Prologue 2: The Hour Is Getting Late

by K. Patrick Glover

The silence is deafening.

It’s been nearly two weeks since “It” happened. Since everybody disappeared. I may not have noticed right away, If I hadn’t been in town.

See, I needed supplies. Ordinary things, water, cereal, toilet paper, toothpaste. A couple bags of Doritos. Seemed important at the time, those damned Doritos. The shelf was empty of the kind that I like, the spicy nacho ones. So I asked the stock boy to check in the back for me.

He never came back.

I waited. I waited at least twenty minutes. Then I stuck my head through the double doors, the big ones that say Employees Only on the outside. I know I was breaking the rules, but I only stuck my head through, I didn’t actually go back there.

I didn’t see anybody, so I called out. No answer.

I shook my head, figured the stock boy had snuck out on break and forgot about me. I decided to forgo the Doritos and headed for the front.

It was very quit. No other customers. I could hear something in the distance, very far away. It sounded like a woman screaming.

I hurried to the front, my nerves getting the better of me. The checkouts were as empty as the aisles had been. The front door was propped open and I could feel the breeze coming in.

I left my cart and walked around the registers. Two of them were open, money in the drawer. I looked around, and I almost took it, after all, it was just sitting there. But broke or not, I wasn’t brought up to be no thief.

I pulled my cart to one of the open registers, tallied up my merchandise and paid for it, making sure I took the proper change.

Then I bagged my things up and walked outside. The street was just as empty as the store. I felt, well, kind of like I was walking through a movie set and all the actors had gone home for the day. Like nothing was real, just facades.

I walked across the street and into the bar.

No one.

The radio was on, but only static came from it’s speakers. A cigarette, burned almost to the filter, sat smoking in the ashtray. There was a nearly full glass of whiskey beside it.

I drank it, but I didn’t leave any money. I figured the fella that had been here had probably already paid. I wondered where he went. Where everybody went.

My next stop was the sporting goods store. I rarely stopped there, no reason for it. Until today.

I could still hear that poor woman screaming, off in the distance. So that’s where I was headed. And I thought I just might need a gun.