The Great Wreck (12 page)

           
Seven
weeks after we had arrived at the cabin, now with the phone lines, internet,
and television gone, we were completely alone.

*
     
*
     
*

           
It
stayed quiet for about two weeks after the power went off for good. By then we had
settled into our daily routine. I’d get up, cook breakfast, make coffee and
toast.
 
Greer would be up next. She’d eat
my toast, drink my coffee and head out the door to run around the perimeter of
the cabin’s property.

           
At first
I’d just say, “Stay inside the fence line, yeah?”

           
Greer
gave me a sour look and replied, “Got it,
Dad
.”

           
After a
few of these exchanges, I’d just say, “Watch your ass out there.”

           
And
Greer would respond, “If I don’t nobody else will.”

           
After a week
that got old so I would say, “Watch your can.”

           
Greer’d
say, “Shake it, sake it!”

           
Me,
“Watch your badunkadunk.”

           
Greer,
“Red beans and rice didn’t miss me!”

           
And so
on, “Watch your caboose, ace, apple bottom, backpack, backside, badinkadink,
behind, bell, biscuit, booty, bum, bumper, buns, cake, fanny, humps, juicy
double, pancake, tail feather, trunk, tucas, tush, duff, kiester, matako,
moneymaker, pressed ham, whoopee cakes, honker, hinny, fanny, fundament,
medicine balls, the thing that gets cold when you sit on something cold, wazoo,
and so on.”

           
Eventually
I ran out of buttocks euphemisms, and I switch back to, “Be careful.” Sometimes
I’d mix it up a bit, just to keep it fresh and say, “Be home by eleven young
lady.”

           
And she’d say, “You’re not the boss
of me!” and run out the door.
           
“Hey my funky valentine, watch
your back out there!”

           
“Good
morning grandfather, bless you!

           
Or I’d
say, “No playing grab ass or fighting out there.”

           
Greer,
“I grin like a baby but bite like a gator.”

           
Or I’d
try, “You’re not fooling around with the Bennet boy are you?”

           
“But
Dad, I love him!”

           
Me,
“You’re not going out dressed like that young lady!”

           
Greer,
“I’ll wear what I want. I’m a natural borne world shaker!”

           
Me, “Is
this the story of the depravity of the beat generations, true?”

           
Greer,
“Wild fire passion and impossible temper!”

           
Me,
“What the fuck?” And so on. It was a stupid little game we played but it helped
break up the monotony a bit and keep the ever-present fear and depression from
overwhelming us.

           
After
Greer took off for her run, Nicky’d come down and make scrambled eggs, then sit
next to me with one of her legs wrapped around mine and eat while reading one
of the many books Tony’s Uncle had brought up to the cabin. Her latest was a
book called
The Drowned World
, I
think. She’d burn through a book, toss it aside, then burn through another one.
I’d see her all day curled up on the couch wrapped in a blanket devouring her
latest acquisition or up in our room buried under the covers. She wasn’t
ignoring me, exactly, she was just ignoring the world outside.

           
Tony
would show up next. He’d eat whatever was left over then drag me down to the
basement where we’d inventory what was there and try to figure out how long we
could stay. Once a week he’d do some voodoo math and come up with a new number.
Eight months. A year. Three years, “Four if we eat Dreysi,” he said counting
the endless rows of cans for the umpteenth time.

           
“Not
even remotely funny, man,” I replied.

           
“You’d
lap that up, dude. Hell she looks just like Nicky.”

           
“Oh,
man! Don’t even say that! You just killed my libido for a week!”

           
He
laughed and continued counting, “Serves you right for making me bring her up
here.”

           
Dreysi would
show up sometime after noon, shove something in her face, then crash on the
other couch across from Nicky spending as much time as she could asleep. I
didn’t blame her. I would have sleep more too if I could have but whenever I
closed my eyes, all I could see were the people in Grants tearing into each
other or dream of Greer’s dead bum eating that little girl’s throat out. I’d
drift off and dream they were in the room, the dead, standing on the corner
waiting for me to close my eyes. I’d see them and jerk awake, heart pounding,
sweat pouring off of me. The starts were so bad my chest started hurting
whenever I’d have one of these night terrors.
 
If I was lucky, I was getting maybe two or three hours of sleep a night,
usually just as the sun was coming up. The weak light would seep into the room
and I could see no one was standing in the corners or at the foot of the bed or
in the doorway. I’d relax and finally get a little sleep before my internal
clock woke me up a few hours later. After that there was no going back to
sleep.

           
So we
each had our coping mechanism; me the parent cooking, cleaning, doing laundry,
Greer and her runs, Nicky in her books, Tony and his inventories, and Dreysi
sleeping through the whole thing. It was dull and it was depressing and on any
given day you could expect to hear someone crying in their room as we all
worried and fretted, terrified about what was happening in the world.

*
     
*
     
*

           
That all
came to an end soon enough as the terror that had engulfed the world reached
out to our haven almost two months from the day we left Albuquerque. Tony and I
had inventoried everything his uncle had again and were sitting out on the deck
overlooking the sweeping views of the canyons, talking about what might be
happening back in the world, where our families were, and what we we’re going
to do.

           
“We
could hunt,” I said, “If we ran out of food.”

           
“You
ever gut a deer?” Tony replied.

           
“No. I
guess I could learn.”

           
“Yeah,
sure. On that note, you see any dear lately?”

           
“Nope.
Don’t go out much.”

           
“How
about bears? Raccoons? Fucking goats? Stray dogs? Even a goddam squirrel?”

           
“None of
those either because…I don’t go out much.”

           
“But
when you do, you don’t see any of those things do you? When I’d come up here as
a kid, this place was always crawling with something; raccoons getting into our
trash, bears roaming around the property, squirrels going apeshit in the trees,
everything, you name it. My man, I am starting to believe the entire forest has
been cleaned out of all animals except us.”

           
“Cheery
thought,” I replied, “At least we have water.” Tony’s Uncle had dropped a well
some seven hundred feet to get to an aquifer that was guaranteed to last fifty
years or so. As long as we had the power from the solar farm, we’d have water.

           
“Yeah,
good old Uncle Bill. Won’t do us a fuck of good if we run out of food, though.”

           
I was
beginning to think Tony had a starvation phobia. Maybe because his parents were
poor when Tony was really young or something. I mean like, eating government
cheese on the fat days, mustard and lettuce and nothing else on the thin ones
of which there were many more. This for weeks on end when the regular food ran
out.

           
From
below and to the right of us I could hear Greer tearing up the trail that ran
along the inside of the cabin’s fence line as she came up the driveway. I
looked over and saw that Nicky had joined her on the morning run and was a few
yards behind her running for all she was worth as well, “You think they’re
racing?” I said as I got up and walked to the edge of the deck.

           
“Fuck if
I know. Greer’s losing it, man, All she talks about at night is the dead and
how they’ve overran everything and that they’ll get up here soon, On and on.
Even when she’s asleep she dream’s about the infection. I think she’s going
crazy.”

           
“Let’s
hope not, for your sake.”

           
“Why for
my sake?”

           
“Because
then the only available female will be Dreysi,”
 
I said laughing.

           
“Ha, ha.
I’d rather fuck a crazy Greer. And furthermore,
 
I would not bang Frigadoris, my friend, not even with your dick,” he
replied laughing and leaning over the rail.

           
“Yep.
Dreysi-land: where boners go to die.”

           
“The
Great Bonner Graveyard.”

           
“What
are you guys training for? Mount Taylor Olympics?” I called out over the deck rail
watching Greer fly down the last few yards of the driveway. I saw the sweat
pouring off of her, the way her breath tore in and out, then the look of sheer
terror on her face.

           
Greer
nearly collapsed as she reached the cabin’s doorway and looked up at Tony and
me, “There’s….someone…in the woods…,” she wheezed as Nicky ran up behind her.”

           
“What
did she say?” Tony said looking at me, the color running out of his face.

           
“I think
she said she saw something in the woods.”

           
“Not
something, someone,” Nicky said as she leaned over to catch her breath then
looked up at me, “We saw someone back in the woods. They were a hundred yards
or so from the fence line.”

           
“Are you
sure?” I asked.

           
Nicky
nodded and gulped in the air.

           
“Fuck.
Do you think it’s the neighbors?” I asked Tony.

           
He shook
his head, “The Johnston’s are the only ones close and they’re too fucking old
to be hiking all the way down here from their cabin. Let’s go take a look.”

           
I
followed Tony down into the basement, “Just one second,” he said and walked to
a closet in the corner of the basement and opened the door,
 
I could faintly hear a few beeps like someone
punching in a security code, then heard Tony open a secret door at the back of
the closet. I walked up behind him and looked inside.

           
“Holy
shit!”
 
I said. Inside was a small,
walk-in safe that had dozens of rifles, handguns, shotguns, and ammunition hung
neatly on racks, “You’re uncle expecting to wage a war up hear?”

           
“He was
a bit of a doomsday prepper,” Tony said, “Guess he was right, huh? You ever
fire one of these?” he said pulling out what looked a lot like a M-16 automatic
rifle.

           
“Yeah,
in my two tours of ‘Nam I packed one of these. What do you think?”

           
“Ha, ha.
It’s pretty easy to use, “Tony said, “Safety on and off
here
. Bullets in
here
.
Point
this
end towards the bad guy
and pull
this
thing here called a
trigger. Replace ammunition like so,” he said demonstrating how to swap out a
magazine clip, “I recommend having it set for semi-automatic like this, and
remember if you go to full auto, the rifle will want to pull up and to your
left so be ready to compensate. And don’t shoot me or any vital part of your
body off. And, most importantly, don’t shoot me. Got it?”

           
“Got
it,”
 
replied nervously taking the
machine gun and putting the safety back on. Tony grabbed another rifle, then
handed me a bag and began feeding me rifle clips. He then took one for himself,
filled it up, then grabbed a pair of binoculars, a 9 mm pistol, and pistol
ammunition for good measure, “Let’s go, Buffalo Bill.”

           
“After
you Lone Ranger,” I said as Tony sealed up the safe and we walked outside. It
was a sign of how scared the girls were that they didn’t even comment on the
rifles, they just watched us go, then went into the house locking the door
behind them.

           
We walked
quietly along the perimeter road until we reached the back fence. Tony pulled
out the binoculars while I scanned the immediate forest a few yards from the
fence. I didn’t see anything. Nothing moved or made a sound.

           
Suddenly,
Tony froze looking out into the woods, “There! Goddamit, I see someone,” he
dropped the binoculars and tried to spot the person with his eyes, “Yeah, there
they are,” he said and handed me the binoculars.

           
At fist
all I could see were trees and bushes, then I spotted something moving away
from us, about three hundred yards out, “I see it,” I said. Whoever it was, was
moving deeper into the woods and up the mountainside, “Maybe the Johnstons
brought family with them? Or hikers maybe?”