Gregory Norris - Down with the Fallen - A Post-Apocalyptic Horror Anthology

Sensing my presence, Ted wheeled around on his squeaky metal stool and announced to his audience of one, “I am taking my family to Murori.”

“ Muwhatti?” I said.

“ Murori, Nebraska,” Ted corrected, magnifier shop glasses pitched crookedly on his shiny bald head. He was beaming like a boy who had just found pirate treasure, and then added, “Population of 1.”

And he’s not kidding either. He shows me on a map. The least populated town in the USA. The most people that ever lived there was back in the 40s. Like 90 people or so. But these days, it was just one lady. Some widow named Tiler or Teler. She was also the mayor and ran the town restaurant. Ted had some notion that he was going to tap into his 401K, buy some of her undeveloped property and build a cabin there or something. He was rambling about solar panels, and I realized my mouth was literally hanging open as I took in his words.

“Um, Ted… dude… (clearly a talking down the jumper tone) be smart. What are the chances that you are the only guy who has this idea? I mean, if I was that lady, and it was really not gonna go back to normal, I’d be buying a shotgun and setting up some landmines right about now.”

I laugh. Ted doesn’t. Ted smiles at me with his lips pressed together. His face takes on this weird expression. He extends his hand and gently pats my shoulder, like I’m some small child that asked if Bigfoot was real. A scene from Father Knows Best flashes through my mind, and I almost think he’s gonna call me son, and then he says something in this dreamy-wise voice which freaks me the hell out. “You got a little girl, right, Doyle? Little Biya? Sweet little girl. You just think about that.” Teddy hops off his stool and wanders away. I watch him slowly head down a half-lit hallway, a few rolled up maps under his pudgy arm. I forget to ask him what job I should hit. That’s when my cell phone rings about Beth.

As I push open the deli door, I see Tommy’s got one of those dreamcatchers on the back of it, a bunch of mini, rusty, copper cow bells tied with lawn bag twist ties. Done in a hurry. It’s not pretty but it does the job; it announces another forehead. He’s even pulled the front register counter from its original spot on the right side of the store and angled it, in a very fire-hazardy kinda way, so that you actually have to walk around it to get inside the 1800-square-foot establishment. A kind of guards on the tower, alligators in the moat move if you ask me. Good for you, Tommy. Maybe that’s why your place is still open.

Tommy lifts his head with some urgency, recognizes me, relaxes, and resettles into his bean can sharpie project. I pick up one of the green plastic baskets on the floor next to the counter and head past him down aisle one. He’s only fifty-six, but he looks seventy if you ask me. I know his age only because of a birthday card from last year that he’s got thumbtacked to the corkboard behind the register. The card was from his wife, Lisa. I remember the day she showed it to me before she gave it to him. I was in the store with Biya that day. My daughter was completely engrossed with sucking on the caramel lollipop Lisa had just handed her. Lisa had pushed the card in my hands for a “guy’s take” on it. I told her it was pretty funny, which was clearly the right response, and it made her smile. Course, I didn’t have the backbone to tell her the truth. That guys don’t give a crap about greeting cards. The outside of the card is light blue, a cartoon of some old coot with a walker, and a grey puff of fart shooting out his ass. The inside says: At least I know you’re still breathin’! Love you, hubby! Happy 56th! It looks like it’s got some red gravy spots on it. They’re not, though. Gravy spots.

“Hey, Doyle,” Tommy says as I pass him.

“Tommy,” I respond. That is pretty much all the exchange we’ll have tonight. Except when I ring up. Then he’ll tell me what I owe him. He used to ask me about Beth and Biya. Or about the news of the day, the mobs, the marks, new colors, etc. People talked a lot about the Gidgidoo and the bad stuff a while back, like some degree of small talk made it all a little more bearable. Like the whole world wasn’t losing its mind. But he stopped seeing the gals come with me, so he stopped asking questions. I also never asked where Lisa was.

You know, I had told Beth to stay inside, and keep Biya inside, too. I told her if someone knocked to say I was just out buying more bullets. But we both knew she’d never say that.

A woman who lived across the street from our apartment called me from my wife’s cell. Told me to come home. There had been an accident. She was also the one who met me in the street as I was standing over my wife’s corpse just under the fire escape. I vaguely remember a small crowd around me as I stared down. Bet you some of the guilty ones were right there, just at arm’s length. So me, a small gathering of potential suspects feigning outrage, and neighborhood fishwife busy body bitch, Frannie Lebow, hysterically crying, holding my hand like she knew me and telling me what happened with an almost too eager delivery.

Beth had been in the middle of painting a giant mural on one of the walls in Biya’s bedroom. A bunch of soccer ball-sized bumblebees, flitting around a forest of brightly colored, three-foot-tall flowers. Now, Beth was no artist by any stretch of the imagination. She had majored in economics at Rider, but anything… anything to keep the kid and herself busy, happy, calm. Normal was good. Beth had been working on it for a couple days, and every afternoon when I would get home from work, my daughter would excitedly collect me at the front door and drag me into her bedroom to see Mommy’s daily progress. No, Dad, you can pee in a minute.

Beth was never neat about anything she did. She could for sure tell you where everything was in the apartment, and she was an exceptionally thorough cleaner, so you’d never know the mess had existed—but her process was, well, explosive. And her work on the super-sized flower mural was also executed in the same true-to-form, harry-caray, Beth fashion. Brushes everywhere, multi-colored fingerprints on coffee cups, and remnants of paint spills that had been only half wiped up. The pink thumbprint on the butter container was the best.

I had just left the apartment for work, about 7am, (same day I learned about magical Murori from Ted) and Beth, I guess, realized she needed something. Not following our never open the living room window commandment, which we had discussed about 7 million times, Beth had climbed out onto the fire escape to shout after me. She didn’t call me on the phone. She decided to yell into the street, where everyone heard her. Fran was watering a plant on her own balcony and heard it. I, however, did not. I had just turned the corner.

Fran says this is when all hell broke loose, because two women, whom she did not know, but was sure they did not live in the neighborhood, started to yell and point at my wife from the street below. Because there was purple splotch on her head. A little lingering paint from a three foot tall flower. Right smack dab in the middle of her forehead. Good going, Beth.

Now, could my wife have shouted down, I am painting a mural on my daughter’s wall ? Sure. Could she have quickly grabbed the paintbrushes and paint can and dumped them over the fire escape as proof? Maybe. But she didn’t. She did the totally wrong thing. Beth panicked.

Fran said Beth shrieked, “Oh No!”(pretty much the worst thing you could shout, right?), cupped her hand to her mouth like she had been caught , scrambled back inside, and slammed down the window.