Closer To Heaven - Patrick Sean Lee (rosie project .txt) 📗

it!” I laughed, because I never had! Electricity was always just there, and it came from big power plants that sent it to everyone’s house. And all the stores. Once more I knew that Jerrick was a genius. He knew everything, I guess because he read books in Braille, and probably studied very hard when he’d been in school. I thanked God I’d met him. I was so excited and wanted to get our food back home quickly, and get Lashawna all well again so that we could go to Target! They had toys there, too, and I remembered they had bicycles at Christmastime. It sounded like so much fun. Finally!

 

EIGHT

Jerrick and I pushed and pulled the carts home, through the side gate to the rectory. He told me of the many wonderful things we could gather again. We could have music, and I liked that, but we would need a CD player. Target had them, he said. We could watch movies on Father’s DVR. We could gather books from the library and read to one another. So much would be the same, except there would be no other people in our world, unless other children far away managed to be spared by the clouds. We’d never know until we went to look for them.

“Who knows? There might be others alive in Seattle or Los Angeles. San Diego, and all the cities in between us and them. There might be people alive in Kansas City or Chicago…New York and Philadelphia.”

“But how could we ever find them? All those places are so far away.”

“We’ll wait until you or Lashawna grows up. Maybe in a year or two. You can learn how to drive, and then we’ll start looking,” he said.

“That’s what Munster was going to do, I think, before I told him about the man back inside the mini-mart. I shouldn’t have done that. But, he is alive. I saw him.”

“Yes, I know.”

“I think the man had him, but Munster was okay…unless the cloud I saw got them.”

“Maybe Munster and the man were just together, looking for you! Did you ever think that maybe the man wasn’t bad at all?”

“He was pushing Munster!” I said.

“Are you sure? And if he was, maybe he was trying to get him to run faster, away from one of the clouds.”

I hadn’t thought of that. But the man had scared me when I first heard his voice at the mini-mart, and so that made him bad.

“Why do you think the clouds didn’t kill Munster or the man when they first came?” I asked Jerrick. We were at the door to our house, now, and so I went up the three steps and opened it.

“I don’t know. Maybe the clouds you and Lashawna saw weren’t the reason everyone—or nearly everyone—died. Maybe something else killed them.”

“Oh no. I saw them from the hospital window. It was them. I saw them looking for other people to kill.”

“How do you know that’s what they were doing? Did you actually see them doing that?”

“No, but that’s what they were doing. I know that.

“Two steps. Take the water. I’ll hold the door open for you.

“There are good clouds, Jerrick, and bad clouds. That’s what I know for sure.”

“I don’t think you know anything for sure, but we’ll find out.”

Jerrick went in with his arms filled with 24 bottles of new water. I carried two bags…no, three…and followed him into the kitchen. Lashawna was still sleeping, but I could see her breathing, and she wasn’t making faces, like she was in pain, so I knew she was fine.

“You put this stuff away. I’ll go unload the rest,” I whispered to him.

“Ya.”

It must have been close to lunchtime when I finally got all the grocery bags into the kitchen. Jerrick was doing a terrible job unloading them. He had cans of fruit all mixed up on the same shelves as canned meat, and canned vegetables, so I made him hand me the cans, and I arranged them like Momma used to do. Fruits together. Vegetables on another shelf, and like that.

“I wish we could heat the soup or tamales, don’t you, Jerrick?”

“It won’t be long, Amelia. Pretty soon. We have a microwave; all we need is power to turn it on.”

“How will you do that, Jerrick?”

“The generator, remember? I’ll tell you how to go to the circuit box outside and hot-wire the house circuits into it.”

“I don’t think I want to do that. I don’t like hot wires. Won’t they burn me?”

“No, silly. They’re not actually hot, and until we get the generator running there won’t be any electricity in them.”

“I want a bike,” I said.

“You can have any one you like. We’ll find the best one in Marysville for you.”

“What do you want most?” I asked.

“Music. I love music, and my ears are good.”

“Me, too. I miss my iPod. I wonder what Lashawna would like the most?”

“I’d like a hot dog,” Lashawna’s voice answered from the doorway.

Jerrick’s head snapped up. I was so surprised to hear her voice that I dropped the can of tuna I was opening. Lashawna stood with her hands at her side, smiling at Jerrick and me. She looked wonderful, except for her hair, which was all tangled still from sleeping. I ran to her and gave her my Grizzly Bear hug, one like Daddy used to give Momma sometimes when he was very happy to see her.

“You’re awake!” I said, kissing her cheeks and working some of the tangles out of her black hair.

“I’m hungry! What’s for lun…Jerrick,” she stopped what she’d started to say, pushed my hands aside, and spoke to her brother. “We simply have to make one of the clocks work again. I need to know what time it is. Well, sometimes, especially when I’m hungry, or when it’s bedtime. I have no idea how long I was asleep. If we had a clock, I’d know. Was it long? Can’t you find some batteries that work…”

Lashawna was fine. It took her five whole minutes to say what she wanted to say. She was fine.

We ate tuna for lunch with Ritz crackers and warm Pepsis, and Jerrick and I told Lashawna all about our shopping trip, and how we would all go together to Target to find more things when she felt strong again.

“I want a motor scooter. A Honda!” Lashawna said when we’d finished. “I can drive one of those. They’re just like a bike!”

“We’ll get you the best one in the city,” Jerrick said. Suddenly I didn’t want a plain old bicycle anymore. I wanted a motor bike, too. And a helmet with my name on it in case I fell, or ran into a car or a tree.

“You can ride on the back,” Lashawna said to her brother.

“Nope. I want a Maserati,” he laughed.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“It’s the car I’ll get us.”

“But how will you drive it?” I asked.

“I won’t. You or Lashawna will.”

“We don’t know how to drive!” we both said at once.

“You’ll learn.”

So it was settled. We would find two motor scooters, one Maserati, a generator, no bicycle, new clothes for each of us, books from the bookstore and the Braille library place, lots of DVDs. Just anything we wanted and could think of. Except new friends. That would have to wait until one of us learned how to drive so that we could go far away and look for them.

While Lashawna got better, we sat mostly in the bedroom. Lashawna and I read from some of Father’s books, although none of us could understand what they were about. The words were just too big, and the sentences were way too long. Jerrick said most of them were “Theology books” that all priests and Rabbis and Ministers had to read. I wasn’t at all interested in those things. I found one called “Of Mice and Men”. It sounded good, and so I pulled it off Father’s bookshelf and began to read it to Jerrick and Lashawna that first night. It wasn’t what I expected. There was a mouse, and there were two men, but some of the words were too big, and there were no pictures at all. The mouse didn’t do anything, either, except sit in this older man’s pocket! So, I put it back, and then began to tell stories kind of made up from books I remembered reading.

I checked the candles in the sanctuary three times. They were all okay every time I went in. I watched for clouds that spinned, but didn’t see any. I fixed dinner and breakfast with Jerrick, and took a bath with a washcloth, and water from the bottles. I didn’t have to worry about Jerrick seeing me, but I stood in Father’s bathtub with the door closed anyway. The bottled water was cold, and so I didn’t take a long shower at all.

That’s how we lived for two more days. Lashawna found a Harry Potter book in Father’s library the second day, and she read out loud from that. She’s a good reader. Harry Potter made the time go by more quickly. I like him and all the wizard children, and I wished I could go to the school he did because it reminded me of a very big, happy cathedral where kids could talk and not get punished by the priests or nuns or parents for doing that. The only bad thing about Harry’s school was the three-headed dog hiding in that hall, and which would bite you and probably kill you if you got near it.

I wanted some hot food!

On the third day, I think it was, Lashawna looked all better and normal, and so Jerrick said it would be fine to leave our house and go to Target. Maybe some other stores if there were any good ones in the shopping center. The rain was gone. It was cold, but we didn’t mind that. We dressed warmly and left right after breakfast. I was so excited!

“I wish I could drive,” I told them when we reached Walnut Street. “We could fill the trunk with lots of things. Too bad Munster isn’t here. He said he could drive.”

“It would be neat to have a truck!” Lashawna said. “Just think how much stuff we could bring home then!”

“I have an idea,” Jerrick said. “Why don’t we simply move into Target. That way we could have everything we want and not have to lug anything home in shopping carts.”

“I want a bed, that’s why” Lashawna told him.

“They have beds there,” he said back to her.

“No they don’t. Just bedspreads and sheets.”

“Oh,” Jerrick said laughing.

“And pillows!” I said.

“But no mattresses. So we can’t move in there,” Lashawna said.

That settled that. Besides, I had already grown comfortable in the rectory. I liked our bedroom because it was small—not a whole store. I liked our kitchen with the window on one side. I liked our backyard, even if it needed to have the grass mowed. We could clean everything up, especially Father’s messy front room, and once we got electricity, we’d have a real home again, with hot food and lights that didn’t burn out. And I liked our church because it was big and had colorful windows, and we didn’t have to sleep there, and God was there,