Chapter Two

Nov. 12, 2011

We didn’t eat. We hardly spoke.

We dialed our phones. We left messages. We waited 10 minutes and then did it again. We flipped through the channels. In hindsight it still amazes me how many channels were still operating, with shows running in some kind of sit-com loop hell. At one point we watched an episode of Two and A Half Men. No laughter. Flip, next. Stephen Colbert was ranting about hatred for squirrels. No laughter. Flip, next. Where’s the phone?

We cried. We devised theories hoping their plausibility would cast a light on our situation or open a door to the past.

At one point I made an entry in my journal.

‘The world has ended and Carrie and I are apparently the caretakers for the time being. Our families are gone; our friends are gone; our lives are gone but life goes on for us. It is I Am Legend without the zombies – I hope.’

That was all I wrote. Now, being somewhat of a pot sampler over the course of my life, I have written some pretty twisted stuff in my journal. What separated things this time, though, was I actually meant it.

Weirdness and savage reality pressed our spirits into small spiked boxes and a wimpy malaise coursed through our veins. Hours fell past and sleep won the day.

Chapter Three

Nov. 13, 2011

I was awake before the sun rose.

I dressed and leaned to Carrie’s ear and whispered, “I am going to go for a walk.”

She lunged up and grabbed me. “Don’t you dare you bastard. Don’t you dare leave me!”

She was terrified that I would not return, that I’d disappear, too.

That made me consider what this surreal nightmare would be life without her and lay back down and held her.

Through the course of that day, we checked as many websites as we could and flipped through radio and television channels again. The same Two and A Half Men episode came on. An American network station, based out of Spokane, that had been running the day before was now snow.

The world remained silent as death.

We ate soup and we held one another.

It was all we could do.

The next day was the same. And then the next day. Fear and depression and sharp anger flowed about us.

We sat on our deck in the cold, wet November afternoon and drank every last ounce of beer and wine in the house. We laughed and talked about silly things we could do if the world was truly ours and ours alone.

And then we talked about our children, which was a bad idea. Depression once again rose up and slapped us useless.

Chapter Four

Nov. 16, 2011

It wasn’t until we were out of coffee that I found the courage to return to the nearby grocery store. Carrie wouldn’t let me out alone and came with me. We walked the two blocks to the store and once again took in the numerous signs of sudden and ultimate carnage.

When we stepped inside the store we were hammered over the head with the reality of our situation. As the power was still on, the store remained fresh and appealing to the senses, except where the spilled milk lay.

I tore open a package of steaks and sniffed carefully. No gag reflex.

“The meat is still good, I think,” I said. “We best grab a bunch and freeze it.”

With that, we shopped.

We filled a shopping cart with meat, milk, cheese, canned goods, frozen foods and coffee. On the way out of the store, pushing a filled shopping cart, I stopped at a cash register and opened the drawer.

Carrie chuckled nervously. “What are you doing?”

“Just in case,” I shrugged.

“What about a security camera?” Carrie pointed out. “You might get us in trouble. Don’t. Put it back. It isn’t right.”

I actually stopped and thought about putting the money — roughly $200 — back in the till. Then I shoved the bills into my pocket and returned for a fistful of loonies and twoonies.

“Reckon we won’t need this crap anymore,” I said. “That’s why we can probably have as much as want.”

Carrie reached into my pocket and grabbed the wad of bills and dropped them back into the till. “No,” she said sternly. “Bad karma.”

“Bad karma?” I snorted. “What good is karma now?” I waved my hands about, indicating the empty store and the obvious lack of humanoids.

“Ahh,” Carrie shot, and pushed the shopping cart toward the doors, which politely whisked open.

I nudged Carrie away from the cart and took control. “All right, but we’re taking this cart with us,” I huffed.

We pushed our booty back home and packaged meat for the freezer and put everything away. It was such a normal feeling – something we’d done so many times together before.

Then Carrie pulled a carton of yogurt from a bag and her legs left her. She slumped against the kitchen wall and slid slowly down into a tight ball, her arms wrapping tightly around her knees. Deep sobs fell from her. I put my hands on her face and pulled her into my chest. She didn’t have to say what knocked her down. Our grand-daughter was a yogurt fiend and the thought of her not being beside and us and excitedly demanding a bowl of it as we put groceries away was too much for her to bear.

I took that as a sign that we needed to drink some more, and pulled down the only booze we had left in the house, a bottle of Bailey’s.

A few hours later, after we had several coffee and Bailey’s, Carrie declared, “Let’s go to the bank.”

I smiled and it was on. We were now like two children locked in a candy store overnight.

We clambered in my SUV and drove the short distance to downtown Cranbrook.

The first bank we entered was the RBC. The cash machines, to the left of the entry, blinked at us as we walked in. When we tugged at the door, it was locked.

“Of course, Remembrance Day,” Carrie said.

We stood shoulder to shoulder and looked into the bank. After a few seconds I started kicking the bottom of the glass door and shouted, “Hey, anyone in there?”

My booze and alternate reality-battered mind then seized on a theory.

“What if these fuckers are behind it all?” I lobbed.

“Who?” Carrie encouraged me. “Royal Bank? They’ve been doing pretty good lately but I don’t think even a chartered bank could make all humankind disappear.”

“No,” I slurred. “The financial industry.”

“What end would be favoured from that for them?” Carrie said, placing her face against the glass of the door and peering inward.

“I dunno. They get to keep all our money?”

Carrie then bolted outside and I watched her walk around the corner. I was about to follow her when she returned, clutching a large rock. Before I had time to ask her what she was up to, she hurled it against a glass door, exploding it in a splintering cobweb.

Laughing hysterically, I hoofed in the remaining glass and cleared passage through the door for us.

We skipped into the bank and Carrie began to bark orders. “Grab all the money that you can!” She cackled.

“I thought you said it was wrong to take other people’s money?” I said, making my way around to the tellers’ side of the counter.

“What people?” she snarled. “Find some bags!”

In a short time we had bagged up thousands of dollars and took delights in prying through the facility. Then we crossed the street and did the same thing at CIBC, then across the street again to rampage through the credit union.

On the way back from the bank sprees, we stopped at the B.C. Liquor Commission and stocked up on supplies. Again, thanks to Remembrance Day, we had to break into the store. But this time, sensing the need to keep the store in good shape for storage, we broke a bottom pane out of a front door and went shopping.

A dozen cases of beer, five boxes of wine, a couple of bottles of Bailey’s, a bottle of vodka and a bottle of Scotch.

“Well, flibble my giblets, that should do ‘er,” I said, slamming Ointment’s back door. “We should be good for a few days.”

When we got home we counted $29,450 in cash. The power was still on at home, and, apparently, elsewhere in the city. We had a fridge full of food, our larder was stocked, and our booze cabinet was bursting.

While fanning stacks of twenties we ‘celebrated’ our sudden bounty sans moral pain with far too many glasses of wine and cans of beer.

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