The Last Tribe (43 page)

Like a fire that burns down a
forest so new trees can grow, the rapture destroyed all the good and the bad
from Sal’s life.  It took his family, but it took away his yoke.  It took away
civilization, but it took away the burdens that shackled him.  Sal was free. 
He drove too fast through the streets of New York City because that is what Sal
wanted to do, and no one told Sal what he could and could not do anymore. 

The BMW screeched to a stop short
of the RV’s at 59
^th
and 5
^th
.  Jamie and Peter sat in
their chairs eating soup for lunch.  A small fire burned in a pit at their
feet.  Hubba was on a bed in between them.  He sat up and barked. 

“That’s Sal.”  Jamie told Peter. 
“He must have come back.”  There was no joy in the woman’s voice.  Jamie was
disappointed.  She wanted to leave Sal behind.

“Well, let’s meet this young man.” 
Peter put his hands on each armrest and pushed himself up.  He was tall, taller
than Sal and the other men in the group.  As he aged, his knees and hips tended
to get sore quickly.  Despite his fantastic physical shape, he needed leverage
to stand.

Peter towered over most people. 
Sal was big, but not tall.  Peter had at least four inches on the dirty drug
addict.  As the men shook hands for the first time, Peter did so from a
position of strength.  Sal was immediately irritated.  Peter looked like the
banker that told Sal he was in pre-foreclosure. 

Sal had many faces, and today’s
face was one of friendliness and thanks.

“Very nice to meet ya, Peter.  Sal
Torvale,” Sal gripped the man’s hand tightly.  “Bernie told me a little bit
about ya.”  Sal grinned, almost purred to the older man.

“Jamie, how are ya?  It must be
great to have found someone yer own age.”  He went in for a hug with the woman,
but she sat back down as he leaned towards her.  Sal was high.  The pills he popped
in his room at the Seminary were kicking in.  He was clueless to the fact that bringing
attention to Jamie’s age was rude. 

“I’m afraid it’s just us here,
Sal.  The rest of our group went to see the sights.”  Peter pointed to the RV. 
“There is some soup on the stove if either of you are hungry.  I hope you do
not mind, I’m going to eat mine while it is still hot.  I know it’s 50 out
today, but that will cool ham and potato pretty quickly.”  Peter sat down next
to Jamie and picked up his soup. 

“Soup sounds wonderful.  I’m a
bottomless pit when I come up here.  I need to fill up from all those months of
being empty.”  Bernie pointed towards the other trailer.  “Over there?” 

“Right in there hon, there are
bowls in a sleeve next to the pot with spoons in a box.”  Jamie looked at Sal. 
“Sal, there are chairs in the trailer, be a dear and grab a couple.  You two
can join us.”

Sal squinted his eyes.  He did not
take orders from the old woman, but he was in a peculiar spot.  He needed to
keep a friendly façade with Peter.  Jamie had not asked him for favors in
months, knowing he would ignore her.  Sal, high and irrational, believed she
was trying to get him to show his true spots, or worse, was taking advantage of
the situation.

“I’m not very hungry right now.  I
think I’ll take a walk around the camp.  It’s been a while since I’ve been to
the park, and this will be my last time.  If Bernie is hungry, she should have
all the soup.”  Sal turned his not getting the chairs into a magnanimous
gesture.  “I’m going to stretch my legs a bit.”

“I’ll get Bernie a chair.”  Peter
pushed himself up again.  “She can use mine.  I’ll grab another.”

Sal turned angry.  The tall man who
looked like the asshole banker who took Sal’s house, was now showing him up. 
And who the hell was Jamie to give Sal orders anyway?  This was really her fault. 
He hated that old woman.  She was bossy and had a mouth on her.  She needed to
learn some respect.

Sal stormed off without saying
another word.  He flipped up the hood to his sweatshirt to hide this face,
twisted in anger.  “Just keep it cool, Sal, just be cool.”  He thought to
himself.  Sal wore work boots, the same boots he wore for three years.  He loved
the boots, the leather was broken in and comfortable.  He had jeans, a maroon
t-shirt with a faded, stretched out collar, and a dark tan sweatshirt.  Unlike
the others in the New York group, Sal kept the same clothes he had before the
rapture.  He had a new car, but the same comfortable clothes, the same drug
habit, and the same angry attitude. 

Sal did not want to wander in the
park.  It was early, and walking the ten or fifteen blocks to his apartment was
his idea all along.  He would take a nap, pack up his things for the next day,
and return to the RV’s later.  He did not like Peter, and had never liked
Jamie.  Spending four hours talking to those two, or listening to them talk was
not high on Sal’s list of things to do.  By the time Bernie came out of the RV
with a bowl of soup and glass of punch, Sal was a few hundred yards away,
walking towards the upper west side.

“Where is Sal going?”  Bernie
asked, confused as to why he was leaving.

“I bet he’s going to his
apartment.  That son of a bitch, I hope he gets high and passes out, and we
leave him here.  He’s worthless, worse than that, he’s a drag on the group.” 
Jamie spat venom.

“Apartment, what are you talking
about?”  Bernie sat down, soup in hand.

“Antonio, he’s a good kid, he and I
talk sometimes when everyone else is asleep.  He puts up a tough front, but
he’s lonely, he misses his family, his friends, anyway, he opens up to me, and
he followed Sal a few months ago.”  Jamie took a sip of water.  “And that
bastard has an apartment on the upper west side, some old brownstone.  He has
fire, and food, and that’s where he’s been going.  We thought he was scavenging
for drugs, but he has drugs.  He goes off to be comfortable while we are
starving.  While those little angels are starving, while he saw Ahmed dropping
down to weighing nothing, and probably damaging his kidneys from giving his
food to the rest of us, that son of a bitch, Sal.” Jamie let out a cry as tears
rolled down her face.  “That son of a bitch was letting us all die.  Have you
noticed he hasn’t lost much weight?  He’s still a big strong guy.  The rest of
us are withering away, and he stays fat and burly.  I say we call him out on it
and leave him to fend for himself.  He doesn’t want to help us in our hours of
need?  He can try to survive on his own forever.”

“He had an apartment?  That can’t
be true.  He didn’t do that, Jamie, he didn’t.  No one could do that.”  Bernie
put her hand on Jamie’s leg.  “Antonio made that up.  Sal isn’t a bad person. 
He’s just mixed up.  The drugs have control of him, but he’s not bad.  Antonio
is playing with your emotions, trying to turn you against…” 

Jamie cut her off, “My god, Bernie,
do you even hear yourself?  Who feeds the kids when he can?  Who stayed with us
even when he begged us to move to Queens.  Who always stayed between Avery and
Sal?  Antonio is the good one.  He tries to act tough, but he’s just a kid. 
You think Sal showing up for one of your services every other month and saying
‘amen’ to you means he’s a good person?  That he’s seeking redemption?  He’s a
conman, Bernie.  He’s a lousy, stinking, conman, and his time is up.”

Peter remained quiet.  When Peter
was young his father described a loud and obnoxious man by saying,  “What’s on
his mind is on his tongue.”  The comment so affected Peter he became the
opposite, seldom giving his opinion without first considering the
consequences.  Peter led by example as a pilot, father, and husband.  The new
world was different.  It required him to be vocal.  He was one of 25 people
left in the world, and an important member of the group.  It was time to step
forward.

“Bernie,” he said calmly.  “I know
you are having a hard time believing Jamie or I guess really, Antonio.  Let me
ask you this, what if it’s true?  What if Sal has been keeping a life with
heat, food, water, and drugs, and he’s been keeping it separate from the
group?  What would you suggest?”  He looked at her as a friend.

“I can’t believe it.”  Bernie
replied.  “I can’t believe anyone would do that to others.  If it’s true, well,
it means he’s betrayed us, betrayed us every second of everyday.”  She lowered
her head.  “I don’t know what it means if it’s true.  I hate to think what the
group would want to do to him.”  She lifted her head and looked towards Jamie. 
“My god, all those nights the girls cried themselves to sleep in hunger pains? 
All those tears Cameron cried?  All the times I averted my eyes as Avery was
getting dressed, her body like an extreme anorexic’s, and I was ashamed I
couldn’t feed her?  All that time, Sal had food?  What kind of person is he? 
It can’t be true, because if it is, that man is a monster.”

Bernie set down the soup,
disgusted.  Peter picked the bowl up and offered it to her.  “Eat.  You don’t
look much like a sumo wrestler yourself.  You need to finish this soup and get
another bowl.  I’m afraid you are going to blow away.”

Bernie blushed, her chocolate brown
cheeks turning a light shade of red.  “You’re right.”  She took the bowl from
Peter and continued to eat.  “You are a quiet man, Peter, but when you do
speak?  You know what to say.” 

“I would enjoy attending your
service tomorrow morning.  I have missed my faith, and appreciate your
leadership in my search to reconnect with it.”  Peter smiled at the woman. 
“There are decisions that we must make about Sal, and we’ll make them as a
group.  It will not be one person’s burden.  You are taking too much on
yourself.  Please realize, there are more of us to carry the water.”  Peter
grabbed Jamie’s hand after he said it.  “Both of you, understand, we’re a family
now, or a tribe as Emily likes to call us.  We have individual decisions to
make, but we can also grow stronger as a group.”

“You sound like a televangelist.” 
Jamie told him, lightening the mood.  “If you try to talk both me and Bernie
into marrying you right now, the answer is no.”  Jamie gave a loud laugh at her
own joke.

Bernie let a warm smile creep
across her face, she loved the old woman.  Jamie made everything seem better. 
She found humor all around her.  “I am going to say no, too.”

Peter blushed.  “For the record, I
did not ask either one of you, let alone both of you.  When you tell this story
to the other women, I never asked.”

“You were about to.  I could
tell.”  Jamie snickered.

“You are welcome at my service
tomorrow morning, Peter.  I would enjoy your attendance.”  Bernie continued to
eat as she spoke.  “We can reconnect to our faith together.”  She took a last spoonful
of soup and stood, “but right now I am going to continue my reconnection with
food.  May I get anyone else more soup?  I put another can on the stove.  It
should be warm.”

“Just bring out the pot, we’ll all
take more.”  Jamie was trying to put weight back on after the long winter of
starvation.

When Bernie went into the trailer,
Jamie turned to Peter.  “I’m an old woman, I’ve seen a lot in my life.  I’ll
tell you this, whether Sal comes with us or not, his time with this group is
limited.  He can’t keep himself under control long enough to function.  He’ll
run out of drugs, or walk off during chores, and we’ll have to make a hard
decision.  Feed a man that won’t do anything, or make it so we don’t have to
feed him anymore.”  She looked at Peter with all the seriousness of a heart
attack.  “It would be best if he passed out and we left him.  If there is still
a God in heaven, Sal Torvale is on a drug binge right now.  Better we leave
him, knowing he has food and will live and die by his own hand, than having to
kill him down the road.”

“Jamie, we’re not going to kill
anyone.”  Peter tried to console her.  “You’re exaggerating,”

Peter hoped she was wrong, but he
knew hard decisions were on the horizon.

With the Sal conversation behind
them, Peter, Jamie, and Bernie enjoyed the afternoon.  They had no
responsibilities.  They ate, sat, and talked for hours.  Jamie asked her friend,
“Bernie, you’ve been walking around like a ghost for half a year, and now you
are happy and fun.  Are you drunk?”

Bernie shook her head.  “I have
been living in the past, living with my grief for too long.  You are right,
Peter and his friends arriving was a sign, a sign that life must gone on.  Sitting
in my chapel praying that my daughter and husband are still alive is selfish
and dumb.” 

“You had a daughter?”  Peter asked
her.  “What was her name?”

“We named her Sarah.  We loved her
above all other children.  That was our religious family joke.”  Bernie beamed
when she spoke about Sarah, her soccer team, her choir recitals, her math and
science grades.  She had pride and love in the memories. 

“My oldest daughter was named
Sarah.”  Peter told them.  “She had five children, bless her heart.  I managed
to have two, and I thought that was tough.  Two kids of my own, and we ended up
with eight grandchildren.  Can you believe that?”  Peter chuckled.  “You’d
think I raised my kids Catholic or Mormon, not Episcopalian.” 

“I had 13 grandchildren.  My
daughter was also named Sarah, my second child, the only girl among three
brothers.  She was the strongest.  I spoke to each one of them before they
died.  I could not visit them, spread across the country like they were, but we
spoke on the phone.  Each one of them would ask me, ‘Mom, are you sick yet? 
You’re going to beat it, Mom.’ And I would tell them they were crazy.”

“I didn’t know you had a daughter
named Sarah.”  Bernie said to Jamie.  “Funny we had daughters with the same
name.  We should start a club.  It’s going to be a pretty small club.”  She
chuckled.

The church van rolled up at
4:30pm.  Sal had not returned. 

Bernie could hear singing from the
van “and we’re too busy singing, to put anybody down…”