The Last Tribe (52 page)

“John and his kids play tennis.  I
don’t think they are close to your level, but they play.  There are courts
here.”

“I am starting to miss it.  I’m
sure you had something in your life that was a grind.  That’s what tennis
became for me.  Pressure to play well for my team.  Pressure to play well and
get into a good college.  It was a grind to practice all the time.  Now that
it’s gone, I miss it.  I miss playing for fun with some of my friends.”  She
looked at Todd as they walked.  “I wasn’t a very nice person.”  She paused for
a moment as they continued towards town.  “I knew I wasn’t nice, but when
you’re in a good high school, and you’re pretty, and you’re a tennis star, and
you have a senior boyfriend, well, you just sort of evolve into this
self-centered bad person.  I was mean, and petty, and self important.”

“High school, good times.”  He told
her.

“Yeah, well, it was fine for me. 
My parents gave so much, and my brother and sister were such sweet kids, and I
was this self-centered bitch that steam rolled their lives.”

“I’m a parent.  That’s not how we
feel.”

“No, I was horrible.  I’ve
changed.  You don’t sit at the bedside of your brother while he dies, then your
sister, then your mother, and finally your father, without becoming a bit
introspective.  I know what I was, and I know what I want to be.”

They were to the corner of town,
walking in a well worn path used by Rebecca or Greg hundreds of times.  Someone
had cleared the way with a snow thrower.  Small banks arose on both sides of
the path.

“I think about why I survived.” 
Avery’s voice was flat.  ”Was it some kind of punishment?  A curse?  Did some
power make sure the selfish tennis bitch, who took her family and friends for
granted, lived through their deaths.  Did God keep me alive to make me realize
how much I needed them?  Is this a punishment for how I lived my short life? 
How I’d squandered my time with my family?”

“That’s pretty harsh thinking for a
young woman.”  Todd tried to console her.

“I don’t know you, Todd.  I see
that you have your wife and kids, and you didn’t go through the alone time that
most of us did.  I was alone in my apartment building for weeks.  I stayed at
my neighbor’s apartment because they fled the city to try and escape the
disease.  My family was dead right next door for four weeks, and all I had was
time to think about how shitty a person I was.  How crappy a sister I was.  How
ungrateful and disrespectful a daughter I was.”  She stopped walking.  “God, I
don’t even know you, but I’m rambling on about how horrible I was.   And then I
tell you that you don’t understand because you are blessed with your family.  I
mean, all you asked me was ‘what’s your story?’ and now you’re probably like
‘I’ll never ask Avery a question like that again.”

“I like talking to you, Avery. 
It’s why I asked.  I don’t know you, but I want to know you.  We’re probably
going to be together for the rest of my life, helping each other, our children,
our grandchildren, survive whatever world we can carve out for them.”  He looked
at her when he spoke.  “You’re right, I have a different perspective.  I didn’t
lose my family or my brothers.  I have people in my life that know me.  I can’t
say I’ve experienced the gut wrenching loss that you did.  Hank, my oldest
brother, who you probably just met for a moment, he can talk to you about loss
and despair.  I can talk to you about hope, about fighting for the next chapter
in my life.  I do not have the opportunity or the curse that you do.  I did not
suffer through weeks of solitude or months of desperation and starvation, but I
can help you think about where you want to go and help you become who you want
to be.”

They walked again, and Avery
continued.  “Well, to recap, I was a bitch, and my family died, and I’m stuck
in an apartment in New York with not so much food.  The stores were all looted
weeks before, no more deliveries were being made to Manhattan.  I was up a
creek without a paddle or even a boat.  I cried a lot.  I kept waiting to get
sick, hoping I would get sick.  I didn’t want to live and fight to survive. 
I’m seventeen, I’m a princess, I’m not a badass who takes on the world and kills
animals to eat.  Shit, I was a vegetarian.”

Todd laughed. 

“Yeah, that does deserve a laugh. 
I’m not a vegetarian anymore, I can tell you that much.”  She laughed too. 
“So, I’m into my third week of loneliness, the power is off, I’m trying to
ration my food, my water, and I’m in a really bad place.  I’m bored, and one of
the things my mother always told me, ‘you’re never bored if you have a good
book.’  Totally a mom thing to say, right?  Anyway, I find my neighbor’s
bookshelf, and they were Jewish, and I find
Night
, and I read it.”

“Incredible, right?”

“I’m sitting on a couch, and I
finish this book, and I’m crying, and I realize, I am going through something
similar.  I mean, not the horror of being murdered, but losing everything,
losing my family, watching them die one by one as I’m helpless to do anything about
it.  I think, what the hell is wrong with me?  I’m alive.  I’m strong.  Get the
hell off the couch and do something.”

“Pretty big stuff for a seventeen
year old princess.”

“You’re not kidding.  It was
October, and cool in New York.  I put on jeans and a warm coat.  I pack a
backpack full of stuff I can use, and I start walking.  I don’t even care where
I’m walking, but I assume people might be near the park or the water.  I’d
heard rumors about the park, about fighting and guns, all before my dad died.  I
decided on the river.  I walked west and south, and who do you think I run
into?”

“Meredith?”

“Sal Torvale.”

“No.”

“Yes.”  They stood in front of the
town hall.  Avery’s story was so riveting neither of them wanted it to stop. 
“I run into this absolute creep.  The one thing I will say about Sal, he was
not a pervert.  He never once acted or spoke sexually towards me.  He wasn’t a
gentleman, but he wasn’t a perv.  There, I said something nice about him.  Now,
the rest of his personality?  I could tell he was high.  I went to high school,
I’d seen the stoners, the rich kids who took drugs.  Sal was just floating
along, and he didn’t care about anything.  He would smash windows and doors as
if he liked it.”  She turned and looked at the town hall.  “Like this glass
door.  He would pick up a rock and throw it through.  Is that what you and I
are going to do?  Maybe, but he wouldn’t even try the door first.  It might be
open, but he didn’t care, he would smash it.”  She walked over and pulled on
the door.  It was locked, but she noticed the bolt was barely catching the hole
to lock the door.  Avery tugged and the door popped open.

“See?  Sometimes you don’t have to
destroy things.  Anyway, the problem with the rapture, as I’m sure you’ve
realized, once you hook up with someone, you’re stuck with them.  I couldn’t
shake Sal, well, I could have, he got high and passed out a lot, but really I
couldn’t.  How could I leave a person who was providing food and protection for
me?  It’s like you said a few minutes ago.  I’m stuck with this bum for the
rest of my life.”

Avery held the door open for him. 
A second door was also glass, but did not have a lock.  He pushed it open and
let her into the building. 

“How long was it just the two of
you?”

“A week.  An entire week with just
me and Sal.  He’s high almost all the time, but he’s functional enough to get
us food and shelter each day and night.  It’s funny, he was breaking into
places to find drugs, while I hunt for food, water, blankets, a bed.  I might
have been helping him more than he helped me that first week.  Anyway, I keep
asking him, ‘do you think we should settle somewhere, have you heard about
other people?’ but I don’t ask too many times because, well, I’m afraid of the
guy.  The one thing I controlled was our direction.  I keep moving west and
south.  We ran into Jaime a week later.  She was a spitfire old woman, heavy,
smart, funny.”

“Heavy?”  Todd asked, he looked at
a large aerial map of Hanover Township hanging on a wall in the lobby, scanning
water works notations.

“Yes, she was actually kind of
fat.  She was round and pissed off.  She wasn’t from New York.  She got stuck
there.  Anyway, she meets us and says there is a group of survivors forming at
a seminary in Chelsea.  When Sal and I arrived, Cameron, Wendy, and Bridget
already made their trek.  I’m sure you’ve heard highlights of that, amazing. 
Ahmed was there.  He acted very important, like he was trying to contact the
Mayor and the President directly to see what the next steps for our country
were.  I did not have the heart to tell him everyone was dead.  He kept dialing
numbers on his phone.  Meredith was in a corner, sitting in the fetal
position.  She wouldn’t talk.  She barely ate.  She was a mess.”

Todd made big red X’s where he
thought there might be water towers.  None of the X’s he drew were near town. 
“What woke her up?”

“Bernie pulled me aside and told me
the girl’s name was Meredith, and asked if I would take her under my wing. 
Bernie was too busy with the three little ones.  Kelly wasn’t around to help
out yet.  Jaime was too old to break through the wall Meredith built.  I was
enlisted to help.”  She stopped and pointed to a spot on the map.  “There’s
one.”

“Thanks.”

“I was glad to have buffers between
me and Sal.  As I said, he never tried anything, or looked at me funny, I think
because he had a daughter my age, but I was still creeped out by the guy.  I
told Bernie I would do whatever she needed, and I went around the room and
introduced myself.  I started with the kids, then Ahmed, who gave me his
resume, and then sat down next to Meredith.”

“And?”

“She was at a bad age.  The little
ones were too young to understand.  Older people have seen or experienced
death, and can digest it.  She was old enough to understand, but too young to
digest.  I was sort of the same way, but maybe I was just old enough, anyway. 
You’ll get to know her, she’s a great kid.  She was one of eight children, the
fifth born.  She lost everyone.”  Avery stopped.  “And had to watch it happen. 
Her parents were Mormon, and her grandmother lived with them too.  Can you
imagine?  Eleven people living in New York together?  Anyway, they had a place
in Queens, a house, and her father heard about Bernie, ‘The Pastor Who Didn’t
Get Sick’ was the blog article.  He brought Meredith to the seminary on his
deathbed.  Their car was parked across the street from the seminary all
winter.  He went into an apartment building and died in the stairwell.  I made it
my mission to get her out of her cocoon.”

“You did that and more.”  Todd
looked at the map before turning to Avery.  “I didn’t see anyone die.”  Todd
confessed to her.

“What do you mean?”

“You and everyone else, you talk
about seeing someone die from the rapture, and, well, I never did.”

“How is that possible?  You have to
have seen people dead.  They’re everywhere, even here in Hanover.”

“I’ve seen the bodies.  I saw the
grave in Central Park, the gunfight at the Metropolitan.   I’ve seen death, but
everyone talks about watching parents, children and siblings die.  Emily and I
were in our house with Jay and Brian.  We didn’t lose anyone in the house.  We
lived our lives, shielded from it all.  I don’t know the despair you have
experienced.  I can guess what it’s like, but I didn’t have to deal with it
myself.”

“You didn’t lose anyone in your
life?”

“I lost three in-laws, four nieces,
I lost plenty.  Friends, probably all of my extended family, but I didn’t watch
anyone die.  You talk about being there, next to the bed when your parents
passed.  That’s unreal to me.  My brother Hank held all of his girls’ hands as
they died.  I can’t believe he is recovering from that.  Everyone in the group
has experienced a level of pain I can only imagine.”

“You know why Bernie snapped back
in New York?  She took in all of the orphans and needy, she watched people die
over and over again.  The morgue truck was parked outside her building for the
first months.  She buried her own family, tended to dozens, hundreds, thousands
of other people who died in beds around the seminary.”  Avery looked down and
shook her head.  “I think it blew a fuse in her brain for a while.  We are all
excited about this second chance at life.  We met about it after dinner that
first night, talked about how incredible this opportunity is, to meet up with
other normal people.  You’ve saved us, helped us find our way.”

“Don’t give us too much credit.  We
are just as lucky to find you.  Plus, I brought you to a frozen town in New
Hampshire.”

Todd shook his head.  “There’s
nothing near us.”

“I have an idea, I don’t know if it
will work.”  Avery said shyly.

“What is it?”

“My best friend’s mother was a
realtor.  She had detailed files on houses she listed, and I think her office
kept those files.  She was older, so when I say files, she had paper files. 
They weren’t computer files.”

“Yes.”

“Well, maybe there is a solar house
or green house we could consider.  When I was talking with Matt two days ago,
he said he lived in a solar powered house in Charleston.  What if we could find
one here in Hanover, or some other town close by?  I’m sure there was some
environmental crazy who had solar cells and well water.  I read about all of
the green options in high school.  They were expensive, but rich green-minded
people didn’t care.”

Todd looked at her.  “Avery, you
are brilliant.  What’s even better?  If it’s a current listing, it might be
empty.  We won’t find bodies.”

“I didn’t think of that.”  She
agreed.

“This is why we have to think like
a team.  Everyone should voice their ideas.  Don’t hold back on me again.”  He
mock scolded her while making his way towards the door.  “There’s a real estate
office right across the street.  Actually there are two or three.”  Todd stopped. 
“Before we try our next idea, you said you wanted to check out some other
stores.  Do you want to do that first?”