Circles in the Dust (7 page)

“My name’s David,” he informed her.

“Elizabeth,” she mumbled, still holding her gun in a death grip.

“Elizabeth?”

“Yeah?”

“Your safety’s on.” David turned and traipsed into the wood with a smile.

chapter 7

The walk back to David’s cabin was spent in silence. David’s head buzzed with questions but he was so weak from his passive-suicidal episode that he had to focus all his energy on walking. He tried to strike up a conversation a few times, but could only get out a handful of words before being winded. Several times he had to stop and rest against a tree after attempting to probe the girl, Elizabeth, for more information about her mysterious background. He eventually gave up on the interrogation and focused on making it back to his cabin, something he was not sure he could do. He kept stealing glances back at her, making sure she was still there, reminding himself that he wasn’t the only human alive, that his life had begun again just when it was coming to an end.

              At length they finally mounted the final rise before David’s home. He walked in front of Elizabeth, lifting his head, his eyes following the body of the tree behind his cabin all the way to the top. His tree. It stood tall and proud as ever, beckoning him home. His gaze rested lovingly on the stoic pillar as he hiked the last bit of hill, his thoughts taking a brief respite from the mysterious girl he had stumbled upon in the woods. Or, more accurately, who had stumbled upon him.

             
He paused as they reached the top and his home came into view. Elizabeth was still on her way up, so he took the chance to rest for a moment and regroup. Blood rushed to his face as he looked down into the hollow. It looked like one of the deserted camps he had wandered through when supplies had begun to run low and those who had survived the old world’s initial blow were swept up by the second. There were cans littered around the fire, which looked like it had been cold for months. A mere handful of logs remained in the once proud stack beside his cabin, the ax usually stuck in one nowhere to be seen. His door hung lazily open and there was a hole in his roof where it had been caved in by snow. Awakened from his delusional haze, David realized with a start just how much he had let himself go.

             
She reached the top while he stood there staring down at his mess of a camp.

             
“Are we close—” she started to ask when his cabin came into view. “So this is it?”

             
“This is it,” he responded. “This is home.”

             
“You built this?” she asked, and he had to look at her to see if her awe was sincere. Her face showed no signs of sarcasm. Her eyes were wide and her mouth hung open, if only a little.

             
“Yeah, I built it myself,” he said hesitantly. “It’s not much, but it’s something.”

             
“It’s impressive.”

             
“Really?” She had to be mocking him.

             
“Of course! We were lucky enough to find an old farmhouse, so we didn’t have to build anything.” She jumped as she mentioned whoever it was she had left to explore the forest, ending her speech and fixing her eyes on her feet.

             
“That is lucky,” he said softly, afraid of scaring her off. “The houses that were out here were taken pretty fast. After a while there were a few vacancies, but a corpse doesn’t make much of a roommate, with the smell and all, so I found this little hollow and settled down here.” He smirked a little at his dark humor and looked up to find a smile cracking through her nervous visage. Of course, it could have been something funny about her feet, where her eyes remained glued. His head spun at the effort required to talk and walk down the hill, but he fought the nausea rising in his throat and savored the grin hiding behind her stony front.

             
“Well, it looks cozy,” she said as they were nearing the bottom of the hill.

             
It was cozy at one point; now, as David walked up to his open door, he couldn’t agree less.

             
“Sorry it’s such a mess down here,” David said, running his hand through his greasy hair, pulling it out when it got stuck in the mud and thistles that had taken refuge in his clinging mane.

             
“The world’s a mess,” she said, casting a sidelong glance at him.

             
“No kidding. I’ll get some food started, I’m starving,” he said as he reached for his bucket. Empty.

             
She saw him look into the bucket and sigh. She dug into her bag, pulled out her aluminum water bottle and offered it to him, saying, “My contribution.”

             
He wanted to refuse her offer and started to, but he was so ravenous and fatigued that the thought of making a trip back to the river made him feel physically ill. He relented and took the bottle with a muttered “Thanks” and poured the contents into the single pot that sat next to the fire. It had been lying upside-down, but a quick brush removed the dirt from its lip. He hung it over the fire from the tripod he had lashed together and limped over to his cabin.

             
It was no shock to see his possessions in complete disarray. The hooks on the walls were barren, but most things seemed to be present. He picked up his blanket and tossed it back on the mattress, which seemed to be soiled with unfamiliar stains, and took a seat on the ice chest that held his last morsels. He let his head sink into his hands, allowing himself a moment to take in what was happening. He was home, awake, alive, with a girl. All at the same time. She was real and he was going to make her a meal. Then she was going to leave. No. His head whipped up and he winced. He couldn’t let that happen, couldn’t let his one link with the rest of the human race abandon him to the awful pit of woe he had so recently crawled out of. He hadn’t even realized how dismal his state was until she found him. His stomach turned sour at the thought of being alone again, of returning to the numb existence he had lived in for so long. He wouldn’t be alone. Not again.

             
He rose, went over to the door and poked his head out to look at Elizabeth. She was sitting on the stump next to the fire, just where he had left her. She was beautiful, and not just because she was the only girl he had seen in nearly two years. Her hair was limp. Her coat was oversized and fell to her knees, and her black jeans were torn and stained at the ankles. He had no real standard to judge her against, but to David, sitting there in the gray morning, she was surely radiant.

             
Her face turned from the forest toward the cabin where he stood. He ducked his head back into the house, hoping she hadn’t noticed him staring. He went back over to his chest and lifted the lid. What he saw inside made him blanch. Besides dust and cobwebs aplenty, there remained two cans of beans and one of corn. That was all. How had he let his stores run so low? No roots or berries or anything to supplement it. David sank to his knees on the dirt floor of his cabin, resting his head on the lid he held open, wishing for a moment that Elizabeth had never found him. Wishing that she had found him a year ago, when he had food and a fire and a cabin that wasn’t falling apart. When he was strong and confident. When he had something to offer.

             
When he had regained his composure, he returned to the fire.

             
“How do beans and corn sound?”

             
“Anything sounds good right now, honestly.”

             
David was carrying the three cans of food that were his last. This was all he had to offer her. Lucky she wasn’t picky.

             
“Good, because I haven’t got much else left besides that,” he lied, feeling it wasn’t too much of a fib.

             
“That’s all right,” she replied. “Do you live off canned food completely?” Her voice sounded sincere, as if she were only curious, but David couldn’t help but feel a little offended. He tried to push those feelings down; now was not the time to be sensitive.

             
“I have a garden behind the house,” he replied, keeping his voice even. “Though it really doesn’t do much good.”

             
“I see,” she said. “So the people that live out here,” she stopped and looked at him from the corner of her eye, “well, lived out here, and you, of course, live off the things you could salvage from the city?”

             
“I guess, yeah,” he replied slowly, trying to think about his life out here in a broader sense than he was used to. “I make what I can and try to avoid going back there as much as possible, but I suppose a lot of the things I have are from there. I got a lot of them before I realized how dangerous it was…” he trailed off, sifting through his memories of the past and how he had come to be where he was now. “Most of what I have are just camping supplies, and most of them I salvaged from other people’s camps. I was just a kid when everything happened… I didn’t have much when I started out here.”

             
“You took what you needed from other people out here?” she responded reproachfully.

             
“I didn’t steal,” he snapped. He caught himself and resumed in a more even tone. “I did what I had to. When I say took, I mean that I collected it from people who didn’t make it, who couldn’t hack it. Stealing seems like a pretty gray area now anyway, don’t you think?”

             
“Not really,” was her curt answer.

             
Well, some of us had to choose, he thought to himself. Bad or dead.  “Well, a good deal of what you see came from the city. I went back a lot the first few years. Before I realized how bad an idea that was. All the fighting…”

             
“At least you realized that before it killed you,” she said. “I can’t imagine you need to go back for much of anything by now, though.” She continued when she noticed the black look on his face. “It looks like you’ve made a nice home for yourself here.”

             
“Home,” he repeated, feeling that the word did not adequately describe his cabin or his hollow, as much as he wanted it to. Not like it had.

             
“Though it must be lonely out here.”

             
“Did you gather that?” He almost laughed. “It’s one thing to not have anyone else around, but to know that there isn’t another person over in the city, or a few miles away at their own camp. It’s kind of,” he paused, trying to think of the right word to describe the way he had felt in the instant before she had found him, “crushing.” 

             
“I can imagine.”

             
“Can you?”

             
“Well, I-”

             
“Well what? You said you live with other people. You have a camp or something out there somewhere, obviously far away, because I’ve never found it. How can you imagine what it would be like to be the last human being left on the planet?” His voice began to rise though he tried his best to control his tone. Why was he getting so angry?

             
“I just mean that it must be hard, and I’m sorry,” she said. “At least you’re not really the last person left,” she added.

             
“I guess that’s true. I’m sorry,” he said. “I haven’t spoken to another person in a couple years. I’m… rusty,” he said with a forced grin.

             
“It’s okay,” she assured him, brightening up a little at the smile he managed to crack. “Shall we start the food?”

             
“Oh, yeah,” he said, realizing he had been standing there with the cans in his hands, distracted by their conversation. He realized with a start that the fire was crackling happily next to them. He looked around and saw no wood shavings or any sign of tinder on the ground and wondered how she had started the blaze so quickly.

             
“You got the fire started,” he stated aloud.

             
“I thought that would speed things up a bit,” she replied, gazing fondly at her creation.

             
Once again David was flabbergasted. This girl was exploring the deserted woods alone, came from some faraway place where people still existed, and apparently had magical powers.

             
“Thanks,” he said as he studied her face.

             
Who was this girl?

chapter 8

              David got the food cooking over the fire and went to his cabin to find a second bowl and spoon for Elizabeth. He walked through the doorway and looked around, wondering where he would have such items. It had been a long time since he had needed more than one of anything. There was a heap of plunder against the wall on the left, full of scraps of old tents and sleeping bags, lanterns with long-dead batteries and jumbles of rope. He collected all the things he thought might be useful in the future from abandoned camps, a pack-rat to the end. It was rare that he went through it; over the years he had mostly made deposits. Anything readily useful never made it to the heap, so most of what remained here was junk. Now he had a specific amount to withdraw, it seemed he would never find it. He started lifting piles of things off the top, seeing old flashlights, bits of string, parts of boots. A spare hat or a cooking stove with no gas would have done little to improve his quality of life, but there was probably a luxury or two he had overlooked in here somewhere. Hopefully a bowl and a spoon. Just one bowl, one spoon. Was that too much to ask from a pile of junk?

             
He sifted through canvas bags and cardboard boxes that crumbled at the slightest touch, over hill of garbage and dale of junk, only to come up empty-handed. He punched a ratty blanket in frustration and cursed as his fist collided with the tin box underneath it. He unwrapped the box from the deceitful old rag, thinking it might have to do as a bowl, and breathed a sigh of relief as he looked down at a small mess kit. Inside the metal dish was a small plastic spoon, and he nearly cried. He walked back out to the fire, prize in hand.

             
“I found something for you to eat with,” he told her as he held out the small metal bowl.

             
“Thank you,” she replied, taking the bowl and looking at the inside. He hadn’t thought to wipe it out but thankfully it had been scoured by time and she was satisfied.

             
“Those beans should be just about ready.” He reached down and stirred them with the stick that made its home in a loop in the rope holding the tripod together. “I don’t think I have any salt left,” he said.

             
“That’s all right. I’m so hungry I would have eaten them cold.” David laughed nervously.

             
He grabbed the handle of the pot with a rag and spooned some of the beans into his bowl, giving her the lion’s share. She held out her bowl to give him some of hers, but he refused. She thanked him with a shy smile. David looked over and thought he saw her cheeks redden. That was good.

             
“So you said you’re from… the north?”

             
She looked at him for a moment, studying him, before mumbling through a mouthful of mush, “Yup. Pretty much straight north from here.”

             
“Wow. I wouldn’t want to live any farther north than here. Must be cold. I though most people tried to make their south, hoping to find warmer weather,” David replied.

             
“I doubt it’s very warm anywhere,” she said, without taking a break from chewing.

             
“That’s why I never left,” David replied, only half-interested in the chipped ceramic bowl in his hands. He was starving but his mind was much more interested in this girl at the moment. Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day, but when there are no fish left, the last is just a tease.

             
She let out a mumbled laugh in consent and continued shoveling food into her mouth. He watched her, sifting through what he knew about her in order to plan his future moves. Her name was Elizabeth. He liked that name. She had found him and saved his life and come back to his cabin. At least she hadn’t run away or left him on the riverbank to die. She was cautious and hesitant, so she might even be real, though she had started the fire without using flint or any kind of tinder that he had seen. Could she have matches? If she had matches, she might have more luxuries from the old world. Back where she lived. He knew that was somewhere in the north, and that there were at least some other people there, though not how many. His mind caught on the fact that she came from the north; why didn’t that fit?

             
“You said you came down from the north, right? On your way to the city?” he asked her, forcing himself to take a bite of the beans that were beginning to cool off.

             
She studied him for a moment and swallowed the bite she had been working on, taking her first break from focused mastication since they had begun eating. Her gaze was icy but her green eyes stirred something in him; something he had not felt for a long time, something he feared would interfere in his plans.

             
“Yeah, though I’m on my way back at the moment, actually,” she responded, keeping her eyes level with his. David held her gaze and noticed while he thought of his next move that she hadn’t looked him in the eye for more than a moment since they had met.

             
“You must be a little lost,” he stated. He had found her by the river, and that was an hour’s walk east from where they were now. The city was west, a fevered night’s journey from his camp.

             
“I was just a little off track, I guess,” she answered, her eyes never leaving his. He saw her swallow hard even though she had yet to take another bite.

             
“Oh, okay,” he said evenly.

             
“I meant to head straight north from the city, but I thought I’d try and find an easier route back to the Base.”

             
The Base? Elizabeth withered visibly as David’s face registered surprise at the name. “The Base?” he repeated.

             
“That’s just what we call it. Where we live. It’s just an old farmhouse, but we all took to calling it ‘home-base’ and that just kind of turned into the Base,” she explained. She stuffed her mouth full again and dropped her eyes back to rest on the ground.

             
David couldn’t help but think her behavior queer. Granted, he had only known her for an afternoon and she was the first person he had seen in nearly two years. He could be wrong.

             
“What’s it like?” he asked, unwillingly to drop the subject.

             
She looked up at him, annoyance coupled with fear spelled out in her expression. “It’s, I don’t know, a lot like this, I guess,” she said, looking around at David’s camp. “We don’t have a lot and we just barely get by.”

             
“Well, I can understand that.”

             
“Are you really the only one out here?” she asked, locking her fiery eyes with his.

             
“Yes,” he responded hesitantly, aware of a sudden transformation that had just taken place in the girl across the fire. The timid mouse had just taken on the visage of a fox.

             
“And you really don’t know where any of the other people out here went?” she continued.

             
“Where they went? What do you—” He stopped as it struck him like a blow. He had completely missed it. How had it never registered? Everyone was gone. Not dead. He hadn’t heard the cries, the moans, hadn’t smelt the decay or stumbled on that many abandoned camps or bodies. In his wanderings had he really missed the fact that while there were the remains of camps littered throughout the forest, he hadn’t actually buried anyone? He always buried the dead, but his shovel sat untouched behind his cabin. The valley really was empty.

             
“I—” he started and couldn’t think of anything to say, just sat there with his mouth gaping like a trout, beans dripping out of the bowl his hands had trouble holding on to.

             
“You really had no idea, did you?” she asked with a quizzical, almost pitying, look.

             
He sat for a minute, looking down at the ground, unable to conjure up any words, this passed-over fact burning in his mind, holding any other thoughts at bay.

“They’re gone,” he finally spat out. “I thought they all just died and left me here. But they’re just… gone.” David couldn’t believe the words that were spilling out of his mouth. How had he missed everyone packing up and leaving?

              “I may have some good news,” she interjected after they sat there for a few minutes in silence. He looked at her, still in shock, feeling sick and confused and oblivious. “I think I know where they are.”