Barren Waters - The Complete Novel: (A Post-Apocalyptic Tale of Survival) (33 page)

“Not this woman! I want drugs!” she’d screamed.

He remembered the birth fondly. Susan had always been strong, and true to form, hadn’t wavered in this. People always said the birth of a baby was the closest thing to a miracle, and to Jeremy it was. He would never forget that day. It brought their family together as nothing else had before or since. Olivia tended mother and baby with quiet assurances while Liam panicked outside the doors. Jeremy still didn’t know how his mother had done it, but remembered later how she’d confessed that her confidence had all been an act. She’d laughed, eyes glittering, and shrugged her shoulders.

“I just figured a woman’s body would do what a woman’s body was supposed to do. My job was just to be there to cheerlead.”

Jeremy thought of that day and of all the days since. They’d been through so much: all the planning, all the secrets, all the wins and losses and countless sacrifices. Liam’s death, and Susan’s, it had all led up to this single moment—a moment that would matter little if Jeremy lost her now. He couldn’t. Couldn’t bear it. Couldn’t lose them both in the span of a single year. He couldn’t live through that. Not even for Seth.

A sob tore from his throat as his eyes searched each empty room after the next. He thought of the sparkling sea glittering just outside the glass siding of the building, imagined its shimmering surface and the silence of its depths below. He pictured the miles and miles of empty water, turquoise slowly fading to black. Nothing existed in that void. Nothing lived. It was a tub filled with water and a graveyard of bones.

He imagined the hills and valleys of the ocean floor, of the smooth curves of jutting whalebones in castles atop the sand. He thought of the hundreds of shark teeth covered by a fresh layer of sediment each year, and the trash that would forever be mixed in. Perhaps if Sam died then he would join the bones, he thought suddenly. Perhaps if she died then he would find a small boat, row past the breakers and white caps, find a place where the shoreline wasn’t visible. Perhaps then he’d cast himself over the side and join the silence of the dead. Perhaps his bones would settle with the teeth, be covered by sediment and forever captured in a sandy tomb. It was fitting really. It was where he belonged. He had done terrible and monstrous things to get them here, and after all was said and done, all those things may have been for nothing. She might die anyway, and he would belong in the depths of those barren waters.

He sprinted from the room and sighted the last set of double doors just down the hall. Entrance to these required a thumb or palm print against a scanner—he wasn’t sure which. He slapped it in anger and flung himself against the door. How was this happening? After all this shit? How?

He startled to the sounds of Seth’s running feet and turned, unable to draw a breath. The boy stopped short, empty hands lifted high. He wilted. He’d found nothing. Jeremy whirled in anger and slammed his shoulder against the wall. He was sure the disks were in there. It made sense. It was the treasure vault—the treasure that always seemed to elude him. He howled with rage and hurled his body against the door.

“Wait!” Seth screamed. “The counter!”

Jeremy turned and growled. “What counter? What are you talking about?”

“You laid her across the counter. But I remember there was something inside the glass.”

Jeremy froze.

The unconscious mind works in mysterious ways. People see thousands of things in a day—hundreds of thousands in fact—yet often don’t process the images till much later. The concept was actually one of the scientific theories behind dreams. Dreaming, scientists believed, was the mind’s attempt to assemble and organize images as it rests. And so Jeremy’s mind organized. It tripped over the images as he replayed them in his mind: their entrance into the structure, both wild and chaotic, the beautiful figure of the cardboard woman, the pallid tone of Sam’s cheeks, the dustiness of the counter where he’d lowered and left her body, the oblong cylinder resting on sapphire velvet inside the glass case.

He sucked in a breath. Dear God! An applicator was right there. Just below he glass. It had been there all along.

He raced back to the reception area and pushed through the white double doors. Sam was still breathing, though just barely so. Jeremy lifted her from the case, set her gently on the floor. He pushed himself to his feet, viewed the case with fresh eyes and wept. It was there. He just hadn’t seen it.

The pressure of a stone pressed against his palm and he dropped his eyes to Seth. The boy nodded and stepped back, and Jeremy approached the glass and slammed the stone against its lower right corner. It splintered but didn’t break, an intricate pattern spidering from a small hole. Again and again, Jeremy dashed stone against glass till it shattered.

Lifting the small applicator from the cushioned velvet, he was suddenly aware of his own sobbing. He knelt at her side, lifted the corner of her shirt, and inserted the applicator in the unit at her belly. It clicked into place and he held his breath as he pressed the plunger. Seth’s hand found his own as the numbers began to rise.

The sea is nature's vast reserve. It was through the sea that the globe as it were began, and who knows if it will not end in the sea! Perfect peace abides here. The sea does not belong to despots. On its surface immoral rights can still be claimed, men can fight each other, devour each other, and carry out all earth's atrocities. But thirty feet below the surface their power ceases, their influence fades, their authority disappears. Ah, sir, live, live in the heart of the sea! Independence is possible only here!
Here I recognize no master! Here I am free!

-Jules Verne,
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

“Guys, it won’t hurt you,” Jeremy called out from his blanket on the sand. He laughed at the two of them as they ran to the edge of the water and back. They would creep to its edge then scamper from the tide in a cacophony of giggles. “It won’t kill you, goofballs. You can at least dip your toes in it.”

As usual they ignored him. The game was much more fun, he supposed. He turned his gaze to Sam and smiled. She looked amazing. Her burns had healed and she’d put on a fair amount of weight—at least ten pounds by Jeremy’s estimate. And for a girl as slim as she, ten pounds was noticeable. The morning they’d found the disk in the case, Jeremy and Seth had sat by her side and wept. The moment the meter at her belly had reached 100% was without a doubt the most satisfying of Jeremy’s life to date. Afterward, they’d moved her to a square of light by the door and coaxed her into drinking a bit of water. Seth had stayed by her side while Jeremy ran to his bike to retrieve the crowbar.

It had taken him two hours, a stream of ugly curse words, and a sprained wrist to get through that security door, but in the end the reward was breathtaking. Rows and rows of unshipped disks waited just beyond the doors. Cartons of them, boxes, cases, and crates—more than enough to last Sam one hundred lifetimes or more.

That’s the thing about the end of the world, Jeremy mused, all the stuff that remains, the overabundance for the few who are left behind. Sam was one of the lucky ones. No, Jeremy corrected—perhaps the
only
lucky one. The only one of her kind at least. It was quite a humbling thought, one that brought to mind images of street wars occurring all across the country at that very moment, of the struggles for power and the games of tug-of-war. It brought to mind visions of emaciated women, mothers pushing their ailing sons in the baskets of broken-down grocery carts. In this new world certain things had become more valuable then diamonds and Sam was now a very wealthy woman.

The disk had immediately helped stabilize her health. As had the life they’d made for themselves at one of the highest peaks in Point Loma. Jeremy had expected the children to choose a monstrous mansion at the top of the highest cliff, a French chateau in the suburbs, or a posh penthouse in the gas lamp district. He thought they’d lay claim to a sprawling manner that overlooked the blue waves. And he was proud of himself. He had actually allowed them to make the final decision, had left the important choices completely up to them. The way he figured, it was his job to get them there. Let them now decide how they’d spend the rest of their lives. But to his surprise, they’d chosen modestly, a small yellow house at the highest rise, a dated, one-story ranch beneath a cluster of cedars and overhanging elms. At times Jeremy wondered if it reminded Sam of the cabin in Sevierville.

The view was spectacular. Seth had scavenged for binoculars just like he’d wanted. He’d hold the twin convex lenses to his eyes and peer out across the Bay in the early dawn light. From their window, Jeremy could see as far as Tijuana, Mexico, and at some point he planned to scavenge for a powerful telescope to view the stars and beyond.

The house they’d chosen was small and much older. Jeremy thought it might have been built in the late twentieth century. “Big love grows in small spaces,” Sam had said with a smile. Jeremy couldn’t agree more. They’d moved in and planted their garden, but the house was already replete with many natural gifts. Fragrant lemon trees, boughs heavy with ripened fruit, had already been planted by others against the west wall of the yard. The soil was black and rich with nutrients, and already their small seeds had begun to sprout. They’d planted spinach and kale, cherry tomatoes, and cucumbers. They’d planted peach trees and a row of once-famous California Nonpareil almond trees. They’d even harvested fully matured fruit, some from the yards of neighbor’s—but only the ones where no one was home.

Jeremy didn’t think they were alone in San Diego. He wasn’t stupid. They couldn’t be. The land here was too rich, life too readily sustainable. Though they hadn’t seen anyone yet, they certainly hadn’t tried hard to look. They had too many other important things to do. Jeremy repeated the same scavenging strategy they had in Tennessee. He ventured out only at night and stuck close to home during the day. There was much to do at home anyway. For one, the house had to be cleaned and dusted. Old food, long dried and spoiled, needed to be removed from shelves. And the smelly refrigerator had to be dragged down the street. They’d set up a complex system of rain catchers atop the house’s roof, though it didn’t rain much in San Diego. It was something Jeremy knew they’d eventually have to find a solution to, but he didn’t worry about that much.

Life had become deliciously regular. Their spirits had mended and their sore muscles had knitted and healed. It would take time to move past all that they’d seen and done, but the human spirit was nothing if not resilient. Jeremy dropped to the warm sand and closed his eyes. Bright spots of sunlight danced behind his eyelids. Sometimes still, he would wake up at night, sweating and frightened, unsure of where he was and panicked that the children weren’t beside him. He was so accustomed to sleeping in the same room that he had to retrain himself to the comforts of sleeping alone.

At times he was proud, couldn’t believe they’d actually made it. At others he wondered if the decisions he made weren’t reckless and irresponsible, or if maybe he’d just gotten lucky with the results. At times he even wondered if he was a bad father. Sam was right. He
had
put all of his eggs in this one basket. Things could have gone much different. There were so many forks along the road they had travelled. Any one of them could have led to her death. But they hadn’t, and Jeremy thought it best not to dwell on the way things could have been.

He turned his face to the spray of the surf. Susan would have liked it here. She loved the great Smokey Mountains of Tennessee, but he wondered if she would have liked this better. They didn’t have a new ark yet, but they were hard at work building one. She would be proud of that. Jeremy pushed himself up on an elbow, watched Sam and Seth playing on the beach. They were bent low and inspecting something, a shell perhaps, or a bit of smooth sea glass. Sam felt his gaze and scampered over.

“What’d you guys find over there?”

She was out of breath. “A crab! I
think
it’s a crab at least. It’s funny looking. It lives in a tiny shell and burrows beneath the sand when the waves rush out to sea.

“A mole crab,” he said with wonder. “That’s amazing Sam.”

“A mole crab? That’s a terrible name.”

He grinned and shrugged. She was still big on names. “Well, that’s what they’re called.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I think I’ll pick out a new name.”

She turned her face to the wind and peered out over the water. Jeremy had allowed them to come down to the beach, but only because this day was so special. It was Seth’s birthday, or so he had said. Ten years old, he’d said triumphantly. Jeremy didn’t know if it was true or if he was just trying to catch up quicker to Sam, but he decided to play along.

“I like it here,” Sam said under her breath. “I think Mom would have liked it too.”

“Yup. I’m sure she would have.” He took a breath. “I’m glad you like it, Sam, because it’s yours now. All of it. It’s your future. Yours and Seth’s.”

She turned to him. “And yours.”

He laughed. “And mine. Mine and the mole crabs’ too.”

“So I guess everything isn’t really dead out there then.”

He squinted into the sun. “Guess not.”

“Think we’ll see any fish? Seth is over there looking for some in the shallows.” She laughed. “He says he’s looking for
shadows
of fish. He says you can’t see their bodies because they’re too fast.”

Jeremy shook his head. “No. I don’t think we’ll see any fish. Not us at least. Not your children or your children’s children. Maybe your children’s children’s children’s children— but not us.”

She cocked her head. “My children?”

Jeremy sucked in a breath. The words had just come out. He hadn’t given any thought to their meaning, had taken for granted the promise they held. He shrugged and pointed toward Seth.

“Yeah. Maybe. I mean why not? All you need to make a child is a man and a woman right?”

She turned and peered at Seth, hand raised to her brow. Jeremy watched a slow smile split her face and she shook her head.

“Eeeeew, Dad! That’s disgusting!”

He laughed as she scampered away. He supposed five years was quite a gap to bridge at their age, but as time marched on, Jeremy was sure the friendship would deepen into love. He felt a lump rise in his throat. This was it. He’d really done it. He had actually done what he long thought impossible. This was what he and Susan had always wanted for Sam—a happy life, a secure home, and a lifelong companion; the possibility of family and children all her own. He smiled. Perhaps he wasn’t such a bad father after all. Maybe Liam would be proud.

He basked in the sun and recalled the first time he’d seen Susan as more than just a girl with moles on the side of her face. She’d been bathing in the stream that ran behind their house, and guiltily he’d watched her—at least until she caught him. She’d screamed then laughed, then returned to the same spot the very next day. That memory always brought a smile to his face. It perfectly captured the spontaneity of her spirit and the serendipity of life. People seem to come into our lives at the exact time we need them to—and not a moment sooner.

This was what he focused on as he watched his daughter giggling and scanning the beach for mole crabs. Perhaps humanity might survive this extinction after all. He turned his face to the glittering water and basked in the salt spray that bathed his face. Perhaps humanity was excellent at the survival part. Maybe it was just the preventative stuff that needed a bit of work. If humanity had just turned its energy and enthusiasm to initiatives that worked to protect and conserve—well, maybe there would have been a different outcome for everyone.

Humanity had failed the sea. But perhaps our ingenuity and resilience could see us through any cataclysmic event. Or maybe it would be our devotion, our willingness to sacrifice for those we love. Maybe that would always save us in the end.