The Day After Thanksgiving Ch. 01

Today has been full of things that I thought would never happen. I've been sitting in this concrete bunker for about four hours now. There is one window made of thick double paned glass, but I am afraid to lift the cover and look out. I keep watching the clock on the wall. I've been down here four hours and seven minutes exactly. I haven't got the hang of the ham radio yet, but the cb radio is working fine. In a way I'm lucky I decided to stay here. In a way I'm not. It just might be my biggest mistake ever. And believe me, I've made plenty of mistakes. I was going to head back home for Thanksgiving. I haven't seen my mother in ten years. I want to see her really bad. Things weren't right between us when I left. When I made up my mind to go home, I felt like I had finally grown up enough to sit down with her and tell her I was sorry for the way I had been. I had been debating over the trip for almost six months. I wanted to take a trip and spend Thanksgiving with my mama. Right now that's just about the farthest thing from my mind. 

Broken transmissions break through the silence on the cb radio every so often. I've been able to make a few things out. Sometimes a voice will come blaring over the radio and cut off after only a few words. I've heard alot of different voices. Some come through loud and clear. Some sound like they're on a desert island somewhere. According to the last transmission, there's a hell of a fire going out on I-95 between New Smryna Beach and Daytona. Something about a gunfight and a tanker truck exploding. From what I could make out the fire spread out to other cars around it, and now both lanes are blocked off and full of burning cars. 

I heard a sudden blast of words.

'Some fucker is trying to jack my truck!'  followed by two booming reports. Then silence. 

Right now that silence is killing me. Every time a voice breaks through on the radio I jump. I keep wanting to grab the mike and call out, but every time I start to I get scared. I want to know exactly what is going on out there before I leave the bunker. I want to know if everything I've been hearing is true. I'm lucky I got a job here. This bunker has enough dried food and bottled water to last a family of four for six months. At least that's what the store owner told me. I can't help but wonder if he's alive right now. Maybe he's stuck out on the interstate with the millions of other evacuees. By what the radio says, there is a traffic jam stretching all the way from the Keys to the middle of Georgia. And that's only the people who have tried escaping in the past four hours. I just can't fucking believe this is happening. 

A voice suddenly comes screaming out of the radio. I can't tell if it's male or female. There's alot of feedback and white noise, like when you talk to someone who has you on a speaker phone. 

'I've got three, count 'em three. They are firing on the east bound lane. Shit! Now one of them is turning towards me.'

A moment of silence, then more of the same voice. 

 'I'm down in the seat. I hope he thinks my car is empty. Fuck! My car just took a hit.'

I can hear muffled booming noises and the rapid staccato of distant gunfire over the radio. The little speaker makes the sounds flat and hollow. I hear a tinkling sound like breaking glass, followed a burst of gunfire. The sound is close and loud. The radio screams in a blast of static. As the static dies away I hear another voice faintly.

'I ain't dyin' alone motherfucker.'  

The voice is followed by one more shot. 

No way I'm going out there now. I'm scared the people shooting will eventually come here. I work in a gun shop, see. I'm damned lucky the owner is one of those paranoid survivor types. I bet he would have tried to make it here if he wasn't in town picking up a delivery of stocks and slings. He's a good guy, paranoid or not. I suddenly wish very badly that I could see him again. Even if he is a cheapskate who pays as little as he can get by with. To hear him talk, a man making the minimum wage is fucking rolling in the green. 

The door to the bunker is hidden under a piece of green outdoor carpet. It's on the floor right behind the counter where the register sits. If someone breaks in they will go right for the guns and the cash register. They will stand on the carpet, take the money and run. I hope. The owner explained to me why he set it up that way. He has this little foot switch under the counter beneath a loose board. He taps the board twice and the bunker door slides open. In the event of a robbery, he taps the switch twice, grabs the cash machine and hops right down into the bunker. The door slides shut after a couple of seconds. 

"Those fuckers can shoot all they want, they won't get through. The door is wood on top and two inches of plate steel underneath." He told me. "And if they find the switch, I'll be waiting with both barrels loaded."

That's not much consolation right now. I've never been so scared. So scared of everything. The radio has been silent for about five minutes now. I can hear small bleeps and patches of static emitting from the speaker at random. It might be people a long way from here trying to break through and transmit. It might be somebody close by trying to get out. Right now I just don't fucking know. Before today I've never even touched a cb radio. I always thought they were used by redneck truckers who said 'breaker one-nine' and 'that's a big ten-four good buddy' alot. I guess I should have watched those reruns of BJ and The Bear a little more closely. 

The radio came to life. 

'I can't get no more than thirty miles an hour out of this damn thing. The median is packed in places so I'm having to jump in and out if traffic. Every time I get going people try to block my way. Goddamit I'm trying to help these ignorant bastards and clear a path. If they'll let me through I can make a way for 'em to drive. Can't they see my flashers?'

Someone replies.

'Fuck those assholes. Drop that mike and get the hell outta there Jim. If you slow down they're gonna take your truck. We're tryin' to make it out to Missy's. If they catch up to you, stop and back over 'em. You got to do it Jim. These fuckers ain't letting us go.'

'I ain't bout to do that.' Jim yelled in response. 'Some of em's got kids with 'em John. They got kids and they're runnin' their cars right the hell out in front of me! John somebody's got to do something!'

'There ain't nobody who can do anything. Jim, please buddy, just floor that thang and get your ass outta there. I've got Reese here with me. He says he misses his daddy real bad. You run over anybody who gets in your way and you can see him by the end of the day. I ain't gonna let nothin' happen to your boy Jim. You know that. We'll be waitin' for you at Missy's. If you have to get another vehicle let us know. We're gonna be shootin' any car we don't recognize once we're there.'

There was a long pause. I started when Jim's voice came back over the speaker.

'I'll do it John. You watch over Reese. And don't tell him about his mama yet. that's my job.'

'Ten four man. Out.'  John responded. 

I sat there staring at the radio waiting for the next transmission. Moments later I heard another voice, then it died abruptly.  There must be alot of atmospheric interference. This radio seems like it is picking up transmissions at random. I would bet most of the people talking into their cb radios aren't getting any responses. I tried fiddling with the knob a bit to see if I could get a clean channel. I got nothing but blank silence so I returned it to the original setting. I immediately heard another voice come to life over the radio. 

'Oscar this is Regina. Do you copy? Do you copy?. According to the police band another one just hit over on I-10 near Tallahassee. Repeat we have another one. If you can hear me, dig in deep Oscar. I hope you're listening. Regina out.'

For a while I felt like I couldn't move. This is just too much to be real. But everything says it's real. This isn't some staged act or a big prank. There aren't any hidden video cameras or paid actors disguised as every day citizens hidden in the crowd. Nobody in a cheap looking suit is going to pop up out of nowhere holding a microphone and say 'Surprise! You're on candid camera!'  

Right now I'm so fucking ashamed of myself. If I wasn't so damned greedy I would be halfway home by now, and all this evil shit would be a thousand miles behind me. My coworker Nick laid out, and my boss called me and asked if I could pick up his shift. Calling Nick a coworker is kind of a contradictory statement. That fucker wouldn't hit a lick at a snake. He's more like a co-dependent than he is a co-worker. Saturday is the busiest day of the week here. The boss couldn't work the storefront because he had to pick up a delivery. Hunting season is two weeks away. If he's not well stocked then the buyers will pass him over for someone who is. 

I wanted the overtime so I could buy a new aluminum driveshaft for my car. I have been wanting one for a while now. I've done alot to my car. It's a hell of alot meaner than it was when I bought it. I knew I would need to replace the old cast iron driveshaft sooner or later, or eventually it would snap like a twig when I got into the gas too hard. I put my trip home off for a week so I could pick up the overtime. I half heartedly told myself it would be better if I saw mama the day after thanksgiving, so she wouldn't feel like she had to cook for me. I knew it was really a cowardly cover up. I wanted the money and didn't think twice about making my mama wait another week. Besides, she didn't know I was coming. It was going to be a surprise. 

When I was a kid I used to surprise her with all kinds of stuff. There was an old lady who lived down the block from us. I used to get in trouble for picking her flowers. I would tell tell her they were for my mama and stomp away with a handful of flowers that still had dirt clinging to the roots. I remember it hurt so bad when mama sat me down and told me I had to stop picking her flowers. I thought mama didn't like them. Mama tilled up a little spot in our back yard and we planted some bulbs together. She didn't lecture me at all about the flowers. She showed me how much work the old lady down the block had put into growing them. I apologized to that old lady one day, and I remember walking back home holding my mama's hand. She was crying. 

And now I'm stuck here in the bowels of the earth waiting for the next voice to come screaming over this fucking radio. 

I finally got my nerve up. I had to try and reach my mama. I've never been too proud of myself. Saying I have low self esteem would be an understatement. I tend to avoid any kind of exposure or attention. When I was in school it terrified me to speak in front of the class. I would get the jitters and just about piss my pants. I'm just about to fall apart now so I gotta try something. I picked up the handset and pressed the mike button.

"I need to talk to somebody." I said.

A voice responded immediately. I dropped the handset, then cursed myself or being so jumpy and picked it up. It would be just my stupid luck to break the damned thing and cut off my only dependable communication.  

'I hear you brother.'  The voice said. 'Talk to me.'

It was a man's voice. I pressed the mike button and spoke slowly. I was shaking all over.

"I am in Florida. I need to talk to my mother." I spoke into the mike, trying to speak clearly as possible. 

There was a brief moment of silence, then the voice came back again.

'I copy you. Do you know the situation?'  The voice asked. 

"Yes." I responded.

Yes I do know the situation. I still can't grasp it, but I fucking know it. I looked at the clock again. It read four fifty three. 

At five minutes til four someone detonated a nuclear bomb off the southern coast of Florida. Forty five minutes later one went off in Tallahassee. Outside this bunker people are raging and fighting for their lives in a furious rant of bleeding, scratching humanity while I am tucked away like a rat in a bolt hole. Now here I am stuck in the middle of biggest shit storm of all time, and I'm crying like a baby because I want to see my mama. 

I choked back my tears and pressed the mike button again.

"What do I do?" I asked the stranger on the other end. 

'You hold tight brother. We'll figure that out.' He answered, then the radio went silent.

I pressed the mike button again, but the radio was dead. I tapped it several times and got nothing. No static, no white sound of an open mike. Nothing. I held the button down anyway. 

"I'm sorry I missed Thanksgiving mama." I said through my tears. "I'm so sorry."  

Fade To Black