River's Rising

by Dan McNeill

  "Yeah, Po guesses you're right about that Waymond," he said, slowly putting his pole back into the water.

  "You know I love you buddy, right? You know that whenever I talk like Grandpa Lou, it's because I love you. It's for your own good, you know."

  "Po always knows you love Po, Waymond, no worries. But Po not know what happened to Po's good."

  "Huh?"

  "To Po's good Waymond. You're always telling Po you doing it for Po's own good. Po thinks his good is right where he left it. In his sock drawer!" He started to laugh but instead let out a deep stanky belch while he slapped Raymond on the knee.

  Raymond wasn't sure if Po was being serious or if this were just a joke. Probably a little bit of both, knowing Po. Sometimes Raymond wished he could treat Po like a brother again, like the wise old goof he used to climb trees with and giggle at when he read. But those days were long gone. By necessity, that relationship had changed.

  Raymond leaned back and smiled, tugging at his line. "Listen bud, there's enough good in you to fill a zillion sock drawers."

  Po's puffy cheeks turned a rose red as he looked down at his bobber floating on the lake's surface. With a tiny ripple as a warning, something grabbed hold of his line and pulled it under the surface fast. Shaking his head in surprise, he sat up straight, looking over at Raymond with a big nervous grin.

  “Hang on!" Raymond shouted, not wanting to say anything else and make him nervous. Nope, he wanted his brother to bring this one in all on his own.

  Po looked ready. Standing up, he focused hard, making sure not to let the fish out of his site. Slowly, he reeled the fish closer. Raymond could tell it was not going to come easy. The fish stopped fighting long enough for Raymond to grab a look at him. With dark blotches lining its side, Raymond could tell the fish was a largemouth bass. He forced out a smile that didn't do much to hide his look of worry. These guys were jumpers.

  “Keep at it Chewie! You almost got him!” Raymond shouted, trying to sound upbeat. The last thing he wanted to do now was to freak him out. “Get him on the shore and I’ll help you hold it down.”

  Po hesitated, and for a second, it almost looked like he was going to flip forward into the drink. Focusing hard, Po reached over, and with a serious swoop, grabbed the line and slammed the fish onto the dry ground between him and Raymond.

  Raymond cheered - for his brother's unorthodox way of doing pretty much everything and at keeping his confidence. As for the squirming fish - with Po’s considerable upper arm strength, the bass remained more passed out than Raymond was after over-imbibing on Grandpa Lou's rum-spiked punch. Whistling Aunt Rhodie, Raymond removed the hook from the fish's mouth and placed the catch into their cooler. They would eat tonight.

  “So," Raymond said as he closed the lid. "How about a story for the star fisherman?”

  Po put his pole down so fast Raymond thought it was going to crack. He sat up straight and looked back at Raymond with his full attention. Po squirmed his hand into his lime-green windbreaker, removing a slightly tattered book with a faded green cover. With a wide grin, he handed the book over to Raymond.

  Po loved stories. Any stories, really. He loved hearing them, he loved watching them and he especially loved make-believing them. Of course he especially loved this story.

  But the one time "giggly book" was now like a poison for Raymond. It was in fact the only sickness that Raymond caught from the two-weeks of the Rapture. Two weeks.

  Raymond recalled that clearly. It started on a Saturday. He remembered that because they cancelled football practice when the news reports started screaming slaughter. Two Saturday’s later and everyone was gone. Almost everyone.

  Raymond’s memories of those two weeks of chaos were jumbled and unclear. Like a rapid-shot YouTube video of washed out images and tinny sounds - of their mother’s suffering wails, of fires from the looters. And the sound of their dad's timid voice reading the Giggly Book to Po.

  Yes, their father, who had completely disappeared during the weeks leading up to the outbreak, suddenly had decided to show up. He looked tired and distraught, wearing a tattered corduroy sports coat that reeked of sweat. Raymond never got a closer look than that.

  He was home less than a day. While Raymond's mother sat in the other room coughing up blood and shitting out her insides, his father locked himself in the room with Po. And read to him. On occasion, he would come out for a couple of minutes and check on his wife. Muttering pointless apologies as her limbs atrophied into dried out cancerous nubs, he would retreat in haste back to the room with Po. Later that night, without a word, he was gone.

  Raymond tried to rebury the fury. “So,” he said, forcing a smile. “Where should we start?”

  Po tapped his head with his finger, pretending to ponder the question. Raymond knew where he’d have him start – the part where Dorothy first arrives in Oz.

  “Hmmm...how about...” Po said.

  Raymond began turning to the page.

  “How about the part where Tin Man saves the Queen of the Field Mice from the Wildcat? Po wants to hear about that Waymond.”

  "Really?" Raymond stared at Po with a puzzled look. "What makes you want to start there? We never start there.” Raymond knew that on most occasions, they never even got to that part.

  Po looked back at Raymond, seemingly just as puzzled. “Oh, Po don't know Waymond,” he said, shaking his head. “Po just guesses he likes it when the little mice go back and save Lion.”

  Of course it was about saving the Lion. The Cowardly Lion. It was about saving Abraham. After the great day they had fishing, Raymond didn't want to get into it with him. He'd let this one go.

  “Sure bud,” Raymond finally said, starting to thumb through the chapters. "Whatever you want."

  Coming up to the page, a sharp yelp came from one of the nearby cottages. Raymond looked up. It was Rowdy and by the sound of things, he must have encountered something. The dog was running into the woods, barking furiously now.

  “Hey,” Raymond said, trying to hide his concern. “How about we have story time at the campfire tonight, during dinner? I’ll even break out the Green River, in honor of your catch! But right now, it sounds like Rowdy might need our help.”

  “No pwob Waymond,” Po replied. “Po’ll bring the gear back home. You just be careful, all right?”

  “Of course,” he smiled. With Po lumbering back up to their cottage, Raymond ran off to check on Rowdy.

  The dog's barking seemed to be coming from the street in front of their house. Sprinting past the small cedar shed Raymond used to dry fish, he grabbed a baseball bat and jogged between the grove of apple trees. As he turned the corner to the front of the house, he held the bat high, ready to swing.

  But there was nothing there. Almost nothing. Standing in front of the cabin where Mr. and Mrs. Beatty used to live was Rowdy. He was staring off at something beyond the thickly overhanging branches at the end of the property, past which was the dam that Raymond and Po would fish off of on occasion. Raymond approached him cautiously, holding the bat up over his shoulders.

  “What is it boy?” Raymond asked. Following Rowdy’s gaze, Raymond tried to find what it was he was so obsessed with. Then, on one of the tall branches of an expansive maple overlooking the lake, Raymond could make out a single bushy-tailed squirrel, prancing down the trunk onto a crooked power-line pole. “You made me come all the way out here for this?” Raymond gave him a shrill whistle to get his attention. “Come on,” he commanded. “Let’s get back to the house. Po caught a fish big enough for all of us. If you're lucky, I may even give you some.”

  Rowdy obeyed, as he always did. But as they began their walk back to the cottage, Raymond couldn’t help but notice Rowdy’s curious attentions constantly being tugged back to whatever he had noticed just moments earlier. Raymond also couldn’t stop thinking about something else. Rowdy didn’t care much for squirrel.

  Chapter 2

  With the sun setting, Raymond tossed a few more logs onto the
campfire. It was raging now, painting the sandy beach behind their cabin with a carpet of glowing ash and cinder. While the dancing flames of the campfire reminded Po of happier times, Raymond made sure the flames were stoked for a more practical reason. To keep away the wolves.

  For Po, it was about family. Everything was. The smell of the fire meant the opportunity to relive fond memories of a time when, for a change, he was an equal in the Bean family. A time when he and his siblings would stay up late eating junk food, playing pranks on their cousins in the adjoining cabin. All in all, they were times when Po was at the center of the action, not because of his disability, but because of his gift. And Po had one hell of a gift.

  Po could tell a great story. He got it up from their Grandpa Frank, on their mom’s side. Grandpa Frank was a Harley-riding hooligan who played the fiddle and had partied one time with the Dropkick Murphys - Raymond's favorite band. Raymond had great memories of sitting around the fire pit at their old house while Grandpa Frank used to alternate between telling tales from when he was a punk kid in Dublin and reading from his Amazing Stories collection. It’s probably where Po got his love for science fiction movies – and his gift for spinning his unique brand of yarns.

  Raymond passed Po the last can of Green River while the embers from the still smoldering logs continued to glow. Reaching for another log, he looked over at the sun, admiring it as it inched below the horizon of the lake. Normally, Raymond didn’t like to keep Po out past dusk. But today, maybe he could make an exception.

  “Ah-hem,” Po said, clearing his throat. “Ready."

  “All right, go for it,” Raymond said, munching down the last piece of fish.

  Placing his thick hands on his knees, Po heaved his head back and belched while simultaneously singing, "Kiss Me, I'm Shitfaced" - Raymond's favorite song by the Dropkick Murphys and the only time Po would allow himself to cuss (since a burping cuss apparently didn't count). He nearly got to “and I only bought her one round” before running out of gas. It might have been Po’s personal best.

  Po rested his Superman doll on the red cooler that sat between him and Raymond. "When are we going to go back and look for Abe again?" he asked.

  "I dunno," Raymond said. "Maybe right after the last snow."

  "That's what you told Po last year Waymond. We can do it you know. Everyone needs saving you know."

  Raymond got up and ducked behind a tree, pretending he had to go take a piss. He hated this conversation. Despised anything really that had to do with Abe. Why would they want to risk what they had here to rescue a coward.

  He also hated it because he knew Po was right. Before his mom died, before she took her last tortured, plague-filled breath, she sang to him. Just a song. No philosophical one liners. No heartfelt final words of wisdom. Just a song.

  What a Wonderful World. At the time, Raymond had no idea why she sang it. It was beautiful, sure. And it was another thing that Po did that made Raymond laugh (Po's Louis Armstrong imitation was a spot-on Yoda). But why that song? And why then?

  It wasn't until months later, after the streets grew silent, after even the Death Collectors disappeared, when Raymond figured it out. He and his two brothers sat shivering in their basement going through the last can of food from their supplies. Perhaps to lighten the mood, Po started to sing. To sing mom's song. And Abraham started to cry.

  The basement. Years ago. The song was playing on a scratchy old vinyl album from mom's vintage stereo while she vacuumed upstairs. Po was talking to Raymond's G.I. Joes in the rec room while Raymond played video games. Abe was reading Catcher in the Rye. Again.

  There was a loud bang from upstairs and their mom started screaming. The three of them raced upstairs to find that dad's old bookshelf and fallen over onto her legs. Raymond could see bone.

  "Lift!" she yelled at them. But the book shelf was massive and they were only like nine years old. In those days, Po was short and flabby.

  "Lift it!" she yelled again. They looked at each other, put their hands underneath the top shelf and lifted it just enough for mom to shimmy herself out. Abraham called 911.

  When he returned, mom pulled them all together in a hug. "Together, you three can do wonders."

  Po was the last to let go of that hug. He wanted to keep it going forever. He knew that this moment was perfect and that the second he let go, everyone would go back to their corners to prepare for the next round. The fight between the twins that would never end.

  Ultimately, this was what Raymond was trying to protect. Po's innocence. Their mom's memory. Even in some small way, their family's honor, what was left of it anyway, Raymond guessed. Po, in the stories he'd tell around the campfire at night, was the carrier of it all. This is what he would sacrifice everything for. This right here.

  Po looked up. It started like it always started. A far off buzzing sound, wheezing in and out like a lawn mower engine starting to go bad. A screech turning into a steady yet pounding wail. When they first started hearing the sound, Raymond thought it could be a misfiring air raid siren. But no. Air raid sirens didn't move.

  On this night, the distant sounds seemed to be quieter than normal. But the sounds still were a collection. A swarm of something playing in unison.

  Po got up and sat next to Raymond, taking his hand. Po knew. He knew that nothing scared Raymond much but that this sound did. He knew it terrified him. He smiled at Raymond, chugged down the last drop of his soda pop....

  "I play in a band..." he belched. "We're the best in the land..." he burped. "We're big in both Chelsea and France..." he gurgled. "I play one mean guitar and..."

  That was it. Out of gas again. Po swung his arm around Raymond's shoulders as the screeching sound fell away into silence.

  "Crap!" Raymond blurted out. "The water jug. The one you knocked over. We need to go fill it up before it gets too dark, else you’ll have to drink lake water for breakfast!"

  "Well let's go do it now Waymond," Po said, standing up as Rowdy ran to his side. "Po'll need time to tell you the story!"

  Nodding in agreement, Raymond slung Remmy over his shoulder as he let Po and Rowdy lead him up the long sloping hill back to the main road. Po pulled out his Superman doll for some extra protection. With the glow of their fire pit disappearing back by the shoreline, the dark shadows of empty cabins filled the void. So much had changed here.

  Vegetation unchecked grew wildly now in the strangest of places – thorny red roses popping out from the front seat of a yellow Ford Mustang convertible, an apple tree growing out in the middle of a back yard hot tub, sunflowers drooping over a port-a-potty in front of a half-constructed cottage. From within the crumbling foundation of the old Peterson cottage Raymond could now pick blueberries. A baby birch tree had even sprung up in the pool house of the O’Toole cottage, where her mom and the ladies would play bridge in the summers while Po played X-Box with Mrs. O’Toole’s son Connor.

  Po and Connor were best friends – and not just because they both had Down syndrome. When they weren’t playing video games at Connor’s cottage they were out running around Lake Como catching frogs that Connor would toss into the oversized black cowboy hat he always wore. Sadly the O’Tooles only lived up here in the summers and were back in Illinois when the virus hit. Raymond had guessed Connor didn’t survive. Another sadness he kept buried in silence.

  “Stop Po!” Raymond grunted, grabbing Po by the arm as he forced him back behind a row of wildly overgrown hedges. A herd of dark shadows were making their way up the street.

  Horses. Four of them. Raymond stopped holding his breath. He'd seen this bunch before. Part of the clan that came from the old stables on Lee Street.

  Stepping over twisting vines that marked where Lincoln Avenue used to be, Rowdy headed north past a block of cottages that Raymond never ventured into anymore – not since he saw bears there three months ago. Raymond took another cautionary look around, instinctively passing his hand over the butt of his rifle. He’d long-since taken from the homes anything they
might need to survive. As far as he was concerned, if the bears could make use of the flat screen TVs and cedar-planked hot tubs, they were more than welcome to them.

  Before long, Rowdy had led them to the old hand crank water pump. The “Laughing Well”. That’s what people from Lake Como used to call it. Raymond didn’t remember why, but he did remember Gramps taking him to the pump when he was a child. Back then, it had been painted fire-engine red, but over the years, most of that had chipped off, revealing a scratchy sort of gun metal gray.

  Approaching the pump, Po bent over and held the big plastic jug under the rusty spout as Raymond began pumping the handle. It took a few seconds for the water to come up from the well.

  The water came out, first in squirts, then in gushes as Raymond pumped the handle. Po held the jug firmly as it filled. Gathering water was a one-person job, but Raymond always was sure to give Po a role in everything. In days like these, they all needed a sense of purpose.

  When the jug was filled, Raymond pulled it aside, letting the pump run a little longer so Rowdy could quench his thirst. He tossed his hair back behind his shoulders and gave Po the thumbs up. “I hope you ate your spinach this morning Po-Pye, because you’re carrying back the bucket. I’m taking a break.” With that, Raymond sat down on the large old rock next to the water pump, rested his rifle by his side and stretched out.

  “Po-Pye! Ha! That's right Waymond!” Seeing that Raymond was taking a breather, Po took it as an opportunity to say his prayers. Grasping the tiny silver cross he wore around his neck between his forefingers, he bowed his head and began to mutter his wishes.

  Po's prayers were nearly always the same - not that Raymond always listened in. Unlike most people, it was quite seldom that Po ever asked for things during his prayers. He talked to dead people and past pets. His mom, their dad, their grandparents and a multitude of gerbils, fish and rabbits- Goldie, Hermy, Tony, Buck, Butch and Bob, on this evening. Raymond paid attention last year when Po started adding Abe to his list. Secretly, the addition of Abe to Po's dead family prayer group made Raymond more than a little happy. But he would never say that to Po.