Flowers in a Dumpster Read online

  “And the damn President on the airwaves almost every night telling us everything was A-Okay,” Miguel grumbled, bitterness dripping from his words like acid. “I mean, people were dropping like flies, the hospitals were overrun, similar reports were coming in from across the globe, but still that pompous prick with his fat face and jet-black hair just smiled and said there was nothing to worry about.”

  Sadie smiled apologetically at Edwin. “You’ll have to excuse my husband. He gets a little, shall we say, passionate on the subject of President Kane.”

  Edwin chewed on a piece of meat, swallowed, and then asked Miguel, “You don’t think the government had something to do with the disease, do you?”

  “Would you put it past them? It could have been some kind of biological warfare project gone horribly awry. Regardless of how the sickness started, though, there’s no way the President didn’t know how serious it was.”

  “Maybe he just didn’t want to create a nationwide panic,” Edwin said.

  Miguel pushed his almost empty plate aside. “Panic? Maybe people could have protected themselves better if they were a little more panicked? By lying to the public about the seriousness of the outbreak, it made people complacent. Even when they saw the evidence with their own eyes, they believed the President because surely he wouldn’t lie to his citizens, right? It doesn’t matter if he had a hand in creating the virus or not, his actions doomed this country. I consider the man a murderer. He should be put to death.”

  “He’s probably dead already,” Sadie said quietly, but her words were corrosive, too. “Or at least, he is if there’s any divine justice left in the world.”

  Miguel shook his head. “If that man turned out to be one of the two percent with a natural immunity . . . Well, that would be enough to make me question my faith.”

  “Don’t blaspheme,” Sadie said, but she wore a faint smile. Edwin now pushed his own plate away. He looked uncomfortable, his face twisted in a grimace. “Please forgive us. This is terrible dinner conversation. It’s been so long since we’ve had a guest, we’ve forgotten our manners.”

  “No, it’s not the conversation. I think my exhaustion is finally catching up to me. Would you mind terribly if I retired for the night?”

  “Of course not. I’ll warn you, the pull-out sofa bed isn’t the most comfortable thing in the world.”

  “The last few nights I’ve slept on the ground, so it’ll be like sleeping on a cloud, I’m sure.”

  Edwin rose from the bench when Miguel said, “Stick around and have breakfast with us in the morning. If you’re going to be setting off, might as well do it on a full stomach.”

  Sadie graced her husband with such a brilliant smile he suspected he would get a little something extra in the bedroom. Edwin smiled at him, too. “That’s very kind of you. I’ll see you good folks in the morning.”

  “Do you need any help?” Sadie asked.

  “I think I can manage. Good night and bless you all.” With that, Edwin hobbled back to the mobile home and disappeared inside.

  Miguel and Sadie exchanged smiles over the table. Miguel turned to his son . . .

  . . . and gasped. Zeke had gone pale.

  ***

  Edwin expected he would have no trouble falling asleep, but sleep eluded him like a slippery eel. He tossed and turned on the mattress, which was in fact less comfortable than the hard ground, but his troubled mind was what kept him awake. He could hear the family talking quietly outside, though he couldn’t make out their words.

  They were such a lovely family, and one of the few fully intact families he’d run across in the last few years. What were the chances all three would be immune to the virus? Of course, if both parents had a natural immunity, it would definitely increase the chances of their offspring being immune as well.

  He would never be able to fully express his appreciation at the generosity they had extended to him. Miguel’s initial hostility and mistrust were understandable, but it was obvious these were good people.

  This was why he thought it might be best to sneak out early in the morning before they awoke. They had a nice setup here and he wouldn’t mind staying for a while, but he couldn’t risk them finding out the truth.

  Still listening to the family’s murmured conversation out back, Edwin finally fell asleep.

  ***

  He awoke sometime in the night to the sound of creaking floorboards and heavy breathing. Edwin cracked open his right eye and scanned the room, but the overwhelming darkness kept him from seeing enough. As his vision adjusted, he thought he detected a hulking figure standing right next to the bed.

  “Miguel?”

  There was no answer, but then the figure raised something into the air. Edwin tried to move, but he wasn’t fast enough. Pain exploded along the right side of his head and he plunged back into even deeper darkness.

  ***

  When Edwin came to the next time, he found it much easier to see his surroundings, thanks to the torch lamps’ flickering flames. He lay outside on the surface of the hard, splintering picnic table. Edwin tried to rise, despite the intense pounding in his head, but found himself strapped to the table with sturdy ropes. He craned his neck to look back toward the mobile home and saw Miguel standing there. “Hello, Mr. President.”

  Edwin could only make a hoarse croak when he tried to speak. He licked his lips and tried again. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’ll admit, you’re pretty unrecognizable,” Miguel said, raising a baseball bat and propping it casually over his shoulder. Edwin saw the blood on the end of it. “You’ve all but wasted away, your hair has gone silver, and what with half your face looking like Freddy Krueger there is a good chance that we would never have realized who you really are. Believe it or not, Zeke was the one that put it together.”

  “Miguel, I don’t know what Zeke thinks—”

  “He was only a boy when the sickness hit, so I doubt he even remembers what President Kane looked like, but it was something you said that struck a nerve with him. After spewing lies and misinformation at the public in your press conferences, you’d always conclude with, ‘Good night and bless you all.’ Funny, Sadie and I had forgotten that, but Zeke remembered. And once he said something to us, it all fell into place. President Stephen E. Kane. Let me guess . . . the ‘E’ stands for Edwin, right?”

  Edwin thought about denying it, but he didn’t have the strength. “What happened was not my fault. I didn’t do anything.”

  “Except deceive the entire nation.”

  “At first I honestly didn’t know the severity of the situation.”

  “And after you did?”

  “Well, my advisors kept telling me it was best not to come clean with all the frightening details, that it was better to keep the public calm.”

  Miguel snorted a laugh. “So the Leader of the Free World was just following orders, just like the Gestapo.”

  “Please, you don’t understand. I was just trying to—”

  “And not only did you lie your ass off to us all back then,” Miguel said, paying no heed to Edwin’s words, “but then you came into my home and lied to my family.”

  “I did not lie.”

  “You didn’t give us your real name and you said you were a lawyer before the world ended.”

  “As you already deduced, Edwin is my real name, my middle name, and before I went into politics, I was a lawyer.”

  Miguel smiled. In the flickering light it was frightening, predatory. “It’s pretty slippery maneuvering, deception without any outright lies. Typical politician.”

  Edwin looked past Miguel toward the open back door of the mobile home. It was obvious to him that he was not going to be able to reason with this man, so he figured his only hope was Sadie. She seemed the more rational and compassionate of the two. “Sadie!” he yelled. “Sadie, please come out here!”

  “I’m right here, Mr. President.”

  The voice startled him, causing him to yelp. He craned his nec
k to look in the opposite direction, the far side of the yard that led to the lake. A figure stood just outside the torches’ reach, but then Sadie stepped forward and her face was painted with shifting light and shadow. She looked sad and weary.

  “Sadie, thank God. You’ve got to help me. Your husband is out of control.”

  Sadie walked forward slowly and took a seat on the picnic table’s bench. She stared off into the distance, her eyes unfocused as if she were seeing another place, another time. When she spoke, her voice was flat. “When my mother first got sick—just a case of the sniffles, that’s how it started—I begged her to go to one of those emergency clinics that sprung up around town, after the hospitals became overcrowded. I heard on the news they had specialists there that could help. I was down on my knees, in tears, pleading with her. She wouldn’t go, though. She’d always been a stubborn woman. She kept saying, ‘The President says there’s nothing to worry about, that people are freaking out for no good reason, like with the Bird Flu.’”

  Here Sadie paused and turned her gaze on Edwin. He suddenly wished she’d look away again. “My mother died in agony, choking on phlegm, spitting up blood, struggling for each breath, cursing God and screaming for me to kill her.”

  Edwin shook his head, still hoping to get through to her. “That’s not my fault. If she was showing any symptoms it means she was already infected. There was no cure, no treatment, so she was a dead woman regardless of whether or not she went to a clinic.”

  Sadie’s expression became so cold and emotionless it terrified Edwin. He turned his head back toward Miguel, who suddenly seemed to be the lesser of the two evils.

  Miguel laughed softly. “That was probably the wrong thing to say to her.”

  Sadie pushed herself up from the picnic table and walked around it, joining her husband. The two stared down at Edwin as if he were a pesky insect that needed to be squashed. These two good Christian people, a former kindergarten teacher and nurse, now looked like monsters.

  “So what are you going to do?” Edwin asked, not really wanting to know the answer. “Beat me to death with that bat?”

  Miguel glanced over at the bat on his shoulder as if he’d forgotten it was there. Then he tossed it off to the side, where it landed in the high grass with a faint thud. “No, amigo. That would be too good for you.”

  “What then, the shotgun?”

  Sadie shook her head. “All that buckshot in your flesh would be too wasteful.”

  “Wasteful? What are you talking about?”

  Miguel reached to his waist where he pulled a serrated hunting knife, lethal and nasty looking, from a leather sheath. “Looks like we’re going to be having steaks for dinner tomorrow night.”

  Sadie’s lips spread into a wicked grin. “With plenty left over for enough jerky to last us through next winter.”

  Edwin screamed long before the knife was used, but there was no one left in the dead world to hear or care.

  THE SUPPORT GROUP

  New York arrived late, but New York was always late. He took his usual seat next to Los Angeles, who despite her caked-on makeup and hair extensions looked haggard and frail. Across the way, London nodded, sucking on his pipe so that an amorphous cloud of smoke enveloped his head. Paris was also in attendance, perched on the edge of one of the uncomfortable folding chairs that made up the circle. Her pointy hat looked rather ridiculous.

  The group was packed today, almost all the seats taken.

  “So what’d I miss?” New York asked then doubled over as a violent fit of coughing tore through him. He hacked up black sludge into a handkerchief.

  Los Angeles had her chin tucked down against her chest, and she flicked her eyes toward him as if she hadn’t the strength to actually lift and turn her head. “I was telling everyone how I tried to shake the little buggers off again, but they just hold on for dear life and keep going like nothing happened.”

  All around the circle, everyone nodded soberly. They were all inflicted with the same disease. Little parasites had infested them and were slowly killing them. They came to the group for mutual support but also to hear stories of possible treatments and cures.

  “I tried washing them away,” Miami said, reaching up and scratching at her head. “I mean, I really doused the fuckers. Got rid of some of them, but not enough, and it seems more just came to take the place of those I washed away.”

  Next to Miami, New Orleans laughed, the sound deep and resonant. “Tell me about it. Several years back I really thought I’d managed to wash myself clean of the things, but now they’re all back. I can feel them crawling all over my skin.”

  New York squirmed in his seat. He too felt the parasites all over him, polluting his body with their foul sickness. It had been so long since he had felt anything but tired and weak and contaminated. He didn’t even know what it was to be healthy anymore.

  “What are we going to do?” he asked, his voice breaking. The question, familiar to the group, summed up why they came back week after week.

  “You could do what I did.”

  All eyes turned at the sound of Chernobyl’s thick accent. She was the only person any of them knew that had actually beaten the disease. But the radiation treatment had taken a lot out of her, leaving her a withered husk of her former self. Her hair had fallen out except for a few matted clumps, and she seemed lost in her clothes, as if she were nothing more than a stick figure held together by twine and parchment.

  Everyone was impressed by Chernobyl’s success at eradicating the parasites, but no one was willing to pay such a steep price to be free of them.

  And yet, New York thought as he coughed up more black sludge mixed with his own blood, he might just be getting to the point that he’d try anything.

  WELCOME

  Stranded in the middle of somewhere.

  The thought entered Steve’s mind as he stepped out onto the asphalt. Al exited the passenger’s side and joined him in front of the car. They raised the hood and stared down at the Toyota’s innards for some time.

  “So,” Al said, breaking the silence, “how long are we going to look before we finally acknowledge that neither of us knows the first thing about cars?”

  Steve closed the hood. “I think this is about long enough. I can’t figure out what could be wrong with it.”

  They’d had the Toyota Celica only four months, the first new car either of them had ever owned. If the two men had not pooled their resources, they would never have been able to afford the automobile. It had been running smoothly up until a few minutes ago. Al noticed a low sound, like playing cards in bicycle spokes, and then everything shut down. No lurching or sputtering. The engine simply ceased, and Steve had guided the car to the right where it coasted to a gentle stop on the grassy curb.

  “Well, looks like we’re stuck here,” Steve said. “Better pull out your phone and call a tow truck.”

  “Oh yeah, my phone.”

  “Don’t tell me you didn’t bring your cell.”

  “No, I brought it, it’s right here.” Al pulled the compact black phone from his pocket and held it up. “But I’m out of minutes.”

  “Well, that’s great,” Steve said, but there was no harshness in his voice. While he was more than a bit irritated by their brand new car’s refusal to go, he found the situation more amusing than anything else. This whole scenario—a young couple’s car breaking down in a remote area—was straight out of one of those cheap horror flicks Al always dragged him to. With one significant deviation, though. In those movies, the car always broke down in some backwater hillbilly town where the residents wanted to rape you or eat you or sacrifice you to some corn god. The area in which Steve and Al now found themselves was nothing like that.

  “I guess we should go ask someone if we can use their phone,” Al said, leaning over and bumping his shoulder into Steve’s.

  Steve planted a quick kiss on Al’s lips. “Guess so. I just hope the people in this neighborhood can afford phones.”

  Al
laughed and the two headed across the street.

  Ever since Steve and Al moved in together, they had developed a fondness for taking drives. It started out as a game. They would pick a road that neither of them had ever been down and see where it led. This soon evolved into routine drives through the more affluent neighborhoods of town. Steve and Al shared a studio apartment, a tiny box of a place that reminded both of them of a motel room. They couldn’t afford anything bigger yet, Steve worked as a waiter and Al with mentally handicapped children, but they could dream of something bigger. They would drive through the rich neighborhoods and pick out their favorite houses, speculating on how it would be to live in such domestic palaces.

  It was toward one of those domestic palaces that Steve and Al now walked.

  The house was large, two stories, of multi-colored brick. The downstairs boasted large bay windows under which beautifully landscaped shrubbery grew. On either side of the front door, a large oak slab with a polished brass knocker, were old-fashioned gas lanterns. Even now low flames flickered, though darkness had not yet fallen. The house was expansive without being cold and foreboding like some other large homes. There was a certain coziness to this house. In fact, Steve had been about to pronounce this home his favorite of the evening when the Celica had stopped running.

  In the front of the house was a paved drive that curved in a semi-circle, bordered by a row of knee-high bushes. Steve and Al walked down one side of the drive, fingers intertwined, and a gentle breeze ruffled their hair. Al glanced at his watch. 06:47 PM. The sky was the deep purple of a fresh bruise, stars flickering like the flames of the gas lanterns. It was a gorgeous spring evening, the kind of evening romance novelists wrote about in their saccharine fiction.

  “Think we’ll be invited in for tea?” Al asked. “Get a firsthand glance at how the other half lives?”

  “Who knows? Maybe they’ll be looking for a couple of young house-boys to do the cleaning in nothing but a pair of bikini briefs.”