A Town Called America (5 page)

After the US government collapsed, the dam outside Brick Creek was in complete disrepair. The filtration system began to clog after employees stopped maintaining it, and eventually the water stopped flowing altogether. The water finally spilled over, causing the structure itself to erode, and very quickly the flooding began. Between the flooding from the dam and the, the sewers filling up, and the water poured into basements and substructures. The buildings and homes in neighboring towns weren’t built to sustain such tremendous water damage, so many of them also collapsed.

When the US government fell apart, it had taken only a few days for grocery-store shelves to be stripped due to looting. After that the animals and bugs moved in, along with violent gangs from the cities that devoured any scrap left behind. The stench of rotting food and dead flesh filled the air. Bodies lay in the street, also looted of anything of use.

With riots and fighting in the streets, gunshots became the norm throughout the days and nights. The local governments quit long before this began; they also didn’t have any answers. Bands of gangs eventually marauded towns, killing anyone in their path. They burned buildings and shot anyone on sight.

Around that time Brick Creek, with its few remaining residents, banned together and built the wall around the main part of town. After the defenses were in place, it was a while before anyone had come through trying to cause problems, most likely because there wasn’t much left for people to take, and the outsiders knew it. In the months after the M.M. stormed Brick Creek, almost everyone they hadn’t killed eventually starved or just left.

After Brick Creek the M.M. tore across the country, looting and burning remaining towns and cities. The few hospitals left were either burned or bare of supplies. Children across the country were now without antibiotics. Well, a person can guess what happened to the children after that.

In the months after the attack, a handful of people were still holed up in Brick Creek, in some of the older brick buildings they’d fortified. Eventually fewer and fewer people came around, but when they did arrive, the first thing they saw was a large sign outside town that read,
PRIVATE PROPERTY
:
WILL KILL ON SIGHT
!
WE HAVE NO FOOD
,
WATER
,
OR SUPPLIES
!

As difficult as it is to imagine, this town actually had it easy compared to the some of the cities. People living on the thirtieth floor in a high-rise, for example, had no air conditioning, elevators, or running water.

Most of the population didn’t even know how to clean a fish or butcher a deer if they had one. People in years past had been too reliant
on the food at stores and everything convenient being there whenever they’d wanted it. Eventually city streets began to fill with water, collapsing them and turning them into flowing rivers of garbage and waste.

All this was compounded by the fact that even before the US government had collapsed, the storms had hit. For two years straight, they struck like nothing anyone had seen since Hurricane Katrina. Day after day rain and wind pounded the earth, destroying everything in their path. The winds were so strong that they forced many people to take refuge underground, far away from the coasts. The damage had been in the tens of trillions of dollars.

The roadways, unmaintained for so long, soon grew over with vegetation. Plants and weeds broke through the pavement and tore the thick roads to pieces. Because of the lack of fuel, most vehicles were abandoned and rusting. Glass had been blown out of vehicle windows, their contents spread across the land in what was a never-ending river of trash and objects that people once had thought were important. Towns and roads were a maze of vehicles and garbage and in places were almost impassable.

One year after the destruction of Brick Creek, it was a ghost town. Its only occupants were a few diehards who refused to leave. Rick’s cabin was now unrecognizable to anyone who had seen it in its better days. The roof over the porch was now on the ground. The windows had been shattered, and anything inside of importance was long gone, ransacked by looters.

From the outside anyone who looked at the cabin immediately could see the garbage spread throughout the front of the house, and the toolshed had collapsed after someone had burned it to the ground. Most of the trees atop the hill provided firewood, but only a few still stood at the bottom near the cabin.

The tires on Rick’s El Camino were flat and the fuel tank long empty. It sat next to the cabin and hadn’t been moved since the attack on Brick Creek.

EIGHT

R
ick, Chris, and Shawn were sitting at the small wooden table, eating dinner. Deer was a real treat they didn’t get to enjoy very often. The table was narrow and just big enough for three people to sit comfortably. On the table two small candles flickered, lighting the room just enough to see for movement and to give a calming glow to the three people who were passing food and chitchatting.

The RV was nearly twenty-five feet long and seven feet wide. Inside the vehicle the table fit with just enough room for a chair on each side. From the cabin Rick had removed a long narrow countertop, as well as a gas stove and a fridge, all of which were now next to the dinner table.

Farther down the thin corridor was a couch next to a wood-burning stove. The warmth from the stove gave the small space a comforting feeling that helped ease the tension of being in such a cramped space for long periods. At the far end were three more rooms. Two rooms had bunk beds, and the other had a larger bed that could accommodate two people. The inside walls were made from cheap plywood, as the 1970s RV, even new, never had been a high-end model.

Under each of the two bunk beds were storage shelves from the floor to the bottom of each bunk. Food, supplies, tools, and batteries filled the spaces completely. A thin set of stairs was in the center of the RV, across from the tiny bathroom that was big enough for one person to barely fit in. Unfortunately, however, they had to use the outdoors
as their bathroom, as the RV didn’t have plumbing. The stairs led to a four-by-four-foot hatch on the ceiling that was the only exit.

The three people sat in the room, eating their meal and trying to enjoy one another’s company. Other than small talk, not much had been said between the three lately. They all felt trapped and alone. Seldom did any of them leave the tiny, confined space unless they were gathering wood or food.

Nearly a year before, Rick had found Shawn lying in a ditch, after he had crashed his Harley on some ice near the cabin. Rick had brought him to the cabin, where he and Chris had tended to him until he fully healed. After seeing the destruction of the town and the world outside, all three had decided to make drastic changes in their lives.

The large hole adjacent the cabin that had been intended for a garage was now gone. Rick, like the cabin’s previous owner, had wanted a three-car garage that would give him room to work on vehicles as well as room for a shop. The hole, dug for the foundation, was near fifty feet long and twenty feet wide.

In the months after the destruction of Brick Creek, the three had worked hard to bury the RV with dirt until only a small hatch showed through the ground.

All three intentionally destroyed the cabin to try to keep outsiders away. The shed, on the other hand, had been burned to the ground by a squatter who had thought it was a good idea to make a fire inside it. However, the burned shed did give would-be intruders the idea that there wasn’t anything left of value, and hopefully any nosy people would just move on. Their new home was, for the most part, secure—far from luxurious but secure.

In the early days, a few times people did make their way to the cabin, whether to look for shelter or to loot. It didn’t matter, however, because Rick wouldn’t take the chance on any unwelcome visitors. On more than one occasion, someone had shown up, and things had turned violent. Violence wasn’t what Rick—or any of them—wanted, but in his mind, he had no choice given the circumstances.

Shawn argued that if they killed someone, there was no point in surviving because they’d be no better than the M.M. Rick and Shawn
didn’t see eye to eye on that topic. Rick couldn’t understand his logic; he firmly believed every man had the right to protect himself and his property.

The one thing Rick and Chris had kept from Shawn was that Rick had been in the military. They both knew that if Shawn ever found out, a permanent wedge would be driven between them from that moment on. Shawn wasn’t a supporter of any military of any kind. On more than one occasion, Rick and Chris had to bite their tongues as they foresaw a blowout from comments Shawn had made. Shawn was truly antimilitary and antigun, and he justified this by telling them he considered himself a pacifist.

Not long after the RV had been buried, Chris was the first to kill someone. The intruder had been trying to steal food from the cabin when he saw Chris and shot at her with a rifle. After that she felt not only anger but also resentment toward Shawn. She never had wanted to kill anyone, but it had been either him or her. At the time she didn’t see any other solution. Nevertheless, as time passed, Chris knew she couldn’t change what she had done. It took some time, but eventually she forgave herself.

As time passed she and Rick had found themselves in situations that had forced them to kill. It was the one thing Chris found the most difficult to get past in her life. However, truth be told, it also was the one thing she found she was good at.

Rick had told Chris, “The first time you kill is the hardest.” For Chris this couldn’t be closer to the truth. Shawn, on the other hand, was less forgiving. After the first time, he made every attempt not to speak to Chris or Rick.

Rick and Chris also had grown very close, and Shawn couldn’t understand what she saw in a man almost ten years older than her, someone Shawn considered a murderer. Shawn, blinded by jealousy, quickly had forgotten that they’d helped him while he was injured and that they had welcomed him into the cabin. Nor did he care that Rick and Chris protected and fed him when he refused to pick up a weapon.

Repeatedly they put themselves at risk for food or supplies, but he didn’t seem to care. He felt they were throwing their relationship in his face, and he was an unwanted third wheel.

Shawn was young, and Rick knew this, so he was willing to overlook his behavior and allow him to stay, regardless of how little he contributed to the group. Under his rough exterior, Rick was a soft soul who wanted the best for those around him, even Shawn.

It was an early morning in October, and Rick was still sleeping when he heard the gunshots. He sat up and looked around the dark room. “That was right outside,” he murmured, almost holding his breath. Then he heard three more shots, one after another. Within a second Rick was up and moving.

Chris was outside, gathering firewood. The weather was cooling fast, and a slight breeze chilled her skin.

As she worked, she thought about the many circumstances that had forced her to become a woman when she felt she should still be a girl. Almost twenty years old now, she thought of Rick and her deceased mother and how she had shot and killed many people. She wondered whether those people had a families and why things had changed so quickly.

She also wondered whether things could ever be the same again and whether she even wanted things to go back to the way they were. She’d been so unhappy before the fall of Brick Creek, and now that she was finding peace in her life, the world had fallen apart around her.

Chris stopped and sat near a tree for a moment. All at once a wave of emotion consumed her. As she rolled on her side and curled up in the fetal position, tears poured from her eyes, which she didn’t
attempt to try to hold back. All the emotions she’d held inside for so long were exposed.

She sat up for a moment, wiped her eyes, and looked around to ensure Rick wasn’t near. She couldn’t let the one person she cared so much for see her like this. They’d been living together for nearly a year, and every day they seemed to be growing closer. He was the first person she had let in so closely. Nevertheless she still felt he eventually would lose interest, like all the men she had known before.