After the Day

by Matthew Gilman

  He tried to clear his mind as he stepped up to the next house and checked the door. This one was unlocked and he ventured in scanning the room for anything of danger. He flipped the safety on his gun on and hoped to not find anyone inside. He almost shot a beautiful woman, one he hoped to see again.

  After quickly checking the house he checked the kitchen and other rooms for food and supplies. Like most of the houses he had been in this too was empty. As time went on the community he lived in has been running short on food. The ability to pillage food from abandoned houses becomes harder as the same house is raided three of four times. Some of the higher command finally created a map that shows the outline of the city. As they go on patrols and look for supplies the areas are checked off and they know not to patrol those areas again.

  As he exited the house he looked at the other men and shook his head. The amount of food that is in the back of the truck wasn’t worth the gas they used to drive it. The only victory today was that this neighborhood was now clear on the map and they can go to more promising land tomorrow.

  Flipping the safety on for his rifle he jumped into the back of the truck and helped the others keep a watch while they drive back to the camp. The good thing about not finding any food was the ride home. If the truck was full they would be traveling back on foot. He relaxed and closes his eyes. He sees her in his mind. He wonders what she is like. How would a conversation go with her? Every day he hears about the pagans and their ungodly nature.

  Taking a protein bar from his pocket he slowly eats a portion of his ration. He wonders if she has food, how long has it been since she had a full meal? He joined the Lord’s Army for the food. They seemed to be like him, in appearance at least. When he first joined he didn’t care much for the sermons, he didn’t listen most of the time. The hunger spoke to him more than anything the Reverend said. Now that his stomach was full his brain was able to listen to other things.

  The truck pulled up to the gate and they are quickly waved through. The commanding officers walk up to the driver to ask about the food that was found.

  “Not much today I’m afraid.” The driver says.

  “Did I ask you yet?” the highest ranking person from the three replied. His name was Collins and John didn’t care for him much. Collins was an appliance salesman before the nuke went off and now he was in charge of the missions they were sent out for every day. He had no military background but acted like he was in all five of the major wars in the last century. The only reason he was in charge of anything was the fact that he was a member of the Reverend’s previous parish.

  “Half used bags of flour, garden tools, duct tape. What exactly were you guys looking for out there?” Collins said looking into the back of the truck.

  “The areas that we have been sent to have already been cleared or they were picked through really good before the cleansing.” John said explaining the lack of food.

  “We’ll fix that,” Collins pulled a map out of his pocket and looks at a mess of circled and highlighted areas. The entire thing had been worked over really good. It was then John realized that the whole city had been salvaged and what they were looking for didn’t exist.

  “Head back over to the Vine district and check these houses by the campus.”

  The driver looked quickly at the map.

  “We’ve been there twice now. There is nothing there.” The driver replies pointing at the roads they had checked. “We even went through the campus dorms knowing the college students didn’t have anything saved up. We didn’t find shit.”

  Collins was getting frustrated. Why didn’t anyone respect him?

  “If I give you an order you follow it.” Collins looked at the driver and then the rest of the group. He turned around and walked back to his tent, a large green structure with a pointed roof and smoke stack for the wood stove inside.

  “Horse shit,” the driver said opening the door and stepping from the truck.

  “Aren’t we going back out?” John asked the driver, a man he didn’t know very well. He thought his name was Chris. A stocky man with a large gut. It had been shrinking since they met months ago. John wondered how big this man was before food became rare. Chris also had a long reddish brown goatee and shaved head. Covered in tattoos, Chris looked intimidating but was a big teddy bear when at the camp. A former truck driver he always volunteered to drive on the missions. Some of the rumors were that he was also in the Middle East wars before the nuke in Washington.

  “Fuck that,” Chris said to John as he walked back to his own tent on the other side of the camp. “One thing I don’t do anymore is listen to walking stupid.” Chris points at Collins tent and turns back around on his walk.

  John takes his rifle and decides to head to bed early tonight. Then he heard the hand siren being cranked. This was the sign for the camp to gather for the Reverend.

  Camp was a farm that was on the outskirts of town. The tents went up in the fields and the Reverend and his family lived in the old farm house with all of the luxuries. Hot water, electricity from a generator, there was even a working television. John wondered what the Reverend would watch at night. There were no TV stations. Everything had to be on DVD or old video tapes. Behind the farm house was where everyone gathered for the Reverend. He came out of the back door and stood on the porch overlooking the yard. In the winter they moved things into the barn but it wasn’t cold enough yet for that.

  John slung his rifle over his back and waited for the Reverend. A girl stood on the porch cranking the siren, watching the crowd gather. It was the Reverend’s daughter, Isabel. She had been sneaking out at night to see John. Long blonde hair, bright blue eyes, milky white skin. She was the girl with the golden hair for most of the men in the camp. Untouchable, unapproachable, and someone you did not turn down if she wanted you. At first John enjoyed her visits. She used him as her personal playground and he obeyed. But he came to realize quickly that it was a game of control. He wasn’t her partner, or even potential mate. He was a toy that he knew one day would be discarded. Most men would kill for the opportunity to be her plaything for one night. John had his one night and now wanted more. More was not an option with Isabel. Her marriage would be constructed by the Reverend for some political gain and John wasn’t in love with her. She didn’t love him.

  John watched her on the porch. Her blouse was tight and pushed her breasts up into the v-neck. Her tiny waist exaggerated the size of her thighs and the fullness of her buttocks. She enjoyed being the sexual object of attraction for the men in the camp. It was her form of rebellion to her father. The women in the camp hated her. John caught moments when the Reverend used it to his advantage.

  Isabel saw John in the crowd and winked at him as she placed the siren down. If she showed any interest during the day, she would visit that night. He felt some arousal at the idea but it didn’t come on full force until he thought of the woman in the house. Her black hair. Shapely body, the eyes. That’s what caught his attention. Large, innocent and beautiful, her eyes were fixed in his mind. Tonight he would not have sex with Isabel, instead he would think of the woman in the house.

  The Reverend stepped out on the porch and raised his hands to the crowd. Many cheer and wait to hear the words that would naturally flow from his mouth. The man had a talent for speaking in public. He could get the audience to hang on his every word and he could be talking about nothing. John thought of the old videos he saw about Hitler. The man could get an audience wrapped around his finger.

  “Brothers and sisters.” The Reverend started. “Today is a joyful day. Today God has given us a message. He’s not mad, oh no. The message he has sent is a reminder of the task he has sent to us. These are Old Testament times my brothers and sisters. These are not the promising times of Jesus, there is no turning of the cheek. We have seen what comes from that. What we have here is a chance to correct what was not finished thousands of years ago by Moses, Abraham, David, and Solomon. God gave them instructions to raid those villages and k
ill every single man, woman, child, cattle, to burn the houses and the crops. Let nothing remain of these people and you will live in peace. It was a simple order. Had they followed it, the world would not have been as corrupt as it is. Just as God had flooded the world we are to sweep this land as his hand and take back the promise land that he saw fit to let be destroyed by their deeds.”

  “Before that terrible day our lands were infested by heretics and pagans. God made this country a great land for the God loving people and we were prosperous. The richest land in the world. He didn’t give it to the Jews, but to us. We are his chosen people and we will take back what is rightfully ours.”

  The crowd cheers. Heads are nodding in acceptance. The Reverend’s top men are walking through the crowd telling all the men about a meeting first thing in the morning.

  “Tomorrow at sunrise, the head-quarters tent,” Collins tells John.

  “What’s this about?” John asked.

  “There are still Muslims and other offenders tainting our land. It’s why God hasn’t blessed us with food lately.” Collins steps to the next man feeling that his answer was satisfactory.

  John thought of the woman in the house. He hoped she would have left, maybe the house, but the city? He started forming a plan in his head. He had to get to her before they did.

  Chapter 9: Three years after the Day

  The catch of the day turned out to be nothing more than a few squirrels and a raccoon. Nobody in the camp had figured out how to cook it so it was worth eating. The squirrels were skinned and cleaned. The fur’s thrown in the fire, not seen as being large enough to warrant the time to save and use later. The woman placed the bodies into the boiling water to soften the meat. The older squirrels, the larger ones, had to be softened or the meat was tough to eat regardless of how you cooked it.

  Adam looked at the supplies for the camp and knew that things had to change. They hadn’t come across any big game in weeks and he knew that the people in the camp were not good enough hunters to take down a deer. Soon they were going to starve.

  Grabbing one of the bows and a quiver of arrows Adam set out into the forest for a bigger catch then the one that was brought back earlier. There had to be something that was worth eating.

  Placing his camouflage hat on his head some people said he looked a lot like Fidel Castro in many of the Cuban leader’s pictures. He would remind them that he would shave if there were new razors to be found.

  “Are you going for a hunt?” A woman asked as Adam walked by.

  “Yeah, I’ve got to do something. Squirrel isn’t cutting it.”

  “Bring something back, hell I’d eat a person as long as I didn’t know em.” She said.

  Adam thought it was a joke. Then the idea didn’t seem so bad. His people were starving and they had seen more refugees than game in the forest.

  He took off down the trail and quietly moved up and down the wooden hills. He passed blinds that people had made and found a field where he knew rabbit to live at one time. He was out of breath and he felt his ribs under his shirt. The fat was gone. He hadn’t run a mile and he was out of breath. His ribcage was like a washing board. His pants didn’t fit right. He had added more holes to his belt in order to keep them up.

  He walked through the field kicking thick bushes trying to get a rabbit to jump out. He was getting frustrated, impatient. It wasn’t time to lose control. He was desperate.

  It felt like hours had passed. He had caught nothing. The field was dry. He was about to cry when he smelled smoke. A fire was nearby. He followed the path of the wind and went back into the forest. It wasn’t long before he spotted the light of a fire. Crouching down he hid behind a few bushes and watched as a man cooked a rabbit over the fire. He was alone. Sitting next to him sat a rifle. Adam didn’t know what kind but the man was well fed. He could see some body fat still on the man.

  Adam licked his lips to the smell of the cooked meat and grew hungry as the man tore a piece of the rabbit leg off to eat it. Adam didn’t realize he was drooling even as he moved out of the bushes like he was being pulled to the fire.

  The man saw Adam approaching and didn’t move.

  “Hello. Would you like to share some of my rabbit? More than enough for me I’m afraid.” The man broke off the other leg and handed it to Adam.

  Adam grabbed it and bit into the leg until his teeth cut into the bone. He barely chewed and continued to gnaw until the bones were clean.

  “Hungry I see.” The man smiled at him. “I can’t imagine that you’re able to catch much with that bow. Not much large game left I’m afraid. The first thing to go after the nuke and all that.”

  Adam threw the bone away and pulled his knife out.

  “Oh go ahead, cut some more off.” The man said.

  Adam stepped next to the fire and sliced at the man’s throat. The look of surprise stuck in Adam’s memory. The man’s throat gurgled as he tried to keep his blood in by gripping his throat. Adam stood over him as he watched the man’s fingers disappear into his own throat covered in blood. Soon the life left his eyes and Adam sat back down to finish eating the rabbit. When he was finished he looked at the rifle and noticed it was a .22 long rifle. The man had three large boxes of ammo in his pack. Adam grabbed everything that the man had and as he was walking away he turned around.

  He couldn’t get the thought out of his head that there was a lot of meat that was sitting by the fire. Slinging the rifle over his shoulder and taking the man’s pack he grabbed the man by the foot and dragged him down the trail.

  It was night time when he entered the camp. Half the people were waiting for him when he arrived. They could hear all the leaves being dragged and thought maybe he had been lucky enough to kill a deer.

  “Who is that?” One of the men asked.

  “An unlucky bastard.” Another man said.

  Adam saw the woman that he talked to before he left. He felt convinced that he should talk to the group as a whole.

  “I think it’s time to rethink our survival strategy. I don’t know of anybody here that isn’t starving. Most of us go hungry every night. I for one am tired of eating squirrel every damn night. While we starve I’m seeing people like him doing better and getting fat off the resources of our land. I, for one, am done with it. No longer will I let someone come into our forest and eat our food. If they are going to eat our food we are going to eat them.”

  The group said nothing. It was only a few seconds before one of the men pulled a knife out and began ripping the man’s clothes off. One of the men pulled the boots off the body and turned to Adam.

  “They look my size, you mind if I have them?”

  “I don’t give a shit.” Adam walked away to his tent and placed his new spoils inside.

  When he turned around the group was larger and they were gutting the corpse and getting it ready for cooking. Adam thought he should feel sick. He didn’t know why he was ok with this. The idea still stuck in his mind. It was a waste not to eat it.

  A few minutes later he smelled the meat cooking over the fire and the group was waiting to get their hands on the first bites.

  When Adam received his first piece he didn’t hesitate to eat it. He slept well that night and for the first time the entire camp went to bed with a full stomach. Their starvation problem was solved and nobody thought twice about it.

  Chapter 10: Three years after the Day

  Fatima waited in the dark of the basement. She was breathing low and careful not to move. In the dark she was clueless to the time. She wondered if she had slept. In the pitch black she could have nodded off and not known. What day was it?

  From up above she heard the floor boards creaking. The footsteps moved slowly through the house. She looked up at the sound and traced it with her eyes. They were in the living room, the dining room, the kitchen. They were at the stairs to the basement. Was this the end? Where they coming back to finish her off? Would she finally be with her children? The door opened and light poured into the conc
rete foundation showing the outline of a man standing on the gray of the basement floor. She looked at it, one lone man. She pulled her knife from her belt and held it close.

  “Fatima?” a voice called out. It sounded familiar.

  “Amir?” she rose to her feet and looked at the black image that stood in front of the light. Her eyes strained and she shielded them with her hand. Amir swung the rifle over his shoulder and rushed down the stairs. She started to cry.

  Placing his hands on her arms he looked at her. He looked at her face and her body.

  “You are ok?” he asked checking for marks or blood.

  “Yes,” she replied. “They were here,” she continued.

  “They didn’t take you?” the answer was obvious. She shook her head.

  “There was one. He told them I wasn’t here and left.”

  Amir looked puzzled.

  “Bless Allah,” he said to the news. It didn’t make sense to him but in this world nothing made sense. “We should leave,” he said.

  “The food?” she said.

  “It’s still there? We take what we can and run.” Amir didn’t want to stick around. They could be coming back with friends.

  “How much light left?” she tried to see where the sun was. She realized that the sun shining in was reflected off the house next door. It was now night fall. She didn’t wait for an answer. “We can stay here.” She saw the look of disapproval on Amir’s face. “Just for tonight.”

  “We need to go, they could be back.” Amir was adamant about leaving and running as far as they could. He didn’t trust the Christian army and feared their presence. The fact they were searching the neighborhood was too close for comfort.

  “I don’t think they will be back. If they wanted to hurt me they would have done it when they were here.” Fatima grabbed a can of food that she was planning to cook earlier and walked to the kitchen. She peaked into the living room and saw her firewood and matches still sitting by the fireplace. Nothing had been touched. It puzzled her for a minute as to the purpose of the army searching without taking the food or any of the useful items that were in the house. She had seen people kill for less in the last year.