Perchance to Dream - 4

A week or so after the first time I wrote little stories on the back of playing cards and gave dreams to the whole family, I was walking around the neighborhood, keeping my eye open for anything to scavenge and my mind open for something productive and proactive I could do to help support the family. Honestly, I was pretty low. I wanted a hot shower, a completely hot meal (pizza was at the top of the list that day, as I walked past two former pizza joints), and I desperately yearned for caffeine. This was before the Coffee Mafia, much less having the grinder, pot, and the solar-powered camp stove. Oops. Spoilers. I guess. Anyway... walking around the neighborhood.

That was the first time I saw the no god spray paint.

Might have missed it that first time if not for the three people standing and whispering about it. I get like that when I’m circling my thoughts, that is, ignorant of my surroundings. Scavenging had taken high and seed, and I’ve been focusing on contributing and being ashamed of how I really wasn’t. Everyone else in the household had already started finding their place in the emerging new community and society. Now, I’m not saying I’m lazy. Not exactly. Just... I’m wired differently, I guess. Or maybe I just tell myself that so I can sleep at night. Or, at least try to sleep at night. I’ve gotten plenty of crap that flashes in my mind’s eye even before I get into R.E.M. My ex-boss’s bloody face being chief among those images.

It was hard not to be curious about anything that drew other people’s attention in the aftermath of Armageddon day. The name Wyrd Frontier didn’t come out of nowhere. So, I stepped up to the three people and looked where they were looking. The spray-painted letters filled my eyes for the first of many times.

nogodNOgodnoGODngOdNoGoDnoGOdNOGOD

“What do you think it's supposed to mean?” I asked.
Two voices gave noncommittal mutterings. The third person just shrugged. I wish I could give you some kind of description for them. Anything. But I’m not sure I ever saw any of them ever again. Such is life, both before and after. People come. People go. Besides, those spray-painted words were far more interesting than the people looking at them.

Someone had painted them on one of the old-fashioned townhouses that still had a wrap-around yard. To tell the truth, now that I’m reflecting while writing these words, I don’t recall seeing that house ever before that day. Then again, I didn’t usually go to that part of Midtown before Armagodden day. Lived in some bougie high-rise apartments closer to the capital. If it wasn’t for those two words repeating in different styles, I probably wouldn’t have really noticed this house on that day either.

Those words shone in the early morning light.

nogodNOgodnoGODngOdNoGoDnoGOdNOGOD

I said, “Not even an accurate observation of reality, is it?”

None of my momentary companions replied. Were they even thinking about what I’d been thinking? Standing and looking at those shining white letters brought Armageddon day to my mind. Having lived through it, we all knew gods existed. Hell, one of them had almost stepped on Ellie and me.

We were lying in each other’s arms, relaxing after she gave me a tour of her bed. I was particularly out of it and barely registered when Ellie lifted her head, and asked, “Do you hear screams?”

I stretched and, with some effort, managed to sit up.

Kelly was right. I heard screaming outside. And not just one or two people. That had to be a dozen or more people filling the streets and vocalizing their terror. I can't think of any other way to describe it. Vocalized terror. Back in the world before, I used to love horror movies. An actress’s scream could make or break a movie for me. Sitting in Ellie’s bed, naked and being aware of her nakedness, I realized the difference between even the best of those performing and the screams of people who were really out of their minds, viscerally afraid of something so much that they had to let it out with their voices.

I looked at Ellie. Ellie looked at me. We both gestured to the window with our chins, smiled sheepishly, and nodded. What is it about humanity that compels us to rush toward anything and everything that might give us a glimpse of blood or pain?

Halfway to the window, a deep roar that was something like a cyborg gorilla with bronchitis bellowing through a foghorn shook the floor, rattled the walls, and cracked the windows. Even now, all this time later, my mind rebels at thinking about how I reacted to hearing that sound. I’m only just now able to acknowledge that part of me liked it, still likes it, wants to hear it again, yearns to hear it again. On the other hand, I’m sure I’m going to have nightmares tonight just by writing these few sentences about it. Still, despite the sound, or perhaps because of it, Ellie and I hurried to the window.

We looked out to the cracked glass just in time to see a clawed foot covered with feathers stomped down on the small apartment building across the street.
Purple lightning flashed in the sky and stayed there, momentarily blinding me. When I could see again, whatever that leg was attached to was gone. The lightning remained, and I thought I saw some strange things flapping out of the light fissures.

“What the fuck?” Ellie and I said together.

Outside, some people screamed and ran chaotically about. Others had fallen into a mob and walked in the direction of where I heard giant feet stomping and smashing buildings. Each person in their mob walked with slack jaws and shambling feet. The only thing missing was a slight drone of, “Yes, master.”

Ellie turned to me. “Do you have a car?”

I nodded. “But it’s like ten blocks away.”

“What kind?” Ellie asked.

“A shitty old F-150,” I said. “But again, like ten blocks away.”

“We’d better get dressed and get going.”

Ellie went to the bed, sat down, and pulled on a pair of sweatpants.

“For what?” I asked, not moving.

“Get to my family,” she replied.

And that’s the first glimpse I got of Ellie’s inherent need to take action the moment an idea pops into her head. I love that Ellie loves others enough to instinctively think of getting her family. I wasn't ever really close to anyone. My first instinct was to find some place to hide, cover my ears, close my eyes, and wait for whatever was going on to sort itself out. Unless, of course, wherever found to hide had booze or weed, then I’d get as blasted or as blazed out as I could and then wait for whatever was going on to sort itself out.

Then again, on that afternoon, post-coital bliss surged through my body and stunted my good sense.

Still, I had the wherewithal to ask, “Get them and go where?”

Ellie pulled on a shirt, looked at me, and her eyes shifted one way and then the other. “I don’t know. This... whatever... I don’t know. But I’d rather get my family and figure out the I don’t know on the way or after we get them. Please. It’s my family.” She pulled socks on. “We can get your family too.”

They turned away from her, said, “I don’t have any family. Well, not close,” and got dressed.

Ellie made some attempt at consoling or sympathy, but I tuned her out. Part of my brain was still processing what was happening outside. Another roar shook everything, and I desperately wanted to hide in the closet or under the bed. Then again, considering what I'd seen outside, I'm not sure the closet or under the bed would offer any safety. After all, the earliest months of childhood always lurked in those dark spaces. What if they had come back as well?

We left Ellie’s little apartment in the two-story fourplex that was so popular in that part of midtown and found the stairwell partially destroyed. Once Ellie got something into her head, she didn’t let much turn her away. She went to the lowest remaining step, swayed back and forth on the new ramshackle thing, and jumped.
Nothing about our afternoon together gave me any indication that she was any kind of athletic. Our time together was passionate and enthusiastic, without much in the way of exploring our flexibility or any kind any other kind of physical prowess.

“Ow!” Ellie said from the ground.

“You okay?” I called down.

“Yeah,” she called back with a slight groan. “Didn’t expect it to sting so much.”

I’m glad she couldn’t see me roll my eyes. That was the first time I realized I could restrain myself with a romantic partner, which had gotten me in trouble in the past. I had desperately wanted to say, “Physics. Not just a good idea. They’re the law,” but I bit it back. What did Ellie expect when she flung a body like hers toward the ground from a height like that? Now, I’m not trying to body shame her. Back then, my body was pretty close to hers, and I felt no shame about my carb consumption.

To follow her, I edged my way to the end of the stairs and carefully hung from the bottom of the banister railing before dropping down the last five or so feet. Even with that precaution, pain shot through both legs. I sucked in a deep breath, and my next dozen or so steps came with some tender trepidation.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”

We hustled down the street toward my place and my truck. We never made it because of an executive decision I made.

The first dude we came across on the next block had fashioned some debris into a cross that was almost as big as he was. He was shouting about Bible verses that didn’t exist from the book of Marcus Aurelius and Luke Skywalker. I thought it would be okay with him across the street. If we left him alone, he might yell at us, but I’ve been yelled at before. And, I admit his stuff was pretty funny.

“The cat shall not lie with the master’s Archangel,” and, “A bird burning the bridge in heaven is better than two wasting not in hell,” and “On the third day of your revelation, drink only wine for to purify your mind and bodies and prepare to repopulate the earth.”

But then, he took one look at us, screamed, “Carpet munchers are an affront to the multiplicity of man! Suffer not these bitches to live!” flipped that cross around to wheel it like a sword, and charged us.

We froze. Like total freeze panic mode.

Then again, maybe I was just really confused because homeboy had on a Pride shirt. Of everything else that I experienced that day, that was one of my most vivid memories. Him screaming. Him running at us. Him getting hit in the middle of the street by a minivan flying around the corner. The dull chunk of that impact. The squeal of the tires. the scent of burning rubber from the tires. The duller thunk of dudes head impacting the street. The driver jumping out of the minivan, calling out apologies, and seeing if the first dude was okay. The second guy looked like an upper-middle-class weekend taxi soccer dad staving off a midlife crisis through sheer on we alone. All of that is burned into my mind, along with the shining portal that opened up next to them, the giant lobster pincher that came out of the portal, snatched them up, dragged them away, and the portal closing.

It’s weird what we remember from traumatic moments.

Ellie sputtered words like, “What,” and, “God,” and, “holy shit,” all separated by various inflections and pronunciations of, “ah,” and, “um.”

Something shrieked somewhere behind us. The sound was like someone putting a howler monkey’s voice in liquid nitrogen and dropping it into a food processor. The sound could have been anywhere from one to ten blocks away.

“Change of plans,” I said, grabbed Ellie’s arm, and pulled her toward the minivan.
Ellie got into the passenger seat. I got into the driver’s seat. Almost midlife crisis dude had left the minivan running. I checked the gas level.—between two-thirds and three-quarters full. Better than what my truck had, and it was right here, right now. I shifted into gear and sped off down the street with Ellie giving directions.
This is when I got my first sense of Ellie’s organizational mastery. I had just put my foot on the gas, and Ellie said, “A block and a half up, turn right.”

I made the turn and swerved to avoid a trio of dudes in business suits who skipped into the street looking up with their mouths hanging open as if they were adolescents seeing their best friend's mom in yoga pants and a sports bra for the first time.

“Three blocks up and a left,” Ellie said.

“Taking 160 to biz 80?” I asked.

“Yes.” Then she added, “Exit Watt going north.”

“Gotcha.”

The road looked nearly clear with some stalled cars here and there and minor lumps of debris a block and a half up, so I gunned the engine and maneuvered around the cars, and, a block or so later, realized the debris piles were flattened and mangled bodies. I didn't need to be a rocket surgeon to piece together what had happened to them, what with the giant feet stomping buildings all around town.

“Stop,” Ellie groaned.

I slammed on the brakes.

Even before we completely stopped moving, Ellie had the door open, stuck her head out, and projectile vomited onto the street. I’d been the sober, we-gotta-go girl, at enough sorority and frat parties back in college, holding my friend’s hair in the bathroom, my stomach only did a slight lurch. I got it under control and reached out and rubbed Ellie’s lower back. One of us had to hold it together. Since I was driving, I was the logical choice.

While Ellie was purging her stomach, a cacophony of voices rose behind us. I glanced in the rearview mirror. A swarm of humans came charging around the corner. Some went straight. Some turned towards us. Many were shouting and screaming.

I squeezed Ellie’s arm. “We gotta go, honey.”

In response, she wretched again.

The human Stampede grew closer and closer. I hit the electronic lock to make sure none of these people could get in with us. Only, Ellie’s door was still open. She was still vomiting. “Ellie,” I squeezed her shoulder harder. “Puke in the car if you have to, but we gotta go.” even in a Lovecraftian apocalypse, I was the we-gotta-go girl. “Please shut the door.” I did my best to keep the edge out of my voice.

Elie wretched again.

I pressed the gas pedal slightly, and the minivan rolled forward slowly—not fast enough to escape the oncoming crowd but enough that I could get up to speed sooner than if I had stayed at a stop.

“Sweetie, please close the door,” I said, but my mind was screaming: gotta go, gotta go, gotta go...

The first rank of the crowd caught up with the minivan. A couple of them pounded on the back window. The rest swarmed along each side. If I didn’t accelerate, they’d be pulling Ellie out.

Something thumped against the window next to me. I jumped involuntarily and turned to look. My boss stared at me. Blood streamed down his face from a gash on his forehead. He looked like a bit part in a 1980s slasher film. His eyes met mine.

“Em?”

He rattled the door handle.

“Get off me!” Ellie cried.

I snapped my head almost one-eighty so fast I almost gave myself whiplash. As I predicted, arms were reaching into the open door. Ellie was swatting them away as best she could. Her seat belt was the only reason she hadn't been pulled out of the vehicle.

My boss pounded on the window next to me. “Let me in! Please, Em! Let me in.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, drew in a deep breath, growled, “Aw fuck,” gripped Ellie’s arm as hard as I could, and slammed on the gas pedal.

We speed down the street. The people outside the minivan tried to hold on to Ellie, but my grip, the seat belt, and the physics of mass times acceleration won that fight. Two seconds later, I opened my eyes to make sure I didn’t run into anything.
I wanted to ask Ellie if she was alright, even open my mouth, but something happened that sucked all the sound out of the air for half a block. Pure silence is one of the strangest things I never want to experience again.

When sound returned, the engine revving, the tires spinning on the street, and the minivan displacing uncountable gallons of air hit my eardrums like a physical blow. I didn’t think I could take the sound of my voice striking from the other side. I drove on with the painful cacophony roaring around us, praying we didn’t come across whatever had taken all the sound away, and trying to shake my boss’s bloody face out of my mind’s eye.