swimming in a waterfall.”
“What’s the point?”
The absurdity of our situation fills my eyes with hot tears. Two women standing alone at the end of the world, talking about things we want to do before we die. We’ll be lucky to get one last hot meal.
“Fun,” I tell her. “There’s a village up ahead. I thought maybe we’d check it out. What do you think?”
“What would you do if I wasn’t here?”
“Probably go around.”
“So, why aren’t we?”
“Because they might have medicine.”
“Do you think I’m going to die soon?”
I shake my head, let the rain take my tears where it will.
“I want to get married and have a family,” she says. “I’m going to put that on my list.”
“Forget it,” I tell Jenny.
My sister’s voice is Minnie Mouse with a dash of fingernails down a chalkboard, but only when she wants to bend me to her will.
“But he’s really nice. You’ll love him. Or maybe you’ll just love him a time or two.” I picture her waggling her eyebrows as she encourages me to have casual sex. Our mother would love that.
“Nice,” I say.
“And dreamy gorgeous.”
“I have to wash my hair that night.”
“I already told him about you. You have to come.”
“Then untell him.”
There’s a gap in her chatter. “You almost had me for a second. I can’t. That would be rude. You have to come.”
“I won’t,” I say, and hang up.
My mother rolls out the guilt parade and slaps my buttons like my psyche is a game of Whac-A-Mole.
“…two years,” she drones on. “That’s how long it felt. You were the stubbornest baby ever. Not like your sister. At least she had the courtesy to come two weeks early. Three hours. She wanted to come out. Not like you. That was the longest thirty-six hours of my life….”
I have two choices: attend my sister’s dinner party or tie a plastic sack around my mother’s head until she runs out of nagging. I choose the evil that doesn’t come with a felony conviction.
THREE
The village appears over the road’s hump: Aphrodite rising from the water. She steps through the never-ending drizzle to greet us. There’s no knowing whether she’s friend or foe, but I guess she could say the same about us. In this world everything is a fat question mark. Taxes are no longer certain—only death.
We pass under a stone arch, the reddish brown of clay earth. The whole village is garbed in this same shade: clusters of earthen cottages with shallow porches and roughly shingled roofs; a handful of shops with wares gathering dust behind grimy windows; a church with its windows shuttered and high wooden doors bolted.
There is a calm that feels anything but peaceful.
We stop. Turn. Inspect the deserted street. Nothing moves. Not even a twitch of lace in a window.
“There isn’t anybody here.” Lisa cups her hands, yells through them. “Hello?” Her words ricochet off the deserted buildings.
“Don’t.”
Her hands fall away. “I didn’t think.”
“It’s okay. It’s just best to be quiet, that’s all.”
“Why? What do you think is out there?”
“Desperate people.” And monsters.
“My dad said that’s why we had to stay at the farm. Because at least there we had food and no one was trying to fight us for it.”
“He was right.”
“Do you think we should go back?”
I don’t answer. My attention is on what appears to be a small grocery store. Neat stacks of preserves in ribbon-wrapped jars fill the lower third of the window display. Fruit and sugar. Our bodies could use both.
“Do you hear anything?”
She listens. “No.”
“Wait here,” I say. Someone needs to protect what we’ve already got.
The bell barely trembles as I ease the door open like I’m handling dynamite. I’m standing in what passes for a 7-Eleven in this part of the world. Or maybe it’s a souvenir shop. That would explain all the woven baskets and cross-stitchings clinging to the walls inside cheap frames. I fill two baskets with preserves: strawberry, peach, cherry. The other shops are useless. A butcher and a produce store, both with rotted wares. There’s no medicine here—not even an antacid. The houses are just as selfish: they give me nothing I can use to heal. What these people had is long gone.
Against one wall I find a broom resting, waiting to be of use. So I grant it that wish, twist its head from its neck, assign it a new occupation.
Outside, Lisa is scuffing her boot on the stone steps leading up to the door. Her mouth droops at the edges as though she’s sinking into darker thoughts.
“Jam,” I announce as loud as I dare, and imbue the word with what I hope is a smile rather than a grimace. “Who needs bread? We can pretend we’re kids and eat it straight out of the jar.”
“Can we go? I don’t like it here. It’s too quiet, if that makes sense.”
A year ago this village would have teemed with life. Tourists oohing and ahhing over the postcard-perfect scenery as they spent too much money for a commemorative trinket that would wind up in a drawer the moment their suitcases were unpacked. Locals smiling at their heavier purses, grateful the road through their village was more heavily traveled, thanks to a popular movie and a spate of wall calendars. Even in her dark world, Lisa would have loved it then. I would have, too. I used to have one of those calendars, and the movie went great with a quart of Ben and Jerry’s.
“Soon.”
I hang the baskets on the handlebars before curling Lisa’s fingers around the broom handle.
“It’s a cane,” she says, lightly tapping the tip on the foot-worn paving stones. “So sticks and stones won’t break my bones. Thanks.”
My gaze fixates on the church at the village’s eastern edge. Doors bolted. To keep something out. Or maybe in? There could be supplies in there, a makeshift sanctuary.
“Did you find medicine?” she says.
I stark walking. “There wasn’t any,” I throw over my shoulder. “I want to check out the church.”
“I’m coming, too.”
“Someone needs to guard the food.”
“I’m blind,” she says. “Not useless.”
“Okay. But if anything happens, run in the quietest direction and hide.”
In. Definitely in. Because a heavy beam has been dropped into brackets attached to the door’s frame. What is this village hiding? Who sealed the doors and where did they go?
I suck in as much air as I can. I already know I’m going to throw them wide, because what we need might
