Journal

COPYRIGHT 2011

By

Craig Buckhout

December
12, 2051

I
got no idea how to start this.  Words don’t come easy to me, especially if I’m
trying to think them out.  Give me something to fix and you can know it’ll get
done, but to write something down, that was always Claire’s job.  She’s the one
who always hand wrote the cards and letters and such.  She’s also the one who
wrote down her thoughts on things in these journals of
hers
. 
She loved doing that.  I think it was herperspective f up ahead favorite part of the day.

I
remember there was this one time that I asked her why she made writing such a
habit and why by hand instead of with that computer I got her.  She told me
that writing stuff out helped her understand it better and doing it by hand let
her feel the words.  I never really got what she meant by that, or by a lot of
things she said, ‘til now.  You see, when I run my fingers over what she wrote
on these pages, it’s like I can feel her right through the letters.  And when I
pick up one of these journals, it’s almost as if — I don’t know — it’s almost
as if I’m holding her hand.

About
these journals, like I told you, they belonged to Claire.  I hardly ever touched
them.  They was real special to her.  But considering everything, I figure this
one time I can write something down in them, too.  That’s because I want to
make sure I get my say about her and about the way things turned out.  So if
anyone ever finds them and reads this, he’ll know that my Claire was a good,
decent woman, maybe too good for this world.  I’m thinking that’s what did her
in, too.

Claire
Huston was my wife.  We was married for thirty-three years and we went through
every kind of thing you can think of together; now this, too.  She died today. 
She just slipped away from me in her sleep.  And I feel so God damned useless about
it because I didn’t know what else to do to make her better.  I tried as best I
could.  I swear I did.  We stayed when we should have been gone.  I kept her
warm and hid good.  I made sure she got most the food, too.  But none of that
helped any; she just kept on getting weaker and weaker and weaker until there
was no changing it.

She
knew what was happening to her, too, but she never once cried, or got cross
with me for not doing more, or asked God why he let the world get so bad off.  Instead,
she kept on telling me that things would be all right, that I’d be OK, and that
good people would make everything better again.  That was just like her, though. 
That’s why I loved her.  She saw the good in everything and everyone when there
wasn’t no good to see.

I
wish I could feel about things like that, too, but I can’t.  She was a fine
woman.  I didn’t deserve her.

Anyway,
so when it gets dark I’ll bury her in the backyard there, by that peach tree
she loved so much, and deep down so the dogs don’t get at her.  They’ll still
get their meal though because I’ll be joining her soon enough.  See, the way I
figure it, there’s not much point in continuing to live in this world the way
it is without her here to keep things right.  And for whoever finds this
journal, if you take the time to read her words, they just might lift you up
and help you know her the way I have these many years.  Chester Huston __

April
1, 2054 (Fools Day)
–

My
name is Alan Trent.  I’m thirty-nine years old and originally from San Antonio,
Texas, USA.  I say USA because I’m not sure there is a USA anymore, or, if
there is, where its borders are.  Up until about three, three and a half years
ago I was a part time blackjack dealer in Reno, Nevada with a Masters in
B emotional connection foatjusiness Administration.  How’s that for a combination?  It makes sense if you
know another thing about me; I’m not particularly ambitious.  I admit it and
accept it about myself, even if others don’t.  Anyway, my part time work turned
into no work at all when the lights went out and people stopped showing up at
the casinos.  I hung around for a year or so after that, at least until the
cops and fire fighters and garbage collectors and undertakers, we mustn’t
forget the undertakers, stopped showing up for work, too.  That’s when I hopped
on my thirty-six year old Honda motorcycle, with all I could carry, and rode
north to Washington.  See, it was rumored that up near the Canadian border there
were still functioning governments, but I found only the same; plenty of people
willing to take my life for what little I had.  Now I’m on foot, my motorcycle
broken down about a hundred miles back on what used to be Highway 97, and
headed the other way, back toward San Antonio.

I
have a sister in San Antonio, and she has a husband and three kids: two boys
and a girl.  Only thing is, they’re probably all dead now, but I haven’t a
better idea of where to go.  She’s the only blood relative who may be left; parents,
brother, ex-wife and daughter all long gone from the sickness, sicknesses
actually.

That’s not exactly what did us in,
though, the sickness.  It’s much more complicated than that.  In the beginning,
you didn’t even know it was happening — warming, flooding, drought, fire, starvation,
refugee camps, war.  That’s because it was happening to the same people it always
happened to, not us.  First it was Asia, next Africa, and then even Europe.  So
you just kicked down a few bucks to the Red Cross, turned off the evening news,
and forgot about it.  At least that’s what I did.

There came a time, though, when
even I, as practiced as I am at ignoring the unpleasant, couldn’t do it anymore. 
People here were losing their homes and even entire cities to the oceans —
Miami, New Orleans, Virginia Beach.  Our southern border became a war zone. 
Hundreds of thousands of people, starving people, poor people, tried to push
across.  We fought them of course, them and their armies.

Our old enemies saw opportunity
in this.  First, they attacked our computer network with these viruses, super
viruses they called them, and that shut down our power grid.  Well, of course
everything was run by electricity — our computers, our cars, our factories, our
communication systems, everything.  Suddenly I was out of work, sitting at home
in the dark, talking to myself.  Because nothing moved and little worked, food and
water was rationed and medicines ran short.  After that it was disease and
quarantine, one virus right after the other, and people started dying in large
numbers, faster than they could even be buried.

Next, we must have been attacked
with something that wiped out all remaining electronics because even battery
operated radios quit on us.  They were bombs of some kind, set off miles high
above the earth, just a flash and boom in the sky.  So the federal and state
governments became ineffective, too.  They couldn’t communicate with us, they
couldn’t reach us, and they certainly couldn’t help us.  In Reno, martial law
was declared and eventually no law at all.  Neighbor stole from neighbor,
murder became commonplace.  Nothing was the same.ball cap and dark glasseswot

So
for almost two years now I’ve kept moving, hiding, and avoiding all but a very
few and still suspicious of even them.  I know that somewhere there must be
people who have risen up and gathered not only for their mutual safety but for
some common good as well.  I just haven’t found them yet.

Three
days ago, I discovered this journal, the one you’re reading.  It was in an
abandoned house on the outskirts of a ghost of a town called Mayfair, in central
Washington.  It, along with two others already written-in, and yet another
blank, was in a kitchen cabinet where I was searching for food.  At first, my
thought was it would make good tinder for fire and perhaps be of use after
taking care of my business, but after reading a few pages, I changed my mind. 
This woman, Claire Huston, and her husband seemed like good, decent, caring
people, the kind of people I’d liked to have known.  The kind of people a
society should be built around.  So I got to thinking that maybe as long as
someone carried on with her journal, her humanity will somehow stay alive, too. 
Which brings me to why I decided to start writing today of all days.

I
saw some people earlier, just a couple of hours ago in fact, near a town with
the unlikely name of Okiedoke.  There were two men and a boy of about fifteen,
and they were gathering wood maybe a hundred, a hundred and fifty yards away
from me.  One of the men was older than the other, or seemed so anyway.  He was
bald on top, with a ring of gray hair that hung down on the sides and back.  He
was dressed in dirty overalls and moved about as if he’d suffered a leg injury
of some sort.  The other was a redhead with a long pony tail, wearing what
looked like a black, knee-length overcoat.  He seemed to be the one in charge
because I could see him pointing and the other two moving off in one direction or
another to pick up wood.

The
boy now, he’s not like them.  In fact, I don’t think they’re related at all.  The
reason I say that is he’s tall and skinny, with a milk chocolate complexion, so
my guess is he’s maybe Mexican or American Indian.  Both the men are definitely
fair skinned.  But there’s another reason I don’t think they are related.

A
moment passed there when I thought the kid saw me.  I mean he stared right at
me for at least three or four seconds, maybe more, causing me to move further
behind the tree I was standing next to.   When he finally turned away, he
looked at Mr. Ponytail who was busy picking up a tree branch and apparently
unaware of this whole exchange.  Then this kid did something totally
unexpected.  He purposely dropped his load of sticks onto the ground.

I
guess that must have really ticked Mr. Ponytail off because he put his own load
on the ground and stomped his way over to the kid, where he proceeded to kick
him several times in the butt and legs until the kid finally went down.  The
man pulled what looked like a pistol out of his coat pocket and pointed it right
at the kid’s head.  I thought for sure I’d hear a shot and that would be that,
but he ended up putting it away,  yelling at him, pointing at the sticks on the
ground, and stomping off the few yards to pick up his own wood.  As I continued
to watch, the kid got up to his knees and picked up what he’d dropped.  And while
all this was going on, the other man, the one with the limp, didn’t move to
intercede or even offer comfort afterwards.  In fact, he actually captured or stolen or shot or torn apart.  It can’t be buriedtiflooked pretty
disinterested about the whole matter.

After
they left, I went down to where all this happened.  See, sometimes it’s a good
idea to recognize the shoeprints of a group like that.  They’d definitely be a
bunch to steer clear of, if at all possible.  Well I found their shoeprints all
right, but I also found something else.  On the ground, right where the kid had
dropped his armload of wood, the word “help” was clearly scratched in the dirt. 
My guess is that the kid must have written it there when he was on his knees
and Mr. Ponytail had his back turned.  Smart kid I guess, but I wonder if he
would have done it if he knew he was going to get a beating like that.

Well
anyway, that’s the reason I decided to start writing today.  I’m going to see
if I can help the kid and get him away from those two.  I know it’s a foolish
thing to do.  There’re a dozen good reasons not to get involved.  Believe me,
I’ve told myself ten times over that it would be much safer to just stay
invisible and pass on by.   I’ve certainly seen worse these last couple of
years and done nothing.  So, why the change?  Why not just play it safe and
look the other way?  If I get hurt on this foolhardy enterprise, there are no
emergency rooms to go to or medicines to take.  I’ll be pretty much on my own. 
I don’t owe that kid anything either.  He’s nothing to me.

Still,
I’ve made up my mind to help and can only speculate as to why.  To myself I say
it’s the right thing to do, that no human being should be treated like that.  Also,
if I don’t help this kid, if I turn my back on him, I’m no better than his tormentor. 
I can’t help but wonder, though, are these my words and
my feelings or those of a
woman who now lies buried under a peach tree
in a little town three days walk from here?