Staying Alive

11

“I should have just stayed in my apartment,” muttered John.

Lawrence, for once, didn’t have a positive message to impart to John. He remained silent.

When they’d heard the chanting, John had led them further west to a bar that he’d frequented in his younger years. It was one of those trendy microbrew places that brewed its own beer.

John had gone there so much that he’d become friendly with the staff and eventually the owner. After one particularly intense late night session of drinking, John was forced to take the owner’s keys away from him in order to prevent him driving home seriously impaired.

Because of what might be called an indiscretion on John’s part, he never visited that bar again. He’d slept with the owner’s sister, who was married at the time. The owner found out about it, and left a series of threatening voicemails on John’s phone. John had never been the type to confront situations like that head on. He preferred to deal with the abstract world of numbers, focusing on his financial work and tuning out the world at large.

For some reason that he never could quite figure out, John had kept that set of keys. He’d kept them in his briefcase, toting them around every day. Maybe he thought that someday he’d get the guts to face the owner, who had been a real friend to him many times, and patch things up. But John never acted, and the keys became a reminder of his own cowardice.

The bar wasn’t in the best neighborhood, and the doors were of thick steel, with good locks. But the key still worked, and the door opened for John and Lawrence.

They sat at one of the booths. Lawrence sat bolt upright, his hands folded on the table in front of him, as if he was meeting a new client. John slouched, his legs stretched out on the plush leather booth, his back resting against the wall.

A couple candles burned in front of them on the table. They had been hard to find in the near pitch-black bar. The moon was bright that night, but the bar had never been known for its windows.

Lawrence had drunk two entire large bottles of seltzer water, found behind the bar. John had drunk two as well, along with two beers. Now he was working on his third.

They’d been eating salted nuts constantly, and while they weren’t ideal, they did slowly start to quench the raging hunger that John felt.

“So I don’t get it,” said John, suddenly turning his head and staring at Lawrence. “I don’t get your whole deal.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you sound just so… This whole thing about helping people… It sounds like bullshit to me.”

“And why do you think that?” said Lawrence.

“I don’t need your therapist crap,” said John. “Like I said, none of that matters now.”

Lawrence shrugged. “I’m not trying to change your opinion about me,” he said.

“Look,” said John, taking a long sip from his beer mug. “I’m headed out of here. Out of the city. I’m probably going to die. But I think you should come with me.”

“And why is that?”

“Because beneath all this ‘helping people’ crap, I know you really want to get out.”

Lawrence shrugged. “I’m not sure I’m following you.”

“Well,” said John. “You came here with me, didn’t you? Did you do that for purely altruistic reasons? I mean, what help have you provided me so far? Sure, you told me to get inside. That helped, but I’m pretty sure I would have figured that out myself. It’s hard to miss that crazy chanting. It’d be hard to miss the screams…”

“Like I said, I’ve always been helping people. What I didn’t say was that I always do the best job, or do the right thing… I haven’t known how to approach this problem… Maybe I didn’t do a good job, but who could?”

John studied Lawrence’s face. He saw right through him, down to his core. He knew Lawrence wanted to get out, but that he didn’t have the guts to do so. Instead, he was hiding behind his old identity, an identity that wouldn’t serve him any longer.

John also knew that he himself had a greater chance of actually getting out if he had someone else there with him, someone to watch his back, someone to help him.

While John had spent most of his working hours staring at a computer, he’d also needed to meet regularly with clients and other investors. And he’d grown good at manipulating them. There was no other way to put it. He could call it anything he wanted, but he knew he was using well-defined tactics of manipulation. And John was the sort of person who was OK with that.

He could use those tactics on Lawrence.

If Lawrence really believed in his old professional identity, John would use that to his own advantage.

“Look,” said John. “There’s nothing you can do for the people here in the city. Everyone’s going to starve to death, or who knows what. There are plenty of horrible fates that await them and you yourself. You can’t help them. But if you get out… out to the countryside, there are going to be more survivors. There aren’t going to be mobs there. There are going to be people who made it through, who haven’t been sucked into this madness here… If you come with me, you could do much more good… I’m not asking for an answer now. Think about it. I’m leaving at dawn tomorrow.”

Lawrence nodded, but didn’t say anything.

John slept restlessly, as could be expected, but even so it was the best sleep he’d had in the last two weeks. The beer and peanuts had finally made his stomach actually feel full, and despite being buzzed, he felt he was regaining his strength.

The bar was on an out of the way side street, and there were no screams to be heard that night.

In the morning, John woke up feeling better than any day since the EMP, despite his mild hangover.

He started rooting around the bar, looking for things that could be useful. He gathered bottles of seltzer water, candles, lighters, and knives. Unfortunately, he didn’t find the gun that had been rumored to be kept behind the bar.

“Hey,” he said, prodding Lawrence. “You ready to go?”

John figured that if he posed the question this way, a “yes” was more likely.

“Uh, yeah,” said Lawrence sleepily.

John didn’t question him. He already had what he wanted from Lawrence.

“Help me get ready,” he said. John gave Lawrence a rundown of what might be useful.

After twenty minutes, they had a pile of things laid out on the bar. Their weapons consisted of kitchen knives. Their food supply was nothing but nuts and limes. The milk in the mini fridge had long since spoiled. John filled some growlers with beer, saying the extra calories would be a help.

The next problem was trying to figure out how to carry it all. Lawrence had nothing useful, and all John had was his leather briefcase. Eventually, John found sacks of hops in the back. He slit them open with his kitchen knife, emptied out the smelly contents, and filled two of them with as much as he could. He handed one to Lawrence, who slung it over his back silently, and they were off.

John locked the door behind him, in case they needed to come back to the bar, in case the plan didn’t work out.

John’s mindset had changed yet again. He was starting to think it was possible that it actually all could work. He still knew it was a long shot… There was a long way to go just to get out of the city.

But if they could do it, get out past the dead-car traffic jams of the city and into the suburbs, he knew they could somehow find at least one working car with gas. There had to be one somewhere. All the city streets were gridlocked completely. There was no way to drive out.

“I still don’t get how you survived out on the streets,” said John, as they walked along the sidewalk. The sun was shining, and it would have looked like a beautiful normal day in Philadelphia. Except for the dead bodies that both John and Lawrence ignored. And except for the cars abandoned on the road.

They passed some military trucks that were abandoned as well. Inside one of them, there was a soldier who looked like he had literally been torn limb from limb. Only a mob could do that. Not a single person. A group of people, acting together, like one giant animal.

“I don’t know either,” said Lawrence. “Then again, things have always worked out for me like that.”

“So tell me what it was like,” said John. “I literally didn’t leave my apartment since it happened.”

Lawrence started telling John all about the initial riots. He told John about the extensive looting. That was when people just thought the power was out momentarily. They thought it was going to come back on, and they wanted to get their money’s worth, so to speak, by grabbing as many expensive goods as they could. Some, though, thought about water and food, and the grocery stores were empty within days.

Then the military came in, with their big rumbling trucks. They kept the city on lockdown, and imposed a curfew.

But as the days went by, and the power didn’t come back on, the military and police were getting disorganized. They couldn’t communicate with each other, and there was no one that they had to answer to. There were no higher ups. No word came from Washington. No word came from anywhere.

“And what happened after that?”

“Well, you saw the aftermath,” said Lawrence, wincing at the painful memory. “Do I really need to go into detail?”

John didn’t say anything.

“So how are you planning on getting out of the city anyway?” said Lawrence. “You know if we manage to cross the river, there’s still going to be about forty-five city blocks until we’re out. Heading directly west, that is. And it’s still dense after that. I doubt we’ll be much safer once we reach Upper Darby.”

“Remember,” said John. “You’re coming with me, so drop the whole ‘how are you going to escape thing.’”

“Fine,” muttered Lawrence.

“And the answer to your question is that I have no idea,” said John.

They kept walking. The sun was at their backs, rising slowly over the apparently empty city.

Many of the bodies on the ground looked fresh.

“They must have been killed last night,” said John.

Lawrence didn’t say anything.

“Are you used to them or something? They don’t seem to affect you. The bodies, that is.”

“I don’t know,” said Lawrence. He seemed to be lost in his own head.

“Hey,” said John. “Do you know of any boat rental places on the Schuylkill?”

“Boat rentals?”

“Yeah, you know, tourist traps? That sort of thing…”

“I think there was a paddle boat place. I haven’t been down there in a few years, though.”

“Perfect,” said John. “That’s going to be our out.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you see? We don’t have to cross through West Philly. We’re going to take one of those boats and leave the city that way… Who else is going to be crazy enough to be on a boat?”

Lawrence laughed nervously. “That’s pretty crazy,” he said.

“Well, do you have a better idea?”

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

It was too late.

A hand reached out and seized John. Or tried to seize him.

They had walked right past an alley and John had been so caught up in his plans that he hadn’t even bothered to look in the alley. He had a lot to learn.

John turned, seeing his attacker for the first time. He was an overweight man, with a big belly. Like John, he wore business clothes that had become tattered.

For a second, John thought he recognized him. Maybe from some meeting long ago.

The attacker lunged forward, barreling towards John with all his weight. He collided with John, and they both fell to the ground.

The attacker grabbed John’s hops bag, the bag full of food. It had fallen to the ground when John had been knocked down.

The attacker was up in a flash, moving quickly despite his size.

Lawrence lunged at the attacker, trying to grab him, but he merely grabbed the man’s shirt. The man easily pulled himself free, and went dashing down the alley.

“Shit,” said John, scrambling to his feet.

He knew that he needed that bag of food.

He also knew that he was lucky to be alive. Most people wouldn’t merely tackle him for a bag of food, or unknown provisions. Most would kill first and examine the contents of the bag later. But this attacker was weak.

Just like John. He’d had the opportunity to stab the man when they were both on the ground. But he hadn’t done it. The knife had been in his hand the whole time, but he simply hadn’t acted.

He wasn’t about to make the same mistake twice.

Knife in hand, John dashed down the alley.

Lawrence ran clumsily after him. John heard the footsteps behind him, but didn’t turn to look. He was intent on catching the thief and getting back what was his.

The alley opened up to 18^th Street.

John turned the corner.

The attacker was resting against the brick wall of a building, the sack of food between his legs. He was panting heavily with exertion, and rummaging through the bag greedily. He didn’t even look up to see John approaching him. He was too hungry, too desperate, to act sensibly. He was at his wit’s end.

John walked slowly towards him, like an animal approaching its prey. He was angry, furious. His chest felt hot. Stealing someone’s food was as good as killing them, thought John.

There was a sound off to his side, but John didn’t look. He was too intent on the man rummaging through his food sack.

Something hard hit John in the shoulder. Pain flared through his body, and he fell to the ground. His head hit the pavement, and the knife fell with a clatter from his hand.