She is cute. The sun hasn’t been too hard on her. She practices smiling.
When she comes out of the bathroom, the air is so sweet. The sunlight is blinding.
She walks over to the soldiers and smiles. “Can I get some more water, please?”
There are three of them at the water truck. One of them is a blond-haired boy with a brick-red complexion. “You sure can,” he says, smiling back at her.
She stands, one foot thrust out in front of her like a ballerina, back a little arched. “You’re sweet,” she says. “Where are you from?”
“We’re all stationed at Fort Hood,” he says. “Down in Texas. But we’ve been up north for a couple of months.”
“How are things up north?” she asks.
“Crazy,” he says. “But not as crazy as they are in Texas, I guess.”
She has no plan. She is just moving with the moment. Drawn like a moth.
He gets her water. All three of them are smiling at her.
“How long are you here?” she asks. “Are you like a way station or something?”
One of the others, a skinny Chicano, laughs. “Oh, no. We’re here tonight and then headed west.”
“I used to live in California,” she says. “In Pasadena. Where the Rose Parade is. I used to walk down that street where the cameras are every day.”
The blond glances around. “Look, we aren’t supposed to be talking too much right now. But later on, when it gets dark, you should come back over here and talk to us some more.”
“Mom!” Franny says when she gets back to the fence, “You’re all cleaned up!”
“Nice, Babe,” Nate says. He’s frowning a little.
“Can I get cleaned up?” Franny asks.
“The bathroom smells really bad,” Jane says. “I don’t think you want to go in there.” But she digs her other T-shirt out of her backpack and wets it and washes Franny’s face. The girl is never going to be pretty, but now that she’s not chubby, she’s got a cute thing going on. She’s got the sense to work it, or will learn it. “You’re a girl that the boys are going to look at,” Jane says to her.
Franny smiles, delighted.
“Don’t you think?” Jane says to Nate. “She’s got that thing, that sparkle, doesn’t she?”
“She sure does,” Nate says.
They nap in the grass until the sun starts to go down, and then the soldiers line everyone up and hand out MREs. Nate gets Beef Ravioli, and Jane gets Sloppy Joe. Franny gets Lemon Pepper Tuna and looks ready to cry, but Jane offers to trade with her. The meals are positive cornucopias—a side dish, a little packet of candy, peanut butter and crackers, fruit punch powder. Everybody has different things, and Jane makes everybody give everyone else a taste.
Nate keeps looking at her oddly. “You’re in a great mood.”
“It’s like a party,” she says
Jane and Franny are really pleased by the moist towelette. Franny carefully saves her plastic fork, knife, and spoon. “Was your tuna okay?” she asks. She is feeling guilty now that the food is gone.
“It was good,” Jane says. “And all the other stuff made it really special. And I got the best dessert.”
The night comes down. Before they got on the road, Jane didn’t know how dark night was. Without electric lights it is cripplingly dark. But the soldiers have lights.
Jane says, “I’m going to go see if I can find out about the camp.”
“I’ll go with you,” Nate says.
“No,” Jane says. “They talk to a girl more than they’ll talk to a guy. You keep Franny company.”
She scouts around the edge of the light until she sees the blond soldier. He says, “There you are!”
“Here I am!” she says.
They are standing around a truck where they’ll sleep this night, shooting the shit. The blond soldier boosts her into the truck, into the darkness. “So you aren’t so conspicuous,” he says, grinning.
Two of the men standing and talking aren’t wearing uniforms. It takes her a while to figure out that they’re civilian contractors. They aren’t soldiers. They are technicians, nothing like the soldiers. They are softer, easier in their polo shirts and khaki pants. The soldiers are too sure in their uniforms, but the contractors, they’re used to getting the leftovers. They’re grateful. They have a truck of their own, a white pickup truck that travels with the convoy. They do something with satellite tracking, but Jane doesn’t really care what they do.
It takes a lot of careful maneuvering, but one of them finally whispers to her, “We’ve got some beer in our truck.”
The blond soldier looks hurt by her defection.
She stays out of sight in the morning, crouched among the equipment in the back of the pickup truck. The soldiers hand out MREs. Ted, one of the contractors, smuggles her one.
She thinks of Franny. Nate will keep an eye on her. Jane was only a year older than Franny when she lit out for California the first time. For a second she pictures Franny’s face as the convoy pulls out.
Then she doesn’t think of Franny.
She doesn’t know where she is going. She is in motion.
Acknowledgments
I will forget to thank someone. I always do. Please, I beg forgiveness in advance.
First, thanks to the folks at the Rio Hondo workshop: many of these stories were critiqued at 9,000 feet in the Taos Ski Valley. I can’t thank all of you because I will forget someone, I know but thanks especially to Walter Jon Williams who first brought me to a part of the country I love more than I can say. To L. Timmi Duchamp, and to Ellen Datlow, who asked for stories. To Caroline Spector, who read for me. To the group in Austin—Jessica Reisman, Caroline Yoachim, Ellen Van Hensbergen, Jen Volant, and Meg McCarron—reading, food, and cocktails. Thanks to the folks at WisCon for making the space in the world that they do. To Karen Joy Fowler for writing what she writes as much as for her insightful comments. To Gavin J. Grant and Kelly Link for being so enthusiastic about, of all things, another collection of short stories. To Jackie Tunure at Fourth Wall Studios, who read for me in Los Angeles. To all the people I met at Clarion who have started out as students and gone on to be come friends and colleagues—you have no idea how much you have taught me.
To Adam who asked me to write “The Naturalist” based on a dream he had, and to Bob, who has always treated me as if there was nothing at all strange about my choice of careers.
Publication History
These stories were originally published as follows:
“The Naturalist” Subterranean Online, spring 2010
“Special Economics,” The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy, May 2008
“Useless Things,” Eclipse Three: New Science Fiction and Fantasy, October 2009
“The Lost Boy: A Reporter at Large,” Eclipse One, October 2007
“The Kingdom of the Blind,” Plugged In, May 2008
“Going to France,” Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet 22, June 2008
“Honeymoon,” “After the Apocalypse,” and “The Effect of Centrifugal Forces” appear here for the first time.
About the Author
Maureen F. McHugh has lived in NYC; Shijiazhuang, China; Ohio; and Austin, Texas; and now lives in Los Angeles. She is the author of a collection, Mothers & Other Monsters (Story Prize finalist), and four novels, including China Mountain Zhang (Tiptree Award winner) and Nekropolis (a New York Times Editor’s Choice). McHugh has also worked on alternate-reality games for Halo 2, The Watchmen, and Nine Inch Nails, among others.
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Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are either fictitious or used fictitiously.
After the Apocalypse copyright © 2011 by Maureen F. McHugh. All rights reserved.
Small Beer Press
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McHugh, Maureen F.
After the apocalypse : stories / Maureen F. McHugh. -- 1st ed.
p. cm.
isbn 978-1-931520-29-4 (trade pbk. : alk. paper) -- isbn 978-1-931520-35-5 (ebook)
i. Title.
ps3563.c3687a69 2011
813’.54--dc22
2011006769
First edition 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Text set in Minion 12 pt.
Paper edition printed on 50# 30% PCR recycled Natures Natural paper by C-M Books in the USA.
Cover by fonografiks (fonografiks.com).
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