by Patten, Sean
Amy said nothing, her blue eyes fixed on me.
“And maybe you’re right,” she said. “But I’m going to think positively about this. One of us has to, right? You’ve got your pills now, and…you said this is good for a few months, right?”
“If I’m careful. And if no one manages to steal them.”
“So a few months,” she said. “And in that time your body’s going to be getting all the garbage and fast food and everything else out of your system. And maybe we can get you going for runs, get that heart nice and strong. You exercise?”
“Nope.”
“Me neither,” she said. “But we can start. Once we find my mom and get settled somewhere we can focus on getting you in the best shape of your life. And…”
She went on like this, spinning a delusion about me, a man in his fifties, getting into shape that I’d never been in before. I knew she was just making herself feel better, so I let her do it.
But as we drove, all I could think about was how things were more likely to play out. I wasn’t long for this world, and the best I could do was make sure that Amy was ready for me not to be around.
I had to make certain she’d be prepared. She had to be ready to survive.
15 Ed
The sun dipped low in the sky as we arrived back in Sandy Vista. The sky was a wild orange, deep red down where the sun began to fall below the horizon. Between the desert and the abandoned houses and the danger and lawlessness in the air it all seemed like something out of the Wild West.
“I was wondering why these houses were all still abandoned,” said Amy as we drove back down the main drag towards the subdivision.
“Huh?” I said, my mind elsewhere.
“All these houses,” she said, gesturing to the rows and rows of dilapidated homes. “You’d think they’d be full of squatters, right? Or at least junkies trying to strip all the copper out of the walls.”
“You think Sherri was right?” I asked. “You think your friends in the homeowner’s association are keeping the peace.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “It sure makes sense that they’d keep troublemakers away. But I doubt it was anything sinister, you know? Probably just David and a few of the guys doing patrols in the back of a pickup and shooting their guns into the air whenever they spotted anyone.”
I didn’t think the same way. There was something about David, something that told me he’d go to any lengths to make sure that his perfect little community stayed perfect. If anything, the power going out would only make him more desperate to keep normalcy in place.
But he couldn’t keep the outside world out forever. It was coming for him, one way or another.
We soon arrived at the gate, and before I could say anything Amy was out of the car and pulling the barrier open.
“Got it!” she said with a smile once the gate was open.
I drove through, and she pulled it shut behind me before climbing back into the car.
“I could’ve done that, you know,” I said.
“It’s fine,” she said. “Save your strength.”
“I’m not going to let you do this, you know.”
“Do what?”
I pulled the car forward, taking it down the long, winding road of cookie-cutter houses and pristine lawns.
“Acting like I’m helpless.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “I just… I want to start pulling my weight, you know?”
“By opening the gate?”
“By taking things into my own hands.”
I couldn’t argue with that. How much Amy had really let the information sink in over the course of the last twenty minutes, I couldn’t say.
“Just let me keep doing things like we’ve been doing them,” I said. “I’ve got my pills, and I’m not on the verge of dropping dead. For now, at least.”
Silence hung in the air as I drove slowly.
“Sure,” Amy said. “Sure.”
And that was that. I pulled the car around to the community center, where David and a few of the other members of the HOA were gathered out front, talking over one thing or another. After coming to a stop, Amy and I got out, the eyes of everyone there latching onto us, all clearly eager for good news.
“Well?” asked David. “Mission accomplished?”
Without saying anything, I made my way to the end of the car and opened up the trunk. Then I grabbed one of the boxes and held it out in front of me.
“You guys are good on pills,” I said. “For now.”
The faces of the handful of people gathered lit up as the rushed over to me to check out the goods. David’s stayed steely, however, and I could sense that he was thinking about things in a more practical matter, maybe understanding on some level that he was only delaying the inevitable.
“Good,” he said, stepping over and clapping his meaty hand onto my shoulder. “You manage to get any food or water or anything like that?”
I thought back to Sherri, remembering the supplies we’d given her. I didn’t regret it a bit.
“Alban Falls was a hellhole,” I said. “The longer we stayed there the more chance there was of us not coming back at all.”
David nodded slowly, his jaw working under his trim cheeks. Then a big smile broke out. HOA David was back up front.
“That’s right,” he said. “You and Amy getting back safe and sound was the important thing. And you two did good—some of these pills are lifesavers. Lots of people are going to be staying alive thanks to you both.”
I wondered if Amy was thinking the same thing as me, that being we’d managed to only keep them alive for as long as the pills lasted.
“In fact,” David went on, “I think a little celebration’s in order.”
He gestured to the group of five behind him, all of them looking to be in their late sixties and early seventies.
“Bill? Nancy?”
A man and a woman broke away from the group and came over. The man was short with a fleshy, but friendly face and a head of thinning, silver hair. The woman was the wiry sort of older, with dyed blond hair and blue eyes fanned by wrinkles.
“Amy, I bet you remember the Andersons, right?”
“Of course!” said Amy, stepping over to hug them both, one after the other. “You always had those push-up pops for us during the summer. It’s so good to see you.”
“Good to see you too, Amy,” said Bill.
“You’ve grown up to be such a beautiful young woman,” said Nancy, holding her hands and looking her up and down.
“Bill and Nancy volunteered to make dinner tonight,” said David. “Not a big deal. Just for everyone you see here.”
“Well, she’s doing all the hard stuff,” said Bill. “I’m going to do my best to stay out of the way.”
The handful of seniors laughed at the standard joke.
“And I don’t think I’m being too out of line if I were to extend an invitation to you both,” David continued. “What do you say?”
“It’s fine by us,” said Bill, wrapping his arms around his wife’s slender shoulders. “The more the merrier.”
I glanced over at Amy, our eyes meeting. Evidently she was thinking the same thing.
“Won’t ever turn down a home-cooked meal,” I said.
David clapped his hands together.
“Perfect!” he said. “Then it’s settled. We’ll be meeting up at their place in a couple of hours. Right about when the sun’s…there.”
He pointed towards the horizon, indicating a spot in the sky a touch lower than where the sun was at that moment.
“Why don’t you both take some time to wash up and decompress, and then you can just head on over? Amy, you still remember which house is the Andersons’?”
“Sure do,” said Amy. “Big grey house with the bumblebee statue out front.”
“You got it,” said David. “Some things never change, do they?”
“Then we should get to it,” I said, eager to be back at the house and have a few
minutes to myself. “See you all in a little bit.”
They all waved, offering their chipper “byes” as Amy and I got back into the car. The drive to her mom’s place was less than a minute, and soon we were back in the dark interior of the house.
“Bad vibes,” I said. “I don’t like it.”
Sherri’s words were fresh in my mind, a confirmation of how I’d felt deep down about this place.
“No kidding,” said Amy as she opened up a drawer and took out a few candles. “But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t ready to get something in my stomach.”
I hated to agree with her on that subject, but so was I. Amy set the candles up here and there in the living room, the sunlight seemingly dimming by the second.
“Listen,” she said, lighting one after the other. “I’m feeling just as weird about this as you are. But for now, let’s do what David said—wash up and get ready to go. I don’t know about you, but I could use a shower and some clean clothes.”
“Clean clothes?” I asked. “You gonna let me raid your mom’s closet?”
She laughed, the first laugh I’d heard from her in a while.
“No,” she said. “As much as I like the mental image. Mom still has some of Dad’s stuff in boxes around the house. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if I let you have some of his stuff—you look about his size. And it’s not like he needs it.”
I wanted to object, feeling that there was something unseemly about wearing a dead man’s clothes. But the idea of fresh clothes and a shower sounded so good, and I couldn’t find it in me to resist.
“I’ll take the master bedroom shower, you take the one in the hallway,” Amy said, already heading up the stairs.
“Just don’t put the shower on full blast,” I called after her. “And drink what you can. Don’t let it go to waste.”
“I know, I know,” she said as she disappeared up the stairs.
Once she was gone, I sat in silence for several moments, my gaze set on the lit wick of the nearest candle as I let myself get sucked into the kind of trance that only fire had the power to put you in.
I thought about the pills and Amy and the HOA and everything else. It all seemed overwhelming, and as I sat in that warm living room I tried to get into my head that “overwhelming” was just how life was going to be from then on out. As much as people like David and the rest of the HOA wanted to pretend that things could go on just as before, it wasn’t going to happen.
I heaved myself out of the easy chair, knowing that any more time spent sitting was risking falling asleep. Not to mention the idea of a shower and clean clothes was a hell of a motivator.
Minutes later I was in the bathroom and stripped down to nothing. I turned the shower on, the pipes groaning in the walls as the faucet began to drip with cool water. I stepped in, sticking my head under the trickle and letting out a sigh of total pleasure.
It was pure heaven. I didn’t care that the water was cool, I didn’t care that there was only a little of it. At that moment, I was nothing but grateful for what was likely to be one of, if not the last shower of my life.
“Ah, fuck it,” I said, turning the faucet onto a higher volume, a harder stream of water hitting my body.
I washed up, using the soap and shampoo that was in there and getting myself cleaner than I’d been since before Dead Air.
A knock sounded on the door the moment I turned off the water.
“Hey!” came Amy’s muffled voice through the door. “There’s a box out here. Take whatever you need.”
“Thanks,” I said as I wrapped a towel around my body.
After grabbing the box, I set it on the bathroom counter and opened up the cardboard flaps, a musty smell rushing up to greet me.
Sure enough, Amy’s dad had been the same size as me, right down to the thirty-four waist. I took out a pair of dark jeans, a light blue linen button-up, some clean socks, and even a pair of boxer shorts. Why her mom was holding onto this stuff I could only guess, but I wasn’t about to complain.
Amy met me down in the living room. She’d changed too, wearing a shirt for some nineties grunge bands and some dark jeans.
“Lucky for us Mom doesn’t get rid of a damn thing,” she said. “Haven’t worn this since I was twelve.”
I allowed myself a smile before turning my thoughts to the dinner ahead.
“You ready to do this?” I asked.
Amy got up. “Ready as I’m going to be.”
Together we stepped outside into the cool evening air, the sky brilliant with stars and the moonlight casting the houses in an eerie silver sheen. We walked in silence, eventually reaching the house with a very conspicuous statue out front.
“What’s with the bee?” I asked.
“Never figured it out,” she said. “You want to ask them, be my guest.”
I chuckled at that as we moved nearer to the house. Flickering candlelight shone from inside, the door opening as soon as we approached, David and the homeowners stepping out to greet us.
“There they are!” he called out, his voice booming through the still of the evening air. “Who’s ready for a night to remember?”
16 Ed
“Come on in!” said David, all smiles.
It struck me as odd how he, and not the Andersons, seemed to be taking over hosting duties. But I kept my mouth shut as he corralled me and Amy into the house.
The interior was standard suburban: inoffensive minimalist décor, an open floor plan, and a living room centered around a massive flat-screen TV and assorted electronic equipment, all useless now. Dozens of candles were set up around the space, providing ample light. Felt like a waste of a limited resource to me, but fitting with the theme of forced normalcy that seemed to be the Sandy Vista standard.
We said our hellos to David, Bill and Nancy as they led us to the dining room where a surprising number of people—looked to be a dozen on first glance—were gathered around a long, candlelit table. There were far more people than the few who’d been outside of the community center, and I wasn’t one for crowds.
“The gang’s all here,” I said as Amy and I stood at the entrance to the dining room.
“We were going to keep this a low-key affair,” said David. “But then I realized this was the perfect opportunity for the newest additions to the community to know the board.”
“Nice thought,” I said, my eyes tracking from face to face. “But what about Powell? Isn’t he one of you guys?”
“Ah, Powell couldn’t make it,” said David. “He’d gotten a little weak without his meds. He has them now, but needed a little time to rest and let them do their thing.”
“Sure,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound as cynical as I felt.
“But please,” said Nancy. “Take a seat. Food’s almost ready.”
She placed her hand on the small of my back, giving a soft push that seemed more than a little insistent. Amy and I shared a glance before turning our attention to the two open seats at the far end of the table. Nothing else to do but get on with it.
Our wine glasses were full before we’d even put our butts in the seats.
“Hope you two don’t mind white,” said Bill. “Figure we might as well drink it before all the cool air in the cellar’s gone.”
I knew that I needed to make sure that I stayed focused, kept my wits about me. But damn, some cold white wine sure sounded good.
Screw it. I reached out for the glass and took it, allowing myself a long sip. It was delicious. Crisp and refreshing, and just a tad fruity.
“So,” said David to Amy. “You’ve made quite a splash since you left us, Amy. Rock’s not really my thing, but even I’ve managed to hear about KPX.”
“Not like you can ignore that festival every year when it comes to down,” said one of the women at the table. “It’s all the talk about on the news.”
“Dead Air,” said one of the men. “Such an awful name. Why can’t they call it something less morbid? Like maybe the ‘Desert Sunrise’ festival?�
�
“Oh, that sounds so much better,” said another woman. “And then they can do something about all those obnoxious, loud bands.”
They went on like this, trading gripes about the festival and the sort of “element” it brought to their neck of the woods. I had my complaints about the festival, sure, but they had more to do with the hell that Amy and I had been through.
I kept my mouth shut, though, enjoying my wine.
“Robin,” said another woman at the table. “Let Amy talk.”
All eyes turned to Amy at my right.
“Um, yeah,” she said. “The band’s had a lot of success.”
I wondered what she was thinking at that moment, all those people there asking about how much fun it was to be a rock star when those days were already long gone, her band members dead in the desert.
“And you think you’re going to keep playing?” asked Nancy. “I know the power being out is a pain. But I bet you could do some fun acoustic shows.”
The woman who’d had the issues with the Dead Air bands clasped her hands together in delight.
“Oh, that’d be so nice!” she said. “You could get some normal guitars, play in front of a bonfire.”
“What about the bass guitar?” asked one of the men. “Every rock band has a bassist.”
“That’s what Amy played, right?” asked the woman. “That’s the one with the thick strings? Oh, I don’t know my instruments very well.”
“Yeah,” said Amy, her tone reserved. “That’s the one.”
“They have acoustic bass guitars,” said Bill. “And I bet it’d be easy to find one. Just go to LA and go to one of the music stores.”
Yeah, I thought. And get killed in the process.
The men and women went on like this, talking about the power outage like it was nothing more than some temporary annoyance, like a downed power line that the electric company was dragging their feet in getting taken care of.
And it was easy to see how they could feel this way. Here in Sandy Vista they were isolated from the hellscapes just down either direction of the highway. A half-hour drive in one direction was Alban Falls, a few hours in the other was Dead Air. People were dying right at that moment, and all these people could talk about was Amy’s band, and how music used to be better when they were younger.
