R. Allinson: The Last Day on Earth

They both stared in shock at the line up at the petrol station at Little River.

“I’ve never seen it this busy before,” said Mitch.

“No, me neither… I don’t think I can make it to Geelong…”

“It’ll probably be just as bad there. Let’s just wait here.”

They played noughts and crosses, then hangman, in Mitch’s sketchbook while the line slowly moved forward. Lucy looked around at all the other people, anxiously, impatiently waiting. A fight broke out up ahead when one man in a hotted up commodore tried to skip the line and budge in.

Finally, it was almost their turn. There were only two cars ahead of them now. The line up behind them was longer than ever.

“Nearly there!”

“I think you may have spoken too soon,” said Lucy after she watched the man at the pump shake the nozzle then throw it down in frustration before storming off into the shop where the cashier was. She looked over at the other pumps, where people were having similar reactions.

“What? Oh no, they can’t have run out. We’re almost there!” Mitch exclaimed. “What do we do now?”

“Wait and see, I guess.”

They didn’t have to wait long. A young man dressed the petrol station uniform came out with a large hand-written sign that said:

NO MORE PETROL

LPG GAS ONLY

(UNTIL THAT RUNS OUT TOO)

SORRY!!

Lucy and Mitch both swore at the same time.

“Glad I’m not him.” Mitch nodded toward the attendant who was rapidly being surrounded by an angry looking mob.

“I hope they don’t hurt him, it’s not his fault,” Lucy said, worriedly. So far it just seemed to be verbal. No one had thrown any punches yet.

“What do we do? Do you have enough petrol left to get to my house?”

Lucy looked at the petrol gauge. “Nope. Probably get halfway there. I’m almost running on fumes.”

“Bugger.”

“It’s okay, I’ll call my Dad. He’s got some petrol tanks on the farm. He can bring us some,” said Lucy as she rummaged through her handbag for her phone. She really hoped her father would be able to come. She didn’t fancy walking or hitch hiking the 170 kilometres in between here and the farm.

“Hi Mum, it’s Lucy.”

“Hello, sweetheart, where are you? Are you all right?”

“Yes and no. We’re at the petrol station at Little River. I’m almost out of petrol and they’ve run out here. I was hoping that Dad could come and get me and bring some petrol?”

“Oh no, out of petrol!”

“Yeah. There are a lot of angry people here.”

“Will you be all right?”

Lucy looked over at the crowd surrounding the poor attendant. Some of them were still yelling at him, but he was just shrugging helplessly and trying to back away from them.

“I think so. No one’s done anything stupid yet. I don’t envy the poor kid working here though.”

“Well, be careful, Lucy. Don’t get involved. Here’s your father.” Lucy could hear her mother murmuring to her father.

“Hi, Dad,” she said when he picked up the phone.

“Hello, pumpkin, what’s the matter? Your mother said you ran out of petrol.”

Lucy told him what she’d just told her mother.

“Are you in the actual town, or at the servo on the highway?”

“On the highway.”

“All right, hold tight, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

Lucy moved her car out of the now useless line-up and parked next to the building. Some of the other people drove off after finding out there was no petrol left, but quite a few stayed. Lucy wondered why, then realised they were probably as stuck as she was. Her father wouldn’t get there for about two hours.

“Are you hungry?” Mitch asked. “I’m gonna go in and grab some food.”

“Yeah, a bit actually. I’ll come in with you.”

They got out of the car, Lucy locked it out of habit. She looked into the car parked next to them. A middle-aged lady was sitting there, crying. Lucy bit her lip, contemplating whether to say anything to the woman or not. Lucy hated it when people asked her if she was okay or all right when she was crying, when she obviously wasn’t. Whatever this woman’s problem was, there was most likely nothing Lucy would be able to do about it, and what was the point in interfering if she couldn’t do anything to fix it? It was probably the whole asteroid blowing everyone to smithereens thing that had her upset, and there was definitely nothing that Lucy could do about that.

She turned and followed Mitch through the automatic doors. The shelves looked a lot more depleted than they usually did. Lucy grabbed a packet of chips, a cold bottle of water, and an ice cream out of the freezer, and then joined the line-up of people waiting to pay. Looking around the shop as she stood in line, she noticed quite a few people who didn’t seem to bother with paying for their sweets or drinks. They just grabbed them off the shelf and with a furtive glance towards the harried cashier, walked outside. She raised her eyebrows at Mitch, who was hovering over the almost empty newspaper stand, but he just shrugged at her.

The woman in front of Lucy was taking a long time at the register.

“I don’t think it’s working,” the woman eventually said. The flustered cashier took the debit machine, looked at it and swore.

“Do you have cash?”

“No, I only have my cards.”

“Ah, just take it,” he said, throwing his hands up in the air. “All of you! Just take it! Take it all! I don’t even know why I’m here. Screw this for a joke.”

The man tore off his name tag, threw it in the bin and stormed out the back through the ‘Employees Only’ door. The lady in front of Lucy looked around in alarm. Lucy looked over at Mitch. He looked bemused. The cashier came back out and looked around at the startled patrons. He grabbed an armful of chips and chocolate bars, looked defiantly up at the security camera and walked out.

Lucy sidled over to Mitch.

“What do we do?”

“You heard the man. Just take it.”

“It feels wrong.”

“The world is ending, Lucy. It’s gonna get worse than this if they don’t figure things out.”

Lucy nodded. “I suppose you’re right.”

Mitch grabbed a couple more bottles of drink out of the fridge, elbowed his way to the freezer and pulled out a few of their favourite ice-creams.

“Never know when we’ll be able to get these again, better make the most of it while we still can,” he said in response to Lucy’s quizzical look.

Lucy picked up a few more things, paused in front of the register and left a $10 note.

“You know someone else is just going to take that,” Mitch chided her.

“It makes me feel better.”

They sat under the shade of one of the trees behind the service station quickly eating their ice creams before they melted, which was rapidly happening in the afternoon heat. Word of the free-for-all inside seemed to be spreading, and the stranded people were swarming in and out of the shop laden with food and to Lucy’s utter amusement, lottery scratchies.

After an hour and a half Lucy saw a familiar dirty blue ute drive in. She jumped up and waved at her father. She pointed towards her car. He parked opposite it and Lucy ran over and leapt into her father’s waiting arms. Her father’s arms had always been a safe place, somewhere no one could get her, and nothing could hurt her. Not anymore, but remnants of that childhood fantasy still clung, and his hug did make her feel better, at least for a few moments. After hugging her for several minutes, he patted her on the back and put her from him.

“All right, let’s get a move on, your mother’s anxious to get you home.”

“You got here quick,” Lucy said.