Before you die, they say your whole life, good and bad, flashes before your eyes. All the things you regret, and all the things you’re proud of. But when everyone around you has been crushed by what seemed to be the end of the world, and you’re still living, your life replays on an endless, stretched out reel, repeating itself every single day.
All the luxuries that portrayed themselves as being important were now lost, and therefore you were stuck with nothing but your raw instincts and involuntary grief that would creep over you when you least expected it to. With those luxuries that had been obliterated, hope had gone too. You have nothing to live for when the family you toiled to create was blotted out by soot and fire, and the crumbled remnants of buildings that once grazed the English skies surrounds you interminably. Your friends might be scattered memories, but there is nothing to remind you of them. Soon, they will be forgotten, just as your identity will. You are one among the few living, a scavenging creature surviving off of what was left behind. You can either join forces and risk your head being blown off by a fellow straggler’s unclean gun, or stumble through the rubble on your own and learn from your minimal mistakes.
“What’s your name?”
“Does it really matter anymore, mate…?”
“Don’t play smart with me, what’s your name?”
“John.”
“Last name?”
“Entwistle.”
There he stood at the entrance to an abandoned grocer, no longer high and mighty, only recognised by awestruck faces, the one-and-only John Alec Entwistle. No one cared to push and shove to see him anymore—why would one waste precious time on a celebrity that was nothing to a world destroyed and was making no noticeable return. Society had been outrun by the sheer importance of survival. People defined themselves now with what they knew, not with celebrities and politics.
A man with a worn face smudged with soot, looking to be in his late 40’s, planted himself at the front glass doors, guarding, and refused to let John in until he told him who he was. The man’s hazy blue eyes flicked over a small paper packet he had clutched in calloused fingers. With a fleeting glance, John could only make out names in spotty black ink that had been scrawled hurriedly in a column. One name stood out to him – Joseph E. Stratford. It seemed oddly familiar to him, but he couldn’t recall where he had heard or seen it. No matter.
“Right. You can pass. You know the rules.”
Nodding absently, the former bassist passed through the split glass doors, snatching up a spare cart from the stack that had been knocked over in what the living citizens called “The Bomb Storm”. After all that had happened, it was all John could think about – but now, business was business and he had not a thought spared on the event.
The store had several aisles, illuminated dimly by flickering ceiling lights. Plaster dust sifted through the cracks in the ceilings, causing an eerie whispering sound to travel throughout the building. Other than the sound of people’s shoes against the battered linoleum floors, it was silent— the sort of silent that cried death and despair, empty of love and hope. John carefully stepped over a fallen shelf, his gaze fluttering over the shattered jars of pickled peppers and jams, the contents mixed with dust and glass. Entering an aisle complete with breakfast meals and pre-cooked dinners, John’s hand shot out to grasp an assortment of granola bars, packets of oatmeal, and some strange chicken dish to be heated up over a fire. Hearing a shuffling nearby, he stole a glance over his shoulder at a young boy in his teens perusing the derelict dairy section against the wall.
“’Ey, the rules are not to get any dairy, fella. It’s for the safety of your own health. It’s all gone bad,” he spoke up, stopping momentarily in the centre of the refuse-ridden aisle.
“That’s a rotten rule – we’re taking whatever we can find. Can’t you see? England’s a bleeding ruin, mate! Why don’t you pester someone else, y’great brute.” The kid plucked a milk carton from the shelf and glared irately at John before storming off around the corner, his boots knocking through fallen boxes of kitchen sponges.
Well, he knew one thing for sure. Dairy wasn’t the only thing that had gone bad around here. Retreating from the store, John waved a thoughtful goodbye to the man keeping guard at the entrance. Unexpectedly, he remembered where he had seen Joseph E. Stratford. On the telly! He was a well-known criminal around England before WWIII, charged for murdering 2 families. So this man was keeping watch for the dangerous men, was he? All John could think was, And what if he encounters one of the men on that list. Where’s his backup?
The walk back to where he currently held his living quarters was long, tedious, and strenuous on the nerves. All around were the skeletons of once famous buildings that had attracted tourists from every corner of the world. Even Harrod’s, John’s selected favourite men’s clothing store was on the way back to home, but it had been burned and scorched, the windows broken, and fire still licked the ceilings in the back of the store. Streets held empty, dilapidated cars, some with limp, decaying bodies strung over the seats. Stopping in the middle of a wide road, John looked down the length of it, capturing it all in full view. As if he was viewing a movie at a theatre, he saw the jagged outlines of bombed buildings, smoke rising from apartments and houses, the sky stained with the thick soot, air hazy and heavy. Dark, black, and threatening storm clouds rolled in from the east, igniting with lightning flashes not too far off. Not wanting to risk getting caught in the rain, John hurried over the ruins, just getting to safety under the roof of the neglected antique store that he had accommodated as his own. The rain began to pour relentlessly, rattling the weak windows with the stormy wind. The atmosphere at a standstill in the lifeless store, John set down what he had retrieved at the grocer, removing his coat as he stood in front of an old mirror. He had gotten tired of seeing the same depressed and hapless face glowering back at him. Mangled strands of long black hair hung about his sickly pale face, eyes sunken and shrouded with the shadow of his firm brow. He was unshaven, black quills coating his jaw and part of his throat, his lips dry and cracked. Not wanting to look any longer at what he had become, he moved away from the mirror, sitting down on the staircase which led up to a demolished and devastating upper level. He pulled a granola bar from the box, peeling back the cellophane and taking his first bite of food to satisfy his hunger that had been clawing at his belly for 2 days straight.
Where were they? Dead, probably. John could only hope that his wife and child were safe, and his band mates had joined together with their families and were prospering and living well somewhere off over the hills. But what were the odds of that? Was he selfish enough to think that he was the only one living? His gaze shot over to the handgun resting on his desk, the one that he thought of putting to the back of his throat every night. To pull the trigger and be free. Of course, he couldn’t do that. If they were alive, then they needed him. And he could not rob them of his friendship and loyalty.
