Expiration Date

When I think about the end of the world, I taste Cheetos. It's weird, but that taste is one of the few things I really remember from the way things used to be. So unlike most of the people I know, I think about the Event pretty often.

On the Saturday morning it happened, my fiancé and I were watching a low-budget cable clip show. Harriet was laughing at some stupid reality show star, and I had my hand deep inside a bowl of what my grandpa used to call fuzzy worms because of because of the way the fake cheese powder sat on the elongated corn puffs.

I popped one into my mouth, and she was gone. There was no flash, no sound, no skip in the TV recording. One second Harriet was looking at me laughing, and the next second I was alone and the world had changed forever.

Nowadays, whenever I think about her--the last thing I saw as the world I knew ended--I taste Cheetos. And when you consider that it's been maybe twenty years since I've had cheese--real or fake--a phantom taste of Cheetos is pretty welcome.

I was just beginning to get the taste in my mouth when Norbert plopped down beside me. In some ways, his intrusion was a blessing. I didn't have to relive Harriet go from laughing and happy to not being there at all. I just got to remember her laughing face, which didn't happen nearly often enough. But I didn't get to taste Cheetos, either.

"What do you want?" I asked him, opening my eyes.

"Nothin," he said.

"What's the plan for today?" I tried to shake Harriet's face from my mind. I blinked a couple more times than was necessary. He noticed. He was used to me brooding or reminiscing or whatever else he said I did depending on his mood.

"She's gone," he said.

"Don't, Norbert. Just don't. Not right now."

"You know she's gone," Norbert said. "She ain't comin back. We've been through this before."

"I said not now."

"Yeah, right now. This has gotta stop, you daydreamin about her all the time. What do you think is gonna to happen?"

"I don't know, Bert."

"You think that we're just going to be walkin down the road and there she'll be, twenty years older, still in love, and searchin for you the way you're always lookin for her?"

"Norbert, I said I'm not doing this right now."

"Thing is, you're doin this all the time. I know you still care about her, but she's gone."

"I know," I said.

"I wonder sometimes. Point is, I don't like to see you hurtin like this."

"I'm fine, Bert. Really. I know she's gone. I am painfully aware of how gone she is. I just...I just can't help but want to see her again, you know? Once. Kind of like you and your parents. Don't tell me you never think about seeing them one more time."

Norbert grunted. That was below the belt, I know. He had been just a kid when the Event happened. His parents were arguing over the breakfast table about money, then they were gone. It seemed almost seemed quaint now--none of us had used money in nearly two decades.

Norbert closed his eyes and composed himself. I'd have to apologize for that remark later.

"Not gonna happen, man. They're gone, and so is she. Sorry."

"Yeah," I said. "I know. Either way, what's the plan for today? Get anything good in town last night?"

He shrugged. "I heard from Puckett last night the Rapture nuts might be coming this way. Probably not gonna be a good idea to stick around here."