The dog that had been running chaotically earlier startled me as it ran full speed down the street and made a sharp right towards the Ramada nearby. I saw a small group of people heading up the street, carrying full bags of things and dressed for winter. I could hear them talking, laughing amongst each other – it felt good to hear.
They didn’t see me as they walked up Sutro, and I made sure they didn’t. I wasn’t about to run into people again, but it was so awesome to see people living despite the aliens’ trouble in trying to kill us off.
: :
The Wells bridge was destroyed – it was a pile of rubble. Amongst the huge chunks of concrete and roadside signs, I saw crushed cars, people that had died trapped within. The river below was a mess of floating debris, trapped in ice and slow moving water. It didn’t look easy to cross, but I didn’t feel like walking any further down Fourth just to get to South Virginia. I tightened my bag around myself, and headed over.
Carefully picking my way through rubble and metal, it took me some time to cross the bridge. It was slow going and scary – things shifted and tilted in such ways that I squeaked and squealed as I caught myself, making unnecessary noise as I did so. By the time I’d made it over to what remained of Kuenzli, I was breathing hard and nursing a hand I’d smooshed between two concrete blocks. Wells was a destroyed mess as well – being that it was one of the main streets that penetrated the area straight through. I debated on moving up to Ryland to get closer to California, pausing in place to stare ahead. More abandoned vehicles, a fire truck lying on its side near the 7-11, caught my attention. I wasn’t sure what it was that made in look in that area specifically, but my senses were tingling.
I ducked low against a Napa Auto Parts truck, holding my breath. Straining to hear anything out of place within the silence, I touched the cold metal with both hands and wondered what it was I’d seen in the first place. Cautiously peeking over the truck bed, I scanned the area again and finally saw what had caught my eye – a couple of soldiers pushing through the mess within the intersection of Mill and Wells.
I ducked once more, making a face. They were dressed in urban camo, carrying standard assault rifles, yet they were also leading horses that were loaded with canvas bags of what I assumed were supplies. Their voices were quiet and muffled with the distance between us. Cautiously, I peeked over yet again, to make sure that they were continuing on the way they were faced. Once I felt assured of the space between us, I hurried on. California Avenue was so close – it was nearly five minutes by car, and this motivated me badly to just get there.
Once I reached that particular intersection, I hid behind another vehicle, peeking over and watching as they continued on. They were using the crowded street to send two guys at a time into an establishment, search around, and bring back things that they deemed useful. In a city that was currently abandoned and empty, it made plenty of sense in that there would be enough supplies to keep people alive for some time. I watched them for a few moments, then continued on, hitting Ryland, crossing over to Liberty and hoping that there was enough distance between the streets and their proximity for them not to see me.
Anxiety hit me suddenly, and instead of creeping around the vehicles and keeping a watchful eye in that direction, I started booking it down the snow-covered sidewalks, absolutely sure that there were people chasing me. I didn’t even look back – even though I was extremely short of breath and I was not destined for any Olympic event, I was propelled by fear and desperation to continue on. I was thisclose to reaching home, and I wanted to get there. I slipped in snow that hadn’t seen other feet since – well, I guess for a while, judging from the buildup that had settled on abandoned vehicles around me.
The air was cold to breathe in, so inhaling and exhaling hurt. The silence around me was so unnatural and still that it felt I was physically absorbing that as well – a heavy weight that dismissed the cold slush that built around my pants legs and soaked my shoes. I slid across Holcombe with a startled squeal that ended with an awkward squawk as I slammed hard into the stoplights. The metal vibrated with such loudness that I wanted to bury myself underneath the nearest car. The sound echoed off the icy windows in the buildings around me, sent birds scurrying up into the sky. The green Lincoln street sign flapped in place, chains jiggling. I winced, covered my ears, then listened hard for any sign of surprised voices, for movement other than my own.
Then I got back up, limping for a short distance until the stiffness of impact had withered away with another burst of adrenaline. Booking it down the street, I told myself I wasn’t the best action hero, the smartest heroine there could be – I probably looked like one of those stupid saps that panicked in horror movies, that just sprinted off in hopes to just get away and ends up getting slaughtered easily.
I looked over my shoulder and saw nothing but my footprints – it made me wince, but I continued on, moving closer and closer to South Virginia – closer to home. Pumping my arms hard, I focused on the intersection ahead – I’d turn left, go up a couple of blocks, turn right – I was so close to home that I imagined my parents waiting in the living room, waiting to signal me as I approached. They somehow knew I was thisclose to home, and were waiting patiently for me to arrive. Stupid and ridiculous, I know, but it motivated me as I grew closer to South Virginia.
The Bank of America building loomed high overhead, blocking out the sun, towering over the Nevada State Bank just across the street. Streetlights were covered in snow, the colored globes hidden beneath – the sign for South Virginia was a rewarding sight. As I crossed over from South Center, my footsteps ringing off the library to my right and to the realty offices on my left, I chanced a look up at the sky – to see the clouds hanging ominously overhead, promising more snow.
I looked down and skid once more as I locked eyes with a startled soldier, who looked too young to be holding that assault rifle he was lifting. His partner was pointing in the other direction, and I tried to stop – but momentum kept me sliding. Good thing because once I hit my back on the snow covered sidewalk, the delivery truck to my right was sprayed with a spew of rounds that blocked out anything that could have been said. I turned onto my stomach, pushing myself with desperate strength underneath this vehicle, snow hissing under the impact of hot rounds masculine voices shouting out. I crawled underneath the truck, wiggling between the two front tires and coming out from underneath the grille. The kid kept shooting and shouting, and I couldn’t even hear what he was saying.
It was so loud and so scary that I couldn’t even think coherently – I just knew I was going to be hit. This desperation forced me away from the noise, running desperately away from them. I didn’t even think about where I was going – I just wanted to go.
Snow hissed and bullets exploded around me – I don’t know how I didn’t get hit, but I squealed and ducked around the nearest building – I was running north on South Center, away from where I needed to be. I realized this as I passed the library, gulping in cold amounts of air and hearing them run after me. I glanced back, saw them tearing around the corner of the building, trying to keep their balance on the snow covered sidewalk and misplaced bulk of their uniforms and supplies. One tumbled onto his side while the other brought his gun up again – I turned a hard left back onto Ryland, towards the parking lot near the Nevada State Bank that looked as if someone had crushed it from above.
I didn’t understand why they were trying to kill me when we’d all survived an alien attack last night. Shouldn’t we all be coming together and working as a team? Of course, I wasn’t going to stop and ask – I didn’t want to get gunned down just blocks from home.
Crater shaped impacts showed me smashed vehicles, a sewer system that sent up puffs of smelly clouds – there were buildings here, once, but in my blind panic, I couldn’t even remember what they were. I headed towards the parking lot, trying to keep distance between me and those guns.
I glanced over my shoulder, seeing the one still on his feet stumbling over so
mething that had been hidden under snowfall, tripping him and sending him and his weapon sprawling into the street. Guess he wasn’t familiar with the area to know what was there, and I used my knowledge for my advantage. He was shouting something as I ran across South Virginia Street to the parking lot and made a right towards the intersection again. I realized that he was giving directions for an interception in the direction I was going.
I saw movement to my right, up Liberty, a couple of guys on horseback catching sight of me. I made a hard right, running, once more, away from the intersection and running down South Virginia. I wanted to scream with frustration as I heard the sounds of the guys on horseback giving chase. Cutting across a corner of what remained of the parking lot, I ran onto Court Street, the looming justice building empty and strangely gothic. The horses were trying to keep their balance atop of the slippery surfaces, and the men were communicating loudly to each other over radios that crackled angrily within the unnatural stillness of the city – I could tell where they were without even looking back.
I was too terrified to do so, anyway, sure I’d catch a bullet of some kind in the face. Huffing and puffing, I pumped my arms and legs as fast and as hard as I could possibly go, managing to make it to South Sierra street – I figured as long as I stayed on this side of the Truckee River, I’d be fine. I could lose them somehow, and not stray that far away from home. With this in mind, I turned towards the Family Services building.
The doors opened when I pushed them in, and that bought me some time from those guys on horses. But glass shattered as they shot in after me, causing me to duck. I screamed after hearing and feeling something hot pass by my shoulder, and this caused me to throw myself behind the security stand that allowed entrance into the lobby of the building. Once I assumed I was okay, hearing them continuously shout out to others that they had me cornered, I crawled hastily from the security stand and went for the stairway ahead of me. I clamored up that, struggling to catch my breath and having absolutely no idea where I was going to hide. I’d driven past this building all the time, yet I’d never been inside.
I heard them clamor into the building after me, so I knew I needed to make this quick. I turned towards some service windows, and threw myself in that open slot between counter and plastic. I barely managed to fit – losing weight helped so much at a time like this – but I dropped back down onto the floor, scattering papers and desk shit all over the place. Picking myself up, I went running for the door near the back, opened it, and burst out into more office space. I had to hide myself fast, so I searched for the best place to do so – I burst through another door, followed the signs for the stairway, and headed up.
I heard them clearing out the areas behind me – they were fast, and they probably heard my desperate running. I tried to stifle my heavy breathing as I slammed through another set of doors and ran down an empty hall, unsure of what floor I was on and what sorts of rooms were around me. I took a metal door in, the heavy release of the latch ringing out within the silence, and took another set of stairs down to ground level. I slammed through an emergency fire exit, coming out onto Rainbow, behind the court building.
Sucking in air, I ran for the river, thinking I could lose them somehow over there. The bridge had been destroyed – the theater across the Truckee River was a crumbled mess, the parking lot garage next to it a pile of rubble – I ran for the ruined bridge, and managed to cram myself desperately into the wreckage, to hide myself behind fallen walls of concrete and a black Escalade that still had people inside. The smell was horrendous, the rushing river crashing so loudly around the debris and overtaking the silence of the streets that I couldn’t even hear if the men were still looking for me.
I looked into the Escalade as I pressed both hands against my nose and mouth. I looked at the crushed roof, the shattered windows, and the decomposing bodies of a man and woman dressed in stylish suits. From the looks of it, they’d been workers at the court. Struggling to catch my breath as quietly as possible, I hugged my knees to my chest and strained to hear the others’ presence. The water made the temperature that much colder – it lapped at the edges of the debris in front of me, rushing against the Escalade’s tires.
I stared down at this, and waited.
: :
When night came, it was impossible to see a thing. My body was stiff as I climbed out from the wreckage, peering out into darkness so thick and heavy that I couldn’t even find my way back to the street without reaching out with both hands and physically searching for obstacles in my path. Enough time had passed for those people to have lost interest in finding me.
When it snowed, there was a thick, ringing quality to it that made silence seem like some breathing thing. There was a heaviness in the air that told me it was snowing – this made me exhale heavily, knowing that I had to find somewhere to bed down for the night. I had no idea whether I was looking down South Sierra, or facing Island Avenue. I sniffled, wiped my nose with my sleeve, and began walking.
I bumped into cars on my quest, and finally found a street sign that told me this particular street charged a toll for parking, so I knew I was back on South Sierra.
I stumbled my way onto the sidewalk, and began to walk South Sierra Street, keeping my ears open and my eyes wide. Despite the length of time, the physical exhaustion I felt in my journey, I was still motivated enough to walk. I simply hugged myself tightly and began the silent descent towards Liberty once more. As I did so, I examined the outlines of buildings around me, recognizing them by their proximity.
My movements were the only indication that someone was still alive in this area. Glass crackled slightly, metal shifted with the cold, and somewhere in the far distance – I couldn’t tell, due to the echoing – a dog barked something that wasn’t a panicked bark.
Reaching California Avenue excited me. I was almost home. Being so close to it, I kept walking. I stumbled into fire hydrants and hidden debris as I did so, but nothing was going to stop me from reaching my home. Everything that had been a problem or hitch in my journey so far was nothing, now. And reviewing it all, as my teeth chattered and body shivered, I had to admit to myself that I was tougher than I’d previously thought.
In the warehouse, I thought I’d never make it. I’d cried, I’d cowered, I’d hid and did things I still wasn’t proud of – but I’d survived many things. I’d come this far. I’d lived and outlived the situations that had popped up. I had done things I’d never seen myself do, or had even imagined of doing.
By the time I’d reached Mark Twain via Nixon, and the silent, dark houses reacquainted themselves to me, I was overfilled with energy. There was a dump truck that was overturned in the center of the street, but that was easy to negotiate. A cat meowed loudly from one of the houses, and I knew it had belonged to the elderly couple from around the corner – Milly, they’d called it. A piece of shit animal that always used mom’s flowerpots as a personal toilet.
Still, I greeted it joyfully when it revealed itself to me, an orange tabby with a loud meow that echoed off the emptiness around us. My house was just ahead – a maintained lawn with brick-lined flowerbeds, with a wooden porch that had a single bench lined up with the railing. Mom’s windchimes were singing softly in some breeze, and snow started to fall the moment I hurried up my walkway.
I wanted to call out their names in relief, pulling the storm door open and trying the front door. It was locked, and I ignored the metallic protest of the storm door as I released it, turning to go to the back walkway. I slammed instead into dad’s Range Rover, and it took me a few moments to process this. It was piled high with snow, and parked exactly as he had left it that day I went to work.
I stared at the vehicle, feeling both relieved and puzzled that they hadn’t even used it to escape the First Night. Something tightened and built at the base of my throat, and I swallowed hard. Ignoring the rising feeling of this unidentifiable something in my chest, I hurried to the wooden privacy fence, reached my fingers between the thin slit
of the gate and the support beam of the fence, and popped the lock with my finger tip. The gate swung open, so loudly that snow fell from the trees in the backyard, as if startled by the noise itself. I pushed through nearly three feet of snow on my way to the stairs of the back door, glancing over at the separate structure in the yard. Dad’s study.
The snow in the yard was high, undisturbed. No one had used this yard in some time. I stared at the silent addition, thinking of the gun cabinet he kept in there and wondering if he’d just gathered everything he could that first night and had taken what he’d needed from there, so that they could live in the house without – I couldn’t think clearly after that.
Before I ascended the stairway, I reached underneath the brick layering of the railing my dad and a friend of his had constructed years ago, finding the key still nestled between crumbled brick and mortar.
I unlocked the back sliding door, pushing it open and feeling it catch on the single metal spike that dad had always kept within the rail – a back up in case someone picked the lock on the door. I tried to squeeze myself into the narrow slot of door and frame and couldn’t do it.
The Long Way To Reno Page 27
