The Event Series (Book 4): Filling in the Cracks

by Thomas Larson

  “You did think about that as you wrote, didn’t you?” he said.

  “I, ah, er……no, I don’t think so,” my head was buzzing, I think it was the meds.

  “Why not?” came his reply.

  “I never considered it important. We were all gonna die at some point, and it was an easy out I guess. I mean some of the characters were addressed, and left the story with ways other than the big C.”

  “True, and there was a point where you started down the cancer road with the whole radiation thing, the power plant leaks and all. By the way that was nicely done in getting that resolved. But you forgot a factor that would have made a difference.”

  “I did?” I mumbled, still comfortably numb but now fighting to stay awake and alert.

  The Doctor, the voice explained that there were two factors, actually three involved. The radiation leaks from the power plants played a part, which explained why Matt and Tanya were able to survive cancer free when they went west.

  But also there was the Carrington Event. When that occurred it stripped away some of the ozone layer that protected us from radiation. It was not a lot of damage, in the end probably no more than out aerosol usage in the 70s. But that Carrington thing was only the frosting on the cake.

  The cake was the human activity part of it that took place when the military, or government or whomever implemented the plan to nuke the cities. It had been long discussed or theorized what the impact of 100 nukes would do to the atmosphere. And there were a lot more than 100 set off. It not only put a lot of crap in the air which caused some global cooling but also cause decay to the ozone layer.

  “You’re not real!” I said.

  “Well, I am and I am not. I am a real character, Major Barkley, but I am a fictional character and here to visit you, to help you clear up some of the open spots in your stories.”

  I grunted.

  “That radiation thing bothered some of your readers and some of the other characters. And in the end, it was key to the death of a few, Tom being the most prevalent one,” he added.

  I lay there for a moment letting it seep in, then I tried to sit up a little, and although I had not been opened up a lot for the surgery it was uncomfortable.

  “I see,” I mumbled, then asked, “were you happy with the way you and ah…..”

  “Charlene, I was Charlene,” I had not noticed the nurse who had joined us behind the curtain.

  “Were you both happy with how it ended for you?” I asked.

  He chuckled, “You never went into a lot of detail on that, we just kind of blended in with the rest of the slow decline of the group at the archive. But we were both good with that. We had a nice life together, and in the end, slipped away, peacefully.”

  “Good, good,” I closed my eyes for a second or two, a long blink.

  I heard the curtain slide back a little and a new voice joined us, no joined me. There was the recovery room nurse,

  “So how are you doing?” she asked as she began taking my blood pressure.

  I knew better than to ask if she had seen the pair who had just visited me. I have been here before.

  As she did her thing, Doctor Raymond, my surgeon came in. He told me that I was doing well and that the operation was a success.

  “I think you will be fine with pain by tomorrow but I am going to give you a few extra pills for it just in case,” he told me.

  I thanked him as he turned to leave, then he turned back around toward me. “Who was Doc Barkley?” he asked.

  “Why? Why do you ask that?”

  “Well, as you were going under for the operation you said ‘Doc Barkley says not to fuck this up.” Raymond replied.

  I smiled, “Oh, a friend, just a friend.” These characters, these creations of mine are with me, always.

  A Guilty Pleasure

  I will admit it, I am a glutton. I have this guilty pleasure a couple of times a month where I go ‘troughin’, a trip to the Hometown Buffet. Yeah, I know, sneeze guards, and the food is not certainly in gourmet class, but it is tasty, sodium and fat filled. And I like the selection, the meatloaf and pot roast are my favorite.

  I usually go just after the lunch hour because then I get my senior discount and I always enjoy the visits because along with the food there is generally entertainment with the meal in watching my fellow diners.

  Today there was a herd of buses at the restaurant. It is the midway stop for the run from Boston to New York and those motor coaches are usually filled with Asians. Today the place was packed and the chatter was lively, although not in English. But the line to pay was not long and I was able to find a booth in a far corner.

  As I settled in with my plate of assorted salads, I noticed that the usual senior crowd was not there. I think they have figured out the bus routine and will show up a little later.

  As I sat lost in thought while playing with my iPad, someone walked up to the table. I didn’t look up from my ‘Words with Friend’s game at first, I figured it was one of the waitresses.

  “Hi, I am sorry to bother you,” she said, “but there are no seats left, with all the bus people, would you mind if…..”

  I looked up, wow, skin tight jeans and white T-shirt.

  “ah, no, please, sit down.”

  “Thank you,”

  She slid onto the seat across from me. I am not going to go into the guy thoughts I had as I checked her out other than to say I worked my way up from the table. But it was her face, and her eyes that caught me. She was pretty, a kind of country western looking girl with a cute smile, slightly crooked nose and brown eyes. I always like brown eyes with blond hair, long blond hair.

  It was those eyes, they were striking, and yet there was a touch of sadness behind them. She seemed like she had seen stuff, sorrow, pain, and it was sitting there, in her eyes.

  “I’m Tom,” sounds dorky but what else do you say. I mean I could have said something witty, or stupid like ‘do you come here often’ but decided to just let witty drop.

  “I know,” she said with a faint smile, “You write.”

  I looked at her, was she real or was I ……

  “I am Michelle, Stumpy’s friend, girl-friend.”

  I stared.

  “I just wanted to pop in and give you a little more insight it me. You painted it me, but you didn’t paint me all the way, the before The Event.” She said as she looked down at her plate. It was her salad course too.

  “I, ah, what can I say. Your character had some good action, but in the end….’

  “No, it’s okay, I liked what you did, Mark, Stumpy and I got a good deal and I was happier with him than I had ever been in my life, my so called life.” She smiled at me as she spoke. “I was a pretty tragic character until then.”

  She started to unwind the ball of yard that had been her life telling me how at an early age her single mom had raised her. It was not a good childhood with a string of ‘Dads’ coming through the little apartment they had in East Hartford. Her mom was basically what one would have called a ‘crack whore’. But she did protect Michelle from it, ‘whoredom’, the best she could.

  Michelle told me that basically she was on her own from like age 13 on, she lived in the apartment, but she was the mother taking care of Angie, her real mom. It had been terrible, the drunken nights with Angie puking away while Michelle held back her hair. Holding her as Angie cried about the terrible life she had after beatings by the drunk guys she would bring home, or would move in after their stays in prison.

  “It made me strong, I loved my mother, but hated where she was, what she had become,” Michelle whispered, choking back a sob. “She died when I was 17, her liver, it was gone, it was terrible to watch, to live through, but she finally had peace.”

  Michelle looked up at me, I could see the sorrow in those eyes and now I began to understand what that sorrow was.

  She told me that after Angie died it was hard, she had no one, she stayed with friends, or slept in hallways or any shelter she could fin
d. Somehow she became friends with Kelsey, a girl who worked at the local Hooters in Manchester. Kelsey was a good person, and had also lived a struggle too, the hell that Michelle was going through. She helped Michelle, got her cleaned up, showered and such.

  “I never took drugs or drank to escape, I saw what it did to my mom. I promised her when she was lying there in the hospital, near the end that I wouldn’t do it,” then she chuckled, “I did get hooked on Manga. I would spend time in the library or the bookstores just reading those silly Japanese graphics novels. I wanted to be one of those characters so badly.”

  She went on and told me that Kelsey got her a job at Hooters and it went well. She was not rich, but she did pretty well. She and Kelsey roomed together and it was good, all good.

  “Kels got a man, he was a good guy and he took her away from all that and suddenly I was alone, again. But it was okay, I had the apartment, it was a little tight money wise, but I was almost making it, the rent and the guys at the restaurant made sure I had enough to eat,” she said, staring off into space.

  She said that over time her love of Manga, and waifu and cosplay led her to a place that at first she was happy about, but over time led to some sorrow.

  She told me that it began when one of the customers at Hooters suggested that with her looks and body she would make a great dancer, exotic dance. At first she said that it embarrassed her and made her feel uncomfortable. But then she thought more about it, and somehow decided that maybe she could do it if she made herself one of the many manga characters that she found so strong and appealing.

  So one night, she ended up going to one of the strip clubs, an amateur audition night dressed in a cosplay outfit to give it a try. It was a small club, with only one girl dancing at a time.

  “I was scared shitless and almost backed out, but then, I stepped on stage. I had a typical kind of Sailor Moon, school girl outfit on and had done my hair to match the look, little puffy buns on the side.”

  She sat for a minute, still staring off into space.

  “I became that character, I was not Michelle anymore, I was someone else, something else, and it was okay.”

  I just listened, and yea, I visualized in my mind.

  “When I got back to my apartment that night, I found that I had made almost as much money dancing as I had working at the restaurant for a week.” She looked at me and smiled, but it was a sad smile.

  She said that over the next few years she danced a couple or three nights a week. It was fun at first but then it got different. The guys were all the same, wanted her, propositioned her, tried to do things to her, and she came to hate it. But the money, it was hard to walk away from the money.

  She went on saying that she had worked her way up to the top club in the area. She was at “The Blue” three nights a week and making $1000 to $1500 a week. It was not all straight stage dancing, there were some private dances for like stag parties and lap dances involved, but she did not do ‘tricks’ even though the owners wanted her to.

  There was one of the guys, the manager, Tony, who was always after her. He had the hots for her wicked but she was able to fend him off. He was a biker guy, fat, bearded, disgusting looking and he would hit on her, but never took it to the next level, never tried to force it. And really, he was a nice guy under that hair and fat.

  When the meteor hit she said that things changed. As the world began to fold up Tony and his crew, the other bikers, saw the situation and decided it was a good idea to get out of Dodge. So one night, a couple of days before the army blew up the cities they all took off toward the Berkshires. The original plan was to get to upstate NY, which was where Tony was originally from, farm country.

  “It was all going well but then Fury, he was like the number two guy in the club, he and Tony had a falling out. Tony saw the handwriting on the wall and he actually helped me get away, he and I took a ride one day and ended up near Hinsdale. He stopped and told me to run, to go and hide in the city. That was where I ended up in the group that was run by Brother Gabriel.”

  I knew the rest, which was what I wrote about, how Fury and the biker gang played, attacked Hinsdale and came for Tom and his people at Romanica. How she was rescued from the Hummer and met Mark.

  “Mark, oh, he was wonderful, so wonderful, I never met someone like him before. He was kind, and patient.” She said, smiling, but this time there was no sorrow in those eyes, it was happiness.

  “We spent time together, and it was ….. I remember the first time, it was one of those moments, I think we both felt it was time but he was so shy about it. I was the one who forced the issue.” She was blushing as she spoke. “I felt like one of my manga heroes who found true love, and we had. It was wonderful, Thank you.”

  I stared at her, I had done nothing, I did not really talk all that much about the romance of these two characters in the stories, and yet, she filled this in, not me. How can this be? It is almost as if the characters are taking on real lives of their own, they are alive.

  “I need to get some carrot cake it is almost as good as the ones that Mark used to make.” She said as she slid out of the booth and walked toward the dessert bar.

  “Great jeans!” I thought.

  She never returned to the table.

  Molly

  A beautiful fall day, the sun was out, it was kind of warm for mid-October. I felt the need to get out with the camera and do some photos of the Notch, all aglow with the colors, the golds, yellows and reds on the maples and birches along the path.

  When I actually got there it was a little brisk, but not bad. I had a specific area that I wanted to visit. It is a slight downhill in the bike path where there is a slow gentle curve that should be just perfect for the photos I wanted to take.

  I started down the path to the right and as I neared the tunnel that ran under the interstate I saw the graffiti on the concrete walls. It was they typical stuff, I love ….insert male or female name, 9/11 conspiracy stuff and a couple of gang related messages declaring boundaries. I just strolled by them, it was cool in the tunnel and the sooner I could get out and back into the sun the better. But one, there was one bit of spray paint that really caught my eye and I stopped to stare at it. It was a ‘bio-hazard symbol painted in red. I stared at it thinking about the concrete wall in the archive that hid a danger, something that General DeSoto desperately wanted.

  “Is doggy here Mister Tom?” said a small female voice just behind me.

  I jumped, I hadn’t heard anyone come up on me.

  “I’m sorry Mister Tom,” came the voice as I turned around.

  It was a girl, a young women, she was about 18 I think, but small, fragile, with blond hair. I knew after some of the other visits I have had who it was.

  “Molly?” I said.

  She smiled, a wide grin, happy that I recognized her.

  “Yes, Hi,” she said almost shyly. “Is Lucy with you? I know she was here the other day.”

  “No, no she isn’t,” I answered.

  Molly, wow, now that was a character that I had used in the trilogy that really did not get as much development as I would have, could have written about. I think the idea of her special power, the seeing things came through, and her almost childlike qualities. But there was never any explanation of her. she was kind of an enigma.

  “It is okay, I will visit with her later. She is close by.”

  “Molly, I…” I began

  “You needed me in the story, which is why you made me. I was a sort of bridge, a character that moved the story along,” she said, but the voice, it was different, it was that of a mature, normal woman of the age or even older than the form that was standing before me.

  “I did, you’re right. But then I never filled you in, I only drew the outline and never filled in the colors.”

  Again the mature voice, “and how would you have done that. There really wasn’t all that much to fill in. I was a special ED kid with the sight.”

  “Yeah, but how did you get throug
h the initial onslaught, the early days?” I asked…I had not really thought about it before.

  It was the child voice again. “Oh, silly, that was easy, I just saw stuff coming and knew where to be safe. Daphne and Maria took care of me, and I kept them safe too.”

  “But you all were captured, all held hostage.”

  She laughed, a delightful little girl laugh, “But I knew Tom and Asuna were coming to save us.”

  “I see,” I muttered more to myself than out loud.

  “And in the end I knew we would be safe and happy. And, and I would have a doggy!” She smiled.

  I stared at her. Amazing…she was amazing. As complex a character she might have been, she was actually pretty plain and simple.

  “So do you have any questions for me?” It was the mature voice, the woman’s voice.

  I stood for a second and thought. “Yeah, I do. Did your life go well, was it a good life?”

  She smiled kindly, again in the adult voice, “Yes it was all that I ever wanted. Even for be a retard, it was good.”

  The use of the term ‘retard’ caught me off guard.

  The little girl was back, “Mommy and Daddy were wonderful to me. After we moved to the archive I finally got some. I never had a mommy or daddy before that, I was put in a hospital and no one ever came back for me.” There was a moment of sadness in her eyes and then they brightened. “But Mommy Washa and Papa Shane were so good to me, and each other.”

  “But I never put that in the book!”

  “It is in the one you are writing now, we know, we see, we watch over your shoulder. And Asuna sends one of us from time to time to help you with the story.” It was woman voice.

  “I ah, yeah, I guess you would see that.” I replied.

  “So I know the other question that you have,” and this was weird, the sentence began in the woman voice and change to Molly voice.

  “Oh?”

  “Yep, you want to know what was behind the wall,” she giggled.

  “I, ah, yeah, I had some ideas but never decided.”