The Last Man On Earth

The Last Man On Earth

“We gotta do it,” Ron is saying. We’re at the beach, sitting on sand, staring at water. How long did it take us to get here? We’ve been wandering endlessly, looking for life. Neither of us knows which ocean this is, if it’s even an ocean at all. A lifeguard chair towers over us; my imagination draws a lifeguard into it. Zinc on nose. Whistle around neck. “Today. Tonight. Waiting isn’t smart.”

“I know,” I say. “You think I don’t know?”

*

A long-ago Sunday afternoon, drinking margaritas in the sunshine at that strip mall bar with the tables in the parking lot. It’s hard to believe now that margaritas were real, that friends were real. Laughing, licking salt off the rim, with women who had loved me since I was 14—my god, what abundance, what decadence.

*

Because all life forms (as far as Ron and I can tell) vanished some time ago in the middle of the night, bars and restaurants stand permanently closed now, inaccessible unless Ron breaks the glass. When he breaks glass, my body tenses and then I can’t get my head right for days.

Not that I’m counting days. Ron’s the one who keeps track somehow.

I stand outside restaurants sometimes, looking at the place settings. I imagine customers materializing, unrolling silverware from linen, buttering bread, passing salt, adjusting ties, shaking sugar packets, discussing business as usual.

*

“Think I’ll go for a swim.” Ron stands and strips.

I look away from his old man body, finger the locket around my neck, my 34th birthday gift from Diego.

If Ron starts to drown, screams for help, I’ll sit and watch. I swear I’ll just snack on trail mix from our duffel bag and watch him flail. I’ll laugh.

*

There are two problems with happiness:

1. When you have it, you don’t recognize it.

2. When you no longer have it, the memory cuts like a diamond blade.

So I try not to think about the Old Days, but I do.

*

No, of course I’d swim out to him. Save him. What am I thinking? Of course.

*

At my wedding, Diego waiting at the altar, my mother said softly, “You did it.” She was crouched behind me, fixing my train, fluffing it for maximum flowiness.

“Did what?” I asked, but I knew what she meant. I only feigned ignorance so I wouldn’t wreck my mascara before walking down the aisle.

*

Ron is a dot, bobbing in the waves. I imagine a shark jumping up like Jaws, making him disappear in one bite. But of course, there are no sharks anymore.

*

That day with my friends and the margaritas—I remember now why I felt so alive. Diego and I were new. We had just come off a weekend of sex, and making a paella together, and holding each other the way I loved, my face pressed to his warm, pulsing neck. I was going back to his place after drinks and I couldn’t wait to see him, touch him, fork my fingers up the back of his scalp, through his silky hair.

My high school friends, my forever friends—we were 30, 31 that day, still young enough that drinking wouldn’t show up on our faces in the morning.

“I’ve never seen you like this,” Leah said, taking my hand. “Or…not since high school. I’m just so happy to see you like this.”

“I trust him,” I said. “He’s good. He knows everything and he’s gentle.”

Leah put her arm around me.

Jill told us about a bad date she’d had the night before—a guy with a Confederate flag bumper sticker. She said, “I wouldn’t have slept with him if he was the last man on Earth.”

“No, but you would have,” Lynne said. “If he were the last man on Earth, you’d have to.”

We laughed.

“I’d let the population die off,” Jill insisted. “Trust me, it would be for the best.”

*

Ron finishes his swim. He’s heading toward me, dripping, naked. I close my eyes. In my head, glass shatters. When I was 15, after my mother broke up with him, she took out a restraining order on Ron. He was prone to drinking too much whiskey, prone to standing outside our door and screaming, for all the neighbors to hear, that my mother was a bitch.

*

I open my eyes, open my heart-shaped locket and look at the tiny pictures. Diego’s face, my face. I have the images memorized, every detail, every hair, every one of Diego’s teeth. The night he gave me the locket, after my birthday dinner at Giuseppe’s, we fell asleep in each other’s arms.

When I woke in the morning, alone in the bed, I figured he was downstairs making coffee. Or maybe he’d taken Zip for a walk. The air felt eerily quiet, though the room looked unchanged. Our wedding photos on the dresser. His watch on the bedside table. The same crack in the ceiling, a long bolt of lightning.

“Diego?” I called.

My heart sped up. My heart knew before I did.

*

Eyes closed, I feel Ron standing over me, dripping, blocking the sun. I hear him panting. I hear glass shatter. That night when I was 15, I was home alone when he smashed the sliding glass door, went looking for my mother, settled for me.

“We gotta do this,” he’s saying.

I say nothing. He is the lucky one. Had been locked up for nearly two decades when all living things disappeared. Found himself alone on the prison lawn. Climbed the fence to a weird kind of freedom.

“You won’t hate it,” he tells me. “Stop telling yourself you’ll hate it. It’s all about managing your mind. It’s all about having a positive attitude. I kept a positive attitude all those years behind bars.” His hand on my leg is cold, wet. “You don’t have much of a choice,” he says. “What are you going to do, let humanity go extinct?” He says, “You don’t have a choice at all.”