Sardines

Look, it wasn't me. I didn't do it. I'm just like you. Hanging in there, you know? One morning I woke up—like everyone else—and shit. Shit! Nothing worked. You remember. No electricity, no phone calls. There were riots and fires, but they didn’t last long. Thank god. It was every man for himself, more than usual. No one had an answer to the question "Why?" “What happened?” “How?” Right? 

There was no mushroom cloud. No giant meteor. No zombies, which disappointed a certain kind of dude. There were theories, sure—a lab leak, A.I., Jesus. For the most part, none of it seemed real until all those graves needed to be dug, but other than that, the end of the world wasn't that bad. It could have been worse.

I did see a man hanging from a street lamppost once, during the early weeks of panic. An execution? A warning? He didn’t have shoes, so I didn’t really, you know, investigate.  I heard a rumor that scavengers ate a baby, but who would eat a baby? There's barely any meat on a baby. You sell it, or you throw it away; everyone knows that. I'm not saying there weren't roving cannibals out there, especially in the mountains and plains, but that's a lifestyle choice, not a matter of survival. 

But back to you-know-who. Fergus and I first met at this abandoned church where you could barter goods for shots of moonshine. I had collected enough acorns for a buzz. The guy who ran the market was friendly enough, but kitted out like a Navy SEAL, with body armor and a sidearm tucked into a chest holster. He seemed to know Fergus, who wore hunting camo from head to toe. I don’t think I ever saw him out of that camo.  I got drunk with him that first night, just shitfaced. We laughed under the moon and passed out in the booths of an old diner that was half-burned down.

I woke up hungover to Fergus staring at me. Red flag? Sure, in retrospect: red flag. But like, everything is a red flag these days. Reality. He handed me a canteen of water. That was nice? I noticed, as I was chugging, his machete, scuffed-up, slightly rusted, something a landscaper would keep in the back of his pickup. It was next to him, close by. Always close by.

He wasn't in a hurry, so he told me a story: the cops were pulling their guns for any reason: food, ammo, fun. Men, women, didn't matter. Point-blank. Bang. One day, a cop pointed a shotgun at him. Fergus.  He immediately stopped and saluted him. Like a soldier. The cop laughed. He wasn't a real cop. They became friends.

I asked what happened to him.

“Dogs. He couldn’t outrun them.”

Goddamn, right?

“Were you ever in the army?”

“No.” 

Fergus kept his head shaved; his prized possessions were a pair of blue disposable razors and a bar of hotel soap. I asked him why he bothered, and he said, “lice,” and pointed at my long, greasy beard. He had small teeth but smiled anyway. Big hands. Dumb hands. Before I knew it, we were traveling together. I shared what I had, which wasn’t much. Nail clippers. Instant coffee. The next week, he swapped a goosefeather bedroll for some past-their-expiration-date antibiotics; I had gotten an ear infection. I was grateful. 

We spent most of our days walking down roads and through the woods, talking about what we missed. Him: ice cream, cigars, the NFL. Me: karaoke, clean sheets, sardines.

"Sardines?"

"Yeah," I said, "with hot sauce, chopped onions, and saltine crackers."

He laughed.

"My favorite Instagram dude wore a Fez and reviewed expensive cans of sardines."

"Expensive?"

"Yeah, rich people love fancy sardines."

He asked me what I did for money. What my job used to be. 

“I worked for an app,” I clarified: “computer stuff.”

He didn't respond at first; the sound of a dull razor scraping a sudsy scalp filled the cold air until he replied: "So you're smart."

"I could have been an influencer."

"An influencer?"

"Yeah."

"You can be anything you want to be; you're an American." He got real serious about that last part.

Fergus was supportive, at first. Which I liked. We'd joke. Bust each other's balls. He had a sense of humor then. I'd get stuck in the mud, or fail to splinter a tree with his machete, and he'd laugh at me, and I'd say, "Shut up, fucker."  He woke me up once by farting in my face. That’s Fergus for you.

He spoke about freedom sometimes, randomly. I liked freedom, so I nodded along. Sometimes he'd get worked up about "those people," and who doesn't get worked up about politicians. I think that’s who “those people” were. He once asked me if I was a 'boob' or 'ass' man, and I had never thought about that before. Both?

At night, we'd tell stories about our lives. I didn't know if my parents had survived; his folks had died long ago. He was single when everything happened, and my girlfriend and I split not long after the power went out. We hid in our one-room apartment for as long as we could. She eventually followed the crowds toward the soldiers with bullhorns. The government camps. I guess the idea is they’re going to rebuild? How’s that going?

When everything went to shit, I was delivering takeout for an app to make ends meet, and then chaos. I did the best I could for a while until I met Fergus, and he had a plan.

He knew things, or at least he seemed to. He showed me the North Star. He talked a lot about mushrooms; don't eat the red ones, but there's a yellow kind that tastes like chicken. I don't think we ever came across mushrooms. He said if we ever decided to stop roaming, to settle down, we'd need to set boobytraps. He talked a lot about boobytraps. Apparently, they require dozens and dozens of sharpened sticks. He taught me to dry my socks every night.

Fergus used to work for a popular "survival shelter company" that would come to your house, dig a giant hole in your backyard, and drop in prefabricated bunker modules made out of fiberglass composites or corrugated steel, complete with generators, air filters, and blast doors. The smallest units were cozy, for coffins. The cost of a lake house, maybe? Something a surgeon or lawyer could afford? Fergus told me about multi-million-dollar jobs: bunkers hidden behind fake shelves in basements, with full kitchens and home theaters.

He was a heavy equipment operator, backhoes and bulldozers. He wasn't the most skilled person on the job, but he was ambitious, always listening, and he swore he knew where these bunkers were, or he could tell, just by looking at a place, if there was one under the ground.

They were everywhere, he said. Easy pickings. The moment the system collapsed and the lights went out, all the fat cats disappeared. Poof! The rich and powerful panicked and sealed themselves in their bunkers like pharaohs buried alive inside pyramids.

And, I know you know, it wasn't just that the lights went out. Communication too. Wi-Fi. Radios. If you were a billionaire in a bunker, there was no way you'd know what was happening outside. Fergus figured we could use that to our advantage. 

His plan was to hike deeper into the suburbs, away from the mountains, country, and cities. 

Simple. The prospect of stumbling on a stockpile of supplies was also enticing. So we searched. And we got lucky. The very first house we hit was a sprawling ranch-style house at the end of a long gravel driveway. It looked haunted from a distance. 

"Jackpot," he said. “Maybe there’s fancy sardines,” he said.

To our surprise, the house hadn't been torn apart, and we found some food: stale pretzels, a couple of granola bars, and a can of fruit cocktail. We spent a few days in that house. Sleeping in beds. Eating with our eyes closed. That was one of the last times we’d eat for a while. We found a deck of UNO cards and played a few rounds. 

From that moment on, there were good days and bad. On the good days, we broke into untouched houses, enjoyed a night out of the dampness and cold, took a load off. But the bad days were increasingly unpredictable: anything could set off Fergus. Rain. Hunger. He started mumbling to himself. 

"He's slowing me down."

"Who are you talking to?"

He didn’t answer. Yeah, it was weird. I know. I can admit that now. We continued marching, in silence, through entire neighborhoods hollowed out by wave after wave of raiders. This seemed to depress him, like he knew we were living in a pile of bones.

“Are we going in the right direction?” I’d say. 

“Shut up,” he’d reply. Or: “Fuck you.”

We stumbled on a pair of fellow foragers who had made a nest in a garage. This was rare. They were filthy, skeletal. Dressed in rags; hoodies pulled over hoodies, torn sweatpants. She was on her back, staring up. There was a bullet hole in her right cheek, almost a dimple. The back of her skull was gone. He was curled up on his side across from her, his right temple blown open. There was no gun. Was it stolen? Were they murdered? 

Fergus got closer. Closer. He studied the bodies. 

"There are flies in her nose."

He took interest in their belongings, and the piles of garbage they’d collected. I slowly stepped out of the garage and for a moment, I was alone. Fergus was busying himself, and I could have escaped then, I guess. I could have made it to the camps in a few days. 

"What did you find?" 

"A toothbrush."

The toothbrush was gray, worn. It went immediately into his mouth. We were back at it within an hour. We left the lovers to rot. One foot right in front of the other. He explained the ways clients hid their safe rooms, sometimes behind bookcases that led to secret passages. So we’d kick down doors, knock on walls, and fumble inside closets. I’d ransack the cupboards, too, searching for something—anything—to eat. Then the houses slowly got bigger, and the lawns wider. Two-story Colonials turned into mansions. 

“We’re close,” he’d whisper. “We’re close.”

But then we came upon the big house at the end of Old Chesterbrook Road. The big house at the end of Old Chesterbrook Road instantly cheered him up—a wealthy family had lived there.

“This is it.”

“Are you sure?”

There was a chill in the air. Summer was slowly turning into fall. Fergus' head was covered in sweat. 

“This is it.” 

The door was open, and I crept in, careful not to wake anyone, as if there was anyone to wake up. The carpets were moldy. Birds chirped upstairs. There were assorted awards on the mantelpiece. Trophies covered in dust. "Innovation." "Technology." "Leadership." I said something like “I’m going to check the kitchen,” but he grabbed me by the arm. 

"Later."

And.

"Follow me.”

Fergus walked downstairs to the basement, a large room with a foosball table and a big-screen TV. He knew exactly where to go next; he was like a dog who caught a scent. Behind a rack of shelves was a wall that slid aside when he pushed with both hands flat against it, revealing a bunker door.

“I knew it.”