Preface

I was so excited to do this Back Fence thing that guess I missed the part where
Melissa said it was supposed to be a true story.

So I’m going to read my little soliloquy here anyway. But first I’m going to tell
you the true part.

See, about six months ago, I had this dream where I died. No. It’s ok. It was in
the dream, you know? But it was unlike those Freddie Krueger movies, you know,
where if you die in the dream that means you Die. For. Real.

And I didn’t die for real. In fact the first thing I did was go take a leak.
Because that’s what doctors always make you do after you have an operation. It’s
what they call a sign of life.

Anyway, when I died in the dream, I got to find out what my last words will be. So
I used that in the story. And that’s true part.

SEVEN MEALS FROM CHAOS

I am in the subway when the world burns. Some kind of cascading power failure
sends my train crashing into another. I hear the crack of crumpling steel and the
tubular thud of my head hitting the railing.

Now pain. Blackness. It seems like hours trying regain consciousness in the
darkness.

Already in the tunnel I smell the smoke, sweet and acrid at the same time. There
in the dark it all but chokes out the pale light from my cell phone that guides me
to the surface.

And everything is burned: the trees, the buildings, the cars. Charred corpses
everywhere. Black and steaming. Above, a sky of smoke blocks the sun.

I walk for a day and find no food or water. At the city center I come upon a
wrecked city bus turned on its side.

Inside the bus, the bodies are fused, contorted, and burned, but I have to climb
over them. Have to find food.

There. There behind the driver’s seat. A lunch box! Inside, a cheese sandwich in
tin foil and a coke.

I down the coke in three or four swigs and sit on the empty curb to eat. One bite,
something like Gruyere maybe. Still molten from the fire.

A kid watching, his eyes black vacant coal, his body badly burned. His hand is
gone.

Here, kid. Take it.

The kid runs off without a word. How long can he last, I wonder?

Then I see the man watching me. He emerges from the shadows, black suit clean and
free of soot and the foulness that surrounds us.

Forgive my English, he says. I am called Maecenas. I have water. Food. Shelter.

Come. Please.

The bunker is many levels below the street. The elevator is stainless steel and
smells of oil, like something new from the factory.

The dining room is simple, opulent, dark maple chairs and a white tablecloth.
Inside, two men and two women stand to greet me in their formal clothes. They hand
me a bottle of water. We do the introductions.

Meal One

First there is salad. I go for the Blue Cheese, croutons, and bacon bits. So
hungry! The baguettes are like heaven. I could swim in these greens and the joy of
stuffing myself, I swear. The others continue on to the other courses, but sated
now I can only think of sleep.

Meal Two

Breakfast is a veggie skillet. Eggs, Green peppers, onions, potatoes, all

smothered in a cheese sauce. I notice Robyn then. Young, gorgeous, incredibly
buff. I tell her about how I used to get the same skillet at the Uptown Bar. Turns
out she’s from Minneapolis.

Meal Three

Cheeseburgers for Lunch. Grilled with all the fixings. Sesame buns. Incredible.
Turns out Maecenus was a chef whose family came into big money. I ask him to tell
me more about the bunker. Can’t place his accent. Serbian, maybe.

Meal Four

Maecenus emerges from the cooler with large cuts of prime rib. The cooler is
cavernous, shelves of everything from canned goods to freeze-dried meals. For some
reason, I notice that the door can be bolted from the inside.

The Prime Rib comes and is marvelous. No need for a knife.

One of the two men is Jackson. Some kind of athlete, I’m guessing. He tells me how
Maecenus saved him when world burned. The other man, a professor, has a similar
story. He keeps checking his watch.

If there’s any humanity still out there, it will soon be gone, he says. I read a
paper at Cambridge that says that in a food shortage, society will totally break
down after the inhabitants miss their seventh meal.

I look at my plate and try to imagine what is going on out there. Starvation.
Disease. Anarchy.

Meal Five

Brunch is crepes. Coffee. Fruit. Toast. An array of dishes laid out in perfection.
The other girl, Angela, starts to open up to us. She ran away from home. Her
father beat her when he found out she was pregnant.

Her story is captivating. No one notices as I stuff my backpack with baguettes.

When everyone sleeps I sneak out. Up the elevator and back to the place where I
found the boy.
He is hiding under the hulk of a fire truck. He won’t come out. I leave the food
and make my way back. Then something stirs behind me. Footsteps maybe? No. There
is no one. The world is a graveyard in cinder.

Meal Six

We are having soup and sandwiches when something crashes outside. Maecenus runs
over to bolt the door and we hear pounding and screaming.

They’re here! He yells. How could this be? How could they find us? I look at my
backpack. I have brought our doom!

Maecenus looks down. We are not going to make it. I’m so sorry. All the makings to
rebuild the world and now this tragic fate.

He goes to the cabinet and takes a pill. I catch him as he collapses. He looks up
at me. Almost peaceful as the door begins to buckle.

I hold him. Please. I have to know. Why me?

A long breathe. Then he says, I wanted to compassion to die last.

The door crashes open. The mob is tattered, burned, wild-eyed. In their hands
crude weapons, pipes, clubs.

They’re coming for us. I throw the tray of bread at the opposite wall and they go
for it, scrambling. I grab Robyn’s arm and we run toward the cooler.

The iron pipe comes down on my forearm. Compound fracture. Blood everywhere.

They have her.

I crawl to the cooler and pull the door closed just as the smallest of them tries
to come for me.

It was the boy.

Meal Seven

Inside the cooler now. Cold. Terrible screams. Smoke smell. Pounding.

My arm is wrapped. Dead. Useless. It’s been days now and they keep trying the
door. Now it sounds like a fire ax hacking at the hinges. They’ll be inside soon.

I scribble these words with my left hand and think of all the good fortune I’ve
had in my life. My friends. My first Harley. The sun in Lisa’s hair on our Wedding
Day. The birth of my son.

And then I think of Maecenus. So many questions. Was he right? Will compassion die
here, now, with me? Or did it die long ago? And is that why the world burned?

No answers. Just swallow the pill now. But first, I have to figure out what I’m
going to say when I go to meet God.

And then I know.

“I’m so grateful.”