Is It Starting?

I get that feeling, somewhat like anxiety, that ties in to the thing they call inkling. I have an inkling we are in for the unthinkable. I forgot to tell you that they have temporarily closed the schools, which sucks considering it's my Senior year. I was counting down the days! Now every day that goes by with no class I gotta tack them on to the wait. In that respect the days seem pointless. They claim it is an infestation, but of what, and what they plan on doing about it eludes every administrator.

And the boredom. My goodness. Last night Bethany and I sat at my window and counted how many military vehicles we saw pass by our house. It totaled 37. They've been coming and going for a couple weeks. No soldiers in the streets, yet.

Yet.

The news anchors are the most entertaining thing we have. Every night they get on live and look all flustered and flummoxed. I would feel that way, too, if I had to act enthusiastic about the most pointless stories you've ever heard. My neighbor Ms. Nils owns a rare Rex breed of cat, and it had kittens. The Channel 5 news was there covering those pink, hairless rats.

So let us review. Armed policemen, heavy influx of military, schools closed on false premise, the rattle of gunfire once or twice a day (three times today), the media covering pointless (more pointless) stories rather than anything you'd call news. I told Dad the s.h.i.* is about to hit the fan. He smiled at me and said, "I know." And that's when the day went straight to hell. I looked Dad in the eye and asked him a question.

"Are we prepared?" He must have been bored because he got up from his magazine, and took me into the garage. The first thing he did was test the doors to make sure they were sealed tight. He twice made sure the back door was locked. Then he checked the fuel in the generator.

The other day he bought a bunch of lumber. He has been cutting it up, sometimes for hours. The shapes of the boards stacked in the corner resemble the shapes of our windows. He walked me to his big metal cabinet and unlocked it. Inside he showed me cases of food cans, a hundred gallons of water, several first aid cases, water purifiers, survival packs, etc.

"I've been preparing for years." he said. Then he looked off somewhere between the generator and eternity and muttered, "But not for anything like this." His eyes lost that misted look and he smiled at me, his hand on my shoulder, and encouraged me back in the house. I took a step, my heart all of a sudden in my throat, and he grabbed my arm. That's like trying to move forward while your bicep is in a vice screwed into a pole cemented into the ground, man.

I looked back at him and saw that flicker of fear. That's when I noticed a human shadow cross the window. It moved erratically, fingers clenching and unclenching. We heard it moaning. It came to the back door of the garage, and fumbled at the doorknob. Dad and I were both creeped. He stepped quietly to the cabinet and opened it. From a top shelf, hidden from plain sight he pulled an assault rifle.

He looked at me, pointing to my chest. He signaled that I go to the door, open it, and then get back.

"Martin," he said, "Look at me son." I felt frozen in place. I looked him in the eye, and was suddenly capable.

"Open that door, and then get out of the way. Back quickly away, toward me. If I have to kill this person, I want you safely away."

The thing was pounding on the door, jerking the doorknob back and forth. I swear I thought the knob was going to give. A part of me hoped it would so I wouldn't have to approach the door. Dad nodded at me.

I walked to the door, dropped my hand to the doorknob, and looked over my shoulder to judge the best path of retreat. I took a mental picture of it. I turned the lock, opened the door . . .

The first thing to hit me was the smell. It was a guy, and he smelled dank, filthy. You know, filth beyond just being dirty. It was the filth of someone who had sat in their own juices for far too long. Transient. (I had to look that word up) Combine transient with the smell of death and you got this guy. I found my feet moving on their own and somehow, I ended up behind Dad in under a second.

"Who are you?" Dad yelled. "What do you want?"

He just stared at us. In his eyes was a ravenous madness I . . . I can't describe. He stood in the doorway and let out this moan; long, and agonizing. For a moment I felt pity for him. Then he bared his teeth and charged us.

Dad jerked back in response, sending a bullet through the doorframe. Then the dude was on us, clawing and snarling. Dad put the barrel in the guy's mouth. A muffled thump, the sound of water spilling on the floor. And a silence so perfected it was unnatural.

"Martin," said my Father, as he lay beneath the corpse (always the cool head), "Close and lock the door. NOW."

I did what he told me to do. He got up from under the thing, whose smell had been amplified by opening him up. I just couldn't speak. I felt something drip down my temple and when I wiped it away, it wasn't sweat. Was I hurt? I felt for wounds. That's when Dad spoke, "What now?" he asked.

What now. We had just killed a man. A very sick man. We let him into our garage, and even now I cannot tell you why. I think with all this chaos Dad finally let his powerful curiosity get the best of him. I don't think he meant to kill him, just scare him away. I wonder how many interrupted break-ins have that objective in mind before they turn bloody. Either way, I would have pulled the trigger on this cat, too.

Bethany was in the doorway, her mouth open, eyes wide. She was looking at the body on the floor, and Dad with a gun in his hands. She blinked and seemed to come back to us for a moment. She tried to stammer out a question. I felt the same way. I didn't know where to start. Call the cops? Dispose of the body ourselves? What are we, the mob? We must have looked the part, covered in this dude's blood. I felt my whole reality shift in one violent moment.

But one thing stood out.

I didn't feel guilt. I registered the fact that my father didn't either. This was not a murder. This guy's blood was already coagulating, browning, as it oozed from the wound in the back of his head. "Bethany," said Dad, "Call 911, and tell them we had a break in. Martin, you go wash up. You weren't here."

I attempted a protest but that fatherly glare cut me off before a syllable left my tongue. I nodded and walked inside. "And be careful you don't get anything on the carpet!"

My Dad. You're covered in blood, we just shot some kind of freak of nature in the garage that very much used to be a human being, the world just took a dump on life, and Dad is worried about steam cleaning the carpets. I had to laugh.

I laughed as I krept my way upstairs, and successfully reached the bathroom wherein I closed the door, got undressed, and wept as I sat in the shower. That's right, I cried. I can't say why, except that I couldn't stand. My knees shook with a violence that scared me even more, so I cried. I hugged my knees in the tub and sobbed. Some part of me wondered if this would be one of the last showers I would ever have. I hope not. I love showers.

The police didn't exactly show up like Law & Order where they knock on your door and a few uniformed boys ask, "Is everything alright?" No. These guys were armored; riot gear, and armed for an invasion. And they looked scared.

"Where is the perpetrator?" the Beard asked. I could only differentiate them by their facial hair. When I pointed to the garage Mustache and Goatee cocked their weapons and went into the house. Beard signaled the ambulance, which I noticed only because he signaled to it. There were no lights going on any of the vehicles. The guys carrying the stretcher, complete with body bag, were not EMTs. They looked like SWAT. Then I saw that they were SWAT as they trudged down the hall to the garage door.

No statements, no paperwork, no "call down to the station," and no smiles. These guys were in and out with the body. They even had a crew do a full scrub down on the crime scene. The garage still smells like chlorinated bleach.

I think the only question asked was, "Do you own that weapon, sir?" Dad answered in the affirmative. Beard nodded. "Buy more bullets." he said. Then he closed the front door softly as he and his crew left.

I was left with the feeling that I had just been in the presence of some true hardcases. Kind of felt like I was in a movie. Am I in a movie?

Dad just called. I think it's time to board up the windows.