“How many times do I have to say this to you; DO NOT GO OUT BY YOURSELF!” Janet yelled. Her mahogany hair fell recklessly by her worry ridden face. The other families in the cellar stared at the spectacle in front of them.
“I know mommy, I just wanted to get some air. We have been in this cellar for a week. I didn’t hear anything outside. I wanted to see if the city was still there.” Margie cries. Her frail little body made her look younger than her 14 years. The terror of knowing that the country is at war and that it had finally made it to their home turf was slowly wearing away her pubescent shielding. She used to be a happy, normal, moody young girl. Her curly black locks used to cover her head like a crown, telling everyone she was the princess of the world. Nothing seemed to break her. She was more confident then most girls her age. It could have been because she was beautiful and all the girls in school wanted to be her. She would walk through her high school and watch as all the boys stared at her, wanting her in a way that she did not quite fully understand. She liked the attention though. It made her feel wanted and special; but, now with the schools closed and being stuck in this cellar waiting. She no longer felt special. She was scared and tired and anxious. Her mother’s frantic worrying and her incessant pacing around the cellar bomb shelter made it all worse. It was like her world was crumbling around her.
She started hearing small bangs in the distance. The quiet cacophony of sounds echoed off of the shelter. “They’re getting closer.” Her mother whispered to her. The city lay helplessly in the background. Margie could feel the pressure of the world slowly encroaching on her last refuge, her last feeling of safety.
“Mom, why? Why is all of this happening? Why are we fighting? Why hasn’t Steven come home yet?”
“Your brother went off to protect us. We fight because we have to….protect…protect what we hold dear, our freedoms. I want you to grow up not worrying if Iran or Iraq or North Korea or anywhere else is going to attack you. That’s what your brother understood. He left to go fight.”
“But you always told us fighting was wrong. That fighting only led to more fighting. And that we should settle our differences with words. You said that adults don’t need to fight anymore because they can talk and understand.”
“I know, but for some things… talking does not work. That other country won’t talk. All they want to do is blow things up and kill innocent people, like you and me. When talking fails we have to fight. Or they will hurt us.”
“But isn’t that country made up of people too. Do they all want to fight?”
The quiet distant boom grew louder and louder as it made its way to the house. Margie and Janet both ducked and held on to each other as the resounding sound shook the shelter. The echo of automatic fire clanged off the building next to them.
“How did they get so close.” Janet yells to the other families in the shelter. Their worried faces echoed back the same feeling of despair that Janet was feeling. A small white man stood up. Scared and determined, he walked up the stairs to the entrance of the shelter. The sounds were louder now. He peeked his head out into the air. The 5 story building next to him was on fire. The windows were blown completely out. The bricks were charred and smoldering like the end of a cigarette. “This is bad”, he said, “This is really bad.” Another volley of fire rang out from the city streets. The little man stood there, head popped out of the door. His hands were limp and hung by his side like curtains. “Hey, come back in here!” Screams the man’s wife. He didn’t turn around and he didn’t answer. His body swayed for a moment and then tumbled down the stairs. His head was split open. Half of his face was gone and the other half was smeared on the door. The man’s wife started to cry and scream. Anguish, tiredness and hopelessness spread through her voice like a disease, infecting all the families hiding in the shelter. Margie sat there deaf to it all. Her little body was still and her eyes were staring holes, like light through a magnifying glass, into the dead man.
Another explosion reverberated through out the shelter. They heard the cling, cling, cling, cling of bullets ricocheting off the obstacles to their targets. A hard clash brings down the door to the shelter. “Everyone hide!” Janet coughs up through the smoke of the explosion. She picked up Margie and put her into a large red igloo box and closed the lid. Men holding black rifles entered the shelter first. They separated the men, women and children. Margie was the only one not found. The angry looking men in their black uniforms and black rifles tie all of the women and children together. They drag the men outside. Margie hears the muffled screams of the women and children from inside her box. The cold wet interior kisses her legs as they started to cramp up from being in such a small space. “Bam, bam, bam, bam.” She hears over the women’s and children’s cries. The stairs creaked as the uniformed men came rumbling down the stairs. They started speaking in a language foreign to Margie’s ears. Then they picked up the rope tied to the women and children and dragged them outside. The screams became more distant to Margie as she lay in her plastic tomb. The sound of more gunshots snaked its way down the cellar strangling Margie’s mind. She stayed still not by her own volition, but because of the terror that infiltrated her muscles causing them to tense up and paralyze her.
For a long time she sat in her box, unable to move. The quietness that surrounded her was almost unearthly. She picked herself out of the box and stared at the partially destroyed cellar. The boxes with food were torn apart and the stairs were broken. She climbed up the stairs jumping over the cracked and missing steps into the city. The buildings lay wasted around her. Cracked glass and smoldering cars were littered everywhere. “Mom!” She called out, the silence broken by her ragged scared little voice. “Mom, where are you?” She walked slowly into the street. The bodies of her former cellar-mates rested face down on the sidewalk. Mary the florist, Jane the florist’s daughter, Randy the grandpa, Arnold the 4 year old boy who always carried an old worn stuffed rabbit, Francis the gay bartender, Janine the African painting collector all laid face down on the concrete. The blood slowly ran down the street and started to pool in the gutter. Margie’s mind went numb again as she walked past the bodies. She looked left into the bushes and saw an arm hanging out the bush. “Please no,” she thinks to herself.
Drawn to the bush she walked over to it, the bruised hand seemingly reaching out to her. The body of the mangled woman was stretched out on her back. The clothes were ripped off of her and bruises and cuts from the bush were scattered all over her body. One large bullet hole was right in her chest. “Mom….mom…mom….” Margie cried picking up the dead woman. The tears on her face dropped like rain, soaking the woman’s face washing the dirt off in small spots.
Margie got up and then started walking away. A TV in another building managed to survive. Its CNN newscast blared at the little girl.
“With DC, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco being destroyed, America is in the worst state it has ever been. We are now broadcasting from Denver, Colorado all of our offices on the coast have been destroyed. Our recent attacks on Iraq, Cuba, North Korea, and Pakistan have caused a significant backlash. The axis of evil that was professed by President Bush have banned together because of America’s refusal to have peace talks as long as they have communist countries. I will say that America is at its darkest hour. We have just got word that our missiles have hit and demolished Baghdad, Iraq; Esfahan, Iran; Pyongyang, North Korea and La Habana, Cuba. The nuclear onslaught was believed to be successful. However with the nuclear destruction of our cites and occupation by axis forces in America, we are not sure how long out own country has. For all of you who do or do not believe in god, please pray to whomever you must that we will make it thro……” The signal went dead.
“Why, what could be so important for this many people to die!” Margie called out to the dead TV screen. The eerie silence and death abound in front and back of her suffocate her as she is brought to her knees. A slow whistle from above her made her turn to the sky. In the distance, she saw a large metal object dropping from the sky. She stared at it some more, the fire blasting out of the end of it became clear. With a loud crash it hit. A giant explosion sprouted up about a mile away. A giant concussion hit Margie knocking her off her feet. A wave of heat singed her skin sending shots of pain to her brain. It was all over quickly, the blast, the heat, the sound, the force and now there was nothing left. The buildings were totally demolished and there was no sign of life in the city anymore.
