Нэнси Кресс - The End Is Nigh

We go past the center of Pigment, near the high school. I stop at this arts and crafts house with a hoop out front. It looks like gingerbread. Jules doesn’t even ask whose house we’re at.

I ring the bell. I’m so nervous I’m panting.

“Don’t leave me,” Jules whispers. She’s sniffling. “You’re my family.”

But she’s not.

A Hobbit opens the door. Mrs. Nguyen, I presume.

“I’m looking for Fred,” I say.

Twin baby girls and a toddler boy crowd the mom’s legs. Warm air gushes out. It’s been so long since I felt radiator heat that I almost mistake it for magic.

Mrs. Nguyen brings us to a plastic-covered couch. The kids surround us, drooling. Out of habit, I pick one up and squeeze her thigh until she laughs. I’m going to murder Mr. Nguyen if I have to. This doesn’t change that.

Mrs. Nguyen brings us blankets and steaming hot cocoa with little marshmallows. The sugar is so sweet that my mouth dries on contact, then waters all over again.

“Jesus God this is good,” Jules says.

Mrs. Nguyen grins. “Don’t tell the Militia about our heat!”

We fake smile back.

“Mr. Tom Crawford, Ms. Juliet Olsen,” Mr. Nguyen says as he walks in. He’s still in khakis and a dirty shirt. He seems pleased we’ve come.

“I want your ticket,” I say. “I know you have one.”

Jules squeezes my knee.

Mr. Nguyen sits on the arm of a La-Z-Boy. The kids squirm and roll like seals. Mrs. Nguyen brings out hot brie and crackers.

“I love food,” Jules says as she scarfs. “I’m so happy about food!”

“Are you staying for dinner?” Mrs. Nguyen asks.

“I want a ticket,” I say. “My sister needs me. She can’t be raised by those people.”

“You know your parents got four tickets, don’t you?” Mr. Nguyen asks.

I’m holding a dull cheese knife, which should be funny but isn’t. I’m also crying. Everybody looks horrified. Mr. Nguyen is standing between me and his kids. Mrs. Nguyen is holding the twins. Even crazier, Jules has the little boy.

“Give me your ticket!” I’m shouting, waving the damn cheese knife.

Mr. Nguyen opens his wallet. He pulls out this credit card-looking-thing and hands it to me slowly, and I want to yell, Seriously? You think I’m going to cheese knife your stupid family?

The ticket is clear with engraved writing:

Offutt Refugee Center, First Class

Thomas J. Crawford

109-83-9921

I’m holding both the card and the cheese knife, and for just a second, I’m happy. Fred Nguyen is a magician.

Jules leans over, babe in arms. “Why do you have his ticket? Did you steal it?”

Mrs. Nguyen kind of connipts. She’s waving her hands, which happen to be full of kids. “His parents traded it for fuel to Nebraska! Dears, dears! It wasn’t easy for them. You have to know. They had no other way of getting to the shelter. Without fuel they’d have frozen to death. They had to sell! But true, true. We could have given it away. That would have been Christian. Indeed, indeed. I wish we had, to be honest. I truly do wish we had. It was a bad idea.”

Mrs. Nguyen runs out of steam. She’s got big tears in her eyes. “Now, Tom, dear, may I have that knife?”

I’m looking at Mrs. Nguyen, who’s holding these sweet baby girls who just happen to be the same age as Cathy. And I’m wondering if it would break her heart if I stabbed them.

“What are you people, the sultans of petroleum?” Jules asks.

“My husband prepared a year ago. They should have chosen us. We deserve to live,” Mrs. Nguyen says.

“Honey, take the children into another room,” Mr. Nguyen says, and Mrs. Nguyen starts to reach for the boy in Jules’ arms but I stop her.

“Let me get this straight—My parents got four tickets? They kept three and sold mine, to you, my teacher, who’s supposed to be a nice guy? Mr. Role model? Mr. Don’t Let The Devil Out?”

Nguyen nods. “I meant to give it back to you. But I’d been hoping to acquire more, for the rest of my family,” he opens his arms to signify his wife and three kids. “The clock ran out.”

“That’s really sad for you guys. As long as you’re giving them away, you got another ticket for me?” Jules asks.

“Please put the knife down, Thomas,” Mr. Nguyen says. “I’m very sorry. You know I am.”

I’m looking at Jules and the boy in her arms. She kisses his cheek, because it’s human nature to love children. But not for nut jobs like me, because all I’m thinking about is murder.

She turns to me. “Put the stupid knife down, you psycho! You’re freaking me out.”

We leave with eight gallons of gasoline and my ticket. It’s more than enough to get me to Offutt. Jules helps me carry it to the back seat of Nguyen’s Kia. They’ve also packed a lunch for us, white bread peanut butter and jelly. Because Jules is a mess, she’s already forgiven them. She hugs Mr. Nguyen, his wife, and his kids good-bye.

“Should I drop you off with your family?” I ask once we’re on the road.

“I don’t want to die with them. I’ll go with you as long as this goes,” she tells me.

Which won’t be long. There are four checkpoints between here and Offutt, and you need a ticket to get through every one.

Through static on the AM dial, a scientist is talking about how gravity’s all messed up because of the asteroid. My crank-phone has stopped getting reception. We’ve got twenty hours and six hundred miles to go.

I stop at the hospital first.

“Wait in the car,” I tell Jules.

“What’s your plan, Sherlock?”

“I need to finish something.” I shut the door and leave her in the warmth, then jog to the entrance. I grab a scalpel. That legless guy is in the same bed. There aren’t any doctors around. Just that same janitor, scrubbing those same floors.

“You hurt my friend,” I say to him.

The guy smirks. He’s still got glitter on his cheeks. His stump rots in the corner. He was scared yesterday, but now it’s funny. He’s one of those.

I want to cut him up. Take my revenge on Jules’ behalf. That way I’ll have done right by her. I won’t feel bad about leaving her to die in this town that she hates.

“You think you’re so special,” I say. “But that doesn’t excuse you.”

I’m not getting through to him. His smirk is horrendous. I squeeze the bandaged stump until the scab breaks open along with the stitches. Blood oozes. He writhes. Now is the time to slit his throat. Now is the time to be what I was always meant to be. Important.

But I’m not thinking about puppies and skinned people or all the bad things anybody’s ever done to me. I’m trying to let the devil out, and I realize Nguyen wasn’t a genius after all, because there’s no devil in there. There’s just fucked up me, and I’m nauseous.

I let go and I’m walking backward. “It’s coming,” I say. “And no one loves you.”

We make it to Offutt. The checkpoints were abandoned by the time we passed through. It’s a wonder my ticket didn’t get stolen all over again. Makes me almost believe in God.

A storm is brewing—everything seems especially light.

We reach the final checkpoint—Offut. Here, there’s lots of soldiers. I get an idea. Maybe it’ll work.

They don’t necessarily believe my story, but they pass it up the chain. We get to the final line. I can see the elevator to salvation about five hundred feet ahead. It’s iron, with linked chain pulleys. It goes down three miles, where there’s enough self-generating fuel to last 10,000 years. There are 200,000 people and fifty miles of tunnels down there. These are the facts we’ve learned from the crowd along the way.