Tamberlin's Account (4 page)

But it stayed busy and actually got worse when I skimmed the city limits of a large town—there were a lot of police cars. A few military vehicles. A few civilian vehicles on the side of the road. There were probably a lot of indications of what was really wrong and how bad it was that I just couldn’t see and I
wouldn’t
see until I was forced to deal with a situation head on.
Then
I
saw
. But that was later.

At that time I was more concerned with dealing with the hours on the road. I never count on finding channels with enough music I like to bother listening to the radio. So, like on the way there, I was listening to my iPod and didn’t think about checking news—maybe I wasn’t concerned about hearing it, I can’t remember.

The first song that played,
Embryo
by Dir en Grey, seeped almost more from the dark than from my speakers when it started. When I love a song, it’s almost parasitic – I let the music take me, sink its teeth in. I let the song devour me. Sometimes it feels good to just put in the earbuds and spread out on a bed or the carpet and be eclipsed in a perfect song.

In this case, the songs were eating the miles and I was gladly losing time.

Later, my cell phone rang once, but the bars were low and the sounds I got didn’t add up to words. It was Marie.

I was at about ½ a tank and was compelled to top off. That probably had less to do with some intuitive fear of whatever bad thing I was sensing, than just knowing I was crossing South Dakota and I sure as hell didn’t want to run out of gas between towns… in the middle of the night. The service station was busy and I had to wait behind four other vehicles for my turn.

Out in the orange lights of the Cenex, everyone was talking excitedly—no,
hysterically
. I wanted a cold drink, so after I filled up I went inside. The shelves were nearly picked clean. There were no drinks to buy, but people weren't ravaging the "to-go" food as badly—so I settled for a 32 oz vanilla soft serve with a straw and paid for my gas. I didn't take all I could of the goods there. I didn't even buy chips.

The clerk looked exhausted or scared. When I checked out we shared a look of confusion.

"Anything else?" she said.

Behind me someone said something about "...nurses treating people on the sidewalks."

At the next register someone was buying a spare gas can. Its redness seemed brilliant. Beckoning. My ears were ringing. I felt like they were going underwater. I couldn't stop looking at it.

I told her “no” and goodnight.

1:21am

I left into the less stuffy sound of the same conversations, but outdoors.

Then I had to look somewhere besides the gas can, but then I saw red—everywhere. The one inside might have been the last because the rest were out here. Some people even had 3 or 4 of them.

I saw three people looking through the windows on the opposite side of my car. They barely hid their guilt enough to move a couple steps back, as I approached.

I used my key (because I always lock my car doors, even if I step away for only a couple minutes) and entered through the passenger side—because I don't take chances like that. Like I was going to stand in the middle of them with my purse and keys in hand.

I was nervous to slide into the driver's seat. I didn't want to make eye contact. I only looked down long enough to slip my key in the ignition. When I looked up I noticed all the out of state plates. I reminded myself, who was I to know what could be going on that they would be there. I didn't know. Actually, they couldn't have known yet either—or at least the magnitude of it all or  I’m sure many wouldn’t have bothered to be as “civil” as they were. I didn’t miss the fear and confusion in the majority of their faces. I didn’t miss that every vehicle was packed to the roof, either.

I turned the key and crept through the disorderly gas station. People were yelling at me and everyone else at the pumps, impatient for their turn. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the people surge on what looked like a fight that had broken out inside the station. Someone ran with a gun. Something told me I needed to get the hell out of there. I switched on the blinker, turning east. I looked both ways and then up at nothing--because I was listening. I slightly tilted my head toward my left shoulder and squinted—as if that actually helps, but I didn't hear it again.

I thought I heard a gunshot.

After waiting for a few vehicles to pass, I turned out, glancing at the car's clock.

1:26am

I was worried.
Beyond
instinct—I really
knew
I should be. I wondered where my friends were. I started thinking about family I hadn't seen since I was a child.

It was a little further down the road when I found out this wasn’t something to just worry about. Everything before was like a tornado watch.
It
was a warning. I had every reason to be scared for my life. All lives.

It was horrible and unreal.

At first it wasn't horrible—I can't describe it; I think that's just not the right word.

In a dream everything is possible and sometimes you wake up and you realize you're in a heightened state of fear—it was like that fear plus the mortal panic of seeing something ethereal—like facing God, but with the exact opposite energy that I think a person would feel in God's presence. If you believed we're not always in it.

I can't describe it.

Damn it.

It’s like my soul was terrified.

In
Home Alone
, Kevin wishes his family would disappear. I fantasized
so many times
about this happening. Sometimes I yearned for it—I
wished it
with
absolute
sincerity.

I can't even address that part of me—it’s sitting in my mental "IN" box.

Should I feel guilt? I suppose I should feel satisfied? I don't—I just don't want to go there.

Anyway—I just thought about that.

I made my family disappear.

If I leave this house will I end up a long ways from here?
Will I see one of my friends' cars on the vehicle graveyard interstate?

Or maybe my doctors will find the right combination of medications and I'll come to in a mental hospital and everyone will be okay. As okay as we were.

It's just any other day before the impossible happens. That's how it is in the movies and in reality too.

Everything is routine until aliens show up.

I feel so bad.

I do not have things happen that I want or think that I want. Sometimes I felt like fate was against me for how much bad luck I've had. I used to say, “Do I stink? I should. I’ve been pissed on all day.”

That my simple escapist fantasy could be responsible for this and my unlikely survival. At least I can't know if it was me or any other person out there who wondered what it would be like. Anyone who was tired of the routine and dreaming of something more exciting in their life. If they're dead and I'm not, should I blame myself? I dunno. I can't stop picking this scab.

God, it's late. I'll run down batteries and this is definitely not worth it.

Oct 12 12:55pm

I wish you could tell me how this happened for you.

Oct17 11:15am

Mr. Ages looks like he's laughing on mute. I love his face. I've never had a pet before. He's more like a companion I guess. I don't think of him as a pet. I don't know what to think of him. But I love his face and I need his presence. He is basking in the sun and dark eyes are sparkly and the heat has put that smile on his face.

The trees are really pretty. The maple trees appeared to be burning, the same way that the sun set fire to the fox. The wind is warm—unseasonably? I wouldn't know, but it feels amazing. The air smells so sweet—all these dying things smell so good. The leaves aren't crunchy, they are soft with dew. There's about four inches of leaves on top of more than a foot of browning grass.

It's almost Halloween. I'm pretty sure it won't be the same thing this year.

I'm almost afraid of what will happen.

It could make things worse. Who knows?

I love Halloween.

I'd work so hard to make sure I spent a considerable part of it scared out of my mind with Dee’s help, who would always visit to celebrate the holiday, her favorite. She said I had a better yard for the haunted cemetery we raised every year. But I think she also liked to go somewhere she didn’t have to lift a finger for a few days.  

I’d go to her place for our birthdays, mine’s January 17
^th
and hers the 21
^st
. Since we met when we were 9, I spent every birthday with her.

Are you alone?

Is it not enormously stupid to ask you questions? A perpetual question.

Is it not enormously stupid to be curious about you?

Oct 18 9:30am

I found the road map—I knew I had one; I just had it in a different spot.
I must have been organizing
It was still in my "travel" pack.

I know I'd have to head south. How far?

There have got to be other people out there, but do I want to cross paths with them?

I know how it is here.

I don't know anything else.

All I know is that I didn't make it
five
miles!

I can’t know if anyone's okay. What if someone comes looking for me? I'm not even at my house.

I just don't have any idea what I'm going to do.

This won't hold out.

But damn it's beautiful right now.

Oct 19 3:11pm

Just washed up at the creek—water's getting cold.

Mr. Ages is a mess, but he's happy. He killed a huge squirrel earlier. He'll miss the frogs. He ate a lot of them. They did hellable things to his breath, but he was fed and that made me feel good. Yeah, out of dog food.

Cripes, that's a whole nother can of worms.

How do I travel with Bark Face?

I'm not leaving him.

But that also sounds like certain death.

He won't do a muzzle. I don't have a real one, but the ones I've tried he's gotten off and hated until he did.

I'll have to see if I can find one—I doubt a lot of pet supply shops were over picked.

I've never muzzled a dog. Can they still make a sound? I know I don't want him biting anything. If something happens to me—he can’t be stuck in a muzzle.

Anyway, wuz going to tell you that I got two more. Turtle and a stranger.

I thought the mailman might have turned in his chips, but there the fucker is right now.

Wait a minute Mr. Postman. Got something to do.

I just brought Mr. Ages inside and I can't find that busy body.

If I can get the nerve to face him, I can handle anything. There
are
freakier busy bodies, but there are no creepier ones.

When a creep's job is to know where you live it makes him ten times the creepy.

I can't figure out if I'm writing this to you or for me.

I have to minimize.

I liked to keep things. I can't do that anymore.

We lock our doors to keep our things safe when we're away. It makes me sick to think of someone ransacking my life for something useful and tossing aside things that mattered so much to me.