of debris that had been caught in this building from the flow of water.
As she started to paddle away from the debris pile, she screamed, “Oh my God!”
There were bodies, bloated and floating, along with her in the pile. The stench assaulted her nostrils with rotten flesh, and she had to put the paddle in between the bodies or push off of them directly to free the boat. She started to paddle frantically, completely freaked out. She rounded the corner in the building and saw where everything was coming from. This building had survived fairly well and only one large window had broken on the front. The flow of water had entered that window and was now creating a huge eddy inside of the building. She paddled as fast and as hard as she could to that window, with the faces of the dead still flashing in her mind.
She found her way toward the freeway once again and vowed that she would tie up the raft to anything she could find before she fell asleep; that way, she could not drift too far while she was resting. All in all, her raft held together well, and she was making decent time. One day began to blend into another as the mountains came closer, and her water and food supplies were depleted. It was tough, at times, to tell how deep the water was because she couldn’t see through the green slime. Occasionally, her pole would hit what Erika thought could be the bottom. This would cause her to hope that before too long, she would be reaching some kind of a shore. But more than likely it was just some unseen debris lying under the slime, because she could not even see an edge to the toxic film on the horizon.
On the fourth day of traveling on the raft, Erika awoke at first light. She lit her candle so she could make some oatmeal and tea. Usually, she hated tea, but it was nice to throw some herbs into her water and heat it up. It gave it a totally different flavor, and at least it was some kind of flavor. She thought how nice it would be to have a big old cup of coffee but that was not an option. Her fruit was totally gone, and all that remained were oats and nuts. When she gazed toward the mountains, excitement washed over her. They were very close. Today was the day she would finally reach them! She finished breakfast and lit a smoke. Then she sat back to finish waking up before she would have to pick back up the oar and paddle. She scanned the landscape of sludge. Was that smoke from her cigarette or from something else?
“What the heck is that? It looks like a huge fire. Maybe it’s a wildfire, but with all that water, how can it be burning? It looks like it’s coming from that huge cone. Is it a volcano? It is a volcano. Look how thick and black that smoke is. Oh well, it’s a long way off. It probably won’t affect anything this far away, especially since there is nothing left. I don’t care anyway because today, I’m going to reach that land. I’ll find someone to drive me home. I’ll walk all the way if I have to but soon I will be there, home with my husband and my son in my arms again.”
Erika picked up her paddle and rowed with a vengeance. She held her pace all morning. What she noticed in the distance had indeed been a volcanic eruption. But her assumption that it would not affect her was wrong. Even though it was hundreds of miles away—and thanks to a sudden change of wind direction the smoke would not
affect her area—the lava followed freshly opened cracks in the earth. It flowed into the newly formed lake in Sacramento where the lava cooled and the temperature of the water increased. Erika didn’t notice until she paused her paddling that the water had begun to steam. When she noticed, she was concerned but unaware of the implications. She figured it was best to just keep going. The shore was very near, but as she traveled through the super-heated sludge, the plastic jugs that held her afloat began to melt. She was only half a mile from shore when her raft began to take on water. Erika’s suit held off the burning effects, but paddling an overweight piece of wood through ooze was not going to get her to shore fast enough.
The excitement of reaching shore overwhelmed her, and she was thinking impulsively. She figured she wouldn’t need her supplies because she could get whatever she needed if she could just make it to shore. Erika plunged into the gross sludge, keeping her head out and depending on her suit to protect her. She began to swim to shore. The heat from the water began to overwhelm her, and she swam hard to make it to shore faster. Pain began to take its hold and, with her limited energy supplies depleting quickly, she struggled on. She finally swum to a shallow enough area that her feet reached for ground. Her last energy reserves were expended on her walk to dry land. Erika collapsed as she reached down to hug the soft dirt.
Erika awoke in a dimly lit room, and she anxiously looked around to make sure her escape from the bomb shelter and struggle through the sludge had been for real. Her eyes confirmed that it had been reality. It had been so long since she woke up someplace that was familiar; the panic she felt upon waking up was beginning to feel normal. She took a deep breath and looked around. She was in a barn that had been damaged by the earthquake but was sound despite the abuse it had taken. As she tried to sit up, pain pierced every inch of her body, and she screamed.
Day After Disaster, The Changing Earth Series, Uncut Edition Page 4