“Sarah, you can’t seriously expect me to believe you saw an island in the middle of the bay.”

“I swear that I did. It was right out there, surrounded in mist and there was this tree in the middle of it.”

“I thought you said it was surrounded in mist. How could you have seen a tree?”

“Believe me. It was there.” Sarah planted her foot in the grass next to the sidewalk looking at Jonathan. Despite her anger, her defiant stance, John couldn’t help but notice how beautiful she was. Her evening dress and scarf flowing in the light November breeze, her hands on her hips daring him to contradict her again. He loved her, despite all the crazy that came with the package.

“Look, I’ve been here before. I walk by here on my way to work every day. There is no island in the bay and no tree. It was a trick of the moonlight on the fog. That’s it.” John reaches for her arm but she moves closer to the bay.

“I want you to have faith in me John,” she said as she backed away from him slowly.

“And not believe my own eyes? What I’ve seen?”

“That’s what faith is.” She twirled around like a child, letting her arms fly out with centripetal force, her thin scarf waving like a banner celebrating her vision of the world, one John had always wanted to share but never quite could.

“Okay, how about I believe that you believe you saw an island there? Is that good enough for you?” He prodded. This wasn’t their first fight, and he knew how this would end. She would be sullen for the next few days whining about how he never took the time to really look at his surroundings. As if seeing what was in front of him was not enough. But once winter rolled in solid, the fog would stop being so damn prevalent and Sarah would go back to normal. At least until spring rolled around again.

“Don’t you dare condescend to me. Don’t you dare.” She flared up turning her back on him and looking out into the fog rolling over the bay. He could see her shoulders bobbing up and down, this was a bad one. He knew he’d be paying for that comment for the next week or so.

“Come on, don’t cry . . . come on, turn around. I’m sorry.”

“No.”

“What do you mean no? Hun, come on. Turn around. I’m sorry.” John walked up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders, messaging them slightly. He didn’t try to turn her around this time, he knew that would just make things worse.

“Is this what you wanted? To see me crying again?” she shrugged off his hands, “I wish, I just wish, for once you would believe me when I say that I see things. I wish you could believe that there was more here than you can know. But you can’t can you?” She turned to face him, tears flowing freely down her cheeks. “You can’t admit that the great John Reed could possibly miss something.”

“As big as an island? No, I can’t,” John tried to keep his voice level as he spoke. He wasn’t trying to be difficult; he didn’t want her to be upset. He refused to give in to her delusions, he had tried that before and it led wandering around the woods for an hour, looking for a door that kept conveniently moving as they approached it, or at least that’s what Sarah had said. John hadn’t seen any door or the puddle that ruined his good work shoes for that matter, just the blasted mist.

“You’re such a . . . a . . . oh forget it.” Sarah turned back toward the bay and began to walk toward the water.

“Where are you going?” John followed her.

“Someplace else.”

“To your island?”

Sarah stopped and John thought for a moment that he might have gotten through to her this time. He knew that psychotherapists would suggest he play along with her delusions, ask her what she needed to feel safe, but fuck that, this time he got to her, this time she was listening. John’s moment of glory was short-lived though. Sarah turned toward him slowly, deliberately.

“You smug bastard, you self-righteous smug bastard. So what if I am? So what if I go to my island and climb the tree? Would you even follow me? Would you try to find me in the places you don’t think exist?”

“Anywhere.” John took a step toward her, but each step he took forward, she matched him, walking backwards, not looking as she neared the waters edge.

“Right, anywhere,” she continued to back toward the water, her feet inches from the edge, her heals sinking in the softening ground. “It’s easy to say that for you, so easy. Because to you there is no anywhere. To you it’s just the bay, just the woods, just the fog. But there are places in the fog, places you won’t let yourself see. Places you won’t let yourself go because you’re so sure. Because you know so much.”

“Come on Sarah, gimme your hand. Let me dry your tears.” He reached out to her.

“Don’t touch me.” Sarah’s words came out with so little force that they were almost lost in the wind. She sounded like she were already lost in the fog, too far away for him to reach this time. Through it all, the tears leaked from her eyes their drops falling gently to her chest.

“Sarah . . . why are you crying.” John reached out to her, but he stopped advancing, hoping it would keep her from walking into the water.

“Is this what you wanted? Is it, you bastard?” Sarah’s voice was calm despite her words. John felt chills run down his spine as she turned her eyes on him, looking deeply. “You’re so sure of yourself that you couldn’t give a fuck what someone else cares about. The great Jonathan Reed, keeper of all that is true. Are you finally satisfied?” She continued backward toward the water, not even pausing as her broke it’s surface and the cold bay water began to lap at her ankles.

“How am I supposed to answer that?” He watched her with growing concern. “Look, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Just come away from the water, you’re shoes are getting wet.”

“Haha.” She twirled again, causing water to splash up on her dress.

“Sarah, come on.” He hurried forward and grabbed her arm. “You’re scaring me.”

“Don’t. Touch. Me.” The venom in her voice surprised him as she wrenched her arm from his, letting the bracelet he’d given her earlier that night wall unheeded into the shallow water that now separated them.

“Sarah . . . Sarah! Sarah, come back here; you’re going to ruin your dress. Sarah?”

“You said anywhere John. Anywhere.” She said as she turned and continued deeper into the water.

“Sarah . . . Sarah?” She was up to her waist now, poised to dive in, but she stopped and turned to look back at him. “Where are you?”

“You said Anywhere.” she said as she turned, dove into the icy water, and began to swim out into the mist.

“Come back! . . . Sarah.” Jonathan Reed stood on the back of the bay and watched as the woman he loved swam into the mist and out of sight.

He waited for a few moments, expecting her to get cold and come back or call out to him again and yell at him for not coming in after her, but he was going to be damned if he ruined his new Calvin Klein suit because she wanted to be stubborn. He listened as the splashing grew fainter and eventually faded from hearing. Assuming she was simply treading water to see if he would come after her, he called after her.

“Sarah, come on! Enough is enough,” he waited for a response or to hear her begin to swim back. When he didn’t hear anything, he began to panic.

Throwing his jacket and suit coat to the ground, Jonathan ran toward the water, kicking off his shoes as he went. His heart skipped a beat as the water bit into his ankle, freezing him to the bone. Undeterred, he plunged forward, his breath coming in short gasps as the water surges up around his waist. For the first time that night, he thinks considers the possibility of hypothermia setting in with water this cold and remembered an article he’d read about the plain that had landed in the Hudson River a few years ago. If people hadn’t been rescued, the could have lasted between 10 and 20 minutes before they started losing strength in their muscles. Sarah still had plenty of time left, but they had already been walking for a while in the cold and her evening dress and think scarf didn’t allow for much insulation. As far as Jonathan could tell, she could be going into the beginning stages of hypothermia already. With the thought of losing Sarah to the cold bay at the top of his mind, John dove into the water with abandon and started calling to her the minute he broke the surface again fighting for air as the ice water seemingly punched him in the gut.

By the time he climbed back on shore, a good 18 minutes after his initial plunge, exhausted and shivering, the bank was swarming with people drawn by his yelling. One or two of them had apparently called the police because the blue lights lit the waters edge and had given Jonathan something to aim for. He heard the hum of an outboard motor as he tried to catch his breath on all fours next to his coat. Two men in dark pants and light blue shirts placed a blanket over his shoulders and with a quiet electrical hum, he could feel the warm air begin to circulate under the blanket. The paramedics reached under John’s arms, raised him to his feet and helped him into the back of the waiting ambulance.

A police officer, his badge reflecting the alternating red and blue of the ambulance’s flashers, walked over and after a quick sidebar with the paramedics, turned his attention to John, pad and pen poised to take notes for his report.

“Sir,” the officer began, “can you tell me your name?”

Jonathan pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders and shivered despite the warm air circulating around him now. He managed to get out his name with only a little bit of stumbling on the initial J.

“Can you tell me why you decided to take a dip in the bay on a day where the high was only 50º?”

“I went in after my girlfriend, Sarah.” John looked down at his sodden socks. “We had gotten into a fight and she decided that going into the water was the best choice.”

The officer scribbled on his pad, frowning. “Is she still out there?”

“Unless she doubled back while I wasn’t looking, she should be.” Jonathan looked over the officer’s shoulder at the search light from the police boat cutting through the fog and reflecting off the water. “I only came in because I know that I wouldn’t be much help if I got hypothermia as well. She’s been in there for a while, so once you get her out, you’re going to need to get her warmed up really quick.”

The officer’s radio squawked, and he cocked his head to one side adjusting the volume to listen better. After it quieted down again, he continued. “What did you and Miss?”

“Sarah Fuller.” John was beginning to feel disoriented and a little dizzy.

“What did you and Miss Fuller fight about?”

“It’s a little silly.” John said. He didn’t want to let the cop know that she was having delusions about worlds in the fog.

“She didn’t think so if it drove her into the water. Do you think she would harm herself because of this ‘silly’ fight of yours?”

“Sarah, God no.” John’s head jerked up quickly causing the world to begin spinning like it used to after his college benders. “She loved life. A little too much some times I think, but she loved life.”

“Do you have any idea why she would go into the water then?”

There was a long silence while John considered his answer. If he told the officer the truth, he probably wouldn’t belief him anyway; if the cop did believe him, they’d probably lock Sarah up in the psych-ward at Brigham and Women’s. John pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders and shivered. The officer’s radio chirped again and he excused himself to check in with his superiors. John took this time to look around.

He sat in the back of an ambulance, facing the water as it lapped the shallow beach. The wind coming off the bay was oppressive and he was pretty sure that there would be frost tonight, and he knew that if they found Sarah now, she would be unconscious in the best case. Her face floated in front of his face, her smile. That glint in her eye just before she did something crazy. It hadn’t been there this last time. Instead all he could see was the pain in her eyes, the tears on her cheeks, and the venom in her voice as she called back Anywhere.

John laid back on the floor of the ambulance and let the warmth of the blanket envelop him. There was no more Sarah, he knew that to be true. She’d be found, he was almost sure of it, but she was already gone. No one, especially not his girlfriend in her evening dress. John felt his tears mixing with the cold water dripping from his hair. If only I was a little quicker, if only I had gotten her help, if only I had tried to see her world a little harder, if only . . . But there were no more if only’s.

“Sir, are you alright?” a man dressed in a suit and tie walked over tapping Johns knee twice.

“Ya, I was just resting my eyes,” John said as he say up. “This cold really zaps your strength.”

“That it does,” the man in the suit replied. It was one of those cheaper J.C. Penny jobs, dark blue with darker pin striped, the tie was hideous. It splayed out at the end, but the worst part was the pattern. Bright yellow and navy blue diagonal stripes. “So Mitch tells me that you were with Miss Fuller when she went into the water.”

“I was, we were having a fight,” John said.

“He said,” the guy in the suit replied as he pulled a pad and pen from his jacket pocket. “About something stupid I think he said. Mind telling me what that stupid thing was?”

“Can I ask who you are?” John didn’t like how the guy in the suit was acting. He knew too much to be a reporter, and he was definitely no paramedic.

“Detective Laith, Sam Laith,” the man in the suit said as he balanced his pen on the pad and reached out to shake.

With a little fumbling to keep the blanket around his shoulders, John reciprocated the gesture “Jonathan Reed.”

“Now Jonathan,” Laith said picking his pen up and scratching it on his pad. “New pen my wife got me for our anniversary, one of those fountain deals,” he said shaking the pen a little. “I just can’t seem to get it to work when I need it. Oh well, do you mind if I record this?”

“No, that’s fine,” Jonathan said with a chuckle. “Those pens never work when it’s cold like this. Finicky things. You’d be better off with a ball point in the winter.”

“Thanks for the advice, I’ll have to keep a couple in the car,” Laith pulled out a digital recorder and tapped a button on its side. “This is Detective Samuel Laith interviewing Mr. Jonathan Reed on the night of November 21st,” he checked his watch, “11:15 PM. Mr. Reed, you’re aware I’m recording and provide your consent?”

“I do detective, and you can call me John.”

“Thank you John, formalities you understand. I just have a few questions for you regarding the disappearance of your friend.”

“Sarah? She’s my girlfriend. Sarah Fuller.”

“Now, I just want to let you know that you do not have to say anything, but should this all go south, it may harm your defense if you don’t mention something now that you later want on record. Of course these questions are to find out what’s happened, so your answers will be going in my report as evidence. The responding officer tells me that he received an anonymous call about a couple fighting by the bay and the caller was quite concerned. Do you mind telling me, for the record, what you and Miss Fuller were fighting about?”

“We were arguing, but I don’t see why someone would have been worried about Sarah,” John said.

“Well, she did run off into the bay to get away from you.”

“No, it wasn’t like that, she . . .” John stopped and looked at the recorder. If he said what really happened on record, no one would believe him. And if they did, he would be dooming Sarah to the psych ward when she was found. “She wasn’t trying to get away from me.”

“Then why would she go into the water?” Laith hitched his thumb toward the bay as the tendrils of fog spun in the spot light in the search boat’s wake. “You seem like you live in town here, she’d know how cold the water was, wouldn’t she?”

“Of course she did,” John stared into the spinning fog as he continued, “we grew up here. Sarah was just a free spirit.”

“If you don’t mind sir,” Laith said, “there’s free spirited and down right crazy. I’m not sure the first one would cause someone to run out into freezing water.”

“She wasn’t crazy. She’d just sort of do these things once in a while.”

“These sorts of things?” Laith asked. “What sort of things are those?”

“What?” John broke from his revery in the fog.

“You said that she does these things once in a while. I was just hoping for something more specific.”

“Ask her when you find her,” John said. “If she wants to tell you, she will. She’d just get mad at me again if I told you.”

“Again? Were the two of you mad at each other tonight? Is that what caused the fight?”

“I guess you could say that,” John shook his head. “She kept telling me that I wasn’t listening and that I wasn’t support her.”

“Interesting. So was there something specific this time, or was this a common argument?”

“Common enough I suppose, but when she was being realistic, I was very supportive. It was just those fanciful moments that I couldn’t get behind.”

“So was this one of those,” Laith searched for the word, but came up blank, “what did you call then?”

“Fanciful moments. Ya, this was one of them.”

“So you weren’t being supportive?”

“I tried,” John looked down again. “Not that hard honestly, but I did try.”

“So when your efforts weren’t acknowledged, that must have been frustrating?”

“What was frustrating was the whole argument,” John shook his head and ran his left hand through his drying hair breaking up some of the ice that started to form.

“Understandable, I mean to seem like a straight up guy,” Laith said placating, “all you want is a little less of those fanciful moments, right? So you chased her in the water after she didn’t accept your support?”

“Not really, no,” John slowed the conversation down a little. He was starting to get suspicious of this officer’s motives. “So have your boys found her yet? Your boat’s on the way back.”

“The fog is getting too think to continue,” Laith followed John’s gaze out to the boat. “I’ll be honest with you here Jonathan, given the temperature of that water, this is moving over to a recovery not a rescue. I’m sorry.”

“Yah,” John said calmly, “I had figured as much.” He looked down, regretting that he had let her go. How could he have known she would swim out there, not turn back. She had never given into her fantasies before, but without a body it is hard to believe she is actually gone. He felt the tears welling in his eyes and fought them back. “Isn’t there any chance?”

“Until we find the body, there is always a chance,” Liath agreed. “Honestly thought, I wouldn’t hold out much hope.” He gaged Jonathan’s reaction. Often it was the the subtle tells that gave away a suspect. This man seemed upset, but he didn’t cry at the pronouncement of Sarah’s death. Laith waited for his reaction to the idea of hope, sometimes that was more telling.

“Given the water temperature,” John began after a long pause, his voice wavering, “and the amount of time she’s been in there, unless she got out of the water . . . no.” He let out a sigh, “No, she’s gone.”

Laith nodded. That was unexpected. Most people refuse to acknowledge the finality of death when they’re faced with the loss of a loved one or someone whose loss they were involved with. “I’ll let you deal with your loss then, unless there is anything else you would like to add.” Jonathan nodded his head in response. “You don’t have any plans to go on vacation anytime soon do you, I may have more questions later?”

“Excuse me?” John looked at Laith.

“Do you have any plans to leave town anytime soon?”

“Am I under arrest?”

“No, nothing like that. You are free to do as you want. I just want to be able to reach you if I have need?”

“So I’m a suspect?”

“You were the last person to see Miss Fuller alive.”

“I see.”

“So is there anything else you’d like to add to the record here? Maybe why you chased her into the water?”

“I suppose it won’t hurt anyone now.”

“I suppose not.”

“Alright, so we did argue, that much you knew already,” John was still unsure how much he was going to reveal, how much would be smart to reveal. He knew more than they needed for their investigation, but the detective had a point, if he left everything as is, there was a lot of circumstantial evidence which pointed to him, the argument, the fact that he was seen coming out of the water himself, and not least of all the fact that he was the last person to see her alive. “What you don’t know is what we argued about.”

“You want to tell me that now?”

“That thing still on?” John nodded at the recorder in Laith’s hand.

Laith nodded in response.

“Alright, I know it sounds unbelievable, but Sarah believes,” John shook his head and sighed, “believed that there were other worlds in the fog.”

“Other worlds?” Laith could see the defense forming now, this guy was laying grounds for the insanity plea.

“Ridiculous, I know, but she was adamant,” John looked at his feat and pulled the blanket closer around his shoulders. “It started at the beginning of this year, she’d talk about seeing children playing in the mists. She said they lived there. At first I thought she meant in the park, you know like homeless kids.”

Laith nodded, not wanting to interrupt the tale. It was one of the better ones he’d heard lately. He figured he’d been wrong in the early assessment, this guy was setting up a defense that she killed herself. As if someone would dive into the bay in the middle of the fall, next thing he’d say she put rocks in her pockets or something.

“Well, I humored her at first. Just let her believe that I saw them too, and she would get so excited. I just let it go. Then things started getting weird with her. She’s say that she saw doorways in the woods or islands here in the bay.”

“Islands?” Laith saw the trajectory of the story now. She saw an island and went out to it. Forget rocks in the pocket, this guy must have rocks in his head if he though this story could float. “Are you saying that she was swimming out to an island?”

“I tried to stop her. That’s the argument that people heard.” John looked up, his eyes rimmed with red, a slight glisten in the street lights, but he still avoided looking Laith in the face. “I told her that there was nothing there. No island in the fog, no tree, but she wouldn’t hear it this time. She pushed and pushed until I couldn’t take it anymore.”

“So that’s when you ran her out into the water?” Laith was sure he had his man now. The guy all but confessed to drowning her.

“What? No.” He met Laith’s eyes with a defiant stare. “You really want to pin this on me don’t you. No I didn’t run her out there, I didn’t drag her out there, I didn’t kill my girlfriend. She went out in an effort to get me to prove my support. I was an idiot and told her that I would follow her anywhere, so she decided to test me.”

“So you were following her out into the water?”

“Yes, she wanted me to.” John looked back down. “I just didn’t move quick enough I guess. I lost sight of her in the fog and that’s when I went in. If I’d gone in earlier, if I had been more forceful or less. If I’d been anything else.”

“That’s a lot of ifs,” Laith let his comment hang in the air. This guy was trying to pull on his heartstrings, trying to get him to feel bad.

“Well, isn't life just the series of if’s that we chose to take?”

“I’m not sure what you mean about that, but I think I’ll leave you alone,” Laith said looking at his watch. He announced the time and day, then flipped the recorder off. “Let us know if you’re planning on leaving town any time soon, just in case we need to talk more when you’re a little less philosophical. You know, if we need to know more about these children of the mist and stuff.”

Jonathan grunted and nodded his head. As he watched Detective Laith walking away, he instantly regretting telling the detective about Sarah’s worlds in the mist. He knew it sounded crazy as he was saying it, but at least he could pawn it off on shock. The EMTs came back over and fussed with him a bit before clearing him, giving him a warm blanket that wasn’t battery operated, and asking if he had someone he could call for a ride. John declined and headed off toward his apartment.

He knew that he should call Sarah’s parents when he got home, but as he locked his apartment door behind him, he couldn’t bring up the courage to make that call. She was an only child, a promising musician, and the apple of her parent’s eyes. The news would kill them. John knew it would be better coming from him as opposed to some stranger, or them staying up all night worrying about her, but the police had her name, they could make the call.

Jonathan went into the bathroom and stripped off his wet cloths. He walked out and sat on the edge of his bed with his cellphone in his hand, Sarah’s home number pulled up ready to hit send and tried to convince himself that not calling was the right thing to do, after all what could be possibly tell them. In the end, Jonathan Reed dropped his phone on the floor of his bedroom, fell back across the bed and wept until sleep overtook him.

“You never listen,” was the complaint Eve would make over and over again, and for a while it was true.

We used to take walks around the neighborhood every day in the summer, we’d talk about our day or just hold hands together in silence. Then there was work and the kids and getting Susan to fencing class, Teddy to scouts. It took a lot of time, and it often felt like I was just a chauffeur.

In the mean time, you would stay home. But when I got home, there were still dirty dishes, and food to cook, and the house wasn’t clean, and you would be sitting there on your computer or sleeping. “Why don’t we ever do anything together any more?”

“I’m just too tired all the time,” you said. “I can’t seem to get things started.”

“I’m running around with the kids, and you’re just lazing around,” I’d shoot back

“I’m not lazy,” then you’d cry, leave the house, or up to bed and slam the door.

That would be the fight, and they’d always end with you leaving me, leaving us. One way or the other, you were always leaving. I’d tried to get you to stay. When Susan was born, I didn’t complain about the laundry or the cleaning. I would just do what needed to be done. But it turns out that empathy is not inexhaustible. I tried too when Teddy was born.

“Let’s go for a walk after dinner tonight.”

“It’s too late,” you’d say. “It’s so hard to get moving.”

I’d drag you out, and things would be good for a little while, then it was back to leaving and slamming doors.

“What’s wrong with mommy?” Teddy’d ask. What could I say?

Postpartum depression, they said. We tried therapy, several times. She’d go a few weeks, but there was always a reason she stopped. Then back to “You never listen,”

“I’m listening now. I am. But you stopped talking. Stopped trying.” I say bending down, placing the flowers on her grave.

10:30 AM

I’m writing this in case I don’t make it. Hopefully someone will find this when everything calms down and let my family know what happened.

The day started off normal enough, breakfast then I dropped the kids off at daycare. It wasn't until about fourth period, as I was about to begin discussing chapter four of Frankenstein, that things got weird. Sarah and Billy, from my fourth period class, were staring at Sarah’s phone, as usual, and I had to take it away. But when I asked her to had it over she said that I had to see what was going on. I didn’t really care about whatever latest snap story they were giddy over, probably something about the Senior Variety Show they had last night. I told her to just hand it over or she’d have to go to the principal, but she just looked at me, wide eyes and her and Billy stood up and walked out.

That rattled me a bit, but I pushed through and had the rest of the class focused on Frankenstein’s reaction to the creature when the principal came over the intercom putting the school in lockdown. She didn’t say her typical this is an ALICE drill, so the kids were a bit freaked out, but we sheltered in place for a bit. That’s when Christian showed me the video on his phone.

It was disgusting, but clearly fake. I told him it had nothing to do with the lockdown and to relax for a bit until the drill was over. Though, honestly I’m a bit freaked out, thus I’m writing this down. Probably get a good laugh out of it later.

11:30 AM

The kids are starting to complain about missing lunch, and I’m not really sure what to do. I’m sure the school will just push lunch back a bit. I tried to check with the teacher next door, but he brought his kids down to the computer lab. There hasn’t been any more announcements and the kids are starting to get anxious. A few have been trying their phones, but none of them seem to be working. I tried to text the daycare that has my kids, but nothing. I’m getting a little concerned.

12:00 PM

I’ve decided that the school is not going to be making any more announcements. Maybe this wasn’t just a drill. I’m going to get the students out of the school, then I’m going for my own kids. I hope this phone thing is just localized. School’s wifi isn’t working either, so I’m not all that confident that it’s local.

12:30 PM

Holy shit. Holy shit. We left the classroom about a half hour ago and I’m still shaking from this shit. My hallway, typically a quiet one anyway, was empty. Downstairs it was fucked up. I left the room with 18 kids, Sarah and Billy had left earlier and the other five kids from the class had been out with the flu, so I had 18 when I left. We all got out, but I do not know what happened on the first floor. Blood, so much blood.

Where the fuck were the police.

I sent the kids home. Most of them had cars or hitched rides with their friends. Six of them told me that their parents aren’t home and want to come with me. I don’t know.

12:40 PM

Went to the town hall to find help, someone to contact the kids’ folks. I knew when I opened the door that whatever had happened in the school had spilled over to the town hall. This is fucked up.

I keep trying to reach my kids’ daycare, but nothing. My wife isn’t responding to my texts either. What a fucking week to go to Boston.

There was a noise in one of the offices in the town hall, so I went in. Big mistake. Nothing was in there, but there was a lot of blood. Whatever had been in there was gone, thankfully.

1:35 PM

Got to my truck at the far end of the parking lot. Other side of the damn school from where we came out. I turned on the radio, and we listened.

Mostly just music, but NPR was reporting a sudden uptick in violence. After a bit of searching, I was able to find a DJ who was taking calls from people.

They’re saying it’s zombies. One person said that they came down stairs to see their toddler eating their cat. I don’t even know what I’d do.

I feel like shit, but I have to leave the kids. I have to get to my own children.

1:43 PM

I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t leave those kids alone in the parking lot. I’m pretty sure that this has to be some War of the Worlds shit, and I told them so too, but I couldn’t abandon my students. I mean if it were my kids . . . my kids. I’m dropping my students at one of their houses that’s on the way to my kids daycare. I just hope I’m not too late.

2:30 PM

I left the kids at one of their houses, no one was home, but they promised to lock the doors and get in contact with one of their folks. I left them my cell number, not that I’ve been able to use it much, still can’t reach my kids’ daycare or my wife. I’m still 20 minutes out from the daycare. The roads are mostly empty, lets hope they stay that way.

3:00 PM

They’re not there. I got the to the daycare, but it was empty. It’s her house, so I figured she’d be there no matter what. I don’t know where to go from here. I saw some people on the road, wandering. They looked like they were in shock. The whole way the radio is talking about zombies. I can’t believe it. I won’t believe it. There has to be another reason.

First, my kids.

I’m at a loss for where to go from here. They didn’t leave a note, but I know my daycare provider has kids in the high school and elementary school. If I were her, that’s where I’d go.

3:15 PM

I found her son, Jimmy. He was running home from school. Seems he’s been hearing the same shit I have about zombies. He believes it. Says he saw his principal attack some of the students.

3:25 PM

Jimmy and I got to the elementary school and it doesn’t look good. There’s about fifty people wandering around outside. Some are kids. Half of them are covered in blood and some seem to have lost limbs. Maybe there’s some credence to this whole zombie thing after all. If so, I really need to get my kids.

5:00 PM

We almost didn’t make it.

Jimmy and I were able to get into the school around back. I parked the truck on the road so the noise didn’t draw the attention of those wanderers . . . those zombies. No doubts now.

Inside was beyond words. My stomach is churning even now as I write it down. Those small bodies, some were still moving, but most of them were well beyond any help I could give. As soon as Jimmy and I came through the back door, we saw this little girl, sitting in the middle of the hallway rocking back and forth. I walked over to see if she was alright. As I got closer and cleared my throat to get her attention she turned and I saw those eyes. They looked like the eyes of a fish the day after it’s caught. Luckily I stumbled back because she lashed her arms out at me and fell over revealing the stump of her left leg that I can only assume she had been chewing on.

We were able to get away as she dragged herself across the hallway toward us and eventually found Marcy, my daycare provider, and several of the kids she watched. My daughter, her face streaked with tears and dirt, ran to me the minute that she saw me and hasn’t let go since. I didn’t bother with their car seats, with everything that was going on. Don't tell my wife, she’d probably be a bit pissed.

I’m worried about my wife, Alice. She’s still in Boston, and I can’t reach her.

5:30 PM

I never finished the story of how we got out of the school. After we met up with Marcy and the kids, Jimmy was relieved until he heard about Ken, his dad. I guess Marcy and Ken had been on the phone when his office was attacked by the zombies (damn still feels weird to write that). I didn’t hear the full story, but from what I gather, he was at least able to say goodbye to her before . . . well, before the screaming started.

We got a taste of that leaving the school. When I met up with Marcy, she had my two kids, Lucy and Adin, two other toddlers Abbie and Luka, and Marcy’s daughter Sarah. I know she was supposed to have two more kids, but I haven’t worked up the courage to ask about them yet. Lucky for us, Adin is a quiet baby otherwise we’d have been screwed. I carried him and Lucy out of the classroom that they had all hidden in and we headed for the door we’d come in. Problem was, we couldn’t see the light anymore because it was blocked by a mass of bodies. I’m guessing people who had the same idea as Marcy, just a little less luck.

We had to find a new way out, I knew the front was a no go, so we moved to one of the other doors. Most of the school was empty, but we saw a couple of those things, kids mostly (Sarah was barely holding it together, impressive though given that some of those kids were probably her friends). Marcy wanted to leave through the gym, but I’d seen enough horror stories to know that was a bad idea, so we found an art room with an outside entrance. The door was closed and the room was empty, which was good, but there wasn’t a window in the door to the outside. We took the chance and shoved the door open, there was some resistance, but Jimmy threw his entire weight into it and shoved whatever was behind it out of the way. Turned out to be a small child, well what used to be a small child, maybe kindergarten, snacking on the art teacher by the look of her reddening smock. The kid lashed out with his small read hands and grabbed ahold of Luka’s arm. He cried out as Jimmy grabbed in around the waist and pulled him away topping the kinder-zombie.

They never show that in the movies, the little kids, I never thought about it before, but there must be hundreds of kid zombies. Fuck.

We were able to get Luka away, but he was slick with blood. Jimmy held him tight and we all ran to the truck. Not meant to hold eight people, but we crammed in and sped off.

I brought everyone back to my house, less populated street, back in the woods. I’m hoping it will be safer. We’ve secured the house as best we can, we’re all hunkered down in the upstairs bedrooms. We have some weapons, a couple bats, a section of gas pipe, and a battery operated chainsaw. I have my fencing foil and a grinder to sharpen it, but I’m a little worried the noise will attract them.

It’s starting to get dark, and we decided not to turn on any lights tonight, so I’ll get more down tomorrow.

1:30 AM

My phone buzzed with a text message and woke me up. My students had retreated to their attic, and they said there was something down stairs. They want me to come and help them escape.

I looking at my daughter sleeping next to me, I want to stay put and keep her and my son protected. But I can’t help thinking if it where my kids, I’d want someone to help them. 

“Pimkit,” the controller called. “Provide the class with today’s liturgy from the Book of Journeys. You’ll find I’ve already uploaded it to your reader.”

A lanky, pimple faced kid pushes his chair back causing the worn metal legs to complain against the equally worn floor. Looking at his peers in their grey uniforms, sitting in this grey room, looking at their readers, eyes averted from the teacher and each other. Maxwell Pimkit lifted the black reader off his desk. It was his dad’s old model, not the sleek new ones his classmates had, but it got the job done.

“Today, Pimkit,” barked the controller, a heavyset man in the blue uniform of the low level bureaucrats.

Maxwell cleared his throat, inhaled the stale metallic tasting air, and tapped the screen on his reader to call up the day’s liturgy. “The Book of Journeys, Chapter five, verses 33 through 37. From the very dirt we were lifted up by science and made to be things of the firmament. We come from nothing, and back to nothing will we go, our service done to the community and the captain. As the fuel of our founders was used to propel raise us up from the dirt of our ancestors, so shall our bodies fuel future generations in both life and death.” When he finished, Maxwell stood transfixed by last six words, the finality and certainty of the Captains.

He knew why the controller made him read today, normally it was a reward for good behavior, but with Max, it was always something different. This time was the most cruel. Max had missed two days of Junket C to deal with his father’s suicide. Not deal with emotionally, the Captains had forced him to clean the bulkhead where his father had shot himself. They claimed it was the only way to clean the shame from his name because his father had deprived the community of an much needed engineer. It hadn’t worked. His fellow cadets in Junket C were relentless, but not as bad as the controllers.

“Sit down Pimkit,” the controller snapped.

Max felt his face burning as he sunk into his seat to a chorus of boys snickering under their breath. He tuned the rest of the lesson out and scrolled through the file’s on his dad’s old reader. Coming across an old program his dad had used to teach him basic programming when he was nine, Max dug into it remembering the patience that his dad showed while he was learning. he remembers every line of code. It created a little stick figure that danced across the reader’s screen. So simple, but his dad had been so proud of him when he’d finished.

Max was about to run the program when he saw an extra line of code that linked to a cold stored file somewhere else on the reader in a subroutine that Max didn’t remember. What really drew his attention is that the file it was supposed to pull up was titled PIP, a nickname his father used for him sometimes. He said it was from his favorite Earth-based author Ickenson or Dickman or something. Max ran the program and a passcode box popped up with the hint: Where did Pip go? Max typed in a few possibles, his mom, Dickman, Ickenson, Earth, but none of them worked. He swore under his breath and closed the program. Later, he told himself, I’ll look at his books unless the Sweepers had already been to our bulkhead.

“Pimkit,” the controller’s voice was barely restrained.

Max looked up to see his entire class staring at him. He felt his stomach drop out, like in the centrifuge, as he realized that the controller had asked him a question and was waiting for an answer.

“Today, boy,” there was no attempt this time to restrain the annoyance in his voice.

Just then the speaker in the room came to life with a sharp whistle before the voice of a Captain came through. “Maxwell Pimkit, report to Bulkhead seven foxtrot niner niner.” Then it simply cut out.

A smile crept across Max’s face as he shrugged, pointed to the speaker on the wall and said, “I gotta go.”

“Don’t keep the sweepers waiting like you kept us waiting,” contempt clear in the controller’s voice this time. “Have a little more decency than that loser of a father you had.”

This time the class laughed outright and nodded their heads. Suicide was considered the most selfish of crimes because it denied the community. At least his dad hadn’t jettisoned himself, then they would have taken Max’s stuff too, as it was, Max would be able to select three things of his father’s to keep, the rest would be used to make up for the loss of service by gifting to the Captains. He’d planned on keeping his dad’s bulky old reader, this strange puzzle box he couldn’t get open, and his dad’s old uniform, but now he’d have to take that old book.

On the way to the bulkhead they had shared, Max tried to figure out which of the other two things he’d let go of. The reader was too important to him, too many memories, and a chance to figure out why his dad had killed himself. The puzzle box was too intriguing to let go of. Max loved a challenge and his dad had always refused to tell him how to open it. He passed through the metal corridors of the ship into the bowels toward Junket C berth. He stopped at the corner of corridor 7F knowing this would be the last time he would enter the berth he and his dad had shared since his mother’s death. He felt the tears begin to bite at the back of his throat.

“Hey Max, you okay?” Sim’s soft voice wore down some of his resolve, and he coughed to keep the tears back. Sim the only person in Junket C who hadn’t turned on him since his father’s death.

“Ya,” Max looked at this feet. “I’m just getting my stuff. They’re moving me to Junket D to apprentice with the engineers. You know, fill in for my dad.” He knew it was a lie, orphs didn’t end up as engineers, but he didn’t want Sim to feel worse for him than she already did.

“I thought you were on track to being a medic?”

“Plans change,” Max shrugged helplessly. “Captains said: Everyone must work for the good of the community. All that fusion waste.”

Sim wrapped her arms around Max’s shoulders and gave him a quick kiss under his right eye. “It could work out, I hear they transfer the good cadets up to Junket B.”

“Rumors, Sim,” Max shrugged her arms off knowing this was goodbye, but not willing to say it. “Anyway, the goblins are waiting. See you around.”

“Yah,” Sim whispered as she watched Max round the corner and plod toward his old bulkhead. “See you around.”

The cleaners, or goblins as Max liked to call them, stood like statues in their green uniforms on either side of Max’s old bulkhead. They were there to make sure that Max only took his clothes and the three things he would keep from his dad, nothing else. Everything else belonged to the Captains. Max looked at the old uniform, the pictures of his parents, arm in arm on holiday in Excelsior IV. That trip had cost them three month’s of their combined salary, but they always said the trip was worth it because no trip, no Max. At the moment, Max was wondering if that would’ve been better.

“Your clothes have been packed and moved to Junket D. Pick your three items and get down there. You’re already late,” barked the taller of the two cleaners, though that wasn’t saying much.

Max walked past them, ignoring the late comment. He planned to take his time here although he already knew what he’d take. This was his chance to say goodbye, and he wasn’t going to let the goblins take that from him. His eyes wandered around the room as he walked to the book case. Everything in there was a memory for him. He ran his hand along the back of the old leather chair his father had brought with them when Max’s mother died and they were forced to move from Junket B to Junket C. Max had wanted to take that, but there was a space limit given to orphans. His items needed to fit into the footlocker at the end of the beds in the orphan dormitory. Dropping his hand from the back of the chair he went across to the book case. He knew the spine of the book he was looking for like he knew his father’s face, a worn green tinted leather, a luxury in space that his father had plenty of. His hand found it quickly, almost by memory, it was the last book his father had been reading, his bookmark still halfway through. Max pushed the bookmark further into the book to hide it from the eyes of the goblins so they wouldn’t count it.

Max went to the table next to his father’s chair. The wooden puzzle box sat there, no discernible seams. It’s dark polished surface had confused Max for years, but his father had always insisted that the thing could open, and he’d promised to show Max when he turned 18. He called it the time capsule. That wouldn’t happen now, Max though at he hoisted the box, too heavy for its size, under his arms and began to leave the room.

“’Bout time. They radioed for you twice Orph. Get your blasters down to Junket D or they’ll space that crap you took,” the goblin motioned toward the book and puzzle box. Turning to his partner, “Thankless orphs, you think he’d take a picture of his folks or something. Come on, lets get this crap down to fuel storage so they can burn it and we can go home.”

“Okay, but remember that the Captains wanted the stuff from the main room brought to their lounge.”

That was all Max could take, and he sped up to get away from the green vultures picking the carcass of a dead man. He shifted the heavy box a couple times on his walk and realized that the contents made no noise as he did. He hoped to himself that the time capsule puzzle box wasn’t one of his father’s jokes. Max shifted the heavy box again as he stepped out of the lift leaving his old bulkhead in the single family section of Junket C behind and headed to his new one in the Orphan section in Junket D. He was going from having his own bedroom to sharing a bunk bed with some kid he didn’t even know.

Max looked turned the corner into the empty bunk room. Twelve beds, six on six. Max looked for an empty one, it was easy enough to find because the trunk was propped open at the foot of the bed. Max sat down on his new bed, tucked back in the corner on the lower section of bunks, and turned on his dad’s old reader. He pulled up the subroutine PIP and opened the book and skimmed the first few pages to find the answer. After several unsuccessful tries Max typed in churchyard and the program began to run. A new set of text appeared on the screen that said Put them in and press here and a small compartment slid open on the side of the reader exposing two small ovals attached to wires. They looked like a modified ComCell used for the Captains to communicate orders to their workers without actually having to leave the Command deck on Celestial A. Max put the ovals in his ear as he’d seen his father do when he was headed off to work and tapped the screen. His father’s face appeared on the reader and his voice whispered through the specialized ComCells.

“Pip, if you’re hearing this, then I guess they finally caught up to me. I’m not sure how they did it, but I have to assume it was made to look like a suicide so they could get the contents of our bulkhead. Hopefully you took the puzzle box, and I’ll assume if you’re hearing this you have the book too. That’s good. Keep them safe.

“There are a few of us, five to be exact, but I can’t tell you names in case the Captains are listening, but we’ve found something out that they want to keep secret. We don’t know how to act on it yet, but we’re working on it. If you’re listening to this, that means I’m gone. It’s up to you to find them and take my place. They will be watching for you, but until they know you’re not just another wide-eyed Junket boy, they won’t approach you. Don’t worry, I know you well enough to know it won’t take too long for them to figure it out.

“Max, it’s real. Find them, and they’ll show you what we know. The Earth, Max,” his dad’s voice was getting louder. His eyes widened in excitement. “We can go back. It’s livable. The Captains don’t want us to know because they’d lose control,” Max heard his own voice calling in the background, muffled he recognized it. “I gotta go, but think of it Max. Remember the descriptions I used to read you from the stories. The sky, the fields. It’s all real. I wanted this for you so badly, bud. It’s up to you. Find the Earth, Pip. Take us home.”

The screen went black. 

Could I explore you through your Instagram?

Your photos show adventure, wanderlust,

Temporary moments; your epigram

lacks your residing presence among us.

The occasional overexposed pic

Or filter to cover some unseen flaw

Bends reality and skews the skeptic,

By intent or accident, you withdraw.

Your Instagram story can’t contain you

Or hold your life up to the light of day,

Because the life we let others into

In minutes will quietly fade away.

You’re more than a simple captured minute,

Your life’s influence will continue infinite.