Another knock on the door interrupted his thoughts. It swung open to a silhouette.
“Matt. Are you there?” His heart did a couple quick somersaults. Heather. He licked his lips and whispered back.
“Hi.”
“Can I, um, come in to bed with you? Not because of something weird or anything, just I couldn’t sleep.”
“The beds are too soft,” Matt whispered.
“Exactly.” Her head bobbed up and down. “And all these noises outside, and I thought maybe if we were together, I’d be able to get some rest.”
“Abby’s already here. Jump aboard.” He patted the other side of his bed. She stepped into the moonlight shining through the windows, wearing flannel pajama pants and a tank top. As she dug underneath the covers, her scent filled his nose, strawberries and that something else he’d never been able to identify.
Three people in a double bed was a tight squeeze, and he found himself almost nose to nose with Heather, their faces only inches apart. She tucked one hand under her head, the other arm rested on top of her body, held tight by the sling.
“How's your arm?”
“Sore. But getting better. I can move it at least.”
“I can’t believe you did all that. Saving Liz, twice. Finding out about the transmitter. Everything."
“I wouldn’t have figured out that last bit without you. I remembered what you said about them having something to tell each other apart. You were right.”
Abby snored against his back and pushed in to him, inching him closer to Heather. Their noses touched now, and as they talked, her lips would brush against his, butterfly light. The entire experience was enormously distracting, and he lost track of the conversation altogether, only able to focus on her closeness. At some point, she let him take her good hand in both of his and he held it tight to his chest. Soon, they stopped taking, and dozed with their heads together, breathing in time so he wasn’t sure where his breaths stopped and hers started.
They must have fallen asleep. When the alien alarm screamed outside, they all flinched and groaned, but they were all becoming so immune to it, it was barely worth commenting on anymore. It looked to be just before sunrise, based on the meager light coming through his window. Abby pressed harder into his back and he thought she had already fallen back asleep. Heather’s face was still inches from his, and she stared at him with her blue, serious eyes.
He debated going in for a kiss. On the one hand, his little sister was in the bed with him, making it inappropriate. On the other, Heather's lips were right there, and her mouth was a little open and her hands belonged to him. But she had said nothing weird, and she seemed tired. His head spun. She licked her lips.
“Matt,” she breathed at him. “You are bad at reading signals.”
He assumed she meant something alien-related and tried to figure out what byzantine pattern he missed.
“You mean like the way the aliens hover in the air? I thought about that, I think it has to do with-”
“Matt, please don’t make our first kiss be one where I need to beg you.”
Oh.
He didn’t know what to do with his hands and all at once he became hyper-aware of every part of his body. His head must have hit a thousand degrees. He didn’t even need to lean in, they were already so close. It was just a matter of going for it, and-
A loud thump from across the hall startled him and he sat up.
“What's that?” Heather looked around. “Are the aliens hitting the roof now or something?”
Their motions jostled Abby awake. She rubbed her eyes and clutched Fuzzy Bear tight against her chest. A low moan slipped out.
“Why are they in my room?” she asked.
She was right, the noises came from across the hall. Matt scrambled out of bed, Heather beside him, and the three of them crept out of the room to see what madness the aliens had in store for them now.
Nothing prepared him for the scene unfolding in Abby’s room.
Pete and Liz crouched underneath the skylight, illuminated by the glow of the rising sun outside. Candles had been lit throughout the room, giving the entire scene an otherworldly vibe. Part of the skylight was blocked by what seemed to be a damp pillowcase, with moisture soaking through. Pete crouched with a long shovel and Liz held a rake.
“What the hell are you doing?” Heather said.
“Hunting.” Pete didn’t look away from the skylight. “We filled a bag with chicken and steak and stuff. When they’ll come to eat it, we'll use these to kill them.” He held up his shovel.
“You’re insane,” Heather said, summing up Matt’s thoughts. “Get away from there.” The intimidating shape of an Alien filled the skylight.
“I knew it!” Pete did a little dance under the window, keeping his eyes locked upwards. “Come on, you fucker. Come on and eat.” Heather pulled Liz away from the window
Everything was happening too fast and Matt’s brain screamed at him, but his thoughts flittered like butterflies, denying his efforts to catch them. Random ideas pinged through his mind.
Pete is going to stab the alien through the window.
The glass will break from the point of the shovel.
The alien will die and then drop.
In the skylight, the alien hovered close to the window, and a compartment opened. Small, spider-like appendages dropped out and picked up the pillowcase, lifting entire chunks of meat into the cavity. Bright flashes came from the interior; he assumed that meant the protein was being atomized somehow.
“Fuck you!” Pete stabbed upwards with the shovel, and just as Matt suspected, the glass broke when he pierced the alien. Shards fell around Pete’s head and shoulders, dangerously large chunks that could have cut him badly, but he ignored them.
“Kill it!” Liz yelled. Heather held her back with a single arm. In the dim light, she looked feral. Both her and Pete had gone crazy. This was wrong, all wrong, and something nagged at the back of his brain. The tiny shape of Abby rushed by his leg.
She yelled, “Let me help,” and ran beside Pete.
Pete stabbed again and again, alien blood raining down onto his face. Abby stood close, cheering him on, inattentive of the danger. Matt stood, frozen in place, too many thoughts hammering his head, unable to move. The alien vibrated and trembled in its death throes and Pete jumped out of the way to stand beside Liz and Heather, leaving Abby under the window by herself.
The voice in Matt’s head screamed now, and he closed his eyes.
The alien will drop.
A single window will not break the fall.
Aliens weigh over 200 pounds.
Abby is underneath.
“Holy shit, get out of the way!” Matt’s eyes snapped open, and he screamed and took a step forward, too late to do anything. Pete’s vicious plan worked too well, and the air filled with the low, vibrating hum that signaled the creature’s death rattle. Above them, the alien shuttered in the air. Abby clapped, joy and delight in her eyes, not understanding the danger.
“It’s going to collapse!” he yelled, and Pete looked down at Abby. Matt saw understanding register in his friend’s eyes.
“Abby, no!” Pete dove forward and shoved Abby out of the way just as hundreds of pounds of alien crashed through the window. He never had a chance. His push sent Abby flying into the corner of the room, hard enough to cause her to rebound off the bed and slam to the floor. In the corner, Liz screamed, an animal sound that caused Matt to grind his teeth and clap his hands to his ears. Behind him, the door crashed open. The adults crowded inside, trying to process the scene.
Matt’s paralysis finally broke. He rushed to Pete, who lay on the ground on his stomach, half his body crushed by the alien. Blood surrounded him. So much blood. It soaked into Matt’s knees when he knelt on the carpet beside his friend. With a grunt, he heaved the alien off. Underneath, Pete's body was a mangled ruin. His arm bent at an unnatural angle and something that looked like bone poked out from his shirt. Pete made a half-barking
sound and his eyes fluttered across the room, landing on nothing.
“Abby?” He coughed it out as a question and gripped Matt’s hand. Droplets of blood covered his lips.
“She’s fine, you saved her. You did it, Pete. You didn’t leave her behind.”
Pete coughed again, spitting up a cup of blood that splashed onto Matt’s legs, but Matt didn’t let go, he squeezed Pete’s hand harder and tried to comfort him. He spoke over the sound of Pete’s labored wheezing.
“It’s going to be okay, buddy. I love you and I’m here with you, I’m not going anywhere. Don’t look at anything else, just look at me. You saved her Pete. Okay? You did it. You saved us all.”
Pete’s eyes stopped their wandering and focused on Matt.
“Can’t breathe.”
“It’s fine.” He struggled to make words come out of his mouth, he was crying, and he was so fucking sick of crying.
Pete tried to say something, but instead vomited more blood. He took one more rattling breath and then nothing. His eyes opened and closed, one final time.
Abby rushed to his side, too late, sliding across the blood-soaked carpet.
“I’m sorry, you’re not a bad brother, I lied, you’re a good brother.” She pulled at Pete’s arm and Matt tried to hug her, but his mom was faster, she scooped Abby up while his dad led him from Pete’s broken body.
“Matt, come on. There’s nothing you can do.” His dad’s voice didn’t sound right, like he swallowed a handful of gravel. Matt held on to Pete's hand because if he let go, who would Pete have? Matt was the only one left. Someone needed to hold his hand so he wouldn’t be scared when he got to wherever he was going.
Heather pried his fingers free. She knelt beside him and whispered in his ear. He didn’t understand the words, but it didn’t matter. He clung to her voice, the heat of her breath, and she lifted him to hit feet. This was the second time Pete had died. Why did this time hurt more than the first?
“Get your family safe, Cutler.” Mr. Keene had come into the room at some point, Mr. Gardner behind him.
“We’ll take care of this. You all get out.” Mr. Gardner wiped tears from his eyes, and Matt let himself be led away by Heather. The old man knelt beside Pete and pushed back a strand of hair.
“I’m sorry, Peter. I should have been here. I’m so sorry.”
In the background, Mr. Keene said, "Make sure you get the transistor thing, John." and Matt realized that they now had a second device. Part of Pete’s plan had worked, but the cost was too high.
The sound of Abby’s muffled sobs into his mom’s shoulder escorted him from the room.
Day 7: The Last Day
Liz
No one paid any attention to Liz, standing by herself in the corner. Matt and Abby went to their parents, as did Heather. Mr. Gardner knelt by Pete’s corpse, doing his best to cover the body with a bed sheet. Liz tried to process how she felt about that; about Pete being reduced to slightly cooling meat under a cloth blanket covered in pictures of Winnie the Pooh characters. Pete’s smile. Gone. Pete’s touch. Gone. His laugh, his voice; his jokes… all gone. She picked the thought up and spun it around, but couldn’t locate a way in. Everyone cried. Liz didn’t.
She snuck out of the room, only snuck was the wrong word. It carried the sense of stealth, of being careful. No one paid her any attention. Leaving was effortless and unnoticed. If there was metaphor there, it didn’t resonate.
Her feet carried her to the kitchen, uncoupled from her thoughts. She opened the fridge to grab a drink, but nothing remained. Dry and half eaten leftovers, wrapped by Mr. Cutler, were a meager audience to her thirst. Instead, she turned on the faucet over the sink. It let out a sputter of water, a brief release of moisture, and then nothing. They were out of water now.
Oh.
Outside, the birds sang, ignorant of the aliens above them, blind and numb to the world around them. Pete was dead, but the birds sang. One life ended, but others kept going. Why life one and not life two? Why anything?
She still wanted to drink something. Beside the counter, curated gallons of water stood in plastic containers, harvested and stored by Mr. Cutler. A single glass perched on the counter and she dipped it into the water, hoisted up the liquid, and let it tilt down her throat. Was it good? She wasn’t sure.
The alien transmitter sat undefended on the kitchen table. A small box the size of a deck of playing cards. A miraculous device that could protect a person from alien offenses. Heather swore it worked. Heather wasn’t here. No one was here.
She picked it up, surprised by its heft. Much heavier than she would have suspected. Perhaps it had something to do with the foreign circuitry that powered it. Maybe the metal was a kind never seen on Earth. Holding it, she tried to will herself to feel something. Anything.
Nothing.
Through the front hallway, early morning streams of sunlight inched along the floorboards. Still turning the device over in her hands, she walked toward the front door. Sounds of crying and consoling floated down from upstairs. She thought it would bother her, but instead, she found it irritating. Shut up already. He wasn’t your boyfriend. He wasn’t the only person left in your life. You have a family.
Her hand moved to the doorknob. Interesting, that she was going outside. How well would the transmitter work? Did it matter? Worst case, it didn’t work, and she died. Worst case, it worked, and she lived. A coin toss with two ruined sides.
She opened the door and breathed in the morning air. It was a breath that could only exist in the early pre-dawn, one that carried scents of dewy fauna and clean breezes. Across the street, the sun inched over the surrounding forest, casting shadows of red and gold across everything, striving to be haunting. Another night survived. For some of them.
It was underwhelming. Poets, the lot of them, were liars and con men. There was no unknowable beauty in a sunrise, only the harsh disappointment of routine. The sun rose every day without her help. It would set tonight whether she existed or not. It would be almost impossible to have less of an impact on anything than she’d already had in the first eighteen years of her life.
The grass retained moisture from the night and when she sat, it soaked into her pants. In her left hand she held the transmitter, but with her right, she brushed the grass, feeling the tickles of hundreds of individual blades. Closing her eyes, she lay back and allowed herself to breathe.
Sunlight on her neck. Grass on her hands. A gentle breeze tickling her neck. Was that enough? Was life – the sheer act of it – enough? Could a sunbeam fill her? She had no one now. No parents or boyfriend. No one to hug her and tell her she tried her hardest or laugh at her stupid dreams or share the moments.
She was alone. For the first time, truly, crushingly alone.
A single tear dripped from her eye, but she concentrated on the warmth of the sun. All she needed to do was let go of the transmitter. That’s it. It wouldn’t even hurt; her mom didn’t cry at all. In fact, it was borderline humane. She wasn’t sure if there was a God, but this exit felt like a technicality even he could get behind, notwithstanding his obsession with sophistry. All she needed to do was open her hand. Hardly even a decision when you think about it.
But still. The sun. Warmth on her cheek. The grass playing against her palm. Could being alive be enough? What would replace her joy now that joy was behind her? Did it even matter? How much was there to cling to anymore?
This new world needed new ways of thinking. Two aliens, dead. Somewhere, she’d be willing to wager, someone else had killed two more. What if she found that person? They could work in partnership, killing the things that took everyone. Could there be a nobility of purpose in that?
Would that be enough?
Would anything?
Her dad would wait for her. Now, later, it didn’t matter. He’d be there. Would he be proud of her, at the last? When she looked into his eyes, when she threw herself into the warmth of his embrace, what stories would she tell? He always understood her, he calle
d her his little peanut with a hard shell, and he joked only he got through. Lifetimes ago, he’d poke her ribs, and she’d giggle and sometimes, Mom would join in, the three of them exhausting themselves in laughter.
Those moments existed, somewhere. Buried though, and sometimes… sometimes it took too much energy to dig. Sometimes, keeping it together was enough. And a moment could become her forever.
She took a final, deep breath and attempted to luxuriate in the swell of her chest, the catch and release of her lungs, the harmony of her body working to keep her alive.
The sun. The warmth.
She flexed her hands and decided.
Martin
Martin leaned against the wall with his arms folded while John covered the boy with a bedsheet. Blood soaked through right away, causing the thin sheet to turn opaque and cling the body. John sniffled and sobbed through the process and Martin provided support by handing over additional blankets.
This whole thing had turned clockwise. Cutler fucked everything up. This was the problem with people, he’d found. He’d give them a little rope, try to be a nice guy and let them figure stuff out for themselves, but then they’d always wreck things. His plan had been solid. Dig through the houses, get a network going, huddle and wait for next steps. If they’d stop all their squirming, they’d be able to last a month, at least. Plenty of time to figure out a longer-term plan, if not for the Cutlers. Between Krista's bitching and her wuss husband's crying, his skull ached with a persistent headache. He regretted screwing the wife. She was crazy, and he had a rule: never fuck crazy.
And now the son seemed to have his clutches in his daughter, already making her act stupid. Running outside to save her friend? Digging through alien intestines for miracle moving devices? They were all nuts.
John finished covering up the boy, another mistake to place at Cutler’s feet. What was he doing, letting the kids run around by themselves like that? He should have locked them down, confined them to their rooms and shown them a man was in charge. This never would have happened under his watch.
Aliens and Ice Cream Page 25