Corn, Cows, and the Apocalypse (Part 1) (11 page)

-
The Last
Supper
-

             
I
made a quick meal of spaghetti o’s and Vienna sausages.  It was hardly a meal fit for an adult, but I didn’t want too many dishes and I didn’t want to spend more than a few minutes preparing it.

             
I was surprised that Garrett hadn’t argued about leaving.  He packed up his bag and set it buy the door like he planned to leave that night instead of in the morning.  When he came back in with his jacket on I expected he might skip the meal as well. 

             
He looked over the microwaved meal with disdain before looking to me.  I didn’t offer anything that might be construed as an opening for appeal.  He came in and sat down at the table.  He didn’t bother offering the standard, “looks good” before diving in with his spoon. 

             
It was apparently a race against awkwardness, so he didn’t bother to swallow between bites.  The faster he ate the more my stomach felt too sick to eat.  I knew we had gotten off to a rocky start.  I also knew that he wasn’t a great conversationalist, but I thought perhaps he might attempt to mend the situation.  I watched him practically choke himself to get through our last meal together and it made me feel like a piece of gum on the bottom of his shoe. 

             
I didn’t bother excusing myself when my eyes started to water.  I just slipped away from the table and went upstairs to my bedroom.  As much as I wanted him to be gone I still hated hearing the front door slam shut. 

             
I buried my head in my pillow so I didn’t have to hear his motorcycle distancing the house.  I tried to remind myself that I wasn’t alone.  My friends would be back, hopefully soon.  Garrett was a difficult man to get to know, but he was still a better conversationalist than the walls.

             
“You forgot to take your bags out of the satchel.”  Garrett’s muffled voice said.  I lifted my head from beneath my pillow.  I was certain he could see my tears, because he already looked uncomfortable.  My hair was no doubt a mess from the pillow, but that was nothing to trifle about now.  “Your clothes.”  He said waving two bags from the clothing store we had gone to the other day.

             
“Just put them anywhere.”  I said baffled that he was making the effort to bring them upstairs when he could have just left them downstairs, or strewn them through the yard if he preferred. 

             
He dropped the bags right below him, taking the “anywhere” part literally.  “What about this one?”  He pulled a small bag out from under his jacket that was from the same store.  I recognized it immediately.  It had been stashed in with my wet clothes.  “What do you want to do about this bag?”

             
“I don’t know.” 

             
He pulled the pink nightgown out of the bag and dangled it on one finger.  “What are we going to do about this?” 

             
“I don’t know.”  I said again irritated that I was on trial for having the pink nightie when he was the one who had put every last innuendo into the damn thing. 

             
“This is a beautiful nightgown, but I can’t keep it.” 

             
“I’m not asking you to.”  I cringed with confusion. 

             
“I like the way it feels.”  He continued with his rant.  “I like the way it moves.  I would love to lie next to this nightgown night after night, but I don’t have that to offer.” 

             
I took in a deep breath as a gleaned the meaning of his words.  “You’re just here to train me.  You’re going back to Chicago when we’re done aren’t you.”  He nodded.  “How long?” 

             
“Not long.  I’ve been wanting to explore this, but for reasons even beyond time limits, I didn’t think that was fair to you.  I see my waffling has made me seem like a tease.  I’m sorry for that.  I didn’t mean to put you on the roller coaster with me.”  He stepped forward and handed me the negligee and sat on the bed with me.  “I didn’t argue with leaving because I thought it might be best if I leave before I make you hate me for more reasons than you already do.  The truth is, you either need to put that on, or I need to get the hell out of here.  Either way I’m still going to be the son-of-a-bitch who runs out on you.” 

             
I looked down at the night gown.  I already knew what the answer was.  I still had mixed feelings about Garrett’s personality and his motives, but in the end there weren’t a lot of men to choose from in the new world.  One night stands and flings were about as good as it got. 

             
“Will you ever leave Chicago?”

             
Garrett took my hand.  “I have responsibilities there.”  I glanced down at his hand. 

             
“So I shouldn’t turn down all the marriage proposals I get after you leave.”  He smiled and even chuckled at that, but didn’t necessarily answer.     

             
I stood up and took the nightgown into my walk in closet to slip it on.  When I returned Garrett had lit the emergency candle I kept beside my bed.  It was a little gesture of romance, but I appreciated it. 

             
He looked me over with tensed urgent attraction.  It had been a long time since any man had looked at me that way, if ever.  When he pulled me to straddle his lap, my hands started to shake.  “Are you okay?” 

             
“Yes,” I said with a tremor in my voice.  “I didn’t get a lot of practice with sex prior to the world ending.”

             
“Oh,” he said leaning back on the bed.  “It’s a good thing I’m your trainer then.” 

             
I smiled and leaned over to kiss him.  He tasted like mint, and I wished I would have brushed my teeth.  When he finally pulled me back from the kiss he proceeded to instruct me on what to do, starting with removing his pants. 

             
At first I thought the scene seemed a little too directed and unromantic, but since my past experiences were hardly worth mentioning, anything was an improvement.

             
We experimented with several different positions until I found one that actually did for me what any position did for him.  He brought me the satisfaction I had been missing from my other experiences. 

             
“Thank you,” I panted into his ear, still dizzy from euphoria.

             
He chuckled and caressed my cheek.  “You say that like we’re done.  Always trying to get out of your training early.”  He clucked his tongue.

             
“I hope this isn’t a work me until I puke training session.”

             
“No, but I’m pretty sure I can get you to exhaustion.”  He kissed me deeply.  It took a moment before I could get used to the fervor of it, but once I did I was offering it right back. 

-
One Night Stand-

             
There are details in conversations that you often miss the first time.  It isn’t until you go back over the dialogue that you notice what you missed.  Garrett had been completely honest with me about not being able to stay with me.  He said he would have to go back to Chicago.  He also said we didn’t have long.  Little did I know, that meant he was going to leave immediately after I fell asleep from our lovemaking. 

             
It was alarming at first.  I kept looking for him, in case he was just hiding somewhere in the house.  When the day went by without his return, it was clear that he wasn’t out getting supplies.  When he wasn’t back the next day it was also clear that I might run out of supplies and I had no transportation to get more. 

             
I built up a warm fire that second night and planned out my journey to see Priest the next day.  To my knowledge, he didn’t have a vehicle, but I assumed one of his harem could give me a lift into town.  If their druggy stupor didn’t land us in a ditch, I might survive another week on my own. 

             
When I heard the Dodge truck pull into the drive my heart leapt.  I peeked out the kitchen window and saw the four-wheeler loaded in the back.  There was no sign of the motorbike.  That meant Devin and Haden were back, but not August.  I watched them both climb out of the cab arguing about something.  I resisted the urge to run out and greet them.  It had been a hard three months for me, and an even harder last week, so I wasn’t going to make them feel like heroes just for returning. 

             
I moved back to the fire and warmed my hands.  Devin stormed in like he had never left.  “I don’t care, I won fair and square.  Lenore!”  He caught sight of me and rushed over.  I couldn’t help but smile at his energy.  He picked me up in an all-encompassing hug, and twirled me.  “Oh, sweet thing, I missed you.”  He set me down and kissed me.  It was a wetter kiss then I expected, but I didn’t pull away.  “Did you miss me?”  He said still holding my face.

             
“Endlessly.” 

             
He smiled and pulled me into a tight hug.  “Are you okay?”  He whispered in my ear.

             
“Yeah.”  I whispered back.

             
He pulled away again.  “You would not believe how much fun I had.  We went to the tournaments in the Metro and I won!”  He did a little dance to show his enthusiasm.   

             
“Devin.”  August’s voice carried over from the kitchen door.  She looked serene and magnanimous as usual, but seeing her reminded me of every hit I took from Garrett in her name.  The pain I endured to live up to her expectations of me.  The still forming scars that were proof that I was forever changed into the woman she wanted me to be.  It was always hard for me to be angry at August, but in that moment, anger was the only emotion I did hold for her.  “We can talk about that later.”

             
“Hello, August.”  A said rather coldly.  Devin backed away giving us space to stare across the house at each other.  Haden managed to find something of interest to do in the kitchen cupboards, so she didn’t interfere with the showdown. 

             
“Hello, Lenore.”  August said as she strolled over to me.  She was offering a little bit of a smile, but I couldn’t match it.  “How did everything go?”

             
“Well enough.  I’m sure most of the evidence of my work has started to heal, but I assure you the scars remain.”

             
August looked a little hurt by that statement, but she smiled anyway.  “I hope you understand now why I did what I did.”  She moved around me toward the fire.  I wasn’t sure if it was Garrett’s training, my self-professed psychic ability, or just my understanding of August, but I already knew what she was doing.

             
“Yes, I understand your purpose.”

             
August grabbed the fireplace poker and whipped it at my head.  It took everything I had not to block it, especially since I could have kicked it out of her hand before she brought it up to swing.  The poker stopped millimeters from my face.  August looked disappointed, but in the realization that I hadn’t flinched, she found a different kind of disappointment. 

             
I perked an eyebrow at her.  “Shall I dance for you now?  Or do you prefer to play marionette with my strings?”  August lowered the poker.  I saw her glance to Devin. She didn’t even know how to handle me.  “We’ve disappointed each other.  I haven’t lived up to your expectations of me and you certainly haven’t lived up to mine.  Don’t worry though.  I understand what you want now.  I can be the person that
you
want me to be.”

             
August took the stinging concession like a punch in the gut, but she didn’t try to offer anything to make me feel better about being abandoned for three months.  “Well,” Devin said rubbing his hands together behind me.  He pressed them down on my shoulders and squeezed like he might be able to release the tension in the room by easing the tension in my shoulders.  “How’s about you start dinner while I tell you all about my feat of bravery?”

             
“I’ve already eaten.”  I pulled away from his hands and sat down in the chair next to the fire to read my latest book.  I could tell everyone was baffled by this new change of hierarchy, but no one dared contest it.  I had made my stand.          

-
Clemency and Cigarettes-

             
The lookout rotation resumed as normal that night.  I took the early shift, but I decided to take a couple extra hours so Devin didn’t take the bulk of the evening himself.  He normally took midnight to three, Haden took three to six, and August was up early.  Most nights though Devin didn’t wake Haden and did a full six hour shift.  This in turn prompted August to wake a little earlier to compensate.  Haden always griped at him for not waking her, but it was obvious she appreciated it.

             
Instead of my usual spot on the side porch, I sat on the railing of the back/front porch in the dark listening to the cicadas.  (The apocalypse hadn’t done anything to lessen the insect population.)  Well before two a.m. Devin pulled himself off the couch where he had been napping and joined me. 

             
“Hey.”  He said still rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

             
“What are you doing?  I told you I’d wake you.” 

             
He leaned on the railing beside me and pulled out his pack of cigarettes.  He offered me one and I took it.  Smoking wasn’t cool, but it was something to do, and nobody cared about cancer anymore.  Slow suicide was back in style. 

             
He lit mine first as any gentleman would.  I sipped a drag off it that made my lungs want to crawl out of my throat and slap me in the face.  I managed to only cough a little.  He chuckled quietly to himself as he enjoyed a few long drags of his cigarette like a veteran beer drinker might chug his first can of beer just to quench his thirst. 

             
“You okay?”  Devin asked and before I could give him the cliché
fine
— “For real, are you okay?”

             
I flicked my cigarette a few times to make the embers glow before answering.  “I’m mad.”  I looked up at him to see if he was going to high tail and run at the honesty. 

             
“At all of us?”  He asked.  I could barely see his face, but I knew he could see mine.  I could almost picture the worry etched in his beautiful face.  He wasn’t a fighter—at least not socially—he was a lover, and it would grieve him desperately to be the cause of my pain. 

             
“No,” I said in all honesty.  “For once I’m mad at August.”

             
“She’s a hard woman to be mad at.”

             
“I know.”  I took a drag of my cigarette so it didn’t look like I had completely wasted it.  The second time wasn’t nearly as bad, but it did bring to mind what it might feel like to suffocate in a burning building.

             
“Was it tough, the last three months?”

             
“Yes.”  He didn’t seem to like that answer.  He was probably hoping I would say that it got easier each day, or I learned fast, but when the stakes keep getting raised, you don’t really know how far you’ve come until your there.  “The stupid thing is, I spent the last three months learning to be independent from you guys, and I think the only thing I accomplished was becoming dependent on Garrett.”

             
Devin looked away, suddenly preoccupied with something else.  It was probably just his reservations against prying, but it might have been a tinge of jealousy.  When he finally turned back, he looked angry.  “He didn’t take advantage of you, did he, out here, alone?”

             
I almost smiled, but decided that I needed to take Devin’s concerns seriously.  “Garrett put me through a lot, but he didn’t hurt me like that.”

             
Devin seemed content with that.  “I have to tell you about the tournaments.”  I could hear the excitement in his voice.  He was nearly giddy. 

             
I crushed out my cigarette and touched his arm.  “Tell me tomorrow okay.”  I gave him a smile that hopefully apologized for not being attentive to the ten-year-old boy inside of him.  “Don’t stay up all night.  The point of a rotation is to rotate.”

             
I started to climb off the railing, but he grabbed me and lifted me off.  After my feet were down he kept me in a tight embrace.  “I know you’re supposed to be our new secret weapon, but don’t change okay.  I liked you just the way you were.”

             
I was tempted to ask if that included being his kitchen slave, but I decided not to ruin the generous compliment.  “Okay.”  He pulled me back and kissed me.  It was a long, firm lip press that seemed to express his gratitude, remorse, and relief all in one. 

             
When he let me go, I smiled at him.  He didn’t smile back, but I got the sense he was still worried about me, despite my agreement not to change.  It was probably warranted, but like all emotions, anger either dissipates or curdles into something else.  In this case, it was probably going to be bitterness.