GREEN TSUNAMI

by Cooney, Laura

  LWOA (love without acronyms),

  Joy

  August 19—8:11 p.m.

  Joy,

  I don’t know if I mentioned the buzzing to you before, but there was this loud, overwhelming hum that would come and go. It never lasted long, but it was disconcerting (yes, something can be disconcerting, even in this new world where everything seems that way).

  Well, I think I finally found the source.

  As I tried to make my way toward the city (again), I came across something that shocked me. The only way to describe them was giant bugs. Man-sized insects. Big, black beetles with large, segmented eyes like large red globes on their heads. Their appearance filled me with a strong sense of repulsion, more than they should have. I mean, they were creepy enough, but they bothered me in a way I can’t quite put my finger on, down to the core of my being.

  And yet, at the same time, I felt compelled to approach them, to touch them. It’s funny how I seem to have such little control over my impulses anymore.

  At that time, they were not buzzing. But I assumed they had to be the cause.

  In fact, as I stood there, reaching out to feel their hard carapaces, they were completely still. Not even any sign of breathing (how would one tell through such a hard exoskeleton?). I wasn’t even sure if they were real or if they were statues.

  But I was convinced they were alive, because of the sudden, strong, repellent sensation I got as I touched them.

  I forced myself to move away from them. I was about five feet away, staring at them, waiting for them to move. But they didn’t.

  And then, suddenly, I felt a great throbbing in my gigantic foot. A pain that caused me to lose my balance and tumble to the ground, flailing around as I tried to get my bearings. It was so unexpected. I sat there in the dirt, hugging my foot to me, waiting out the pain with tears in my eyes. It finally subsided and I was able to stand again.

  I then moved as far away from those creatures as I could.

  I know there is something important about them. That they play a role in the events that have transpired. But I have no clue as to what that role might be.

  Have you ever seen such a thing where you are?

  It is like they just suddenly sprouted from the earth. I’d never seen their like before. But now they stand there, like ancient monoliths.

  I have no idea what they are, but they have been haunting my nightmares. Last night, I dreamt that several of them had me trapped and were eating me alive.

  Of all the odd things I’ve seen, of all the threats I’ve confronted so far, these have been the most troublesome to me. And I have no idea why.

  Aaron

  August 20—3:03 a.m.

  Hey Aaron,

  No, I have never seen such bugs as you describe. I doubt that they are of any relevance at all. I would not disturb them if I were you, for you might end up being very, very sorry.

  I am wondering if you have any idea where Davey is. I imagine in his present humongous form, he is difficult to overlook. Perhaps you could ask if anyone has seen him? I do feel that he has the power to locate my position and deliver me from this underground dreariness.

  Today, I ate a peach. It was sweet and juicy. The fuzz on it felt warm and human. Much like I would imagine it to feel if I brushed my cheek against one of those fur-faced old ladies I used to see on the bus. They couldn’t have survived the tsunami, could they? The way they used to ride the bus back and forth all day and not go anywhere, I couldn’t see the point to their being alive.

  The peach gave me energy and it made me smile all day long. I even smiled at “my” Balloon Head, Woody. Cindy is still not eating the fruit. She is weak and sick, yet the moral smugness remains. As she scowled at me while I ate the peach, I found myself wondering what type of fruit she’d turn into. I think she might end up a freeze-dried fig.

  I heard rumors the third floor is all vegetables now. Perhaps Bradley will go upstairs with me, as I am dying for a corn on the cob. It is wonderful to have fresh food again. I cannot help but feel grateful to the Balloon Heads, for I am sure they had something to do with the transformation. I wish I knew the formula for how this is done. Then I could tell you and you could enjoy delicious, fresh fruit, too.

  There is a little child here now. It looks to be about two or three years old. I can’t tell if it’s a boy or a girl. Bradley thinks that someone from the second floor, amid the human-to-fruit change, got Jose to take pity and bring it down here. It seems likely, as Jose has been feeding it like a stray kitten. We are all a little wary of it, as we don’t know if the child could infect us with this fruit disease. Some people are talking about taking it back upstairs, but nobody is brave enough to touch it. Jose claims he never touched the child and he doesn’t know how it got here.

  The tyke is annoying. It screeches and mewls like a sick cat. Even if it is not infected, I wish it would go away. I think Cindy wants to pick it up and comfort it, but she is afraid of what the others will do if she does.

  It is screeching now somewhere in the hall. And it is 3 a.m. I loathe its big, round, wet eyes, its snot-dripping, walnut-shell of a nose. Its curly black hair is greasy and looks like it’s been applied to its head by a paint roller. I wish Davey were here so I could feed it to him.

  I need to eat another peach. I’m starting to get depressed again.

  August 20—11:46 a.m.

  Joy

  How you can say the bugs have no relevance? How can either of us know what is and isn’t important anymore? The world is so different now.

  I’ve seen these creatures at various points throughout the neighborhood. They usually stand in groups of two or three, and I swear they weren’t there before. I have no idea where they came from. There aren’t a lot of them, but the ones there are look ominous to me. I have yet to catch them buzzing. When I hear the noise and go to see if it originates with them, the sound stops. But I know they are the source. They have to be.

  I have the strangest feeling that they are waiting for something to happen. And I’m not sure if I want to know what.

  Your stories about fruit make me hungry. I don’t care what the origins of them are. They sound better than what I’ve been able to scavenge. Much of the food left behind has gone bad or mutated in strange ways. As for food growing in the “wild,” I have no idea what is edible and what’s not anymore, but I’m getting more and more inclined to risk it. At least you know what you’re eating is safe and it doesn’t hurt you.

  The school building caved in upon itself. Now it looks like a vast green lump. Almost like clay. The windows, that had changed to strange eyes made of glass, are now completely gone. If anything remained alive in there, it must be suffocated by now.

  I have no idea where Davey is. After he got out of the building, he moved surprisingly fast on the outside, considering how large he has grown. I lost sight of him fairly quickly. To tell you the truth, I’m in no hurry to see him again. I don’t like what he has become. And I won’t go out of my way to find him. But I wish him luck surviving out there, in this new world.

  That toddler you saw sounds as disturbing as Davey. What kind of world turns children into monsters?

  Well, the power here is running low. I’d better sign off now.

  I’ll try to write again soon.

  Aaron

  August 21—2:46 a.m.

  Aaron,

  Tonight, this naked dude was rubbing his dick against the wall. I don’t really know too many people here. I keep to myself. But I knew him because I gave him a nickname: Jockohama. I called him that because all he ever talked about was sports. That seemed ridiculous to me. All the ball players are probably dead or transformed to the point of losing all athletic ability. And there’s no place to watch players play anymore.

  Jockohama interested me because I wanted to see at what point he’d finally stop talking about sports and see that he was part of an increasingly shrinking group of survivors of the worst calamity on earth. Well, like the song says, tonight’s
the night. He had his arms and legs pressed on the wall like a gecko. And he was rubbing the dick like a horny dog on a table leg. It was almost funny.

  Jockohama was moaning. As I continued watching, he started making the type of noise you make when you walk on hot sand in your bare feet in the middle of summer. His dick looked like a popsicle melting in the sun. The ooze ran down the wall and onto the carpet. I heard this clattering noise and turned around and saw Jose rolling his bucket and mop toward the melting man.

  I felt sick and ran down this dark passage where I go hide. I heard sniffling and saw the child sitting in my corner. I shined a flashlight on it, hoping to scare it away. Its face had become long, red, and heart-shaped with little black specks. I had such a craving for something sweet, I dug my nails into its face and scooped out some pulpy flesh. It was the perfect strawberry. Not tart at all and it was juicy. I ate its face. When I was done, the headless child got up and ran away. I don’t know how it is alive without a head. All I could think was, “At least I won’t have to hear you cry anymore.”

  What are you doing out there, Aaron? Why aren’t you trying to find me? Things here are getting worse. We’re dying here. If it’s not the fruit, it’s the walls that get you. And all you can talk about are those damn buzzing bugs. Fuck those bugs. What about me, your wife?

  Now I remember what it was that we were fighting about before the tsunami hit. It was about your obsession with minutia. How you were so involved with things that you couldn’t see me, you couldn’t see Davey. Maybe that’s why Jockohama stood out to me. He was so focused on sports, nothing else existed. I wanted to yell at him, “Hey, asshole, it’s the end of the fucking world.”

  Just like I wanted to yell at you, “Do you see me? Can you hear me? Do I exist? Do you care?”

  And now, I say to myself, Aaron isn’t going to find me. He just wants to look at the funny bugs. Maybe that’s why I kept fantasizing about Davey, of all people, rescuing me.

  I’m sorry if this hurts you, but I just threw up the baby’s strawberry head. There are red guts all over the laptop and my fingers are bleeding strawberry juice.

  Very Truly Yours,

  Fucking Joy

  August 21—2:44 p.m.

  Joy,

  Remember me telling you how my foot throbs unbearably every time I try to leave the neighborhood? Well, I noticed my foot doesn’t hurt much anymore. Ever since I had that bad pain attack near those bugs. It’s like that was the last of it.

  I don’t know why I felt the impulse, but I tried to walk out of the neighborhood this morning, and nothing stopped me. It will still take me awhile to get there, but at least it’s a start. I wasn’t going to say anything because I don’t want to jinx this. I don’t know if there are other barriers between here and where you are. I didn’t want to get your hopes up. But it sounds like you’re about to give up on me. And I wanted to make it clear that I’m still trying.

  There aren’t many other people. Not that I’ve seen. The ones I have come across are deformed in weird ways and won’t come out of their hiding places, but I see them watching me. And what I see of them makes me think that my foot was one of the more merciful mutations. The good news about that is at least nobody has tried to attack me again.

  I have this small transistor radio. It was tossed in a drawer years ago and we forgot all about it. But, except for the laptop, it’s my only contact with the world outside here. It sounds like many of the people who are left are moving south, to Los Angeles. Maybe we should go down there, too.

  It’s funny. The guy on the radio today was talking about the tsunami. About how it felt when it came. Do you remember that? One minute, it was just another day, and the next, there was this huge wave blocking out the sky, crashing down on us. Not like rain at all. Smashing most of the buildings. Drowning millions of people. And yet, some of us survived. I have no idea why we didn’t perish with the rest of them. Our measly little house wasn’t any stronger than the skyscrapers the tsunami crashed to ruins.

  I was home. The wave should have pulverized the house. I should have drowned. But I didn’t. And our house was mostly whole, even as it slowly disintegrated upon itself, becoming a big, breathing lump of alien flesh. A new life-form. One that didn’t provide shelter for creatures like us anymore.

  The guy on the radio was talking about this. How could anything have lived through that?

  It’s almost like the tsunami was alive, too. Like it spared some of us on purpose.

  There’s damage, but not everything is damaged. And it’s selective. You’ll see a house that looks untouched in the middle of other houses that were smashed to bits.

  I don’t claim to understand any of this.

  The truth is, I can’t remember much of what happened after the wave crashed down on me. I remember struggling in liquid, a helpless, drowning sensation, and that’s about it. The next thing I knew, I was stretched out on our lawn, near the garden. Whole, and barely wet. Just that green film covering me. Even the ground was mostly dry by then.

  Have I told you how quickly the water had disappeared afterward? Sucked into the earth? Into the sky? I have no idea. No one does. It left as quickly as it arrived.

  The people in Los Angeles. Supposedly there are only about fifty of them there, but it’s more people in one place than I’ve seen in what seems like ages. There was a broadcast from there. It sounded like most of them were praying. I guess the end times are finally here. But I refuse to believe this was some kind of biblical prophecy come to life. None of this makes sense. There are no angels here to take people away. Just a lot of drowned, dead bodies, especially along the shorelines. That’s what I heard.

  I found a store with some fresh batteries and snagged a bunch. Between the radio and the laptop, I can’t afford to lose my only connections with the outside world.

  I’m coming. I’m trying to get to you.

  I just don’t know if I’ll be able to get that far. Or if something will stop me.

  Aaron

  August 22—2:22 a.m.

  Aaron,

  What are we doing on this fucked up planet? Why are we alive when so many are dead? I guess the dead have always outnumbered us. The Silent Majority, I believe they were once called—well, until Nixon hilariously appropriated the term to describe Americans who were not a part of the counterculture. I guess one could interpret that as meaning conservative people are dead. LOL. I must tell Bradley that one. Although conventional politics hardly matter now. And Bradley’s new focus is the Balloon Heads. He still crouches down to chat with them every day.

  I couldn’t help but think of Darwin when you wrote of the randomness and illogic of who did and didn’t survive the tsunami. Is it luck or is there an intelligent force behind this? I always fall back to the Balloon Heads. I’m sure they have some role in deciding who lives and who dies. Why are some people destroying themselves on the wall and one floor turns to fruit and another to veggies (rumor has it)? I think the Balloon Heads give us these irresistible impulses to melt into walls, to get up at 2 a.m. to write on a laptop, to tear off and consume the head of a strawberry child.

  The child is still creeping around with no head. It can’t vocalize anymore, but we can still hear it as it crashes into things. A common occurrence now that it can no longer see. People were asking what happened to its head, but nobody knew. Bradley looked at me and smirked the first time that question was asked. I’m too ashamed to ask him what he knows. The child is a brutal reminder to all who are parents here. But nobody speaks of loved ones.

  I want to bring you up and say, “Aaron says this and Aaron says that.” But I stop myself and think What if no one else can communicate with their spouse? What if the other people’s emails went unanswered? Nobody talks about it, so there’s no way to know. If I say something, there’s a good chance some people would resent me, and I don’t want to upset someone. So we’ve intuitively made this into a taboo topic.

  Cindy is always lying down on her straw mat. She’s runn
ing a fever and barely has the strength to get up to go to the bathroom. I was mad at her for not eating the fruit, but now I just feel sad. I put cold washcloths on her forehead and lay her head on my lap and pet her long, silky blonde hair. Well, it is not so much silky now as it is greasy. I try to bathe her every few days, but she is so weak that it exhausts her. I want to feed her some of the fruit because I know it will help her, but she keeps saying no. She clutches at the stuffed donkey Jose gave her like a little girl.

  “I’ll die before I eat that,” Cindy said, staring up at me from my lap.

  “You will die then,” I said.

  “What‘s to live for?” Cindy asked.

  That shocked me, coming from Cindy. She was always the bubbly one in the office. She liked to talk about the power of positive thinking and how God wants us to spread joy in the world (joy, haha…that is definitely not me).

  Cindy opened her watery, bloodshot eyes wide and said hoarsely, “The Rapture.”

  “Jesus is coming down here?” I asked.

  “You know it’s the end of the world, “Cindy said.

  I gently lifted her head from my lap and left her lying on the straw mat. Do you think it’s the end of the world, Aaron? I mean, we all talk about it like it is, but deep down, do we really believe it?

  Spreading the Joy,

  Joy

  August 24—5:16 p.m.

  Joy,

  I am making the most progress I have in weeks, but it’s been slow going. And I don’t always have access to the Internet, so I’ve been quiet awhile. No matter how used to my foot I get, it’s still a big impediment. It makes it difficult to do just about anything.

  One thing that surprised me today was that I noticed the sky was turning blue again. I think it has been going in that direction all along, but I just didn’t notice. It almost makes me think that things could go back to the way they were, even though I know it’s too late for that.