The Great Unknowable End

by Kathryn Ormsbee

  “She says you’d benefit from a college education. Says you could study engineering.”

  I looked at my father. I couldn’t read his face or tone. He seemed guarded and thoughtful, and almost sad. I wasn’t sure why he was telling me these things. I’m not sure he knew either.

  I set my bowl in the dish rack and wiped my sudsy hands on my jeans. “It’s a nice thought, but the application deadlines have passed.”

  I said this as though application deadlines were the only obstacle that stood between me and college. I was tempted to tell him that That Stella had a perfectly charmed life and had been accepted into the mechanical engineering program at the University of Kansas, and that made everything all right.

  “I’m tired,” I told him. “Going to sleep a little more before work. If work is happening.”

  As I was about to leave the kitchen, I found myself saying, “The rain. It’s not anything to do with the plant, is it?”

  My dad’s brows cinched in tight. “Slater Creek? No, of course not. Hon, I don’t think there’s any good explanation for the weather we’ve been having.”

  “Yes, there is,” I said, though more to myself than him.

  Yes, there is, I tell myself now. Though that reason is as veiled to me now as ever. Even if I knew the scientific explanation behind everything that’s happened—the winds, the animals, the storms, the rain—that doesn’t mean it can’t be the apocalypse. Kim said so herself, voicing the thought that had only lived inside my mind before. I wonder if she was only joking, though. Maybe she feels silly about it now, in the daylight.

  I don’t think it’s silly. My closet door won’t let me. I checked on it after breakfast, only to find those same violet numbers, perfectly synchronized with the ones over town hall. That must mean something. Something for me, personally. Otherwise, wouldn’t everyone else in town be talking about the numbers in their closets?

  I seem to be the only one in that predicament.

  • • •

  According to the midday weather report, it is supposed to rain again tonight. The real question on everyone’s mind is, naturally, if this rain will be of the regular or doomsday variety. Connie says there’s no reason to fret, but the salon’s clients do not share her confidence. The phone rings repeatedly with cancellations, and in the end, Connie closes up shop a full hour early. I’ve already checked in with Mr. Cavallo, who after grousing for upward of five minutes about how this weather is killing his business and how he has absolutely no retirement saved up, confirms my expectation that, no, the Dreamlight will not be open tonight.

  I go home. The first thing I do is open my closet door and read the ongoing countdown there: 07:07:54. Seven days, seven hours, and fifty-four minutes. I have a full week to do what I never dared before. Standing in the closet, I have a good view of my bed, and my thoughts fix on the project hidden beneath it. This Stella would want to work on her project more than anything, but That Stella would like to complete it too. The project, it would seem, is the intersection of my two lives, and I decide that this will be how I use the rest of today’s precious time.

  With my bedroom door locked, I haul the wicker bin out from under my bed and set its contents on my desk: four sets of walkie-talkies obtained from multiple visits to the army-surplus store, the finely sanded wooden frame, the as-yet-unopened package of nine-volt batteries. I set to work, and I do not stop. I pull myself away only to put TV dinners in the oven, and then to remove them. Tonight Jill and I break with our Nightly News tradition. I set Jill’s dinner on the kitchen counter as she listens to a radio broadcast detailing more about the arrest of David Berkowitz. I take my dinner back to my room and shut the door. I work, eat a bite of lukewarm mashed potatoes, and work more. I don’t answer Jill the first time she calls my name, an hour later. Only when she pounds on my door do I shove the project into its hiding place and let her in.

  She doesn’t say a thing, only runs to my window and tugs open my blinds. I had not noticed the sound of the rain until now.

  It’s back. It streams down my window in thick sluices.

  And it is red. Red as blood.

  • • •

  Jill takes it well, considering. She does not scream or ask a lot of unanswerable questions. In fact, her overwhelming opinion on the rain is that it is “real neat.”

  “It’s like the ten plagues!” she says, sprawled on my bed. “You know, from the Bible.”

  “Yes, Jill. I know what those are. I’m not sure that’s the best comparison, though.”

  Jill says, “Who knows.” Then: “Why isn’t this national news?”

  “Because it’s not happening anywhere else,” I tell her, tummy-crawling to where she lies on my bed.

  I’ve put my project away for good tonight. It is clear that while Jill may not be in hysterics, she does not intend to leave my room anytime soon.

  “Nowhere else?”

  “No. None of our out-of-towners at the salon have talked about anything out of the ordinary—no downpours, no pink lightning, no blo—um, red rain. Just us.”

  “That’s not how weather works,” says Jill, frowning. “Weather doesn’t happen to one town.”

  “It’s fine,” I say, as much to myself as to her. “As far as we know, no one’s been hurt or killed. And I’m sure they’re testing the rain as we speak. It seems harmless.”

  Jill takes one of my pillows and hugs it close to her chest. “So you think we’re okay?”

  “Yeah, Jill. I do.”

  I say so, even though I don’t feel okay myself. That is what older sisters do.

  “Does Dad?”

  “He said not to worry; it’s just something wacky in the atmosphere. It’ll sort out.”

  “What if it doesn’t?”

  “It will.”

  “Promise?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ll be here. You won’t leave me if it gets scary, right?”

  “I’ll be right here.”

  • • •

  Jill falls asleep on my bed, and I do not have the heart to move her. I remain next to her, listening to the tip-tap of rain on the windows. Though I’m expecting sleep, it doesn’t come. An overwhelming urge falls on me as I lie there. I sit up, quiet and careful not to jostle the bed. Slowly, carefully, I sneak from my room out to the hallway. Then, faster, I tiptoe down to Jill’s bedroom.

  I open the door, wincing at the unavoidable creak of its hinges, and push it only as far as I must to fit through. Then I make quick work, crossing to Jill’s closet door.

  I swallow a burning breath as I place my hand on the knob and, slowly, turn it. It’s too long a wait, though. Impulse takes over me, and in one swift motion I throw the door open.

  There is nothing there. No violet numbers.

  I am not satisfied yet. With less care than before, I make a thorough inspection of Jill’s room. I scan her walls, her ceiling. I open her bureau drawers and even the small, pearlescent jewelry box on her vanity. Again and again, I am disappointed. I find nothing. No countdown.

  Of course. I knew this already. Jill would have told me. Unlike me, she would have shared. But I needed to be sure. I had to check, to see if it isn’t just me.

  It is, though.

  Why is it only me?

  The question drives into my head as I quietly return to my room and sit back on the bed. At the shift of the mattress, Jill mumbles and curls her knees closer to her chest.

  I envy her sleep. I envy her peace. And yet, somehow, I’m filled with a greater feeling of freedom than I’ve had before, when I first discovered the numbers in my room.

  I am the only one.

  Good.

  That Stella takes this as a sign to carry on.

  • • •

  The red rain continues to fall. For three days it comes down on us, spasmodic, in unpredictable intervals of calm and storm. We begin to make local news every night. Reporters confirm that the phenomenon appears to be concentrated solely over Slater. Meteorologists come
into town, even researchers from KU. Reporters ask them questions, and they reply in ten-second sound bites. From what they can tell, there is nothing wrong with the rain other than its discoloration. They continue to run tests. They continue to hypothesize and speculate. Some cite similar cases in highly populated and polluted areas, though none of these documented incidents match what is now being called “the Slater Scenario.”

  On Saturday I stop watching television. I’ve lost interest in reiterated facts and confounded scientists. In the end, it doesn’t matter how the end is coming, just that it’s coming. Connie calls to say she’s closing the salon for the weekend, due to far too many cancellations. The Dreamlight has been closed until further notice.

  During pockets of reprieve, when the clouds clear with alarming rapidity and the sun comes back out, townsfolk race to the grocery to stock up on bread and milk and jugs of water. Dad takes a trip out on Saturday afternoon and returns after a fresh downpour has started up, his clothes stained crimson, like he is a character from a Stephen King horror novel.

  Outside, rivers of red rush down street gutters, as though our house is downstream of a massacre. There is nothing anyone can do about it, save skip town. And some people do. I overhear our neighbors talking one night, through the den’s thin windows. The Metzes are going away to visit family in Missouri. They don’t know when they’ll be back, but according to Mr. Metz it won’t be until “every last drop of wrath’s been poured out.” That isn’t an option for us Mercers. We have no distant relatives to visit—both Mom’s and Dad’s parents are dead—and even if we had, Dad couldn’t take off work, and we couldn’t afford a trip out of town.

  If I am honest, though, I wouldn’t want to leave. I want to see how this apocalypse plays out. I want an excuse to be That Stella until the bitter end, whatever end that may be. If I am honest, I secretly think this red rain may be on my side. It’s preventing me from working day and night, the way This Stella would. It’s allowing me to be That Stella—a girl who doesn’t have to work, a girl who can stay at home and do what she likes, even be lazy.

  Jill and I play her Happy Days board game so often that even she grows tired of it. I read The Cosmic Connection through again, re-underlining my favorite passages. I bring the record player into the den, and I play my three Elton John records on repeat. I do these things because I couldn’t before, and now I can.

  I continue to work hard on my project, and I finish. I am nearly finished, anyway. I only need one more part from the surplus store, which I intend to visit once the rain lets up. If it lets up.

  Jill is the first to notice a change. On Saturday night, she calls me and Dad to the den and points excitedly out the window. There is nothing to be seen . . . and that is the point. Together we look outside, expecting new showers to start any second. Minutes pass, and then hours. The rain holds off. The night sky is clear and starry.

  Though none of us will say it out loud, the hope among us is palpable:

  Maybe, just maybe, this part of our apocalypse is over.

  • • •

  Sunday morning, the sky continues to be clear. Not even a wisp of cloud mars the cerulean sky.

  When my father wakes up, he and I debate whether to drive out to Ferrell’s. In the end, we decide that not even the possibility of town-wide destruction should keep us from observing our Sunday tradition. Anyway, there cannot be town-wide destruction yet. The countdown on my closet door reads 04:16:12.

  Four more days.

  Ferrell’s is open, but there are only two employees on shift—one server and one cook. I’m surprised even they are around. The crowd is always sparse when we come here, since most of the town is in church. Today we are the only car in the lot. Our server comes out to tell us that the deep fryer is not working, so we order extra-large malts in place of tater tots. The radio is playing another Bay City Rollers song. It seems Dad cannot take any more of the lively chorus, because he clicks it off, and we eat the rest of our meal in silence.

  We pass First Baptist on the way home. It’s still steepleless, but the parking lot is full. I suppose strange events and uncertainty bring people out. I wonder what Slater’s preachers are telling their congregations. Is this a punishment from God, or is it, perhaps, discipline? Are we townspeople supposed to repent, or is someone else to blame? I know what Pastor Barkley must be saying in First Baptist; he is no doubt blaming the depraved pagans of Red Sun. The commune was a favorite topic of his even back when we attended services. He warned how its members exhibited the worst excesses of the fall of man. They rejected traditional forms of family and government, and they indulged in the pleasures of the flesh. They were a warning to us, the members of God’s flock, about what dangers lay outside the fold. While I do not doubt that Pastor Barkley is casting blame on our resident hippies now, I know that not everyone in his congregation thinks the way he does. The Mrs. Humes of the church, who fought for my mother’s burial, who maintain that neither life nor death is easily defined. Town meetings might be bad, but surely not everyone in Slater is that narrow-minded.

  We turn onto Vine, and as we do, Jill draws our attention to a large, hand-painted sign outside town hall that reads COMMUNITY MEETING, THIS WEDNESDAY, 6 PM.

  I calculate how much time we will have left on Wednesday at six p.m.: one day, seven hours, and twenty-four minutes.

  “Hey, what’re those boys doing, trying to get a haircut?”

  I startle at Jill’s laughter. She’s pointing at the storefront of Vine Street Salon, where two boys in Red Sun tunics stand outside. One of them leans, arms crossed, against the door. The other is peering inside the darkened salon, and though I cannot make out his face, I know who it is.

  “Dad!” I shout. “Dad, stop the car!”

  19

  Galliard

  SUNDAY, AUGUST 14

  “Hey. Hey, man. That car’s slowing down—should we beat it?”

  We’ve been outside the salon for ten minutes, and most of that time’s been spent figuring out what to do next. Archer told me it was a gamble to come out on a Sunday and that most businesses in town are closed for church. But I had to try.

  It’s the first day since Thursday that the red rain hasn’t poured down, and this morning, the Council finally decided to allow us out of our residences. Which is fortunate, because I’ve come this close to wringing Archer’s neck on nine different occasions, and I don’t know that I would’ve resisted the urge on the tenth.

  He and I have played every card game you can name. We even invented a few of our own. Last night we built a tower that reached the top shelf of our closet. The whole time, Phoenix’s painted Stella looked down on us with brush-stroked eyes. This morning, I took the canvas off its nail and turned it paint down on my desk. It feels wrong to have that painting now that I’ve met her.

  Then I told Archer, “I’ve got to see her.”

  “Oh man,” said Archer. “Oh man.”

  He insisted on coming along, and I didn’t feel I had the right to refuse. It’s been Archer who’s tried to get me to go out every summer, after all. And then there’s the fact that, during the three days we were cooped inside, I finally cracked and told him about the letters. About Stella. About Phoenix, formerly known as Craig. Everything.

  Well. Almost everything. Not the part about how I think these weird storms are the work of Holly, Hendrix, and Joplin, or how I’ve written my first song since being on the Outside and it’s like nothing else I’ve composed.

  “Okay,” he said, when I laid it all out at three this morning. “I get why you did it, but it’s fucked up.”

  “I don’t know how to tell Stella the truth,” I said. “Phoenix is being a dick, and I can’t tell her he won’t see her and I’ve been pretending this whole time. That’ll be too much bad news at once. I can’t tell her the whole truth until I convince Phoenix to speak to her.”

  “Yeah, well, Phoenix isn’t gonna do that.”

  “I’ll make him.”

  Archer cackled for a
full minute at that. “With what army? Galliard, c’mon.”

  I glared at him for the cackling, but especially for being right.

  “You gotta tell her everything,” said Archer. “I’ll be your backup. Make sure she doesn’t kill you.”

  I never said I wanted that kind of backup, but Archer’s taken it upon himself to provide it, should Stella Kay Mercer attempt to castrate, blind, or immolate me on the spot.

  I’ve taken this morning’s clear skies as a sign. My gods have heard my plan and approved it. The good weather is their blessing.

  Things at Red Sun are stable in general. The rain hasn’t killed the crops or the chickens; it’s just keeping outsiders in their homes and away from the Moonglow. Like Archer predicted, the Council called a commune-wide meeting this morning, and its official opinion, announced by none other than Rod, is that pollution is to blame for the strange weather, which means it’s the Outside’s fault. I’m not about to tell them it’s mine. All my actions line up perfectly with the freak weather events. To me, though, they’re not bad. They’re changing me. They’re making me brave. They’re the work of the Life Force.

  And so, armed with that bravery and a new resolve, I biked to town with Archer, to the salon where Stella said she worked, and I prayed to Buddy for confidence and Janis for bravery and Jimi for cool. Then we arrived to find the windows dark and a sign flipped to CLOSED. And it’s as we stand there, deciding what to do next—ride back to Red Sun or look for a place to eat—that Stella appears.

  “It’s her,” I say, in answer to Archer’s question. He’s already mounted his bike, but I shake my head in disbelief. “No, that’s her.”

  The car comes to a complete stop. A man looks out at me from the driver’s seat with large, dark eyes. Stella’s eyes. Phoenix’s, too. Beside him sits Stella, who looks as bewildered to see me as I am to see her. She throws open her door and races around the car toward the two of us. Her hair is big, frizzier than usual. She’s wearing a pink paisley top and matching shorts.