THE COLLAPSE: Seeking Refuge

by Frank Kaminski

  “Mmmm. Bless your heart, Eddie, bless your heart,” Fish said to himself with his mouth full of cheesy-garlic-butter yumminess. Pharaoh licked his lips as he watched Fish eat, so Fish tossed him a cheese-slathered Ritz, which the dog skillfully caught in his mouth before it hit the ground.

  “Dude, I’m going to get your dog food out of the truck. Stevo’s gonna be pissed at me if he finds out that I’m giving you crackers!”

  Just then, Fish heard a gunshot. He couldn’t discern which direction it had come from, but guessed that it was coming from the beach, just as Tarra had told him earlier that morning. “Oh yeah, forgot about that. Gunshots…she said. I’m going over there later today, I’ll worry about it then,” Fish thought, and went back to enjoying his calorie-packed breakfast.

  As Fish ate, Pharaoh began a low growl. It was the emergency alert system in effect. Fish looked over his shoulder, and sure enough, he spotted a short, gray-haired old man in a khaki-colored, unbuttoned trench coat walking along the road. He was skinny, and the coat he was wearing was too large for him, almost as if it were someone else’s. He had his eyes set on Fish at the picnic table. Oddly enough, the man was carrying a large brown book under his left arm. Fish hoped that the man wasn’t about to interrupt his meal, but he kept staring at Fish as he walked toward site 199. It was inevitable. The man intended on speaking with Fish about something.

  “Ah, shit. He’s coming over here. It’s okay, boy. It’s just an old dude,” Fish declared quietly to the still-hungry Pharaoh. He thought to himself, “This old coot better not ask for any of my cheese and crackers!”

  “Good morning, young man,” the trench-coated old man said, courteously.

  “Mornin’,” Fish apprehensively replied back to him with his mouth full.

  “May I speak with you for a moment?” the old man asked as he approached the picnic table. He pointed his palm at the bench on the other side of the table, as if to ask, “May I sit down?”

  “I guess,” Fish replied. The man obliged, and sat down. The book remained under his left arm as he spoke.

  “I understand that you and your family are new here? I’d like to be one of the first to formally welcome you to The Park,” he said, and extended his right hand to Fish. Then he introduced himself, “My name is Walter Pullman.”

  Fish wiped his greasy, cheesy fingers quickly on his jeans, and shook the man’s hand, “I’m Fish.”

  “Nice to meet you, Fish,” the man acknowledged. Then, he just smiled and watched Fish continue to eat, as if he was waiting for something.

  Fish asked, “What’s with the book?”

  The man happily replied, “I’m sooo glad you asked!” He gently placed the brown book on the table in front of himself. The book had faded gold letters that read, “HOLY BIBLE” in the center of the time-worn tome. Fish knew what was coming next, so he tried to cut it off before it even got started.

  “Dude, you’re not going to Jesus-thump me, are you?” Fish asked. The man eye’s widened and he raised his eyebrows. He was aghast with shock at Fish’s response, but kept his composure.

  “That’s not exactly the proper terminology, young man, but in a way, yes,” Walter said. He unconsciously began stroking the gold letters on the bible, then continued with, “I only have one question for you, Fish. Have you been saved?”

  “Saved from what?” Fish asked nonchalantly as he chewed. He was still spraying cheese onto his Ritz crackers and popping them into his mouth, never minding the guest at his table.

  Walter looked confused. Why didn’t Fish know what that meant? Was he a heathen? He certainly didn’t have any manners, that much was true. He was precisely the type of man that needed his help! These were desperate times! Walter decided that it was going to be his mission to enlighten this young man, Fish, with the word of Christ. He figured that he would need to utilize simple words for this man to understand his message.

  “Have you accepted Jesus Christ into your heart, Fish?” Walter asked in a serious tone.

  Fish thought about it for a moment, then answered, “I think so, back when I was a kid or something.”

  “Oh, splendid! Praise the Lord!” Walter rejoiced, and put his hands together. At first, Fish thought that the man was done with his sales pitch, and that Fish was off the hook. Maybe the guy would just get up and leave him alone with his crackers.

  But he was wrong.

  “Okay, cool,” Fish said in a bored voice. “Thanks for coming by.” He hoped that the man would take the hint and leave, but he didn’t.

  “Fish, can I ask something of you? These are terrible times, dangerous times. Can I count on you to help me spread the word of our Lord?”

  “Dude, I’m actually kind of busy. I just got assigned as the new night shift beach security team leader and stuff-” Fish started, but was cut off by Walter.

  “Perfect! You have a position of leadership! What better way to help spread the Good Word!” Walter had put his hands in the air with joy.

  “Yo, I am totally not going to go around and Jesus-thump everyone. Sorry, you got the wrong guy here,” Fish stated, almost laughing in the process. Walter’s face instantly morphed from happiness to fury. He pointed his finger at Fish as if he was about to scold a five year-old child.

  “First of all, young man, stop using that term immediately! It’s disrespectful and blasphemous! It’s not even the correct one for crying out loud! And I am absolutely not going to repeat to you the proper disrespectful term. Second, if you haven’t already noticed, Satan is upon us. Satan is listening! Just take a look around you! See what has happened to our world? Are you ignorant?” Walter screamed fanatically and then sneered at Fish, awaiting a response and a proper apology.

  Fish could tell that Walter was super pissed off, but he wasn’t going to sit there and get punked out by the old man.

  “Satan is upon us, Satan is listening? Is that right?” Fish started, and then nodded his head, as if agreeing with himself inside his brain. He then reached into his jacket and pulled out his 9mm. He brandished it in front of Walter and continued with, “I’ll tell ya what, if Satan comes around, he’s gonna get two bullets in the fuckin’ chest. Just like anyone else that decides they wanna come around here and mess with me or my family!”

  Walter glanced down at the weapon with terrorized eyes. He was horrified! Was Fish referring to him? He was only trying to save another soul, but this Fish character was beyond saving. He was a monster! There was no time to spare, he needed to escape the conversation.

  Walter stood up to leave the table so fast that he had startled Pharaoh, who began barking loudly at the gray haired prophet.

  “I must leave at once!” Walter said, frantically. He snatched his bible off the table and almost fell over the bench backwards trying to get away. The fearful old man clutched the bible close to his chest and left the table.

  Fish began laughing as Walter sidestepped widely around the furiously barking dog, chanting, “Hellhounds on all sides surround me, Lord give me strength!”

  Fish continued to giggle as he watched the skinny man run down the road with enough speed to make his oversized trench coat flap away behind him.

  Once Walter was completely out of sight, Fish shook off the strange encounter and yelled to nobody in particular, “Now that was some bizarre-ass shit!”

  Fish said to Pharaoh as he resumed eating, “Good job buddy, thanks for helping me get rid of that weirdo.”

  Fish tossed Pharaoh another cheese-covered cracker as a reward. “Shhh, don’t tell Stevo!”

  *****

  It was almost noon. Stephen, Tarra and the Kays were making their way back to site 199 for some lunch. Meanwhile, Fish thought about all the food in the back of the truck. He didn’t like the idea of it being unsecured, especially with weirdos like Walter walking around in The Park, so he spent some time moving it from the bed to the cab of the truck. He had noticed Stephen and Tarra’s guns on the passenger side floor. “Hmmm, why didn’t they take their weapons? Stev
o has a pistol, but Tarra doesn’t have a handgun. Was she cruising around with the Kays unarmed all day? I need to talk to her about that,” Fish thought.

  Once everybody was back at site 199, Stephen noticed an empty brown plastic roll in the firepit. He knew it was from a Ritz box.

  Stephen asked Fish, “Did you eat an entire roll of crackers this morning?”

  “Yeah, but I didn’t eat the whole can of cheese, though!” Fish replied. Tarra rolled her eyes at Fish’s comment.

  Kyla asked excitedly, “Can we have some cheese and crackers too, daddy?”

  “I suppose,” Stephen said, and then sighed in defeat. He couldn’t deny his children after he just allowed Fish to get away with it. Stephen continued with, “We’re going to have a family meeting tonight to discuss the food situation.” He looked mostly at Fish, who was sitting at the picnic table. Fish was grinning, and he knew that he was in trouble, but damnit…those crackers were totally worth it!

  Tarra went to her husband and quietly asked in a mischievous tone as she put her arms around his neck, “Can I have some cheese and crackers too, daddy?”

  Stephen laughed her off and replied, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let’s all have some cheese and crackers. Just for today, though.”

  Stephen sighed and joked silently to himself, “I’m supposed to be the resource manager for the entire park, and I can’t even manage the resources at my own campsite!”

  As everyone (besides Fish) ate their cheesy crackers at the picnic table, the adults talked about their experiences that day. Fish asked Stephen and Tarra about leaving their guns in the truck, and they had both explained to him that they didn’t want to intimidate anyone, especially since it was their first day in The Park. Fish understood, but he still didn’t like the idea of Tarra being unarmed. He offered his 9mm pistol to her, and she declined, saying, “I’m working in the center of the park, I’ll be fine. You’re going to need it more than I will.”

  Stephen thought about Fish’s offer. He was right. Tarra shouldn’t be unarmed, whether or not she was in the “center” of The Park, it didn’t matter. So, Stephen offered his pistol to her, saying, “I’m going to working at the beach today, so I will be taking the M-4 with me. You can take Eddie’s .38 special.”

  Tarra got upset and put her palms up in front of herself and spouted, “Guys, stop. Just stop! Keep your guns. I’ll take the damn shotgun with me from now on if it will make you two feel better.”

  Fish and Stephen nodded at each other silently in agreement. It actually did make them feel better. Stephen then remembered something, and said, “Oh, and another thing. If you hear air horns, then we are under attack. The beach security teams carry them. Some of the fishermen I spoke with earlier today informed me that there have been two attacks recently.”

  Tarra suddenly felt bad about getting upset with the boys. Maybe they were right after all.

  Fish added, “Yeah, and there was this old Jesus-thumper that visited me here today. Walked right up and sat down! He got pissed at me, though, and took off.”

  “Wait,” Stephen almost laughed, “did you call that man a ‘Jesus-thumper’ to his face?”

  “Kind of, yeah. Maybe I did.”

  Tarra laughed and corrected Fish, “You realize that they are called ‘bible-thumpers’, not ‘Jesus-thumpers’, right? Both terms are derogatory, though. It’s not nice.”

  Stephen boomed with laughter, “No wonder he got pissed off!”

  “Oh, oops,” Fish chuckled. “I don’t care, I’m not going to apologize to him. Pharaoh barked his ass off at the dude, and you know he never does that unless the person is a turd.”

  “True,” Stephen agreed, changing the tone back to seriousness. “I don’t like the idea of people walking into our site, either.”

  Everyone agreed to subscribe to a heightened security posture. They had thought that being inside a sanctuary such as The Park eliminated any danger, but they were wrong.

  Once lunch was over, Tarra kissed her husband and left with the Kays, taking her shotgun with her, of course. Fish and Stephen remained at site 199, for they had to wait until Meghan came by with the location of the day’s three o’clock meeting. Fish told Stephen that after he received the day’s location, he was going to head to the beach to find Alexis Tillman. He needed to get his briefing from her. He also wanted to know if she was single or not.

  Stephen said, “Good, we can walk together. I have people meeting me there this afternoon. I’m going to teach them how to catch herring.”

  Fish got excited, “Dude, I want to do that. I love catching herring!”

  “Maybe after you get your brief you can join me. I’m going to need to borrow your herring rig, anyway. I don’t know if any of the people on my fishing teams have them,” Stephen said.

  The truth was, he hoped that Fish would accompany him, regardless. Not only because he wanted to go fishing with best friend, just like old times, but Stephen didn’t like the unknown, and the whole beach scenario was an unknown to him at that point. Fish made an excellent bodyguard.

  Meghan arrived at twelve minutes past one o’clock. This time, she was on a bicycle. She quickly told Fish and Stephen where to meet at three o’clock, and then pedaled away to her next notification.

  “She’s kinda cute,” Fish stated after Meghan was out of earshot.

  “Don’t even think about it, brother,” Stephen warned.

  “What? I was just saying...” Fish grinned.

  *****

  Tarra had received some disapproving looks from some of The Park residents as she passed site after site with her daughters and the shotgun. Some even shook their heads and mumbled something. She figured that they were probably just jealous that Tarra had such wonderful protection. Maybe they didn’t have a gun for themselves.

  At least Carrie had no problem with the gun whatsoever, saying, “Look at that! Nice! My dad taught me how to shoot on my tenth birthday.”

  Carrie had instructed Tarra to leave the weapon just inside the RV enough to where it would be easily accessible by either of them. She explained that the recent attacks had made her more vigilant than she had been in the past. Tarra was getting the impression that Carrie was just a big ol’ tom girl, and possibly not even a lesbian after all.

  A few minutes after Tarra had returned to Carrie at site 72, two women approached with a small boy. The boy was clinging to one of the women’s pant legs. It must have been his mother. Tarra guessed that the little boy was somewhere around three years old. The two women appeared clean and well-maintained. Tarra even detected a bit of makeup on the both of the women’s attractive faces, which was an odd sight during The Collapse.

  The little boy, however, was a stark contrast to his mother’s preened appearance. He was a total mess. His jacket and pants were covered in filth, and his face was a snot-encrusted, dirt-smeared wreck. Some of the gunk was even in his hair.

  Carrie and Tarra got up from their seats to greet the women and determine what was wrong. The women approached the nurse’s site but addressed only Tarra.

  “Are you Tarra?” the woman with the boy asked.

  “Yes, I am. How can we help you?”

  “I’m Julia Hollingsworth, my husband is the gate team leader,” the woman said, and extended her hand to Tarra. Julia seemed to be wearing her husband’s rank on her sleeve. Tarra recalled many of the navy wives doing that exact same thing when they were on base. It was so pathetic, in her opinion.

  The other woman introduced herself as Sydney Joseph, and her husband was also on the gate team.

  “Nice to meet you both,” Tarra stated cordially. She then crouched down to the boy’s level and said, “Who’s this little guy?”

  The boy bashfully turned his snot-scummy face away from Tarra without answering.

  Julia replied for him, “His name is Dakota, and he’s actually why I’m here. We heard that you were really good with children?”

  “Wow, word spreads fast around here!” Tarra laughed amiably. She had
considered it as a compliment.

  Julia asked, “We were wondering if you could watch him for a little while. Our husbands didn’t get a chance to eat anything this morning before they left for their shift, and we were hoping to take them some food.”

  Suddenly, Tarra thought that three things were odd. One, that these women knew about what was said at the leadership meeting the day before. Two, that the women had been addressing her the whole time and appeared to be purposely ignoring Carrie. And three, since there were two of them, why didn’t one of them watch the little boy while the other ran the food out to the gate?

  Carrie had been watching and was fed up. She rolled her eyes and went back over to the Kays at the picnic table. Tarra’s perception was that her new boss wasn’t kosher with the idea of watching Dakota for a while.

  “Please?” Julia begged, and looked pleadingly at Tarra. “I would take him with me, but it’s a really long walk. Not only that, but the gate could be a dangerous place for a little boy.”

  Tarra was at a crossroads, and hesitated before responding. She was new to The Park, and first impressions were everything. She wanted to be friendly and contribute whatever efforts she could, but she also didn’t want to accept any liabilities without Carrie’s approval. The child would definitely be a liability if any emergencies arose that would need both of their attention. But, what were the chances of that? Carrie had been holding it down all on her own up until that point, anyway.

  Carrie suddenly tossed out her own opinion from the picnic table, “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Tarra.”

  Julia put her hands on her hips and angrily blurted, “Excuse me? I wasn’t talking to you, Carrie. I was talking to Tarra.”

  Tarra looked back at Carrie, who was shaking her head, and then back at Julia. She sensed strife. Was there some type of animosity amongst these women? Did they have history?

  Even though Tarra was smarter than the average bear, sometimes the compassion in her heart would overwhelm her, and she would choose to react accordingly instead of following her intellect and instinct. She did have a question, though.