What Comes After

July 16

The meeting was at two in the afternoon, so Mom and Dad grabbed everyone at one, so we'd arrive there in time. At one in the afternoon in the middle of summer, it was in the mid-fifties. That's what we'd normally see in the middle of autumn. I can't imagine what winter will be like.

The town was desolate. There were some charred remains of cars, and some of the glass had been shattered, but it looks like someone has been cleaning it up, sweeping all the glass to the sidewalks and laying out bright orange cones. But as we approached city hall, there seemed to be more people. Lots of more people. There were at least a hundred waiting outside to enter and who knows how many more inside.

Mom and Dad were wary as we stepped in line. I think they were worried about other people bringing guns or knives or other weapons. "Remember to stick together," Mom said. "If anything goes wrong, find each other first."

"How long do you think it's going to take?" May asked.

"At least an hour," Dad said. "People are going to be asking questions: water, heating, food, gasoline, electricity."

"Do you guys actually think something bad is going to happen though?" I asked.

"No," Mira said. "I can see that they're doing metal detector checks and searching through everyone's belongings. No gun or knife will ever be able to make it through."

Mom piped in. "I saw somewhere that people can manufacture plastic guns usi—"

"Mom," May said. "Sometimes you watch too much TV."

"I don't even know why someone would bring a gun," I added. "I mean I get the whole sense of protection thing, but like, doesn't that put everyone else in danger."

"When people are scared, they'll do anything to protect their family," Dad said. "It doesn't matter if it's logical or not, a gun gives people a sense of safeness, and that's what they're going to listen to."

The security guard by the door made us take off our jackets and go through the metal detectors. If we had any weapons, they'd tag them and leave them off to the side for you to pick up after the town hall was over. I saw the stacks of guns. There weren't as many as I expected— roughly twenty or so small pistols— but that's still a lot.

The room was packed. There were some volunteers unfolding and arranging chairs, cramming them together to fit as many people as they could. Mira and May managed to snag some seats in the back, but Mom, Dad, and I had to stand with Grandma and Grandpa. I spotted Charles in the crowd and waved to him.

He waved back and weaved through the crowd to get to me.

"You're here," he said.

"And you're here too," I replied. "Are you ready to watch the town hall?"

"Yeah. But we're mostly here for the food."

"How many people do you think would be here if no one got bribed?"

"Probably two people, maybe three," he said. "You seem like the type of person that'd be there."

"I don't know if that was an insult or a compliment."

"Think of it as both," he said. "Anyway, you probably should get back to your family. The whole thing seems to be starting."

"I'll see you next week."

"You better," he said. "I'm still waiting on your first wish."

I went back to Mom and Dad. They managed to find one more seat, so Grandma and Grandpa could take the first two while Mira and May shared the third.

A man walked onto the stage. I believed that he was our mayor, but I wasn't sure what his name was. He stepped up to the podium and adjusted the microphone. The whole place was silent because everyone wanted to know what he was going to say.

"We're in dark times now. There is no denying it. Many of our families were affected by the floods and many of us had people close to us who passed away because of this disaster."

"I understand your fear. It will be tempting to give into it, especially when hope is difficult to find. But we mustn't give into it," he said. "Last week, there were massive demonstrations that quickly turned violent. Many people were hurt, including young children and the elderly."

"This is not who we are. We must be stronger than to give into fear and anger, to succumb to these counterproductive attitudes. People say that disaster brings out the best and worst in people. I want this to bring out the best. We must stay strong as a community. We must help each other and those in need. We must shine a light on fear and anger and embrace hope. Only then can we rebuild our society and our humanity together."

There was a scattered applause. The speech was pretty impressive, and in any other circumstance, he would have received a standing ovation. But today, everyone was too scared and worried that his message of hope just rang hollow.

"So I've set up a donation box," he added. "I know that many of you have hoarded food and other supplies. But some of us have not been so fortunate. Donating food will be a step in the right direction in helping all of our community prosper. Remember, we must embrace hope and reject fear."

"Now I will be taking questions."

A dozen hands shot up. He picked on a random person.

"When will the electricity be back?"

"We don't have a timeline for that yet. Much of the infrastructure to generate electricity has been damaged, so we are still coordinating with the state to resolve this issue," he said. "For now, only essential locations will receive electricity. The hospital, fire station, and police station will all be up and running."

"And the mayor's house," someone in front of me grumbled. "I heard that his house still has power."

The mayor pointed to another person. "Will we be losing natural gas?"

"Not in the near future."

"What's that supposed to mean? Are we going to lose heating or not? Answer the question."

"Yeah!" someone else in the audience shouted. "What are you trying to hide?"

"The situation right now is extremely volatile," he said. "I cannot make guarantees about when we are going or not going to lose gas."

"What about water?" an old woman in the front asked.

"As far as I can tell, we are not losing water anytime soon," he said.

"So you don't know?" a man in the audience shouted. "Do you know anything? Because all I'm hearing is I don't know."

Our mayor was floundering, and I felt bad for him. With everything going on and the world being in total chaos, his job is pretty hard.

"School?" another woman said. "My kids are going to high school. Will they be open?"

"Yes," the mayor said, probably grateful that someone brought that up. There were some groans in the audience. "School will continue as usual, beginning in mid-August."

"But how are our kids going to read without electricity?"

"We will be preparing lanterns and flashlights for students in the classroom. Furthermore, all online curriculum will be adjusted so that we will be able to do it without computers or the internet."

He fielded a couple more questions about electricity, the internet, and rebuilding the coastline before calling it quits. Some people shouted at him when he left the stage since there were a lot more people still raising their hands. But I don't think there was anything more he could offer them.

The food distribution came after, and it was complete chaos. People practically jumped on the people giving out the food. I did what Mom and Dad told me to do, which was stick with my family and proceed carefully. The city council had to bring police officers and security guards in to sort out the mess.

After a solid half an hour of people pushing each other and rushing towards the food, some semblance of organization appeared. Everyone gathered into a loose line that snaked around the room. When we got our food, I looked into it. There were about ten cans of food inside, a far cry from the amount of food in the beginning.

"There's nothing in here," I said.

"Shh," Mom said. "We'll discuss this later once we're out of here."

"No one's going to jump us," May said. "People aren't that stupid."

"People made stupid decisions when they're scared or angry. And looking at the room right now, they are definitely scared and angry."

"I agree with your mom," Dad said. "We can talk about this when we get home. I don't want anyone talking about food in the plaza. People have guns. It's not safe."

We hustled out of the building and crossed the street before heading back home. It began snowing ash, a little sprinkle of dust that blanketed the streets a dark gray. Another volcano must've erupted up north. Mom made sure that we all were wearing our ash masks correctly.

It was dark when we reached our house. I wasn't sure if it was because of the ash storm or the sunset or a combination of both, but it felt like the middle of the night. It was pitch black inside, but nobody dared to turn on the lamps in our house.

"It's too dangerous," Dad said. "We don't want to become a target, especially because everyone is so angry."

But we couldn't see anything without the lamp, so we turned one on to the lowest dimness and ate cold beans from our food bag.

"So what are we going to do about the food situation?" I asked.

"We're running out of food," Dad said. "I don't want to use our stockpiles too heavily until the food bags run out."

"So we're going to have to eat less food."

"But I'm always hungry," May said.

"Maybe your dad and I can eat one can on Sundays," Mom said and nudged Dad. "You've always wanted to start fasting."

"No," Dad said. "We need to be strong. I'd recommend cutting down from three cans to two every Sunday and Wednesday for the time being."

"But tomorrow is literally Sunday. That's so unfair," May said.

"Tomorrow is our last three can day," Dad said. "From tomorrow onwards, two cans every day."

He continued. "And because of the natural gas situation, we might need to start gathering kindling and firewood for winter ahead. It's the middle of summer and temperatures are dropping every day. We need to prepare for the worst, a winter with no heating except for the fireplace."

"But the ash outside," Mom said. "It's not good for the kids."

"Maybe your grandparents can help," Dad said. "We can have rotating shifts. Each person works outside for an hour or so."

"But where are we going to store the firewood," Mira asked. "No one wants to sleep near branches and they're going to bring in lots of insects."

"We'll store them in the garage," Dad said. "Neal and I will push out the car tomorrow."

"Why me?" I asked.

"Just do it," Mom said. "So we're all good for tomorrow."

"Yes sir," May said.

Mom gave her a withering glance, and we finished our cans in a calm silence.

Looking back to last month, everything that I wrote feels hopelessly naive. We've still got a lot of food in the pantry, but every day it seems to be dwindling like the world around me. The radio has gone silent— except for the list of the dead from the government— and all my whole world is just my house and a couple of other places.