by McBain, Tim
The smoke seemed to grow as they drove toward it, the dark cloud occupying more and more of the horizon. Delfino sucked on his teeth, and the air whistled between them. Then he shook his head and spoke again.
“Hard to even say how big we’re talking, but this much smoke? It’s got to be most of the city, I’m afraid.”
He unscrewed the cap of his water bottle and took a swig, a rivulet running down his chin which he smeared away with the heel of his hand. Funny to see a man drinking out of a dented up Aquafina bottle that was at least nine years old, Baghead thought. That was real recycling.
“People staying there?” Baghead said. “I mean, as far as you know, the place wasn’t vacant, right? Not like the dead cities.”
“There was a little market on the edge of town. Nothing fancy. A couple tables of stuff, some veggies from backyard gardens, junk and knick knacks mostly, but I geared up there a few times. People were staying in the outskirts mostly, I think. Nobody right downtown. But yeah, it’s not vacant or anything. People’s shit is getting burned right now, for sure, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
He took another long slug of water, screwed the lid back on and dropped the bottle back into the cup holder. The liquid sloshed within, making it rock back and forth a few times before it settled.
“You staying hydrated, man? It’s important out here in this heat.”
Baghead shrugged and unzipped the bottom of his hood to drink a bit of his own water. He angled himself away from the driver a little and brought the army canteen to his lips. Lukewarm water flooded his mouth, the temperature making it a touch unpleasant at first, but the wet felt good sliding down into his belly, warm or not.
He wiped his lip with the back of his hand, screwed the cap back onto the canteen, and zipped the canvas flaps back together. It always felt a little weird to re-shut his face within this fabric enclosure. A sensation of relief came with being covered up once more, but the relaxation was countered with a throb of claustrophobic frustration at being resealed in the tomb he’d made for himself, at the open air being shut away from him as always.
It was like zipping his head up in its own tent.
Delfino picked at his bottom front teeth with his index finger and thumb, and then he retracted his hand from his maw and spoke.
“Interstate will pass right through the suburbs. We could be looking down on the fire from the overpass at a spot or two. Might be smart to look for a way around it. Avoid the whole mess if we can.”
He tilted his head to look at Baghead for a beat, and then he went on.
“’Course leaving the interstate comes with its own problems. The other roads aren’t maintained, and we’re more likely to drive into a trap if we venture off course. Even if all went well, it’d almost surely slow us down by a lot.”
His hand returned his mouth, thumbnail scraping at the gap between a canine tooth and an incisor this time. He didn’t remove his hand to speak this time, talking through it instead.
“I could go either way on this thing. I figure this is your deal. It’s your call.”
Baghead looked out at the road, at the blacktop pocked with brown spots where potholes and creases were filled with sand.
“We’ll stay on the interstate.”
Delfino smiled and nodded.
“Truth is,” the driver said, lowering his voice. “I kind of want to see it. The fire, I mean. Never seen a whole city go up in flames like that. Just WHOOSH. Kind of want to see it up close, you know? Be honest with me now. Don’t you kind of want to see it?”
Baghead stared out at the smoke in the distance again. The black cloud almost looked angry now, tufts of smoke twisting around each other in a jerky way that seemed to convey agitation, he thought, like they were fighting each other for territory.
“I don’t know,” he said, eyes still locked on the black. “I’d say we’ve been watching the world burn for a long time already. Long enough for me, anyhow.”
Izzy
Presto, Pennsylvania
176 days after
Izzy was half-sprawled on the couch, one hand outstretched. She was making progress with the squirrel. That morning, she got it to eat out of her hand. It didn’t climb on her, but reached out carefully to remove the food from her palm. It stayed next to her hand while it ate, until Erin bustled into the room and scared it back into its hiding place.
The trick was lying flat to appear smaller and less imposing. That was when it would come the closest. Also, no moving. Movement seemed to startle it more than most noises. She had to be totally still, and that meant hiding her blinking. She had her face tucked mostly into the crook of her elbow, with just the corner of one eye peeking out.
One second the arm of the couch was empty and the next moment, poof. There was the squirrel. It was so quiet. Like a tiny, fuzzy ninja. It’s tale quirked twice, and then it hopped toward Izzy’s hand.
“This is still pretty hot, so you should let it cool for a few minutes before you start to feed Squirrelman.”
Izzy willed herself not to flinch at Erin’s voice. The squirrel paused but didn’t run away. That was good.
“OK,” Izzy said, her voice low and steady. She didn’t move her mouth when she answered. She spoke through her teeth like a ventriloquist.
“Hey!” Erin clapped her hands, and Izzy twitched involuntarily. The combination of the sharp noise and the sudden movement startled the squirrel, and poof. It scurried away and was gone in half a second.
“Why did you do that?”
With a hand clad in an oven mitt, Erin lowered a glass jar to the table. Steam rose from the liquid inside, forming beads of condensation around the lip of the jar.
“Because you need to pay attention.”
“I have to feed Squirrelman. I know!”
Erin peeled the glove from her hand and let it flop onto the table.
“That, too. But I’m leaving.”
“Duh.”
“Since when were you so sassy?”
“Since always.”
“Oh, right. Thanks for reminding me,” Erin said and rolled her eyes. “I’m leaving. And you need to be alert.”
“I am alert! Look,” Izzy said. She used her fingers to stretch her eyelids extra wide, then turned her head from side to side. “Super alert.”
“No, you’re focused on feeding that stupid squirrel. You need to be thinking about what happens if he wakes up.”
Erin gestured toward the sleeping bag with her thumb.
“You already told me what to do.”
“And?”
“And I run to the bedroom and lock the door and wait until you get back.”
“What about the gun?”
Izzy let out an exaggerated sigh.
“I take it with me.”
“That’s kind of the most important part.”
Erin chewed at a chapped spot on her lip, her eyes watching the slight rise and fall of the sleeping bag.
“Stop worrying and just go.”
Erin stared at her for a few moments, looking torn.
“Go!”
“Alright, I’m going.”
Fabric rustled and zippers zipped, and Erin was half out the door when she stopped.
“You have to come lock this, dingus.”
Izzy hopped over the back of the couch and tossed the cereal bits onto the counter. She dusted the crumbs from her hands before shoving Erin the rest of the way through the door.
“No funny business,” Erin said. “I mean it. Be careful.”
“Okaaay,” she said, dragging out the second syllable.
Izzy pushed the door closed and twisted the deadbolt, then stuck her tongue out at Erin through the glass. Erin shook her head and finally turned to go.
Izzy watched her through the window, boots crunching over the snow, leaving a trail of prints that ran from the house to the barn. She let the curtain fall closed after she saw Erin zoom down the driveway and out of sight on her bike. Such a worry wart.
&nb
sp; When she went to retrieve the cereal from the counter, it was too late. The squirrel had retrieved it first.
“You little thief,” Izzy said, darting toward the animal. It stuffed the last piece of food into its cheek and leapt out of sight, obviously spooked.
Crap. She shouldn’t have lunged at it like that.
“Sorry, dude. But stealing food is not cool.”
She went still and waited, but the squirrel didn’t come back out. She’d need to lure it back with more food.
She eyed the jar of cooling sugar water on the table. Probably still too hot. She could do one last training session with the squirrel before she started on that. If she was lucky, Squirrelman would have one of his bouts of semi-conscious loopiness. He had no idea what was going on, but he was just awake enough that they could usually coerce him into drink through a straw. Way easier than feeding him spoonful by spoonful.
The cereal crunched as she thrust her hand in for another fistful. She made it a generous amount, too, without Erin here to monitor the squirrel’s intake.
She glanced behind her. The squirrel knew the sound of the cereal bag and usually couldn’t resist hopping closer in hopes of getting some of what was inside. But it was still out of sight. She must have scared it bad.
She was rolling up the bag and securing it when she felt it. An electric prickle that ran over her scalp. It took her a moment to even realize what was happening. She had the distinct feeling that she was being watched.
Holding her breath, she rotated around slowly.
There, sitting straight up in the sleeping bag and staring straight at her. It was Squirrelman. His eyes were wide, probably as wide as hers, and for a while they just looked at each other in silence. This was no half-conscious stupor. He looked awake. And alert. And maybe a little scared.
“Hi,” she finally managed.
Without blinking, he answered.
“Hello.”
Erin
Presto, Pennsylvania
176 days after
Erin’s eyes stung and watered from the cold air whipping at her face. At least it wasn’t snowing, which felt like being stabbed by tiny ice daggers.
The snow on the ground was problematic enough. Maybe it went without saying, but it was slippery. For some reason, that had surprised her. The first time she’d ridden in the snow, she was towing Squirrelman. Going slow hadn’t even been a choice. That fucker was heavy.
But the second time, when she’d gone out to collect a load of his supplies, she tried to brake for the turn into the driveway and went skidding past. She was lucky she hadn’t ended up in the muddy stream at the other side of the road.
At Casa de Squirrelman, she started to load the last of his supplies into the trailer attached to her bike. Six trips up the ladder to the loft and then back down, balancing an armload of goods.
She had to be smart about how she stacked things in the trailer. Larger, heavier items on the bottom. Smaller items in bags, tied to the outside.
She got everything attached and bungee-corded in place when she turned around and noticed a stack of goods she’d forgotten to add to the pile.
“Damn it,” she said and started pulling everything off the trailer.
She configured and reconfigured the trailer, trying to fit it all in one trip.
“Like the world’s shittiest game of Jenga,” she muttered to herself, adjusting a case of canned tomato soup in the middle of the tower.
A gust of icy air ruffled her hair, and she looked up. It was snowing again. Big clumpy flakes.
She glared at the two boxes and three bags she still hadn’t been able to fit on the trailer and forced herself to admit defeat.
Walking the bike back up the sloped drive, she tried to put a positive spin on it.
Only one more trip, Erin thought. One more trip, and then they’d hunker down for the rest of this crappy weather and wait for Spring.
She climbed onto the bike and let her hands off the brakes. She didn’t even have to pedal on the return trip. She could coast the whole way.
When she got back to the house, she was going to have a big ass cup of coffee.
She tried not to smile. Smiling made her chapped lips crack and bleed.
The brakes squealed as she slowed to take the turn onto her driveway. In her dream world, Izzy had telepathically sensed her impending return and had a steaming mug of coffee waiting for her. Erin eased the bike around the curved path through the spruce trees. Dream on, she thought.
The house came into view, looking cozy with the soft layer of snow blanketing the roof and the puffs of smoke coiling from the chimney.
And then she saw something that made her jam on the brakes so hard she almost went over the handlebars.
It was almost enough to make her want to stop and rub her eyes, to make sure she was really seeing it. But it was him, alright. Squirrelman moseying up the back porch and through the door, cool as could be. Like he owned the place.
And Izzy was nowhere in sight.
Oh God.
What had he done to Izzy?
Without giving it much thought or planning, she dragged the bike behind one of the little outbuildings in the yard and parked behind the potting shed, out of view from the house. Her hands were already shaking from the adrenaline.
Stay calm, she thought. Panicking won’t do anyone any good.
But she couldn’t stop the images from flashing in her head. All the death she’d seen. All the violent ends. She pictured Izzy lying face down in a pool of her own blood, body limp and limbs askew. Gunshot wound, blunt force trauma, or maybe something less bloody. A purple ring around her throat, each fingerprint clearly visible.
Erin tasted something hot and bitter in the back of her throat, and she swallowed, pushing the vomit back down.
Calm, damn it. No puking. No hyperventilating. No fainting.
She leaned against the shed to catch her breath and slow her thoughts.
OK. She didn’t think Squirrelman had seen her. So now she needed a plan.
For Izzy’s sake — if she was still alive — she needed a plan.
Using anything she could squat behind or lean against for cover, Erin skirted around the house. When she got to the pile of cans and refuse she’d dubbed Mt. Trashington, she counted to three and made a run for the back porch.
She wrapped her fingers a little tighter around the pistol in her hand before tiptoeing up the back steps. This was going to be the scary part. Just bursting through the door seemed so ballsy. But she didn’t think she’d be able to sneak her way in.
Erin crouch-walked to one side of the door and then she stood, pressing herself flat against the vinyl siding. There was no room to hesitate once she went through that door, she just had to do it.
Her heart pounded so fiercely, she felt like her whole body pulsed with the beat.
She pivoted, trying to get one quick glance inside before she went all Kool-Aid Man through the door. A metallic sound came from inside, like two metal buckets clanging against one another. With a gasp, she threw herself backward against the exterior of the house. Squirrelman was coming out.
Her thoughts churned in a jumbled mess for a moment before she realized this was better than she’d planned. He was like a stupid fly, wandering right into a spider’s web. A spider holding a loaded gun.
She had just enough time to get her finger poised in front of the trigger and to inhale one last cool breath of air before she heard the rattle and squeak of the door opening.
He didn’t even have a chance to close the door behind him, and Erin was on him, pressing the gun to his spine.
“Don’t move. Hands up.”
She wasn’t sure if the hands-up thing was necessary, but she’d seen it on TV so many times, she just went with it.
He froze and Erin jabbed the Glock a little further into his flesh.
“What did you do to her, you piece of shit?”
Decker
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
2
05 days after
The tabby cat left while he was sick, never to return. He didn’t blame it. He would have left, too, if he could. He hoped it found a warm place to stay. A barn or shed somewhere where the field mice flowed like wine.
The gray cat stayed, though. He’d thought they were both gone for sure, but he woke one morning to the sound of the little gray beast purring at his feet. Its coat had grown thicker for the winter, so it looked like a little gray puff ball laying on the couch, its legs tucked up underneath the body. It didn’t occur to him how much he’d missed the cats until the tears welled in his eyes upon seeing his gray friend returned. He didn’t cry, but it was a close thing.
The winter stretched on into February, though it was thankfully mild. The nights were long, black things, but the days were tolerable.
At first, he passed most of the time sleeping. He ate what little food was on hand — a few cans of soup and boxes of spaghetti without any sauce to go with — but he didn’t plan to scavenge for more until the snow was gone. Luckily for him, that was only a few days off. It melted, and though it threatened to snow a few times after that, spitting white flecks at him, it never came back enough to stick.
He didn’t have the energy to chop firewood, but he gathered enough branches from the woods to keep a small fire going. When he got too lazy to collect more, he burned books and broken down furniture. It didn’t warm the house, but the living room stayed lukewarm or better. He slept on the couch mostly. On the coldest nights he lay on the floor in front of the fireplace, shivering more than sleeping.
The nights made him want to quit, made him wish to die in his sleep. The black surrounded him, and it seemed to go on and on. The twelve hours without sunlight seemed like an eternity. The hopelessness that visited him in that darkness was hard to fathom and harder to endure. The dark and the cold attacked him, thrashed him, chapped his skin and pulled it open. He couldn’t imagine carrying on if it had been an especially harsh winter, if the days hadn’t provided him with real relief from the night’s tortures.