A. R. Shaw's Apocalyptic Sampler: Stories of hope when humanity is at its worst

by A. R. Shaw

  Something in her stomach tightened when she took the first step. The air thickened around her. More than a tingle went up her spine this time. She suddenly wanted to flee. With her hand on the banister, she took her second step on the rug-lined stairs. She hated to leave the dusty marks with her footsteps but she could think of no other way. As her hand graced the banister railing, dust accumulated like a train. Gray dust bunnies gathered on the back of her hand and she suddenly thought of mites and shook off the debris. She watched it slowly sink onto floor below. This house seriously needs a good dusting, she thought then she sneezed loudly three times.

  If there had been a murderer upstairs he surely waited for her now, knowing her exact position.

  Sloane continued up the stairs, determined to shake off both the scaredy-cat she’d become and the dust allergy she knew pervaded her senses.

  A hallway teed at the top of the stairs with a Tiffany lamp sitting on a side table next to a red upholstered chair. A decades-old phone hung on a wall above it. She couldn’t guess what century the phone was from; she’d never seen anything like it. A stained-glass window barely lit the area with a soft multicolored glow coming from the beautiful rose design. There were five doors lining the dark hall. She first opened the one in the center and it led to a brightly lit gray bathroom. Again she tried to date the house or at least those that occupied it last. The toilet was the kind with the overhead tank; she couldn’t remember the last time those were used. She had memories of seeing them as a girl in old buildings but had no real reference as to what decade they were from. A cast iron claw foot tub sat on one side and tile lined the sparse room. There was no shower head, only the tub and then a pedestal sink sat on the other side with a beautiful leaded glass mirror hung above it. She wasn’t surprised to see a small fireplace in the bathroom at the far wall. Storage cabinets were painted white like the trim and window and recessed into the deep wall. The tiny white octagonal tiles, though dusty, showed no chips or wear. An oval window above the claw foot tub with spider leaded glass design was the only natural light in the room. “Hmmm.”

  She closed the door and decided to go left first, to the nearest door. She’d try the last door before the staircase on her way down.

  The next door opened up to a bedroom with two twin wood framed canopy beds with matching whole cloth linen quilts flanking a large blue velvet-lined window. A tattered rug lay on the floor between them. And shadows struck odd angles on the walls with the dormered ceiling. There was barely any light and before she knew it, she walked into a spider web. She waved her injured hand through the air to get rid of the menace when she heard a noise from down the hall. She shamed herself immediately for becoming too comfortable, too lax and confident that no one was near. The girls were downstairs still; what would become of them if something happened to her?

  She quickly backed out of the room and closed the door, standing silently, waiting for the next sound to make itself heard. Her breath shortened when the scratching began again. She thought of it as a scratching sound and imagined a boot dragging carefully across the wooden flooring. But why would he risk the noise and not pick up his feet? She thought.

  She heard it again, sure it was someone lurking on the other side of the next door. “Hello?” she said but was met with silence. “I’m sorry to intrude. We just need a place to stay. We mean you no harm,” she said when she heard it again. She swallowed hard, the back of her throat scratchy from the dust she’d inhaled.

  She reached out for the black cast iron knob as before and noticed her hand shaking as she did. She was terrified and wanted nothing more than to flee down the stairs but that was a luxury she didn’t have anymore. She had to face whatever was beyond the door. “I mean you no harm,” she repeated as she took the handle firmly in her hand and turned it.

  The door flung open, one of the girls screamed, “Mom!” and instantly she was torn but focused on what she saw in the room first. With her heart hammering in her chest she yelled downstairs, “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes, are you okay? We heard you talking to someone.”

  She turned from the bedroom and went to the banister so that her voice would carry better. “I’m fine, Mae. It’s fine. I heard a noise and thought there might be someone here but it turns out a tree branch has made its way into one of the bedrooms and was scratching on the window frame.” Her breathing was still rapid and then suddenly she felt something brush up against her leg and she screamed loudly.

  “Mom!” Mae cried.

  Sloane turned around, weapon drawn, and expected someone to be standing right behind her but found only the back end of a gray cat fleeing back into the bedroom, startled by her scream.

  “Oh my gosh, I’m going to have heart attack here!” she said with her hand literally over her pounding heart. Mae continued to cry below in distraught heaves with her sister and Nicole shushing her.

  “It’s okay, Mae. It was only a cat. I scared it more than it scared me. Whew! I’ll be down in a few minutes, girls. I’m sorry it’s taking so long. There are a lot of rooms in this place.”

  “It’s okay, Mom,” Wren said. “We’re fine.”

  Though she heard Mae still crying, she couldn’t blame her daughter. Her own nerves were shot as well. With two more doors to check, she briefly considered leaving them an unknown. Instead, she continued on in a more hurried pace. She went to the damaged room that the cat fled back into and looked for the kitty. Seeing its eyes glowing at her from under the bed, she said, “Come here. I won’t scream at you again.”

  The cat must have partly believed her; it scurried toward her and then beelined past her and down the hall to the stairs. She wasn’t sure if it was a stray or if it belonged in the old house. It probably came through the broken window along with the tree branch swaying against the house. Before she closed the door, she looked at the ruined room. A part of the floral wallpaper was torn and falling on one side nearest the window. The curtains, which were once nice she assumed, were blackened with mold and were literally falling apart with rot. A queen bed was moved at an angle and not at all in the neat condition the rest of the house had followed. The floor was water damaged and all sorts of debris from past storms lay strewn all over the room. She imagined there was probably more than one critter taking refuge in the room and decided to close the door behind her.

  She stepped farther down the hall and opened the next door; this one faced the front of the house. When she opened the door, she guessed it was the master bedroom. A large, dark wood four-poster queen bed sat over an enormous baroque rug in hues of murky gold. Needlepoint decorative pillows, though faded from the sun coming in from the opposite window, sat offering a guest respite still after all these years. Opposite the bed was another fireplace with dusty candles still sitting in brass candlesticks connected by spider webbing.

  As she entered the room she walked almost reverently around the bed. Someone loved this place once. She reached out and straightened one of the dusty green candles that had angled over time. At the edge of the room stood a smaller door; she opened it and found a cedar-lined closet nestled into a dormer, still with belongings hung with care on wooden hangers. She reclosed the space smelling of moth balls and in front of the bed frame she found a yellow-painted pine trunk. A blanket chest, she thought. There were probably cleaner blankets in there instead of taking one from one of the dusty beds. She knelt down to open it and its hinges squeaked as she slowly lifted the top. Inside lay striped ticking blankets that probably hadn’t been touched in decades or more; she was afraid to speculate. She reached inside and pulled out the top two bundles. They smelled of moth balls and cedar but at least the dust was less than in the room. She went to close the chest and found lying on top of another blanket several old envelopes and a beautiful bone-handled knife in a sheath. “I’ll take only what I need,” she said to anyone who might be listening and carefully replaced the trunk lid.

  With one room to go, she closed this door behind her as she left and
moved on to the last room in the hall. She opened this door and found another room with twin beds like the first. This time the color scheme was more feminine than the one before. Two beds with faded light pink spreads sat in the center of the room with two windows with white lacy curtains. One wall was complete with cupboards for storage and the other was centered with another fireplace. A homemade rag doll sat on the mantle along with a miniature tea set with pink roses on white china. She opened the small doors and found another cedar-lined closet, with a few dusty belongings of residents past. She didn’t have time to check out the decade they might be from. Her mother’s instincts kept telling her she needed to get downstairs to her girls. Finding no foes, she held the mothball-smelling blankets close and her gun a little more relaxed at her side as she exited the room and closed the door behind her. There was nothing to be afraid of upstairs or down. Then she wondered if the house had a basement. That would have to wait. Her girls had been through enough; it was time to get them warm and dry.

  28

  Kitty

  On the way down the stairs, she noticed the hallway had darkened with the storm but also the time of day, which she met with both a blessing and in scary anticipation. She needed to get an inconspicuous fire going in one of the rooms on the main level and make the girls comfortable for the night. They had a few rations in their bags to eat, now she only debated which room was the least scary that she could have them comfortably lie down around a fireplace without their sleeping bags and other gear they had to leave behind.

  She found them as before, huddled together on the puddled floor, Wren in front of the younger two girls with her weapon lying across her lap. They looked pale and beyond cold. The younger girls were still suffering from sore throats from the gas they’d inhaled and their pale skin worried her. She had no idea what effect those chemicals would have on them over time. She missed Ace, wishing he was there with them to help guard their safety, and she simply loved him and worried he’d died in the fire searching for them or was shot by the crazed government agents. Either way, she missed her furry friend. “Okay girls, come with me,” she urged.

  “Are we staying here?” Mae asked in a sort of horror that broke her heart.

  “Yes, it’s safe enough. There isn’t anyone here. It’s been abandoned for a long time now.”

  “It’s creepy,” Mae pouted.

  “It’ll be okay,” Wren said in forced reassurance.

  One look at her older daughter and Sloane knew she too was terrified of the house and its strange furnishings but she was coping.

  “Come on,” she said again and helped Nicole up from the floor. She was still damp and shivering. She led them into the gray room with the piano. At least in that room there was a separate door leading into the backyard, which gave them more than one exit if needed. Besides that, she suspected it was a family room at one time and it seemed a little less scary than the rest of the house.

  “Where’d you get the blankets, Mom?” Wren asked.

  “Upstairs in an old chest,” she said.

  “Everything’s so dusty,” Nicole remarked.

  “Yes, this house was abandoned long ago, I suspect, but that’s a good thing for us. It’s secluded and I don’t think many people know it’s hidden back here, so we’ll see how it goes for a few days. Did you guys see a cat?”

  “No, what cat?” Nicole asked, her eyes round with wonder.

  “The gray cat that made me scream earlier. It ran down the stairs. I thought it might have gone into the kitchen.”

  Wren shook her head, “No, we never saw a cat.”

  “Hmmm?” It hardly seemed possible since she remembered watching the scared feline run past her and down the staircase. Where did he go? She wondered.

  The girls marveled at the gold-framed portraits against the gray walls as they followed her to the fireplace at the end of the long rectangular room.

  “What is this place? Where they rich and famous?” Mae asked.

  Sloane chuckled. “I don’t think so. I think they probably kept a lot of their family heirlooms and passed them down the generations.”

  “Look at that old piano,” Nicole said.

  “Can I play it later, Mom?” Wren asked.

  Sloane gave her a sad shake of the head. She would like nothing more than to let her girls run around and make themselves at home here but that wasn’t their life now. Every second was precious and one of caution if they were going to survive this.

  “No dear, sorry. We have to keep quiet. There are other buildings out here and a basement that I haven’t checked yet. There could still be someone hiding out here. Drawing attention to ourselves is the last thing we need to do.”

  “I’m freezing, Mom,” Mae reminded her, wrapping her arms around herself and shuddering.

  Sloane looked at her daughter. Her voice still sounded hoarse and she looked as pale as ever. She ran her hand over her forehead, checking for warmth covertly as she embraced her and rubbed her arm. “Give me a few minutes to get a fire going.”

  “Mom,” Wren said, “won’t smoke coming out of a chimney attract attention too?”

  Sloane took a deep breath in, regardless of the dusty air, and let it out. She’d thought of that. But the fact remained, she needed to get the girls warmed up fast. There was dry wood sitting at each fireplace in the house. She’d noticed that as she went through. They were secluded in the woods with an overgrown single driveway and hopefully, no one else around. Not only that, it was dusk and by the time she had the fire going, if the flue was clear, it would be dark and no one could see the smoke coming from the fireplace on a moonless night like tonight. With the house fires miles away, even the smell of smoke would be masked by the ones earlier in the day. “I think we’ll take the risk considering it’s nearly dark and we’re pretty secluded in a big storm. We need to get warmed up before we get sick. You girls need to sleep. It’s been a really long day.”

  That explanation seemed to be enough for Wren for now. Her daughter seemed satisfied and removed her backpack when they reached the fireplace. “How does it work?” Wren asked with reference to the cold open cavern.

  “We’ve always had gas fireplaces, haven’t we? This is old school. There’s an art to building a good fire,” Sloane said as she knelt down in front of the hearth.

  “Can we use some of the couch cushions, Mom?” Wren asked as she began to make a comfortable area in front of the fireplace for them.

  “Sure, first lay one of the blankets down on the floor. Then sit on top of that. Take a few cushions carefully over to the other side of the room and shake them out. Use the other side to lean against. We need to keep as much dust out of our lungs as possible.”

  Wren agreed and did as her mother asked while Sloane turned on her flashlight and shined it up into the chimney. She didn’t relish sticking her hand in a dark hidden place filled with who knows what creepy crawlies hanging out by the old chimney. She really couldn’t see much with the angle of the flue but assumed the damper was closed. She looked around the fireplace and found a brass hook hanging from a fireplace set with a carved pineapple on one end. Thankful she didn’t have to use her hand after all, she reached in with the hook and guesstimated which direction it needed to go, either up or sliding sideways. In this case it gave way upwards but not before releasing a lot of debris and more than a few bugs down into the fireplace. “Ewww…great!” she said, knowing full well how silly she was being. This was survival now and a few spiders were the least of her worries.

  Once the damper was set in place she looked around for what to use as kindling. She hadn’t noticed it before but next to the neat dry stack of wood there was also a canister of small sticks, gray with age, standing in a crock cylinder right next to the wood. Of course there is.

  She set out stacking a three-log design on the cast iron grate, the way Finn had taught her many years ago, and then underneath that she scattered piles of the dry kindling and knew the debris of pine needles that had fallen down from the
damper would also work well to light the fire. She pulled her backpack to herself and though it was still damp from the rain, she knew just where to find the matches she’d previously packed that were both waterproof and wrapped in secure plastic bags. She lit the match and the girls all watched. The flame grew brighter as the kindling caught. It was now nearly pitch dark in the room with only a low blue cast through the window to see by. Soon, their eyes were mesmerized by the fire growing ever brighter and catching onto the seasoned logs easily.

  She assessed the girls’ condition. They still coughed intermittently and in a sequence that made her nervous. She began pulling out water bottles from their packs and an MRE each for them to eat.

  Wren opened up the other blanket and laid it across their laps as the three girls relaxed against the old cushions propped up against their backpacks for support. The fire began to warm them as Sloane kept watch with her weapon by her side. She also drank her own bottle of water and an energy bar from her pack but surveyed the room and windows as the girls began to relax.

  “After you eat, please try to sleep. I’ll keep watch and feed the fire.” They seemed comforted by her words though she wasn’t comforted by the sound of the younger girls’ voices. They coughed and hacked every few minutes; even Wren coughed a time or two, just not as much. Damn those selfish men. Why couldn’t they just leave us alone?

  It wasn’t long before she noted their snores. She wasn’t sure how they fell asleep so fast. She was just as scared of the eerie house as they were and couldn’t imagine closing her eyes right now, no matter how tired she felt. Having the fire flames’ reflection dance across the elegant gray walls didn’t help either. She took another drink from her water bottle, slowly swallowing, letting the tepid liquid soothe her raw throat. Maybe we could stay here…not long term but for the time being.