Long Empty Roads

by Sean Little

  In the pharmacies, I took drugs. —Wait, that doesn’t sound right. I didn’t take drugs like a junkie. I mean I put drugs like antibiotics and similar pills into a bag and took them back to my RV in case I needed them later. I wasn’t a pharmacist, but I knew that antibiotics and painkillers had their uses. At the very least, an industrial bottle of ibuprofen could go a long way. I also went to the pharmacies because I figured that if someone had been there recently, it would show. I figured that pharmacies and grocery stores would be the places most likely for survivors to stop and try to resupply. I went to those places hoping to find signs that someone else was still alive.

  One of my hidden fears was that the drugs that currently existed would all go bad and I’d have nothing. I know that pharmaceuticals have expiration dates, but I didn’t know if those were just a safety thing, or if that was a hardline “take-this-and-you-will-die” warning. I survived the Flu, but I knew I wasn’t immortal. Infection could kill me. A good virus could kill me. Stupidity could kill me. How many people died because of a stupid accident in the days before antibiotics were commonplace? I made a mental note to plunder a book of natural remedies from a library before too long.

  Shipshewana, Indiana was a town of about 700 people before the Flu struck. As I entered the town limits now, it was abundantly clear that none of them made it. Grass towered in every lawn. Branches had fallen in storms. A thin patina of dust coated every surface. I slowed the Greyhawk to a crawl and crept through the empty streets.

  There was a single, tiny pharmacy in town. I pulled to a stop in front of it. A plain sign over the door read “The Shipshewana Pharmacy.” It was a small building, an old-timey looking little place. It was a rural pharmacy, no real frills, but still quite nice and quite necessary. The store’s name was emblazoned on the building on a vinyl sign made to look like a red-and-blue pill. A tattered OPEN flag hung in front of the store. The door was still intact. I hoped there would be adequate stores of medicine inside.

  I slipped out of the Greyhawk, grabbing the Remington shotgun and my rucksack with supplies as I did. “Stay,” I told Fester. This was another private joke. I knew he wasn’t going anywhere. He knew how good he had it.

  I walked to the door and pulled the handle. It wasn’t locked. It swung open easily, and I strode inside. Light from the glass door provided decent illumination in front of the store. The rear was dark. The store was narrow, the shelves still relatively stocked. The cold and flu medicine aisle was decimated, of course. I had yet to find a pharmacy with a well-stocked supply of Tylenol Cold & Flu. The first couple weeks of the Flu had caused a massive run on anything that might alleviate any symptoms. I slipped behind the counter and pulled my LED flashlight from the bag. I scanned the rear for any drugs that I might recognize or take for later. The antibiotic Z-packs were easy enough to find. The painkillers, too. Most medicine, though—I had no idea about what it was or what it did. The technical names were long and confusing and meant nothing to me.

  I did notice that one section of the store was picked over. Bleomycin. Cisplatin. Etoposide. Ifosfamide. In each of the spots labeled for those particular drugs, the shelves had been picked clean. No idea what those things were. It seemed strange, too. Why that one section of the store? I found a guide to pharmaceuticals and looked them up; they were all cancer drugs—specifically, testicular cancer. I checked the shelf again. In the light of my LED, I noticed marks in the dust. Fingers had left trails. Boxes had been moved after the dust had settled.

  AFTER the dust had settled.

  My stomach immediately twisted into a weird knot of hope and fear. Someone had been in here relatively recently. Maybe yesterday. Maybe not this week. Maybe not last week. But at some point in the last month at least, someone had been in this pharmacy. Someone was still alive and they were in or near Shipshewana, of all places. Forgetting the need to pilfer proscriptions, I ran out of the pharmacy. Part of me was elated that someone else was alive. Part of me was terrified that they’d be deranged and might shoot at me.

  I ran back to the RV and started it. Should I lay on the horn? Should I hide the truck? I had no idea what to do. I wanted to laugh, cry, and scream all at the same time. I pulled the RV down a street next to the pharmacy and threw it in park. I leapt out with the shotgun. I went back to the pharmacy and tried to find clues. There were faint footprints in the dust around the store. There was no record of whom, obviously. The footprints were faintly visible in front of the store, now that I knew to look. They looked like they left the store and headed slightly to the left. I guess that was as good a place to try as any. I started walking in that direction.

  I only made it half a dozen steps when I saw him. He was walking toward the pharmacy leaning heavily on a pair of metal canes, the kind with the braces that ran up the forearms. He was elderly, at least early 70s, maybe a little older. He was stick-thin, a slow-moving skeleton in green runner’s shorts and a black t-shirt with the rainbow prism from Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album cover on it. His head was bald, fringed by a shock of wiry, white hair, and complemented with a long, stringy white beard.

  I couldn’t help myself. Joy welled up in my chest like a spring. All sense of cool or concern left me. I started waving like a maniac. I yelled out, “Hey! Hey there!” I started to jog toward him.

  The man froze, his head whipping up. His jaw dropped open, and he looked at me with wide, terrified eyes.

  I realized I was holding a gun. “Oh. No, man. I’m…sorry.” Stopped, dropped to a knee, and laid the gun on the ground. I held up my hands to show I wasn’t armed. “I’m not going to shoot you. I’m a friend!”

  The man sank to his knees, slowly, painfully. He covered his face with his hands. I could see his shoulders twitching. He was weeping.

  I ran to him, stopping three paces back to give him space. “Sir? I’m sorry about that. I wasn’t going to shoot you. Honest. I’m not a violent guy.”

  The old man wheezed and sobbed. He looked at me with watery eyes. He couldn’t speak. Sobs wracked through his body. I don’t know why, but I started crying too. I stepped forward and sank to my knees in front of him. He reached spindly skeleton arms toward me, and we embraced. His arms felt like sticks around me, as if a strong wind would snap them in half, but there was a desperate strength in them. We held each other and sobbed for several moments. Neither of us could find words.

  When we finally separated, the man’s trembling hands grasped my shoulders. His fingers kneaded my flesh as if to make sure I was real. He held me at arm’s length. He blinked away tears and swallowed hard. Then, in a thin voice he asked, “Are you him? Are you the angel I’ve been praying for? Did you come to finally let me die?”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Hermit of Shipshewana

  What do you say to something like that? I had no witty comebacks. I did not even have anything comforting to say. I was stunned. My mouth opened and closed several times as I fought for words. Finally, I was able to muster, “I’m Twist.” I didn’t know what else to say. “I’m just a kid.” Technically, I was an adult, but I still felt like a kid. I didn’t know that I would ever feel like an adult, really. I stood frozen like a deer in headlights waiting for the old man to stop crying. Each second took an eternity.

  The old man wiped his eyes with trembling fingers, and he gave a coughing laugh. “Well, it’s good to see you, Twist. Damn good to see you. Good to see anyone, really.” He pulled me in for another hug, and we both started laughing. He clapped my back several times. The dull, hollow thumps felt good. It made me feel like I was real, like I wasn’t dreaming anymore. I returned the favor for him, careful not to hit too hard for fear of breaking him.

  When we finally separated, I got to my feet and helped him to his feet. Standing, he drew me in for another hug. I let him because it felt good to have friendly human contact again. I could feel his ribs with my forearms. I could feel his vertebra poking out in the skin on his back. It was abundantly clear that he was not well at all, and pro
bably not long for this world. It had to be cancer.

  He stood there for a moment, his hand on my shoulder to steady himself. Tears continued to leak from his eyes. He swiped at them with the back of his wrist. “Well, where are my manners? My name is Fisk. Doug Fisk. And it’s damn, damn good to see you.”

  “Twist,” I repeated. “It’s really good to see you, too.”

  “What kind of a name is Twist?”

  “Nickname. My real name was Barnabas.”

  Doug smiled widely. “I like Twist better.”

  “Me, too.”

  “It’s a lot more Mad Max, a lot more Road Warrior, if that makes any sense to you. Fits better in the apocalypse.”

  I was surprised that Doug knew his Australian apocalypse films. “That’s what I said!”

  Doug shook himself as if he was trying to wake from a dream. “Well, look at this—my first guest in more than a year, and I don’t even offer you a drink. Why don’t you come back to my place? I have food. I have water. Are you hungry?”

  “No, I’m fine. I have food, too. I’m well stocked.”

  Doug bent down to pick up his crutches. I kicked myself, mentally. I should have picked them up for him. My mother would have been mortified if she’d been there. She’s probably rolling in her grave. Doug didn’t seem to think ill of me, though. He said, “Well, what in the name of all that’s good and pure are you doing in Shipshewana?”

  I felt no fear, no deception in the man. I felt safe with him, strangely. I did not, for one second, think he was going to steal my RV or try to kill me. I told the truth. “I was looking for survivors.”

  Doug looked around at the empty streets in the tiny town that once held 700 people. “Here? In this town?”

  I shrugged. I know that I looked sheepish. “Well, anywhere. I just came here because the name of the town made me laugh.”

  The old man gave a short bark of a laugh. “I get that. I like that. You and me, Twist, we’re gonna get along just fine.” He started limping back in the direction where he’d been coming from. “C’mon, good sir. C’mon back to my place. I will put us out a feast! I’d kill the fatted calf if I had one. Chicken will have to do, instead.”

  I started to follow. I didn’t want to break the protocols of new friendships and first conversations, but I knew I had to bring up the drugs. “Were you headed to the pharmacy?”

  The smile ran away from his face. He hesitated, and then nodded. “Yeah…I…” His voice trailed away, and he laughed again. “I’m dying. Got the big C.” He stood in profile to me. “You can tell, right? I was diagnosed just before the Flu hit. Did two radiation treatments, and then the world ended. I went from making plans to leave all my things to my family, to watching my family die. Isn’t that a kick in the dick? Everyone died, and I was still there. Ironic, isn’t it?”

  “You were getting drugs to treat the cancer?”

  “I was getting painkillers. I used up all the cancer drugs a few months ago. Maybe that’s why I lasted so long. Now, it feels like I got lightning in my crotch and it hurts. I have been making myself walk over there once a day to get a day’s supply of painkillers.” Doug looked at the crutches. “Maybe today will be the last time I do that.”

  “Why not just bring the whole supply? You don’t look like you walk too well. No offense.”

  Doug waved off my comment. “None taken—I don’t walk too well at this point. But, I leave those drugs where they are. If I brought them all back with me, I might just decide to take all of them at once. Plus, this forces me to keep moving. It’s not much, but at this point, it’s my whole day. It keeps me going. It gives me a reason to get out of bed. The day I can’t do it anymore, I know that I’m short-timing it. I figure I’ve got time enough for lying around and not moving coming soon enough, so I better do what I can while I can.” He gave me a smile. It wavered for a moment, but he bit back the sadness. “Enough about that! Let’s go back to my place. We can talk and eat. It will be good to talk to someone.”

  “I have an RV—” I started.

  “Bring it!” Doug called over his shoulder. “It’s the white house, just over there.” He pointed to a simple white rambler. No frills. It was the type of house that I’d seen at least a hundred of in every town. The lawn grass was overgrown and all the windows were dirty. It was the type of place I wouldn’t have looked at twice if I had only been passing through town. It made me wonder if I’d accidentally passed other survivors.

  “To the feast!” Doug called. There was a spring in his crutch-aided steps. As I moved to the Greyhawk, I realized there was a spring in my steps, too.

  I parked the RV in Doug’s driveway. There were no shade trees in his yard, so I cracked all the windows for Fester, even the two front windows. I knew Fester wasn’t going to jump out, and I was certain that no one would happen by and snatch him. I still locked the doors to the RV, though, despite the fact that anyone could reach through the window and hit the power lock. Dumb, I know. Old habits die hard.

  Doug’s house was much cleaner than I thought it would be. The living room was simply decorated, a brown couch and recliner, and a large, flat-screen TV with a thick layer of dust on it. There were old pictures hanging on the walls. I saw Doug as a much younger man, a family man posed with a wife and three children in the cheesy Olan Mills-type family portraits done for church directories. There were pictures of the three kids as high school and college graduates, and pictures of weddings. Around those bridal photos and altar shots were pictures of grandchildren, school portraits with bright, excited smiles and fresh-scrubbed faces.

  “All gone now.” Doug’s voice startled me. I twitched. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s strange to hear someone else’s voice, isn’t it? I’m used to hearing my doddering old voice and that’s it.” He held out a glass for me. “Well water. Better than that bottled stuff you’ve been drinking, I bet.”

  I took the glass and took a long drink. He was right. The mineral tang on the tongue was a pleasant change to the sterilized, tasteless bottled water I had been drinking for the past year. Plus, it was much colder than the bottled water I’d been drinking all summer. It wasn’t refrigerator cold, but it was much colder than room temp or RV-in-the-summer-warm. Nothing beats icy cold water when the temperatures climb, but this was an acceptable second place drink. “It’s very good.”

  “Had to hook up a hand pump to the well when the power went out, but it’s been worth it. I pump up a couple of buckets in the morning and it lasts me all day.” Doug gestured to his kitchen. I followed him, taking a seat at his kitchen table. There were stacks and stacks of word puzzle magazines on the table.

  “It is how I passed the time,” he said with a sheepish grin. “I’d go through one of those things in a week. I ran out of my own supply, used up all the ones at the stores in the area, and had to take to rooting through my neighbors’ places for magazines with empty puzzles.”

  “I read a lot of books.” I told him about holing up in the Sun Prairie Public Library for the past year and tearing through their collection, sometimes reading two or three books in a day—depending on the length and how badly my winter depression had been affecting me.

  “Smart man,” Doug said. I don’t know why, but hearing him call me man made me feel really good. There was something easy about his nature, something overwhelmingly paternal. In the few minutes I’d known him, I already felt endeared to him. He was one of those old guys who felt like everyone’s Grandpa. I wanted him to take me fishing, for some reason.

  Doug had a wood-burning cook-stove in his kitchen. It had not been there originally. Part of his kitchen wall had been cut so the heavy exhaust pipe could be threaded to the exterior. The stove was cold now, though. The summer days made it far too warm to bear cooking indoors. “This is how I survived the winter.” He patted the old stove’s flattop. “Pretty much sat in here all day, every day. Kept this place nice and toasty. I had a bunch of neighbors with wood-stoves. Stole all their wood. I cook outdoors in the summer, tho
ugh.”

  Doug sat at the other vacant chair at the table. He rested his crutches against the wall next to him. He leaned forward and gave me an earnest, friendly smile. “So, Twist—tell me everything.”

  “Everything?” When someone asks you to tell them everything, where do you start? I hesitated.

  “Tell me, how did you survive the past year? You’re a young guy. You must be mighty resourceful. Did you carve your existence out of the wilderness Iron John-style?”

  “I don’t know about that.” I’ve never read Iron John. I had no idea what he was talking about. I took another long drink of water, and then I launched into my tale. I told him about burying my parents and my girlfriend, and then waiting to die under the big tree in my yard while reading Stephen King’s The Stand. I told him about realizing I was immune to the virus, and finding my dog Rowdy in the neighbor’s house, and then moving to the library. I talked about raiding stores and taking cars from the local Chevy dealership to explore the countryside. I talked about storing wood for the winter in the community room of the library. I rambled on and on, telling him every detail—except for three things: I didn’t tell him about how I almost put a gun to my head and ended myself, I didn’t tell him about finding two other living people, and I didn’t tell him about suffering hallucinations due to depression and isolation. I didn’t think I needed to start off our friendship by letting it drop that I might be nuts and that all the other survivors I’d met had died shortly after meeting me.