by Carl Meadows
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Part 1: THE RISING DARK
October 1st, 2010: DARK NEW DAYS
October 2nd, 2010: DEMONS AT THE DOOR
October 4th, 2010: DARK PURPOSE
October 6th, 2010: THE WALL
October 7th, 2010: THE HOME FRONT
MY GIRL
October 8th, 2010: FAITH
October 12th, 2010: RECOVERY
October 14th, 2010: WHY ME?
October 15th, 2010: THE DAY THE WORLD SHIT THE BED
October 16th, 2010: THE DAY THE WORLD SHIT THE BED, PART DEUX
October 18th, 2010: THE CUPBOARD UNDER THE STAIRS
Part 2: FAMILY AFFAIRS
October 21st, 2010: NO REASON WHY
October 25th, 2010: COME GET SOME
October 26th, 2010: OPERATION BIRTHDAY
October 28th, 2010: PARTY ON, DUDES
October 30th, 2010: DRAMA
November 1st, 2010: ALPHA AND OMEGA
HOPE
November 3rd, 2010: REUNITED
Part 3: DREAMS OF LIGHT AND DARK
November 5th, 2010: CHANGES
November 6th, 2010: SQUIRREL TURDS
WE WILL RISE
November 11th, 2010: IT’S OH SO QUIET
November 13th, 2010: WE’RE HUNTING WABBITS
November 17th, 2010: NO LUCK
November 20th, 2010: CONTACT
November 23rd, 2010: ASCENSION
November 25th, 2010: PROGRESS
November 28th, 2010: NOMADS
November 30th, 2010: WHITE CLOUDS
December 1st, 2010: EVERYTHING IS WHAT?
HOME
About the Author
About Chris Philbrook
Also by Carl Meadows
Dedication
PART 1
THE RISING DARK
OCTOBER 1st, 2010
DARK NEW DAYS
Hey Freya.
It’s been nearly two weeks since you left and more than a week since I last wrote. The weather has shifted to suit my mood, I think. Autumn has arrived with a vengeance and the last couple of days we’ve all largely been housebound thanks to a blast of rainstorms that has made going beyond the gate too miserable to warrant the effort. The last thing any of us needs is to get sick with a chill of some kind. The severity of any sickness will be amplified by our end-of-the-world vibe.
I have to keep reminding myself that I’m not the only one affected by your loss. You were popular here. Everybody loved you. Particles misses you more than anyone, I think. I’ve since learned that pugs have not only mastered the expressions of outrage, indignation, and contempt with ease; they also do a hell of a line in heartbreak. The little dude’s big eyes seem to be constantly holding back tears and I’ve seen him sitting by the glass doors, staring out into the rainswept yard in the direction of your grave, a forlorn whimper breaking everybody’s heart over and over again.
Everybody here has lost someone or something, whether it was before the world shat itself, or since, so grief isn’t new. Your death, however, has hit the lodge hard. You’re the first of our new apocalypse family we’ve lost. Well, you and Laura; I shouldn’t forget about her. She was always so detached though, and never really tried to fit in, lost as she was in her sea of pain while demons from the depths of her psyche raged at her in the quiet.
I still can’t let myself hate her. I want to, as wrong as that is. I need someone to blame for your death. I need a focus, a place to put this tight ball of rage that – on some days - just crushes the air from my lungs. Her suicide took you from us. From me.
I want to say how selfish she was to do that, to put everyone else in such peril by her actions, knowing that someone else could get hurt, but how can I possibly know what storms raged inside that head of hers? Shit, she was only twenty-two years old and used as an unwilling sex slave for three months, repeatedly raped by laughing men who would high-five each other after using her and the other captives to satisfy their lust, only to be thrown back in her prison, waiting for a repeat.
What a fucking awful existence.
I don’t know how I would handle that, so I’m not going to pretend to know what darkness lurked in her thoughts. Anyone on the precipice of suicide, teetering on that edge with only the slightest of nudges required to fall, doesn’t have thoughts of what comes after. That must be the darkest and loneliest of places to exist if oblivion is the only path you can envisage, and I guess she just wanted the noise to stop, with no thought for what lay beyond.
So, yeah. The two of you were the first casualties of our new apocalypse settlement, hence why I think this has hit everyone like a freight train. The thing that really scares me is that you’re unlikely to be the last, given the current state of the world. That terrifies me more than I can articulate.
We’ve done little other than grieve. After your funeral, I virtually locked myself away for the first three days. Selfish as all hell, I know, considering the hefty weight I hung around Nate’s neck in pulling the trigger for me, but I couldn’t function. I think I said in my last entry that I’ve never really lost anyone close to me before. Whenever someone I knew died, it was the obligatory shock and, “Ah man, that’s shit,” comment, but I never really felt anyone’s death before. I’ve never really been close enough to anyone except Dean and Maria to… well, to basically care enough, as shitty as that sounds. I knew a big circle of people pre-end of days, but those inside the circle of trust were few. Mostly, everyone else was in my triangle of suspicion or my square of disappointment.
I think I’ve done three of the grief stages these past two weeks. Denial and anger were certainly my go-to states early on. I couldn’t fathom I wouldn’t see or speak to you again, or huff with open envy at your radiant skin and flawless features, only to hear that musical laugh you had - which was like the tinkling of a bell - at my fake outrage. Anyone who came near me got the short and snappy version of Lockey, my only desire to be left alone with my little guy Particles so we could grieve. I’ve done a lot of apologising these past couple of days before I sat down to write again.
I don’t do depression well. I’ve mentioned before my moods are extreme ends of the scale; I’m in-your-face Tigger on crack, or I’m Eeyore after downers washed down with cheap bourbon having a pity-party for one. I don’t really have a middle ground. Laugh or cry, that’s me.
I’ve moved, I think, to the bargaining stage now. I’m looking for meaning, I’m reaching back out to those around me and as expected, they held no ill will or judgment. The hugs I got from Maria and Norah made me realise I should have reached out much earlier to them, but when grief puts its big boot in the crack of your ass, you don’t get much wiggle room. Logic and reason go right out the window.
So, here I am, back at the keyboard. I realised just how much my storytelling and rattling stream of consciousness helped keep my emotions and thoughts in some kind of order, and it’s weird how therapeutic it’s become now. This is my version of lying on a couch and talking about the random shit storm of thoughts and feelings that make me who I am. It’s a release in a way. Lord knows, I’m in need of some therapy after everything.
I’ve processed everything this past week. The god-awful fuckery here at the lodge when I heard Ariel’s mind break and I had to leave her, the horror of the apartment block and its tales of tragedy, pulling the trigger on live people at Castle Bancroftstein for the first time, the sight and stench of the ten women executed there, and then you, Freya. You were the weight that tipped me over, that caused me to crumble under the pre
ss of emotion that had been threatening to consume me for weeks.
So, now you’re my therapist, which is kind of weird when you consider it. It’s your death I’m trying to come to terms with after all. Talking to you, while you silently listen wherever you are, unable to respond, about your death? Hmm. Yeah, it’s weird, but it’s all I’ve got.
Everyone has done their part in holding shit together. I mean, it’s not like I’m the keystone to our little settlement here, but I am Nate’s only reliable partner for venturing beyond the gate. He’s used this grieving time to start live firing with Alicia and Mark, busying himself with the familiar, as your death only emphasized just how much we lack in both defence and attack. Norah’s knowledge of the shotgun is a handy last resort – as displayed in dealing with Laura’s reanimated body – but the woman is in her early sixties and isn’t going to be clearing buildings or pulling sentry beyond the gate, though I don’t doubt she could. That woman is a rock.
Nate and I can’t be the only active shooters, so Alicia and Mark need to get up to speed. By all accounts, they’re doing pretty well. Safe, sensible, and steady, at least when doing drills. You never really know how anyone’s going to react when the shit hits the fan, until said shit hits the aforementioned fan and it starts flinging around. Still, all the groundwork is done.
This situation got me thinking about who else is out there, as well. Bancroft’s macabre setup won’t be the only band of survivors we come across I’m guessing, and we can’t bank on any new communities or individuals we cross paths with being amenable to trade or alliance. People are suspicious, scared, and desperate, and those three things make for an explosive mix. Plus, some people – as Bancroft adroitly showed us – are just fucking rotten.
Sigh.
Anyway, I will continue to grieve, but I’ve had my self-indulgent pity party, and winter is coming. There’s a lot to think about, and a shit ton of stuff to do, so now I have to put my own feelings aside for the moment and join the collective again.
And the best way to start these dark new days is with a hot shower.
OCTOBER 2nd, 2010
DEMONS AT THE DOOR
The rain has finally let up, but the world outside is drowned, so we’re still getting under each other’s feet. There isn’t a great deal of personal space to be had except when sequestered away in our own rooms, so it’s taking time to really get used to this new way of life. Still, they’re good people, and everyone is making the best of it we can.
I’m grateful for Grace and Theo’s bungalow attached the lodge, though it’s a little emptier without you here, Freya. I can’t face going into your room just yet, though I know I’ll have to eventually. Hell, sooner or later, we’ll have to give that space to someone else, but it’s too soon right now. For the moment, it’s still just me, Nate, and Particles living in here.
I decided to use my renewed desire for contribution by helping Nate with the weapons maintenance. He’s a stickler for regular cleaning and to be honest, the simplicity of the task was what my brain needed. I was doing something of value, as I hate sitting idle, but it’s not taxing. Nate is also great to be around when you’re low because he’s so unobtrusive. If you just want to work in silence, he lets you, and the two of us spent an hour in comfortable quiet, each with our own thoughts, as we worked our way through the weapons that needed attention.
I have to keep reminding myself what I asked of him, so I don’t forget the burden I placed on him that day we lost you. He took that gun from me, pulled the trigger that you’d asked me to pull, without hesitation or word of recrimination. He takes so much on himself, when he must already carry so much from his time in the military, and he does so without expectation or need for gratitude. He just does it, no questions asked, no judgment.
I felt it was time I addressed it. We’d been sitting in silence at the bungalow’s small dining table, the smell of gun oil hanging in the air, when I finally spoke up.
“I never thanked you,” I said quietly.
He didn’t look up from his work. “For?”
“For… Freya.” I had to forcibly push your name out.
“None needed.”
“In that you’re wrong,” I sighed. “After door nine….”
He cut me off, still not looking up as he worked at one of the rifles. “When you can’t carry the weight, you let your team share the burden.”
“You keep putting that burden on yourself,” I chided.
“I can carry the weight.”
“Can you though?” I put the cloth down and looked at him squarely. “Can you ever really get used to this kind of weight?”
“I didn’t say I was used to it, Erin,” he said softly. “I said I can carry it. You never get used to it, not if you’ve got anything left of your humanity.”
He sighed, putting down the cloth and moving to the kitchen counter, where he checked the kettle’s level, then flicked the switch, my eyes drawn to the little red light. Neither of us said a word as he took two cups from the cupboard, spooning coffee from a jar into each, before he turned back to me and leaned on the kitchen counter, folding his thick arms across his chest.
“You’ve adapted better than most to this new world,” he said. “But there are things now that no amount of training and drills can prepare you for. That young couple…” His words trailed off for a moment as he swallowed a hard lump, closing his eyes as he took a slow breath, gathering himself before continuing. “What we saw in that apartment is unheard of. I’ve seen the worst of the worst do the worst you can imagine to their fellow man, and I still wasn’t prepared for that. But I’ve learned over a long career and bitter experience how to compartmentalise, Erin. I’ve learned to spread the weight over time, but I don’t ever get used to it, and I’d never want to. It reminds me I’m still human.”
“I just want this feeling to go away,” I admitted. “To box it off.”
Nate shook his head, turning back to the kettle as it came to the boil. We both waited in silence for the light to flick out.
“Grief doesn’t go away, Erin,” he said, eyes fixed on the stream of boiling water as he poured. “Despite what people say, time isn’t a healer. You never really heal from grief. All you do is learn to manage it better. It’s a sneaky bastard though, and you’ve always got to be aware of it, or it will creep up on you when you least expect it.”
I absorbed this, nodding my thanks as Nate placed a fresh black coffee on the table in front of me as he returned to his chair. We sat in silence for a moment again, both sipping at our steaming beverages, sorting through our private thoughts.
“You’re just starting out,” he said, drawing me from my mental wander. “I don’t expect you to be able to put these things in a box and shove it to the dusty corners of your mind in a handful of weeks or months. You’ve lost a friend for the first time, and grief never gets easier, but there’s something particularly raw about that first experience. It rips a hole in you that you think can never be filled and will forever remain… empty.”
He sipped at his cup again, no doubt recalling that first ragged wound of his own grief that he spoke of, and that made me wonder at it too. There’s still so much I don’t know about Nate, and he hasn’t talked of his life before the world ended in any great detail. In truth, I haven’t asked, even though I’ve joked before I was going to. Who knows what wounds lie there? I don’t want to be the one to aggravate them and I figure he’ll tell me in his own sweet time. If I’ve learned anything from my first experience of real grief, it’s that grief is a very private thing. I wouldn’t want anyone questioning me if I wasn’t ready to talk about it, so until he is, Nate’s history is his own.
“Freya wasn’t even dead, and you were already grieving, denying it was happening, asking questions of yourself if there was another way, whether there was something you could do to stop this god-awful thing from happening.” He shook his head. “There wasn’t, Erin. There was nothing you could do. Pulling that trigger yourself, at that moment,
would have taken something that you weren’t ready to lose just yet.” He put his cup down and in a rare show of physical affection, he placed his callused hand over mine, his eyes boring right through me. “You didn’t put a burden on me, Erin,” he said, his voice resolute. “You allowed me to take one from you, and that’s a big difference. Don’t ever apologise for asking for help.”
I cried again then, and Nate held on to my hand, the rough callus of his thumb coarse against my skin, as he gently rubbed the back of my hand. He didn’t say anything else, just let me purge myself of the swell of emotion that had been building through the conversation.
I’d felt such terrible guilt during the time I locked myself away. Guilt that I couldn’t do what you asked of me, Freya, and guilt for asking Nate to endure the pain of your mercy killing. I’d thought I was so weak, yet the truth is simpler than that, I’ve realised. Nate’s words reassured me that it isn’t me that’s weak.
It’s that Nate is so damn strong.
He carries so much weight for me, for all of us, so it has me wondering; who helps him with his burdens? Sooner or later, after so many years of death, and misery, and pain, what is this man’s limit? It seems endless, which has me in awe of him, but for all the strength he has, that strength has to be finite. It has to be.
As I dried the tears with the cuff of my sleeve, I made a silent promise to myself in that moment. When that time came, when the weight that Nate carried became too much, when I saw him finally buckle under that strain, I would be the one to stand beside him when the demons came knocking at his door. No matter what it cost, no matter how it might break me, I’d do it.
Because that’s what you do for family.
OCTOBER 4th, 2010
DARK PURPOSE
So, yesterday I nearly died of fright.
Obviously, I didn’t, because here I am, writing about my weird moment of stark terror, but I think I’ve ruined one pair of pants for all time. Scared the shit near clean out of my arse.
