The Last Orchard

by James Hunt

  It was funny, the memories that returned whenever you visited a place. It was like a portion of whatever happened anywhere on planet Earth was permanently carved into that section of the earth. And thinking about the sheer number of events that took place on this planet, Charlie figured that just over the course of human history alone, there were enough scars on Earth to make it unrecognizable.

  But what happened to those memories of places that no longer existed? What happened when a place that held so much of who you were was just wiped off the map, or transformed into something that you could never see again in the same light?

  All the holidays, and birthdays, and family gatherings that they had on the property were distorted now, hazy from the smoke that had choked the life out of those memories and left them charred and burnt like the orchard itself. And maybe that’s how Charlie would always see it now.

  He stared at the water gently flowing downstream. Always moving forward, never stopping.

  Motion was life. The constant struggle of growth, and the pain and discomfort associated with it, were a reminder of your existence.

  “Charlie?”

  The voice was quiet, but familiar, and he turned to find Liz leaning against one of the last trees before the riverbank.

  Her hair was a mess and her clothes were wrinkled and dirty, and still damp from their night in the rain. She kept one hand to her side where she’d been shot and then gingerly walked over the smooth stone of the riverbank, careful to keep her balance.

  Charlie stood to help her, but she motioned for him to stay put.

  “I walked all the way here,” she said. “I can make it the last couple of feet.”

  Charlie still held out his hand, which she accepted when she was close enough, and then the pair sat down together, though Charlie noticed that she kept her distance.

  “Your mother is worried about you and your dad,” Liz said. “You need to talk to them.”

  “I know,” Charlie said.

  Liz glanced out onto the river, the morning rays of light brilliant against the surface of the water. She smiled. “It’s beautiful here.”

  “It is,” Charlie said, exhaling, his mind troubled by the words that lingered on his tongue, begging to be spoken. “I don’t know what to do, Liz. I know that when I go back to everyone, they’ll expect a plan of what to do next, but I don’t have it. We have nothing. No food. No home. If the pumps were damaged in the fire, then we won’t have water from the well. No medicine, no weapons. Everything’s gone.”

  “We’re still here,” Liz said.

  Charlie looked at her and frowned. “And you think that’s a good thing?” He shook his head then glanced out onto the water. “I should have just gone up in flames with the farm.”

  “Hey.” Liz grabbed hold of Charlie’s chin and pulled his face toward her. “Don’t go down that road, you hear me? Whatever self-pity that you think you’re entitled to doesn’t exit, because you haven’t earned it.”

  “I haven’t earned it? Liz, I don’t have anything left!”

  “You have your family and your friends!” Liz pleaded with Charlie. “You don’t think crops can be regrown? You don’t think homes can be rebuilt? What do you think people do after a disaster? They rebuild, so don’t give me that crap that you’re afraid, or you don’t have any answers, or that people won’t want to hear what you have to say.” She gestured back toward the orchard. “You’re not the only one that’s hurting here, Charlie Decker, and you’d do well to remember it.”

  With her rant ended, Liz grimaced and then clutched at her side as she leaned away from Charlie.

  “You really don’t pull any punches,” Charlie said, sporting a sheepish grin.

  “No,” Liz said.

  Charlie nodded, and then the pair sat in silence for a while, each of them staring out onto the water, the sunlight dancing across the river.

  After a few minutes Charlie finally nodded and then stood, wiping the dirt from his jeans. He extended a hand down to Liz, who accepted, and helped her off the ground.

  Liz lost her balance, and when Charlie caught her, their bodies were pressed together. Charlie had his hands on her hips, and she pressed her hands against his chest. The pair locked eyes, a flash of heat exchanging between them.

  Charlie leaned close and then kissed her. She tasted sweet, like the honey crisp apples they grew at the farm, and she was warm like the sun that baked him during the long days. It was familiar and new all at the same time.

  Liz pulled back quickly, grimacing as she clutched her stomach. “Sorry.”

  Charlie smiled, shaking his head. “It’s fine.” He took her hand and then walked away from the river and back toward the burnt ash of his home, knowing that it’d be easier to face it with her by his side.

  In the woods, the shadows of the branches and trees were made long by the rising sun, and their peaceful walk back to the orchard was interrupted by screaming and shouts.

  “Go,” Liz said, gesturing for him to run, knowing that she couldn’t keep up. “I’m right behind you.”

  Charlie sprinted toward the screams. But while he wanted to run quickly, his legs were slow and lethargic, exhausted from last night and the long, grueling days.

  “Charlie!” Martha shouted, stumbling through the woods, struggling with the uneven terrain.

  Eventually his mother stopped, letting Charlie come the rest of the way. When the pair finally met, Martha clung tight to her son’s arms, struggling to catch her breath.

  “What happened?” Charlie asked. “Did they come back? Did—”

  “Your father left,” Martha answered, terror filling her eyes, which became watery and red. “Doug too. I don’t know where they went.”

  Charlie released his mother’s hands and then sprinted toward the orchard, hoping to catch his father and Doug before they arrived at Mayfield.

  13

  Charlie stepped from the green forest and back into the charred remains of the orchard, smoke still steaming off the trees and that scent of burning wood still clinging to the air like morning dew on grass.

  He kicked up puffs of ash on his sprint toward the road, dirtying the back of his pant legs with grey dust instead of the rich dark soil that had provided so much life over the years. On his sprint toward the road, Charlie tried not to look at the charred remains of the field.

  A part of him believed that if he ignored looking at the burnt options of his youth, then he’d be able to only remember what it looked like before. It was a child’s logic, but at that moment he knew that he wasn’t strong enough to do anything more than that.

  But he couldn’t block out all of the sights, and by the time he reached the road, it felt like all of the memories of his youth and the past twenty-four years had been tainted by the fires that had raged through the night.

  Tears in his eyes, Charlie sprinted out onto the road and started his long path toward Mayfield. He considered looking for the dirt bike, but after one glance toward the barn, he knew it wouldn’t have survived.

  But Charlie didn’t make it very far before exhaustion took hold and he was forced to stop. He turned around, the blackened fields of his home and the skeletal remains of the house he grew up in still in view. Charlie dropped to his knees.

  The sun beat down on his face, and the clear blue sky was a contrast to the blackened and scorched earth that surrounded him. No matter where he went, that cloud of death followed him. He couldn’t shake it, and he couldn’t rid himself of it, no matter how hard he tried.

  But a rumble to the west caused Charlie to turn his head. He squinted down the road, the noise foreign, but familiar. They were vehicles, a whole convoy of them. An armed convoy. It was Dixon.

  Having collapsed in the middle of the road, Charlie squinted from the bright sun. And that was exactly where he stayed as the front vehicle of the convoy stopped a few yards from his position.

  The passenger door opened, and boots hit the pavement. Lieutenant Dixon stared down at him and extended
a hand. “Christ, Charlie, what the hell happened here?”

  Charlie regarded the hand, half of himself still lost in confusion. Then, realizing he hadn’t imagined all of this and that the man in front of him was a real as the air he breathed, he grabbed hold of the lieutenant’s hand and hoisted himself to his feet.

  “They came back,” Charlie said, blurting the words out like a mad man, pointing to the burned fields and wrecked homes. “We have to get to Mayfield. Quick.”

  “That’s where we’re headed, but I’m not sure you want to join,” the lieutenant said, trying to move Charlie out of the Humvee’s path. “Mayfield is about to turn into a war zone.”

  Charlie glanced at the long row of military vehicles, all of them the same old versions that Charlie, Liz, and the lieutenant had ridden in on their escape from Seattle after Liz had been shot. Each of them was filled with soldiers, and Charlie counted at least one hundred.

  “War zone,” Charlie said, whispering the words to himself. He snapped his attention back toward the lieutenant, grabbing hold of the soldier’s shoulders. “My father went there with a neighbor. I have to get them out.”

  The lieutenant opened his mouth to speak, but then shut his jaw, knowing from the look in Charlie’s eye that he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. “Get in.”

  Charlie rode in the very back of the Humvee, and while the driver and the other soldiers eyed him curiously, none of them spoke to him on the drive toward the town.

  The cramped Humvee reeked of body odor, and the tin can that they found themselves inside was ungodly warm. It didn’t take longer than a few minutes for Charlie to break out into a sweat. He kept to himself on the ride over but listened to the conversation of the soldiers, who spoke as if he wasn’t even there.

  “What’s intelligence say about the rendezvous point?” a soldier with a thick Southern accent asked, sporting black, Buddy Holly glasses that were too big for his face.

  “We have another unit approaching from the south,” the lieutenant answered.

  “What’s the likelihood that these bastards just turn tail and run?” another soldier asked.

  “Command says the enemy will most likely implode the asset before we have an opportunity to secure, so we need to go in fast and hard,” the lieutenant said. “We’ll be attacking at the same time as the units from the south, so we’ll have to be mindful of crossfire.”

  “How did you get in contact with anyone?” Charlie asked, pulling everyone’s attention toward himself. “Radios?”

  “Morse Code,” Lieutenant Dixon answered. “But once we arrive at the location, we’ll be basing our assault off of synchronization.” He lifted an old pocket watch and then stuffed it back into his pocket. “Someone get him a weapon.”

  The other soldiers glanced around at one another, questioningly. “Lieutenant, are you sure you want to—”

  “He knows how to handle himself,” the lieutenant said, not even bothering to turn around. “How the hell do you boys think I managed to make it back to the base in the first place?”

  The questions ended and the soldier with the thick black glasses and Southern accent handed Charlie one of the M-16s.

  “Just don’t shoot me when we’re out there,” he said, then pressed his finger against the assault rifle’s barrel. “And remember that’s the dangerous end.”

  Charlie gripped the weapon, flicking the safety on to make sure he didn’t have any unplanned discharges. He’d handled an assault weapon before. His father used to own one, but he sold it a few years back, never thinking he’d need it to fight a war.

  The entire ride to Mayfield was plagued with anxiousness. Charlie worried that he’d be too late, that his father and Doug would already be dead on the streets by the time he arrived. But he kept glancing out the window, hoping to find them still on the side of the road, walking toward Mayfield. Since no one saw when they left, it was still a possibility, especially since he knew his father wouldn’t be able to keep a fast pace for very long.

  Once they passed the road sign that signaled they were less than a mile from Mayfield, the nerves inside the Humvee became electric.

  “We secure the perimeter,” Lieutenant Dixon said. “Retreat is not an option.”

  “OOO-RAH!”

  The confirmation came in a unanimous chorus, and Charlie felt it spike his adrenaline. He adjusted his hold on the rifle and told himself that the moment he got out of the Humvee, he’d start searching the buildings for his father and Doug. But he already had a good idea of where they might be holed up.

  The hospital at the end of town offered a perfect view for a sniper into the terrorist’s stronghold of the power plant. At the very least, from that position they’d be able to determine how many insurgents they were dealing with and how to take as many of them out before they were gunned down.

  When they stepped into town, Charlie saw the carnage that the terrorists had left behind. The buildings were burned and charred, some of them still smoldering.

  Matching burnt corpses littered the streets, forcing the drivers to weave around the bodies as best they could, but the convoy didn’t slow.

  “How close, Lieutenant?” the driver asked.

  “Until we can’t drive anymore,” the lieutenant answered.

  Every pair of eyes watched the buildings pass, the Humvee forced to slow at the stalled and broken-down vehicles that littered the road. The deeper they went into the town the worse the carnage and congestion became, until the driver was forced to stop completely.

  “All right, men, let’s move!” the lieutenant said, then flung his door open.

  The other soldiers exited the vehicle just as quickly and lined up in formation around the vehicle, awaiting further orders.

  Charlie was the last one out of the vehicle, and he circled around toward the back and out of the way. He glanced back at the row of vehicles, all the soldiers recreating the same formation out of the lead vehicle. All of them had their eyes locked onto the surrounding buildings, and the only sound that echoed through the town was the light hum of the vehicle engines that they had arrived in.

  And then the first gunshot rang out.

  The bullet collided with the lead Humvee, and Charlie and the rest of the soldiers ducked before a barrage of retaliatory fire sent the pair of terrorists retreating to the bulk of their forces.

  “Forward!” The lieutenant waved his arm, and Charlie let the sea of soldiers pass him and head down the road while he sprinted for the back side of the Main Street buildings. He figured that if the forces were coming from the west and the south, then keeping to the north would be a safe bet to stay out of their way.

  Once Charlie was down a side alley, he kept his eyes peeled, jerking in spasms whenever a random gunshot fired, but he grew used to the noise quickly the more he heard it and the farther he headed down toward the hospital.

  Charlie checked down the alleys every few buildings, making sure that he didn’t get ahead of the soldiers. The last thing he wanted was to be mistaken as an enemy and shot dead before he even had a chance to save his father.

  But the soldiers were moving quickly and efficiently in the streets, and Charlie found himself struggling to even keep up with the soldiers as they hurried toward their objective.

  The farther they progressed, the more violent and explosive the gunfire between the two forces became. Charlie kept low, his heart pounding with every step as the hospital building came into view.

  He glanced to his right, the soldier’s progression forward slowed by a cluster of masked terrorists out of the alley a few buildings down.

  One of the terrorists spotted Charlie and fired, forcing Charlie close to the building for cover. He planted a knee and returned fire, but his adrenaline was pumping so hard that it affected his aim, sending the bullets wide left and right.

  He waited for them to disappear and then restarted his trek toward the hospital. Gunfire grew more intense, and so did the screams of the men in battle.

  An ex
plosion rocked the earth and sent Charlie stumbling forward on his hands and knees. He whipped his head up in time to see the plume of smoke rising from the direction of the power plant.

  Charlie pushed forward. He was less than one hundred yards from the building when another explosion rocked to his right, catapulting Charlie ten feet off the ground where he landed hard on his shoulder, the harsh crack triggering a scream of pain that he couldn’t control.

  A high-pitched din drowned out the world of sound, and he was unable to hear his own guttural cries. He managed to sit upright and saw that his shoulder had been dislocated. A wetness covered the side of his head, and he reached for it with his good hand and felt blood.

  Charlie rubbed the substance between his fingers, staring at it like he didn’t recognize it, but then pushed himself off the ground, his hearing slowly returning as he stumbled toward the nearest building. He wandered through the smoke from the blast and slammed his shoulder up against the wall, then jerked his arm up and in, the harsh crack of cartilage and the crippling sensation of pain dropping him back to his knees.

  He gasped for breath, then hacked and coughed from the smoke that filled his lungs. His shoulder still ached when he moved it, but most of the motion returned. He stumbled back toward the rifle and picked it off the ground.

  The smoke only worsened on his final trek to the hospital, and Charlie coughed, his eyes burning. With the rifle raised and the sounds of war pushing further in the distance, he heard the patter of quick footsteps heading in his direction.

  Charlie froze, searching the hazy horizon, but turned too late as the body of a man collided into him, sending them both to the ground. Charlie scrambled to his feet, reaching for the rifle, but the man lunged at Charlie, punching him on the chin.

  The pain traveled through Charlie’s head, lighting up the back of his brain, but he managed to keep his wits about him and countered the punch with a blow of his own. The pair then locked horns, grappling over the ground, rolling over one another, elbow and knees jabbing at whatever body parts they could reach, and finally Charlie landed on top, his hands wrapped around the terrorist’s throat, and squeezed, choking the life from him.