The Dystopian Diaries

by K. W. Callahan

  WHAT’S NEW?!

  I left feeling terrible, as though my integrity and intentions were being called into question simply for trying to make an introduction. Miles didn’t like it either. When the ax-man confronted us, it was the first time that I’ve heard Miles growl at someone in a long time. Poor dog was acting skittish all the rest of the night. Didn’t hurt his appetite any, but certainly didn’t do his nerves any good…nor mine.

  October 9th

  4:41 p.m.

  I didn’t write yesterday. I think it’s the first time since I’ve been out here that I’ve truly felt just completely bummed out about things. I know that probably sounds weird with a huge chunk of the population wiped out around me, but I’ve been so isolated here at the club that I don’t think that realization ever fully hit me. After finally finding other people here, though, and realizing they want nothing to do with me, I’m left wondering. Is this the world I live in now?

  Is everyone against everyone? Rather than meeting with a greeting or a handshake, do we now greet each other with weapons and insults – or with interrogations regarding their intentions?

  I don’t know, but I don’t like it. Still, I guess it’s something I’m going to have to learn to deal with.

  October 10th

  8:13 a.m.

  VERY cold last night! Wearing extra clothes, with extra blankets on top of my sleeping bag, and with Miles beside me, I was still chilly. Even Miles wiggled beneath the blankets I had mounded atop me. If this is a precursor to winter, I’m going to be in bad shape out here in my tent very soon.

  Not good…definitely NOT good.

  1:49 p.m.

  Well that was unexpected. Right as I was cleaning up lunch, Miles started acting funny. At first, I just thought it was Miles being Miles, that he was still hungry, needed to be taken on a walk or that maybe he had detected a squirrel in the near vicinity. But even squirrels are not the delight they once were to him. Miles has become accustomed to them and realized his tubby butt is never going to catch one.

  So a few seconds after Miles started his antics, I heard a voice calling out from the base of the tailings pile on which my camp is perched.

  It was Madeline…and she was ALONE!

  I invited her up to camp, suddenly feeling somewhat embarrassed about the state of affairs here. I don’t always keep the tidiest of living spaces, but considering that it IS a post-apocalyptic living environment, and also considering that my guest lives in a maintenance shed, I guess I shouldn’t be too self-conscious.

  Madeline began by apologizing for the scene back at their shed. She explained that Jesse – the name of the man staying with her – was surprised by my presence and was unsure of my intentions, thus resulting in his gruff demeanor. She continued by saying that I was the first person they had come in contact with for some time. She hadn’t revealed our prior meeting on the other side of the lake to Jesse for fear he might react badly.

  I can’t blame her after the reception I received from him at the shed.

  She went on to explain that she and Jesse had been long-time friends. They had grown up together in Woodcrest and he was very protective of her.

  HUH! NO KIDDING!

  Madeline also explained that they had both been living in separate houses back in Woodcrest during the outbreak. She had worked as a server in a local eatery, and he had worked as a sort of handyman, picking up work around town whenever it was available or whenever he ran short on cash. But when the outbreak had gotten really bad, circumstances had brought them together. Both being single and relatively unattached romantically or otherwise, each had found the other a useful crutch during the ensuing apocalyptic outbreak.

  I decided not to press too hard regarding just HOW Jesse had been using his Madeline “crutch” – or vice versa.

  According to her tale, Madeline said that they had initially tried to hold out in Jesse’s house. But survivors ransacking the town for supplies had forced them to pack up and flee. Jesse knew of the club, having worked for several summers during high school on its grounds crew, and thought it a potentially good spot to hold out. But when they initially arrived to the club, others were already holed up inside the shed Jesse had planned for them to occupy. Thus, she explained, the reason for their camp near the lake opposite my own position atop the tailings pile.

  At that time, a family of four was staying inside the shed – mother, father, young son, and daughter. Rather than risk a situation that could lead to confrontation, and with the weather still pleasant, Jesse felt it a better move simply to set up camp in another area and let the family remain where they were. Being young and healthy, and without children in tow, so Madeline thought it a respectable and thoughtful move on Jesse. She told me that he really wasn’t that bad of a guy; he just had a short fuse. And after their experiences in Woodcrest with the looters, he was very distrustful of strangers in this new world.

  I thought this a pertinent time in our conversation to bring up the break-in of my car and the mysterious visits I believed I’d been receiving to my camp.

  Madeline seemed surprised by my revelation and said she new nothing of the trespassing or the theft.

  It didn’t surprise me. Would she admit to it if she or Jesse bore responsibility in some way?

  I then asked her what she knew of the family who had been in the shed before them. What had happened to them? Why they moved on or to where?

  She told me she didn’t know. One day she had been out with Jesse and they had decided that it might be a good idea to see if the two groups couldn’t link up and work together. When they had arrived to the maintenance shed, they’d found it abandoned with no signs of the family.

  They both figured that the family must have moved along, either having run out of food or having decided to give it a go living elsewhere. Therefore, she and Jesse had moved in.

  It was at this point in the conversation that she explained she needed to go. Jesse didn’t know she had come to see me, which didn’t make me feel all that great about her presence. The last thing I need is a rampaging Jesse charging into my camp claiming that I’m making moves on his girl; although, answers to what their relationship truly is, was, or will be, remain elusive. Madeline said she just wanted to apologize for the other day and let me know that they weren’t bad people, just suffering under bad circumstances.

  Yeah, aren’t we all?

  I thanked her for her consideration before she left, but I was left wondering about their situation. It’s so hard to get a read on Madeline. Her answers and explanations sometimes left much to be desired. I mean, I find it hard to believe that it was someone else who wandered way out here to break into my car or invade my camp. I guess that it’s possible it could be that family that was living in the shed before. Maybe they were looking for supplies before they moved along to their next spot.

  And I feel like I just couldn’t figure out whether Madeline and Jesse are actually together or were just forced together by circumstances like she said. And if they had been forced together, had something MORE grown between them since the end of the world as we know it?

  Guess it’s really none of my business, but with so few neighbors around, I’d like to feel slightly more comfortable with the ones I DO have. And now that both sides know of the existence of the other, will we be able to peacefully co-exist? I don’t want to constantly be looking over my shoulder for an ax-wielding Jesse or worried about my camp or my car being pilfered. I think that as winter approaches, we might prove useful to one another. I certainly would mind trading Miles off to Jesse for a chilly night or two in exchange for Madeline to snuggle up with.

  But I suppose only time will tell.

  October 11th

  11:29 a.m.

  Fishing was a non-event today. I hope that this isn’t a precursor of things to come. I wonder if maybe the cold weather has driven all the fish deeper in the lake. If that’s the case, I could really be screwed. I’ve been using the fish to really extend the food supplies I broug
ht with me, and even then I’m beginning to run perilously low on certain foods. Given, I’m completely sick of eating fish, but if the fishing dries up, what will I do for food?

  3:17 p.m.

  Looks like the cold weather might be here to stay. Yet another obstacle (other than fishing) that it looks like I’m going to have to spend more time working around. I spent a large part of my day (when I wasn’t fishing – or at least holding my pole, since not much else was happening) collecting firewood and moving my tent closer to the campfire. That’s a delicate balancing act in itself. I want the tent close enough that I get some of the heat from the fire but not so close that I melt its fabric or expose it to floating embers. I strategically positioned the tent in a spot that is upwind from the fire to specifically guard against such an event. But that negates most of the heat effect. I feel like it’s a no-win situation.

  Added to the growing list of difficulties lately is the issue of bathing. It’s not that it’s that big of a deal, but I’m definitely not taking my dips in the lake any longer. Now I have to heat water over the campfire and use that and a washrag. It’s a much lengthier process, and since I can’t get fully submerged in the water, I never end up feeling completely clean at the end of the process.

  Plus, the water temperature is problematic too. It’s the Goldilocks syndrome hard at work. At first, when I pull the pot off the fire, the water is bordering on scalding. But then, in the chilly fall air, it cools rapidly so that by the time I’m done with my quick wipe-down, it’s very cold. There is only a multi-minute (at best) period at which the water is the perfect temperature, which means I’m left scrambling to wash and rinse as quickly as I can.

  At least I don’t have to shave anymore. That would only lengthen an already somewhat torturous process. I’d estimate that my beard is nearly half an inch long now. Never really thought I’d grow a beard, but necessity dictates. I wonder just how long it’ll get.

  October 12th

  10:41 a.m.

  Well I have some crazy, just plain crazy, and frightening, news to report.

  So just after dark last night, I was picking up around camp. This is something I usually do each night to tidy the place up and keep wild animals from invading my home. It also helps keep things dry should there be a heavy dew or if it rains.

  I’d say it was right around eight o’clock, and pretty much completely dark out when I heard something at the bottom of the old tailings hill on which my camp is perched. At first, I figured it was just a squirrel or a raccoon or something. It seems that with each passing week, the animals around my camp seem more abundant and willing to insert themselves into my personal space. Guess they’re getting used to me. I’m becoming a fixture of the forest.

  Just the other night, something was pawing at the outside of my tent. It was a raccoon I had to shoo away. And two nights ago something (I’m guessing raccoons as well – the little devils) managed to get into my fish cooler and steal the last two fish I had in there. Even with the cooler tied shut with a bungee cord, they still managed to get inside! But I digress.

  So back to the noise I heard at the base of camp. Anyway, when I first heard it, I kind of shrugged it off. But then it became this weird sort of guttural gurgling noise. It concerned me since I thought that maybe the animal was in some sort of pain or might be sick or diseased or something. I mean, who knows? It could be rabid or this flu thing could have transferred over from people to animals, right? And after a few whimpers, my fearless attack dog slinked into the tent, tail between his legs, so I was left on my own to investigate.

  With Dad’s old gun and a flashlight, I made my way carefully from camp down to the base of the tailings pile. Then I began a general inspection of the area from which I thought I’d heard the noises, searching around trees, within bushes, and behind felled logs. The whole time, I hadn’t heard any more sounds like the ones that had begun this little adventure. I was starting to hope that either I’d imagined the whole thing or the animal had found a better spot in which to gasp its last few breaths.

  It was just as I was about to give up and head back up to camp that I heard the sound again. It was a terrible sound, something I hope I never have to hear again, something between a sorrowful zombie and someone gargling mouthwash.

  Uh oh, hold on. I think I heard something.

  11:24 a.m.

  I don’t know if I’m just jittery after last night or what, but I keep thinking I heard things down toward the base of my hill here…non-natural things – HUMAN things.

  I think I’m getting paranoid. But after last night, who could blame me?

  So back to last night. You’ve got old faithful – Miles – cowering in the tent. You’ve got me with Dad’s aged firearm (which I still haven’t fired, and don’t completely trust TO fire), and you’ve got zombie-like gurgling noises seeping from the blackness of the forest around my camp. All-in-all, it was setting up for a great time (sarcasm on full blast if you couldn’t tell!).

  When I finally heard the noise again, it gave me a better point of reference with which to work since I was already at the base of the tailings pile. And after a few more moments of searching, I found the source of the noise. It was a person…or what REMAINED of a person.

  Actually, it was a kid. And as much as I wanted to help him, initially I was very cautious since I had no idea who he was, where he’d come from, or what his condition was.

  I tried talking to him at first to ascertain his state, but he was of little help in clarifying things. His garbled speech, paired with the darkness of night (even with my flashlight) did little to clarify things.

  I maintained a safe distance until I was sure about whether he was a Su flu carrier or not. I’d heard things (back when I still had a television to bring me the news) about the sad state into which flu carriers fell toward the latter stages of the infection. And since I’d yet to meet one of these people face-to-face (thankfully), I had no idea of just what the actual characteristics of a Su flu victim were in their dying days.

  But enough for now. I have a lot to do, more fishing included since those damn bastard raccoons robbed me!

  9:23 p.m.

  I swear I heard distant gunfire tonight (quite a bit of gunfire in fact) right around dusk. But it wasn’t as distant as the time before when I thought I heard shooting.

  Worrisome…very worrisome.

  October 13th

  10:14 a.m.

  It’s a pretty nice day weather-wise. I’d say it’s already right around 50 degrees and sunny. There’s just a hint of westerly wind. I’m sitting here writing while I keep an eye on my fishing pole, trying to pair my shopping (since the lake is as close as I come to a grocery store these days) with the telling of my story. Although the longer this thing goes on, the more I wonder why I bother detailing my journey through it. Will anyone be left to read it? Guess it doesn’t matter. Writing gives me some sort of purpose to stay alive other than to just stay alive.

  I haven’t had anymore unwelcome visitors since the other night. His name, the best I could understand it, was Ben…maybe Dan, but I’m pretty sure he said Ben. It was hard to tell considering the condition he was in. Once I got close enough to see that he was injured, not sick as I had initially thought, I did my best to help him. I couldn’t do much considering the extent of my medical knowledge, and the severity of his wounds.

  “Ben” (that’s what I’m calling him, whether it was actually his name or not) didn’t have much left in him when I found him. The poor kid couldn’t have been more than 12 or 13 years old from my best guess. He was lying in a pile of brush toward the southern base of the tailings hill and was barely conscious. Upon my initial inspection, I could see that his clothes were torn and extremely bloody. And he was in such bad shape that I couldn’t risk moving him to my camp, since trying to get him up the hill would prove extremely difficult in his condition. I was worried that if I tried to carry him or even get him to his feet, I could do more damage than good.

  I tried to ge
t Ben to explain how he’d been hurt and what I could do to help him, but talking proved difficult for him. I soon realized why. His throat had a severe injury to it that almost looked as if someone had tried to cut it with a knife. This, paired with his blood loss, was making it hard for him to speak, and when he tried, it was garbled and largely incoherent.

  It was all really terrible. I had no idea what to do to help him so I hurried back to camp and got some hot water and other supplies with which I hoped to clean him up and at least attempt to bind his neck injury. It was upon my return, and during my subsequent efforts to unbutton his flannel shirt to allow me to work on his neck wound, that I realized the poor guy had been shot as well.

  From what I could tell, working by flashlight, the bullet had hit him a little below the left shoulder. While I was doing my best to patch the wound with some bandages I’d brought in a first-aid kit, I asked him who had done this to him.

  The poor kid managed several brief sentences in response, but I could make out few, if any of the words comprising them. But one word did stand out; a name rather, at least it sounded like a name…Maddy.