~ 1 ~

 ~ New Millennium ~

Date: May 28th, 1999

Time: 10:53 AM

Place: Nazareth, Pa (8 days after the emergency landing.)

 + Howie +

I’m huddled down here in a small shack with Nick and two other people we don’t know. We managed to get separated from the other guys after the last explosion. My only hope is that they are alive. We were much too close for comfort when that last bomb fell from the sky. Just when I thought that Brian was getting really good at sensing when they were about to be dropped, this one made an entirely different sound.

They are getting better at these attacks. At least that’s what this small resistance group told us when we stumbled upon them just two days ago. The last blast supposedly killed about 40 people. They are bombing in the middle of the night when they think everyone is sleeping. I’m not sure how much longer we have.

“How you holding up buddy?” I placed my hand on Nick’s shoulder. He’s stopped talking, ever since the last set of attacks. I can’t blame him. I’m not sure how much more of this I can take and I’m supposedly an adult.

He’s just sitting here next to me with his arms wrapped around his legs, rocking back and forth with his eyes wide open. I don’t know how to calm him down and I’ve given up on telling him that everything will be okay. He knows I don’t even believe that anymore.

“We’ll get out of this. I promise.” Of course I still have to try.

I feel so helpless. What if the others are dead? I’m not sure what I would do. In the last place we were in, a completely unrecognizable Philadelphia, they said that the President had given up on negotiations. He decided to flee the country and let the survivors fend for themselves.

Kevin and I had looked at each other at that moment knowing that we were pretty much toast, unless we could figure out a way to get ourselves back home, we didn’t have much longer. The clock was ticking and Charlie told us we only had a certain window of opportunity to find the portal that took us here in the first place. I wish I was better at math and science. None of us had a clue what the hell he was talking about.

At that point, before we parted ways, Charlie gave Kevin a vile of pills. He told him that he should hold onto them and be ready to hand them to us if we got caught by one of the mobs hunting celebrities down. It would be quick and painless.

I heard they caught Him and his family shortly after. He was tried as a traitor just for helping celebrities and hung in the middle of the square as a message to the rest of the people in the city.

Seems like the logo, ‘The City of Brotherly Love’ has been replaced with, ‘You help people escape and we will kill you!’  

“I’m going to go check to see if there are any survivors out there.” The nice older man who helped the two of us to safety said.

I nodded and stood up, ready to help. He quickly pushed me back down though, “You stay with the boy. He seems to need you more than I do at the moment.” I nodded.

I don’t think he knows who we are. After the last attack, we really took extra precautions in making sure we looked as ordinary as possible. With how dirty and tattered we look, we do just blend in with the rest of the crowd now.

A really nice woman came and bent down beside me, handing me a bottle of water, and then gently patting Nick’s hair, fixing a few that were out of place.

She smiled, “How are you holding up?”

“I’m okay.”

“My name’s Clara by the way.”

I wasn’t sure whether to use my real name or not but I had a feeling by now it didn’t much matter, “Howie.”

“Nice to meet you.”

Clara was about 55 or so. She actually reminded me a lot of my mom. She had this maternal look in her eyes that made the really cold shack we were in, feel like a warm cabin by the lake.

“Please let me know if there’s anything else I can do for the both of you.” She stood up to leave.

“Thank you for helping us.” I felt the need to keep talking to her because honestly, I didn’t want her to walk away. I needed the company and Nick wasn’t really much in the way of that at the moment.

She must have sensed this because she turned and sat down beside Nick and across from me. “I haven’t seen you around, are you from here originally?”

I shook my head, “No, we’re from Florida.” That has been our go to tag line since we arrived here.

“I hear there’s not much left down that way.” She turned her eyes towards the floor.

“I heard the same.”

She looked over at Nick and then started moving her arm slowly up and down his, “And what about you honey?”

Nick didn’t say anything. He didn’t even look at her.

“He doesn’t feel much like talking at the moment.”

“Sadly, we’ve seen it a lot with the younger ones. I’m surprised he’s made it this far. We haven’t seen anyone under 21 pass this way in quite a long time.”

“You can tell he’s that young?”

She nodded, “You need to make him look older. You can stand to look older too. You’re just a baby yourself.” She then moved her hand from Nick to me and placed it on my face. “You actually remind me of my son. He was at NYU studying Law when it happened.”

“I’m sorry.”

She took a deep breath and smiled, “I’m almost glad he didn’t live to see this.”

The man came back in and bolted the door shut behind him. “I didn’t see anyone moving out there.” He then gave me a sympathetic smile, “That doesn’t mean they didn’t survive though, son. They could have been taken in by someone else.”

I nodded, trying to stay hopeful at least for Nick’s sake. He let out the tiniest whimper after the man said that. “Thanks for looking.”

“Sure thing, we’ll go back out after lunch.”

He walked over to Clara and gave her a kiss on the cheek and then he held his hand out to me, “My names Randy, I’m sorry I haven’t properly introduced myself to you.”

“I’m Howie and this is Nick.”

“Nice to meet you both.”  He looked over at Clara, “I’m going to go wash up before lunch.”

“We’ll be here sweetheart.” She stood up and wiped the dust from her pants. “I better go get some soup warming on the stove. I remember when May used to be warm. I miss those days.”

“Me too.” 

I glanced over at Nick and placed my hand on his head. “We’ll find them Nicky, I promise. Like Randy said, I’m sure they found shelter.”

“I just want to go home.” He said in the smallest of voices. “This place is horrible.”

“We’ll find a way home. Charlie was helpful. We just need to get back to New York and find that guy Matt he told us about.”

“He’s probably dead.”

Nick was probably right but I wasn’t about to say that, now that he was finally talking again. “You have to have faith.”

“Faith is what started this whole mess in the first place, isn’t it?” He looked me in the eyes, his were pooling with tears.

“I’m still kind of unclear about what happened.” And that was the truth. No matter how many times people explained this to me, I was baffled. We all sat and listened to stories of how this war got started acting as if we were just trying to confirm information instead of  letting them know we hadn’t been around to witness it for ourselves.

Charlie and his family are the only ones we actually confessed to. No one else would have believed us. I’m still not entirely sure I believe us and I was there. I saw with my own eyes what happened although I kind of keep hoping I’ll wake up and see it was all just a giant nightmare. Like Ebenezer Scrooge, maybe this is some kind of message from above that I have to change my ways otherwise this will actually happen one day.

If this is a dream, it’s the most realistic one I’ve ever had.

Nick’s coughing fit broke me out of my thoughts, which is the other thing that’s concerned me for a few days. I handed him my water bottle, “Drink this.”

“I’m not thirsty.”

“It doesn’t matter, just drink it.”

He grabbed the bottle and took a swig, coughing as soon as he swallowed. This kid has always been prone to getting sick but now was not the time for this to happen. I stood up and walked over to the very dirty window by the door. It was the only window in this place. It was never meant to be a house. It really is only a shack. The house which is directly in front of us was completely destroyed by fire. No idea how long ago. Now there were only two folding chairs, a table and an old, burnt mattress lying on the ground covered with bright quilts that didn’t fit the grim décor of the place.

Clara had a pot boiling on a make shift fire in the middle of the room and their fridge was nothing more than a big cooler they probably used for tailgating before football became illegal.

“We make do with what we have.” It was then I realized she caught me staring at our dismal surroundings. I felt bad.

“How long ago did that happen?” I asked, pointing at the house.

She sighed, “A few months.”

“Come and sit.” She said motioning for me to take one of the chairs at the table.

She ladled out some soup into a bowl and handed it to me. Despite the fact that we were in a shack, the soup smelled incredible. Maybe it was also because we hadn’t really eaten anything of real substance for a few days now. “Eat up while it’s warm!”

She walked over to Nick and handed him a bowl as well as a huge piece of bread. “You boys need your strength.”

“Thank you so much!” I said, not knowing how we were ever going to pay these people back for their generosity. Maybe we could take them with us. Let them see what things were like had they not elected Donald Trump as President.

Randy came back in to the shed with his hair all wet. A hose in the back served as the shower he was talking about. “It’s freezing out there!” He said as he placed his coat back on before taking a seat at the table.

Clara handed him a bowl of soup and then poured one out for herself and sat on a milk crate.

“I think it might snow again tonight.”

“Who would have ever thought we’d get snow in May?”

“That’s what happens when you interrupt the natural order of things. It’s good, isn’t it? My wife is an amazing cook, especially given the little she has to work with.”

I nodded at Randy, “It’s wonderful, thank you so much for feeding us.”

“Our pleasure.”

I paused before continuing. I have wanted to talk about the other guys for a while now but I’ve been so concerned about Nick and his mental state I kind of avoided the issue, but the later it got, the less chance we had of finding them. “After we eat, I was wondering if it would be okay if I left Nicky with you guys and went looking for the rest of our friends.”

“Of course, in fact, I’ll go with you. Clara wouldn’t mind watching the boy.”

“I should go too.” Nick said from the floor. I knew that was going to happen. I was hoping he’d fall asleep in the meantime.

I looked over at him, “I think you should stay here.”

He stood up and walked over to the table, stopping to cough along the way. He coughed so hard he dropped his bowl of soup all over the floor. “I’m so sorry.” I swear he looked like he was going to cry. Something was going on with him. I wish Kevin was here. He’d know what to do about this.

“It’s okay honey.” Clara said running to clean up the mess with the damp towel Randy had used for his shower.

“This is why you need to stay, Nick. You’re sick. You need to rest.”

“What if you don’t come back?”

“I’ll make sure he gets back to you, okay?” Randy said with so much assurance in his voice, even I believed him.

Nick nodded and then sat back down on the newly cleaned floor. “We should maybe head out now, before people start coming out looking for food. Not saying anyone is going to hurt anyone but desperate times…”

“Good idea.” I stood up and handed my bowl to Clara.

“I’ll take good care of Nick while you’re gone. How long has he been coughing like that?”

“For about a week but it’s gotten worse the last few days.”

 She looked concerned. “And how do you feel?”

“As well as can be expected I suppose.”

I didn’t like the look she gave her husband. I felt like they weren’t telling me something. For the first time since they rescued us, I felt uneasy. Maybe I should take Nick with me.

“Come on son, let’s get going.” Randy placed his arm on my shoulder and opened the door to the shack. I glanced back at Nick who had the same look as a kid whose parents are leaving him at school for the first time.

“I’ll be back and hopefully with the rest of the guys!”  I smiled at him.

He nodded and then went back to his original position of cradling his legs in his arms and rocking back and forth.

This area before the bombs hit was probably a cute little cul-de-sac. All the homes most likely looked the same. My parents lived in a community very similar to this one. Now it looks like a tornado ripped through. Just about all the homes are gone, except for one smoldering wall here and there. Randy nodded to a family who were sitting outside by where their garage used to be.

“They don’t know what to do with themselves. They just come and go through the rubble everyday as if maybe they’ll find what they’re looking for.”

“And what is that?”

“Their little girl.”

“Oh.” What more can you say?

We walked all the way down the street for about a mile and a half to where we were when the bomb actually hit. The street was all but gone and my heart dropped. There was no way they could have made it. We would have seen them if they did.

“There are some places where people go to hide around here, after the sun goes down. We can try to hit that first thing in the morning, but for now we best head back. We need to get some sleep.”

I wanted to stay and look around a little more, they had to be just within reach, but it was so eerily quiet and deserted that I wasn’t sure I’d like what I found if we did keep searching.

When we got back to the shack, Nick was lying on the floor covered in a layer of blankets and Clara was sitting at the table humming a song to herself.

“Did you find them?” He asked sitting up in anticipation only to fall back to the ground when he visibly saw the answer.

“We’ll try again tomorrow.” Randy said locking the shack door with a combination lock you’d find on a high school locker.

“Time to go to bed.” 

I looked at my watch and saw it was only 2 in the afternoon. He kept going, “We don’t sleep at night here which is why we have survived as long as we have. Now that the attacks happen at night we sleep during the day so we are ready for whatever the night may bring.

“Good idea.” I was tired anyway and honestly not really feeling all that well myself.

I went and lay down next to Nick who rolled over to face me, “They’re dead Howie, aren’t they?”

“I don’t know, Nicky.” I gulped, trying to avoid the tears. I had been holding them in for a long time but now they started to fall freely.

Nick wasn’t sure what to do with that so he grabbed me in a hug and then turned to give me some time.

“It was only a couple of weeks ago that we were celebrating the release of our album.” Nick said after a few minutes of silence.

 “Yeah.” I said wiping away the tears, and closing my eyes to remember just as another bomb went off.