Off Track

by Neil Bullock

  Greg asks, “Would you consider it then?”

  Alice shakes her head. I say, “No, but hopefully in that case, we wouldn’t have to. Maybe there’d be willing participants.”

  He seems to be coming to terms with the idea that our species is most likely dead. He sighs again and turns back to me. “You never wanted kids?”

  “Me? No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’d just rather not risk that I picked up any parenting tips from my dad.”

  “Oh. Was he—”

  “He was a manipulative con man. Let’s just leave it at that.”

  Greg nods. “Fair enough. Look, I’m sorry I brought up the repopulation thing. It’s hard to get your head around the fact we might be the final generation.”

  I nod and smile, and I’m surprised at how genuine it feels. “Yeah, it is. Don’t worry about it.”

  He returns my smile.

  We talk about our plans for tomorrow a little more, then we make our way upstairs. The house has eight bedrooms and Greg picks the one that overlooks the swimming pool and tennis courts around back. Alice and I pick rooms next to each other.

  I stop at my bedroom door, turn, and call, “Good night.”

  Greg pauses down the hall, turns and gives a cheery wave. Alice emerges from her room and offers a tight-lipped smile. “Night, Eden.”

  I gaze at her for a second, then we all disappear wordlessly into our rooms. When I’ve fallen into bed fully clothed and am looking around at the unfamiliar space with all its unfamiliar dark nooks, I wish I’d asked Alice if I could share her bed, but I start to drift off to sleep even as I’m having the thought. Before I have time to think about much of anything else, I’m gone.

  Now

  I observe the gap between the locomotive and the first carriage. Aside from the coupler, there’s nothing there. It seems there really is no way into the locomotive. I turn my attention to the door that leads into the first carriage. While I’m staring up, it splits in two, each half sliding silently open.

  A feeling of dread begins at my shoulders and radiates down my spine, but I don’t move. I half expect someone to step out and invite me aboard, but nobody does. I can see inside though. There’s a vestibule of some kind, presumably with a door that leads deeper into the train. All I have to do is climb the four rung ladder and I’ll be inside.

  Is that what I want?

  I take a step back and look at the silhouettes of trees in the distance.

  I only have the two options here. I already know, or at least strongly suspect, there’s no future for me on this planet. All forms of life may be at an end. My options, then, are to get on the train, or to unscrew the cap of the Oxycodone and down the contents. The decision isn’t an easy one. The only thing I know for sure about this train is that it killed me in my dream. Realistically, that’s no different to my other option, the Oxy.

  All things being equal, I’d rather a quick death than a drawn out one.

  Which is it? Is Oxy a quick death? What about the train?

  I don’t know what to do.

  New Day

  April 26th

  Like yesterday, it’s almost aggressively sunny when I wake, like the sunlight is physically beating itself against the curtains and will break through if I don’t open them. I stare at them for a second as the last two days come flooding back. It’s tempting to give up, to stay in this magnificently comfortable bed forever, but I have places to be. We have a plan to enact.

  I climb out of bed and note that both Alice and Greg’s bedroom doors are still closed. I figure I’ll allow them some extra time to sleep while I make breakfast. Soup isn’t going to cut it if we have fifty miles of walking to do over the coming days.

  I walk downstairs, taking in how different the house looks in the daytime. It’s bright and inviting, filled with pale shades offset by rich, dark timber here and there. I make my way to the kitchen and hunt through the enormous pantry for calories. Finding nothing, I walk through into another room containing an enormous freezer, which is when I notice the power finally gave out. There’s a lot of stuff in the freezer, and most is still cold and fresh enough, so I figure I might as well use it. Rather than play with the gas stove, I take a camping stove outside, hook it up to one of several gas bottles I find out there and stand in the warm April sun cooking bacon by dropping the entire frozen block in the pan and awkwardly peeling off slices with tongs when they warm up enough. I eat some slices as I go, but soon I have a large pile of crispy bacon – a perfectly balanced breakfast. I head back inside with the plate and place it in the center of the kitchen table, then call upstairs. “Breakfast!”

  When I hear nothing, I climb the stairs and knock on Greg’s door – the closest one. When he doesn’t answer, I open the door a crack and say, “Greg? You awake?”

  When I push the door all the way open, I see a black puddle close to the edge of the bed. Some of it has oozed onto the floor. “Oh, no...” I repeat this as I start to hyperventilate, each repetition becoming breathier and more panicked. “Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no.” I run from the room and throw the door of Alice’s room open.

  The pile of blackened sludge is almost dead center on top of the bedspread. My lungs force all their air out and I struggle against tears to take more in. I walk across the room, crouching by the bed. The sludge glistens in the sun. Did she suffer? I didn’t hear anything. If she’d suffered, I would have expected to hear her scream like the people in the food court.

  I remember my last thought as I drifted off to sleep, wishing that I’d asked to share the bed with Alice. I now wish more than almost anything that I’d got out of bed, marched into her room and demanded to spend the night. Maybe I couldn’t have stopped this, but I could have done for her what she did for the first victim. I could have told her everything was going to be fine. I could have told her she was on her way to see Mark. I could have held her while she—

  When I’m out of tears and my stomach hurts from gasping and sobbing, I sit alone in the silence. The house has turned from somewhere I wanted to be to somewhere I must escape. Every second I sit there listening to absolutely nothing, my fear grows that whatever is happening will come for me. I start to move without being completely aware of it. I run down the stairs, throw open the front door and by the time I think to look back, the house is out of sight.

  If this is coming for me, I have one thing left that I need to do.

  Later

  April 29th, 2019

  The last few days have passed in a blur.

  Normally, I’m pretty good at hiding from my feelings, but Greg and Alice’s demise has screwed me up. I can’t stop thinking about it. Why did I survive when they didn’t? What’s so special about me? Alice was a doctor. Surely, she deserved to live more than I did. Maybe the same thing will still happen to me. It’ll take me just like it took everyone else around me. Why would it not? Still, I keep moving forward because I have to know for sure what waits for me at the end of this journey.

  I don’t know where I am, but I can’t be far from my mom’s house. I’ve been slowing down since realizing that. It seems obvious what I’m going to find there, and I don’t want to confront it. I’ve been heading downhill for some time, and I hope that means I’m about to reach Tillamook. I picked up a river yesterday afternoon, which I think will take me into town. From there, it’s a comparatively short walk to the coast. You can’t see the ocean from my mom’s place, but you can smell it. I’m looking forward to that in a weird, guilty sort of way.

  I haven’t seen a single living organism since Alice. At first, I was a little anxious walking through Tillamook State Forest. It felt like the trees were closing in around me, but I don’t even know if the trees are still alive. I slept where I fell from sheer exhaustion. I fear I am alone, at least on this continent, and I don’t fancy my chances trying to get to a different one. The only way I can see it happening is if I head north to Alaska, wait for winter, hope the
ocean freezes enough that I can walk into Russia. And maybe get eaten by a polar bear.

  I stop walking and start giggling.

  The idea is ridiculous. I picture myself running cartoon -style across the sea ice, legs spinning and going nowhere, while a confused polar bear watches.

  Abruptly, I stop laughing. The silence is all-encompassing.

  I start moving again.

  My mom’s house comes into view, and I find I am wrong – you can see the ocean from here. A tiny portion of it, but it’s there. Why didn’t I know that? I feel like I should have known that. I approach the front door, palms sweating, heart racing, and knock. Normally, I wouldn’t knock. I have keys, but I didn’t bring them.

  “Mom? Nana?”

  On either side of me are beautiful flowers in reds, purples, oranges, and yellows. There is not a single bee in sight. I wish Alice were here. She’d be almost as devastated as I expect to be in a matter of minutes, but she would be here for me, and I for her. I wish Greg were here. I wish someone were with me, for fuck’s sake. Is that too much to ask?

  I knock again.

  There’s no answer.

  The door is unlocked, so I open it.

  The hallway beyond is devoid of life, but also lacks any puddles of that terrible tar-like substance. That’s good. I step inside and close the door behind me. I think about Mrs. Castillero next door, how she’s usually the first to spot me arriving for a visit. She sits out in her porch swing, sipping coffee for what seems like most of the day. Her absence was almost more jarring than my mom and Nana not answering the door.

  “Mom? Nana?”

  Cautiously, I move into the living room. It is exactly as I’d expect, though the television would normally be on at this time of day. Nana would be watching some atrocious daytime soap opera or other. The television is off, but I assume that’s due to a lack of power.

  The dining room is similarly empty.

  I find my mother in the kitchen. I know it’s her because Nana was getting too old to be able to use the kitchen effectively. There is a jar of spaghetti sauce open on the counter and a pot of water on the unlit burner.

  I stifle a sob because my stomach muscles still hurt, then I just stand there for what seems like days. Time ceases to mean anything. I imagine what my mother might have been doing. Clearly, she was preparing food. I try to conjure her up in my mind’s eye, but I struggle, and that brings me closer to tears, but mostly I just feel defeated. I stare at the sticky black mess on the floor in front of the stove. I wonder what her last thought was. I wonder if she was in pain. I wonder if Nana tried to help. Maybe she survived and was taken later, like Greg and Alice. Maybe they went together.

  I don’t want to think it, but I think it anyway: what if Nana is still alive?

  It can’t be true, can it? I venture outside and my stomach sinks as I find Nana’s remains on the ground, just in front of her favorite garden chair. She’s nestled in among a normally spectacular array of flowers in just about every shape and color you could imagine. It’s not quite there yet — it’s only April — but I can see the beginnings of how it will look.

  Nana would have liked this to be the last place she ever got to be. In her garden among her flowers.

  And that is the thought that tips me over the edge.

  It was late afternoon when I arrived. I’m vaguely aware of being hungry, having had only the bare minimum of food since I left Greg and Alice behind. I’ve tried to stay hydrated, but the near constant headache probably means I’ve not done a very good job. There’s a supermarket a twenty-minute walk from here. I consider going, but I can’t face it. I’ve walked enough. I’ve been through enough.

  Despite everything, despite what’s downstairs, I feel safe here. I became an adult in this house. I figured out my place in the world. I basically grew up here, in all the ways that matter. Fresno, where I lived with my mom and dad, means nothing to me. I barely even remember it.

  I roam the house aimlessly, finding myself in my old bedroom. Not much has changed since I left for college. Then I’m on the bed, face up, staring at the ceiling.

  In seconds, I’m asleep.

  I couldn’t do it.

  I stared at them for such a long time, but I can’t bring myself to… to clean up mom and Nana. I did it for Mark because I couldn’t bear to see Alice staring at his remains. But… I just can’t do it. It feels wrong, like this is where they’re supposed to be, and I don’t want to take them away. I know that’s stupid. I know they won’t know one way or the other, but I still can’t do it. Part of it is the ick-factor I recall from cleaning up Mark. But most of it is that I just don’t want to deprive them of being where they belong.

  That means I can’t stay here. I don’t want to see them like that every time I want to use the kitchen or go into the garden.

  I don’t know what to do now, though.

  I want to stay nearby. I love this place. This is where I belong just as much as Mom and Nana, I just can’t stay in this particular house. There are plenty of vacation homes for the rich and annoying in the area, so I guess I’ll find one and move in there. I spend much of the day hobbling around the town looking for places where I could be happy. I don’t find anywhere, probably because happy is now an alien concept.

  And besides, even if I found somewhere to live, what then? What is there for me? We had a plan when it was me and Alice and Greg, but if I’m the only person left, survival no longer seems all that important. If all the animals are gone, I can’t surround myself with dogs and live as a crazy dog lady. There are no people, so even if I thought I could restart humanity — which I can’t — there’s one part of the equation missing. Can I really live out the forty or fifty years I might have left completely alone? Humans are social creatures. Why would I do that to myself?

  Part of me understands the purpose of the trip before I set out on it; part of me thinks I’m just going out for groceries to begin my new life. I walk slowly, doggedly in the direction of the supermarket. The sun is going down, which makes people’s remains less conspicuous. There are cars crashed into other cars, and into walls. I haven’t heard an engine since I left the mall back in Portland.

  The supermarket parking lot is filled with cars, most in parking spaces. There are some remains close to the entrance doors, but mostly the people seem to have been inside when the end of the world came for them. There’s plenty of space to pick my way between them. I grab a hand basket and make my way to the drinks fridge, now silent and room temperature, and procure a bottle of water.

  Then I head to the in-store pharmacy.

  It’s difficult to ignore what I’m doing as I’m doing it, but there’s still a large part of my brain that refuses to accept that I’m preparing to die. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or maybe even this year. But at some point, I’m leaving this life behind, and if the end of the world forgets about me then I want the means to do it on my own terms. I find what I’m looking for quickly – a large bottle of Oxycodone – then I head for the exit.

  Outside the store, I freeze.

  Out on the road beyond the parking lot, floating three feet from the ground, is a sleek black train that I now remember dreaming about the night before the apocalypse.

  “Huh.”

  Now

  The second to last thing I do in this, my old life, is think about the people I loved. My Mom and Nana. Alice. I didn’t love Greg, but he was certainly a major part of my life despite knowing him for only a couple of days. It seems only right that someone think about him under the circumstances, and given that I’m probably the only person left, I guess it falls to me.

  That done, I sigh and climb aboard.

  part two

  two

  All Aboard

  Once aboard, I turn around and watch the doors slide silently closed. Two illuminated buttons are set into a silver panel to the right of the opening. The top button depicts a vertical line with two arrows pointing outward on e
ither side — the button to open the doors. The other button has the arrows pointing at the line — close.

  There’s a smell in here, like something once pungent has faded into the background over time. I have a momentary panic. This train is nonsensical, so why did I climb aboard? The second I ask myself this question, the buttons dim, and I’m trapped.

  I chew my lip while I take in the space. It’s a small vestibule, painted mostly black like the outside of the train. The carpet is red and gold and might once have been nice, but seems to have suffered due to wear. Maybe that’s a good sign. Maybe there are actual living people on this train. There are three exits from here. The door I entered through, the one directly opposite on the other side of the carriage, and the one to my left, which must lead to the rest of the train. Opposite that door is a noticeboard, though it’s not like any noticeboard I’ve ever seen. It’s a matte black panel over which the word “Notices,” rendered in bright white letters, hovers about a half inch above the surface. There are no notices posted.

  I press my face to the front wall of the carriage and peer sidelong at the noticeboard trying to figure out how it works, but I can’t. I lose sight of the word once I’m looking at it from ninety degrees. As soon as I return to looking at it head-on, the word becomes visible again.

  I rotate to face the door that leads into the train. What the hell, right? I have nothing to lose that I hadn’t already given up on some level.

  I slap the top button, and the door glides open.

  On the other side is a deserted passenger carriage that’s more luxurious than my apartment in Portland. It’s more luxurious than anywhere I’ve ever been, and I’d thought the house where I stayed with Greg had been pretty spiffy. The carpet here is that same red and gold, but it’s thick and springy underfoot. Ornate light fixtures jut out from the walls on either side. There are sixteen armchairs in four groups, two on one side of a polished wooden table, two on the other. Experimentally, I sit in one and sink down into it. I feel like it’s giving me the best hug I’ve ever had, which, under the circumstances, is very welcome.