Pod

by Stephen Wallenfels

Dad slams into my room. He isn’t wearing a shirt. I see through his skin to shadowy organs underneath. Liver, kidney, a pulsing heart. His head is a screaming skull.

  “Don’t look at them, Josh! Don’t look!”

  The light turns off. It lasted what, fifteen, twenty seconds? Add the ten seconds of screeching brain torture and the whole experience lasted maybe half a minute. That’s thirty seconds of the aliens yanking our chain. Of the POD commander having a little fun, shaking our cages, making sure the humans don’t get too comfortable or feel too safe. Now my room is completely black, except for the lingering blue globs I see when I close my eyes.

  Dad, his brain no longer visible, says, “Where’s your flashlight?”

  “On my nightstand.”

  I grope around, find it, thumb the switch. It doesn’t work.

  “Huh,” I say. “It was working fine when I went to bed.”

  He says, “I’ll get the one in the hall closet.”

  He walks away, his hand sliding along the wall. I look out the window again. The PODs are back to normal—meaning I barely see them. They’re black holes in a moonless, star-filled sky. In the far-off distance a coyote yaps, then more chime in. I guess they didn’t like the show either. Or maybe they did.

  Dad walks into the room carrying a lit candle.

  “Couldn’t find the flashlight?” I say.

  “It didn’t work.”

  He stands beside me at the window. I get a sudden flash of déjà vu. The two of us in my room, trying to figure out what the hell happened. It makes me shiver.

  He says, “Looks like our guests have gone back to sleep.”

  That’s his latest word for them—“guests.” And we’re the hosts. Like this is Uncle Charlie, Auntie El, and their obnoxious twins visiting from East Lansing. I told him it’s more like “Masters” and “Bitches,” and guess who we are? He said, “To quote one of your generation’s favorite phrases, ‘whatever.’”

  “They never sleep,” I say.

  He nods.

  “What time is it?” I ask.

  He looks at his watch. “That’s strange.”

  “What is?”

  “The display—it’s dead.” He shakes his wrist, checks the watch again, presses some buttons, frowns.

  I say, “I’ll get my cell.” It shows the time on the cover. At least it did the last time I checked. I’ve got a sinking feeling that things are different now. I pull it out of my dresser drawer. Feeling confirmed. “Nada,” I say.

  He hands me the candle, goes to my desk, and picks up the chair. He carries it to the middle of the room, stands on it, reaches up, and pushes the test button on the smoke alarm. It’s wired into the household circuit, but also has a battery backup. He changes all the batteries four times a year, like clockwork, so it should be fresh. We should hear an angry three-second blast, a pleasant birdsong compared to the alien screech. Nothing happens.

  “Maybe it was some kind of electromagnetic pulse,” he says.

  And maybe they’re getting ready to kick our ass. I say, “It was crazy, Dad. I could see your heart beating.”

  “And you didn’t have any eyeballs.”

  That’s a vision I’d rather not think about.

  We stand there for a few seconds, neither of us saying anything. Then he says, “Looks like the show’s over,” and turns to leave.

  “Now what?”

  “I’m going downstairs to check on a few things.”

  “Make an entry in your notebook, perhaps?”

  He smiles. “Yeah, that too.”

  This is crazy. A week ago he’d be at Defcon 5, running around trying to board up the windows. Now he’s all calm, as if a blue light that turns us into talking skeletons is nothing special. Something doesn’t add up.

  “I think I’ll hang here for a while,” I say, not that into making sure there are still three cans of mushroom soup in the pantry. “Let me know if there’s a problem with Dutch.”

  He stops at the door and says, “You know, Josh, with the smoke detectors not working, it might be better if you—”

  “I know, I know. Don’t use the candle in my room because I might fall asleep and burn the house down.”

  “I’ll follow the same rule,” he says.

  “Safety first!” I call to his retreating steps.

  He walks downstairs. I blow out the candle. I crawl into bed, pull up the covers, and ponder this new reality. Even when the power was out, we still had batteries. The house had a pulse. Now it just feels dead. The simple truth hits me like a brick: I have over fifteen thousand songs on my iPod, and I may never hear a single one of them again.

  Dad breaks the news to me over breakfast. The electromagnetic pulse, or whatever it was, is probably permanent. Nothing works, not even the tiny light on Mom’s keychain.

  We’re sharing a can of mini-sausages when he says, out of the blue, “You know what else uses a battery?”

  I think for a moment, scratch my head. “No!” I say with a fake gasp. “Not the TV remote?”

  He smiles, but it’s the kind that takes some effort. Like when someone goes, Say cheese! and you smile, but all you want to do is poke them in the eye with a cue stick. A couple of other wise-ass comments come to mind, but I don’t say them. I fork the last sausage, dip it in the almost-empty jar of deli mustard, pop it into my mouth, and wait. I know it’s coming—it’s gonna be good. Something real useful, like the battery to his GPS. Or his shaver. The suspense is killing me …

  “My pacemaker,” he says, looking me straight in the eyes.

  DAY 13: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

  Blinded by the Light

  I’m in the trunk. The backseat is open a crack so I can get some air. I can’t keep the seat totally closed because then it feels like I’m sleeping in a coffin. I’m doing something that I shouldn’t be doing—reading a comic book with my flashlight pen. I shouldn’t be wasting the batteries over something as stupid as Aliens vs. Predator, but when my stomach is growling so loud I can’t sleep, it really helps to think about something else. Even if it’s killer space creatures with acid for blood and spider-faced warriors that hunt humans and hang their chopped-off heads like trophies from trees. I whisper a promise to the furball sleeping at my feet—“One more page, just one more … then I’ll turn off the light.”

  I don’t get the chance.

  The screaming demons come back. It’s the same awful sound that exploded in my head just before the spaceballs attacked. I look at Cassie—she’s still sleeping. How is this possible? I can hardly breathe. I need more air. But if I open the seat maybe the sound will be even louder? I decide it doesn’t matter if I’m dead. I clamp the flashlight pen between my teeth, punch down the seat, and crawl outside. It makes no difference because the demons aren’t outside. They’re screaming in my head.

  And then they stop.

  The garage is dark, except for the thin beam coming from my flashlight. I blink, take some deep breaths. A soft blue light is coming inside from beyond the wall. It gets brighter and brighter. Then everything is blue. I know it’s the spaceballs. I reach out for the door handle and choke back a scream. My hands—I can almost see through them all the way to the bones. It’s like I’m disappearing! And my eyes feel like they’re on fire. I dive back into the trunk and lift up the seat. But my sleeping bag is wedged in the opening. It won’t close. I kick the seat down, which lets in more light. Cassie hisses at me.

  She looks normal. Why isn’t she disappearing?

  And then the light goes off.

  But not just the blue light—all light, everywhere. Even my pathetic little flashlight pen. It makes no difference if my eyes are open or closed. Am I blind?

  All I can think of is, the aliens are coming. They used the demons to wake us up, then the blue light to blind us. Now they’re attacking. I try to think of places to hide, but what’s the point? I can’t go anywhere because I can’t see. I might as well stay where I am. I reach out for Cassie, find her. She mews softly as I pull h
er close. I duck my head into the sleeping bag—the two of us alone in the swallowing dark. Waiting for monsters to find us. For tentacles to slide in through the windows and wrap around the sleeping bag and lift me screaming out of the car. I wish it was a dream, but I know it’s not.

  The gun! If only I could use the gun!

  Then I think, Like that’s going to help. A blind girl shooting in the dark at slimy tentacles that could probably crush this car. Brilliant! My ears grab onto every sound. Every tick, click, or rustling whisper of wind. And in the middle of all this, Cassie starts purring. Her tongue, small like a fingernail and sandpaper rough, licks my face. I realize I’m crying. “Stop that noise!” I whisper. “The aliens will hear you.”

  But Cassie doesn’t care about the drooling monsters. She doesn’t care about the fangs or the yellow eyes glowing over the trunk. All she cares about is licking the tears streaming down my face. I take a deep breath and use the rhythm of Cassie’s motor to settle me down. After a moment or two I have another thought—one that makes me smile.

  “Who knows?” I whisper. “Maybe the aliens are allergic to cats.”

  DAY 14: PROSSER, WASHINGTON

  Wicked Evil Grin

  Amanda: SUP?

  What’s up? How about “I’m too busy to pee”?

  Me: IM2BZ2P

  Amanda: LHO URAQT

  Laughing head off. You are a cutie. I’m liking the sound of this.

  Me: SUP w/U?

  Amanda: out of TP

  Out of toilet paper? Ha! I can fix that.

  Me: use $$$

  Amanda: YUK!!!!!

  She’s in a good mood. Not always looking over her shoulder. She’s wearing a purple University of Washington sweatshirt. It’s a little on the baggy side, but she makes it work.

  Me: UR happy 2day?

  Amanda: yes!!! BAM is KIA

  The skinny dude is dead? Cool. Right away I wonder, did she do it?

  Me: was it U?

  Amanda: WEG

  Wicked evil grin. She starts another sheet of paper, so I wait.

  Amanda: 2 men tak hm awy n

  And another …

  Amanda: bring us food/watr/meds

  Me: gr8 news!

  Amanda smiles. Actually “beams” is a better word. She claps her hands and spins. It’s like the goblin king just died.

  Amanda: thx. RUOK?

  Thanks. Are you OK? Not much going on here, except the news about Dad’s pacemaker. I decide not to rain on her parade. Besides, how do you text “pacemaker”?

  Me: SSDD

  Amanda looks puzzled.

  Amanda: WDYMBT?

  What do you mean by that? She doesn’t know SSDD? Dad walks into the room. He stands in front of the window, facing the apartments across the street. Maybe he sees her, but I doubt it. He reaches down his sweatpants and absently scratches his balls. Jesus! I look back up at Amanda. She’s writing, shaking her head.

  Amanda: ewww!!! PIR?

  Parent in room? Maybe she means, Perv in room? If only she knew. It doesn’t look like the ball scratcher is about to leave anytime soon, so I write, “Bye for now.”

  Me: sorry. B4N.

  Amanda: L8R

  Later. She waves and walks away. What? No kiss? This sucks.

  Dad picks up the sheet of paper on the floor with “SSDD” on it. He asks me what it means.

  I say, “Take a wild guess.”

  “Sad Santa disco-dances?”

  I say, “Guess again.”

  He says, “Same shit, different day.”

  My mouth drops open. He smiles, hands me the paper, and walks away.

  DAY 15: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

  My Lucky Day

  Good news: I’m not blind.

  Bad news: I’m totally out of food and water. Not a drop, not a crumb. I can’t sit in this car any longer. I have two hungry mouths to feed. But first I need to think about the dream I had last night. It was so good I don’t want to let it go.

  Mom and I are on the way to the ocean. She’s driving. We’re in a red convertible, a BMW I think, with the top down. The sun is shining warm and yellow in a clear blue sky—there aren’t any spaceballs anywhere. “Little Surfer Girl” is playing on the stereo and we’re singing along. In real life I don’t know the words, but this is a dream, so I do. Our hair is flying behind us in the breeze, and I’m wearing a pair of corny but very cool heart-shaped sunglasses. Mom points to a bunch of dots in the sky—at first I think they’re spaceballs, but it turns out they’re really kites with long red tails. Mom says we’re close, any second we’ll see it—the ocean. In real life I’ve never jumped in a wave, never even seen the ocean. So I stand on the seat, hands gripping the windshield and face in the wind—this is a dream, so I can do that—and look and look, but it’s just out of sight. But I smell it and taste it, the salt, the hot dogs, the suntan oil. Mom yells into the wind that we’re going roller-skating and buying fresh-squeezed raspberry lemonades. We’re going to smear ourselves with coconut oil and get tanned like movie stars! Then someone in the car in front of us throws a can of soda out the window. Mom yells, “Megs! Watch out!” but I just smile down at her and do nothing, and even though it’s going in slow motion, the can hits me in the head.

  That’s what wakes me up—I bumped my head on the roof of the trunk. I have a little bruise on my forehead, but it reminds me of the dream, so I don’t mind. At first I had a headache, too, but now it’s gone.

  The sun is high enough now that I can see what I’m doing, but there’s still plenty of good shadows for hiding. I figure it’s best if I don’t keep the briefcase with me, so I leave it buried under the trash. I hide my treasures in the trunk in a secret storage place under the carpet, next to the spare tire. Cassie is curled up on top of my sleeping bag. She’s peed on it at least twice, but who cares? I’m the only one that smells it. I stuff the empty water bottles in my backpack, slide my shoulders through the straps, and start walking. My destination: Level 1. I’ll work my way up from there.

  Halfway down I remember that I left the Aliens vs. Pred-ator comic on the front seat. I don’t have the energy to hike all the way back, so I tell myself it’s no big deal. Richie won’t notice. Everything else is hidden in a trunk he’s already searched.

  Level 1 is bad news. There’s this awful nasty smell, like a backed-up toilet. It doesn’t take long to figure out where it’s coming from. The green door opens. I duck behind a car and watch a woman and a little girl walk into the garage. The woman is carrying a bucket and a rag. The woman stands in front of the girl while she drops her pants and squats over the bucket. When she’s finished she wipes herself with the rag. Then the woman plugs her nose, picks up the bucket, lifts the top to the big green garbage can, and dumps in the contents, rag and all. She knocks on the door. It swings open and they walk inside. So Level 1 has a new name: The Sewer.

  I get all choked when I sit in our old car. It’s covered with even more dust. The clock that Mom bought at a Walmart in Nebraska on the second day of our trip is on the floor. I look at it and keep seeing the two of us escaping Zack and taking off on our great adventure. That was fun. Scary, but fun. I look around for a note. Nothing but more dust.

  I walk to my second home, the SUV. It’s a horror show. Someone, or something, ripped it to shreds. Hmm … I wonder who that could be. It looks like it was attacked by tigers with chainsaws. All the seats are slashed and the roof liner is pulled down. Too many memories here. Cassie’s cage is on the ground, bent and broken. I promise myself not to come back to this spot … ever.

  If Level 1 was a bust, then Level 2 is a gold mine. With all the trunks open it’s easier for me to search the nooks and crannies, the places Richie and Hacker were too stupid or lazy to look. I find a bag of pistachio nuts stuffed in a tennis shoe, and a short tube of Pringles potato chips under some jumper cables. But the showstopper is a big old Suburban that Richie and his gang have worked over so many times it looks like it’s been through a war. The spare, which is slashed—
Richie must have a thing about slashing tires—is bolted to the back door, which is unlocked. It’s pretty much empty except for jumper cables and a couple of STP oil cans. I’m about to give up when I notice that the carpeting has a seam down the middle and there’s a spot in the back corner where it’s loose, so I give it a pull. It’s held in place with strips of Velcro that keep peeling back and back until I see a black wooden door. I lift up the door. At first I think it’s just a bigger-than-normal compartment for the spare tire. But on this car the spare tire is kept outside. I poke my head into the space, and that’s when I know I found it—the jackpot.

  It’s like a small cave. Definitely not as high as the Volvo trunk—when I scrunch down flat the ceiling is two inches from my face. But it’s wide enough for two of me with my legs almost stretched out. There’s a thin foam pad on the floor that smells like beer and even small air holes drilled in the top. But the mother lode of them all is wrapped in a smelly horse blanket hidden in the far back. Three packs of Winston cigarettes, five emergency glow sticks, a first-aid kit with six PowerBars, maps of California, Oregon, and Washington, and a small container of pepper spray. I dig a little more and find a roll of ten twenty-dollar bills, two motorcycle magazines (both in Spanish), an opened package of spicy-hot beef jerky, and last but not least: two plastic freezer bags stuffed with marijuana. Or, like Zack called it, weed.

  I know weed when I see it. Zack took me with him when he bought it from a guy named Cal behind the PetSmart. He told me that taking a kid along makes the cops less suspicious. And he also told me that if I ever told Mom what we really did on these “trips to the pet store” he’d make me wish I didn’t have a mouth. Then he’d smile and buy me an ice cream on the way home. Zack would have done a belly flop onto a bed of nails for the smelly, dried-up leaves in this freezer bag.

  I jam some of the loot into my backpack, but not all of it. The PowerBars, pistachio nuts, Pringles, and one glow stick I stash in the hiding place. Oh, and the weed. Like, what am I going to do with that? The wooden door drops into place, the carpet seals, and the cave is closed. I used to dream about that when Zack was drunk, a secret hideout or cave I could use to disappear. Well, I think with a smile, now I have one.