“Of course I know that it was not meant to be personal. I mean, I know that now. I’m his mother, for goodness sake. But it hurt our relationship. Things were always tense. Truth be told, I guess I got somewhat personal myself on occasion. I would have preferred that he had fallen into line, tossed out his beliefs and just embraced what all the rest of us believed. That was wrong of me. I see that. And it would have been wrong even if it had turned out that he was wrong and everyone else was right.” Elsie’s voice trailed off and her thoughts went elsewhere for a moment.
“I would give anything to have him here with us while we are going through all of this.”
“Did you say he was in Boise?”
“Yes. He moved up there a few years ago. I hear that there are many survivalist-minded types up there. I called them worse things before all this happened, but I won’t do that now. He tried to get us to come and check out his place, but we wouldn’t do it. We thought he was crazy.”
“Well, just because he was right about the world, doesn’t mean he wasn’t crazy!” Natasha said, trying to lighten Elsie’s mood.
“He wasn’t crazy,” Elsie replied flatly.
“We left Binghamton the day after the power went out. They told me it was an ‘EMP’, but I still don’t really know what that means. The stores were soon out of food. It only took four hours and they were stripped bare. My son used to rail on about that. I remember it now because I hated hearing it.
“He would say, ‘People are crazy if they really believe that the food in the system will last three days after a big enough collapse!’ I just wanted him to shut up about it. But he was right. We went into some stores and there were fistfights over the stupidest things. On one aisle, the only things hanging on the wall were some of those gel soles things… you know… the gel-filled pads you cut and put into your shoes to make them more comfortable? Anyway, people were actually fighting over those. Actually fist-fighting over them. Violence! Over some stupid gel soles.” Elsie shook her head and Natasha smiled, hearing the incredulity in the woman’s humor.
“We just got out of there. All you were going to get in the stores was killed.”
“That’s almost unbelievable. I mean, if we hadn’t already seen the things we’ve seen, I’d call you a liar.” Natasha said.
“There’s no lying about it. We had almost no food in the house. Not anything to speak of. We usually ate out before this happened.” Elsie shook her head. “We made it a few days, but things were getting really thin, and we heard about gangs and looters going door to door. A couple down the street got shot to death right on their doorstep. That’s when we decided we needed to get out.”
“Where were you planning to go?”
“There was no real plan. Some of the neighbors got everyone on our block together—whoever would come—and we had a meeting and just decided to get out of the city. That’s all we could think of at the time. Just get out. You know? Get a tent and get out into the country and just forage. It sounded easy. It wasn’t. But I suppose you all have gone through the same things?”
“I guess you could say it was something like that,” Natasha answered.
“One of the men on our street had a bunch of survival food, and a little hand-pump water purifier, so we figured we’d just walk into the woods until we found some place better than where we were. Isn’t that the story of all refugees for all time?”
“I suppose it is.”
“So tell me about you all. Who’s who?”
Natasha thought for a moment, not knowing what she should say. “Our story is not unlike yours. We’re from a town called Warwick.”
“Oh, Warwick… I’ve heard of it,” Elsie replied.
“My brother was with me,” Natasha said quickly, hoping to cut off any questions in case Elsie knew someone in the other Warwick, or in case she might ask details that would not match up if cross-checked. “He left his glasses at one of our camps and went back for them. We haven’t seen him since. I’m very worried.”
“Oh, honey! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sure he’s okay.”
“I don’t know.”
“You probably all should have stuck together, you know. But he’ll catch up with you, I’m sure of it.”
“I hope you’re right,” Natasha said, but she didn’t believe for a moment that Elsie was right. After the experiences of the last few days, Natasha rejected the kind of Pollyanna thinking that was common to so many modern Americans. Peter had warned them to beware of it. This one thing was a tiny microcosm of what had caused the dependency, lethargy, and deception in the first place: the tendency to believe that everything would somehow work out okay.
Elsie smiled at her, trying to be comforting. “The sun will come out tomorrow, and he’ll be here. You can bet your bottom dollar on that. He’s probably just a day behind us. That’s all,” Elsie said.
This woman, Natasha thought, however good her motives might be, didn’t have a single fact on which to base her assessment. She didn’t know what had happened to Cole, and an honest judgment, based on the facts on the ground as they had all seen them, did not offer much hope for Cole at all. But discourse in America was about emotions and feelings, and never truth and facts. Natasha had to get used to this reality, because it was a tricky one that could trap you if you weren’t careful.
People had the idea that if they were justpositive minded then nothing bad could happen to them. Or, they thought that if they lied to themselves and one another, then the truth would be easier to swallow later on. Natasha was not going to fall for that, but she appreciated the heart behind the deception.
Herein she could see the clash of worldviews that had multiplied and expanded to bring about this catastrophe, and would continue to cause dissolution if it continued going forward. Beyond the wars and fighting and destruction, there would need to be a reassertion of the age-old desire for truth and honesty. The mind of reason would need to triumph over the long reign of emotionalism and lies. What was it that Lang was always saying? It was a Solzhenitsyn quote that he’d repeated several times since they’d fled Warwick…
“One word of truth shall outweigh the world.”
Natasha hoped that somehow, from among the rubble, the truth, and a love of it, would one day rise, stand back up on its feet, and stare the world down again.
CHAPTER 24
Life can turn on a dime. Sometimes, things are going along as expected and then a vicious pirouette occurs. It’s as if we are chasing a beast through the forest and we think we have it right where we want it, and then it turns. It pivots and bares its fangs. In a flash, tables are turned, momentum is lost, victors become vanquished, and lives are lost. In those moments, all we can do is hold on and watch the thing happen.
Sunday
The day was crisp and clean, and except for the snow that was still thick on the ground, it might have been spring. It was that bright and airy. The snow crunched under boots, and the reflection off the snow made the eyes of the four cautious hikers squint into the brightness. After a few hours of good, hard walking, Lang called to Peter and told him that he needed to take a pause. Nature, he explained, was calling. He needed to urinate.