by Laeser, Nico
The rifle in my hands was a bolt-action .308, as much kick and stopping power as my dad’s 12-gauge shotgun, but with greater range and accuracy according to Gary. Gary had warned that by the time I could ready the rifle for a second shot, the fight would probably be over, so I had to make my first shot count.
My part in the plan was to remain in cover with my rifle aimed at the first person to get out of the vehicle, and at the first signs of that man reaching for a weapon, I was to put a bullet through his shoulder. In the following chaos, Gary would take cover behind the truck and retrieve the shotgun.
This scenario had been drawn out like a football play and rehearsed many times. Our coach had explained each of our positions on the team, from the first shot, my shot, to the covering fire from the upper window and the crossfire from the barn. Gary was to collect the shotgun and circle around to the back of the vehicle or, as in this case, vehicles, and finish the play.
In the planning and rehearsal, it felt more like boys playing war games, and when I caught the preacher’s eyes on us, I felt ashamed and embarrassed, like a child on the cusp of being too old for toys, having been caught playing make-believe. Randall took no part in the planning or the war games, and during the standoff, he was to remain inside to keep Haley safe, at Sean’s request.
The reality of aiming a gun at another person was very different from thinking about it. The truck slowed to a crawl and crunched to a halt on the dry dirt, around ten feet away from where Gary stood waiting. My hands were trembling so violently and uncontrollably that it would have taken a great deal of luck to land a shot in the broadside of the barn, and a minor miracle to place a shot in a man’s shoulder. I was terrified at the thought of missing the shot, and equally, if not more, terrified at the thought of making it.
The driver’s door opened and the large hard-faced man I was expecting turned out to be a woman. She was dressed for warmth, not combat, and wore a pleading expression. A sickly feeling crept up inside me as I watched through the scope, and I removed my finger from the trigger, letting it rest outside the trigger guard. As Gary and the dark-haired woman conversed, I watched, wishing I had the ability to read lips like Haley, to know what they were saying, to know if the threat was over.
The woman signaled to the truck. A man and a boy stepped from around the passenger side; the man was limping and the boy, no more than Haley’s age, was trying to help support the man’s weight.
The windows on the second vehicle were dark, too dark to see inside. Part of me expected all of the doors of the SUV to open at once and a group of armed men to jump out, but the driver door opened slowly, and an older man stepped out from behind it with his hands up and palms facing Gary. Seconds later, the passenger door opened and a gray-haired female stepped around the door and joined the driver.
At Gary’s signal, Powell made his way toward the group, all the while maintaining the feigned, yet convincing, posture of a soldier. Gary gestured toward the SUV, and Powell peered in past the driver door over the sights of the now raised rifle in his hands. He pulled at the rear door handle, reset his grip on the rifle, and opened the door all the way with his foot before turning to Gary and mouthing something inaudible. After checking the trunk of the SUV and the bed of the truck, Powell lowered his rifle, and Gary raised his arm, giving the thumbs-up signal I had been silently praying for.
I thumbed the safety switch and breathed a long shaking sigh. I took a minute to calm my nerves enough to move, then slung the rifle over my shoulder, and made my way toward the group, all the while reciting silent prayers of gratitude for not having been tested on my willingness to pull the trigger.
Gary retrieved the shotgun and met me on my approach, while Powell stayed with the new group.
“Who are they?” I asked.
“Just people, same as us. They’ve got no place to go and they’re hungry,” Gary said.
“Where have they been living until now?” I asked.
“She says they were at a makeshift shelter on the other side of town. They were asked to leave because there wasn’t enough food for everyone.”
“Are there going to be more coming here?” I asked.
“I didn’t get that far. Her husband’s injured, busted his leg in a car wreck. I say we let them stay until his leg’s healed, but it’s your house, your call.” He studied my face for a second, and seemingly in response to one of a thousand questions replaying in my mind, he added, “They seem like genuine people; they’re unarmed, and the boy looks like he hasn’t eaten in days. If nothing else, we should get them fed and fueled up.”
I gave a long look to our new guests—their expressions mirrored my own lingering apprehension, all except the boy, who stood smiling with a raised hand. I followed his gaze to the house, where Haley stood in the open doorway, waving back at him. “We can’t just turn them away, so I guess we should bring them inside,” I said. “But we should probably warn them about our other guests.”
Gary nodded. “We should put out that fire too.”
19 | Grounding
They introduced themselves as Owen and Kate—their son’s name was Kyle, and the older man and woman were Kate’s parents, Abigail and Samuel. In the house, they stayed together as a family, but not at the expense of common courtesy. They, in turn, offered to help with the running of the house to pay their way, but the general consensus was that they settle in and rest for a few days before any thought would be given to roles, responsibilities, or compensation. They spared no opportunity to extend their gratitude for having been allowed to stay and share our food, and even though we couldn’t offer anything more comfortable than sleeping bags for bedding, they were glad of the warmth and shelter. They each told stories about where they had been before, and all of those stories shared a common thread. Their previous shelter had been cold, without power, filled beyond capacity, and beyond the group’s means for survival. Among the shelter’s number, there had been a dominating group who had taken it upon themselves to discriminate between those who were of use to the group and those who were not. The common denominator shared between those who had been selected for eviction was their skin color. This deciding factor had propelled Kate and her family to the top of the list to be ostracized, forcing them to find shelter elsewhere.
As I listened to their stories, I was reminded of Gary’s warning, “It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better.”
***
Without x-rays, it would be left to a “best guess” as to the condition of Owen’s leg, but Powell splinted and wrapped the leg as though it had been a clean break and said we should keep an eye on it to make sure it was healing properly. Being included in the process made me feel special, like a trainee nurse, although it was probably only a second pair of hands that Powell needed, and I had already proven myself as a good helper back at the church.
While Powell finished, my attention drifted around the room, settling on Haley’s smiling face. She was sitting on the floor with Kyle, both of them cross-legged and facing each other, passing notes back and forth. These new guests had somehow transformed my house back into what now felt like a home, but the feeling was bittersweet.
I slunk away while Powell went over the protocols of aftercare and recovery with Owen, and I opted to refuel the generator, as much for the necessity of the task as for the moment’s peace and solitude.
A few minutes into the job, Powell appeared and joined me at the slip tank.
“I thought I was on generator duty today?”
“You were busy socializing; figured I’d pick up your slack,” I replied with a smile.
“I can’t help being so popular and charming.”
“Did you come out here to gloat or to help?”
“Looks like you’ve got it under control. Maybe I’ll slack off for a while and watch you work,” he said through what was becoming a familiar smirk.
I shook my head. “How long will it take for Owen’s leg to heal?”
“It usually takes eight
to ten weeks to heal a break,” he said.
“My house is getting to be as full-up as the church was. They all seem like good people though, don’t they?” My question was posed rhetorically, but in truth, I was asking for reassurance.
Powell responded as I had hoped he would. “They’re all harmless, as far as I can tell.”
“I keep wishing that things could go back to the way they were, but honestly, all I want is for my dad to come back. Haley’s mom came back, why hasn’t my dad? Or my mom?”
He put a hand on my shoulder. “I wish I knew the rules. Whatever is happening, there’s no logic to it that I can see.”
“They’re beginning to look like us, the ghosts I mean, they seem to be getting clearer every day; they look almost as real as we do,” I said.
For a moment, we stared at each other in silence, before he offered to take over the pump. I stood, pulled off my gloves, and offered them to him. He shook his head, and I set them back down on the slip tank. I spent the remainder of the job making wisecracks about his technique, but he took it in good humor, giving as good as he got during the playful banter.
We returned inside to see everyone standing in the living room, talking all at once, and staring at the curtain wall.
“What’s going on?” I asked as we neared the group.
Gary turned, put a finger to his ear, and said, “Listen.”
I glanced at Powell with a frown. He shrugged back at me, and then I realized what it was that we were hearing. The voices were coming from behind the curtain.
“Is that ...”
“It started right before you guys walked in, like someone just turned up the volume,” Gary said.
We watched in awe as Sarah spoke her first words to Sean since her passing. Her message remained inaudible over the murmur, but whatever it was brought both tears and a smile to his face. He reached for her hand but paused an inch or two away; both of them had learned that lesson time and time again over the last while.
The shocks hurt, like being zapped by a live wire; having experienced a shock from both bad wiring and from the ghosts, I can attest to the similarity in sensation.
I looked down at my own hands and then back at the couple. “I’ll be back in a minute,” I said and went back outside.
***
“Sarah?”
She turned and offered the broadest smile. “Thank you for taking care of Sean and Haley and for letting us stay here.”
“You’re very welcome,” I said through a smile and held out my hand.
She glanced down and frowned at the sight of my extended hand. She hesitated and then timidly extended her own, wincing at the expectation of a sudden shock, but there was no shock and no pain. Her hand felt solid in mine—not the hand of a ghost, but the hand of a woman returned to life. I turned to see Sean, his mouth opened to begin a question that didn’t need to be asked. I pulled off my work gloves and gave them to him.
20 | Signs of life
It wasn’t long before Sarah and the others reported new sensations. They no longer received shocks from furniture and objects, but said they were cold and hungry. I offered them clothes from my father’s closet and from my own, and most of the curtain wall was taken down. Sean and Sarah were the first to test the safety of non-insulated human contact; there was no shock or pain. Sean had his wife back, and Haley had her mom.
Dressed in regular clothes, the group of newly living was indiscernible from the rest of us; it seemed as though, for most, the process was done and complete.
During this time, Randall remained a silent shadow of the preacher we had first met. I wondered if it had been the actions of the living, or the resurrection of the dead, that had shaken his faith and made him want to shut down and distance himself from us all. I kept my questions to myself and left him alone, as did the rest of the group, all of us hoping time and space would heal his wounds and his faith. My guess was that Randall was unable to see where he, or his religion, now fit in. With so many new people, people who had, by whatever means, been returned to life, it was difficult to see where any of us fit in. No one spoke of God, or of Heaven and Hell; no one could answer any questions about the afterlife in any greater detail than that of a recalled dream. In spite of our surplus of oil lamps and candles, on the subject of God we remained in the dark.
I was somewhat relieved that the majority of our residents were now bound by the same physical rules. The solid and clothed were no longer able to walk through walls, and those few newly manifesting stragglers were now trapped by what remained of the curtain wall and furniture, fenced in to avoid accidental and painful contact.
Our biggest problem became the washroom lineup and the additional mouths that needed feeding, but Gary had said those with hungry mouths also had capable hands that could hold weapons to protect the house from anyone or any group that would come and try to take what we had.
It was hard to gauge what mood Gary would be in from day to day. He disappeared for hours at a time and would come back as one of many seemingly different men. One day he would be intent on working through security drills with an overbearing intensity that put everyone on edge; the next day he would come back happy-go-lucky and as overly friendly as a sheepdog puppy. On one of Gary’s good days, he called everyone together for a meeting. The purpose was to find out about the newly living—where they came from, where they had lived and died, and when. In modern-day clothing, people who had lived and died over a century ago looked no different from those who had died within my lifetime.
I tried to empathize with those who lived before television or the light bulb and with those who had never witnessed harnessed electricity beyond built-up static charge. It was a blessing that the power and modern comforts had been temporarily turned off or decommissioned, offering us time to warn and orient the newly living of the changes in the world and the advancements in knowledge and technology. How strange this new world must have looked to them; even within the confines of my house, there were wonders that could only be explained by magic, or by a trick of the devil, without knowledge of the past century’s technological evolution.
Some who had spoken about their death, had no recollection of the afterlife dream, and had woken seamlessly into this world, which had appeared as a ghostly landscape filled with translucent wonders and humanoid apparitions. To some, we were the spirits and our world was the spirit realm, where the dead seemed unaware they were dead. The prospect of this sent shivers through me; who could say for certain they were wrong? What if we were dead and they were joining us in the afterlife, in death? Perhaps the dream we mistook for the afterlife was merely an in-between stage, a transitional limbo dividing parallel planes of existence—when we died in one, we moved to the next parallel plane or dimension, unaware of our rebirth or manifestation. Perhaps my dad had moved on to the next plane, maybe to be reunited with Mom, and maybe Sam.
The fact that Sarah had returned to our world, the same plane she had left only years before, left me with more questions than answers. Those same questions were the ones I assumed were racing through the preacher’s mind, forcing him to re-evaluate his beliefs and somehow rework those old teachings into the new world that was unfolding around us all.
The newly living, who told of their past lives, were not kings or queens or famous rock stars—they were normal, regular people like us, shopkeepers, farmers, and factory workers. Sarah was the first to undergo a physical, which confirmed a pulse, a heartbeat, and a working respiratory system. They were alive, or as alive as the rest of us.
21 | Revival tour
Even with the fires out, the potential for new and greater threats loomed. The escalating scarcity of food, now amplified by the countless new hungry bodies, would assure the rise of mob mentality and violence. It was hard to imagine a future without famine, rioting, and small-scale war, but the worst prediction was another of Gary’s—if the ghosts of family and friends could return to life, then so too could the ghosts of family foes and enemies, infamo
us killers, wretched kings, warriors, emperors, and tyrants. The bets were even regarding the reanimation of figures like Vlad the Impaler or Adolf Hitler.
“He’s not exactly inconspicuous with that little mustache. If he turns up, he’ll be hauled away or shot on sight,” Powell said.
“Okay, but what about Jack the Ripper, or Billy the Kid, or any number of murderers, gangsters, mobsters, or Wild West outlaws. There could be people who lived and died before our laws were even created,” Gary replied.
“Well, that’s a terrifying thought. Medieval rapists and murderers walking the streets,” I said. “Thanks for putting that in my head, Gary.”
Randall shook his head. “Why would God send those people back to us?” His question was rhetorical, but still he glared at Gary, seemingly waiting for an answer.
“I’m not trying to scare anyone. I’m just trying to plan for the worst. There’s no way to prove that the people in this house are, or were, who they claim.” Gary rubbed at his temples and let out a breath.
“What you’re saying is that once things go back to normal, if they ever do, we could be riding a bus with Attila the Hun or Al Capone,” Powell said.
“Or Jimmy Hendrix,” Owen said.
“Now there’s a bright side—think of the super groups. Jimmy Hendrix on guitar, Freddy Mercury on vocals, John Bonham on the drums, all the greats in one concert, back from the dead and back on tour,” Powell said with a smirk.
“Mozart on the piano?” I added.
My newly acquired smile fell away as I watched the ex-preacher storm out of the house.
Powell gave an upward nod toward the door. “What’s up with Randall?”