One day Kevin woke to discover Wayne’s pickup truck was missing. Kevin was surprised. It hadn’t occurred to him that Wayne would leave. The whole point of being here was that you weren’t anywhere else.
Kevin decided not to say anything to Amy, who might be alarmed. He was alarmed but in a minor way. Amy might be alarmed in a major way, which would have the effect of alarming everyone else. For his family, he was willing to keep alarm to himself.
Unsuccessfully, Amy was cooking bacon. Smoke filled the cabin. The smoke was a reminder of how small their world was, how rapidly the air within it could be exchanged for poison. He wondered how long he could keep Wayne’s disappearance to himself.
After breakfast, Kevin asked if anyone wanted to join him on a walk, knowing the answer would be no. He brought the dog. He walked the perimeter of Wayne’s house, attempting different angles to peer into the uncurtained windows, but all he could see was the spartan plainness of Wayne’s domesticity. Everything—chairs, tables, walls—was wood. He saw no lamps, wires, laptop. What was Wayne trying to prove? Whatever it was annoyed Kevin.
He took another lap around the house. The dog sniffed the grass diligently. Neither Kevin nor the dog discovered anything. He decided to knock on the front door.
The door was also made of wood. He couldn’t say what kind. Oak? It seemed possible. He wondered what it would be like to be the sort of person who knew what things were made of. This sort of person seemed especially valuable in a pandemic. Or maybe not. Maybe what mattered wasn’t knowing things but being able to do them. To this point, Kevin had privileged the former over the latter.
He knocked three times and stepped back from the door. He didn’t expect anyone to come to the door, and nobody did. The dog looked at Kevin, as if to say, What now? He didn’t know. He knocked again, though the house was obviously empty. What is it about an empty house that announces its emptiness? The house’s only inhabitant was Wayne, who was gone. He was probably picking up bread or cigarettes. He couldn’t make everything himself. He’d be back soon.
But what if he wasn’t? Kevin and Amy would be fine for a few weeks. Maybe months. He needed to check with her about canned goods. But what if Wayne came back with the virus? That was a different scenario, one Kevin had considered, though not as seriously as he should have. It was easy to pretend here. It was so green. Could the world really be ending when everything was so green?
It could. It was. He consulted the dog, whose total ignorance seemed enviable, though what did Kevin know? He knew the answer to that: not enough. Barely anything at all. He tried the doorknob this time. It turned.
His impression from outside the house was confirmed inside. There wasn’t so much as an empty glass on the table, which was made of wood. He sat on the wooden-framed couch while the dog sniffed the wooden floorboards. If there were a television, it would have been made of wood. Kevin decided against depositing his feet on the wooden table. Maybe Wayne just liked wood. Or maybe he was a minimalist, not in a modern way but in the pure sense of the word. Whatever that meant. Maybe he’d left the property for good.
The dog wandered out of the room. Kevin followed. What would he say if Wayne came back now? Kevin didn’t have a good excuse, or any excuse. The kitchen looked as unoccupied as the living room. No dishes in the sink or crumbs on the counter. He opened the wooden pantry and the wooden cupboards. They were empty. He considered worrying, not in an abstract way but with real feeling. He followed the dog up the wooden stairs.
There was a bathroom at the top of the stairs and a bedroom on either side. He turned the hot water on and then off. He looked out the window, where he could see his cabin, a Lincoln Log fantasy in a patch of green surrounded by darker green. Whose fantasy was it? Not the kids’. They’d never seen a Lincoln Log in their lives. Tempted as he was to assign the fantasy to Amy, he’d booked the cabin. Perhaps it was Wayne’s fantasy, one he marketed in such a way that each renter got to bring their own vision of getting away from it all to Northwest Montana.
But there was no getting away from it all. There was only delaying the inevitable.
Kevin pulled back the shower curtain. He was prepared for a body on ice, but the tub was as barren as the rest of the house. He returned the curtain to its previous position. His solitary goal on this impromptu mission had become to leave no trace.
In the first bedroom he found two twin beds, tightly made. He sat on one bed and then the other while the dog sniffed beneath the wooden bureau. He emerged with a crown of cottony dust on his snout. He sneezed violently before resuming his investigation. Kevin opened each of the bureau’s drawers. They were all empty.
Kevin identified the second bedroom as Wayne’s bedroom as soon as he stepped inside. Increasingly, the intrusiveness—the wrongness—of what he was doing felt inescapable. He took a step back but only one step. The desire to keep going was strong. He indulged this desire.
It was the first room with a scent. It smelled like dirt that had long ago dried, boots forgotten in the corner of the closet. Or maybe the dirt was everywhere. Where was the dog now? Sniffing something, probably. Worse, barking! Kevin listened. The dog was barking because somebody was at the front door. As though it were a perfectly logical place to visit, Kevin stepped inside the closet and closed the door.
The absurdity of his circumstance arrived immediately. He was standing between two thick coats. They smelled like dirt but not only that. He smelled tobacco, sweat, an animal he couldn’t identify. Maybe a horse. Or cow. The smell was unmistakably animal. Even with the door closed, the closet wasn’t dark. He stared into the light he had. Although he tried to stay still, his hands wouldn’t cooperate. They explored his empty pant pockets. His hands wandered into Wayne’s coat pockets, which were empty, save the thick gloves Kevin had seen Wayne wear while attending to outdoor tasks: planting grass, moving branches. Truthfully, Kevin didn’t know what Wayne did.
Now Kevin waited to be discovered inside Wayne’s closet. Would Wayne shoot Kevin? He appeared to be in the middle of a home invasion. Wayne may have possessed the legal right to shoot Kevin, who wasn’t up to date on Montana’s legal code.
The dog added growling to his barking. Kevin listened as the dog scraped and battered the door. When it opened, the dog escalated his barking. Then, abruptly, the barking stopped. Kevin heard heavy steps on the stairs followed by a long, uninterrupted stream of piss. Water thundered through the pipes at his feet. Then Wayne stepped inside the room.
Kevin stood very still. He limited himself to short, efficient breaths. Wayne stopped making noise. The dog was also silent. The dog might be dead, executed by Wayne. It would be a hard thing to explain to the kids, provided Kevin survived.
When Wayne opened the closet door, he started laughing, as though the elaborate joke Kevin had played on Wayne was arriving, at last, to its logical terminus. He didn’t appear to be holding a weapon. He appeared to be drunk. Alcohol annihilated all of the competing scents in the closet.
“You scared me,” Wayne said, sounding unscared. “When I saw your dog—”
“Where is the dog?”
Wayne moved from the closet to the edge of his bed, which he first sat and then lay on, socks peeling hideously from his feet.
It was early to be drunk, not even nine a.m. Possibly, he hadn’t slept. Maybe he was letting off steam on account of the world’s ending.
“Where is the dog,” Wayne repeated, as though it were a riddle.
Stepping out of the closet, Kevin allowed dignity to return to him, if cautiously. He sat on the furniture farthest from Wayne, a knobby wooden chair that looked like it was designed to punish disobedient children.
“You’re probably wondering what I was doing in your closet,” Kevin said. “I appreciate you not shooting me.”
A hand waved dismissively from the bed.
“Or the dog,” Kevin ventured.
“I like dogs.”
“I like dogs too. I like them okay.”
Wayne sat up briefly before returning to a supine position. He placed one hand over his head and the other hand over his first hand.
“Where were you?” Kevin asked.
“There were people everywhere.”
“Oh.”
“On the street. In cars.”
Kevin straightened himself in the chair. “Thank you for letting us stay here. I don’t know what we would have done.”
“You would’ve figured out something.”
Kevin looked out the window, where he saw the dog sniffing and then eating several tulip heads. Or maybe they were the heads of a different flower. It was difficult to see from the chair.
“You’re resourceful,” Wayne said. “You’re a fighter.”
Kevin nodded, though he wasn’t sure he agreed with this characterization.
“It was like nothing happened,” Wayne said.
“Maybe nothing did.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
Kevin knew it was happening. He didn’t know what it looked like because he hadn’t left the property since arriving with Amy and the kids and the dog. He wondered how often Wayne had left. Kevin wanted to ask, but he was scared of the answer. He waited for Wayne to say something.
“I did notice one thing,” he said. “A defiance, like if the virus hadn’t gotten them yet, they must be immune.”
Kevin had entertained his own fantasies about immunity, which he’d been too timid to share, even with Amy. “What were people doing?” he asked.
“Living their small, selfish lives.”
“That sounds nice.”
“You want to see? You have to drive.”
It was a tacit acknowledgement of the alcohol, which Kevin understood not to pursue further, just as Wayne had signaled a magnanimous lack of curiosity about Kevin’s presence inside the closet.
Wayne reached out, but the room was empty beyond the bed and chair, as well as the people occupying each.
“Let me get you water,” Kevin said.
He considered leaving. Wayne was unpredictable, likely dangerous. Wayne needed to sleep. But Kevin had said he would get water and felt a duty to do so. He had a complicated relationship with accountability, which he’d once believed distinguished him but had recently begun to mourn, like a lover taken for granted. Except Kevin would never take a lover for granted, if only because he wouldn’t have the courage to initiate the affair.
At least, this was the story he told himself that morning.
In the kitchen, he found the glasses right away. They were very clean. He poured water into two of them.
When he got back to the bedroom, Wayne was standing by the window. Kevin realized he wasn’t prepared for a scenario where Wayne didn’t possess a solution. Kevin was comfortable resenting Wayne but not doubting him.
“Drink this,” Kevin said.
Wayne accepted the glass.
“The keys are in the truck?” Kevin asked.
They were. He left the bedroom, and Wayne followed. Outside, he eased into the passenger’s seat with the cautiousness of a drunk reminded of the dangers outside his bender. The dangers inside his bender remained remote, as he’d stopped talking after leaving the house.
Kevin stopped before opening the driver’s side door. “One thing before we go.”
The dog paused his tulip consumption to watch Kevin. The dog had a nose for danger. He looked at Kevin, not with curiosity or judgment, but fear.
“What if we bring the dog,” Kevin said.
Wayne got out of the car, opened the flatbed, and then got back in the car. The dog knew what to do.
The driveway was unpaved. It looked like it was made of ground seashells, but it must have been rock. The driveway opened onto a dirt road with cavernous potholes. Deer stared dumbly at the truck before leaping into the woods, which extended to Canada. One pothole was so deep that Kevin worried the dog would fly out of the flatbed, but he sat agreeably against the cab, barking at the deer.
The dirt road went for three miles—Kevin watched the odometer—before intersecting with a paved road.
“Right or left?” he asked.
Wayne pointed north. The paved road was empty in both directions. Kevin felt reassured, nearly optimistic, until he saw the first car. At first he thought it was headed where they were—wherever that was—but when he got closer, he realized the car had stopped.
“Just go around,” Wayne said.
Kevin slowed the truck. When it was clear nobody was coming in the opposite direction, he moved into the southbound lane. He looked past Wayne and through the passenger’s side window at the stopped car. The driver was bent over the wheel. There was nobody else Kevin could see inside the car. It didn’t appear to be running.
He said, “Should we try—”
“Don’t be stupid.”
Kevin passed the car and pulled back into his lane. In the rearview mirror he could see the crown of the driver’s head. There was no evidence of trauma that Kevin could detect. Wayne stared steadily through the windshield. The dog didn’t make a noise. They drove in silence until Kevin’s phone rang.
“I didn’t think this still worked,” Kevin said.
“Of course it works,” Amy said. “That’s why you have it.”
“I mean, I didn’t think it still worked as a phone.”
“Where are you?”
“With Wayne.”
He looked toward Kevin.
“Is the dog with you?” Amy asked.
“The dog is with us.”
There was a long silence during which Kevin increased the truck’s speed.
“Just be careful,” Amy said.
It wasn’t long before they reached the next car and then the car after that and then the car after that.
* * *
At first, she was very busy. He admired her busyness from a distance. He got used to the sound of her shoes on the tile, even and purposeful. What did his shoes sound like in the hallway? Why hadn’t he noticed anyone else’s gait?
Clap, clap. She was coming.
He kept his door closed. The air purifier worked best that way, according to The New York Times. He put a lot of trust in The New York Times, more than was reasonable. He had a powerful desire to trust something. He no longer trusted many things, such as his boss. Such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
She knocked on his window, onto which he’d taped various posters, signaling support for school events while adding another layer of concealment. He fit the mask over his nose before opening the door.
“Can you believe this bullshit?” The door closed behind her.
“I can’t,” Kevin said. “What’s the bullshit?”
There were two empty chairs in his office. She sat in the chair closest to him.
She said, “Jack, of course.”
Kevin wondered if he would find her more or less attractive without a mask. He found her very attractive with a mask.
He listened as she detailed Jack’s crimes, all of which he was familiar with already. Jack was a cruel and thoughtless boss but not originally so. Kevin had observed Jack’s tactics in various people. The trick was identifying the source of ego and speaking the language of that ego. He considered whether—and how—to share this strategy.
“And don’t talk to me about your secret code,” she said. “That doesn’t work for us.”
“For whom?”
“Women.”
“You’re in luck: I’m an ally.”
“I saw the sticker on your window.”
“I had to attend three seminars.”
“How come all the allies I’ve met tell me how supportive they are but never do anything to help?”
“Because you haven’t met the right allies.”
Her eyes smiled. He wasn’t sure about her mouth.
She said, “My knight in shining armor.”
“I want to empower you.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to sleep with me?”
That question was tricky because he did want to sleep with her. He wanted to see her unmasked. But they worked together. They were having this conversation at work.
On one hand, he wasn’t her boss, and she wasn’t his boss. On the other hand, he’d read this story before, and it didn’t end well.
She started laughing. “I’m fucking with you,” she said.
“I know.”
“Is that why you didn’t say anything?”
“In seminar, they teach you to listen.”
Before leaving his office, she gave him the middle finger. Her arm swung up mechanically. There was nothing personal in the gesture. But what a finger! Slender and serious. A little awning of fingernail. Could it be cherry red? No, something more tasteful, unfortunately.
Alone in his office he considered what he couldn’t do. All of the things he wanted to do fit into this category.
He picked up the landline and was startled by the roar of the dial tone, as if it had been droning since time immemorial. Optimistically, he pressed 9. He was met with a promising silence. When was the last time he’d called somebody?
Later she confessed that the boldness he’d fallen for was an ironic posture. That it was, in fact, the opposite of who she considered herself to be.
But Kevin didn’t know that as he dialed her number. Amy picked up on the second ring.
“You’re right,” he said.
“So what do we do about it?”
He looked for her in the gaps between the posters, but wherever she’d gone was beyond the window’s scope.
“Do you like Vietnamese?” he asked.
“Everyone likes Vietnamese.”
Neither of them had ever eaten Vietnamese food. Together, they disliked it for the first time.
* * *
Wayne was silent as Kevin navigated around the stopped cars. They didn’t discuss what was inside each car. Wayne didn’t look, but Kevin did every time.
“What happened?” he asked.
“That’s how it works,” Wayne said.
“I didn’t know.”
Nothing Kevin had read prepared him for the bodies. They didn’t look dead, but they didn’t look alive either. The dog didn’t bark at a single one. For the dog it was like the bodies weren’t there. They were there for Kevin.
It wasn’t a long drive to Thomas Falls. The stopped cars made it longer. He wasn’t used to seeing stopped cars on the road. Where were the police? He didn’t want to ask Wayne, who might have strong feelings about the police, pro or con. Kevin thought it would be good if they moved the cars off the road, especially if the cars contained dead people.
He was surprised, reaching town, to see people walking on the streets. Kids playing on playground equipment. Moms laughing! Hadn’t they heard about the end of the world? Or maybe he was the one missing essential information.
“Is this what you wanted me to see?” he asked.
“Keep driving,” Wayne said.
Kevin drove slowly through town. He was in no rush to reach his destination, whatever that might be. There were no traffic lights, so he lingered at stop signs, waiting until the truck reached an unambiguously complete stop before driving forward. The dog surveyed the surroundings. They were well into town when Wayne motioned for Kevin to stop.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“We’re here.”
He parked on the side of the road. Wayne opened his door and then opened the flatbed. Kevin followed.
“Is it a problem that there’s no leash?” he asked.
“Not the biggest problem.”
The day was warm and blue-skied, the sort of day people can’t help but talk about, no matter how banal the conversation. The sun was unobstructed and relaxed, as though there had been no rush to travel millions of miles to Earth. Neither clouds nor wind existed in a meaningful sense. Kevin looked for birds in trees, but he couldn’t find any. He heard kids but not birds. The kids were talking about the things his kids talked about: what was unfair, how to get what they wanted, who was mean. It wasn’t any different from what he talked about with Amy.
He tried to remember being a kid. It wasn’t hard. He’d cared enormously about things, but he couldn’t recall why. It had been very important, for example, not to strike out during gym class. He’d gone to extraordinary lengths to put himself in a position not to do so. But had he struck out? He couldn’t even remember being at bat. Thirty years later, all that remained was the black marker he’d used to write his phone number inside his glove, the cold aluminum bench, a physical desire for the grape bubble gum designed to look like chewing tobacco. If such a product existed today, he wouldn’t buy it for his kids either, and yet!
The dog followed Kevin, who followed Wayne. Together they walked down Main Street, or what Kevin assumed was Main Street. He didn’t see any signs, though he was looking everywhere, trying to smolder the images into his brain, so he could retrieve them later. He wanted to be able to explain everything to Amy, who would have a lot of questions.
“The playground was full?” she’d ask. “What about the stores? The restaurants?”
He would try to explain.
But he wasn’t in charge of what he remembered. He wouldn’t be tomorrow and certainly not a year from now or ten or thirty, if he still existed, if anyone did. Why of all the things that happened at age ten did he remember with perfect clarity the goose shit scattered across the outfield, the way boys jogged gingerly around it on their journey to and from the dugout, the merciless honking of Canada geese as they traveled in a wobbly V from one side of the continent to the other?
