Wind

by Cheryl Twaddle

  “No, that’s okay. I don’t smoke.” I felt like I was in some strange horror movie; an empty world, some creepy guy offering me cigarettes and the only other living thing on my side was a stray dog. Maybe zombies would come out when the sun went down. I suddenly wanted to get out of there fast but I didn’t want to leave the shopping cart behind. This could be the only food I’d get and I wasn’t ready to abandon it just yet. Maybe I could talk to this guy, maybe he wasn’t as crazy as he looked.

  “Don’t smoke?” He shrugged his shoulders and put the pack of cigarettes back in his pocket. “I thought all the youth up there smoked. Hmm, maybe things are changing. Last one smoked.”

  “Last one?” I looked at him, intrigued by what he had just said. What did he know? I decided I wanted to hear more.

  “Yeah, you know the last one they sent down here.” He struck a match and lit his cigarette, taking a long drag and blowing the smoke out of his mouth before he said anymore. “They keep opening up the hole and throwing ‘em down here and they keep trying to get away.”

  “Get away? Get away from what?” I felt my heart start to pump quicker. “What are you talking about? Do you know what happened here?”

  “Of course I know,” he smiled. “I am the Marshal ain’t I?”

  “I don’t know, are you?” He stopped and glared at me.

  “Well, if you’re going to be like that, I’m just going to leave.” He turned on his heel and started to strut away.

  “Wait! Don’t go!” He may be weird but, right now, he was the only one who could tell me what had happened. “I’m sorry. You’re right, you are the Marshal. Please, come back.” He turned and looked at me.

  “Do you promise not to walk away with the food?” He smiled and tapped the ashes off the end of his cigarette.

  “I promise,” I said. “Now, please tell me what’s happened.”

  “It’s the 360 don’t you know,” he had come and leaned towards me like he was telling me some big secret, “when the earth turns counter clockwise.”

  “What do you mean?” I had never heard of such a thing.

  “The earth spins the other way and everything gets all wicky wacky and topsy turvy.” He looked at me as if I should know exactly what he was talking about. I stared back at him like he was speaking a foreign language and then repeated what he said as if this would miraculously make me understand.

  “The earth spins the other way?”

  “Yes!! You’ve got it!” He started to do some kind of dance, hopping and twirling around and clapping his hands.

  “No, I don’t got it. What the hell are you talking about?” I was starting to lose my patience. It was like this Marshal was speaking in tongues and I wasn’t understanding anything. “Where are all the people? What happened here? Was there an evacuation?” He stopped dancing and his shoulders slumped forward. Obviously I had disappointed him with my lack of understanding.

  “Oh my, oh my, oh my. What a dilemma. You are just like the rest. Just so stupid, so stupid. Not aware of anything.” He slowly turned away and took a couple of steps. I started after him, still wanting to know what was going on. He spun around with a grin on his face and I jumped back. “Guess I’ll have to explain everything then. Come over here and have a seat.”

  “It’s okay, I can stand,” I tried to protest but he had taken my arm and was guiding me to a car in the parking lot where he insisted I sit on the hood. There was no use arguing. “Thank you.”

  “Get ready for this, young lady.” He bowed like an actor on a stage and proceeded. “Ever since the world began it’s had to struggle to keep away from the huge fireball in the sky.”

  “You mean the sun?”

  “Shh!” He glared at me then continued, “it’s had to struggle to keep away from the huge fireball in the sky. You see, the earth spins once around every day and it spins around the fireball once a year.” I knew all this; it was fifth grade science stuff. “Well, you see when the earth gets close to the fireball during its yearly trek; it starts to get pulled towards it, sucked in like metal to a magnet, so it spins the other way for five days.” He held up all five fingers for me to see then put his hands down and waited.

  “And...?” It looked like he was finished and I still didn’t get it.

  “And wouldn’t you like to know?” He crossed his arms and shook his head.

  “Yes, I would.”

  “Okay,” he skipped and laughed. “Well, when the earth spins the other way, everything up there goes crazy, see. No one knows what’s happening or they’ll, you know, fall off. The gravity gets so heavy that everyone gets sucked into a deep slumber until it’s over. Afterwards, they wake up and have no idea they’ve just lost five days. Voila that’s it.”

  “No, that’s not it. There are no people here. I woke up and everything is not the same.” I jumped off the hood of the car.

  “Oh, yeah,” he paused and put his finger to his lips. “That’s because you fell through.”

  “Fell through?”

  “Yes, you fell through just like the others and me, of course, but that was a long time ago.” I sat back down on the car, trying to absorb what he was saying. “Every time the 360 comes some of the people fall through to this world, a sort of parallel earth, to live forever and ever. The buildings and cars are all shells of what’s up top. Eventually they will fade and we’ll be left in an untamed wilderness and it won’t be pretty. Shall we go?”

  “You mean all of this is just temporary?” I asked, not even bothered that he had just invited himself to come with me. Was it true? Did I really get left behind as the world above me turned?

  “Yes, that’s what I said,” he sounded impatient. “Let’s go, shall we?”

  “By the way, what’s your name?” I asked.

  “I told you, I’m the Marshal and that’s what you can call me,” he shook his head. “You should learn to listen missy.”

  “Sorry,” I said sarcastically. “I’m Nicky.”

  “Hello, Nicky. Shall we go?” He was getting anxious.

  “Yeah, we should go.” What else could I say? Then a thought came to me. “What about my family? They won’t know where I am.”

  “That’s right missy.”

  “But what will they think?” I was starting to panic, thinking of how much they’d be worried about me. “Can’t I go back?”

  “No, no, no,” he laughed again. “No one ever goes back. Ever.”

  “Never?” Oh my God, what was I going to do?

  “That’s right,” he laughed.

  “But I have to,” I whispered. He had already started walking towards the shopping cart.

  “Let’s get the food home,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I had a feast.”

  Chapter 2

  The Marshal and I pushed the shopping cart back to my house. It took us about twenty minutes and I did most of the pushing. Marshal isn’t really a physical guy. He chatted about nonsense most of the way. He explained that food was scarce down here and that by the time the 360 came everyone was half starved and waiting for the grocery stores to emerge for their brief visit. He told me that anything manmade like buildings and cars would only last for a few days before they all started to crumble and blow away with “the winds” that came. “The winds” were extremely strong, hurricane-like, and lasted for about ten days he said. If you wanted to keep anything, you had to bury it in the ground. It had to be at least two feet deep to be safe. I planned to dig a big hole tomorrow and fill it with as much “stuff” as I could.

  “Well, here we are,” I said as we approached my driveway, or should I say the image of my driveway? I don’t know, I was still trying to figure this whole new world out. I looked down at Barker who looked just as tired and hungry as I was. “This is where I live, or lived, or whatever you want to call it.”

  “Pretty little house, Nicky. I like it muchly.” He walked up to the front door and pushed it open.

  “Hey, I locked that earlier! How’d you get in like that?�
�� I ran up after him and examined the door. The lock hadn’t been turned but had broken right through the doorframe when Marshal pushed it open. “Great, my house is starting to crumble already.” Barker let out a soft whimper and I patted his head.

  “Bring in the food Nicky. We must have our feast before we sleep.” Marshal ducked back into the house, leaving me to crate all the food up the driveway by myself. Once inside I brought down a large mixing bowl and filled it with dog food and placed it in front of Barker. He ate it up quickly, not stopping to look at us.

  “There doesn’t seem to be any electricity, so I guess we’ll have to eat whatever’s in these cans cold.” I started to line them up on the counter; SpeghettiOs, soup, Ravioli, fruit cocktail, tomato sauce. Tomato sauce! What the hell did I put that in my cart for? Did I think I was I going to make a pizza?

  “We can make a fire and cook over that,” said Marshall, examining my choices of food. He, too, stopped at the tomato sauce and shook his head.

  “Make a fire? With what? We don’t have a fireplace here and I don’t have firewood.”

  “We’ll burn this,” he said pointing at the wooden kitchen table.

  “The table? We can’t burn the table.” I looked at him as if he were crazy which wasn’t much of a stretch.

  “Why not, it’ll only blow away in a couple of days anyway. We’ll burn it now and then go to sleepy, sleepy then I’ll help you dig your hole tomorrow, right?” He laughed and twirled around as if this was going to be a big party. I looked around my house and felt a sense of desperation overcome me. I couldn’t just let my house blow away could I? But how could I stop it? For the first time, I felt the swell of a tear in my eyes and I turned away from Marshal so he couldn’t see me. I took a few deep breaths to hold back the flood of tears I knew were waiting to break free. For the first time I realized that my life was gone, my family, my friends, my house all of it was gone and I was on my own without anyone but a crazy boy who dressed like a clown and talked like a four year old psychopath. I looked at Barker and knew he was the only one who understood how I felt right now. I was scared and sad and lost and I didn’t want Marshal to see it.

  “Okay, Marshal, you can break up the table and burn it,” I said after a few minutes, my composure back. He clapped his hands. If he had noticed my little breakdown, he didn’t let on. I turned to Barker who was finishing the last of his food. “Come on boy, we have to go back to the store.”

  “Back to the store!?” Marshal jumped at me and grabbed my arm. “Why’d you wanna do that Nicky?” I pulled my arm away from him, surprised by his strength.

  “I forgot water and I don’t think the plumbing works down here any better than the electricity,” I said. “I’ll take Barker and the cart and get a few flats of water. You break up the table and get the fire ready in the back yard. We’ll be back in about forty five minutes.”

  “Listen, Nicky,” he looked me in the eye and for the first time he didn’t look crazy at all, “you shouldn’t be going out there all by yourself. It’s been two days since the 360 finished and the others from the out-a-towns will be comin’ to take their pickin’s. It ain’t safe out there.”

  “What are you talking about? Who are these others?” He was starting to scare me.

  “I told ya, by the time the 360 comes there’s a lot of starvin’ people out there. They’ll do anything to get as much food and supplies buried before the winds come.” He wiped his mouth with a shaking hand. “Most the year they stay out of the town lines and live in the forests and mountains but once the 360 comes they make their way back to collect what they can. They ain’t civil like me either. They’re savages and they’ll kill both you and your dog quicker than you can blink an eye.”

  “B-but we need water,” I said, walking over to the sink and turning the tap to stress my point. I was right nothing came out, “and if they haven’t come yet we should get as much as we can before they do.”

  “Okay!” He smiled as if his warning had never been spoken. “Best be off then.”

  “Yeah, okay.” I started for the front door, eager to get to the grocery store and back before these out-of-town people came.

  “Oh, Nicky,” I turned, “best take this with you.” He threw a gun at me and I caught it before it could hit the floor. It looked old and worn, like something you’d see in an old western movie and I had no clue how to use it. I looked back at him and shook my head.

  “I don’t know how to shoot a gun. I’d never be able to hit anything,” I said.

  “All you need to be able to do is point it at your head and pull the trigger.” He put his two fingers to his temple like a gun and laughed again. “If you hear or see anything, you do just that, okay? You don’t want to be caught by them.”

  “Let’s go Barker.” I had to get out of there before he freaked me out any more. He couldn’t be right could he? He had to be exaggerating about these people. It sounded too horror movie for me. It didn’t matter; I wasn’t going to take my time anyway. I had no idea what time it was but night could be ready to creep in soon and I really didn’t want to be out there in the dark.

  I MADE IT TO THE STORE and back with no problems. I managed to stack ten flats of water on the cart and push it back by myself just as the sun started to settle down for the night. It was going to be pretty dark without the city lights and I was glad to be back. I could smell the fire burning before I reached the house and wondered if Marshal had already cooked us up something. My stomach growled at the thought. Barker was happy to be back as well and I knew he needed a much earned drink of water. He started drooling constantly when we left the grocery store. I tried to give him a drink from one of the bottles but I don’t think he got very much. When we got inside, I’d fill a big bowl for him.

  “Marshal, we’re back.” I grabbed a flat of water and backed into the house. “I didn’t see anything so I think we’ll be safe for the night.”

  “Well, look what Marshal’s been hiding.” I dropped the flat of water and didn’t even flinch as one of the bottles burst and splashed my leg. There was a man standing in my kitchen. He was about six feet tall and built like a football linebacker. He had a pock marked face and jet black hair pulled back in a ponytail. He wore a leather jacket, studded with what looked like thumb tacks. He was probably trying to look like a biker but wasn’t quite getting it. He did, however, look menacing and my heart started to pound in my ears.

  “Who the hell are you?” I asked trying to keep my voice from cracking. I wanted him to know right from the start that he didn’t scare me.

  “I’m the man who’s gonna take all this food off your hands and then take some other things I’ve been needin’,” he smiled and I felt a chill run down my spine. “I need to build up my collection again.”

  “You and who else?” I wasn’t trying to piss him off; I just wanted to know if there was anyone else with him.

  “No one, no one else,” Marshal peeked out from behind the kitchen island and I choked back a gasp. He was on his hands and knees and, from what I could see of his face, had been beaten up. There was blood dripping from his nose, his lip was cut and his right eye was swollen shut. I knew that his warning would not go unpunished.

  “Shut up, Marshall!” The man reached down and slapped the back of Marshal’s head, unblocking the window to the backyard.

  “Ouch!” cried Marshal and I winced at his pain. Then something caught my eye out the window and I forgot about Marshal and what was happening.

  “I-is that a horse in my backyard?” Both Marshal and the man looked at me blankly. “Seriously, is that a horse in my backyard?”

  “What of it?” The man looked behind his shoulders at the dark brown horse that seemed to be enjoying my mother’s well tended garden.

  “Get it out of the flowers!” I started for the backdoor. Something inside me snapped and I was angry. All the confusion and frustration seemed to boil up inside of me and I couldn’t hold it back anymore. I was here, in this new world, on my own and wo
uld probably never see my family or friends again. It was all so unfair and I was so mad that I wanted to scream and tear something apart. I felt scared and alone and the only things in this whole friggin’ place I knew I could trust was some crazy clown and a dog and, now, I just wanted to get that blasted horse out of my backyard.

  “No, no, no Nicky. Leave the horse alone. The Butcher needs him for his travels,” Marshal pleaded with me. I stopped and looked at the vile man in the wanna-be-biker get-up.

  “The Butcher? Is that your name?” I asked him. He was only a few feet from me now.

  “Yeah, and you’d better mind your manners sweetie. If you’re good I’ll be real easy on ya’ after I take care of Marshal here,” he sneered and looked me up and down. I felt my stomach cringe at the thought of him ever touching me. Barker didn’t seem to like what he said either and let out a growly bark. The man seemed to see the dog for the first time. “Well, well, well, I didn’t realise you had a four-legger Marshal. You’re just full of surprises ain’t ya’? He’s still in good shape, too.”

  “He’s not that big, Butcher.” Marshal was still on the floor, kneeling with his hands folded in his lap. “He’d be a waste of your time.”

  “He’s still good eatin’ Marshal.” Butcher wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “You’re going to eat my dog?” I couldn’t believe he would do such a thing. Who the hell was this guy? Was Marshal right? Were the people here nothing more than savages willing to kill and eat anything? I couldn’t let that happen, not to Barker. He was just as lost and confused as I was, even more and I had to protect him.

  “Shut up, bitch! Don’t want him to be too tense when I slit his throat. Otherwise the meat’s no good.” He pulled out a long hunting knife from a sheath tied around his thigh and ran his thumb down the blade. I had to stop him. I couldn’t let him hurt Barker. Then it came out of nowhere. A cold, callous courage rose up inside of me and I acted before I could even think about it.