World's End: Training Wheels
After The End of the World, the people in Shame just sort of stopped worrying about what day it was. And I don't just mean whether it was the 4th or the 29th, but a lot of them quit saying it was Thursday or Monday.
When people started moving into the gym at Meredith Willson High School, the Rileys, a couple who had retired to Shame a few years ago, started a new calendar. They counted the days since The End happened. (I counted their days, once. Seemed to me that they figure the end came when we lost power. I figure it happened a few days before, but I wasn't the one in charge.) They called it AC and said it stood for After the Coming. No one in the gym argued with them and no one in the gym seemed to use the calendar, but there were a few kids who earned a smack or two for asking who it was that came to town.
At the time, I wasn't really worried about the date. I was more concerned with the rising and the setting of the sun and how much could be done before it got too dark. Although, soon after we left town, I wished that I knew the date. Was it just an ordinary day or was it an important day? I never did check the calendar at my place while I was picking up my hiking boots.
There wasn't much else there that I wanted. I grabbed a couple of long sleeve shirts and more clean underwear and I already had my old pocket knife with me, but nothing else would have helped on the trip.
I shouldered the sack and headed out.
Abbot's Sports was a few streets over and one up from where my apartment was, just like everything else within the city limits. The building had been there for as long as anyone could remember and it showed the way the ivy had spread up one wall and anywhere the brick was showing it was crumbling. The Abbots didn't even run the place anymore. The last one in the county had moved out onto a farm to cash in on Ethanol. I guess that didn't quite work out for him.
The store was sort of a catch all for anything that wasn't food. Everything that was sold there could also be rented. Tents and rafts and bikes and sleeping bags for those folks who wanted to see the river or spend some time on it and pretend they were Huck Finn, without the huge black guy, of course.
Trista and Roy weren't there when I looked throughout the shattered windows, but I knew they'd be along soon enough. I headed in and scouted around for the things I thought we'd need.
First were bikes. They seemed like the best way for us to travel. Smallish and pretty damn light, we could ride around any cars and wouldn't have to worry about gas. If we kept up the basic maintenance, we probably wouldn't get much worse than a popped tire or a broken chain, and those were small enough that we could carry lots of extras, and if something worse happened, there were pretty good odds would could find the right tools and stuff in any town we came across. Best of all were the baby carriage things that people used to drag their little kids around in. I figured those things would be great for dragging around extra food and gear for those days we didn't roll on into town.
By the time Roy and Trista showed up, I had already picked out the three bikes we were going to be using and had just finished bolting on the last baby carriage thing.
"Supposed to be using scooters," said Trista, pulling a wad of gum out of her mouth and throwing it over her shoulder. She always was one to care about her community.
"Why's that?" I asked, standing up and stretching.
"Didn't you never read The Stand, Crete?" she asked, coming in close to me. "That's what they all rode into Vegas. Well, that or motorcycles."
"Stephen King must have lived in a place where the gas fell from the sky and all you needed was a funnel to fill a tank." I poked her in the shoulder.
Roy laughed. If his voice had been deeper, I would have called it booming, but it was more like tapping on a snare drum than pounding on a bass drum. To the best of my knowledge, Roy was the only black man who lived in Shame. There were a couple of colored families who owned farms, but Roy actually lived in the city. How he started teaching here instead of some other place, I didn't know, but here he was. He was also gorgeous. Short cut hair. Solid jaw. Huge shoulders and arms. Dark brown eyes that a person could fall into. It was hard to believe he taught math.
"This is how we're going," I said. "Deal with it."
"Fine," she said, dropping her stuff on the ground. "What do you want us to do?"
"We each need a sleeping bags and tents and stuff," I said.
Roy grabbed my arm as I started to head in. "Go on in, honey," he said to Trista. "I want to talk to Crete for a minute."
"'Kay," she said and headed off.
"What do you want?" I asked Roy.
"Uh," he turned away from me, "I don't know how to ride a bike?"
"Really?" I asked.
"Yeah. Never learned."
"Well," I said, "I'm sure we can find some training wheels in there some where. We just have look."
Showing posts with label World's End. Show all posts
Showing posts with label World's End. Show all posts
Friday, October 19, 2007
Friday, August 24, 2007
Fiction Friday #8
World's End: Moving
As much as everyone in Shame would deny it, we don't really know when The End of the World happened. We can make some guesses, but no one knows for sure because there wasn't any giant explosion, or flying saucer, or Jesus Christ to announce that The End was here.
The best I can guess is that it happened Thursday night or Friday morning about four and a half weeks ago. I figure it happened then because when I got home Thursday night after drinking with Trista and some of her friends, Sanford and Son was on Nick at Night. I know enough to know that the shows are on some sort of automatic rotation, so they don't have to have someone there to handle everything, but when I came back to my place for lunch on Thursday, just about every channel was dead. Some must have had longer schedules laid out in advance, others, not so much.
When school let out, some parents sort of panicked because their kids couldn't just plop down in front of the TV. Their kids were bored. What were parents to do without TV? Drive to the video store and rent something?
The real panic didn't start until a few days later, when the power and phones cut out. That's when people started heading over to the high school. The insanity didn't set in for about a month, but it came and that's when I knew it was time to leave.
First thing I did was head to my tent and pack up. I stuffed some of the clothes that I brought with me into the knapsack I'd taken from Abbot's Sports. The things I left I left because I thought I could get them newer and better by hitting a few stores on my way out of town. Food and how to carry it was a big problem.
And where was I going to go?
Rumor had it that St. Paul and Minneapolis were okay, and people were still living there, but who in their right mind want's to live there? Maybe a stop over would be okay. Just to check things out.
I grabbed my knapsack and hitched it over my shoulder. I was ready to leave the high school. I left the tent, because it was a cheapie, along with all the blankets and the pillows where they were. I knew that there were plenty of better things I could take with me. After all, I was the first one who went into Abbot's when we all moved in here.
During the fight, I hadn't seen my sister, or Roy, so I walked over to his tent hoping to catch them there. When I walked up, I could hear some rustling and some thrashing, and I smiled. These were the noises I'd heard every night my sister brought a guy back with her before I moved into my own place. Funny how something that drove me crazy when it woke me up two or three times a week sort of made me happy now. Not all the time living with my sister was bad. And during those weeks when she had a steady guy, it was like living by myself, but only paying half the rent.
"Trista," I said as I got closer, "I need to talk to you." I started to hear panting. "Trista, God dammit, I need to talk to you!"
"Shit," I heard her say.
"Who is it?" I heard Roy ask.
"My brother," she said. "Now get off of me."
A little grunting and heavy breathing later, she unzipped the top of their tent, poked her head out, and asked, "The fuck do you want, Crete?"
She wasn't really beautiful, sort of cute with her sort of upturned nose and roundish face, but not beautiful. The rest of her was more round than trim and she was lucky that she wasn't old enough to start drooping. She wasn't one to dress sexy, either. She mostly wore loose shirts and long skirts in miss-matched colors. The reason so many guys liked her was because she liked sex, a lot, and she preferred it sober. She was a cheap, easy lay. Our father never liked that about her, but he didn't like a lot of things about a lot of people.
"Leaving," I said. "You and Roy want to come with, meet me at Abbot's Sports in about an hour and we'll all start there."
"Why an hour?"
"You two'll want to finish up," I said, grinning at her with all my power, "and then you'll want to pack and I gotta go get some stuff from my place."
She looked at me like I was nuts.
"We gotta get out of her, Tris," I said, squatting down so our faces were level. "They're going crazy in there. I just saw Mrs. Harding beat the shit out of Mrs. Greeling over Band-Aids. I don't want to be here when that shit," I pointed at the gym, "explodes and I don't want you here, neither."
"And Roy?"
"He'll keep you happy." I winked at her.
"You shit," she said. "Fine, we'll be there."
"Good," I said as she zipped the tent up.
I stood up and heard Roy ask, "What's going on?"
"First," said Trista, "I'm going to cum. Second, we're going to pack. Third, we're going shopping."
"What?" he asked.
"Shut up," she said and I walked away.
I needed to get to my apartment. I needed my hiking boots because, like everyone knows, you never go on a long hike with new boots, and I figured that there'd more hiking on this trip than I ever wanted to do.
As much as everyone in Shame would deny it, we don't really know when The End of the World happened. We can make some guesses, but no one knows for sure because there wasn't any giant explosion, or flying saucer, or Jesus Christ to announce that The End was here.
The best I can guess is that it happened Thursday night or Friday morning about four and a half weeks ago. I figure it happened then because when I got home Thursday night after drinking with Trista and some of her friends, Sanford and Son was on Nick at Night. I know enough to know that the shows are on some sort of automatic rotation, so they don't have to have someone there to handle everything, but when I came back to my place for lunch on Thursday, just about every channel was dead. Some must have had longer schedules laid out in advance, others, not so much.
When school let out, some parents sort of panicked because their kids couldn't just plop down in front of the TV. Their kids were bored. What were parents to do without TV? Drive to the video store and rent something?
The real panic didn't start until a few days later, when the power and phones cut out. That's when people started heading over to the high school. The insanity didn't set in for about a month, but it came and that's when I knew it was time to leave.
First thing I did was head to my tent and pack up. I stuffed some of the clothes that I brought with me into the knapsack I'd taken from Abbot's Sports. The things I left I left because I thought I could get them newer and better by hitting a few stores on my way out of town. Food and how to carry it was a big problem.
And where was I going to go?
Rumor had it that St. Paul and Minneapolis were okay, and people were still living there, but who in their right mind want's to live there? Maybe a stop over would be okay. Just to check things out.
I grabbed my knapsack and hitched it over my shoulder. I was ready to leave the high school. I left the tent, because it was a cheapie, along with all the blankets and the pillows where they were. I knew that there were plenty of better things I could take with me. After all, I was the first one who went into Abbot's when we all moved in here.
During the fight, I hadn't seen my sister, or Roy, so I walked over to his tent hoping to catch them there. When I walked up, I could hear some rustling and some thrashing, and I smiled. These were the noises I'd heard every night my sister brought a guy back with her before I moved into my own place. Funny how something that drove me crazy when it woke me up two or three times a week sort of made me happy now. Not all the time living with my sister was bad. And during those weeks when she had a steady guy, it was like living by myself, but only paying half the rent.
"Trista," I said as I got closer, "I need to talk to you." I started to hear panting. "Trista, God dammit, I need to talk to you!"
"Shit," I heard her say.
"Who is it?" I heard Roy ask.
"My brother," she said. "Now get off of me."
A little grunting and heavy breathing later, she unzipped the top of their tent, poked her head out, and asked, "The fuck do you want, Crete?"
She wasn't really beautiful, sort of cute with her sort of upturned nose and roundish face, but not beautiful. The rest of her was more round than trim and she was lucky that she wasn't old enough to start drooping. She wasn't one to dress sexy, either. She mostly wore loose shirts and long skirts in miss-matched colors. The reason so many guys liked her was because she liked sex, a lot, and she preferred it sober. She was a cheap, easy lay. Our father never liked that about her, but he didn't like a lot of things about a lot of people.
"Leaving," I said. "You and Roy want to come with, meet me at Abbot's Sports in about an hour and we'll all start there."
"Why an hour?"
"You two'll want to finish up," I said, grinning at her with all my power, "and then you'll want to pack and I gotta go get some stuff from my place."
She looked at me like I was nuts.
"We gotta get out of her, Tris," I said, squatting down so our faces were level. "They're going crazy in there. I just saw Mrs. Harding beat the shit out of Mrs. Greeling over Band-Aids. I don't want to be here when that shit," I pointed at the gym, "explodes and I don't want you here, neither."
"And Roy?"
"He'll keep you happy." I winked at her.
"You shit," she said. "Fine, we'll be there."
"Good," I said as she zipped the tent up.
I stood up and heard Roy ask, "What's going on?"
"First," said Trista, "I'm going to cum. Second, we're going to pack. Third, we're going shopping."
"What?" he asked.
"Shut up," she said and I walked away.
I needed to get to my apartment. I needed my hiking boots because, like everyone knows, you never go on a long hike with new boots, and I figured that there'd more hiking on this trip than I ever wanted to do.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Fiction Friday #3
World's End: Shame
You know, it's a funny thing. When The End of the World came, the world really didn't come to an end.
Sure, most of the big cities were gone. (Although, from what I've heard St. Paul and Minneapolis are still there. I guess whoever took us all thought Minnesota was just as useless as the rest of the good old US of A did.) Most of the little cities and towns weren't, though.
My parent lived just out side of a town called Shame in the corn fields of Iowa with my older sister, her husband, their baby, one of my younger sisters, and my younger brother. They grew corn. I guess they occasionally switched to soy beans to help the soil get better, but it was mostly corn. Dad was convinced that ethanol was the wave of the future. I hated growing corn. Me and my other younger sister, Trista, lived in town. She worked at the liquor store and slept around a lot. I worked as a clerk in a law office and didn't. I was hoping to save enough money to head off to community college part time and learn to be a paralegal. Didn't happen, though.
When The End came there were probably about 2500 people living in the city limits of Shame. We had one of the two high schools in the county, though.
At first, everything was fine. People were so scared of whatever caused The End of the World that they all worked together. Everyone gathered at the high school and set up cots and sleeping bags in the gym. We got ourselves organized into groups. Some of us went to grocery store to gather canned good and noodles and other things that didn't go bad; you should have seen the smiles when Roy pulled Ho-Hos and Ding-Dongs out of his cart, people looked like they thought everything was going to be okay. Others went to the hardware store to bring back stuff we could use, like flashlight of all sizes and batteries and tools and wood and other building supplies. The drugstore was hit, too, for peroxide and Band-Aids and other things for the scrapes and bruises we were sure to get.
A lot of families went to their homes and gathered up all their extra blankets and towels and camping gear and things without even being asked, which was great. We pitched tents out on football field so people who wanted the privacy could have it. Mostly, they didn't though. In that first month everyone seemed to want to be near people. I guess it set them at ease.
I moved out into a little pup tent that I had swiped from the sports store, the place I volunteered to raid. At the time, it seemed to me that this was the place to find the things we were going to need, seeing that the electricity probably wasn't going to be back any time soon, if at all, and I didn't think anyone was really out there watching the water, making sure it was kept clean, so the purifying pills seemed like a good idea. And if a couple of things that I took decided to stay in my backpack, rather than be handed over to the group of women who were sorting and storing everything, who could blame me? I had me and my sister to look out for.
Trista'd found Roy's tent, and he was all the happier for it.
After a couple of days, the gym started to stink. People weren't shitting in there or anything, they were using the toilettes in the locker rooms, but they weren't really smelling good, either. Water was still running, sort of, since gravity works whether or not the human race is destroyed; it just didn't get hot. Without electricity to pump the water into the big tank outside of town, though, we'd run out eventually and then what would we do? So, a couple of guys got smart. They went out and built a latrine where the baseball dugouts used to be, that way they didn't have to dig as much. And there were already benches there, too. Plus, having two made perfect sense: one for the men and one for the women. Lucky for us, the hardware story had tons of lime so there wouldn't be too much of a stink there.
Into the second week, some of the guys got restless. They wanted to know what was going on in the world outside of Shame and, since the radios weren't picking any thing up, they decided to put together an expedition to see what was what. At first, they were day trips to the nearby farms to make sure the families were okay and to see if any wanted to come back to town with us. No one came. Not even my family.
I was there for that one. Dad refused to come. He was sure that everything was just fine and that the government of the good ole US of A was going to come in soon and tell us what was going on and that everything was a-okay. When my brother-in-law said the he though him, my sister, and their kids ought to come into town, Dad punched him in the jaw and said nobody was taking his baby girl away from him. Dad always was a stubborn, and an ass. He should have stayed in the Marines. Become a sergeant. Boss scared little kids around for a living. Instead, he grew what he was sure was the gold of the 21st century. And while I feel bad that Ma and my brother and sisters and my nephews were stuck there, if they had any balls at all they would have left on their own.
After the local farms were checked on, people started talking about trips to other towns, or even cities. Lots of people wanted to head into Iowa City and, if no one was there, head up to Cedar Rapids. Some thought people should start by going straight to Des Moines. They argued that that's where most people would be heading. They also thought that if there was going to be any news from the government, it'd end up there first. The town voted, and the decision was to head to Des Moines and check in at Albia, Knoxville, and the other towns on the way.
A team of five men left by truck the first day of the third week since The End occurred. It's normally only a three hour drive, but they were stocked with enough food and gas to last them a week, just in case. Most figured that they'd be gone two or three days. To the best of my knowledge, they never came back.
After a week passed, some men wanted to go searching for the ones who went to Des Moines. Others argued that they had to stay to protect the women and children. Trista called them backward rednecks said, "The 'women and children,'" she put up air quotes, "can do just fine with you shitheads and can make better decisions without you around since you won't make decisions with them. Get the fuck out of here if those assholes are more important to you than your families!" Then she stormed out.
I thought she was right. So did some of the other men and women. What had started as a discussion to plan a trip soon turned into a yelling match. After a while, the group tired out and Roy tried to have a real discussion with everyone. But people flared up and then someone would call someone else something and the yelling started all over again.
Nothing was decided. Eventually people started to poop out, or kids came in saying they were hungry, or they just got mad and left.
I thought they were all idiots.
The day after the four week mark, a fight broke out in the gym between two mothers. One accused the other of hoarding Band-Aids. The accused said that the other didn't have to give her son a Band-Aid for every bump, bruise, or little scratch. The accuser pushed the accused. The accused pushed back. The accuser slapped the other. The accused grabbed the hair of the accuser. And it got worse from there. And I know that there are guys out there who think women fighting women is sexy, but let me tell you, it's not. Men, at least seem to have some rules--no nut shots, fists not feet, once one's down it's over--but women don't. Shins were kicked. Hair was ripped out. Scratches bled. They bit and broke the skin. And when one finally went down, the other kicked her in the face for good measure.
"She was hoarding the Band-Aids," said the winner, spitting blood out of her mouth. I couldn't tell you it was hers or if it came from the woman on the floor.
That’s when others started in. "He has a stash of rice!" "They're hoarding cans of beans!" "Well you're saving batteries!" "Who's saving batteries? I need batteries!" "I'm not saving batteries!" "And who has the pillowcases?" "You are!" And on, and on.
I watched this go on for a few minutes and decided to leave.
You know, it's a funny thing. When The End of the World came, the world really didn't come to an end.
Sure, most of the big cities were gone. (Although, from what I've heard St. Paul and Minneapolis are still there. I guess whoever took us all thought Minnesota was just as useless as the rest of the good old US of A did.) Most of the little cities and towns weren't, though.
My parent lived just out side of a town called Shame in the corn fields of Iowa with my older sister, her husband, their baby, one of my younger sisters, and my younger brother. They grew corn. I guess they occasionally switched to soy beans to help the soil get better, but it was mostly corn. Dad was convinced that ethanol was the wave of the future. I hated growing corn. Me and my other younger sister, Trista, lived in town. She worked at the liquor store and slept around a lot. I worked as a clerk in a law office and didn't. I was hoping to save enough money to head off to community college part time and learn to be a paralegal. Didn't happen, though.
When The End came there were probably about 2500 people living in the city limits of Shame. We had one of the two high schools in the county, though.
At first, everything was fine. People were so scared of whatever caused The End of the World that they all worked together. Everyone gathered at the high school and set up cots and sleeping bags in the gym. We got ourselves organized into groups. Some of us went to grocery store to gather canned good and noodles and other things that didn't go bad; you should have seen the smiles when Roy pulled Ho-Hos and Ding-Dongs out of his cart, people looked like they thought everything was going to be okay. Others went to the hardware store to bring back stuff we could use, like flashlight of all sizes and batteries and tools and wood and other building supplies. The drugstore was hit, too, for peroxide and Band-Aids and other things for the scrapes and bruises we were sure to get.
A lot of families went to their homes and gathered up all their extra blankets and towels and camping gear and things without even being asked, which was great. We pitched tents out on football field so people who wanted the privacy could have it. Mostly, they didn't though. In that first month everyone seemed to want to be near people. I guess it set them at ease.
I moved out into a little pup tent that I had swiped from the sports store, the place I volunteered to raid. At the time, it seemed to me that this was the place to find the things we were going to need, seeing that the electricity probably wasn't going to be back any time soon, if at all, and I didn't think anyone was really out there watching the water, making sure it was kept clean, so the purifying pills seemed like a good idea. And if a couple of things that I took decided to stay in my backpack, rather than be handed over to the group of women who were sorting and storing everything, who could blame me? I had me and my sister to look out for.
Trista'd found Roy's tent, and he was all the happier for it.
After a couple of days, the gym started to stink. People weren't shitting in there or anything, they were using the toilettes in the locker rooms, but they weren't really smelling good, either. Water was still running, sort of, since gravity works whether or not the human race is destroyed; it just didn't get hot. Without electricity to pump the water into the big tank outside of town, though, we'd run out eventually and then what would we do? So, a couple of guys got smart. They went out and built a latrine where the baseball dugouts used to be, that way they didn't have to dig as much. And there were already benches there, too. Plus, having two made perfect sense: one for the men and one for the women. Lucky for us, the hardware story had tons of lime so there wouldn't be too much of a stink there.
Into the second week, some of the guys got restless. They wanted to know what was going on in the world outside of Shame and, since the radios weren't picking any thing up, they decided to put together an expedition to see what was what. At first, they were day trips to the nearby farms to make sure the families were okay and to see if any wanted to come back to town with us. No one came. Not even my family.
I was there for that one. Dad refused to come. He was sure that everything was just fine and that the government of the good ole US of A was going to come in soon and tell us what was going on and that everything was a-okay. When my brother-in-law said the he though him, my sister, and their kids ought to come into town, Dad punched him in the jaw and said nobody was taking his baby girl away from him. Dad always was a stubborn, and an ass. He should have stayed in the Marines. Become a sergeant. Boss scared little kids around for a living. Instead, he grew what he was sure was the gold of the 21st century. And while I feel bad that Ma and my brother and sisters and my nephews were stuck there, if they had any balls at all they would have left on their own.
After the local farms were checked on, people started talking about trips to other towns, or even cities. Lots of people wanted to head into Iowa City and, if no one was there, head up to Cedar Rapids. Some thought people should start by going straight to Des Moines. They argued that that's where most people would be heading. They also thought that if there was going to be any news from the government, it'd end up there first. The town voted, and the decision was to head to Des Moines and check in at Albia, Knoxville, and the other towns on the way.
A team of five men left by truck the first day of the third week since The End occurred. It's normally only a three hour drive, but they were stocked with enough food and gas to last them a week, just in case. Most figured that they'd be gone two or three days. To the best of my knowledge, they never came back.
After a week passed, some men wanted to go searching for the ones who went to Des Moines. Others argued that they had to stay to protect the women and children. Trista called them backward rednecks said, "The 'women and children,'" she put up air quotes, "can do just fine with you shitheads and can make better decisions without you around since you won't make decisions with them. Get the fuck out of here if those assholes are more important to you than your families!" Then she stormed out.
I thought she was right. So did some of the other men and women. What had started as a discussion to plan a trip soon turned into a yelling match. After a while, the group tired out and Roy tried to have a real discussion with everyone. But people flared up and then someone would call someone else something and the yelling started all over again.
Nothing was decided. Eventually people started to poop out, or kids came in saying they were hungry, or they just got mad and left.
I thought they were all idiots.
The day after the four week mark, a fight broke out in the gym between two mothers. One accused the other of hoarding Band-Aids. The accused said that the other didn't have to give her son a Band-Aid for every bump, bruise, or little scratch. The accuser pushed the accused. The accused pushed back. The accuser slapped the other. The accused grabbed the hair of the accuser. And it got worse from there. And I know that there are guys out there who think women fighting women is sexy, but let me tell you, it's not. Men, at least seem to have some rules--no nut shots, fists not feet, once one's down it's over--but women don't. Shins were kicked. Hair was ripped out. Scratches bled. They bit and broke the skin. And when one finally went down, the other kicked her in the face for good measure.
"She was hoarding the Band-Aids," said the winner, spitting blood out of her mouth. I couldn't tell you it was hers or if it came from the woman on the floor.
That’s when others started in. "He has a stash of rice!" "They're hoarding cans of beans!" "Well you're saving batteries!" "Who's saving batteries? I need batteries!" "I'm not saving batteries!" "And who has the pillowcases?" "You are!" And on, and on.
I watched this go on for a few minutes and decided to leave.
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