Summer of the Apocalypse Page 3

  When Dad was out of sight, Eric popped the headphones on and listened to the radio. News and talk dominated: warnings from the Denver Police to be wary of looters, information about possible quarantines from the Governor’s office, lists of school closings (Denver schools were dismissed. Eric frowned. He’d only missed one day.), and health tips (“Stay away from crowds and keep your immune system healthy by eating right and sleeping well”). Eric roamed through the channels, but couldn’t find any music except for a Ft. Collins station playing spirituals that kept fading out. Cars passed steadily by 150 yards below, household goods pressed against the windows. Families, mostly, as far as Eric could tell. Usually a man and woman in the front seat, two or three kids in the back, a dog maybe or a cat. They moved from left to right, their motor sounds swallowed by the stream’s constant rumble. Eric rubbed the rock he sat cross-legged on with his thumb. Tiny glints of mica or quartz caught the sun and reflected them like stone-frozen stars. Most of the rock in the canyon was dark, almost black, granites and schists.

  Something moved on the canyon wall across the stream at about Eric’s height. It was a small mountain goat picking its way across the steep slope. He observed it until it hopped over a ridge and disappeared. The rest of the day Eric watched Dad carry box after box up the trail to the cave. Dad would stand at the side of the highway below and wait until there was a break in the cars. Then he would dash across the road and into the young cottonwood trees that screened the trail’s base. Eric snorted each time. Dad was such a ninny, practically a coward, he thought. Hiding in a cave! Nobody cares if we’re up here. We’d be tons better off if we stayed in Denver, or if we’d gone to California. Surely by the time the disease gets to the west coast they’ll have a cure for it. In the meantime we could be soaking up rays. To kill time that afternoon, Eric practiced with his sling shot, firing irregularly shaped pebbles at targets he set up on the slope. The whiz of the rocks cutting through the air and the sharp crack when they hit entertained him until Mom brought him dinner, a bowl of hot chile and a hunk of bread.

  “Enjoy the bread, Eric. We might not have any more fresh food for a while.” Her hair was pinned back and looked greasy. If Dad really cared about her, he thought, we wouldn’t be stuck on this stupid mountain.

  Eric set the bowl on the rock beside him to cool. “So what’s the plan?”

  “We’re living up here until your dad thinks it’s safe to go home.”

  “Dad’s a nut.”

  “Think of it as a camping trip. Dad’s afraid that the city will be bad. Exposure to the disease, and there’s already been riots.”

  “He’s still crazy.”

  Mom frowned. Eric thought for a moment that she might yell at him, that he had pushed too far. She said,

  “He’s your father. He’s trying to protect us.” Her face screwed up, like she was going to cry. “The world, Eric. It’s all going away. Don’t you care about the world?”

  Eric put a pebble in the sling shot’s leather pocket, aimed it across the canyon and fired. The rock shattered against a boulder on the other side. “I’m getting pretty good with this.” She shook her head and walked back to the cave. Eric wished he’d said instead, “I love you, Mom.” He put on the headphones, cranked up the volume and watched the cars passing below until the sun set and the evening mosquitos drove him inside.

  When Eric took his slingshot and cassette player to his post the next morning, the air was already hot, and gnats rose from the scrub oak like nasty tempered clouds. Two motorcycles were parked in the pull-out across the road from the trail. He scanned the canyon and what he could see of the path for the riders, but didn’t spot them. Several times yesterday cars had parked there, mostly to let faster cars pass, although once a woman had jumped from her truck and run down to the stream to squat behind a bush where she was hidden from the road. Eric looked away until she was gone. He didn’t worry about the cycles.

  He put a tape in the player, adjusted the headphones and pressed “play.” Nothing happened. The battery cover slid off easily and he cupped his hand below the batteries to catch them when he thumped the player against his knee. He shook the batteries like dice in his hand, which he hoped might revive them, and carefully wiped the terminals against his shirt to remove oxidation. But when he put them back, the tape still would not run.

  The radio worked, for what little use it was. The stations were either off the air or broadcasting news. He couldn’t find rock-n-roll anywhere. Finally he settled on KBPI, where at least he recognized the DJ. The governor had declared a general emergency the night before and called for National Guard support at hospitals and “food distribution centers.” Also there was talk about possible vaccines and how the scientists were saying that people shouldn’t panic. Meanwhile, reports from the eastern United States sounded bad, but no one would say how bad. Europe, where the disease started, wasn’t reporting anything now. What bothered Eric was the DJ’s voice. He sounded wheezy and he cleared his throat a lot.

  Eric leaned against a rock and watched the clouds. It’s hard to believe that anything is wrong, he thought. A jet dragged a contrail high against the blue. Probably a military flight, he thought. Commercial service was suspended. The shady side of the rock cooled his back, and lichens flaked off beneath his fingers as he rubbed them. Far up the slope, scrub oak leaves twisted in a breeze that hadn’t reached him yet. The announcements droned. The DJ started coughing and couldn’t stop. After twenty seconds or so, they switched to the station’s call signal and kept playing it over and over. Eric held his cassette player in his lap, his hands around it, and cried.

  After a while, he closed his eyes and fell asleep.

  The heat woke him. The shade that had protected him earlier had retreated, and three quarters of his body was in the sun. He sat up groggily, his head foggy with sleep. His first thought was to check the trail. After all, he thought, I’m supposed to be on guard duty. The motorcycles were still there. Traffic slid slowly through the canyon, bumper to bumper now. The windshields reflected brightly, and he couldn’t see the occupants. Baggage was strapped to the car tops. His second thought was of how lucky he was that Dad hadn’t caught him sleeping. He’d have freaked out for sure.

  He clipped the player to his belt and walked back to the cave. Maybe Mom knew where some batteries were. If not, he might be able to talk her into running into town with him for some more. If Dad was so set against going into Denver, they could go west to Georgetown or Idaho Springs. Eric stopped at the cave entrance. Voices came from within, his father’s and one he didn’t recognize. He scooted into the crawlway and crept closer. The Coleman lantern’s harsh light left deep shadows through the room.

  “You have more than enough for three people,” said the man sitting on a box with his back to Eric. A big soft-looking hulk, over two-hundred pounds, he wore a jean jacket with the sleeves cut off at the shoulder, short, spiked hair, and a dangly earring. Dad stood on the other side of the lantern, his arms across his chest, and another man, tall and scrawny, maybe high school age, sat on Eric’s mattress. Eric pushed himself up slowly and scanned the room. Mom wasn’t there. He thought she might be in one of the back corridors he hadn’t gotten around to exploring yet. She had said that there was a lot more to the cave.

  Dad said, “There’s not so much. I’m planning on staying for the winter.” The jean-jacket man leaned forward. “So we go get more when this runs out. Lots of food there if you know where to look.” “Looting you mean.” “A strong man takes what he wants.” Dad stepped back toward a stack of boxes. The high school kid said from the mattress, “Might be we could team up. You got a good start here. Three guys working together could do all right. We get some women and wait for things to blow over.”

  “You’re not too old for witch wool are you?” said jean-jacket. “All kinds of babes would be happy to come out here and get away from the city. Scared, you know.”

  “I like it alone.” Dad looked relaxed but Eric suddenly felt cold. The leave
s beneath him seemed to crackle like firecrackers and the darkness of the crawlway felt like poor cover.

  “Maybe he’s already getting some,” said high school. “You notice he got three mattresses here?” Jean-jacket walked over to the beds. “Three. You said you were on your own. Who you hiding?”

  “Used to be three of us. My family. They didn’t make it. I buried them out there.” He nodded toward the entrance. Eric tried to look like a rock.

  Jean-jacket said, “That’s too bad. Shit happens, doesn’t it?” He seemed to mull over Dad’s news.

  “Maybe you’re right, old man. You’d do better on your own. So I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you leave?” High school laughed.

  “This is my place. I found it and I did the work to stock it.” Dad stepped back again. Eric slipped his hand down to his waist and loosened the tie on the sling shot’s ammo bag.

  “Other people know about this cave,” said jean-jacket. “Getting here first doesn’t make it yours. I figure I got just as much a right to it as anybody.”

  “Why you talking to this guy?” said high school. “Let’s toss him off the mountain.” Dad looked back and forth between them.

  Jean-jacket paused, as if considering the idea. “Cops. We can’t let him go.” He sighed. “They’re pretty busy, those that ain’t falling down sick, but someone might get interested.” Eric loaded a ball bearing into the sling shot. His hands trembled and he could barely hold the leather patch around the shot.

  “You going to do it?” said high school. Eric got up on his knees. They were both looking at Dad. Eric took a deep breath and pulled the shot to his ear.

  Then Dad moved. He planted both hands on high school’s chest and pushed. The young man yelped as he stumbled back and tripped over the mattresses. Dad dove to the back of the cave. Eric let go of the shot. The lantern burst into a hundred shards of glass, and the room went black. “Run, Dad!” Eric yelled. He turned and sprinted on his hands and knees out of the crawlway. He stood too quickly at the entrance, slamming his back into the rough ceiling, and then he was out and running to a boulder above the cave entrance. He wanted to be higher than them. He loaded another ball bearing into the sling shot and spread a handful more on a flat spot where he could easily reach them. The entranceway was fifty feet away. An easy shot. But he was gasping. Where was Dad? A bearing rolled off. He didn’t take his eyes off the entrance. One minute passed. Two. He wiped sweat from his eyes. A flicker of movement a hundred yards away. Maybe a squirrel. It kept moving, and then it grew longer. An arm. A head. Dad squeezed himself out from under a rock. Another entrance, Eric thought. He wanted to yell to him, but he was afraid the men would come out any second and know where he was. They shouted to each other in the cave. Eric couldn’t hear their words. He figured they hadn’t found flashlights, and they were feeling the way out in the dark.

  Dad climbed to a cairn of rocks higher on the slope and dug into them.

  “Here it is!” hollered jean-jacket as he stepped into the light. High school joined him, and they both shaded their eyes.

  Eric pulled the shot back, not sure what to do. If they moved toward Dad, he would shoot them, but would the shot drive them off or just make them furious?

  Dad yanked a long bundle wrapped in canvas from the rocks and started untying the rope that secured it. The men saw him. Jean-jacket pointed one direction for high school to go, and he went the other. Eric let go of the shot. The ball bearing hissed and nailed high school.

  He went down, holding his arm. “Hell, hell, hell!” He rolled under a scrub oak in plain sight. “I’m shot!” Jean jacket ducked behind a rock. “I didn’t hear anything.”

  “Must have had a silencer.”

  “How bad?”

  High school took his hand off his arm and looked at it in wonder. “There ain’t no blood,” he said. “But I think it’s broke.”

  Eric rose and aimed at jean-jacket, who saw him.

  “It’s just a goddamned kid!”

  Eric let go and the shot smacked loudly into the rock by jean-jacket in a small puff of rock dust. The ricochet whined into the distance. Jean-jacket dropped out of sight.

  “He’s just got a damned sling shot,” he yelled. “It’s not like he can kill you.” Dad stepped onto an overhang that looked down on all of them. “I can,” he said and cocked the shotgun he carried. On the pinnacle of rock, the sun high behind him, he looked ominous and deadly. “Time for you men to go home.”

  Jean-jacket stood. Dad swung the barrel in his direction. There was a long silence. Then jean-jacket put his hands on his head. High school did the same, and the two marched down the trail. “We’re coming back, suck-nuts!” screamed high school when they were almost out of sight. Dad didn’t move. The shotgun pointed toward them until they got on their motorcycles and rode away. Eric sat. Dad jumped from the overhang and sat next to him.

  “You did all right, son,” he said.

  Eric gazed at the dirt between his feet. He didn’t want to look at Dad. If he hadn’t fallen asleep, this wouldn’t have happened. “I thought you were going to die,” Eric said finally. Dad patted him on the shoulder awkwardly. “I thought so too.” He broke open the shotgun. The chambers were empty. “I didn’t have shells in it.”

  Eric stared, open-mouthed.

  Dad said, “I got in a hurry when you started shooting at them. I forgot to load.” A voice above them said, “Good thing I didn’t.” Gravel skittered down the slope. Eric looked up. Mom, holding Dad’s .20 gauge, picked her way among the cactus and granite. “Someone has to have some sense in this family.” She answered Eric’s unasked question. “I went out the back door when they came in the front. Watched the whole thing.” She smiled. “Sure scared me when the lantern went out. You shot it?”

  Eric nodded.

  She looked down at the highway, where the line of cars rolled slowly westward. “Will they come back?” Dad snapped the shotgun closed. “No. I don’t believe they will.” Eric said, “They said they would.”

  “I think they were sick, Eric. Sick people do desperate things, but they don’t live long.” Dad stood and brushed dirt off of his pants. He helped Mom stand, and they walked hand in hand to the cave. Eric, walking behind them, began to laugh. He laughed so hard that he had to sit on the trail.

  “What is it, Eric?” said Mom.

  Eric looked at them both again. Their hair was dirty, clothes smudged. She stood over him, shotgun balanced on her hip. Dad rested his gun on his shoulder.

  “You look…” He laughed even louder. “You look… so different.” He rolled onto his back, short of breath.

  Dad held his hands out and examined himself. “Well,” he said, “it’s not Norman Rockwell.”

  Chapter Three

  A DAY WITH WOLVES

  A sound woke him, or perhaps a flash of heat lightning from the clouds that still hung in the east. He couldn’t tell. His right shoulder throbbed where his stone bed pressed through the sleeping bag, and his backbone felt compressed and warped. He sighed comfortably. These were the sensations he associated with sleeping outdoors. He looked for star patterns for the time. When he’d drifted off, the mountains to the west were just touching Gemini, which would have made it around 9:00, but now Ursa Major, the Big Dipper, was a couple of degrees off the horizon. The world turns, he thought, as it always does. He figured it was 2:00 a.m. or so.

  He identified the constellations: Bootes, with brilliant Arcturus anchoring it; Draco snaking around Ursa Minor, the Little Dipper; and right at the cloud line, Hercules facing the next brightest night light, Vega. Clouds hid Andromeda, Cassiopeia, Cygnus, Capricornus, Pegasus and Aquarius. His dad used to sing a song about the “dawning of the age of Aquarius.” Eric pondered on it for a moment, trying to come up with the tune, but he couldn’t.

  He stared into the sky. One good thing about the Apocalypse, he thought, is the stars shine brighter without city lights to wash them out.

  The air murmured distantly like a deep, deep growl. He
guessed the storm might be fifty miles away and slowly approaching. He remembered how Huck Finn described thunder as a “rumbling, grumbling, tumbling down the sky towards the underside of the world, like rolling empty barrels down stairs, where it’s long stairs and they bounce a good deal, you know.” That was Troy’s favorite part of the book when Eric had read it to him years ago. Troy had sat on his lap and turned the pages night after night by the uneven light from a kerosene lantern. Sometimes Eric could read eight or nine pages before Troy’s head sagged, and Eric would carry him to bed.

  Lightning flickered again, like a far away flash bulb, and Eric flinched. Something moved at the rock’s base. He saw it in the corner of his eye. He rolled to get a better look, but the ground was absolutely black to him. The lightning hadn’t been that bright, but for a moment his eyes were blinded to whatever the starlight might reveal. Gradually, though, he made out the outline of the rock he lay on, and then the clumps of grass below it, and then the asphalt road he’d been hiking, a silver path in the dim light. Nothing moved. He strained his eyes watching the dark mounds of grass until the bass whisper of thunder shook the air again. All was dim silver or black. Cold air slid past his face. Spring was still young and he knew that for many mornings more he’d waken to frost on the ground. Other than the swish his own sleeping bag made as he turned, and the far off thunder, the night slept silently.

  A black hump moved. Eric had been looking to its left, but he was sure that it changed positions. His eyes ached trying to discern this shadow from any other. Another one moved. This one he tracked as it glided ten feet and then stopped. He kept his eyes on it, sure that if he looked away that it would be indistinguishable from every other black shadow on the starlit, silvered backdrop. The top of the stone suddenly seemed too close to the ground. When he’d climbed it at sunset, his backpack dragging him backwards and each handhold a shade too far of a reach, the eight or so feet had seemed plenty tall enough, but now, with shadows drifting around its base, the stone afforded little protection. He pushed his hand into his pack and grasped the handle of his sling shot. The steel ball bearings clinked softly as he opened the leather bag’s neck and grabbed one between his thumb and index finger. Another shadow moved.