by Sean Patten
“It just felt like the right thing to do,” she said. “You and I had been together for so long that the idea of missing out on your dad’s funeral didn’t sit well with me. I know you didn’t always see eye to eye, to put it lightly, but I figured coming to pay my respects was the least I could do.”
More silence, then she went on.
“And I’m sorry I didn’t mention it to you earlier,” she said. “I shouldn’t have taken you by surprise like that.”
“It’s fine,” I said. “But I have to admit, when Steve dropped this all on me…”
A small snort of a laugh sounded through the pipe.
“That funny?” I asked.
“Sorry,” she said. “Don’t mean to laugh. Just that I know how you are, and I can only imagine the look on your face when Steve told you I’d be showing up.”
“What look?”
“The look you make when someone unexpected happens. It’s like this combination of irritation and you smelling something really bad.”
“I don’t have a look,” I said.
Another laugh.
“Justin, you absolutely do. Come on. You’re so structured and like to have things just so. And when something happens that knocks your routine out of whack, you kind of make a face.”
“I don’t believe it,” I said.
“I promise that you do,” she said. “Next time you do it I’ll make sure to take a picture.”
“Good luck with that,” I said.
“Huh?”
“Phones,” I said. “Electricity.
“Oh, shit,” she said. “You’re right.”
“And with no proof of this face, that means it’s all in your imagination.”
“No way,” she said. “I’m going to find a way to show you. Maybe I’ll carry a hand mirror around for just such an occasion.”
“Or you can use one of those old-timey cameras,” I said with a grin. “One of those Civil War-era ones where you have to sit in place for ten minutes to take the picture. Pretty sure those don’t need electricity.”
She laughed.
“Yeah,” she said. “I’m sure that would go over really well. ‘Hey Justin, you’re making the face! Just hold like that for a half-hour while I set up this gigantic camera’.”
We both laughed at the idea, the laughter giving way to silence.
The two of us were still dancing around the issue, and I knew it.
“How’s El Paso?” I asked. “Haven’t heard much from you since…you know.”
“Well, yeah,” she said. “We haven’t really been on speaking terms.”
She cleared her throat and went on.
“But it’s…been good. Just living with Mom, trying to figure out my next step.”
“You find a job?” I asked.
“No,” she said.
“Meet any people in town or anything like that?”
“Not really,” she said.
I was just trying to make conversation, but I could sense that I’d hit on a delicate subject.
More silence passed.
“Truth be told,” Kelly said. “I haven’t really been doing much of anything since I moved back. Mom’s just happy for me to be there and hasn’t put any pressure on me to do anything. It’s like my life’s been in something like a holding pattern since I got there. Don’t really know what to do with myself.”
The words hit me hard. I knew that I had something to do with it—maybe everything to do with it.
“It’s my fault,” I said.
I barely had any control over the words as they tumbled from my mouth. But as I spoke them I realized how true they were.
“What?” she asked. “How is it your fault? I’m the one who’s been bumming around my mom’s house for the last few months watching TV and eating junk food. You don’t need to take responsibility for this one, bud.”
“You said that your life’s been in a holding pattern,” I said. “And I know why that is.”
“Oh?”
“It’s because I haven’t signed the papers.”
Kelly said nothing in response, and I could sense that she was realizing that there very well might’ve been some truth to my words.
“I don’t know about that…” she started to say.
“Seriously,” I said right back. “I’ve been hanging onto the papers, refusing to sign them. And because of that you haven’t been able to move on. We might be separated, but because I haven’t cut the cord you’ve been waiting for me to finally let you go.”
“But you haven’t,” she said. “You’ve had those papers for months, and you’re just letting them sit. Why?”
“Because I’m being stubborn,” I said.
She laughed softly.
“I mean, I could’ve told you that.”
We continued along the pipe, an opening to a larger room now visible in the distance. Through the hazy flashlight beam, the area began to look more and more like what I’d seen when I’d been down here before. I made sure to keep my wits about me as a reply rose up inside of me.
“Because, I suppose…deep down I didn’t want to believe that it was over,” I said. “It was just so strange to know that all that we’d had would be wiped away as soon as I scribbled my name on that piece of paper. And all the words above it, all that legalese. It was just so bizarre and clinical to see what we had reduced to that.”
“Yeah,” she said sadly. “Romance starts in the heart and then ends in a stack of papers written in jargon.”
“Yeah,” I said. “You’re right about that. But it wasn’t just the divorce papers. It was everything. When I first saw the papers, when it actually dawned on me that we were splitting up for good, I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe it. And I was so fucking furious, indignant. I couldn’t believe that you’d do such a thing.”
She said nothing, giving me the space to go on.
“I was like some pissy little kid who didn’t get what he wanted,” I said. “But looking back, it’s almost insane that I thought you could’ve reacted in any other way. I’d been a nightmare, getting completely obsessed with my survivalist crap. In retrospect it’s a miracle that you put up with me for as long as you did.”
“It…wasn’t easy,” Kelly said. “After what happened in Hawaii I knew that you’d changed. I had, too. And I figured that you just needed time to process everything that had happened. Not like I could blame you. But…it just didn’t stop. You got so distant and cold. You weren’t the same man I knew.”
“And I know you tried,” I said then. “But you meeting me halfway didn’t make a damn bit of difference if I was going to be staying put like that. I just can’t believe how much of a shock it was when you finally left and served me those papers. It should’ve been the most obvious thing in the world to see coming.”
More silence. I felt strange, like I was draining myself of a kind of energy that I didn’t know I had. But I felt better. Things were being said that needed to come out.
“Really,” said Kelly. “I was willing to stick around—I’m serious about that. But then something happened that made me realize that what we had, as good as it might’ve been before, was totally gone.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
A sniff cut through the air, and without thinking I flicked the flashlight onto Kelly’s face. She looked exhausted, drained, tears trickling down her cheeks.
“Don’t shine that one me,” she said. “Please.”
I did as she asked, turning the beam back ahead.
I felt awful, like I’d opened up an old wound that I should’ve let heal. But my curiosity got the better of me.
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“Christmas,” she said. “When it all fell apart.”
I said nothing. I knew exactly what she was talking about.
Chapter 19
Five Months Earlier
The smell of cooking food wafted through the house, but if
anything it was an annoyance. I was more focused on the dull light of the computer monitor in front of me, my eyes scanning over the words on the screen.
The topics of the survivalist message board were numerous, and all of them of interest.
“Best Portable Water sources?”
“Need CHEAP rifle…Any1 looking to sell?”
“Where to buy large amounts of ammo that won’t raise any red flags???? Don’t want to get on some fucking red flag list!!!”
I’d found the message board weeks ago, and it was just what I’d been looking for.
Finding like-minded people in person was no small thing, and I’d figured out a while back that I’d need to go onto the internet to find the sort of clique I needed. But that had taken some doing. Most message boards were too heavily moderated, too careful about what they said.
Not the Vault, however. It was deep web, which meant any discussion went. Hell, there were even a few crazies who seemed hell-bent on ushering in the apocalypse themselves, asking about critical points around the country that they could hit that might bring the government to its knees.
One picked up some interesting information reading a message board like the Vault. For example, it turns out the softest part of the country was in Missouri. Should the government collapse, some enterprising warlord would only need a little bit of gumption and manpower to take control of I-70 and split the country in half.
Not exactly the sort of information I was looking for, but interesting nonetheless.
“Dinner’s almost ready!” called out Kelly from the kitchen.
“Yeah, sure,” I shouted back brusquely before turning my attention back to the screen in front of me.
My eyes settled on a thread I hadn’t noticed.
“EMP…Worldwide Apocalypse?”
I moved the cursor over the words and gave the thread a click. The poster, in the sort of misspelled and grammatical-error-ridden writing that was common on the Vault, writing that almost suggested a fevered, desperate person on the other side of the keyboard, one desperate to get out what they had on their mind, went on about the possible effects of an electromagnetic pulse on the globe.
I read with interest. I’d heard about all sorts of doomsday events, from pandemic to a global conventional war to a good old-fashioned nuclear holocaust. But something about the idea of an EMP piqued my interest.
After all, an event like that would leave the world standing—everything normal except for the power cutting out. A nuclear war, for example, would wreck society and thin out the population in the process. An EMP event, on the other hand, would mean seven billion people, all of them just as healthy as they were before the blast hit, all of them desperate to survive.
The poster went through all the details, estimating that casualties could be in the billions by the end of the first year. No power would mean no food, no medical care, no buildings with temperature control. All of the things that made it possible for the planet to support such a large population would be gone in an instant.
It’d be a nightmare.
I sat back, coffee mug in hand, thinking about the bunker I had in mind. The design I’d been considering was already nuke-proof—it’d survive everything short of a direct blast. But now I was going to have to make sure it was EMP-proof.
“Okay, babe. Food’s ready!”
“Hold on!” I growled impatiently. “I’m trying to figure something out.”
No response came from the kitchen, and I turned my attention back to the thread. The poster, as if anticipating my needs, went over what you’d need to make sure your bunker—and all the gear inside—survived such an event.
Turns out a Faraday cage would be enough. It wouldn’t be cheap to add this to the bunker setup I had in mind, but the more I read about the top, the more convinced I was that I needed it. If the power were to go off, having some still-functioning gear would almost certainly make the difference between life and death. I’d need every advantage I had if I was going to survive.
Because if there was one thing I learned reading those boards, it’s that the end wasn’t just coming. It was near, and when it happened it wasn’t going to be pretty. I was going to need to be ready. Not a chance I’d get caught unpre—
“Hey!”
Kelly’s voice snapped me out of my focus. I whipped around in my desk chair, locking eyes with her. An expression of total impatience was on her face as she stood with her hands on her hips.
“What?” I snapped back.
“I just spent an hour making something nice for us to eat and you’re still sitting in front of that computer like a kid in his parents’ basement.”
Eating was the last thing on my mind. I needed to get out my notebooks and blueprints so I could figure out what my bunker would look like with a Faraday cage built in. I was already scolding myself for not thinking of it earlier—as an engineer, I should have known better.
“I’m busy,” I said. “I’ll get some food later.”
Kelly didn’t say a word. Instead, she swooped over to the computer and, before I had a chance to react, pressed the power button. The computer fan stopped running and the monitor went dark.
“Hey!” I shouted. “What’s the fucking deal?”
“You want to stay up all night reading that crap, then go ahead. But you’re eating dinner at the table like a normal, functioning adult.”
The look on her face made it clear she wasn’t screwing around. I didn’t want to risk a fight—if anything, that’d mean it’d be even longer before I got back in front of my computer.
“Fine,” I said.
“Good,” she said, the smile returning to her face. “I made burgers—your favorite.”
My stomach grumbled at the sound of it, and as I got up I realized that I hadn’t had anything to eat all day. It was Saturday, which meant my time was evenly split between the computer and the work desk as I worked on getting the finer points of the bunker planned out.
Kelly stepped out of the office and I followed her, the glow of my computer screen replaced with red and green Christmas lights hung here and there, the tall tree in the living room decked out with ornaments. Crooner Christmas tunes played softly on the speakers, and the smell of fried meat was heavy in the air, and my stomach grumbled again.
“Have a seat,” said Kelly. “I’ll do all the work.”
I slid into one of the dining room chairs, the table already set, condiments and napkins in the center.
“Get some good work done?” she asked as she disappeared into the kitchen.
“Just the usual.”
I didn’t feel like getting into it, and I was surprised she even still asked.
Kelly returned moments later carrying three plates, one loaded with burgers, one piled high with fries, the last packed full of lettuce and tomatoes and onions and all the fixings.
She placed the plates on the table and sat down.
“Now,” she said. “I know this isn’t exactly the most seasonally appropriate food, but I know it’s your favorite.”
“Thanks,” I said, already reaching for the food.
I was hungry, but hunger was nothing more than an annoyance. If Kelly hadn’t insisted upon it, I’d just as soon have eaten the food in my office in front of the computer.
After putting one of the patties onto a bottom bun, I loaded the burger up with toppings before finishing with a healthy squirt of ketchup. I lifted it to my mouth and took one bite, then another, chewing and swallowing quickly before washing it down with one of the beers Kelly had brought in.
“So,” she said. “I was thinking tomorrow we could go for a drive. Supposed to be pretty mild weather. Thought maybe we could drive over to El Malpais and go for a nature walk.”
“Nah,” I said. “Got too much stuff to do tomorrow.”
“Like what?” she asked.
“Gotta do some more research.”
I hadn’t mentioned to Kelly about the plan for the bunker. As far as she knew I was just doing
some research for the hell of it. But I didn’t want to tell her what for until I was ready to break ground.
“Research can wait,” she said. “You and I need to spend some time together.”
“That right?” I asked. “That what Dr. Swan told you?”
There was derisiveness to my tone, and the look on Kelly’s face made it clear she’d picked up on it.
“Always with your comments about therapy,” she said. “At least one of us is trying to work through what happened in Hawaii.”
I set down my burger and turned my attention to her.
“I’m working through it,” I said. “In my own way.”
“By spending all your time on the computer,” she said. “Reading militia blogs or whatever.”
“They’re not ‘militia blogs’,” I said.
“Then what are they?”
“They’re—”
Kelly raised her hand, stopping the conversation before it had a chance to get going.
“It’s fine,” she said. “If you don’t want to go, I won’t force you.”
“Thanks,” I said.
I took one more bite out of my burger, then another. I was doing my best to get it all down the hatch as quickly as possible.
“There’s…something else I’ve been wanting to talk to you about,” she said then. “And I was thinking with the holidays right around the corner it…might be a good time.”
I took another swig of beer.
“What?” I asked.
Kelly took a long, deep breath before going on. I had no idea what was on her mind, but whatever it was it didn’t look easy for her to bring up.
“I was thinking about what we’d talked…before Hawaii. About, um, starting a family.”
The life drained out of me. The last thing I wanted was to have this conversation again.
“Are you serious right now?” I asked.
Her expression turned hard.
“That’s how you respond to that?”
“Kel,” I said. “I don’t want to be an asshole—”
“Too late for that,” she interjected.
“—but we’ve had this conversation before.”
“Yes,” she said. “Back before Hawaii happened we had, and we both agreed we weren’t in the best place for it. But I was thinking that now, with you making good money and neither of us really wanting to travel or anything like that, this might be a good time.”
