A toxic wind blew and it blew hard enough to cast almost everything away. When it happened, most tears went to the way of vapor the moment they formed. I don’t know. It was a terrible thing. That’s what Terry said, old Terry, whose face had deep crevices that seemed to fall into the oblivion beneath the film of his eyes. I couldn’t know if it was a terrible thing or not because I was underground from the moment I started in this world. The things I did know were resigned to the cavern world of steel and canned foods. Nina fed me a lot of sardines, although, I didn’t like the eyes. I would ask Nina for twinkies or those other sugary sweet Hostess snacks, but she didn’t want to spoil me. Once I got into the storage and ate a box full, but my stomach decided to come out of my mouth. Bringing a handful of rags, Terry made me get on my knees and clean up the mess of goo. The goo was soggy and I remember the sour smell was enough to make my eyes sting a little. But I didn’t want to fuss about it because not many people fussed or cried or complained. It was just stone faces all around, impenetrable like the steel walls that lined this little ant farm we lived in.
I once heard stories about the sun. They were my favorite stories.
We were all supposed to do water checks routinely when it came, dripping out of the mess of pipes jutting from the walls. You would have to check with the clicker and if you heard an epilepsy of clicks, it meant to not drink the damned water. I never knew what the clicks meant, but it was an absolute thing to do to pour the water into the dirt, even if I was panting, my throat feeling gritty sandpaper, my flesh like sundried tomatoes. There was a time when Charles, I forgot his face, he always sounded like he was whining, though, and nobody liked that, well there was a time when Charles wanted to drink so much he forgot the absolute thing. He poured the damned water down his throat, I was there. Charles said it tasted sweet and oh so good and he opened his mouth and his tongue glistened with it. Days later though, we were watching whiny Charles whining more than ever before worming around on the floor looking so pathetic. He was an ugly thing then with his face yellow, I couldn’t bare to look at him for too long. Sometime later, Charles died. I remember seeing Terry and some other man, now gone like Charles, carrying his corpse through the lower tunnel, the man said they were gonna berry him. Terry gleamed some of his rotten old teeth and said something like, “Berry him? We’re all already berried right down here.” The other man, now gone like Charles, shared with Terry a grin, but I really didn’t get the humor in it, maybe cause I didn’t know what it meant to be berried.
Len is a corpse now. So is Rudy, Marty,
