We Are Unprepared (17 page)

One of the cops opened the cruiser door nearby and gestured for us to hoist him inside. I was relieved to be freed of that moment, looking at Roger, smelling his rank clothes and imagining what Isole was like from his perspective. My fantasy hamlet was his vacuum of opportunity. He went into the car easily and waved to the crowd who were enjoying a brief moment of fame before whatever consequences awaited him.

With Roger's exit, the crowd thinned quickly. I saw Riggins giving a pep talk to his followers, vowing not to give up on their important cause and promising more opportunities to make their case to the town. Eventually, even the protesters started to say their goodbyes and migrate toward their cars. I just stood there watching it all, in no hurry to leave but no longer serving any purpose. Salty paced nearby, talking quietly into his cell phone. Roger was right about “do-gooder types” working to control the chaos; that was Salty. But what else was there to do?

Suddenly, I felt a hand on my shoulder and spun around. It was Riggins, smiling as if we knew each other.

“Hey there, friend,” he said. The word had never sounded so malevolent. “You're Salty's buddy, right? No reason we can't all work together on this. We all just want the best for Isole.”

“You shouldn't be here, manipulating these people,” I said.

“I'm here because they want me here,” Riggins replied calmly. “
These people
are smarter than you give them credit for. They don't need your protection. Let them choose.”

He was a little right, which made me hate him even more.

“You're using an invented religion to sell them something,” I said. “You're an opportunist, a snake-oil salesman. You don't care about anything here and we both know it.”

I was surprised by my own venom.

“Look, Ash... It's Ash, right?” Riggins had dropped the pretense of a fake Yankee accent and seemed entirely himself now. “I'm using a spiritual philosophy to sell them something they need. How could that be bad? It's not altruism, but it's not a crime either. What are you offering them?”

Salty walked over to us and I could feel Riggins reapply his man-of-God face. He said goodbye as though we'd been having a good-natured chat and walked off before there was time to say more.

“Isole doesn't need this, not now,” Salty said. “We can't be dividing up at a time when we need to be banding together. I don't understand what's happening. I didn't see this coming.”

Salty shook his head back and forth. He was talking to no one in particular and didn't need a response. There was nothing for me to say, but I vowed silently to continue to help Salty in whatever way I could. I had never committed to anything the way he was committed to his community and I was beginning to appreciate why it mattered. Salty had a full life. It was full in the way my father's life was full, full of things that I mistook for provincial clutter instead of real texture. Family, neighbors he cared about, land he'd grown up on. He loved it all, and it loved him back, which didn't happen without some heartache.

“Well, I should get back to work.” Salty sighed. “At least all this is over.”

He looked at the school, which was again quiet. The day's drama was over, but we both knew nothing—nothing—had been resolved.

SIXTEEN

“AND THEN, I
swear to God, the guy pops up out of the back of a monster truck!” I took a gulp of Scotch through my laughter and slammed the glass down dramatically.

I was sitting at Peg's kitchen table around five, the day after the incident at the high school, drinking my third glass of Scotch and laughing harder than I had in many months. We had gone to visit one of the holdouts on our flood plan earlier that night, which was entirely unproductive. The wife refused to let us in the house and the husband threatened to get his shotgun, so we had no choice but to leave. Instead, we went back to Peg's house for deer jerky and drinks, which was just fine with me. I still had no idea what I was contributing to the operation and dreaded the confrontations with the homeowners. Peg's patience was running low, too. I didn't know her well, but she seemed sadder and more detached than the Peg I had met a few months before. I couldn't put my finger on it, but there was a change.

As soon as I sat down at her kitchen table, I launched into a detailed description of the entire scene that had unfolded at the high school with Rodney Riggins. She listened with rapt attention, laughing and nodding along at all the right parts.

“These are exceptional times in Isole,” she said when I was through. “Such histrionics are not common around here. I think everyone's on edge.”

Peg looked out the open window as she said this, toward the naked oak branches. It was February 1, but in my whole life I'd never seen a February that looked like this. The snow had all melted and the flooding was mostly dried up. The silence of winter was still there, but the temperature reached fifty-two that day. The most reliable seasonal identifiers had abandoned us. It was a lull between the last storm and the next one.

“This Riggins guy is bad news,” I said.

Peg waved a hand to dismiss him. “Oh, I think he'll be gone before The Storm is over. I'm sure there are more profitable places for him to move on to.”

I hoped she was right.

“And what about you, Ash? Do you have a god for when the reckoning comes?”

I thought for a moment. “No, not really. I grew up going to church on Christmas, and sometimes Easter, but that was it. I never really had religion, so it wasn't something I ever missed. But I guess I believe in God, whatever that means. You?”

“Well, I'm a Catholic, technically,” Peg said in an exaggerated Irish brogue.

“Technically?”

“Yes, technically. But my spirituality is more complicated than that; it goes back further in history.”

Peg looked out the window and paused. She might have been a little drunk, too. She went on, “The earth, the trees, the fae...”

I couldn't tell how serious she was. “Is this an Irish thing?” I joked.

“Yes, kind of,” she said, unoffended. “Before the church came into Ireland, the Irish lived in close connection with the earth and its spirits. Since then we've all just been pretending not to be pagan witches and descendants of fairies.”

I raised my eyebrows. “A scientist who believes in fairies?”

“Don't get distracted by the word. I'm talking about a belief in the earth's innate power. It always felt true to me.” Peg shrugged. “And it isn't an opposing theory to science. I'm a scientist
because
of the fairies. I grew up in the country, spent all of my time alone in the woods or on the shore. I knew the natural world like a close friend—and because we lived in such a remote area, I didn't have many of those. Ash, I became a scientist because I have always felt a sort of supernatural connection with the earth. I wanted to study it and know it. But I'll always remember that there are unknowable things about nature. That's the supernatural part. Science only takes you so far and I love that.”

Peg let out a long, labored sigh and took another sip of Scotch.

“That's why I live here,” she went on, sadder. “I moved to Isole because it was the closest I had ever come to feeling that vibration of nature around me, the one I grew up with. But it's not going to last.”

“Why?” I asked. “Because of The Storm?”

“Yes, this storm, and all the storms that come after. It's changing, Ash.” A tear streamed down Peg's face as she took another sip and forced a smile. “Don't worry about me,” she said. “I'm fine. I get sad sometimes lately...when I think about it all. It makes me feel...alone.”

I didn't feel equipped to understand her entirely, but I knew about feeling alone.

Peg wiped her eyes, poured a little more Scotch for both of us and raised her glass.

“To the fairies!” she said.

“To the fairies.”

I wandered home soon after that final toast, thinking about everything Peg had said. The vibration she reportedly felt in nature was a startling concept that stayed with me. I think my younger self, the one who spent an entire childhood exploring the woods around my house and diving deep into the science of our wilderness, knew what she was talking about. Grown-up me had a more difficult time with it.

I wondered, too, if all this was why Peg had never married or had children: because she was in love with the land. Can that possibly be an adequate substitute for human relationships? I knew enough to know that I wasn't fit to make that judgment. Peg seemed like one of the most fulfilled and complete people I had ever met. It occurred to me then that she never asked about my marriage. I think she suspected that things were complicated with Pia and that I needed a friend. I imagined that she and I could talk about these things one day.

I felt deeply grateful to Peg as I hobbled home in the slushy warmth, feeling as though we'd shared a secret. It was a sad sort of secret, but Peg had revealed something to me and I was grateful for the closeness it intimated.

When I got home, Pia surprised me by having cooked a proper meal. I was greeted at the front door by a familiar waft of greasy deliciousness: truffle mac and cheese. It was a go-to of Pia's from when we used to host dinner parties in Brooklyn, designed to seem both casual and refined. She would serve it in large, oozing blocks, with a handful of lightly dressed arugula piled on top. We were extra in love on those nights, with Pia shining as the star of the domestic show, our friends around us and aspirations still unmet.

“The social worker called,” she said as I opened the fridge for a beer. She appeared to be focusing closely on setting silverware around the table. “Everything's all set for August with that other family. They're going to move him on Wednesday.”

This was why Pia had made me dinner. I wasn't hungry anymore, but I appreciated her effort.

We ate quietly and politely, forks clinking against plates and throats choking down sips. All the sounds of the room seemed magnified. The cheese was too leaden for my stomach, but I swallowed most of what I had been served. When finally it was over, Pia suggested we leave the dishes and just go relax in the living room. It occurred to me how quickly we had adjusted to this once-impossible luxury of having a living space large enough to just leave messes intact in other rooms. You just walk away from the dirty dishes, to a place where you can't see or smell them, and it's like they don't exist at all. How had this become so normal so quickly, I wondered.

Pia was stretched long on the couch with her eyes closed when I met her in the living room. She looked so pretty lying there in loungewear and rumpled hair. Her cheeks were pink from being outside and her lashes long. It seemed remarkable that I could still feel so attracted to someone I had such knotty feelings about, but I did. I wanted to peel her tight pants off her body and see if we could still be together in the way that we used to. We hadn't had sex in over a month and I'd been left to my own devices for too long. I didn't want to talk to her; I just wanted to be with her body. I wanted the closeness of anyone that night.

Just then her eyes opened and I had the distinct sensation that she had been reading my mind. She smiled and I smiled back. Yes, maybe this is happening, I thought. I took a risk and went to her on the couch, leaning down to kiss her. She accepted my kiss, so I slid on top of her, slowly as if she might ignite at any moment and I would need to spring to safety. We didn't linger long on the kiss—that's for people who enjoy one another's company. Instead, our mouths wandered hungrily. My body came to attention and, right on cue, her hand slid down to measure my lust.

We began tugging out of our clothes, wasting little effort on seduction, just taking care of our own layers and meeting back on the lumpy couch, naked. I liked sex like this. It was savage and impatient. We were good at it. Maybe, I thought, we hadn't drifted so far from each other after all. Maybe it was all still there; we just needed to work harder. I could work harder. I was still a little drunk from the Scotch, but it wasn't just the Scotch. I needed to believe that when disaster struck, I would weather The Storm with my wife. We were in this together and we'd be stronger on the other side. My survival depended on that belief.

She was riding wildly on top of me, her perfect breasts moving rhythmically with her, when I pulled her face down to mine and, without thinking, whispered, “I love you, Pia. Let's start our own family.”

It was the last hopeful card I still held: making children, children that were new and uncomplicated and ours. We could go back to the fertility clinic and start making some babies and living this dream out as planned.

She pulled her face away from mine and I saw that she looked horrified.

“Oh my God, what's wrong with you?” Pia said, dismounting and curling up in a ball at the foot of the couch. “We can't have children! How can we bring children into this world? It's poisoned. The air, the water, the soil, the fucking weather. How can you not see that?”

I considered reaching for my pants, but I wasn't prepared to admit that the moment had ended.

“I thought that's what you wanted, Pia,” I said, working to sound calm.

She shook her head. “I thought that's what I wanted, too—six months ago. But that may as well have been a million years ago, before any of us knew how messed up things were. I need to focus now on getting prepared, taking care of us. I thought you understood that!”

She was angry.

“I don't understand anything—obviously!” I screamed, jumping up to pull my boxers on. “You've lost your fucking mind with all of the end-of-the-world shit! There are worms living in my house, for Christ's sake!”

She rolled her eyes, “Don't start again with the worms. I thought you liked the worms.”

“I like the worms more than those paranoid lunatics you hang out with in your prepper meetings! So yes, I guess the worms are my favorite of all your current associates!”

Pia jumped off the couch, stark naked, and walked over to the giant worm box at the other side of the living room. It had become a piece of furniture, accumulating books, catalogs and an old water glass. She used her forearm to push everything off the edge, breaking the glass on the floor. She unlatched the lid and pulled it open, releasing a fresh waft of earthy stink. With one hand, Pia reached in and pulled out a mound of dark, writhing dirt. Worms were sliding around her fingers and dropping to her feet, but she didn't seem to notice. She walked past me and opened a window with her free hand. With a slight windup, Pia threw the handful of worm dirt out the window, then went back for another, and another.

I watched as she threw handfuls of worms out into the yard, leaving a messy path of moist soil between the worm box and the window. And that was the point: it was a show for me. It meant that I was cruel for hating her worms; or maybe it meant that she felt misunderstood; or maybe it just meant that she really had lost her mind. I wanted her to stop, but I wouldn't break so easily. I even felt a pang of guilt for the worms she'd banished to the outdoors. They hadn't asked to join our broken household. But I wasn't going to let her win.

After a few more dramatic trips to the window, I calmly wrestled her away from the worm box and closed the lid. I hoped that she'd cry, just crumple into a puddle and end the scene, but instead she stood before me, quiet and wide-eyed. We looked at each other for a moment, me towering over her naked body. Then she brought her hands up in front of her—they were coated in the nutrient-dense worm soil—and slowly dragged them down the front of my bare chest, leaving two cold trails of black dirt on my body.

We both contemplated our next move, and then Pia just walked out of the room. I heard her pad upstairs and slam a door. It sounded like a satisfied door slam, the slam of someone who'd just made her point assertively and creatively. Though I was shivering and filthy, I wouldn't give her the satisfaction of a big response. I walked to the kitchen and quietly wiped my bare chest with a dirty dish towel. Then, taking another beer from the fridge, I sat down at the table and chugged it. Having already been drunk and sober again on that day, the beer wasn't particularly pleasurable, but I was way past any expectation of pleasure.

When the bottle was empty, I hoisted my healing foot up onto the table for an inspection. It didn't hurt much anymore, but I had become preoccupied with its progress nonetheless. The area below my ankle was turning from purple to a sickly yellow and some of the tenderness around my toes seemed to be diminishing. But it didn't feel as though my foot was getting any stronger. Instead, it seemed as if I was slowly losing all feeling and control. Maybe it would be best to remove the dead appendage and replace it with a prosthetic, I considered. I certainly couldn't walk around with a dead foot. What if the death spread up my leg, or farther? It seemed a possibility and not one worth risking a useless foot on. I decided to make a return visit to the hospital sometime soon for a follow-up discussion about what was to become of the dead foot.

I waited twenty minutes before taking a shower and slipping into bed beside my sleeping wife. It seems strange to me now that we slept beside each other at the end of those contentious days, but sleeping apart would have been an admission of real change, an official shift in our marriage, and I wasn't ready for that. There was so much change still ahead that I wanted desperately to maintain sameness wherever possible. We had no idea then what a silly impulse that would prove to be.