Chapter 7

7

The End

* * *

And so my eyes remained closed for what seemed like a long time. I remember thinking it had already happened. That I had died, or that the thing had touched me.

Then—

Despite being sightless, a brightness pierced through my eyelids. I thought the sun had come out again. The creature screeched in pain, and the cold coming from it disappeared.

I opened my eyes.

No sun, but there was light, a blinding one.

I turned, brought my hand in front of my face. The light vanished with a heavy click. Once I adjusted back to the relative darkness, I stared at a stranger, the occupant of the house. She was a woman. Older, maybe in her sixties, with a face of heavy wrinkles, but her eyes were young and full of life. How that was possible, with the world so cold and dead, I didn't know.

"I was moving as fast as my legs would take me, but you had to be assholes and break my window. I guess you might as well come in now," she said.

* * *

We barricaded the broken window with a couch. Eleanor and me put it on its end and leaned it against the wall.

Mikey was still in shock. He kept mumbling about what he'd seen, so he didn't help us.

Stone was sitting on the floor. I offered him a hand and he took it. I wasn't as good as crutches, those we had lost somewhere in the snow, but I was the next best thing.

"Follow me," the old woman said.

We did, into a large living room. The warmth greeted us, and God, it was heavenly. My mind was already in the process of burying our journey and that was good.

The windows weren't barricaded, but they were covered with heavy curtains and blankets so they might as well have been. Without the sun or the moon in the sky, the darkness was heavy.

The woman disappeared into an adjoining room for a few seconds and came back with an armful of clothes. "Here. These might be a tight fit, but they're better than the clothes you have on. For you, young lady, I have some upstairs."

I took them from her and said, "Thank you."

"I'll give you fellas some privacy. You can follow me—what did you say your name was again?"

"Eleanor," Eleanor answered.

"Beautiful name. Follow me, Eleanor."

Together, the two of them went upstairs, the steps creaking loudly in the quiet of the dead world.

Stone hobbled to the couch and began changing. I did the same. Mikey, though, wasn't moving. His gaze was directed at the black blanket covering the window. He seemed as pale as the snow outside.

"Mikey," I said, changing into a North Face fleece that smelled of mothballs, "it's gone. The light killed it."

"It was a spider," Mikey whispered. "A giant spider."

"It was something," Stone agreed. He was buttoning up a flannel. The sleeves hung over his wrists and the shirt hung baggily around his torso.

"It can't hurt us now," I said.

"That was my…my worst fear. Spiders, man, fucking spiders." Mikey collapsed onto the floor and leaned his back against one of the couches.

"We're safe here," I assured him.

"For how long?" Mikey asked. "We're going to run out of food or firewood eventually, and then what? We have to do this again. We have to go out in the cold and snow and run from giant-ass spiders."

He was right, of course. It would happen, and we'd have to do something about it or die, but I was firmly in the camp of crossing that bridge when we got to it.

"Don't worry," I told him.

The women came back a few minutes later. Eleanor wore a pair of black and white yoga pants and a pink sweatshirt with a faded picture of Mickey Mouse front and center. Not exactly winter-ready, but warm enough to keep her comfortable in the coziness of the house.

By that time Stone, Mikey, and I were all done up in clothes that were old and either too big or, in my case, too small. If I raised my arms, my fleece turned into a belly shirt.

I had changed into a pair of jeans (also too short) and a pair of high socks that were more like ankle socks. My left foot had turned a bluish-red from the ice water that had gotten into my boots, but the longer I stayed in the warmth of the living room, the more feeling came back to it.

"Well, I guess we'd better discuss some things," the woman said. She sat on the floor in the middle of the room, in the middle of a circular rug, and crossed her legs like a pretzel. "I know Eleanor's name, but I'm a little shaky on the gentlemen." She pointed to Stone. "Rock or Brock, am I right?"

"Stone," he said, and I thought this usually would've made him laugh, but his face remained as emotionless as a—well, a stone.

"Stone. I was close. And you are Michael, Eleanor's little brother," the woman said, nodding.

Mikey said nothing. His eyes were narrowed, but I could still see them bouncing around in every direction. The experience had shaken him. I wasn't sure if he'd ever recover.

"And you, friend, I'm not sure of your name."

"I'm Grady," I said, but my teeth were chattering so it came out as "Ger-gg—Grady."

"Grady, the one who broke my window."

I nodded. "And you are?"

"Helga," she said. "Helga Thompson."

"You're all alone?" I asked. I sat on the couch next to Eleanor. She wasn't paying any attention. Her mind was on Mikey. Worried.

"I am. Been that way for about five years, ever since my husband passed."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Stone said.

"You all are wearing his clothes." Helga brushed a strand of gray hair behind her ears. Her face was wrinkled and her body rail-thin, but she seemed in good health despite all that had happened. "Lucky for you, I never got around to donating them to the Goodwill like I've been saying I would for years."

"Thank you," I said. "We really appreciate it."

"No problem. I'm sorry I wasn't quicker in answering the door. It's been an odd couple of weeks…" Helga said. She averted her eyes to the fabric of the rug and began picking at the coils of thread there.

"They call to you, too?" Stone asked.

"Yeah, but I never see giant spiders. Not until today, at least. I see…I see myself."

"You?" I cocked my head. "You see you?"

"I do, but I look like a zombie. I see the version of myself I could've been, that's what I think, anyhow. Fifteen years ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. The doctors didn't think I was going to make it, but I showed them. Still didn't cure my fear. Every few hours, I find myself feeling around for lumps. Those things out there, whatever they are, they play on our fears—our biggest ones—and catching the Big C is mine. Just as I'm assuming one of you is afraid of spiders." She shuddered. "I can't blame whoever that is. Spiders are right up there with cancer." Despite this, she smiled. It made her look younger. I had guessed she was somewhere in her sixties, but after hearing of her battle with cancer, I changed my mind. She was probably in her early fifties, but the disease had taken its toll on her. That, her husband's death, and now the end of the world. It would take its toll on anyone.

"Do you know anything else?" Eleanor said. "About what happened?"

Helga shrugged. "I'm as clueless as you are. Went to bed one night and woke up to a winter wonderland in the middle of summer. Didn't make a lick of sense."

"You have power," I said. "Generator?"

"Yes, sir. My Calvin was always prepared. I used to laugh at him when he talked about the end of the world, but if it wasn't for him, I'd have starved or froze to death by now." She frowned and added in a soft voice. "Not that it matters much…my world ended when he passed on."

Eleanor leaned forward and put her hand on Helga's. "I'm sorry."

Helga looked up and smiled then put her own hand atop Eleanor's. "Thank you, but I'm a tough gal, I think. I've survived this long; I can survive a little longer."

Eleanor nodded.

"With the power," I said, "you haven't been able to get any news?"

"Cable's out, internet's down, phones are disconnected, and the only radio station coming through is one of those Christian ones. Some guy's on there reciting Bible verses over and over, not telling us what the hell's going on. Last time I turned it on a few days back, he was snoring. I doubt he's gonna last much longer, poor fella."

I nodded. Stone and I knew about that particular radio station.

"So, no, I don't know much of anything aside from the fact that we're, and excuse my French here, pretty well fucked," Helga said. "What about you guys?"

We told her our story from the beginning. How Ed had killed Angie and then Jonas and then how I had killed Ed. She told us she had heard the gunshots. They had woken her up. She lifted her shirt a bit and showed us the handle of a holstered revolver she wore on her hip. "Made me grab this from the nightstand," she said. "Never shot a gun in my life. Got close, though. One of them crazies came trying to barge in my house on the third night of the snowfall. I had the gun aimed at the door as he was beating and clawing on it, but he must've gotten distracted because I never pulled the trigger. Would've, though, believe you me. Calv was always trying to get me to go to the range with him, but ever since my great-grandpa made me go hunting and kill a squirrel when I was around six or seven, I never wanted to pick up a gun again." She shrugged. "But drastic times call for drastic measures and all that, am I right? What happened to your gun?"

"I dropped it," Stone said. "The lake started cracking, Grady fell, and I dropped it. Now it's probably a block of ice."

"Well, don't you worry. Helga'll protect you." She stood and went to the fireplace. There she turned a knob on the side of its base. The flames rose. "Y'all just huddle up by the fire," Helga said. "I bet you're hungry. I was gonna cook up some soup, but I got a big ol' frozen ham in a freezer downstairs I've been craving, only I know I'd never finish the whole thing without some help. But now I got you guys."

My mouth watered at the mere mention of it.

"Please tell me this isn't some cruel prank," Stone said.

Helga raised her right hand. "Not a prank. I'll get the oven fired up now."

* * *

The smell of the cooking meat made my stomach go wild. After so many nights spent eating canned green beans and corn, I never thought I'd see steak again.

We ate in a big, mostly empty dining room. The carpet was pale green and the walls were bright yellow. The table stretched from wall-to-wall, and in one corner stood a china cabinet once full of expensive-looking plates. Those plates now sat on the tabletop. Six of them. One for each of us, and another for the sliced ham. The ham wasn't around long. We devoured it in about fifteen minutes. Helga didn't seem too upset about that, either. She was glad to be able to share a meal with someone other than herself, I think. There was also stuffing and mashed potatoes.

"I don't have gravy," Helga had said, "but I got butter, and that'll make 'em taste pretty good, too."

Stone, his eyes as big as the wolf who impersonated Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother, said, "Mashed potatoes? Are you serious? I'd eat them even if they were covered in sawdust."

"Or snow," Mikey added, which got a few laughs from me and Eleanor. Mostly of relief, I think, because he'd been quiet since we'd arrived at Helga's.

"Snow, sawdust, I don't care," Stone replied.

For dessert, we had two options: ice cream or Little Debbie Zebra Cake Rolls. We opted for the rolls. The mere mention of anything containing ice turned my stomach sour.

So we ate and we talked.

Eventually, our conversation went toward the future.

"I think the weather's gonna break," Helga said. "Call me crazy, but after I battled cancer and won, I'm forever an optimist."

"I hope so," Eleanor said.

"Hope is a good thing. Don't let anyone tell y'all different," Helga said.

I pushed around the crumbs of icing from my cake roll, hating what I was going to say next, but I said it anyway.

"What if it doesn't break? What do we do when the food and the gas runs out?"

"We die," Mikey said, and we all looked at him like he was crazy.

"He ain't wrong," Stone said.

"No, he's wrong," Helga replied. "Y'all aren't from around here, right?"

Eleanor shrugged. "They're not, but me and Mikey have been coming to the lake every summer for years."

"Summer's a different time around good ol' Prism," Helga said. "I'm here year-round, and when the warm days leave and the snow falls—when it's supposed to, I mean—we still get a lot of people vacationing in these parts."

"Really?" Stone said. "Because this place looks like a frozen graveyard with snow."

"Avery's Mills," Helga answered.

"What's that?" I asked. The name sounded vaguely familiar.

"Ski resort. One of the biggest in the Midwest."

"Okay…" Stone said. "How does that help us? How does that keep us alive?"

"It ain't far," Helga said. She smiled. "About three miles north. It's my backup plan if the snow doesn't melt. I know, I know. I said I'm forever an optimist, but I got a little realist mixed in there, too. Anyway, speaking of being a realist, I didn't think I'd have the gumption to go on to Avery's Mills by myself, but now I don't have to go alone."

Stone threw up his hands. "I'm lost."

I was, too, but I had patience. If the summer winter had taught me anything, it was patience.

Eleanor, on the other hand, wasn't lost. Her face and eyes lit up like a July sun. "You're talking about a snowcat, aren't you?"

"Why yes, young lady, I am," Helga said, crossing her arms and looking like the cat that ate the canary. "But I know it as a trail groomer. One winter, Calv and I got to ride in one. One of Calv's drinking buddies works at the resort, and he drives them all the time. So I know for a fact they're there and they work. Those bad boys are like tanks. Not even this much snow and ice could slow 'em down much."

"Whoa," Mikey said. He was grinning, a sight for sore eyes. "That could work…"

"But it's three miles," Stone said. "In this weather, that sounds like suicide. We barely made it a half a mile to get here."

I shook my head. The nearly forgotten feeling of hope was filling my chest again. "We could do it. I know we can."

"Grady's right," Eleanor said. "We can."

"Even if we could, where do we go once we're driving it?" Stone asked. He frowned, but I could tell the idea was starting to sound like a good one to him.

"Who cares?" Helga said. "They got headlights, and those things outside don't like light."

"Exactly," I agreed. "We just get the hell out of here. Away from them."

There was a deep silence as we met each other's eyes.

Then Stone said, "Fuck it, I'm in."

Eleanor and I whooped; Mikey pounded the table with a fist; even Helga clapped. We did this because we all knew we were a family now, and a family sticks together no matter what. I reached over and smacked Stone on the back of his shoulder.

A kind of peacefulness fell over the table, and we ate some more.

After stuffing our faces, I leaned back in my chair, satisfied, happy that the pants I was wearing were a little big in the waist. I glanced around the table and looked at everyone's faces. Eleanor's was windburned, Mikey's eyes were ringed with blue, and Stone's dark skin looked considerably devoid of color, but a happiness missing since the first snowfall had reappeared in each. That was good—hell, that was great.

But outside, in the darkness, the wraiths continued calling our names…and for the first time since the world ended, we ignored them.