Alone.
I never knew silence could be so frightening. As I sat on the curb on the main street in my small California desert town, my screen crawled with goosebumps at the utter silence surrounding me. I woke up this morning to an empty world. No people, no animals, no insects... nothing but empty buildings, empty streets with empty cars. I was alone.
How do you think past that? This isn't something that's supposed to happen in real life, only in science fiction and horror movies or books. But, unless I had gone insane, I was living this impossible nightmare. Where had everyone gone? Why? How? Why was I left behind? Was it everyone in the whole world or just the people here?
A million questions with no one but myself to ask them to.
I'd gone from scared to completely freaked out to borderline hysterical to calmly sitting on a street curb and trying to think things through. What were my options? I could go to the next town over and see if there was anyone there! Yeah, that was the first thing to do. I got up and headed back to my house. I'd drive to the next town and pray there was someone, anyone, there.
I grabbed my car keys from my bedroom and went back outside, walking up to my Saturn, pushing the button on the electronic key control. Nothing. A sinking feeling started to form in my stomach. I unlocked the door with the actual key and, saying a prayer even though I was not a religious person, I put the key in the ignition and turned it.
Nothing.
Continued...
How do you think past that? This isn't something that's supposed to happen in real life, only in science fiction and horror movies or books. But, unless I had gone insane, I was living this impossible nightmare. Where had everyone gone? Why? How? Why was I left behind? Was it everyone in the whole world or just the people here?
A million questions with no one but myself to ask them to.
I'd gone from scared to completely freaked out to borderline hysterical to calmly sitting on a street curb and trying to think things through. What were my options? I could go to the next town over and see if there was anyone there! Yeah, that was the first thing to do. I got up and headed back to my house. I'd drive to the next town and pray there was someone, anyone, there.
I grabbed my car keys from my bedroom and went back outside, walking up to my Saturn, pushing the button on the electronic key control. Nothing. A sinking feeling started to form in my stomach. I unlocked the door with the actual key and, saying a prayer even though I was not a religious person, I put the key in the ignition and turned it.
Nothing.
Continued...