HELLO AFTERNOON - CHAPTER THREE

I KEEP TRYING TO PICK UP THE PIECES

IMAGE BY AI. RUNNING AWAY FROM RADIOACTIVE DOGS.

THE SKY IS yellow with a smear of dark orange clouds. The world kind of looks like how I feel inside. It looks like it might rain.

I’m definitely getting my cardio in today, running full rip down the abandoned streets. The crumbled remains of society are peppered with the carcasses of discarded vehicles.

I was told when I was younger that if a dog seems aggressive, try babytalking it. That did not work.

There are more than five; less than ten. They are absolutely radioactive. They are foaming at the mouth. They are squealing like they are in pain, and the only thing that will soothe their discomfort is ripping me to shreds.

RUNNING IS GOOD, BUT THEY ARE GAINING ON ME

I start growling and making the most beastly noises that can come out of my face.

Nothing… They are still on my heels. Nothing I do will prevent this, and I am tired. I’m tired of running; I’m tired of trying; I’m tired of being alone.

The first dog takes me out at the hip. With a mighty leap, the hound uses all of its radioactive furry fury.

The ground comes up to say ‘hi’. Yes, it hurts. I reach an arm out to brace my fall, but nice soft fingers are met by the clench of teeth. This is an 'ouch' moment.

I can see the fallen buildings reflecting in the still water puddle a few feet away. They are on me, growling and pulling, trying to tear my flesh.

I realize that other than the pressure of their teeth squeezing my glowy, soft skin, I'm not hurt. My flesh isn’t ripped open.

They are frustrated too. I can hear their starving grunts. They can’t tear my soft, delicate underbelly. I am going to survive this insanity too.

What happened to me? Why am I like this?

Eventually, I just sit up. They seem tired and confused. They thought I was a meal.

“I guess you don’t get to poop me out,” I say.

They are staring at me now. They all stop trying to eat me, except for the Chihuahua. Oh, she is a bastard!

The tiny piranha of a dog tries to jump in my face. She is screaming at me. Where do I find the batteries in this thing? So much hatred in her little savage eyes. I can’t help but feel offended. What have I ever done to her?

It doesn’t end there. The little demon sits there giving me shit in her best high-pitched, gravely villain voice she can.

With an outreached finger, I point at her. With time to reflect, I see now this part is my fault.

“You cut that out!” I say.

She does not like the warning; in her mind, she is tearing my finger from my hand. In reality, she has her paws wrapped around my arm, my finger in her mouth, her whole body getting into it as she gnaws and pulls. I can feel the pressure of her teeth, but no injury (maybe just a bit of ego bruising).

I wish I had some food to give them, but I stopped searching for food. I don’t eat anymore, so I don’t bother carrying any. Maybe I should for situations like this one. I wonder if I had thrown some food at the beginning of this chase, would they have gone for the num-nums instead of me?

A few of the dogs lose interest in me. I get up off the ground and search my surroundings. Crumbled society; fallen buildings; end of the world.

I TRY TO KEEP YOU IN MY HEART

My brother, Liam, used to play video games that looked a lot like this. He used to build bases and suits of armour. I don’t know how to do any of that. I miss him.

I never got to say goodbye. He worked on an assembly line. On the day it happened, he was at work.

I was busy with my job as a web developer. (It makes me sound like Spider-Man.) I made websites for people and small businesses.

My business was good. I had mostly small clients and not much competition. Let me tell you, all those small accounts add up. I did well for myself.

I would do anything to hear his weird stupid laugh, just one more time. I hoped that when everything happened, he didn’t suffer. I hope it was painless, and he is with his teenage girlfriend in the afterlife.

He met her when we moved out of a bad neighbourhood in our early teen years. Her name was Hannah Hannah banana. I may have added the last part. I sometimes like to add a nickname to people to help me remember them.

I am afraid that if I don’t keep their names in my head, I will forget their faces. I’m a terrible son. It has been so long and I can’t remember my mother’s face.

Wow, that brings back a lot of memories.

When she was alive, Hannah lived down the street from us. Everybody thought that when my brother grew up, he and Hannah were going to get married. They were inseparable.

Her dad was a drunk. He had his demons.

It was winter. The streets were blanketed in snow. Christmas was around the corner, peaking at us.

The bony branches of bare trees reached up into the night sky like fingers. The moon was sitting low and full.

His wife and daughter were on the sidewalk, coming home, we assumed. Her drunk father’s car came sliding around the corner and went over the curb, killing them both.

NOT A HOAX

We had a very late winter that year. It only lasted a month. So much for global warming being a hoax.

They should have taken all those companies money away and used it to pay the engineers and scientists to fix the world.

They are the ones throwing the garbage in the ocean. They are the ones dumping the oil in the ocean and then raising the price of petrol.

Here is an idea: why don’t we ignore the advice from the idiots destroying the earth? They don’t care. They know they are all going to die, and they hate the young.

Oh yeah, they are all dead right now. The earth is changed forever from the fallout. Humanity is doomed, and this damn dog is still following me, giving me shit.

I looked back at her. All that rage in her eyes.

“Leave me alone, you steroid-ed hamster!”

She stops for a second. Her pink tongue sliding over the little white spears that are her teeth.

I think she understood me.

Yep, she charges me.

So here I am, this radioactive beast chewing on my fingers as I make my way through this dull, lit landscape.

First I see one face, then another and another. They are children. They are hiding along the rubble. Damn it, they are armed children. Where am I, L.A. ?

It looks like this isn’t over.