Vaccinated

I’ve been staring so long that spots cloud my vision. I blink my eyes, more out of habit than any actual desire to see though. As my vision clears, I notice the afternoon rays bouncing off of broken mirrors in the rusted carousel across from me. On top there is an old flagpole with a pathetic excuse of a flag. I’m sure it was once vibrant and colorful, like everything else in the old world. Now it is greyish in color, and frayed down to strips. An echo really. It is pretty windy today and the flag’s resulting dance is chaotic. I don’t fail to make the connection with my own fraying mind.

I rub my finger down the barrel of the gun in my hand. The metal is cool, I take the single bullet out of the clip and pass it between each finger. I once saw a guy do that with a coin as a child. I thought that was so cool at the time, how easily I was impressed before the world collapsed. I never could have guessed that one day, passing this bullet through my fingers would be a type of meditation. A prayer to the forgotten Gods of a collapsed society. In all reality, it is just a promise I made to myself.

2020 changed everything, the catalyst that brought humanity to her knees. First it was the wildfires. The whole world burned as the virus took over. It was a never-ending roller-coaster ride, going so fast you had no hope of seeing the next twist before it was upon you. Many people suffered from an emotional whiplash. Quarantine, riots, mask mandates, and shortages on everything. The whole world literally shut down for months. I remember being blown away by it all, I thought that would be the craziest thing I would ever witness in my life; it was just the tip of the iceberg though. The fear took over, as the death tolls climbed higher and higher. There was mass hysteria. The people wanted solutions, demanding a vaccine.

By the beginning of 2021, the 1st wave of the vaccine was made available to those on the “frontlines”. My mother was a nurse, so she was considered one of them. As 2021 progressed, it seemed like society was on the mend. Don’t get me wrong, things were still a mess. We had lost close to 3.9 million to the virus worldwide. Those of us left started to re-evaluate the world we wanted to live in. We were ready for change; we didn’t want to work ourselves to death just to scrape by anymore. I remember a budding feeling of anticipation. Like a lot of people, I had gotten involved in spirituality during quarantine. Started learning about astrology, started learning about the Age of Aquarius. Started reading all sorts of books, I had an unquenchable thirst for ancient esoteric wisdom. Looking back on it now, it seems like such a waste of time. Nothing I learned was able to prepare me for the world that emerged.

This world is so empty now, so hollow. We never realized how much we relied on women to balance out the masculine energy. We never deserved them, not really. Society taught women from birth that they had to EARN their place in this world. That they had to follow a certain criterion to be seen as worthy in the eyes of the world. In the eyes of men. I’m ashamed to say that I was no different. My mom raised me alone, and despite her best efforts I still treated women as objects. When the first women started dying in 2022, we didn’t realize what that meant for us as a society. Scientists couldn’t find any actual proof that the vaccine was causing the deaths, but we all knew. This was the future we had paid for in fear. It started out as a form of womb displacement that caused internal bleeding, extreme pain and cramping, followed by death within a matter of days.

Scientists were at a loss, it was contagious, but they couldn’t quite pinpoint how. The women of the world just started to synch up, like they would with their menstrual cycles. It spread from woman to woman like a wildfire. Burning through our hopes and dreams. Our whole future, up in flames. That has been the one constant since the start of 2020. It seemed fitting that it would follow suit and consume the last thread connecting us to our humanity.

I remember the Christians praying in the streets. It was the End of Days, they said God was coming for the Chosen people. It did not take long before they realized nobody was coming to save them. Then the story changed, they started saying it was God’s retribution for the sins of Eve. For women not being PURE. That didn’t last long either. By 2024, women were all but extinct. That was almost 10 years ago. Humanity would be completely eradicated from the Earth within one generation. It seemed fair to me. Inevitable, even. Things had been pretty dark for years, but at that point all remaining light and hope were sucked from this cruel reality. With no hope of a future to build toward, man reverted to his basic animal instincts. The only thing coveted in the world today is power. It is a blood bath. Every man fighting to stand atop the food chain. Of course, not everyone reverted. I have killed men, it’s true. Only in self-defense though. I have run into other hermits along the way. We stick to ourselves, try to avoid violence. It is a very lonely and disconnected existence.

I still think about her. My mother. In a way I am happy she was one of the firsts to go, I’m glad she was spared the worst of it. I really took her for granted, her steady presence. She was so strong, so humble. She seemed to like simplicity in life. It wasn’t until after her death that I learned the reason for that is most of her life before me had been chaos, and she valued her peace. She never talked about it, or my father, but I found a book of poems she had written. In it, I read her past. It was littered with broken edges of the woman she used to be. She was so much deeper than she let people see. Even me.

I flip the bullet in the air and catch it. Reload the gun. Taking a deep breath, I close my eyes and mentally apologize to her for what I am about to do. I try to visualize my mom’s smiling face, her eyes sparkling. My first girlfriend. But I see nothing but the world burning. The riots. My mom’s grey eyes empty in death. Running for my life. The face of the first man I ever killed. Then it’s only the flames. My finger tightens slightly.

“You really survived all of this, just to put a bullet in your head now?” The voice comes from right behind me. I jump and spin around, catching my shoe on a piece of twisted metal and falling backwards. I am so surprised and disoriented, that it takes me a moment to realize what has my heart pounding a thousand miles a minute. She stares at me with the most intense eyes I have ever seen. Bright gold right around the pupil fading into aqua green before settling on a deep teal ring. Thick golden-brown lashes catch the sunlight turning the color of flame. Like they are burning. I don’t know what to think, not a single woman has been seen in almost 10 years, and trust me when I say that they have been searching. I have yet to breathe, from my twisted heap on the ground.

“I’m Iris by the way,” she smiles, revealing dimples. I am completely dumbfounded.

Well shit. I look to the gun in my hand, still loaded. Then look up at Iris.

I guess it has finally happened then; my mind has broken. None of this is real. As a last-ditch effort to live, my mind has conjured up a beautiful fantasy to distract me.

She leans forward, holding her hand out to me. A silver heart-shaped locket slips from beneath her shirt, catching the sunlight. I look once more to the gun in my hand.

What the Hell?

This could be a complete psychotic break, or possibly, I succeeded in killing myself and this is the afterlife. What if the light at the end of the tunnel only appears to those who aren’t meant to die in that moment? Those who haven’t finished their work here? What if it’s the doorway that’s not quite open to them yet? And if that’s the case, then perhaps when you actually die, it’s more of a seamless transition? From one reality or timeline to another? Just a shift really… I’m not deluded enough to believe that an actual human woman survived all of this time and found her way to me right when I’m about to end it all. If life has taught me anything, it is that “hope” is just a fairytale to keep us holding on through the monotony of life…

I mentally shake myself and refocus on the present. She is still there, looking at me intensely. Almost challenging me. My stomach gives a little flip.

Either way, I am sufficiently intrigued. Grand delusion or not, I realize that I want to see where this goes.

“I’m Gabe.” I can’t help my answering smile as I take her hand and climb to my feet.