Campbell_Book One

Chapter 12




February 2002

Los Angeles, West



“You got your tool kit?” Connor asked, looking like the cat that swallowed the canary from the driver’s seat of his father’s now very dented red Audi. “You’re going to need it.”

It was a hot day for February. It had been unseasonably warm for most of the winter, and as Tal peered up at the sun, he knew it was a better day to tend the garden than go on whatever fool’s errand Connor had in mind.

“Just tell me where we’re going,” Tal muttered, his hand on the doorknob to his house. “I have stuff to do.”

“Leah can do your f*cking laundry. It’s her job anyway.”

“Toilet’s clogged downstairs. And laundry isn’t her job, and if you keep talking like that, you’re never going to get laid.”

“I already got laid, for your information,” Connor said snidely. “She was a couple years older, big old boobies—”

“I hope you didn’t call them boobies,” Tal replied dryly. “Because there’s no way you got laid when there were still people a couple of years older, if you called them that.”

“Just because your balls haven’t dropped—”

“What? You’ve been spying in my room?” Tal raised his eyebrows, pleased with his retort. “Gross, man. Don’t look at my balls.”

Connor rolled his eyes. “Grow up. Anyway,” he pulled into the Warner Bros. studio lot. “I got my hands on the master key.”

“So we’re going on a tour?”

“No,” Connor snapped. “We’re going to see if we can use what’s in there to make ourselves gods. Film gods.”

“Film gods?” Tal scoffed. “Neither of us know anything about making movies.”

They made their way through the offices looking for anything of interest, dumping a couple of laptops in the trunk of Connor’s car before moving towards what looked like a production building. Connor picked the lock with a hairpin, and a minute later, they were in a long hallway, lined with doors. Connor picked one at random and they walked in.

Tal looked at the wire and button-filled sound board in front of him skeptically. “We don’t know how to work any of these things.”

“But we can learn,” Connor said, as they closed the door behind them and flicked on a few light switches. “This is it. This is how we get ahead.”

“I’m not following,” Tal said flatly.

“I’ve got enough money to finish some of these movies that are probably almost done, and then we release them, and make more money. The more money we have, the more power. Follow?”

When they looked around, they realized that they weren’t the first ones there. A lot of things had been stripped, including costumes and memorabilia, but most of the equipment was intact.

Behind further locked doors were the film reels and discs.

“Hard Sell?” Tal said, turning one over in his hands. “What the f*ck is Hard Sell? I haven’t even heard of it.”

Connor took the film from Tal and poked around until he found a projector. “Let’s find out.”



October 2012

Somewhere in Old Oklahoma



The field behind the house wasn’t new to Lucy and Tal. There were just too many bodies and they had to go somewhere. Seeing them on the surface though, hundreds of them, skeletal, dry fall grass popping up through the rotted clothing they’d likely died in—unless someone had cared enough to dress them in something more appropriate—left Tal both awestruck and drained. Being left behind when most of the people he’d known had died hadn’t been easy, especially in the beginning. Now, it was impossible not to see it as an incredible bit of luck when there was a spare minute to think about it, no matter how hard things were.


When he saw a burial sprawl, Tal mostly felt relief that none of his people were a part of one. He and Connor had worked hard to mandate mass burials after the fact, so there were few heaps like this in West. They walked past it silently, both of them relieved that they hadn’t noticed it the night before. Everyone knew you stayed away from burial sprawls. In the beginning, older kids had told the younger ones stories about them being haunted so they wouldn’t get infections from the rotting flesh, or go looking for their parents, but now that that stage was over, kids still avoided them. There was a certain sacrosanct quality to most of the sites. They were eerie. Lucy and Tal both walked quietly past it, careful not to disturb the site in any way.

“I fell into one of those once,” Lucy whispered, once they were a safe distance down the road. “Maybe five years ago. It had grown over and I was up north and I didn’t know where they were. I was right in the middle before I realized.” She shivered. “They lasted a long time up there because of the winter. A couple of years at least. We burned a lot of ours.”

“We dug big holes a couple of years after and covered up all the ones we could,” Tal whispered back. “There are these giant pits just outside the city.”

“That’s better,” Lucy nodded. “We’ve got one in town, but none of those people mean anything to me.”

“Imagine if we were in university right now, if the world was right. Junior year, I think it was called.”

“I’d probably not be in university,” Lucy said, a grim smile on her face. “I’d probably be dead, or in jail.”

“Why?” Tal asked curiously, before realizing what she meant. “Oh.”

“Medicated to an inch of my life, I’m sure,” she said wryly. “It’d be great. I’d have my own cell, and not a care in the world.”

Tal wasn’t sure he believed that, but he did understand why she had to. “I’d probably be looking to law school in a couple of years. My brothers would probably be married, thinking about kids. It would be very different.”

“Girls who are sexually abused as children often grow up with self-esteem issues,” Lucy replied, like she was reading a textbook. “They often suffer from depression, and try to take control of their lives in unhealthy ways, including eating disorders and promiscuity, and—”

“Trying to take over the world?”

“I doubt the study found that result very often.”

“I’m glad he’s dead,” Tal said thoughtfully. “I bet he is too, especially if he could see you now.”

Lucy nodded in agreement. “I think I’d always kill him, in every life, every scenario. I think it was either me or him.”

“Is he in a field like that?”

“He’s in a hundred pieces scattered far enough apart that they’d never find each other. A field like that was too easy.” She glanced at Tal carefully. “I don’t…remember it all. I think so much happened after that other memories took the place of some of it.” She looked down at her body. “When I think about it, it’s like it happened to a different person. I didn’t look like me then.”

“That’s probably better.”

“I think so,” she nodded sharply. “We need to eat.”

“And find water.”

“Water’s easy,” Lucy shrugged. “We’ve walked by lots of water. Apparently enough that we’re close to Miami, according to that sign.” She pointed to a road sign with a faded casino billboard a few feet away. “You got your Speedo?”

“I don’t think it’s that Miami,” Tal said with a grin, before he realized that she was joking.

The next water came in the form of a wide river with a shallow, rocky bank that the road crossed, and Lucy scrambled down to it without a second thought, desperate for a drink and to wash her face. Tal was glad it wasn’t hot enough for either of them to smell offensive, but he knew the stench of body odor would be unavoidable after a couple of days.

“We need to steal a truck or something,” she grumbled, as they both slipped their shoes to dip their feet in the river. Tal’s ached from all the walking. “And we need a map.”

“In the middle of butt-f*ck nowhere?” Tal muttered back, splashing a little. “I don’t know where we’re going to find either of those things.”

“We must be almost there. We made it pretty far in the car.”

“I can’t believe no one lives anywhere out here.” Tal shook his head. “It’s not like this in the city.”

“There are lots of empty places like this in Campbell. Kids like living with other kids.”

“Yeah, it’s like that in LA too. There aren’t a lot of empty spaces though. Lots of kids moved into the city from the country after it happened, so it’s pretty crowded. Lots of groups though. Some of them make sense, and some are really random.”

Lucy nodded, splashing her feet in the cool water. “We’ve got our groups too. There’s something so lovely about being free to find your own pack.”

“We need a boat,” Tal said, thinking about his small group. A pang of guilt hit him when he realized he hadn’t called them. “I bet the stream leads into those lakes where we’re supposed to go.”

“I wish I knew geography better,” Lucy sighed. “I guess it is flowing south.”

“It’s probably a more direct route than the road.”

“With better odds of getting lost,” Lucy looked at Tal thoughtfully. “But we’re pretty lost anyway.”

“We’ll just follow the road a little longer. See what this casino is.”

Instead of the casino, they found a road south, and some indication that they were already in Oklahoma. In fact, before long they began seeing signs for Grove. Twenty-five miles.

“At least we’re going in the right direction,” Lucy mused. “That’s something.”

“It’s going to take us two days,” Tal grumbled. “Which means we’ll really need to get some food.”

They continued along, ignoring the sounds the other’s stomach as a deep hunger set in. An hour later, something caught Tal’s eye that Lucy had missed. A bike, discarded in a ditch. They both paused as they heard playful laughter off in the distance. Tal narrowed his eyes and took in the first people they’d encountered all day.

“This is a park,” Lucy said enthusiastically, as Tal climbed down and fished the bike out. “Look. Picnic tables, and a playground. We’re somewhere.”

“You want to have a picnic?” Tal chuckled. “Come on. Let’s get out of here before they realize we stole it.”

Fear crossed Lucy’s face, and she stammered, “There’s only one. What are we going to do?”

Tal took the bike and started walking quickly, until they were what he deemed to be a safe distance away. “You’re going to climb on the handlebars and we’re going to get where we’re going.”

Lucy raised her eyebrows. “We are, are we?”

“Yep. I’ve done it a million times. You’ve just got to keep your balance, and I’ll keep mine. Just keep your feet off the wheel.” He swung his leg over the low center bar and held it in place. “Of course, it’s a girl’s bike, and too small,” he grumbled. “It’ll do.”


“So I just climb up?”

“You’ve never ridden on the handlebars before?”

She shook her head. “I can’t do it. Ride one.”

Tal grinned at her, his eyes twinkling. “We’ll have to fix that.”

It took them a while to get their movements in sync and Tal quickly discovered that Lucy had terrible balance, after landing on the ground twice. Once they got going, she figured it out and they started making progress, though much slower than they would have without her on the front.

Tal was hungry, and tired, but Lucy up there, on the handlebars, the wind in her hair, the fresh air from the lake revitalizing her, was the most beautiful thing Tal had ever seen. He rode steadily, dodging the massive cracks in the road emerging after ten years of disrepair. Once in a while he’d catch Lucy’s infectious smile when she’d turn her face to look at something, and he felt a small bit of satisfaction knowing that he’d had a part in it. He’d seen her smile before, but not with such abandon.

“Ten miles!” she shouted, nodding at a sign. “Good work, Tallie!”

“I’m so hungry I could eat a f*cking horse!” he shouted. “There better be food in Grove!”

“They’ll have food!” the girl on the handlebars shouted back. “I bet good food. Look, you can see the fish jumping!”

Tal put the brakes on and they slowed down to look at the fish, leaping everywhere, creating intersecting ripples as far as they could see. “If Grove sucks, we’re coming back here!” Tal exclaimed, his eyes darting between the splashes. “I love fishing.”

“You love fishing?” Lucy said in a tone that insinuated that she unable to imagine it. “You’re a city boy.”

“I used to go with my dad and brothers. I mean, we’d need sticks, and string—”

“We’ll come back anyway,” Lucy said, smiling brightly. “I like it too.”

They made it to Grove as the setting sun lit the sky on fire over the lake, and the late fall leaves made it hard to tell where the sky ended. Grove was a ghost town; no signs of life anywhere. They walked the bike for a while and once they crossed Main Street when they saw a person in the distance. As they grew nearer, both Tal and Lucy’s posture stiffened, unsure if they were encountering a friend or a foe.

The boy that approached them was probably fifteen, with a shaggy mop of brown hair and a pair of sweatpants that matched his grey t-shirt. He looked nonplussed at the two of them, offering a small grin.

“‘Sup,’” he said, with a nod.

“Do you know Red Cloud?” Lucy asked. “We’re here to see him.”

“He’s at the site already. Always goes early.”

“What site?” she replied coolly. “How do we get there?”

“First timers?” The kid nodded, looking them up and down. “Cool. It’s out at Honey Creek Park. Just keep going along here and turn at the sign. Can’t miss it.”

“Is there food there?”

“We got a pig going,” the kid chuckled, a huge grin on his face. “Lots of food. Got to keep your energy up.”

Tal glanced at Lucy, wondering if she’d left out some important information. “For—”

She cut Tal off. “Right!” she laughed. “Okay, well, thanks.”

“Maybe I’ll see you there,” he said, giving them a nod as he continued on his way.

Although they both noticed, they ignored the fact that the boy’s eyes had lingered on Lucy for a little too long. “Back on the bike?” Lucy asked, with a grin. “I mean, if we’re going a little way. It’ll be faster.”

“If you want a ride, just ask,” Tal smirked.

“Keep your hands off my ass this time.”

He shook his head. “Can’t. Your ass is on the handlebars. It’s the price you pay.”

“Well,” she frowned playfully. “I hope you’re not enjoying it.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Tal replied, coolly raising his eyebrows at her as he climbed on the bike, unwilling to admit that he was enjoying it very much. “Let’s get wherever we’re going before dark.”

The path to the park was covered with colorful leaves, and Tal found himself questioning why Lucy’s friend was sending them there. It felt like they were being lead to the middle of nowhere, and it unnerved him after the few days they’d had.

“What do you think they’re doing there?” he asked when they turned onto the road with signs for the park. “Some sort of party?”

“Could be anything,” Lucy said, turning as much as she could on the handlebars to look at Tal in the fading light. “I don’t know much about Red Cloud. He’s someone Bull knows from when they were young.”

Tal pulled over as the headlights from a truck lit up the road. The driver gave a wave, bottle of something in hand.

“Probably a party, huh?” Tal noted, as they resumed.

“The question is, what kind of party?” Lucy countered, as they made their way towards light and a chatter that grew louder by the minute. “Ever been to a rave?”

“I don’t really do drugs,” Tal replied, hopping off the bike to walk. “I’ve gone, but I usually make it like, an hour before I’m bored and annoyed.”

“There’s no club music, so it’s probably not a rave,” Lucy said, curious, as people started walking past. A few at first, then more. Older kids, younger kids, babies. “Everyone’s dressed, so it’s not an orgy.”

Tal’s nose twitched as he started to smell food. Barbecue if he had to guess. “Let’s find your friend’s guy and get settled in.”

Minutes later, they were pointed in direction of an individual who was not what either of them were expecting. Red Cloud was about Tal’s age, if he had to guess, slight, with a shock of rough ginger hair and crooked teeth. He stood about Lucy’s height.

“My grandfather was Cherokee,” he shrugged, taking in Lucy’s amused expression as he introduced himself. “I thought Red Cloud was ironic.”

“Good to be here,” Lucy said, when he offered his hand to shake. “So Bull called you?”

“We sent a couple of search groups out for you last night.” He smiled, as Lucy and Tal stiffened, realizing who exactly they’d hidden from the night before. “You’re really in hiding, huh?”

“Yeah, for now,” Lucy said quietly, smiling at Tal.

Tal realized that he was happy they hadn’t found them and he and Lucy spent the day the way they did, especially now that he knew they’d be able to eat. “Hopefully not for long.”

“Well, people here are pretty self-absorbed. No one really knows who you are.” He waved around. “It’s harvest week. We party pretty hard, but you’re welcome to stay. The whole town is here.”

“We’re really hungry,” Tal said, willing his stomach to be quiet. “I could really go for some food.”

“Eat up, Westie,” Red Cloud said, chuckling. “What’s ours is yours. We’ll put whatever you eat over there to shame.”

“Thanks,” Tal said genuinely. “And thank you for putting us up.”

“You can’t let Lucy Campbell wander around your land without offering her shelter,” Cloud said with a shrug. “And I’m not into starting a war with West either.”


Tal couldn’t get over how people welcomed two strangers into their world that brought nothing, and asked for nothing in return. He ate, and drank the wine he was offered, and for a time, completely forgot that he’d been kidnapped and brutalized four days earlier. He lost Lucy as the evening progressed, trading her somewhat bristly company for quite the opposite—a pretty blonde named Sarah, who thought he was far more interesting than he considered himself. When he looked around, he realized that most of the people that had been milling around laughing and chatting had paired off and were partaking in another form of entertainment that was more horizontal in nature.

“Oh, this always happens,” Sarah giggled, stumbling and joining her townspeople on the ground. “More babies are born nine months after this week than any other time.”

Tal sat down beside her. “How old are you?”

“Seventeen,” she said, scooting closer to Tal. “I’ve only been here two years. Came up from Georgia with a boyfriend who moved on a year ago.”

“Where’d he go?”

“Don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “He was just gone one day, like people are sometimes.”

A bunch of tents he hadn’t noticed earlier began to light up around them, most of them small, like one he remembered using when his dad had taken him and his brothers camping for a weekend somewhere on the central coast. There was a certain voyeuristic element to the whole thing, and as he listened to Sarah describe the festival, the breakdown of the long-held values that most of the people surrounding him had been born with had never been more obvious.

“So you pick someone you like. This week it can be anyone. Doesn’t have to be the person you’re usually with.” Her arm snaked around, linking with Tal’s. “It’s just a bit of fun. The kids that aren’t teenagers yet watch the younger ones after dark, and we all just stay out here without a care in the world—”

“What about when it’s over?”

Her big blue eyes looked up at him. “I guess you decide what you want then. We’re all too young to be so serious all the time.”

“And what about the babies?”

“Everyone chips in and raises them together. It’s a real community here. A family. It’s why I stayed.”

Tal’s foggy mind raced not with the niceties of the situation, but with all the problems that could result from what she’d told him, as her quick hands reached for the button on his jeans.

“I don’t have a condom,” he mumbled, as he lay back in the grass, and let her tug at his pants. “Sorry.”

“That’s not a problem,” she purred.

“It is for me,” he replied, shoving her hands away.

“So what? I’m just supposed to get you off?” Sarah sat up and cocked her head at him, her nostrils flared. “I’m just supposed to suck your dick?”

Tal swallowed, instinctively moving his hands to cover himself in case he’d made her irrationally angry. “Well, no, I just mean that I don’t want—”

“F*ck you,” she spat. “You don’t get to have your cake and eat it too.” She stood. “You’re a selfish West piece of shit. Good to know everything we’ve heard about you a*sholes was right.”

“What just happened?” Tal said, blinking at her. “Did you…are you trying to get pregnant?”

“I should have had one by now.” She crossed her arms and cast her gaze on the ground. “We all need to do our part.”

“What?” he croaked. “Your part?”

“To make our community strong. And you’re from outside. Someone new.” Her eyes darkened. “You wouldn’t have to be here—”

Tal quickly buttoned his fly and scrambled to his feet, putting his back against a tree. “Sorry, I can’t…that’s…no.”

She gave him one final glare and then stomped off into the woods. Tal slumped down against the tree, his heart thudding hard. He’d dodged a bullet, he thought to himself, as he relaxed slightly and resigned himself to a night alone, unwilling to take the chance on anyone else that might be more aggressive with the same mandate. He found a jug of water and drank deeply, the water stilling the churning in his stomach from the wine and food.

Tal felt like an observer in a foreign land as he walked around the park, bodies writhing in the dim light from lanterns in the tents. A few hadn’t made their way inside and littered the ground with flailing limbs and purposeful movement.

It was then that he began to wonder where Lucy was, since this was even less her scene than his. He continued his walk, this time with purpose, looking and listening for something familiar that might indicate where she’d ended up.

“She’s with someone,” a voice from behind him said. “Over there.” He turned around to see Red Cloud nodding at a small green army tent as he came to stand beside Tal.

They both watched, intensely silent as the shadow of a head poked up, with an accompanying pair of breasts, which matched what Tal imagined Lucy’s to be like.

“Who?” Tal whispered, finding himself bothered by the prospect. “Who’s she with?”

“Stacy, I think. She’s…she’s more interested in that than our kind.” Red Cloud shook his head disapprovingly. “But she pulls her weight.”

Tal felt a strange weight lift. “Oh.”

“They spent most of the night together, talking. I guess it’s easy to spot when someone’s like you when you haven’t seen anyone in a while.” He shrugged and pulled a t-shirt on. “I trust you’re enjoying yourself?”

“Yeah, it’s fine,” Tal replied, hoping he wouldn’t ask for specifics.

“Well, enjoy as much as you want. The more the better,” he said brightly, a gleam in his eyes. “I’ll see you around.”

It was weird, seeing the world through the perspective of the people here. Tal sat on a rock not far from where Lucy was. Although he felt invasive, he didn’t feel entirely comfortable leaving her alone and probably drunk, in a park full of procreators.

He tried not to listen too closely to the whimpers and moans, the kisses, and everything else that he was overhearing, but it proved difficult, and once again, he let his imagination run wild until he was too tired to think anymore.



***



Lucy found her traveling companion passed out in the woods a few feet from her designated tent about an hour later, after her bedmate had departed, off to find someone to help her with a biological requirement that Lucy couldn’t meet. It was for the best anyway. Lucy had felt incredibly guilty from their first kiss for myriad of reasons, none of which made a hell of a lot of sense, and was part way into things before she realized the girl was not her type, and was, in fact, quite aggressive. She found her head swimming, a mix of wine and confusion. Things had never been blurrier. In trying to prove something to herself, she was less sure than ever.

“Tal,” she whispered sharply, poking him. “Come on. I’ve got a tent.”

Tal blinked and groaned a little, obviously stiff from laying on the ground. “What? I was sleeping.”

“There are blankets in the tent. And a mattress. It’s just me.” She looked at him, her eyes wet and sad. “You don’t have to sleep out here.”

She extended her hand, and he took it, stumbling a bit as she helped him up. “I’m not really that drunk,” he whispered. “Just fast asleep.”


“Whatever,” she replied. “Come on. Let’s get some sleep.”

Lucy didn’t miss Tal’s nose twitch as he entered the tent, the smell of sex heavy in the air.

“Just go to bed, okay,” she muttered, tossing him a pillow. “No comments.”

“This girl tried to get me to knock her up,” Tal grumbled. “It’s like they’re running some weird baby factory.”

A sleeping bag was bitterly hurled in his direction and Lucy climbed into hers, zipping it up. “Whatever floats their boat. Everyone seems pretty happy to go along with it.”

“But—”

“Look,” she whispered, leaning in close to him. “We can rant about it later because I agree with you, but the walls are thin and we need to make friends while we’re here. You need to learn to stop saying out loud every thought that crosses your mind.”

“All right, all right,” he muttered, curling up and looking more comfortable than he had been outside. “At least they know how to make camping good.”

“Amen to that,” Lucy replied, yawning as she switched off the lantern. “Night.”

“Night,” Tal whispered back. “I didn’t, you know.”

“What?”

“F*ck her. The girl.”

Lucy found her heart unexpectedly in her throat. “Okay, Tal.”

“I couldn’t...” he continued. “It was too weird.”

“Night,” Lucy repeated, happy it was dark, and Tal wasn’t telepathic and able to access her squirrely mind.

There were days she wished she didn’t have access to it either.