Fiction logo

Eight Men Contemplate the Heat Death of the Universe

a short story

By George MurrayPublished 2 years ago Updated about a year ago 58 min read
2
Eight Men Contemplate the Heat Death of the Universe
Photo by Serge Le Strat on Unsplash

“How do you explain the black slavers, then? If the history of race is so cut and dry, if white people are evil oppressors and black people are innocent victims, how do you account for the fact that certain African tribes gave over other tribes to the Europeans? That certain black people made just as much money on the slave trade as their white counterparts? Hell, you could argue that the only reason the Europeans even turned to Africa for their labor was that the black slavers made it so easy!”

“Bro, who were the slaves though? You think black people did that shit- that stuff, sorry- to themselves and the whites just went with it? If white people aren’t the oppressors then where are the white slaves? Listen to yourself, man, you’re saying the Atlantic slave trade had nothing to do with race!”

“That’s not what I’m saying, I’m just pointing out that it isn’t as cut and dry as all that. Your people make themselves out to be victims that they don’t have to be.”

The first speaker is Frank, a white man with a long face and grey hair going white at the temples. He wears a tie underneath a sweater vest, less like a college professor than a man who wishes very dearly to seem like a college professor. After the forum he will return home to his wife who, despite the monotonous slog of suburban retirement, he is still utterly devoted to. They will watch a sitcom on a streaming service that their son set them up with, and at 11 they will get in bed, kiss once, and then fall asleep.

“We’re not victimizing ourselves! I don’t wanna be a victim! My mom, my family, none of us want to be victims! The system won’t give us a break.”

Frank’s opponent is Henry. Henry is the only black man in the room, 30 years old, with small wire rim glasses pushed right up to his eyes and a blue button down shirt tucked into khaki pants. He is also the only one standing, having gotten up to help himself to the complimentary tea and popcorn and getting lost in the argument before he could return to his seat. Henry lives with his mother just a few minutes away from the town center. He thinks of himself as the ‘man of the house’ now that his father has died, but both his sisters have moved out to live with their husbands and so he is less a head of household than he is company for an old widow who wouldn’t have much to live for otherwise.

The patron of the forum interjects himself into the discussion. He clears his throat with a soft chuckle, bright white teeth poking out of his beard. “Not to interrupt the energy here,” he says, “But I’ve got a passage that I think connects to what you guys are talking about.”

Henry crosses the room to an empty seat near Frank. He offers the older man his bowl of popcorn, and Frank accepts a handful with a warm smile.

“Peter 2:16. Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves.” The patron of the forum reads from a small bible but his eyes do not follow the words. When he finishes he holds his breath, then lets it out with a ‘whoo.’ The group nods along, letting the scripture sit in silence for a moment before the talking resumes. Some there are not Christians. Some don’t believe in any higher power at all. They nod all the same.

*

Frank gives Henry a ride home after the forum. They talk about music on the way there. Frank has begun listening to Kanye West and, to his surprise, he really enjoys it. Henry is lukewarm on Kanye. He suspects his friend’s newfound interest is a misguided attempt to smash through racial dividing lines, to connect with Henry by way of his blackness. Despite the ignorant ham-fistedness of the gesture, Henry still appreciates the attempt.

Henry pushes through the week like a rock through thick sludge. He works as an accountant at a large cybersecurity firm, sitting behind a cubicle and crunching numbers from 8:30 to 5. Sometimes at work his brain exits autopilot and he notices discrepancies in the math- Money that comes from nowhere, other sums that seem to disappear into a void. When this happens he stands up in his cubicle and looks over its walls at his co-workers, who he has made no attempt to befriend and who have made no attempt to befriend him. They have their faces to their work, unbothered. He soon follows suit. Being a hero is not worth losing a paycheck.

*

“When I was growing up, I was taught that girls liked it when you called them pretty. Or beautiful, or whatever. It was a compliment! I never meant anything weird by it. No one did. Not any more, though. I got asked to leave McQuailey’s two nights ago because I told the bartender she looked nice. I wasn’t being predatory. It’s not like I called her hot.”

This week the discussion is being spurred on by Duncan, a 40 year old in jeans and a graphic tee. His facial hair seems to be modelled after Tony Stark, a spiky goatee meticulously sculpted onto his doughy face.

Across from Duncan is Bobby, a pudgy guy with a baseball hat and a winter coat, even though it is the middle of June. “As a gay man,” Bobby begins, and next to him the patron of the forum rolls his eyes and chuckles softly. Henry glances at the patron from across the room and gets a friendly wink for his trouble.

“As a gay man,” Bobby starts again. “Women tell me things that they might not tell straight guys. So I actually have a bit of insight into this!”

The entire room turns to Bobby, collective breath held, like children around a campfire listening to a particularly gripping ghost story.

“It’s not that women don’t like being called pretty, or beautiful. It’s that it happens to them too much. And, you know, maybe some or even most of the guys are like you, Duncan, they aren’t being predatory.”

“I wasn’t being predatory.”

“I know. But enough of them are that it makes women distrust the whole pack. It’s like a dice roll every time they talk to a man: Maybe this guy will rape me, maybe he won’t. Is it worth taking the chance?”

Duncan crosses his arms and slumps back in his chair, struggling to mentally untangle the complex social knot before him. “So if I want to talk to a woman. Or ask one out, god forbid. I just can’t? Because if I’m nice to one they might think I’m a rapist?”

“Well-- no--” Bobby searches for the words to explain something that he thinks should be intuitive to anyone over 15. “You can still talk to women. Just don’t be--”

“I’m not predatory.”

“I fucking- sorry, my bad- I know, but-- like, try to appear--”

Bobby is saved by Frank, who clears his throat. Up to this point he has been sitting back in his seat, nursing a hot cup of tea and nodding along with the discussion. “It’s been a while since I’ve been single, so forgive me if this is a little out of touch. But my dad always taught me: If a girl is beautiful, compliment her on her charm, or her intelligence. Because she’s always hearing how beautiful she is! She’s tired of it! Give her something new.”

Duncan nods. This is a line of reasoning he can get behind. “But,” Frank continues, “If a girl is ugly, you should compliment her on her looks. She’s been called smart and funny so much she’s liable to take your head off if she hears it again!”

Warm laughter fills the small meeting room. Bobby feels a twinge of guilt as he joins in- He has an obligation to the women in his life to defend them in this male-dominated space, and though Frank certainly showed a better understanding than Duncan, the objectification is still there. The attitude of the room is still that women are ‘the fairer sex,’ a beast to be tamed or a trophy to be won. He considers pushing back against Frank, standing up for what he knows to be compassionate and correct. But he hasn’t laughed with company for a while. His body longs for it. So he pushes down his higher impulses and lets the energy of the room flow through him.

*

Five days later, Duncan is back at McQuaileys, sitting alone at the bar and drinking an old fashioned. Duncan fancies himself a man out of time- If he came up 40, 50 years before he actually did, he is confident that he would have friends, success, women. The old fashioned is an expression of this. He wished he liked martinis, which in his mind closer embody the bygone era he longs for. He does not like martinis. They are not sweet enough for him.

Across the bar from Duncan is a woman a few years younger than him. She is with her friends, enjoying her Friday night, and every once in a while she looks over at him and he has to quickly look away. As he drinks and stares he finds a flaw in Frank’s rule: If he were to approach the woman, who is very pretty, and tell her that she was smart or funny, she would think he was insane. He has not spoken to her. How would he know if she was either?

He loops this thought in his head for the rest of the night, drinking around 5 or 6 old fashions before he walks back to his studio apartment.

*

“I used to go hunting with my dad when I was in high school, actually. It was important for me. Sounds gruesome, I know, but I think it’s important that, at some point in your life, you make something die. Not to make a habit out of it, of course, but just to see how it happens. To understand what it looks like, and what it feels like. To prove to yourself that you have the power to end a life, so you can understand that power and accept it as part of yourself. If you don’t understand that part of yourself, I think you can lose control of it. You gotta know yourself. Know what it looks like when the life drains out.”

“Did you eat the kill?”

Cormac, the hunter, frowns. He is in his late twenties, and spindly. He wears glasses and does not look the type to have killed for sport. “Sometimes. Venison isn't that great. We’d usually have a steak the night of the kill and then the rest would just sit in a freezer until we replaced it with the next year’s.”

“I can’t be down with that, man. You kill something, you gotta use all of it. Like the Native Americans.” This comes from Ginkgo, a white man with uneven teeth and a Boston Red Sox hat. Ginkgo isn’t his real name. His real name is Norman. He started calling himself Ginkgo 2 years ago, when he found himself in the alternative medicine aisle of a local health food store while in the midst of a powerful acid trip. Ginkgo’s only possessions are the clothes on his back and a toolbox full of cash that he has buried out by the creek, and he splits his nights between a motel on the edge of town and an open field, lying wide awake beneath the stars.

Cormac scoffs. “If you knew what venison tastes like, you wouldn’t say that.”

“I would. I’d eat the guts and the brains too, and I’d make a jacket out of the skin. If I killed a deer, I’d owe it to the deer to put it all to good use.” Ginkgo holds uncomfortable eye contact with Cormac, lip quivering. He feels the deer spirit watching him, above and a little behind the crown of his head.

Cormac feels no such spirit, and doesn’t feel terribly bad about not eating the deer he killed as a teenager. “Hey,” he says. “To each their own.” Ginkgo nods slowly at this and lets a big grin spread across his ruined teeth. “I can dig that, brother.”

“You shitheads don’t know the first fucking thing about killing.”

The energy in the room curdles as all eyes slowly turn to the speaker. He is visibly drunk, dried vomit down the front of a heavy canvas jacket. A lazy eye stares dully at the ground while the other one darts from Cormac to Ginkgo, never blinking, emanating grim judgement. The patron of the forum grins wide and lets air out of his nose in a forced chuckle.

“I mean.” Cormac looks over to Henry, who refuses to meet his eye.

“You don’t mean shit. Skinny little pussy. Killing a deer with your dad isn’t shit. You aren’t tough.”

Frank clears his throat. “Alright, Jack. There’s no need for language.”

“I was in Bagdhad when everything was going to hell. No law in the streets. Just me and the boys. If someone got too close, We shot them. Shot a lot of people. Some kids too. Blew their fucking brains out. Felt good. Should I have eaten the kids, Ginkgo?” He laughs when he says Ginkgo’s name. “Ginkgo. Haha. Fucking faggot name. Do you think I would be honoring those kids if I ate them? You’re all fucking faggots.”

“Stop saying that.” Bobby’s lip is twisted in a frown. “I’m a gay man” -and again the patron chuckles- “And I don’t like it when you call people faggots. It’s crossing a line.”

Jack’s good eye swings toward Bobby and he smiles wide. “You soft little puppy. I’m sorry. Haha. I’m sorry for offending. Hahaha. If I saw you over there I’d shoot you in the head and I’d fuck the hole. Everyone’d cheer me on too. Even the towelheads. They love that shit.”

The patron stands, walks over to Jack, bare feet soft on the hardwood floor. His smile is gone now, replaced with a look of messianic pity. “Jack, can we talk outside?”

Jack looks up at the patron. His twisted face falters. Then he follows the patron out of the room.

*

The patron returns 5 or 10 minutes later. He glides across the room and takes his seat by the window, with such smoothness that the less spiritually attuned of the group did not even notice him enter. The forum is already elbow deep in a new discussion. This time the subject is evolution.

“I promise you, brother. We came from monkeys. I feel it inside me. I go to a zoo, I see a chimpanzee, I know that thing is my kin,” Ginkgo's smile has returned, beaming out from below the brim of his hat.

“I just don’t know if the science is there. It’s a strong theory, for sure, I’m not denying that. But we don’t know for sure. Hell, for all we know, God created the universe 2 seconds ago and just made us fully formed with false memories.”

“That’s not really what happened, Henry.” The patron smiles, a full host of white teeth shining out of a lean, honest face. Henry shrugs and smiles back. “Hey, we know your version.”

The patron laughs. “Are you getting sick of me?”

“No man, of course not. I know you want to share a verse, though.”

Sure enough the small bible is drawn. “Hey,” says Duncan, before the rigorous scripture can fill the room. “How’d you deal with Jack? He was as mad as I’ve ever seen him.”

The patron nods slowly. “I asked him to take a moment to self reflect. We did some breathing exercises. Then he went home.”

The room considers this. “Wow,” says Frank. “That’s why they call you Mr. Conflict Resolution.” Frank gets a widespread chuckle for his trouble, and then the patron once again opens his bible.

“John 3:6: That which is born of the flesh is flesh. And that which is born of the spirit is spirit.”

*

Cormac planned to sleep in on Thursday. It was his day off, one of two days a week where he did not have to wake up at 5 in the morning to work the front counter at 7-11. He succeeds in sleeping in, a full 30 minutes past when he normally wakes up. Try as he might to grant himself some measure of luxury, his sleep cycle is stubborn.

He makes himself a cup of coffee and sits in his kitchen, waiting for his roommates to wake up or for the sun to explode or for something else interesting to happen. He remembers, suddenly, that he dreamed of his sister. In the dream she was unrecognizable from the last time he saw her. Her hair was long, and she was wearing makeup and a skirt. She was walking down the street of a city, not one Cormac recognized. She looked comfortable. Cormac had never known her to be comfortable. Despite the gulf, he knew it was her immediately. Perhaps just some quirk of the dreaming world.

He doesn’t remember the rest of the dream, just her. He has not thought of her in years. Her memory is a childhood oddity, not truly forgotten, but filed away and ignored. Since he was 9, he has been an only child. If you asked him if he had any siblings today, he’d probably say no. He thinks of her now.

She was not nice to him for the first five years of his life. He remembers snippets, none of them good. Her throwing rocks at him when he was 3. Burning his toys. Peeing on his toothbrush. He would get mad at her, but a child only has so much capacity for anger, and he would soon forgive her. She was his older sister, and he worshiped her. She did not care.

When she turned 10 she stopped tormenting him, almost all at once. It was as if a switch had flipped. From then on, his existence did not bother her one way or the other. She retreated into herself, lost what friends she had, went to school and ate dinner and went to bed and repeated on and on. He grew too, making friends and accumulating interests like a magnet. He still loved her, but it was more measured now. At age 6 he knew that she was not a god or a parent, she was just another kid like him.

At age fourteen, she told their parents that she was a girl. They were calm about it, collected. They made no particular comment indicating approval or distaste. She got angry at them for this. She would rather they fucking kill her, she said, than just sit there and say ‘okay.’ Cormac was listening from the next room. Their father told her to go to her room. She said fuck you. She went to her room anyway.

Two days later, men came to bring her to a school in Oregon. She asked their parents what was going on and they did not answer. She tried to fight against the men but they were older and stronger than her and she did not stand a chance. Cormac remembers coming out of his room, seeing the men, telling them to let her go, that she doesn’t want to go with them. When he said that, she looked at him and in that look he knew, despite it all, that she loved him too. Then the men were out the door and she was gone.

The next day, Cormac’s parents got a call from the school. They had lost her, they said. They had a layover in Denver on the way to Oregon and she was able to slip away in the airport. She was never spoken of again.

Cormac hopes she is where she was in her dream, long hair and fashionable skirt in a city that she feels at home in. He knows it is just as likely that she is dead, killed in some corner of Colorado with no friends or family who even know her name. But the dream felt true. Maybe he will see her again one day.

*

“You don’t think it’s even a LITTLE bit gay to date a transgender?” Duncan says, hands on his head and jaw open. A bold new dimension has just erupted into existence right before his eyes, and he has barely begun to understand the previous one.

“If she’s a woman, then it’s straight.” The ghost of a smirk colors Cormac’s face as he addresses Duncan. It entertains him to see the pudgy face behind the goatee strain against the presence of an alien perspective. “If it was a man’s penis, it’d be gay. But it’s not.”

He pauses, then glances at the patron. “Sorry. Is it okay to say…?”

“You can say penis. There’s nothing profane about a body part.”

Henry scratches his head, visibly uncomfortable. “I dunno. I might be with Duncan on this one. Like, for sure if you’re trans I respect it, I’ll call you what you want. But I don’t wanna have sex with that.”

The patron grins and nods.

Cormac’s confidence falters slightly. He had assumed this would be another ‘everyone against Duncan’ subject. He recovers quickly: “That’s alright if you don’t want to have sex with a trans person. But you’re not gay if you do.”

“But it’s a penis!” Duncan is red in the face. “If you have sex with a penis you’re gay. That’s what being gay is! Gay people have sex with penises. Come on!”

Bobby clears his throat. “Can I speak? As the gay man in the room?” Duncan nods and the men turn to Bobby. “Thanks. I think it is kinda gay to be with a trans woman, if you’re a man. I don’t know why that has to be some big judgement. Like, she’s trans. She probably doesn’t think of herself as straight, right? So it’s a little bit gay. Who cares.”

Cormac is silent for a moment. The turn of the conversation is deeply upsetting to him, and he needs a moment to collect himself to keep the blood from rushing up his throat and across his face and into his eyes. He practices his techniques, steps away from himself in his mind, and examines the root causes of his turmoil. It is more than just the shame of losing out the room, to Duncan of all people. He wishes it was just that, that he could destroy, crush it between the thumb and forefinger of his executive function so it no longer troubled his temper. What is bothering him is larger, deeper. He is not sure he would win the fight. His mind hits a wall when he tries to interrogate it and he returns back to himself with a shaky breath.

“I tell you, we never had these talks when I was younger.” Frank shakes his head. “My granddaughter says she goes by ‘they/them’ now. Or they go by ‘they/them.’ The times, they are a changin.”

Henry turns to the patron. “What’s your take on this? I figure you folks aren’t too keen on trans people.”

A grin, a shrug. “We believe it to be blasphemous. God created us in his image, and It’s a great sin to alter that image in any way. Our doors are still open to them, as they are to all people. We hope the pain they feel can be healed through God.” The patron’s eyelids flutter for a moment. “Hebrews 13:8: Jesus Christ is the same Yesterday, and Today, and Forever.”

Jack has been present the whole night. He says nothing, just stares dead-eyed at the ground. Occasionally, like some hunted rodent, his eyes dart up to the patron, or to Duncan, but always they return to the floor. Cormac has been watching him on and off through the night, and notices that his lips are moving, ever so slightly. If he paid a little more attention, he might be able to see that Jack is chanting, soft enough that no one can hear, and that sometimes he stumbles over his repetitions and has to start over.

*

When the forum is over, Jack and the patron have a quiet chat outside the venue. The other denizens of the forum give them a wide berth, talking among themselves rather than eavesdropping. Henry and Bobby joke about sports, Frank gives Ginkgo a light, Cormac needles Duncan over his strange goatee. “Come on, it’s doing nothing for you,” Cormac says. “You don’t look like Iron Man, you look like an asshole.”

“I’m not trying to look like Iron Man. I like having a goatee, that’s all.”

“You’re forty years old and single. You’d feel so much better without the goatee.”

Duncan is caught off guard by the mention of his age. He doesn’t think about it often. In his mind he has always been in his late twenties, perhaps wishing that he was older, more sophisticated, but always anchored in relative youth. He realizes, for the first time, that Cormac is younger than him- so is Henry, and Bobby, and Ginkgo. He has, completely unbeknownst to himself, crossed the line into middle age- But he is not wise, or witty, or any of the things he knew that his older self would be. An angry ball of grief rolls up his throat, but he pushes it down.

“Yeah. Maybe I would feel better.” He turns from Cormac and walks home. Cormac joins in with Henry and Bobby, not paying Duncan another thought.

Jack and the Patron linger for a few minutes after everyone leaves. Gingko is the last to go, skipping off down an alley, down toward the waterfront to look at the stars. The patron smiles at Jack and says something in a language that has been dead since long before Moses parted the sea, before Abraham rose a blade against his son, a language that was only known for a few holdover words and a couple dozen stray suffixes by the time the first stones were being laid in Uruk.

Jack scowls at this, spits on the ground, and walks off into the night.

That week Frank takes Henry and Cormac out for dinner. Cormac is taken slightly off guard by the invitation- he never thought of anyone from the forum as a friend in that sense. To him, they existed for two hours every Sunday night before returning to the broad morass of the town for the rest of the week. On top of that, he has not been out with people in a while. He is quite nervous, but doesn’t let it show. He leaves his studio apartment a few minutes before he needs to.

For Henry, the preparation for the dinner is centered on his mother. At first he tries to downplay the event, a tactic he soon realizes is a mistake. She now thinks that he is going on a date with a girl, and is fussing over his hair, his clothes, his glasses. He swats her away, insisting that it’s not a big deal, but she won’t hear it. In her head she is already seeing the girl walking down the aisle, Henry waiting at the end next to a priest, beaming with love. Eventually, he caves.

“It’s not a date, mom. It’s just some of the guys from the group.”

She stops fussing immediately, maternal pride dissolving into a puddle on the floor. “You mean the Jesus freaks?”

“They aren’t all like that.”

“Just the one in charge. I know what his people do. I’ve seen the documentaries.”

“He’s not that bad. I mean, we’re religious!”

“Not like that, we aren’t.”

*

The three men meet at McQuailey’s at 7, electing to make the most of the warm summer night by sitting outside. Frank drinks a tall irish stout, Cormac a fancy IPA, and Henry a ginger ale. “No beer?” Frank asks.

“I don’t like feeling drunk.”

“Fair enough.”

Conversation is stale at the beginning of the night. It is unfamiliar terrain for all of them- Outside of the context of the forum they are not quite sure what to talk about. They run into several dead ends about movies and music, subjects on which their tastes either do not overlap or overlap too much. “Yeah, I love The Who. One of my favorites,” says Cormac. Henry smiles and nods, unable to spin the shared interest into a broader connection. Inevitably, they begin talking about the forum.

“We gotta take a tally of how many times Bobby starts something by saying ‘as a gay man.” Henry grins over his ginger ale.

Frank’s craggy face folds into a grin. “Does he think we forget?”

“No,” Cormac adds, “He’s just keeping us updated. What if he becomes straight overnight and none of us know?

After the laughter subsides they sit in comfortable silence for a moment. They have found a flow with which to follow and so quiet no longer fills them with awkward panic. When it is over, Henry sighs. “I don’t mean to rag on Bobby. He’s a good guy.”

“Yeah, Bobby’s great.”

“I love Bobby. I love them all!” Frank takes a sip of his beer before continuing. “Some of them are kinda weird, but they’re good guys. There’s not a lot of places I can go without getting shouted down for being a conservative-”

“Frank, we’ve been over this. You’re not oppressed.”

“Point being, they’re respectful. Even though we all disagree about most things. It’s nice.”

Cormac picks at his coaster and hesitates before speaking. “You guys ever. Think about joining? The patron’s church I mean.”

Henry bites his lip. “I don’t know. I don’t think I could do no internet and no electricity. Maybe I could hang with the religious parts. I don’t know. Too intense for me I think.” He sips his ginger ale. “Plus, who’d look after my mom?”

“Not for me either,” says Frank. “I’m too old to convert to anything. Maybe if I was 20 years younger, and unmarried.”

Cormac nods pensively. Soon the conversation shifts and the rest of the night drives the prospect of radical conversion deep into the annals of the memory.

Duncan eavesdrops on the trio from the bar, draining old fashioneds and growing more and more upset with each passing minute. Surely they will notice me, he thinks. Surely they will invite me over to sit with them, maybe Frank will notice my drink and be impressed. Henry will laugh at my jokes and Cormac, the know-it-all, will seethe upon realizing that I too am one of the boys.

The trio do not notice Duncan. They pay for their food and their drinks and then they leave. Henry even brushes the back of Duncan’s chair on his way out. The whole time Duncan’s eyes are fixed ahead, never breaking from the line of alcohol bottles on the other side of the bar.

*

“The deep state is real, brothers, I promise you. There’s a deep state, and then there’s a deep state beyond that, and another one beyond that, and on and on.”

Ginkgo sits on the backrest of his chair, his feet planted on the seat. Henry sits next to him with a hand on the armrest to make sure he doesn’t fall. “I don’t buy it,” he says, tightening his grip as Ginkgo shifts his weight. “I’m sure there’s corruption, but I don’t see evidence that it’s all some grand plan. Just garden variety self interest getting in the way of public service.”

“How many deep states do you think there are, Ginkgo?” asks Cormac, taking the discussion far less seriously than Henry.

Ginkgo's eyes glaze over and his tongue flicks across his lips as he considers. “Thirteen deep states. By my count. Donald Trump is in Deep State number two. Bill Clinton is in Deep State number seven. The lizards start to show up in Deep State number nine.”

“Ginkgo,” Bobby interjects. “Be serious here. There are no lizard people in the government. That’s ridiculous.”

The insane man looks upon Bobby with genuine pity. “They’ve got you good, man. You’re singing the lizard’s song like your mama sang it to you when you were a baby.”

Bobby rolls his eyes but says nothing. He has an inborn instinct to correct people who are wrong-- to let an untruth hang in the air is poison to him, an itch he just has to scratch. But even he acknowledges that some battles are pointless to fight. The group sits in silence for a moment, unsure of how to broach the topic of lizard people.

“Duncan,” says the patron, smiling wide. “What do you think about the deep state?” Duncan has been quiet all night, staring mostly at the floor and then, when he thinks no one is looking, at Cormac with hatred.

“I don’t really care about the deep state.” Another thing about Duncan is that he has shaved his goatee. He does not look younger, or more handsome. When he had the goatee, there was something sickeningly amusing about him, and now that it’s gone he is just a man sitting in a room with other men. No one would give him a second thought on the bus or at a bar.

The patron nods. “Fair enough.”

“No… brother, that’s not good.” Gingko gazes at Duncan, slowly shaking his head. “Apathy is death, my man. You can’t not care. If you don’t care you’re nothing.”

“Then I guess I’m nothing. I don’t give a shit about the deep state.”

The seven other men stare at Duncan expectantly. Cormac and the patron both smile- Cormac with a hint of mischief, the patron nothing but warmth. Duncan sits proudly in his transgression, daring the others to say something. Frank clears his throat.

Duncan breaks. “Sorry. I mean, I don’t care about the deep state.” Everyone settles back into their seats. Duncan thinks that he is done talking for the night, and as such is surprised when his mouth continues making noise: “It doesn’t matter if the deep state is real or not,” He says. “It’s not like it would change anything one way or another. Like, if the world is shitty because there’s a deep state, is that any really different than if the world is shitty and there’s no deep state. Yeah, I know, I’m sorry for saying shitty.”

“It makes a difference,” Ginkgo replies. “If you know who your enemy is, you know what to fight.”

Duncan wants nothing more than to melt into the wall, but instead he snaps his head toward Ginkgo. “And how are you gonna fight the deep state, Ginkgo?”

“Psychic warfare, brother.” Ginkgo is deadly serious. “Psychic warfare and radical love.”

At this, the virile spirit leaves Duncan and his body once again begins working in concert with his brain. He buries himself back in his seat and reaffixes his gaze on the floor. He feels a strange chill on his face, and misses his goatee. Somewhere on the edge of his consciousness he hears the patron recite the night’s bible verse followed by the reverent silence of the rest of the men. Duncan feels suddenly guilty at having missed the verse- his inattention cut him off from the group consciousness, unaware of the wisdom currently seeping down through the room. He clasps his hands together and pretends to be one of them, and for a moment it works.

*

On Wednesday the village elders hold court in the Meeting House to take inventory of the Enclave’s current status, both within its own borders and outside of them, in the town soaked in vice and apostasy. Domestic problems were few- A man working in the stables was kicked in the chest with a horse and now lies in critical condition in the medicine ward of the chapel. Not much discussion there- should he die or be permanently crippled, the responsibility of care for his wife and children would be taken up by the rest of the Enclave. The only thing for the elders to do in that event would be to assign individual responsibilities. This is an easy task, as few in the Enclave are unwilling or unable to take up extra work.

On matters of foreign outreach, they summon their ambassador to hear his report on the world beyond. The patron arrives via pickup truck, the only mechanism of steel and wire allowed within the Enclave’s borders. The patron does not live with the rest of the tribe- out of necessity, he and several other brothers and sisters rent out a house near the center of town. His bedroom is small, with a single twin mattress and a crucifix for decoration. The Enclave eschews earthly excess, and even if they didn’t the patron would not want to make his room overly comfortable or familiar. It is not home, just a place to sleep. The Enclave is home.

They use the Old Tongue to discuss the domestic issues, the language given to them directly by the Almighty, the One Above and The One Below, that they might be better equipped to return the world to its original holy state. To speak of external matters they use English. The Old Tongue would be profaned if it were used to speak of the unconditioned apostates.

“The men do not fully know it yet,” He testifies, “but they are dependent on us now. They feel the aching hollowness of the modern world. They live out of obligation, not joy. The forum is necessary now for them to remain human. It provides them community, camaraderie. In it they become the One that is Many.”

The elders murmur among themselves. A spokesman asks the patron what this means for recruitment. Can they expect all the men to give up the foolish trappings of modernity?

“No.” The patron strokes his beard. “As I said, they have not yet recognized the source of their discontent. I guide them as best I can, but it can be tricky. Some are deep in the throes of substance, others blinded by sexual deviancy. Others are simply too comfortable.”

The spokesman nods, and asks if any in the patron’s group are fit for transition into Enclave life.

“I am hopeful about two of them. One is a young man with a penchant for mischief. He is aloof, but spiritually attuned. He would see the truth if it was presented to him. The other is middle aged but has the soul of a child. He would be an easy sell at this juncture, I believe.”

Then let it be so, the spokesman says. You have our approval to move them to the next step. At this, the patron nods and recuses himself.

He emerges from the meeting house, throwing open the aging cellar doors and gazing up at the blue sky. Above ground the house is nearly gone now, just a mound of cobbles where the chimney once was and a faint outline of a foundation. The patron smiles at the men standing guard, and they smile back. Then he walks across the field to the old pickup truck, where he will wait for his consort to be finished delivering her report. They will then drive back to their plain house and take supper with their fellow missionaries. Neither of them have needed sleep in decades. They will spend the night together, hand in hand, silently contemplating the infinite mystery.

*

“I think people are just afraid of change,” says Bobby. “People were having the same types of freak outs about TV when it came out, and Radio before that. I mean, even early novels were said to rot your brain.”

Henry gives a small horizontal hand wave in response to this. “Sort of. I don’t know if those are great parallels, though. Like, sure, new technology and everything, but TV and radio didn’t change the world like the internet did. The way we interact, the way we learn is so different now.”

Bobby sits back and crosses his arms, nodding at Henry to continue talking. “Um,” says Henry. “Like, Frank. If I asked you what the capital of Mississippi was, what’d you do?”

“Find it in my atlas.”

“Exactly! I don’t own an atlas. I’m assuming you don’t either, and neither does Cormac, or Ginkgo, or Duncan. We’d use our phones.”

“I don’t own a phone either, my friend.” Ginkgo says this while staring at an ant he has allowed to crawl on to his hand.

Bobby uncrosses his arms and scoots forward. “That’s the same thing, though. You’re still looking it up. The only difference is that the internet is free.”

Frank clears his throat to join the conversation. “Probably not much of a shocker here,” he says, “But I agree with Henry on this one. I think when you read something on a page, you retain it better than if you did it on a screen. On a screen, it’s impermanent, so your brain skims over it quickly. The page is real. It gives you time to process.”

“I own an atlas.”

The men look at Duncan, who squirms a little. His goatee has begun to grow back, much patchier than it was before. “I was just,” he says, “clarifying. Because of what Henry said, that he assumed I don’t own an atlas. I do. Own one.”

After a moment, Cormac breaks the silence. “That’s great, buddy.” He says. This does little to free up the air. “For the record, I agree with Henry and Frank. I used to play a lot of video games and spend a lot of time online. I feel better now that I don’t as much. I think it’s really stressful to be that connected all the time, and to have all that information in front of you. I don’t think most people can be jacked in like that for too long without there being some adverse effects.”

“Why do you always treat me like that?” Duncan’s eyes are locked on Cormac, watery and determined. “I’m not stupid. I’m not a joke, either. I bring as much to this group as you or Henry or Frank.”

“Alright Duncan,” says Bobby, hands open and head slightly bowed so as to seem nonthreatening. “It’s not about bringing anything to the group other than yourself. I’m sure Cormac didn’t mean to make you feel stupid.”

“They hang out without us, Bobby! The three of them! I saw them getting dinner together, and neither of us were invited.”

Bobby glances over at Henry, who avoids his gaze. This new information is hurtful to Bobby- he considered Henry and Cormac friends, and he liked Frank well enough for an old Republican. He knows it is their right to get dinner without him, and with his analytical brain he understands that he does not need to perceive his own lack of inclusion as a slight. Likely they did not mean it as one either. But below that in his psyche his emotions run wild. Did Frank not invite him because he’s homophobic? Maybe Henry isn’t his friend, he just acts friendly because he fears confrontation. Perhaps the awkward insecurity that Cormac rarely lets show has something to do with sexuality? Maybe Bobby makes him uncomfortable. Maybe he has a crush, or something.

After a brief tussle, Bobby grants victory to his reason. “That’s fine, Duncan. Sometimes people hang out. It’s not a big deal.”

“Okay,” Duncan has dug his heels in deep. He will see this one through. “Look me in the eye, Cormac, and tell me you respect me.”

Cormac opens his mouth in indignation. “Are you serious, dude?” He looks to Henry for support. Henry avoids his eye too.

“You can’t even do it. You can’t even lie.” Duncan glows with triumph. “You see that? He’s such an asshole that he can’t even pretend to respect me.”

At this the patron rises gently to his feet. “Duncan,” he says. “Can we talk outside?”

“So you can lecture me? Like you’re my teacher?”

“Duncan.”

Duncan falters, his smallness finally overpowering his boldness. He looks around at his friends. None meet his eye, save Jack, who hiccups quietly and winks at him. He sighs, rises, and follows the patron out of the room.

Silence hangs in the air for about a minute as the remaining six wait for the patron to return. It is Frank that speaks first, turning to Cormac with the big eyes and drooping wrinkles of a concerned grandfather. “You should be nicer to Duncan. I know he’s a little weird, but you do tease him a lot.”

Cormac blushes, again uncomfortable with any type of confrontation in which he is on the defense. “But he was acting insane!” he whines.

“I know, but still. Just try.”

Cormac stews in shame as silence once again falls. This time, it is Ginkgo who breaks it. “Hey Jack,” he says, and the old vet’s good eye scans slowly across the room until it lands on him. “What's happening with Duncan right now? Like, how’d it go down when he took you out there?”

Frank, Bobby, Henry, Cormac all tense, terrified of what Ginkgo has done. Jack has not spoken since his outburst, and rarely did he speak before. He’s hard to look at, deeply upsetting to consider. The unspoken rule was to let Jack be.

Jack’s mouth twists into a grin. “Ha ha,” he says. “Ha. He’s being set straight. Won’t be able to resist. Like a soft little shit. He’ll fit any shape we give him. Diarrhea Boy.”

No one responds. Not even Ginkgo. Jack’s good eye rolls in its socket like a hamster on a wheel. “You think you’re safe in here,” he chortles. “You think these walls can keep out the creeping grey. You’re not safe anywhere. Ha. You’re not safe anywhere.”

*

Duncan awakes the next day reborn, a new man ejected from the womb of sleep into the world. After his talk with the patron he felt drained, empty to the core, a shell of skin and fat surrounding a neutral void of unbeing. But when he opens his eyes he feels new again. The uncertainty that has plagued him for the past 15 years is gone, and finally he is able to stretch out inside himself, explore space that was previously overfilled or blocked off.

He goes over to the oven and makes breakfast. Two eggs, salt and chili flakes. Buttered toast and half a glass of orange juice. The flavors are vivid, the same meal he has had every morning suddenly new and delicious. Soon he will be free of this apartment. He will be a new man, with a new home. He will follow the patron away from blue-screen gray sludge television static void into a new existence of sound and color and motion.

*

Monday night finds Bobby, as usual, in bed, on his phone, cycling between Twitter, Reddit, and Tik Tok. The bulk of his energy at the moment is dedicated to Twitter, where he (@bobertJ) engages in rhetorical combat with a 30 year old National Guard veteran from Colorado, known online as @beerenjoyer. Beerenjoyer believes that liberalism has failed, that the institutions of American democracy no longer serve the people and that participation in an electoral project is an exercise in humiliation. Bobby is of a differing opinion: He argues that while flawed, the existing system can still be made to affect positive change if only enough informed, well meaning people participate. In Bobby’s eyes, it is disinformation and mass apathy that have led to our current predicament.

Though this is the seed of discussion, an unknowing observer would not know it. The discussion has devolved: Bobby found a post of Beerenjoyer’s from 2012 where he expressed admiration for the presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Beerenjoyer retaliated by making public a tweet from 2018 in which Bobby claims that he could ‘Make Timothee Chalamet gay.’ Now, Bobby is furiously searching Beerenjoyer’s feed for proof that he is homophobic, racist, or, if Bobby is really lucky, a pedophile.

20 minutes of tweets ago, Bobby and Beerenjoyer enjoyed a healthy audience of voyeurs to their public throwdown. Now, they are too deep, they have gone on too long, and even the most terminally bored sicko has found something more entertaining than watching them fight. No tweet in the thread has received a single like in 5 minutes.

Bobby stops mid scroll. Why is he doing this? What point does he have to prove? There is no enrichment happening here. If he wins this argument, someone he doesn’t know and will never meet will feel brief shame. If he loses, he will be the one feeling that shame. Likely as not, the winner will be determined by who holds out longer, not whose argument is stronger.

If he was having this argument at the forum, it would never have devolved like this. His opponent and him would laugh afterward, their friendship strengthened by the exchange of ideas, not weakened by it. What is he even doing here, on this horrible website, ruining his soul in mindless combat against a faceless man?

He gives one finally half hearted scroll, moves to log out- and then he sees it. The white whale. 2 years ago, Beerenjoyer liked an image of a girl sitting on a bed, wearing a cropped t-shirt and a thong. The age of the poster at the time? 16. Pedophile. Bobby’s epiphany is annihilated by the sweet, bloody rush of victory. He shares the post before his brain knows what his fingers are doing.

*

Henry discovers that he no longer has a job at 10:30am on Tuesday, an hour and a half after he arrives at work and two hours before what would have been his lunch break. Like every day, he has pages and pages of financials open in one tab, Youtube open in the other. He is very disciplined at work- For every hour, he only allows himself to watch videos for 20 minutes. The other 40 must be dedicated to real work. Unbeknownst to him, he has the highest work/play ratio of anyone else in the office.

The first FBI agents come in at 10:15 and stand guard by the elevator. Henry does not notice them at first- he is using his hourly 20 minutes to watch football highlights. By 10:25 the rest of the agents arrive and begin filing through the cubicles, ordering Henry’s fellow accountants to leave the building.

When they get to Henry, he jumps and switches his tab back to his work. When he turns, he is surprised to find that it is not his supervisor standing there.

“Sir, I have to ask you to go home.”

“What?” Henry’s sluggish work brain scrambles to account for the FBI’s presence.

“This area is being designated a crime scene. You need to leave.”

Still confused, Henry reaches for a stack of physical paper he was supposed to cross reference with the company’s digital files. If he has to go home, he might as well get some work done.

“Leave that. It’s evidence.”

Henry learns later that day from the news that the cybersecurity firm he works for is under investigation for a litany of charges- tax fraud, embezzlement, and money laundering, to name a few. It has been dissolved, its assets seized by the state. Henry does not know what to do. He has savings, enough to support himself and his mother for a while while he finds a new job. But he does not have the energy for this kind of instability. His brain is wired against it. He goes to bed early and does not tell his mother until the next morning.

The cybersecurity firm will reform in 6 months, under a new name but with the same structure, the same bosses, and the same clientele. The accounting department will be rebuilt from the ground up, with no consideration for the original employees. Henry never will work for as high a salary again.

*

If they want to make it in time, they must leave in five minutes, and Frank cannot find his tie. He could not find it in the dusty closet with his shirt and blazer, nor in any of the drawers in his dresser. He has searched everywhere twice, and by now he is sure that he either gave it away years ago, or else he has gone senile.

“You wear it every Sunday to that book club of yours,” his wife says from the other room.

“No I don’t.”

“You do. I see you put it on every week.”

Frank’s granddaughter is graduating from eighth grade that afternoon. She and his son and his daughter in law live 3 towns over, where the schools are a little nicer and the neighborhoods a little safer. It’s a nesting ground, where his son’s family lives. People move there to raise children, and then the children leave and the parents leave as well. Like birds flying someplace warm to have babies. That’s what it’s like now, Frank thinks. The family home is dead, the hometown destroyed. If you have money and means you migrate from place to place, staying in place for maybe a year, maybe five, maybe ten. Never truly settling, not like our forefathers would. Or if you have no money and no means you follow the same pattern but you have no say in your destinations, forever a slave to cheaper rents and higher minimum wages, never even claiming full ownership of your home.

If Frank could go back to 1987, the year he bought this house from a smiling real estate developer named Lawrence, he would turn down the deal. He would move his wife and son into his fathers house, that he had grown up in, that his father had grown up in, the house his grandfather had built back near the turn of the century. If he had known the evil that he would be complicit in, he would have laughed in Lawrence’s face and never looked back. Instead, he must drive 20 miles to a trumped up human hatchery to see his beloved granddaughter for a total of five minutes before she runs off to be with her 20 identical friends.

His wife enters the room to find him scowling at his own shadow, standing in the middle of the room, moving not an inch. “Frank, you idiot,” she says. “Your tie is around your neck.”

She is right. It is. Anger and humiliation rush to his face, but he does not take it out on her. He is not stupid. He smiles sheepishly instead. “Me, old?” He jokes. “Preposterous.” She smiles graciously at him and fixes the elusive tie.

“Ready to go?” She says.

“I guess I am now.”

*

Thursday night Cormac dreams that he is a teenager again. There are trees all around him, and it is nighttime. This is how the forest was when he was a child, tall and dark and suffused with grim mystery. He sees a deer in the dream. It is bigger than any deer should be, with glowing white spots on its pitch black coat. There is a gun in his hand, and when he fires the deer stops and shivers and collapses into a singularity, bending the trees and the night around in and into it. His father, who has been behind him the whole time, now walks ahead toward the dread carcass. He stops right in front of it, then turns to Cormac and smiles. And then he walks into the deer’s belly and vanishes.

Cormac wakes up from the dream, and instead of going back to sleep he boots up his PC and enters the lobby of a game he and his friends used to play before they got jobs and girlfriends. He spends a grueling 20 minutes getting spawn killed by a child named “Based_Weinstein” before the game ends.

After a moment of consideration he uninstalls the game file, lays back in bed, and stares at his ceiling until the sun comes up.

*

Gingko is picked up by police at 3:45 AM on Friday morning. It has happened before, and it will happen again. He is out in the park by the water, staring at the stars as he often does. Some nights he does so quietly, other nights he is loud. This is a loud night. The infinite mystery of nature is too much for him to contain and so he runs up and down the waterfront, Whooping and laughing, composing frenzied poems on the spot and yelling them at the night sky. This is how the police find him. He is glum as they drive him to his cell. He was not ready to be done with his exaltation.

Tomorrow they will let him go, as they always do, but tonight he lies awake on his cot and examines the white concrete ceiling. Soon, he notices imperfections in the material- pock marks and cracks, forming shapes and patterns. He remembers that there is no dividing line between nature and man. No spectrum from one side to the other. We are creatures of nature, and what we create is nature. He is still gazing at the ceiling when they unlock his door at 8 AM

*

Saturday is Jack’s day. He lays in the corner of a parking garage, passed out, with a fresh pool of his own vomit for company. What passes for his soul is near the Green Zone in Baghdad, peering down from a rooftop with a bag of chips and a .300 Winchester magnum rifle. He shoots at any target he can see. A stray dog, a ceramic pot left on a windowsill. Unbroken windows in abandoned buildings. There is a corpse in the street, just on the edge of his effective range. It has been there for a day or two, perhaps left by a gang, or the Sadrists, or maybe one of Jack’s friends. Maybe Jack himself.

When Jack has run out of other things to shoot, he notices that a boy has moved out into the street and is trying to drag the corpse inside. The boy is no older than 10, and is struggling with the heavy body. Jack eats a handful of chips, takes aim, and fires. The corpse explodes, coating the boy in a rancid layer of old blood and rancid meat. The boy drops the body and runs to cover.

Every 10 or so minutes, Jack sees the boy poke out to see if it’s safe to recover the body. When he does, Jack shoots the corpse again, and laughs when the boy scrambles to hide. He finishes his bag of chips and wonders if he should get another. Life is good.

*

The patron wakes at 6am on Sunday. He says a prayer, eats a spartan breakfast of toast and water, and takes a quick, cold shower. His fellow missionaries mill about the house to get ready for the day- some off to run the Enclave’s outpost bakery, some to preach on street corners. The patron and his escort are off to prepare for their respective forums. His consort runs a gathering for women. Gender is not specified in either gathering, but both know how to play to their audiences.

The patron allows himself a small, sinful measure of pride. Duncan is the first successful conversion from this town. And there will be more, the patron is sure of it. Cormac will soon come around, perhaps Henry too, and Bobby. He will save their souls and the Beast that calls itself Jack will slink away in defeat. A new day is dawning.

*

The patron has the chairs set up in the forum by 7:30, the popcorn and tea hot and ready, his bible in hand and bookmarked with the verses he feels will bring his friends the most comfort. Jack is the first to come in, stumbling up the stairs and nearly falling into his seat. The patron smiles at him, and Jack smiles back. Neither blinks and neither breaks until Duncan enters the room.

“Hello, Duncan,” says the patron.

“Hello.”

By 8:05 everyone has arrived. Those who are in need have helped themselves to snacks and are chatting amongst themselves, trading jokes and small talk before the forum officially starts. It begins as it always does, with the patron clasping his hands together by his knees and leaning forward slightly, looking at every man in turn, before breaking into his trademark grin. The last person he looks at is Cormac, who sits beside him and shrinks slightly away from the gaze.

“Alright,” he says. “Who wants to start us off?”

Duncan, on queue, stands. “If I could,” he says. “I’d like to apologize to Cormac for what I said last week.”

“Oh,” says Cormac. “Um. Okay.”

“I shouldn’t have taken my emotions out on you like that. It was childish, and unfocused. I see that now, and if I could take back my words I would. I should have approached the rift between us directly. Like a man. Like I am going to do now.” Duncan sticks his hand in the pocket of his coat, takes a deep breath. “Cormac, you are a small person, who delights in making others feel the same way you do. I fell for your game, but I will do so no longer” Now-”

A loud noise, and then a ringing. Cormac at first thinks that something has happened outside, then perhaps that it was localized to just him, maybe his eardrum burst or maybe he is having a stroke. Then he noticed the patron next to him. He notices how still he is, then the blood on his clothes, his face. Then the hole where his eye should be.

“Shit,” says Duncan, shivering with nerves. “Fuck. I didn’t mean.”

Duncan has a gun in his hands. A Walther PPK. The same gun James Bond uses.

It begins to dawn on Cormac that the shot was meant for him. Duncan has always been a fuck up, and now he has missed a point blank shot and killed maybe the only person in the world that he doesn’t on some level hate. Cormac watches, frozen, as the gun rises, and Duncan takes more careful aim-

Bobby tackles Duncan to the ground and the shot goes wide again, missing Cormac at just the last second. Then Henry is with Bobby, wrestling the gun out of Duncan’s hand and pinning him to the floor. Duncan struggles against them but it is two against one, and the two are younger and stronger.

“No, man, no.” says Ginkgo. “No no no no no.”

Cormac follows Ginkgo's eyes to Frank, two chairs over. The old man’s jaw is slack, and his hand is pressed tight against his neck. Blood is oozing from between his fingers.

The hold finally lifts and Cormac bolts over to Frank, taking his hand away and replacing it with Cormac’s own two. The shot Duncan fired mid-tackle grazed an artery and was now lodged in the wall, still splattered with Frank’s blood. Frank’s mouth moves up and down like he is trying to say something, but no words come out.

“Frank!” Henry notices his injured friend and lets go of Duncan for a second. Half his restraint gone, Duncan, sobbing, grabs the gun and presses it against his own temple. Bobby notices just in time and slaps the gun away just as it fires- this time, it finds its original target. Cormac falls away from Frank, clutching the gaping hole in the fleshy part of his leg. Ginkgo squeezes his eyes shut and begins humming to himself.

None notice Jack, seated next to the patrons serene corpse. His mouth hangs open in a half grin, his good eye moving back and forth through the carnage. He does not laugh. He does not need to. “Jack’s day,” he says. “It’s Jack’s day now. Now Sunday is Jack’s day.”

*

Before the EPA was founded in the 70s, the rivers and lakes in the town were unswimmable. Choked with runoff from the textile mill, waste from the sewage system, trash and litter from careless citizens, and humans who stepped foot in the water were lucky to emerge without a rash , a disease, or worse. The pollutants killed all but the hardiest fish and reduced the water to a purely economic feature, a cheap way of moving people and goods up the lake to nearby towns.

Then Nixon came with his regulations, and the water cleared up. Fish returned, swimming returned, and the spirit of the town seemed to breathe again. The textile mill closed when the company found cheaper labor overseas, and the water cleared up more. The movement of goods likewise evolved and it no longer made sense to transport using the lake. With less boats on the water, the fish grew bolder and more numerous, undisturbed by propellers cutting deep whirling slices into the depths. The vital energy of the area slowly shifted from the town to the lake, leaving a population of very miserable people next to a population of very happy fish.

The patron’s funeral is a quiet affair. His consort and several of his missionaries bring his body down to the lake, weigh it down with stones, and let it sink into the depths. To the uninformed it might look like something suspicious, a mob hit or an FBI killing, but those in the know are aware that nothing like that happens around here. The fish recognize the patron, and move quickly. In an hour, all that is left is bones.

*

“I’m working at the Walmart now. It’s not as bad as people say it is. Some of the coworkers are nice, the work isn’t particularly hard. I guess it’s just kind of nice to not give a shit. Like, I’m working at Walmart. They have self checkout. I basically just watch people all day.”

The survivors sit in the park by the water, five chairs in a semicircle. Ginkgo did not show up. He took a bus to the other side of the state the day after. He did not tell anyone where he was going. In another month, he will have all but forgotten the forum and his friends.

“I had to move my mom into a smaller place, but we’re doing alright,” Henry finishes. “Anyway. That’s how I’m doing.”

“It was a nice service,” says Bobby, after a moment's pause.

Duncan’s funeral was that morning. The first thing he did once the police put him in a cell was try to hang himself with his bedsheet. When they took those away, he tried using his clothes. After that he was put on suicide watch, but it didn’t help much. For two weeks every waking moment of Duncan’s was spent hunting for a way to end his life. A few days ago, they entered his cell one morning to find that he had finally managed it, wedging his head in between the bars of the cell and then pushing his body away until his neck broke. Frank’s widow had decided not to press charges just the day before.

“I want to leave town,” says Cormac, who has been quiet ever since he saw Duncan’s body in the casket. “Go cross country. Leave everything, end up far away. I just. I don’t think I can. I’m afraid I’ll make it five states and then I’ll run out of money and just become some homeless junkie. I just don’t want to be here anymore.”

“You’ll feel better eventually,” says Bobby. He does not look at Cormac.

“Yeah, probably.”

Another silence hangs in the air. No one knows how to break it, and in that moment Cormac realizes that he will never see these people again. They cannot do what they did anymore, not without Frank and Duncan and the patron. They will retreat back into their homes and their work, and then they will die, slowly at first and then faster and faster until whatever shrivelled husk is left of them watches, powerless, as the sun explodes and everything they know and love is totally, finally eliminated.

Jack is there, though no one invited him. When Henry set up the chairs in the park, Jack stumbled out of the woods and took his seat. The other three look at him only in stolen glances, none wanting to be the one to acknowledge his presence. Jack, despite his black heart, is not a sore winner. Before they leave, he offers them one small measure of hope.

“This will happen again,” He says. “And again and again and again."

Short Story
2

About the Creator

George Murray

Contact me at [email protected]

Reader insights

Be the first to share your insights about this piece.

How does it work?

Add your insights

Comments

There are no comments for this story

Be the first to respond and start the conversation.

Sign in to comment

    Find us on social media

    Miscellaneous links

    • Explore
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • Support

    © 2024 Creatd, Inc. All Rights Reserved.