Fractured: Tales of the Canadian Post-Apocalypse(26)
Forty days after D-Day
Tom broke. He just broke. He came at me while I pulled weeds in the garden, Bible in one hand and kitchen cleaver in the other.
“God has spoken to me. He has called me to clean this earth of its last unbelievers,” Tom said.
I clutched my dull, muddy spade tight. So small compared to the cleaver in his hand. And I remembered you at the kitchen table, two summers ago, cleaving up that roast pig to serve at our granddaughter’s fifth birthday party. The thought of that almost made my mouth water. What was I thinking?
“So, you’re God’s hired mop, eh?” I asked. Tom wasn’t impressed by my terrible joke. “I don’t remember that from Sunday school. I bet if we didn’t believe in God before, I’m sure we all do now, because how else could this have happened?”
Honestly, it was just talk. My hands shook so badly that I dropped my spade. Life did not flash before my eyes, but I could almost smell that roast pork.
“Just my luck to be stuck with two f*cking Indians, a Chink and a Jap. Getting rid of you must be my ticket to heaven.”
Who talks like that anymore, really? It didn’t even make sense. If China was out of contact, so it stood to reason that a good few billion non-Christians made it to heaven if it really was the end of days. But, Tom wasn’t right in the head. It made sense to him, and that was all he needed.
“Get away from Mr. Kagawa right now, Tom,” Ying said.
I didn’t realize she was standing there till then, with her hand on the trigger of one of the Snows guns.
“Or I’ll shoot, and you’re going nowhere but in the dirt. Now go away, and don’t ever come back around here.”
Cool as a cucumber that one. I owe her my life. I told her she looked convincing, and asked her where she learned to shoot.
“Video games, of course.” She smiled.
Kids these days.
Three months after D-Day
The Snows secured a small boat and are going to go back to Campbell River to see if anyone’s still there. They want to go home before the weather gets bad and I don’t blame them. I joked that they wanted to get away before paying up on their bet, and I wished them luck. We all know they won’t win this one.
Ying avoided saying goodbye. She spends most of her time in the office now, has a bunch of scavenged computers hooked up to the generator. I couldn’t tell you what she’s doing. Still looking, I guess.
I don’t want to think about how quiet it will be without the Snows. I’ve never minded the quiet but this is something else, isn’t it? Sometimes I think I hear your voice and I feel a little bit less lonely.
Five months after D-Day
You can hear the city falling apart. All the windows in those glass towers? They’re starting to crack from the cold. The electricity’s gone out in most areas, thanks to a windstorm a few weeks ago. Some lights on timers sometimes still go on and off, but they’re not going to last – two people can’t keep a city going.
Ying’s taken over a giant house a few blocks away, all to herself. She says that she wouldn’t have been able to afford a house that big no matter how much she saved in her life. The rooms aren’t full of furniture but what looks to me like junk. Cell phones, computers, laptops, tablets, all the cables you can think of. She’s always tinkering away on something.
She checks on me once a week and we have Sunday dinner together. She worries about me, she says. She worries about me? Can you imagine, it should be the other way around! I worry about the quiet, mostly. She’s got no one for company but an old fart like me. I know you think I’m a ball of laughs, but you always did have odd taste.
But the house is warm, thanks to the generator and the solar piping the Snows helped install on the roof before they left. I sometimes boil water for an extra-hot bath. Mostly I cook on the grill these days, or eat out of cans. With everyone gone, there are more than enough cans to last a lifetime even if I never cooked again.
When it’s quiet like this and I’m all alone in the house, I like to pretend you’re at work, and the kids are young again and away at school. Sometimes I want to stay there in those moments and linger.
Ten months after D-Day
Happy birthday, love. Of course I wouldn’t forget. This year I’d hoped to take you on a cruise because I know how much you always wanted to travel the world. I’m sorry that I kept telling you that we couldn’t afford it, because of the kids and all. I’m sorry I had such a hard time keeping a job when we were just starting out. I would have loved to travel the world with you. Just my luck, this would be the year. I hid the brochures in the garage so you wouldn’t find them. I was going to book the tickets for your birthday.
Instead, I invited Ying over and we ate the biggest cake you could imagine. It tasted like shit, because you know I can’t bake but, damn, I tried. We put a candle on it, and sung you “Happy birthday” and everything. I miss you.
One year after D-Day
I caught Tom lurking around the house the other day. He seems right out of his mind. I didn’t want to show it but I was terrified, shaking. I grabbed that gun in the kitchen, stuck a steak knife in my belt, just to look a little more intimidating, and walked out onto the front porch. I pointed my gun straight at him and told him to scram.
He shouted at me, rambled about fallen angels, but he left. I’m still shaking now.
Oh love, you might be proud of me, but God, do I wish you could hold me close and whisper that into my ear. Sometimes this house of ours, when I’m by myself, is too big, and too empty, and I can’t handle it. It’s not like me to be this serious. Sometimes I worry I’ll end up just like Tom.