White Out: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (27 page)

Chapter Five

The sounds engulfed him as he slept, intertwining into
his occasionally rational thoughts and breaking up the places his mind dared to go. He dreamed of being on a wooden raft, where there was nothing to eat but a little boy with cowboy boots on his feet. Edgar dreamed of eating the boy and throwing his bones over the edge (he’d of course hang on to the boots), into the ocean where the sharks would pick away the last sinews and tendons, getting every last ounce of protein from his tiny corpse. Somebody, off on the ocean’s horizon, kept ringing a strange sounding dinner bell in odd intervals, no so much a
ding-dong
, but reminding him instead of a rushing river that could not be blockaded by dams or rocks or sandy beaches.

Something was changing. Something was coming for him.

Edgar woke with a splitting headache, as if somebody had taken an axe to the back of his skull while he was sleeping. "
Zing-a-ling
," he stammered, folding his legs over the edge of Paulie and Christian’s bed. He couldn't remember much from the night before, and didn't really care to. He licked his parched lips, unbuttoning one eye, slowly, and then opening up the other. There was some alien stickiness clinging to his eyelids, something he usually felt when he drank too much. The next thought seemed vaguely familiar: the dead fellow had a liquor cabinet that would make an Irishman weep.

He supposed that was what happened.
Seemed likely. Sounded just like an Edgar kind of evening. He’d had a lot of those lately, especially since the snow first came.

A hazy fog
thinned out, with sporadic recollections returning to him, broken and shattered, but real all the same. A woman. She'd come through the door, asking about his boy, talking about a whole lot of bullsh--

His wife.
It was the sexy broad from the pictures on the wall, the one with the pretty cans and the white teeth. He'd met her last night. He’d met his wife and now he wasn’t quite sure where she was. Shouldn’t she have been sleeping next to him?

"Christ on a bike,
" he said to himself.

There was never a second chance to make a first impression. What had he said
to her? What had he done? That was his new wife. The mother of his child. The matron of his heart. The reason for the season. She was a pretty one and he was expected by the Lord Almighty to treat her that way.

He was a motherfuckin'
family man
now.

The pride was
almost unbearable. 

Edgar stood up from
the bed, walking towards the window, curious about the strange sounds outside, which had leaked into his dream. Pulling back the shades, he peered out into the shiny abyss of the day. Across the street, one of the surviving neighbors was hanging their head out the window, waving a white tee-shirt, cheerfully shouting something that Edgar couldn't hear through the window pane.

The quiet slug of rushing water filled his
head, almost to the point that he thought his ears might start bleeding. The sound was coming from all over, from the top of the street to the bottom, driving him instantly mad.

"It's meltin'. Jesus H, it's melting like a motherfucker!" he said, unable to hold back the shout that was welling up in his belly.
He’d survived. He’d survived the storm and everything was going to be as right as rain now.

He could hear the sewers gushing, filling and spilling
and spewing, unable to keep up with the rapid melt. Edgar pulled up on the window, undoing the safety notches that Yuppie One and Yuppie Two had put in place for the kid (Edgar suddenly couldn’t remember his son’s name—
Johnny? Louie?
). The bubbling din of melting and water rushing grew louder as the window was opened, although Edgar couldn't have imagined it being any louder than it already was. From across the road, he could hear the gleeful neighbor shouting out in rejoice, apparently relieved by the temperatures that this morning had delivered unto them.

Better get to freezin' up again
, thought Edgar.
Or we all gon’ get drowned like sick fuckin’ rats
.

Edgar instinctively quoted an excerpt from The Good Book. Jesus was a magical man, and he executed his plans in ways that man didn't quite see fit. Everything happened once, and it would always happen again and again
, such was the universe. Fuckin' aye right, that's how Edgar lived and breathed.
Jesus was a bad dude-- hell, he IS a bad dude-- and he's comin’ to collect us
, thought Edgar, trying to resist the urge to jump up and down like a silly child with too much sugar in his gut.

He said, "By faith
, Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith." Pausing to study the strangely warm air drifting in through the window, Edgar added, "A righteous man runs a righteous house. Settle in. Settle up."

He was a father.

A caretaker. A carpenter.

A provider.
A destroyer.

A lover.
Oh, yes, he was a lover.

Edgar looked over at the crumpled sheets and blankets on the bed. After he checked in on his
new family, he'd get her to make the bed up proper. It would be their consummation, as soon as she was ready to do that deed. Edgar felt his heart thudding. Ever since he had seen that family photo, he’d fantasized about her. And here he was, waking up with the nastiest of hangovers, and she was waiting for him… in the basement? Yes, the basement. He remembered now. He’d stuck her down in the basement. He tried to picture her sitting on the little couch down there, with no panties or pants on, legs spread, looking at him with simmering eyes.

He looked down at his sweatpants, where a tiny hump protruded, begging to be set free.

Two snakes. Two lizards. Two ducks. Two mosquitos.

Once upon a time, a man named Noah created a boat. He created a boat to save mankind, to save the concept of purity, of living beings that mated in the name of perseverance.
Such was the game of survival.

Two tigers.
Two whales. Two kittens. Two leeches.

Edgar hung his head out the window, smiling as he stared down the
reveling neighbor from across the street, a chubby man with a burly beard. The man pulled his head back inside the window and retreated. He was scared of Edgar for some reason (perhaps because the man didn’t yet know that Edgar
belonged
in this house), but there was nothing to fret over. Edgar was hoping to make friends with the man soon enough, once all this damn snow melted.

Two lions.
Two bears. Two geckos. Two jellyfish.

He looked into the wet snow banks to the left of the house, where the mailman's head was just emerging.
He reconsidered the burly neighbor’s frightful retreat and now it made more sense. He’d seen the mailman. Edgar hadn't buried the fucker deep enough. If he didn't take care of that blight on the eye, and then the nosy fucking neighbor as well, then people would start asking questions. His wife might start asking questions. His son (Bobby? Marty?) would start asking questions, the twerp.

"Well isn’t that a shame," he growled
, staring at the mailman’s half-frozen head.

Two mushrooms.
Two houseflies. Two sloths. Two humans.

Chapter Six

Using a few pieces of steel lawn furniture that Christian had left outside over the winter, Annie had managed a makeshift ladder on to the shallow, sloping roof of the garage. It was incredibly wobbly, but strong enough to get them some elevation. Getting higher than the water was the only way they would beat this thing.

As soon as Paulie was up on to the roof with her, struggling to keep his footing, the lawn furniture was caught up in the rush, swept back into their fenced in backyard.
Chunks of ice careened by, clattering against the eaves of the garage's roof. Annie wanted to swear at the terror of this alteration in their world, but she needed to spare Paulie of any further frightful thoughts. Her fear would heighten
his
fear and that could lead to panic. She breathed slowly, calming herself in the only way she knew how, hoping to set an example for her baby boy.

The roof, though, was not high enough. They needed more elevation. They needed to get as high as they could, possibly to the main part of the house’s roof. Or—

Into the trees. She hated climbing trees and was quite terrible at it when she was a child, but it was their best bet. They would need a sturdy tree, and luckily enough there was one only a short distance away from them.

For the past two years, she'd warned Christian about the
thick oak tree that was rubbing up against the side of the garage:
One day you're going to walk out there and find that it's ripping shingles off the roof, or burrowing into the side of the house. It's too close and it has no signs of rotting. You'll have to deal with that old tree sooner, rather than later. Knock it down Christian. Knock it down!

He had protested, then dragged his feet, protested some more, and then forgot about the
proposed venture altogether. When she reminded him of the tree on one occasion, the scene had escalated into a full-on war, digging up every chore he had ever failed to complete, as he dug his nails into her as well, coaching her on her lack of tact and appreciation. They'd nearly exploded, each in their own way, so Annie hadn't brought up the damn tree again.

Now, that tree was their only chance to escape drowning
in an icy grave. Annie felt a pang of guilt. She couldn't have known. This was just how things happened... she couldn't have ever known.

“Stay here, baby. Don’t move your feet. If you lose your footing, I can’t help you. You understand?” she asked Paulie. He nodded, looking as if he might start to cry at any moment. “Bend down and put your butt against the roof until I’m ready for you. I’m going across.” He nodded again, hunching himself down into a tight package, putting his weight back against the roof. He had better instincts than she would have expected. Paulie was a natural survivor, just like her. This thought dawned on her and it gave her heart warmth and the power to go on. 

Annie reached one hand out, for the closest limb (which also happened to look sturdier than all the rest), wrapping her fingers around it and inching her body forward. She hesitated to look down at the flotsam of icy melt that was swirling about her side yard now, certain that the sight of it would make her vomit or at the very least make her lose all her nerve. Without thinking it over much, Annie thrust her upper body forward, putting all of her weight on to the branch that she was gripping. She swung her legs and feet out, begging the tree branch not to snap on her. Before she could realize what she'd done, her feet were wedged between two of the large offshoots of the oak's sturdy trunk.

She pulled her feet out of the wedge. Her left foot almost didn't budge, but with the final
tug, it came loose. Annie looked up at the expanse of the tree branches above her, scanning the branches in case they needed to go higher. Something inside of her said that they would, insisted that the water was only going to get deeper. Judging by the amount of snow that had accumulated (she'd lost count-
twenty-five feet? thirty?
), the water level would be something shorter than that height, but perhaps not by much.

Sweat trickled down Annie’s forehead. Up until she woke up with a flood outside their door, she was convinced that she would never sweat like this again. She missed the sticky, moist sweat that now clung to her armpits. The warm air felt good on her body.

"Come on. Your turn," she said, reaching out her hand to Paulie. He grabbed her hand, his feet shuffling to keep steady on the steep roof. The kid was four years old. He could barely put his pants on without assistance, and now she was challenging him to sling himself across a rushing gap of icy water, on to a tree. He hadn't even attempted tree climbing at the most rudimentary level yet, so she'd have to climb for the both of them. But they wouldn't be climbing anywhere if he didn't make his move soon.

"
I's scared," he said and a truer sentiment Annie could not recall.

"I know you are, honey. But I have your hand. I'm going to hold on tight and you're going to swing over to me. I won't drop you, baby. I would never drop you, not in a million years."

He couldn't look up at her because he was transfixed by the vertigo-inducing water below. It was getting closer to the edge of the roof. A clunky mass of ice drifted by just then, creating a terrible shriek against the metal gutter. If it got high enough that it started pulling at his feet, her baby might be lost.

"Now, Paulie.
Do it
right now
. Then we're going to climb, you and me. You remember how Daddy used to talk about climbing trees when he was a little boy?"

Paulie nodded, tears welling up in his eyes. He
shuffled a little closer to the edge, centimeter by centimeter. If he went one more inch, Annie might be able to reach his other hand. If she could get that hand, then she would pull him across whether he wanted to go or not.

"It was his favorite thing. You want to climb the tree like your Daddy
when he was a little boy?"

Paulie nodded again. Annie wasn't sure if he knew what had happened to his father. That was a discussion for another day--if there was another day to be had, of course-- when their lives were not in peril.
His father was dead, so she might have been better off not mentioning it, just in case. Paulie didn’t seem to react though, so she assumed he had no idea what had transpired between Christian and Edgar.

“
I'm going to take you on your first climb. Your father will be so proud of you.”

Paulie moved
right to the edge and Annie snatched at his opposite hand before he could second-guess himself and back up again. She had both of his tiny mitts now, but she didn't need to tug against his will. With careful precision, he put one foot out, in the direction of the tree's trunk. Her brave little boy was a marvel to her.

He dangled for only a millisecond, Annie putting all of her strength into her back and arms, refusing to lose her grip on his trembling, wet hands. He swung across, so monkey-like and desperate that she almost laughed at the silly sight.

And then she had him, clutched at her side. He was heavier than he looked. The boy had grown a bit before she'd returned to him, if that was even possible. Other parents had always told her, "
they grow up so fast
," but she never truly realized it until this moment. He wasn't a four-year-old boy. In fact, he was now what some might label a "young man." Annie almost burst into tears, but resisted the urge. There would be time for soppy motherly moments later on. 

Paulie struggled to get his footing on the wet tree trunk, a nervous worry overtaking his face. Annie would not let his
miniscule hand go, not for anything. If she let him go, then she'd let herself go just as well. There was no reason to go on if something happened to him.

The water was rushing up against the side of the house now, rising higher and higher with every minute
, now overtaking the roof of the garage. Flashbacks to the flooding from Hurricane Katrina surfaced in Annie's mind, but that was nothing compared to this. That was devastating, but it moved slow, undulating through the parishes of Louisiana. This was a different kind of beast; violent, quaking, apocalyptic (
there it is, just admit it, thank you much
), and reckless in nature.

The shingles on the side of their house were ripping off from the sheer force of the water.

"I won't let you go," she said to her son, staring into his face, trying to dictate the severity of their situation without scaring him.

"We need to go higher. Are you ready for your first tree-climbing lesson?" she asked, trying to feign a smile.

It must have worked because her son glowed back at her. Perhaps, she thought, he was thinking of his father. Perhaps he was happy to be here, with her, climbing the hell out of this oak tree. Perhaps he was even braver than she thought.

"Climba tree, mammah.
Climb all the way!"

With the sound of rushing water beneath her, growing louder by the minute, Annie reached for the next branch above them, wrestling Paulie near the crook of her arm.
Hoisting herself, she found an unimaginable strength inside of her, like when she’d forced her way through the bulkhead, like when she’d killed off the posse of carnivorous pursuers.

Annie climbed like an expert, though she’d never
gone any higher than the first branch on her granddad’s old sycamore tree.

She'd climb all the way to heaven if she had to.