Wake Me After the Apocalypse

by Jordan Rivet

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  As soon as Joanna recovered enough to walk on her own, she began hobbling around her cabin in ever-widening circles. Getting to know the village helped distract her from the ghastly itching that accompanied the healing.

  Her miraculous survival made her a village celebrity. People always wanted to chat with her about old-world things that had become distant memories for them. They’d stroll alongside her during her daily walks, reminiscing about fast food, movies, and cars. They loved to tell her about various features of the settlement too. No one was as enthusiastic as eight-year-old Robbie, who showed her the best hiding places for hide-and-seek and where to find the strangest bugs.

  “That spiky bush has the biggest caterpillars ever. My friend Adam found one bigger’n his thumb!”

  “That big, huh?”

  “Mommy said it’ll turn into a butterfly if we let it sleep long enough.”

  “Your mommy is a smart lady.”

  “I like caterpillars better,” Robbie said. “Butterflies are for girls.”

  Joanna chuckled, figuring that idea had to have come from Garrett not Chloe. Robbie caught sight of Adam coming out on his porch and darted away with a quick wave over his shoulder.

  In her explorations of the village, Joanna learned that the large building in the middle of the green was a one-room schoolhouse, which also functioned as a meeting space and a religious venue for those whose beliefs had survived the Comet Armageddon. There were sixty-five cabins total, most of them single-family homes. Only a few people hadn’t paired off, and the remaining single folk banded together to build shared lodgings. She remembered all the speculation that BRP would assign official mates for the purpose of procreation. In the end, they had paired up as humans always had, based on compatibility and attraction and convenience.

  And love. She supposed if Ruby and Vincent could fall in love, Garrett and Chloe must have as well.

  Joanna was increasingly left to her own devices as everyone got used to her presence. The villagers worked six days a week—seven during the harvest—and there was always more to do. As soon as she recovered, Joanna intended to work twice as hard as the rest of them to make up for long lost time. She might be out of place thanks to her unique circumstances, but she wanted to prove she could be a productive member of the community.

  Ruby welcomed Joanna’s help in the large communal vegetable garden she oversaw. She was always ready with a laugh and a snarky comment when Joanna made a mistake, treating Joanna as she always had—a welcome change from the near reverence some of the others adopted. Ruby was also sympathetic to Joanna’s desire to blend in as quickly as possible.

  “They made such a big deal about how our training would be this intense bonding experience,” Ruby said one day as they weeded a patch of carrots. “But it’s the day-to-day stuff since that has defined us as a group. The shared labor not just the shared danger.”

  “Is this another attempt to make me feel better by smacking me over the head with hard truths?” Joanna asked.

  Ruby laughed. “You know me.”

  “I hope I do,” Joanna said under her breath, bending to pull a weed out of the black earth. It turned out to be a carrot, and she buried it quickly before Ruby noticed.

  Despite her lack of a green thumb, Joanna enjoyed earning her keep in the garden. Food was shared equally in the village, and everything else operated under a simple barter economy. Many people developed side businesses, exchanging handicrafts and labor according to their skills—some of which had been acquired in the years since they emerged from cryosleep. Vincent’s newfound woodcarving proficiency was a prime example.

  Chloe ran an electrical repair shop, making miracles out of salvaged parts. They didn’t rely too much on electronics, but most of the cabins had indoor lighting by now. Chloe had also designed the windmills they used to generate the little power they had. She was sure to be excited about the solar panels and portable wind turbines Joanna knew were stored in the bunker.

  But Joanna avoided Chloe’s shop, partly because she had already proved her ineptitude with electronics when she failed to fix up a radio—she was pretty sure the jumble of wires and batteries had caused the fire back at the mine—and partly because she felt awkward around Chloe. Joanna and Garrett had been promising each other the world just a few months ago in her perception. Their relationship might have been short, but its intensity had seemed natural at the end of the world. It wasn’t the sort of thing she could get over on command.

  Chloe herself acted as warm and friendly as ever, but her kids and her work kept her busy, and Joanna didn’t see her often despite her improved mobility. Garrett kept his distance too. He had spent hours at Joanna’s side during her recovery, and she felt confused and a little hurt by his sudden inattention.

  Priya, who came by Joanna’s cabin to change her bandages each morning, let slip that people had been whispering about Joanna and Garrett’s romantic history.

  “Chief didn’t want to give anyone the wrong idea.”

  “And what idea is that?” Joanna asked.

  “When a forty-year-old husband and father spends so much time with a younger woman . . .” Priya lifted her eyebrows and trailed off, as if that explained it all.

  “I’m only three years younger than Garrett,” Joanna said stubbornly.

  “You must know how it looks.”

  “Garrett is my friend, and so is Chloe.” Joanna tugged her leg out of Priya’s hands and retied the bandages herself, wincing as the rough textiles scratched her tender skin. “It doesn’t look like anything but that.”

  “Enough people remember how devastated he was when you were lost,” Priya said primly. “And of course folks started to talk when he spent so many hours in your cabin without his wife.”

  Joanna scowled. “I was practically on my death bed. Let them talk.”

  “It’s not that simple,” Priya said. “Things have been delicate since the difficulties. People are wary of anything that might be . . . disruptive.”

  There were those difficulties again. “It’s not like waking up when I did was my choice,” Joanna said. “I had less say than any of you.”

  Priya sighed. “You’ll understand when you’re older.”

  It took all of Joanna’s willpower not to toss Priya from her cabin. They were the same darn age. Besides, she knew Garrett. He was far too noble to consider betraying his wife and children—even with her.

  On the other hand, he must be more worried about appearances than she expected because she saw him less frequently over the next few weeks. He’d occasionally pop his head in to see if she needed anything, but he was quick to return to his mayoral duties—an office that seemed to involve being an all-purpose fixer and extra pair of hands wherever needed. She tried to convince herself he was just extra busy with the harvest, but she feared their friendship was slipping away.

  Joanna spent most of her time with Ruby and Vincent. They didn’t have any children, which made them seem closer to her age than Garrett and Chloe. She often visited their home for dinner or just to relax in front of the stone fireplace Ruby had built. On one such evening, as they sipped bark tea before the roaring flames, Joanna asked them about “the difficulties.”

  “Priya mentioned there was fighting,” she said, studying her friends closely for their reactions. “I can’t imagine this sweet little village getting violent.”

  Ruby and Vincent touched hands, their equivalent of exchanging glances. Then Ruby said, “Remember how we used to worry people would reject the happy sappy BRP way?”

  Joanna nodded. “Colonel Waters always thought full-on tribal warfare would break out. Don’t tell me he got it right.”

  “I wouldn’t call the difficulties a war,” Vincent said. “But there have been more, er, clashes than we anticipated.”

  “So humans are still their own worst enemies?”

  Vincent inclined his head. “That’s one way to put it.”

  Ruby poured Joanna
another mug of bark tea. “Mr. Eagle Scout himself got caught in the weeds.”

  “Garrett fought?”

  “Garrett won,” Vincent said. “I helped as much as I could, but Blake and the others put up a good fight.”

  “Blake?” Joanna looked back and forth between them, confused.

  “He was the leader of the splinter group.” Ruby paused. “Garrett didn’t tell you any of this?”

  “He said Blake disappeared on a scouting mission ages ago.”

  “I guess you could say there was scouting involved,” Vincent said carefully. “Blake and some others wanted to move the community. They thought we should secure a more strategic position before the other bunkers woke up.”

  “Strategic?”

  “Blake claimed old Colonel Waters said some scary stuff about the other BRP bunkers. Blake believed they’d present a threat unless we took action.”

  Joanna remembered the snippet of overheard conversation, the questions she hadn’t asked soon enough.

  “And Garrett didn’t think they were a danger?”

  “Garrett didn’t want to abandon everything we’ve built here,” Ruby said. “He thought we should stay away from the BRP bunkers entirely. He said we’d be safer on our own, and it could be a long time before we ever encounter them if we let them be.”

  “That was cause for fighting?”

  “You don’t understand.” Vincent twisted his mug in his long fingers, his features gaunt in the firelight. “Blake thought that instead of hiding from the baby bunker communities, we should go on the offensive, step in to govern all of them.”

  “It was bad luck that we got pulled out of cryosleep so early,” Ruby said, “but we’ve also seen a bit of the world by now. Blake reckoned we should use that to our advantage.” She tossed another log on the fire, making it hiss and crackle. “We know how hard it is to establish a settlement.”

  “So you were going to be some kind of elder council for the other cohorts?”

  “More like feudal lords,” Ruby said. “Blake said we’d earned the right to tell the other BRP cohorts what to do because we’d actually lived in this new world—and that we could levy supplies from them in exchange for our guidance. Some people found the idea pretty attractive—especially the part about getting our hands on the resources we lost when the bunker collapsed. The rest thought the split between us would be too great for us to ever rejoin the program and we should keep our distance.”

  Joanna saw the merits of both sides. Their success here was hard won, and integrating with the other BRP communities would be difficult after living on the wild frontier for so long. On the other hand, they had years of knowledge and experience that might be crucial for the survival of the other bunkers.

  “So how did the fighting start?”

  “Blake decided to take charge of the nearest bunker, the one in Oregon,” Ruby said. “He recruited followers and gathered all the tools and makeshift weapons he could get his hands on. Garrett tried to stop them. Things got out of hand, and some people ended up dead. Blake and the survivors ran off, never to be heard from again.”

  Joanna’s breath sounded too loud in her ears. “Wait, Garrett killed someone over this?”

  “Two people,” Ruby said. “Since then everyone has been extra obedient. They know Garrett’s not messing around. I reckon they’ll stick with him no matter what.”

  Joanna struggled to take in this information. It was difficult to imagine Garrett getting into a fistfight with Blake, much less actually killing another human being. He had always been the peacemaker among them. He might have changed over the years, but was Blake’s plan bad enough to warrant such a response?

  “This must be hard to hear,” Vincent said when the silence had stretched to the point of discomfort, “but you have to understand that we’ve been fighting for our lives a long time. Both sides saw this as a matter of survival, and they were willing to die to protect the community. Don’t judge those who fought too harshly.”

  Joanna stared into the dancing flames, unable to accept what Vincent was saying. Survival was supposed to be about cooperation and community, not fights to the death. What had happened to BRP’s ideology? She had been skeptical of the officials, but the idea of a nonviolent future had seemed like the only sensible option. The fight against nature was hard enough without fighting each other too.

  Her thoughts turned to the other bunkers. Elsewhere on the continent people who had slept for as long as she had would have woken up. The same training and ideals she had learned at BRP would be fresh in their minds. They would be her age, and they would be untainted by the dark history that led Garrett and the others to believe violence was necessary.

  She looked at her friends. “Is Garrett still determined to stay away from the other bunkers?”

  “Yes.” Ruby stood to collect their mugs. “We thought your arrival might change his mind, but people don’t question him much these days. I’m certainly not going to bring it up.”

  “But if the other cohorts are anything like me, they could use the help of a community like this,” Joanna said.

  “We certainly could have when we first awoke,” Vincent said.

  “You could make the transition easier for them.” The more Joanna thought about it, the more she could see the value in Blake’s plan. It wouldn’t be right to rule over the other communities, but maybe they could help them. And then she wouldn’t be alone. “I think we should reach out to them.”

  “It’s not up to us,” Ruby said.

  “Maybe I can talk to Garrett.”

  “Seriously, Joanna, you need to be careful,” Ruby said. “He was really bent out of shape over Blake and the others. He won’t like you suggesting the same things they did.”

  Joanna shrugged. “What’s he going to do? Leave me for another woman?”

  Ruby barked a laugh. “That’s the spirit. Just watch out for yourself, all right?”

  “Will do.” Joanna stood to return to her own cabin. “Thanks for the tea. I’ll see you bright and early in the garden.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Joanna probably could have chosen a better moment to speak to Garrett about the other bunkers.

  The leaves had begun to turn, and the autumn air had a crisp edge. Most of the harvest was in, and the villagers were catching up on a host of tasks before making the trip out to unload the bunker. Garrett had just finished helping his neighbors fix their roof, a difficult undertaking that involved sealing the shingles with heavy resin. The men ended up sweat-soaked and covered in the sticky goo, unable to wash or eat until the job was done. Even then, the resin could only be removed with carefully distilled turpentine.

  Joanna had been checking the garden’s irrigation system for blockages at Ruby’s request—after accidentally murdering a few too many of her precious plants. She hiked along the ditch, dragging a stick through the murky water and stopping to clear any debris. The ditches siphoned water from the river and channeled it out to the fields, gardens, and an orchard on the far side of town, still very much a work in progress.

  She reached the culvert where the ditch opened into the river at the same time Garrett and his companions jumped in to wash off the turpentine. She waved to the swimmers and began testing the crank on the irrigation dam, happy to be useful after all her time as an invalid. As she wrestled with the crank, the noise didn’t quite drown out the laughter of the men splashing in the river nearby.

  The sun was sinking over the scrubby trees, and the others washed quickly, eager to get home for dinner. But Garrett paddled over to where Joanna was working. The resin had washed away in patches, and a huge smear still marred his shirt.

  “You look like the creature from the black lagoon,” Joanna said. “Rough day at the office?”

  “I’ve sealed a lot of roofs by now,” Garrett said, floating in the shallows a few feet away from her. “Never gets easier.” He sounded more tired than the day’s work warranted, seeming to carry the cares of the village on hi
s shoulders. Remembering an upbeat young man with a clipboard, Joanna wondered if he ever really got a break.

  She took off her shoes—hemp moccasins Winnie had given her—and sat on a rock at the water’s edge, paddling her feet in the current. The river was wide and peaceful here. They were about five miles downriver from where Joanna had gone swimming the day of the fire. Tree branches hung sleepily over the water on both sides, blocking the view of the nearby village. The evening air was laced with the scents of cut hay and wood smoke.

  Drowsiness seeped into Joanna, so different from the anxiety that had plagued her steps for weeks. The water’s cool caress soothed her itchy skin. Garrett’s presence was comforting too, and for a moment it felt as if nothing had changed, as if they were back at the training camp a world away.

  “Did you know how to shingle a roof before?” Joanna asked him.

  Garrett shook his head. “Figured it out along the way.”

  “Hey, we used to talk about building a future.”

  “We didn’t mention the actual construction, though,” Garrett said. “All I do is build stuff around here.”

  Joanna smiled. “You must miss BRP orientation.”

  He shrugged. “I don’t think about it much.”

  “Oh.” Joanna looked down quickly to hide the hurt on her face.

  “That came out wrong.” Garrett swam closer, digging his knees into the muddy riverbed a few feet from where the water lapped at her ankles. “Jo—”

  “It’s fine.”

  “I do miss the time we spent together,” Garrett said, “but I’m trying to provide the best future possible for all of us. I try not to think too much about the past.”

  “I get it,” Joanna said. “It was a long time ago.”

  Garrett made a sudden movement, as if starting to reach out to her, but then he dropped his hand and began scrubbing the smudges off his clothes.

  Heavy silence fell between them. There was too much to say, too much that had changed.