For My Broken Heart - short stories

Natural Selection

"Listen to your mother, Julie," says dad before heading down into the basement. There is still a full bar down there, but the liquor is starting to run out.

That's what dad is now. A useless sponge.

Mom has locked the door behind her, but it's my job to get the deadbolt, the two chains, replace the board and put the kitchen chair back under the handle.

I pull the chamber from my revolver and count the bullets. Six, another six in my pocket. This gun is my closet friend, a Colt Python .357 magnum caliber revolver with a 4-inch barrel and a nickel finish. The matching 6-inch remains in the holster, unused by me personally. The pair belonged to my grandmother, her prized discontinued collectables that she used to kill her abusive, heroin addict husband.

I've made five kills with the 4-inch, I've only had to reload it once. I etch a tic into the grip with a blue pocket knife after each one.

The 6-inch has twenty tics.

I abandon the foyer and head for the kitchen. It's my intention to make something to eat. I rummage through the cupboards and the ice box. I come out with frozen sausages and expired canned ravioli.

I set to work.

While the sausage sizzles on a pan, I start to crack into the ravioli with quite possibly the only working can opener left in the city.

SCREECK!

CRASH!

"What the fuck was that?" I spin around to the noise. It came from outside, tires screeching and then metal crunching. I haven't heard traffic of any kind since the initial panic, when everyone was trying to flee the city.

We were on our feet for days, and it was in those days that I managed to become a murderer five times over. People are still people, but they're savage when they're desperate. They would attack us, either with malicious intent or lunacy. We found this house just outside of a neighboring city abandoned and immediately claimed it as our base. Since then, I haven't seen the outside.

Mom is our scout, she's the only one who knows what's truly happened to our world. She won't share any of her adventures with me, but I know that she relays it to dad because they argue about it constantly.

|"I don't want to know!"

Dad was always a loud yeller,

|"WAKE UP!

But mom could always yell louder.

A get down to the floor and press my ear to the vent. The crash hasn't even caused my father to stir, which means if I'm in any danger it's up to me to defend myself and that stupid fish.

For all I know, it could be mom out there. I can't leave her helpless.

I move around the house and peek through all the windows, but the only ones that I'm actually able to see through aren't in viewing range of the crash site.

My only option is to leave the house.

Mom's rule has always been: Do not leave unless something comes in.

She never did specify what might try to.

It takes all of my courage, and the Colt tightly in my grip to manage to remove the various blockades at our door in order to be able to exit.

I don't know what to expect, and I'm scared, but on the other hand, what else am I going to do? Stay locked in this strange house forever?

I can't. It has to end at some point.

I squeeze my eyes shut, open the door and step outside. I take a deep breath before opening them.

Then I'm screaming.

The car from the crash is in flames. There is a lone woman cowering in the street, shrieking and crying. A few feet away from her, an infant lay still.

This isn't what is horrifying to me. It's the creatures all around the scene, closing in on the woman, seeming to be drawn to her feelings of grief and misery. I find myself filled with cold feelings of guilt and sadness, and frozen in place.

The creatures look human, but they can't be. They are charred black like burn victims, and most of them are remnants, missing bits and pieces. Some of them stagger, some of them crawl.

Answer for your sins.

You did this to us.

it's you're fault, monster.

Monster, monster, monster, monster, provoke, monster, monster, monster, monster, monster, monster, outrage, monster, monster, monster, monster monster monster monster monstermonstermonstermonster monster-*

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH--"

-

I come to on the basement floor. I can hear mom and dad, but they are not beside me. I sit up too fast and get dizzy, my ears start ringing loud and after the blinding white lights subside I realize that there's blood in them.

My mom and dad are sitting on bar stools arguing in hushed voices. When they notice me sit up, they rush right over.

"Julie, thank Jesus, tell me you're alright," dad whimpers.

"Shut up, Frank, this is your fault."

My head is pounding.

"What happened?" I ask.

My mom smoothes my hair. "Julie, cupcake, I need you to tell me what you saw," my mom says.

I give unsettled looks to both of them.

"Did you see the monsters, Julie?" she asks

"Did you see the monsters?" my dad echoes.

"It's all mirrors out there Julie."

"The world is nothing but monsters."

"Every one of us."

"The world is a monster."

"It's going to eat you whole, Julie."

"It's going to eat you whole."

Wake up.