Apocalypsis 01 - Kahayatle

and showed him the propane tanks that sat underneath.   “Voilà.”
    “Wow.   Cool.   Smart.   So where are we going to go?   The mountains?   I hear there’s good fishing there.   And streams for water, too.”
    “I’m not sure.   We’ll vote.”
    Peter smiled vaguely.   “We’re two people.   It’ll always be a tie or unanimous.”
    “Until you get above a hundred pounds, you only get half a vote.”
    Peter looked at me with the most pitiful expression on his face I couldn’t stand it.
    “I’m just kidding, geez, lighten up.”   I didn’t realize how callous I sounded until he looked down at the ground, overcome by sadness again.
    “Shit, I’m sorry.   I don’t mean to act like I don’t care, okay?   It’s just … I’m not used to such heavy duty emotions.”
    “You’ve never lost anyone you cared about?   What about your parents?”
    “My mom left when I was just a baby.   And, yeah, my dad died.   But I was prepared for it.   And he did it at the hospital.   I didn’t have to go through … anything like you did.”   I couldn’t even say the words - I didn’t have to see my dad get eaten.   My stomach churned again, but I needed to know more, so I forced the feelings down and continued.
    “Tell me about your sister.   About Sanford.”
    “Later.   Let me eat and digest before we go there again.   It’s too upsetting for me right now.”
    I nodded my head, stirring the pasta that would cook another ten minutes before it was ready.   I reached over and pulled a can of beans from the cabinet.   “Do you need your beans hot?   Or can I give them to you out of the can?”
    “Well, I prefer them hot, but I’ve learned not to be picky anymore.”
    “Oh, don’t worry about it.   I can heat them up real quick in the microwave.”
    I opened up the can and then pushed the button to open up the microwave above my head.   I put the can inside, closed the door, and turned the dial to the right, setting it on three minutes.
    I turned to look at Peter causally, but he just stood there watching me, saying nothing, his face expressionless.
    I waited a few seconds, looking around the kitchen, tapping my foot and humming a little, before turning the dial back to the left, causing the appliance to let out a loud ding!   I pulled the can out and handed it to Peter with a spoon.  
    “There you go.   Hot beans, served up nice and cold.”
    “Thanks,” he said, giving me a half-smile before he dug in hungrily, shoving beans into his mouth.   He talked around the food and not very prettily.   “I thought for a second there you either didn’t realize microwaves ran on electricity or that you had some kind of solar power thing going on.”
    “Slow down, dude.   The beans aren’t going anywhere.”
    “Sorry,” he mumbled, a bean stuck to the corner of his mouth.   “I’m starving.”
    “I can see that,” I said, mostly to myself, as I stirred the pasta some more.   I acted like I was checking out the water, but I was really just thinking hard to myself, trying to figure everything out.  
    Peter was a bit of a mystery.   He wasn’t from here, but had somehow made it about fifteen miles on his bike without having all his stuff stolen or being attacked by crazy people.   And where had he gotten the books and sauce?   Why hadn’t the sauce, at least, already been taken?   I hadn’t looked at the titles of any of the books yet, but none of them were light reading; they were more like encyclopedias.   But in spite of all the things he’d been through, and the fact that apparently there are monsters living in Sanford, he’d made it to my neighbor’s house.   Why that particular house?
    “Why did you pick the house behind mine?” I asked, not looking at him so he’d feel more comfortable answering my questions.   I was planning on giving him the third degree, but I wanted to try and be sly about it.
    “My aunt lived there.   She had these books I needed that she hid in her house and the sauce.   She told me where to find them the last time I talked to her.”
    Well, that explains why this place and the sauce - must have been hidden well.
    “I never knew your aunt.   Sorry.”   I looked over in time to see him shrug.
    “I didn’t know her very well either.   She was really an uncle who became an aunt.   My parents didn’t really get along with her.”
    “An uncle who became an aunt?   How so?”
    “Transvestite.”
    My eyes nearly