Barren Waters, A Post-Apocalyptic Tale of Survival

It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.

―Ernest Hemingway

Chapter 24

Present Day

That’s the thing about a desert landscape. For a long time, its simplicity is comforting; its purity is cleansing to the soul—until it becomes a big bore, that is. At a certain point, one cactus becomes the next. One sienna field ranges into another, for as far as the eye can see. Monotony tugs at the imagination, and while beautiful at first, leaves one wanting more. The desert is a question that begs an answer. What lies beyond the sandy dunes? How many more miles must we travel?

And where, Jeremy wondered, can we find more water?

That was the question on his dry parched lips. Though his initial plan of sleeping by day and traveling by night had stretched their supply beautifully, it hadn’t prevented the inevitable. They were quickly running out. Particularly after encountering the fire. And bicycling at night presented a new set of challenges. It was actually much harder than one might expect. Perhaps it was the body’s natural rhythms, Jeremy thought. The body wanted to rest at night. It didn’t want to exert itself, or handle stress. Or perhaps it was the depth of silence surrounding them, or the lack of ambient light. When he’d birthed the plan, he hadn’t considered these things. He wasn’t alive when large cities had thrived, but in all the books and magazines he’d ever read, light had blazed in the cities of old. ‘Light pollution’, he’d once saw it named. The darkness of the desert at night is absolute, and it was something he hadn’t expected. Stars reflected off shiny pieces of sand, while the moon guided them inexorably forward, but when its solemn face slid behind a bulbous cloud, they could barely see anything at all. And at times like these Jeremy led the children forward, slowly, a flashlight awkwardly clenched between his teeth, his worry for the batteries a stone in his belly.

They couldn’t see a thing until it was directly in front of them: pockets of sand that curtained the road, thick tumbleweeds, scraps of rubber, or rusted cars. The road was a never-ending chain of accidents waiting to happen. It was a dangerous way to travel, he knew, but he also knew that they didn’t have a choice. The alternative was that much worse. If they continued to travel by day, he reasoned, they would run out of water before reaching California, and though November had come and gone in a flash, December had proved just as hot. This was the Earth’s new climate. This was normal now. Cold and snow were relegated to its past, or to the highest peeks of the Colorado Mountains, to Canada, Alaska, or possibly Siberia. The sun had inherited the rest.

He mustered what moister he could and licked his lips. These past few days, he had rationed himself harshly, and he was beginning to feel the effects. His lips had cracked and begun to scale, and his urine was dark, a concentrated yellow. He knew he was playing at a knife’s edge with this, as he was suffering the early stages of dehydration. He couldn’t allow it to worsen. These minor discomforts were the early symptoms. Confusion and fatigue would likely come next, while unconsciousness and unresponsiveness would be his end. If that happened, all three of them would die.

He pulled his bike to a stop and slumped, his tongue thick against the roof of his mouth. The last exit was a mile behind them, and an old apartment complex was in front. “That’s it for tonight,” he croaked. “I need to rest. We all do. Let’s stop, stay here for the night.”

Swinging his leg over his seat, he peered at the building in front of them. Was it vacant? Safe? There had to be close to seventy units inside, and hopefully rations of food and water. His pulse quickened. It was promising. If they could just locate a few bottles of water…

“Dad,” Sam said, “This is bullshit.” Pulling a bottle from inside her pack, she frowned and handed it over. “It’s not that bad. You’re making too much of this. We still have water. Just drink. If we have to stay here for a while, we can. There’s bound to be water somewhere around here, even if it’s an old reclamation plant. We’ll double-boil it, strain it. It’ll work. And it’ll get us the rest of the way to San Diego. You’re pointlessly killing yourself. It’s dumb.”

He was certain Sam and Seth were thirsty, but they weren’t as thirsty as he. He’d reduced his quota so they could have more. “We can’t stay, Sam.” He pointed to her belly. “Your meter. What’s it say?”

She hesitated because she probably knew, and she was probably trying to spare Seth. Thrusting out a defiant hip, she lifted her shirt and scowled. “Two percent, okay? I’m down to two percent. But you’ve got the pills, so let’s not freak out.”

He hadn’t missed the false bravado lacing the edge of her voice. Had there been a spark of fear in her eyes? Uncapping the bottle, he allowed himself a sip. The water was cool on his battered throat, and though heavenly, he permitted himself just a small sip. “Yep,” he replied. “We’ve got the pills. But there’s only one bottle, so let’s be smart.”

As they walked their bikes across the parking lot, Jeremy swore he could hear her mind spinning in her head.

“Carp,” she asked him tentatively, “you’ve put a lot of faith in San Diego, don’t you think? What if we don’t find what you’re hoping to find? Shouldn’t we slow down and look for pills?”

Though he shook his head, his belly clenched at her words. Had he put too much faith in this foolhardy plan? “We’re 172 miles from San Diego, Pike. If we push ourselves, that’s four day’s time—three if we really push ourselves. The fire wore us out, but it also forced us to move faster, which is good. It was actually a small blessing in disguise. I say we push ourselves, just to get there.” Turning to Seth, he winked a dry eye. “And I seem to remember someone advising us to suck it up.”

Sam stopped suddenly, kicked her stand to the ground. Jeremy turned, brows arched. She looked angry. “Dad,” she said. “I’m sick of this. You’ve put all our eggs in one basket, and I’m afraid you’ve set us up to fail. What if we’ve made this trip for nothing? What if we’ve completely exhausted ourselves and there’s nothing waiting at the end of it?” She scratched a burnt patch of skin on her palm. “What if we had taken our time, instead? Explored each city we passed through? Think about it, Dad, in the thousand or so miles we’ve traveled, how many disks do you think we might have found along the way? How many bottles of pills in those homes?” When he didn’t answer, she pulled Seth against her hip, hugging him without giving it a second thought. “That’s it.” She shook her head. “I’m done. I won’t travel another mile with you. Not until you tell me what you’ve banked my future on.”

Jeremy’s anger swelled out of control. “Did you just say ’what I banked your future on’? Is that what you think of me? Please tell me you’re joking, Sam. You think I’d risk your life on nothing but a whim? A hunch? Some wild intuition?” When she didn’t respond, he thrust his hand into his pocket, felt the shape of the empty disk case and flipped it over to her. He’d been carrying it in his pocket for months, since the moment he’d decided to move forward with his plan. It had become like a coin or a bottle cap to him, like a lucky talisman one might hang around a piece of yarn. The absence of it was strangely discomforting.

She held it up to the light and squinted. “Yeah? So what? What am I looking at?”

“Turn it over,” he demanded impatiently.

She did, and peered at the lettering on the back. “Bigeye Pharmaceuticals,” she said out loud, regarding him with narrowed eyes. “So what? That’s the maker of the product. What about it?”

“God, Sam, you’re impossible. Look what’s printed below the name.”

“I can’t see it,” she complained. “It’s dark out here.” Seth pulled her arm down closer to his face then pulled his flashlight from his pocket. “San Diego,” he murmured when he shone it across the plastic. “It says San Diego.”

“San Diego?” The words had been a mere breath on her lips. Her head snapped up; her voice trembled with excitement. “The manufacturer is in San Diego.” She hadn’t phrased the words as a question. “Do you really think they’ll have disks?”

He allowed himself a second small sip of water before his body demanded that he take a large one. “Yes, Sam. I think they’ll have disks. And there’s something else I think you should know. The technology of the disks was introduced to the world when it was already beginning to collapse. Few people were fortunate enough to receive an implant like the one you have in your belly right now. Your mother and I researched this subject extensively. Don’t you remember how much time we spent at the library? Before everything fell apart, nanotechnology was used for many things, but the disks were still fairly new. So the answer to your first question is no. I don’t think we’ve passed a string of disks along the way. I don’t think the manufacturer had time to sell them, much less distribute them across the entire country. Your mother and I went to great lengths to obtain the ones we did. We met with dangerous contacts, brokered and traded many valuable things. The disks were hard to come by. So that begs the answer to a question, doesn’t it? If we can’t find hundreds of disks out there, where the hell are they? If they were produced in bulk, but never sold or shipped, where might that supply be now?”

As she put the pieces together, she blinked. “Okay, so maybe we haven’t. Maybe we haven’t passed hundreds of disks, but I’m sure we’ve passed countless bottles of pills.”

Jeremy nodded. “I’m sure we have, too. But therein lies the second problem. Over the years, the pills have lost their potency. Though a similar encapsulation method was used, it wasn’t as effective as the disks. Stopping at every town and city along the way would be similar to walking on a treadmill. We would be gathering pills—yes—but losing precious time. I had to make a decision, Sam, and I thought the best one was to get us to San Diego. If we get there and I’m wrong, we’ll just search for more pills.”

Her eyes filled with tears and he felt his throat constrict. He had thought this news would excite her.

“So you’re saying one day the pills won’t work at all?”

Crouching in front of her, he grasped her hands. For once, she didn’t pull away. “I don’t know, Sam. We can’t know for sure. But the disks are better. That much I know. The technology was wildly advanced.” A lock of windblown hair had loosed itself from her messy ponytail. Tucking it behind her ear, he cupped her small face in his hands. “We’ll figure this out,” he assured her softly. “I won’t let you down. You know that. I won’t let anything happen to you—not while I’m alive and still breathing. If we don’t find disks in San Diego, we’ll come up with something else we can do. I’ve only been doing what I think is best. That’s all a person can do. But know this: Grandma was a genius at locating pills, and I remember all of her techniques. If we need them, Sam, I’m confident we’ll find them.”

She dropped her gaze to her feet. “So that’s what happened to Grandpa, isn’t it? He stopped taking pills. For me. He took fewer so I could have more. That’s why he died. Am I right?”

“That’s right. It was just something he wanted to do. You couldn’t have stopped him. None of us could. He loved you more than he loved his own life. So let’s do this for him. Shall we? Let’s honor his sacrifice. Let’s make it mean something. Do we have a deal?”

“We have a deal.” She rounded her shoulders and wiped her tears. She was gathering her strength like Susan use to do.

Jeremy watched her drop the plastic case into her pocket, and then lifted his gaze to the towering building. “What do you guys say we try to find some water? There’s bound to be something inside this old dump.”

And thankfully, that night, they did. At one time this had been a retirement village, and one thing Jeremy had learned over the years was to count on the wisdom and foresight of elders. They tucked away all manner of things. It was a relief really—one less thing to worry about. They drank their fill and gorged themselves, on stale balance bars and old boxes of crackers. The spoils, to Jeremy, were impressive, and for once he let himself relax. Sam read from a book. They slept on the floor. And despite their earlier conversation, they were able to find a bit of normalcy and peace. They didn’t speak of her meter again, or of the hundred-or-so miles of road in front of them. There was a nervousness in the energy between them. They’d reached the end, but wouldn’t say so aloud. But there was also hope and faith. He could feel it. They believed what they needed would be provided to them.

Jeremy fell asleep on his side, facing Sam. Her hand was resting at the edge of his blanket. He reached out cautiously, not wanting to disturb her, and when sleep finally claimed him, he felt the warmth of her hand as she placed it atop his.

The next morning, her meter had fallen to zero, and when he passed her the last bottle of pills, his stomach lurched. Was it the bottle he’d pilfered from Peter, or was it the one he had found beside Seth’s deceased mother? Life was random, seemingly aimless, like molecules scattering from a butterfly’s wings.