Free The Last Days of October by Jackson Spencer Bell

folks say hey,
this looks like the work of that God we’ve been worshipping.   But who knows, right??   Maybe they were on to something.”
    “You can’t be
serious.”
    “Serious as a
motherfuckin’, cock-suckin’ heart attack.   This is some shit , Heather,
this is some crazy-ass fucked-up shit .   I mean, have you seen what’s happened to
people?   Have you seen one of them ?”
    Pain in her belly,
her throat.   Pain all over.
    Mike.
    “I have,” she said
softly.
    “Then can you
understand why some people might think hey, this is biblical.   Must be the vengeance of the Lord.   And why not?   Why wouldn’t He be pissed off?   We’ve been running all over killing people, torturing people, robbing
people.   All of us, every damn one of us
is in on it.   And morality?   Shit.   No such thing anymore.   Men not
only lying with men, but men marrying men and the government blessing it!   I
mean, what the fuck?”
    He shook his head,
which rotated on the spindle of his neck.
    “So maybe they
were right.   Maybe God said like Janet
Jackson, maybe God said, what have you done for me lately?   Jack shit, that’s
what.   And maybe He got sick of
that.   Maybe He said fuck this bullshit, we’re going back to the
basics.   We’re writing us a new chapter
in the Bible, because obviously these assholes forgot a few things.   Maybe He did.
    “But look, I
didn’t have shit to do with that out
there.   I came down the street, I heard
them yelling, I saw this shit going down and I got out of there A.S.A.P.   I’m a single man living alone.   For all I knew, they’d get it in their heads
that I’m one of these queers and string
me up, too.”
    The day just
beyond the plate glass window lit him from behind.   Shadows covered his narrow face, making it
difficult to read his expressions.   His
head seemed to have sunken even lower between his narrow shoulders.   His long arms dangled idly at his sides.   He had never looked more like a mantis.
    Please tell me this is not the last man on
Earth , she thought.
    He looked back
over his shoulder at the bodies hanging across the street and coughed.   He reached into his pocket and removed a handkerchief
into which he hawked something she was glad she couldn’t see.
    “Anyway,” he said,
“what brings you down this way?   Surely
you’re not planning on re-seeding your lawn or doing a tile backsplash at a
time like this?”
    “Camping
supplies,” she said.   She turned and
looked into the dark heart of the store.   She wondered if she’d have to go back there, or if she could talk Clyde
into doing it.   “We’re going to make a
run to Fayetteville, see if the army’s got
anything set up at Fort
Bragg.”
    “Who’s with you?”
he asked.   “Are you alone?”
    “No, I’ve got
Amber.”
    “You guys haven’t
found anybody else?   It’s just you?”
    “Just us,” she
confirmed.   It was dark back there, too
dark, but she could still see the racks on the wall at the very rear of the
store.   Off to one side, the door to the
stockroom stood closed, motionless.   If
she got too close to that door and there was something hiding in there…
    Suddenly, a
different thought pierced her skull.
    Ask him how he knew they were gay if he
wasn’t part of the mob.
    She froze.
    “Heather?” he
asked.
    She reached for
the Ruger as she turned, but she found that he’d moved right up behind
her.   And before she could ask, say or do
anything, his closed fist smashed into her face and made speech impossible.

 
    9.

 
    She couldn’t have been
out long.   She awoke moments later on her
face, draped over the stinking bags of insecticide at the front of the hardware
store.   Someone was unbuttoning her
jeans.   Unzipping them, jerking them
down.
    Clyde.
    “Oh, yeah,” he
said, panting.   “Gonna fuck you both, you
and her.   All day and all night.”
    Hands invaded her
underwear, fondled and squeezed her buttocks.   The side of her