Free Black Friday by Ike Hamill

backed up to the marsh—gave them enough sunlight to warrant the panels. Robby visited several before settling on one. It seemed designed to live either on or off the grid. Inverters, a bank of batteries, and a generator would supply the house with power. In the attic he found a water storage tank that would gravity-feed the taps. A wood stove on the first floor looked big enough to heat the whole space. Robby left the dirty Hyundai up the street and locked all the doors before exploring the house from attic to cellar. He found no signs of the owners except their possessions, which suited Robby fine.
    That night he slept fitfully, still haunted by thoughts of Lyle, but at least he slept in a warm bed.

CHAPTER 10: JUDY

    J UDY PUSHED THROUGH THE door to the convenience store. She had pictured the place as a cold, dark, still-life. In her mind the store would be a snapshot of normalcy—undisturbed shelves and a bell over the door that would announce her arrival.
    Real life was messy.  
    A display case of chips had been turned over and she crunched through cheese puffs scattered on the floor. An evil brown ooze was leaking from the bottom of the ice cream freezer. Judy made her way around the counter. She took a pack of cigarettes and put them in her pocket. Her eyes went to the lottery tickets.
    Judy laughed at herself as she grabbed one of the tickets and started to pull them from the roll. It was one of those twenty-dollar game tickets that takes about ten minutes to scratch off. She folded up several dozen tickets. and put them in her pocket next to the pack of cigarettes. She started to walk away and then turned back. She pulled another pack of cigarettes and added them to the first.  
    There were bags behind the counter. It would be easy to take all the packs, before someone else could take them. She didn’t want that kind of commitment. In her head, she was still an ex-smoker, who just happened to cheat every so often. So what if she happened to cheat every single day?
    Judy was halfway out the door when she turned back. Did someone knock over that rack and then get sucked up into the sky? Or maybe were they still around? She turned her back on the store and rushed down the street.

    ✪   ✪   ✪   ✪   ✪

    Judy walked down the hill to the foot of the bridge. There was a little snow on the sidewalk. It crunched under her shoes as she looked across the water. Judy lit one of her stolen cigarettes and contemplated. This was a different bridge than the one she’d tried before. It was too much to hope that someone would be alive on the other side. While she watched, she didn’t see any movement at all over there.  
    Not a single car, or pedestrian, or even a trail of smoke from a chimney—the other side was just as empty as where she stood.
    Still, she had to try.
    Judy gathered herself and stared across the bridge.
    The wind was cold. It cut right through her jacket. Her cigarette almost went out. She flicked it down into the water and stopped to watch it tumble. When it was out of sight she took another one out and lit it. After a single puff, she let it fall too.  
    It was a pleasant illusion, the way the cigarettes disappeared before they hit the water. They became completely indistinct long before the water claimed them. She could imagine that they’d gone to a safe, warm place. She lit another.
    This one, she smoked for a little while. She crossed her arms and looked out at the horizon. The gray sky met the ocean at a spot where they seemed to agree on a common color. The whole world went to gray there.
    Maybe this was how everyone died. Maybe the world disappeared one person at a time until it was completely empty. What if all she needed to do was let go? Then maybe she would be at peace.
    The idea was compelling. It was simple, and easy to test.
    She glanced down at the water. If this were the end, and eternal peace was at hand, there ought to be a guide. A friendly spirit, maybe someone she knew,