I drive like I’ve never driven before-no speed limits-fuck the police; I drive just how I want to drive. Prime Directive: get on the highway and haul ass to Denver, see if my Dad is still alive, then make my way to Ohio and see if my Brother and Mother haven’t been decapitated, and then head to Boston to see if my girlfriend’s in one piece.
I pull into a gas station with a bit more optimism than is warranted, I don’t quite understand how the infrastructure works but I’m assuming the pumps still work. I park next to a pump and get out, look around. A cool breeze comes through as some papers fly by, a dog barks in the distance. I look inside the convenience store or kiosk, however you call it, windows smashed in and looted. I walk over to check it out and see if there’s anything I can scrounge. I have my Swiffer/Broom ready just in case, knife still in my belt. As I walk towards the door glass cracks underfoot and I get a slight hint of oil in the air, the door is ajar and I slowly step inside with caution. It’s completely silent; the floor is sticky, various drinks and snacks are spilled all over and old newspapers litter the counter. I grab one of them, it’s the LA Times and the front cover states Pandemic both Viral and Bacterial. Well shit, maybe all those antibiotics finally did screw things over royally, I always told my aunt that not everything needed a pill. I read the article and glean that in essence, the CDC and WHO couldn’t deal with a dual hitting combination of a highly deadly and contagious virus mixed with a new strain of Gonorrhea that was completely anti-biotic resistant, a perfect mixture of shit and suffering. I recall an interesting piece from The Atlantic, “Is America Ready for a Global Pandemic,” nope she sure as shit wasn’t. Do you reckon that people simply didn’t read enough of the journal? Why didn’t we heed their call, who was asleep at the wheel-thanks Obama—but really it was probably Trump’s fault.
Looking through the racks I see a few bags of chips left and inside the refrigerators are a couple of warm sodas. I grab what I can and walk back to the car, I think this is pretty cool, didn’t even have to pay. I try the pump, it’s still on and it seems like the station still has gasoline. I fill up and drive out of the station. Navigating my way towards the highway, eventually coming upon I-80 East I merge onto it. Well this is it, the cool wind blows my ponytails left and right and I can still smell my balls but it’s okay, I’m doing something with my life—what’s more important than family and lovers right?
The highway is relatively empty with the occasional burned out car and body, probably infected laying out being lazy. On further consideration I probably should have scored some CD’s or a music player or something, driving in silence is alright but I can actually feel a kind of musical void in my soul. I would kill for some Bill Withers or Nina Simone right now, maybe some classic Al Green, a little bit of My Girl here and there, but that’s the price you pay for freedom.
I drive and mentally map all the things I miss about the past but at the same time feel ecstatic that here I am driving a stolen-my new car-down the highway as fast as I want and that’s all I really have to do, just drive. We used to talk about freedom in the world before, it meant this, it meant that, there was positive and negative freedoms and we all argued about which laws took them away or increased them. Well let me tell you stranger, there’s no law or scripture which captures the present moment, flying down the pavement, four wheels in contact with the asphalt and my soul ethereally above it all not caring one bit about anything and everything.
I drive on for about forty five minutes carefree and just feeling swell and pretty, remembering the song Oh, Pretty Woman—I wish I could hear it one more time. Suddenly a number of cars and people run out from the trees surrounding the road forming a roadblock. I slow to a standstill, about 300 meters out from the block. I see about 10 men on foot carrying what I imagine are weapons but they look like more broomsticks, that’s what the apocalypse really was, a broomstick invasion. They might actually have AK-47s; I can vaguely make out an ammo clip. At this point I realize going forward isn’t an option, I don’t know who or what they want, but I reckon it’s nothing good. I drive the car around and start heading back the other way and right before my eyes I see the same thing occur in the other direction.
I panic; I’m boxed in, dead, soon to be raped and mangled and eaten. I look in the rearview mirror, outmanned, outgunned, outfucked. This is deadpool-guaranteed annihilation. I process every avenue of escape, pretty much all end up with a bloody asshole and my teeth kicked in. I might drive into the forest but this car isn’t going far and I can’t just do another 360, both sides are blocked and a bullet storm ensues no matter which way I go. I could try negotiating but that’s a pipe dream. The only real chance is to go full speed, duck down, and try to drive between the cars or around on the curb.
I can hear yelling from afar “Get out of the car and we won’t hurt you,” faintly, almost indecipherably. I can feel my penis retract into my body and my heart accelerates, my palms get moist. Do or die time this is. I lean back in my seat thinking up all the horrors they have in store for me, I take a look at my passenger seat, all for food and water, or do they want more than that? Anyways I suddenly really wish I could get out and take a piss in the trees to my left. I can’t say how many cars and people and how they are dressed, but I would wager they are what we would call marauders. They aren’t partial to dialog and thinking, rather they just like to get what they want, at least I think so and I’m not going to risk it.
Decisions, decisions, decisions, and I floor it back in the direction I came from. I see a weak point between two cars where it’s just a guy with a supposed AK-47 and head right for it. The accelerating feels great and I feel ready to vomit out of fear and the tree of possibilities, each branch signifying a different but equally brutal and undignified end. They aim their weapons at me and I calculate the distance and steering requirements, duck down and keep the wheel steady. They start shooting and I can hear the bullets whisk through the hood, windshield being pelted-I hear the headlights shatter. Snap, crack, and I hold steady. Suddenly my body gets jerked to the left and blood streams from my left ear after my head smashes the steering wheel. I sit up and look around, I see the roadblock retreating in the rear-view mirror, and realize I must have just skirted one of the cars. Damn that fucking hurt but it feels good to slip by. It’s kind of like when you get an extra twenty at the super market but you feel a bit guilty taking it, in this case there’s no guilt, just pure satisfaction. It doesn’t last long though, my heart sinks when I see about 10 cars pull up on the horizon. Whoever they are, they must really be looking for some new friends. I shove down the accelerator as far as it goes and sit back, the windshield’s got a bunch of holes in it now and from the looks of it so does the passenger seat and my own. Periodically I look into my mirror and notice they are still on my tail, we keep this up for miles and the whole time I’m in a state of complete depravity. It’s as if my heart had fallen into a morass of hate and despair, a miasma of disturbing scents and a great pulling down from within your own body—like a hand choking you from inside; I’m just so fucking scared. No matter my fear I drive on, I feel like I’d like to take a shit and a piss but unfortunately my band of brothers doesn’t think I deserve any kind of rest-room break.
We drive on and on and once my tank hits below half way I start to take this to its logical conclusion, will my gas outlast theirs and if not what’s going to happen? I look a little bit forward into the future and my arms shackled behind my back and a few dicks in my mouth; I only wish my car could go faster. I reformulate, that’s not an acceptable outcome—I’ll take one of these exits and lose them in the city.
We drive on like this for another 20 minutes, around 120 MPH is where the limiter kicks in and you can’t go any faster. There’s an exit coming up and I figure this one’s as good as any other. I swerve through the exit hoping to increase the distance between myself and my new crew. I see a small town come into view, good news; somewhere to get them off my tail. They’re all taking the exit and one of them screeches
off the road and their car flips into the underbrush. I fly through the main thoroughfare doing 80 in what’s supposed to be a 35 zone. It’s not that difficult given it’s mostly empty but the occasional corpse or burned out car mean I stay hyper-vigilant. I slow to 40 and take a sharp right into a side street but the car slides, took it too fast, bam. My head whips forward into the airbag and the wind flows out of my lungs. I lean back blood coming from my nose, I’m reminded of pennies, everything is silent and slowly a faint ringing enters my perception. It grows until I realize the horns stuck, I also realize I’m about to get my face cut off if I don’t bolt. I grab my Swiffer/Broom and backpack and run out the car across the street busting into the first apartment building I see and run up the stairs. I fly up two flights when I notice a door slightly ajar and jump in slamming the door behind me. The floor’s littered with an inch thick layer of extra delicious snack offerings from your local convenience store and the usual sugary drinks, Coke cans, and Gatorade bottles. As if it had settled to the floor over time, building up more and detritus as humans receded further and further from the world. The door’s locks are busted, must have been kicked in before, I head to what I assume is the living room. I’m startled by what I see, two small kids, a boy and a girl probably between 8-10 years old just staring at me wide-eyed.
“Fuck, you scared me,” spurts from my mouth, thinking on this I probably scared them a lot more than they me. “Look, we need to be really quiet ok, there are some very bad people outside, and if they hear us they will hurt us,” I calmly tell them.
I grab the couch and shove it through the pile of junk barricading it against the door, it needs something more though to keep it in place. I shove my Swiffer/Broom between the couch and the doorway to the kitchen, making it fit snuggly so as to keep the coach in place against the door. The kids stand their staring, the boy walks over to me and takes a revolver out of his back waistline and I get a sudden vision of having my insides blown right out, drooling in pain on the floor, wondering what just happened. He hands me the revolver saying nothing as I think about what must be going through his mind, a leap of faith, a complete lack of reason, or the perfect decision?
“Are you hungry or thirsty?” I ask and both of them nod, “Okay, get me a bottle.” I fill it up from my water jug and they take long draughts, breathing out with an “ahh” passing it between each other for seconds and thirds. I give them a one of my bags of Cheetos, it doesn’t stand a chance.
I go and sit on the coach putting my finger to my mouth making sure the kids are aware that they should be silent and I listen for coming death, boots against the ground, and orders of any kind. I can faintly hear the car horn and it suddenly stops. Just barely I hear shouting; I assume they are spreading out.
At this point I realize that I have six bullets in the revolver, which meant that I had to kill at least six of them if they wanted to get their money’s worth. I also reckoned that there were more than six of them, so it was kill six of them and then get raped, enslaved, or killed, or on the other hand kill three of them then kill both the kids and myself. I couldn’t imagine leaving the kids behind to those animals and no matter what one thinks about ethics, no matter how much the world changes, one thing remains constant; pain and suffering. These are essential elements of the human condition, it doesn’t matter if you are the last man on Earth—you find avenues to avoid suffering. I readily admit the children’s suffering matters as well, just ask them. Philosophizing aside, the boy stairs stoically at me, I’m not sure if he’s scared or simply incapable of comprehending anything anymore. It’s as if his mind was erased upon the coming of this apocalypse, rebooted with new software, a more rugged operating system. He stands there with a blank expression, is he aware of the coming cruelties the marauders would inflict?
Sounds like a few of them are inside the building banging on doors shouting, “We know you’re in here,” cliché as fuck.
They run past the door and the revolver is dripping with sweat from my palms, my heart palpitates like I just ran a marathon, and the kids just keep standing, a strange bulwark against the madness outside. They give me an ounce of courage; when you have something to protect things always become more lucid. I hear them run back down, they must have figured I wasn’t here; maybe my luck’s turned. We sit like this in a state of sub-panic just to be safe, two hours pass and I figure they aren’t coming back. By this time it’s dark outside and the two kids are sitting together in the corner.
I come up to them and say “Looks like the coast is clear, I’m Beeblebrox (because why the fuck not), what are your names?”
The boy shifts a bit uneasily and the girl answers “I’m Hope, and this is my brother Jesus.” That’d be funny though right, no, she didn’t say that. “I’m Mary and this is my brother Jesse,” she half smiles.
“How long have you two been here?” I ask.
“We haven’t been here to too long, we were with our parents but they’re gone now,” says Jesse, he’s the younger child.
“I’m tired,” says Mary.
They both retire to the bedroom and fall asleep on a mattress without sheets or pillows; it’s turned brown from bodies other than their own I assume. I check the taps and the shower with a slight religious conviction that for some reason it’ll be running, it’s not. I drink a bit and have some snacks and lay on the coach thinking about what a great day it’s been. I start to cry silently at first, then those tears turn into a real man’s weeping, my chest shakes and the tears stream and flow and come freely. The two kids come back out and look worried, but that might have been my skewed perception.
“It’s all right,” I hiccup through snot and tears “go back to bed.”
They listen and eventually I stop crying, a rebirth always takes place after an emotional outburst like that, at least that’s how it was, now I’m just right back to the world as it is—not much hope but at least I can sleep rape free tonight. Regret weighs heavy on my mind, a jab in my soul. I feel like I should have just stayed home but remembering my family and friends made it only a matter of time; I also had to leave for supplies eventually anyways. But for all I know, all my loved ones are gone, like tears in the rain. These two kids were thrown into this thresher maw alone, maybe this is my destiny.
I wish I had a bag of tobacco and rolling papers, I don’t even smoke but I just crave it, maybe something something Freud or whatever, or just something to take the edge off. Speaking of which, I go and check the fridge, I see three warm unopened Heinekens in the fridge, and a low powerful laugh reverberates through me. I lay back down drinking my spoils, bless those children for leaving me some beer- soon enough I pass out.
The Adventures of Mary and Jesse: Pre-collapse
A T.V. blares another story on CNN, Dr. Thomas Frieden says cuts would “pull the rug out from programs that are helping ensure that we have a safer world.” Miranda, only by possible osmosis could she take the information in, scrolling through her Facebook feed of friends posting pictures of children. Her husband Daquan was reading a Washington Post article.
“You won’t believe this, according to WashPo the CDC is forced to cut back their efforts to prevent global disease outbreaks by 80%,” with some genuine concern.
Miranda briefly glances from her phone to meet his eyes “I can’t deal with the news anymore, if it’s not a pandemic, it’s going to be climate change, or bees, or micro-plastics in the water, I really just can’t do it.”
Daquan raises an eyebrow unsure of what words to choose, a man in his mid-40s, often worries about the world his children will inherit. He wants to console his wife but he often wonders if he himself will ever be soothed. He believes himself and his wife to be good people, with good children, and wishes that his nation’s government would get their act together—fund science, build a coalition of federal and business leaders to combat the increasing threat of a changing climate, reverse and slow the damage being done to the ecosystem. He wonders how he will even teach his children about any of th
is, or even when to bring it up. Mary and Jesse run down the stairs giggling as they pretend to be Thor and Hulk.
“Hulk smash,” giggles Jesse as he swings his arms like a ninja on acid.
“Daddy watch this,” says Mary as she spins in place falling down to the ground. “Did you see that?”
Miranda and Daquan both smile, but the constant hum of chaos, the impossible to reconcile reality that their only option is to play along, while knowing that it only exacerbates our decline.
“Yea I did, are you Thor?” asks Daquan.
“Mmhmmm, and Jesse is The Hulk. Remember when they fought but Hulk cheated and Thor was supposed to win?”
Daquan nods as he swoops down on his kids pretending to the Thanos, they all laugh and play, Miranda too soon joins in on their Marvel adventures. For a moment leaving the dull mental safety of Facebook, their smart TV now playing Anthony Bourdain’s: Parts Unknown. He’s visiting China, a country in which the CDC was forced to scale back their disease prevention efforts. He was enjoying a rather delicious looking soup however, smiling and dining.
“Daddy I love you,” says Jesse.
“Me too, and I love mom too,” says Mary.
Daquan and Miranda both look at each other tenderly, all was well with the world, but each had in the depths of theirs minds an irking pull, forever there-without end that let them know that things weren’t well after all.
Post-collapse
The dimness of the night conceals the terror in the children’s eyes as they stand over the corpses of their still warm parents. Things weren’t always like this of course, dad’s head until only moments ago was still attached and mom definitely used to have a mouth full of teeth. They watched from afar as a band of psychos led by Lord Humongous mercilessly, and with rock music blasting, desecrated the only thing these two loved. They were lucky really, their parents were sharp and heard the approach giving them enough time to hide the children. Now Jesse and Mary emerged from that spot to encounter-in close proximity-the death of one’s parents. Now their only question was, what do they do next? The psychos were gone-the souls of their parents with them-they had each other. Jesse started to cry first, Mary being a bit more sensible in post-apocalyptic dead parent situations tried to shush him, she put her hand on his mouth as he wailed. His tears rolling down his cheeks unto her hands, she felt their warmness—reminded of when her own mother had comforted her. Jesse looked at Mary and another agonizing cry bubbled up but this time muffled, he took a last look at his guardians and with teary eyes nodded knowingly; death was no longer mythical. Even in his moment of mental perturbation, he had the wits to take his father’s revolver.
Pandemic- We’ve Run Out of Toilet Paper! Page 2