Doomsday Diary

The iPhone in my back pocket is a relic of my old life. One I probably should’ve left behind, like Marty did with all of his electronics.

It’s almost comical, now, remembering how hard I’d worked for the newest version of the iPhone. I’d taken the graveyard shift at Safeway for a couple months, on top of my college courses, to save up enough money for half of it. My mother paid for the remainder as an early birthday gift.

All that work and now it’s just a useless square that I grab onto like a safety blanket. The electricity grid failed—and we have no way of knowing when and if someone will fix it—so charging it hasn’t been an option.

Maybe it’s for the best that I can’t open it—the photos and videos saved in it would probably damn near kill me to see. It’s just a reminder of all I’ve lost and the life I’ll never again have.

But still, I refuse to throw it away.

Trudging up the steep incline through the redwood trees, I curse the unbearable heat that not even the constant shade of the canopy provides relief from. Sweat streams out of every pore in my body, causing me to be consistently oily, itchy and agitated.

The stream where I washed off had done little to help, but I had gone in order to be alone more than anything.

I make it to Unit 5, which is basically just a clearing of cracked dirt with a cave underneath a huge redwood tree. Inside, material is hung up to create “rooms” for each one of us.

Marty is sorting out the mushrooms he collected and I scrunch my nose in disgust at the prospect of eating them. Unfortunately, taste preferences are a luxury we can’t afford.

Marty gives sees me and gives me a nod as I grab the phone out of my pocket to throw on my “bed”. Marty eyes it in silent judgement. He’s grown into the habit of criticizing every decision I make, including holding onto the phone.

“Cait!” I hear Benji shout as he rounds the corner with a bottle of rum. I shoot Marty a look. He just shrugs while Benji beams up at me like a kid who just found out they were going to Disneyland.

“Louis gave it to me and I said I could have some,” Benji beams at me. Before I can respond Marty jumps in, “Hey there isn’t technically an age limit.”

I wished Marty would direct his constant criticisms of me at his uncle Louis or cousin Benji for once.

“No Benji,” I say taking it away and his face immediately drops, “You’ll become dehydrated and we don’t need a drunk 13 year old kid accidentally stumbling into a sun ray.”

Benji gives me that typical teenager rebellious look, which just reminds me he has no business drinking.

“Why do you have to be such a bit—“ he starts but I cut him off with a death stare. He gives me the finger and my eyes go wide.

I see Marty holding back a laugh and Benji runs away before I can recover from the shock.

“I always have to be the bad guy,” I snap at him and he gives me pouty look that used to make me swoon. But surviving an apocalypse tests a relationship in the worst way possible.

Plus, acting as a parental figure when I’m only 23 is just another added stressor. I try to think what my mother would’ve done. She always seemed to know everything.

It makes me think about how she once told me that usually three things have to go wrong in order for a freak accident to occur. I mean, she was referring to plane crashes but I constantly think about it was true for the apocalypse.

Combine a meteoroid, global warming and having to shut off the U.S. power grid to reduce fires.

And then those three things set off a bunch of other catastrophic phenomena, at least where we lived in San Fransisco.

A tsunami hit us after the meteoroid impact. Then, some important ocean bacteria that collects CO2 was wiped out by a virus, according to Marty’s theory. He explained that it was due to, and added to, this positive feedback loop that accelerated climate change. Which basically just caused climate change to sped up and now triple digit temperatures are the new normal.

Diseases—from unhygienic conditions and living in close quarter in the city—and overexposure from the heat killed so many people.

I know—a complete crap show.

So here I am, stuck with my semi-ex boyfriend, who I met on Tinder and had been so close to ghosting before the apocalypse, and acting as a parent for his cousin and uncle. If I still had a Facebook, our relationship status would be “It’s Complicated.”

“No offense Marty, but don’t you think it’s time your uncle Louis…” Marty flashes me a look but I just roll my eyes. I

know being addicted to alcohol is a disease. But I can’t help still being bitter that his uncle Louis had lied about packing our lifesaving water bottles in his luggage. Instead he had carried bottles of liquor from San Fransisco to the Redwood forests where we fled.

“Don’t start please,” Marty says with irritation. I get it—the last time we tried to intervene his uncle went into a rage and almost set the whole forest on fire just to spite us.

Thats the one crappy thing about living in the forest—having to constantly be careful not to set the whole place ablaze.

We’re not allowed fires unless were cooking—not that we’d need it for warmth anyway. Which is why were lucky none of the cadre that enforce the rules found out about Louis’s little outburst.

Not that we’d be kicked out anyways. Marty graduated medical school which makes him indispensable to the cadre and the other units within the perimeter. That’s the only reason that his uncle hasn’t been kicked out yet, even though he never pulls his weight.

Benji’s boy scout training also makes him valuable. My own skills survival skills were limited, but that’s what happens when you have a bachelors degree in journalism.

But I think divine intervention occurred when my college counselor insisted I take archery in high school to make me more competitive on my college applications.

I hear the crunching of boots on the dry forest floor and immediately throw the alcohol I’d confiscated under a blanket in my “room.” I grab put my phone in my back pocket and walk next to Marty.

Three huge, muscled people from the cadre walked up to our unit. The largest guy, who likes us to refer to him as “One”, stand well over 6 feet tall.

“You’re up Princess,” One says handing me the bow and arrow. I nearly cringe at the name.

Marty pretends not to hear and the One shoots me a smug smile. I don’t even blame Marty for not saying anything. They provide protection from outsiders and keep the peace between units, while also controlling who gets the resources—like water and food. And the cadre are the only ones who are allowed to have firearms.

“Doctor boy,” One shoots at Marty and Marty stands slightly straighter, eyeing his machine gun. I could roll my eyes because theres no way they’d ever shoot a medical professional. They were practically gods to them.

“Unit 10 has a woman whose water broke,” One grumbles. I feel sort of bad for whatever child is coming into this world—their life won’t be celebrated like it would’ve been before. It’s just another mouth to feed and a drain on resources. Not to mention, their life will be hard and unforgiving.

“Bring water it’s two miles away. Nessa will take you there,” One says nodding his head to a muscular woman who doesn’t look much older than me.

Thats another way that they keep their power—they’ve mapped out the perimeter and know how to navigate their way around. The combination of heat stroke and being lost can be a deadly combination.

“Boy scout,” he shoots as Benji rounds the corner, “You’re water collection. Heat wave is coming.” I could’ve laughed because we live in a never ending heat wave.

….

I used to be vegetarian. Starvation and hunting quickly take that kind of choice away from you.

Sometimes, if I’m lucky, I can find a deer who has died of dehydration, so I don’t have to shoot some little doe eyed fawn.

Even so, I’d be lucky to even find any animal to hunt in this damned heat.

As we walk in between trees on light feet, I can feel Jake—the third cadre member who was assigned to me—starring at my back.

“You know, you’re one of the best archers in the perimeter,” Jake says and I turn around and give him a tight smile. I hate being complimented on a skill that takes away a life.

"Killer, killer, killer," my mind shouts at me.

You’d think, after three years of hunting, my mind would stop scolding me for taking an animal’s life. I push the thoughts away because, at the end of the day, I have to in order to survive.

I know Jake is just trying to be nice. I know he has a crush on me and requests escorting me hunting every chance he gets— something one of the cadre members had teased him for.

He’s easy on the eyes and is definitely my type—tall, blonde, shaggy hair, and a smile that always reaches his eyes. Plus, if something were to happen to Marty, it’d be good to have him as an ally.

I hate myself that I have to think like that.

Guilt wells up in my chest. Even though Marty and I have been on the outs, we’d been through so much together. He was the closest thing I had to family now.

“Cait,” Jake says, pulling me from my thoughts. I turn around and he’s standing there like a nervous schoolboy. I become self conscious about my oily face and disheveled hair, but theres not much I can do about that.

“I wanted to give you something,” Jake says taking a step forward towards me. My face goes red but I keep my eyes on him.

He dangles a rose-gold heart-shaped locket. I recognize the brand immediately. It’s one of those expensive Tiffany and Co jewelry pieces.

Three years back, I would’ve been wonderstruck.

It’s beautiful, but looking at it immediately causes my heart to ache.

It’s a reminder of the cushy life I had before and how things would never be that way again in my lifetime. How I wished we were standing next to the golden gate bridge with the cold wind and fog pinching our faces, instead of an unbearably hot and dry forest.

The necklace was something I would’ve wanted so badly in my past life. I hated that it’s uselessness diminished its value in my eyes.

Then again, I look at the locket and smile at this gesture of normalcy in a world gone to chaos. A gesture of affection and a moment of kindness in a life that has been ruthless.

Just like the phone in my back pocket that I also deem useless, maybe it isn’t. Because it reminds me of the family and the love I had. It represented connection with the world. And that gives me hope.

It's not black and white. I can both hold onto and let go of my past.

I take the necklace with a nod of thanks. And just like that, I hold on and let go.