Monte Vista Village, Toxic Soup (The Survivor Diaries) (4 page)

T
hings are calmer now. We don’t feel like we have to make conversation. Is it because we are not sure what to do next, or is it that we just don’t have energy to talk? Maybe it is the grief. I am not sure. Maybe I should break the ice.

A Half of a Day Later, Maybe

Hours ago, we were startled awake by a new explosion. At least that’s what it sounded like, but of course we can’t see the outside, so we don’t really know.

Mark thinks it was a building collapsing. That is as good of a guess as any.

I immediately tried to call Jill on the walkie. I know she is going crazy being stuck inside for so long with Joseph.

“Jill, are you all okay? Jill,” I waited a few seconds. “Come on, answer Jill.” I started to get worried.

“JILL!”

“I am here, Laura. I’m here.” I let out a long breath and winced as the air evacuated from my bruised lung.

“Are you guys alright?” I asked.

“Yes, sorry. Joseph was trying to get out
to somehow see what was going on.  He tried to start removing the nail from the wood around the window. He’s losing it. If he were not in that chair we would be in a lot of trouble. It’s like cabin fever on steroids.”

“I couldn’t find the wa
lkie for a while there. I put it in the kitchen. It is funny how I keep going in there and realizing there is nothing I need to do. All of our food is with us in the basement in the small kitchen we added in the renovation. Seems pretty foolish to add a kitchen to a room used in emergencies, huh? But it doesn’t stop me from going in there and just looking around until I realize I don’t need to be there. It’s like a muscle reflex, you know?”

“Yeah,” I lied. I am not really that mobile yet. “Hey, Jill, how many days has it been,” I finally asked.

“I have been trying to keep track, and I am pretty sure it has been three days. That would make it

July 18
th
.  And it is 3:40 PM.

Thank God Jill was the only person left with an actual watch rather than a cell phone to tell the time. That makes me wonder if the clock on our bedroom wall made it through. I have not even seen that room since, well, you know.

July 18, Very early morning, probably

I am glad that Mark worked some construction in Japan. At some point while I was in my unconscious state, Mark took inventory on the state of the house. Miraculously, there was no terminal damage to the structure of the house. Of course, we are a long way from where we were before, but we are safe for now. When we are able to get outside, we are going to have some work. Of that, I am certain.

I only get up from my sleeping bag, which is now on the love seat next to my mother’s couch, to use the “restroom”. Ha! Mark has been sleeping on a space he made on the floor next to me. I know he is worried about my injuries. He holds my hand while we sleep. 

I should explain about the “facilities”. We have two large, hardware store buckets. One is for “solid” waste and one for
liquid waste. They each have small amount of sawdust at the bottom that we replenish as we go. I read that was the way you can compost the waste later. All I really cared about was that we could control the smells and sanitation during our internment. Not long after the East Coast was hit we devised a system. We are living down stairs and the wrap around balcony upstairs has a wooden shed covered by more tarps placed flush to the sliding door area. This creates a small room where we (by we, I mean Mark, as he is the only one able enough) pour the waste into a large tub. That way the person hauling it up there and pouring it out, won’t get sick if there is either nuclear radiation and/or biochemical contaminates in our air. I suspect there are both, by the way.  And to make the make-shift toilets cute, I added a # One to one of them and a # Two to the other. Mark helped me attach a toilet seat on each. Smart, aren’t I?

We were just as smart with the water.
Having been a military family, we have moved often. This last time, when we moved into my mother’s place, I bought twenty three plastic containers to use instead of boxes. It helped with the moving breakage problem. The day New York fell, we purchased twenty more. We filled them with gallons upon gallons of water. They are being stored with the food supplies in the laundry room and in the middle of the house, windowless rooms and spaces. We also purchased two large rain barrels that we place inside, as well. Thank God my Annie’s house is really big.

We spent a lot of money preparing for this. Well, Mom did. I had her put it on her credit card. After the first couple of days I was pretty sure she was not going to be getting a bill in the mail. If nothing did happen and things remained as normal we could take most of it back, I reasoned with her. I am so glad now she decided to go along with me. And she didn’t hurt her impeccable credit.

The Geiger counter we purchased is secured in one of the emergency pack packs next to me. If Mark had been there while we gathered supplies, I think he might have thought me ridiculous for this pricier item. Now, I think he will be happy to see it. When I can get up for more than a couple of minutes, I will test the areas around the windows and doors. Here is what the box says:


                    
Two separate channels for Beta- and Gamma- validation (increased precision);


                    
Normal Measurement Cycle of 26 seconds;


                    
Range of indications of 0.05~999.0 mcSv/hr;


                    
Detects Beta-, Gamma-, and X-rays.

So, those are a few of the things we bought in the days leading up to the end. And now we are finding out what comes after the end.

July 19, 2:50 AM, we found a clock in the rubble

It’s so quiet. Before (that’s what I am calling everything before the attack on the East Coast, when we were all just living our lives ignorant if what was to come), there was never real silence. I realize that now. Our computers hummed, televisions blared out our entertainment, video games bleeped, crashed and blasted, and don’t even get me started on our phones.

I was actually jealous of Mark’s phone, before. He used it to get on the internet, to tweet, to “like” various things on Facebook, to Skype with family in Africa, but more importantly, to block me out. At least that’s how I felt. I am glad it’s dead. RIP iPhone, RIP.

But now the night is silent from all of the electronic noise. Now there is nothing except for the natural
sounds of my mother, Hershey and Mark sleeping. Would it be strange if I said I liked this time of the morning now?  Just to think, and write, of course.

It’s cold in the house. Monterey is always wet and cold in July
; the fog thick and heavy in the mornings. We have all of our blankets out now. I can barely turn over; Mark had piled so many on top of me. I am also layered in my clothes and socks.

I can’t exactly say that we are becoming acclimated to our new reality yet but I think we have accepted that it has happened. But where do we go from here? I am not certain
, but I think it we need to pick up where we left off: working at a community level. That is, if there is a community left. Only Jill has used the walkie-talkies. Tomorrow I plan on trying some other channels, just in case.

It has been less than four days since “It” hit, but it feels like so much longer. It is getting easier to breath, so I think my lung is healing. The vomiting continued, but it was slowing down.

We are beginning day four, and I plan to start walking around in the morning. I need to get up and move now, or it’s only going to get harder.

I also think we need to make some solid plans for when we emerge from our crypt. This means we are going to start to have conversations again. It should be interesting, to say the least. But we have to crawl out of our trauma
-induced domes of silence and figure out how we are going move on from this.

July 1
9, 9:15 AM

I started getting things going by getting myself going. To both Mom’s and Mark’s surprise, I was up and shuffling around when they awoke. My body still ached, but I didn’t care. I just needed to move. Ambulatory is important when you have to plan the beginning of the end of the world, a commencement, so to speak.

I am writing while I eat my “breakfast”. Cold spaghetti from a can… yum! I can’t wait until we can get outside and use the grill for some hot food and coffee. The instant coffee won’t dissolve in room temperature water, so I am actually chewing my morning pick-me-up. For a coffee addict, this isn’t going to work.

I have asked Mom and Mark to come and sit with me for the talk. The
y look less than enthused, but they are up and getting ready for it.

I have decided to take all important notes in my diary here. Thank goodness I am an incredibly fast note taker
, due to the fact that my wonderful grandmother taught me shorthand. Maybe I was a 1950’s style secretary in my last life. I think having everything in one place will keep me organized, which I believe will be imperative for the days to come.

So, here are the minutes of our meeting:

Me: “I think it is important to talk about what to do next. We must have a plan.”

Mark: “What are you doing?”

Me: “Taking notes. First, I want to say thank you to both of you. I know that I have been pretty out of it since it happened. I am feeling better today (an exaggeration, but they need to believe it) and it is time we figure out what’s next.”

Mom: “What do
you mean by “what’s next”? We survived. We don’t even know if it’s over yet. We don’t even know what ‘it’ really was.”

Me: “I agree. So, let’s start there. We know, very roughly, what happened when the East Coast got it. We have sketchier information about what happened as it moved to the West Coast. It sounded like it was coming in a wave across the country, and that we got it last.”

Mark: “I’m not really sure that’s how it happened. I think it went across just part of the mid-west. Last we heard it hit just down the middle of the country.” Mark retrieved the globe that must have flown from the in-wall bookshelf and rolled into the corner of the living room. “Okay, we know that the strikes went as far as here. “ He pointed to Texas. “They hit Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. But that’s the last we heard.”

Me: “Good point. But isn’t it safe to assume that the
y continued to sweep west?”

Mark: “No, because they might have been lining up in both the Atlantic and Pacific. It just makes since that it would be easier to reach their targets from closer.” He indicated the oceans on each coast.”

Mom: “I really don’t see how any of this matters. All that matters is that everything is gone, destroyed. There’s nothing left. We are alone.” Note to self: Mom’s getting progressively more upset. Maybe it’s too soon for this conversation. Or maybe she should not be included in the planning anymore.

Mark: “But that’s my point. They might not have gotten anything more.”

Me: “Mom, we need to figure out what we might find outside by piecing together the information that we do have. I have some theories about what I remember about our strike, but I need to work them through. I know it’s upsetting you to talk about it, Mom, so if you want to go into the other room, that’s really alright. Mark and I can work it through.”

Mom: “No, I want to stay. I’ll be quiet.”

Me: “No, Mom. You were listening to the radio way more than we were. You can be a lot of help if it’s not too much for you.”

Mom: “Okay.”

Mark, looking irritated, points back to the map: “It only makes sense that they are sending in strikes from both coasts.”

Me, getting the calendar that still is hanging on the wall and bringing it over: “Then why did they stop the strikes and wait for, one, two, three, four days until they hit California?” I am attaching the calendar page for July with dates of incidents written in.

Mark: “I’m not 100% sure, but we had radio transmissions until they hit us on July 15
th
and there were no reports of strikes until ours.”

Me: “But, maybe they just stopped getting information and that’s why they didn’t report it. Mom, what did you hear during those fo
ur days?”

Mom: “They weren’t reporting because they said that they were not getting any signals, NOAA, or NORAD reports after Texas. I could still get San Francisco stations until the 15
th
, but they either just reiterated what we knew about the east coast until the middle of the mid-west, or they went over lists of things to have on hand and what to do if we got hit. But they did say that there were unsubstantiated reports that there were submarines off of our coast, from L.A., to Santa Barbara, to San Francisco.”

Me: “See Mom, that’s really important information. That means that Mark’s theory could be correct.”

Mom, sort of proudly: “Thanks!”

Mark: “Maybe they were getting into position and rallying allies during those four days. It’s completely plausible that this whole World War hadn’t been planned out that well. We don’t even know why it started. We just assume that it was because the US brought down the whole economy.”