Autumn

Startled, Emma caught her breath and quickly span around. Michael stood in front of her, his normally bright eyes still dulled with sleep and his short hair matted and unruly.
    ‘I’m all right,’ she mumbled in reply, her heart still thumping.
    ‘Did I scare you?’ he wondered apologetically. ‘I’m sorry, I tried to make as much noise getting up as I could but you...’
    Emma shook her head, making it clear that it didn’t matter. Her thoughts had been elsewhere. He could have screamed in her face and she wouldn’t have noticed.
    Michael took another step closer to her and she noticed that he too had slept in his clothes. She turned back to look out of the window and continued to scan the misty horizon, desperately hoping that she might catch sight of more movement. God, she hoped that they would see something else this morning. Not another one of the loathsome bodies though, she wanted to see something that moved with reason, purpose and direction like she did. She wanted to find someone else that was truly alive.
    ‘What are you looking for?’ Michael asked.
    She shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t want to answer him honestly.
    ‘Nothing,’ she grunted. ‘There’s no fucking point, is there? There’s nothing left.’
    Michael turned and walked silently out of the room, leaving her alone to look out over the dead world.

19

    It was twenty past nine before Michael, Carl and Emma actually sat down together in the same room. They were in the kitchen. Carl and Emma sat in stony silence opposite each other around a circular pine table while Michael struggled to scrape together some breakfast from the meagre scraps remaining of the limited supplies they’d brought with them from the city.
    The atmosphere at Penn Farm was heavy and subdued. Michael felt low - perhaps lower than he had done at any time during the last few days - and he was struggling to understand why. He’d expected to feel a little better today. The three of them had, after all, stumbled upon a place where they could shelter safely for a while. A place which offered isolation and protection and yet which was still comfortable and spacious. He looked out through the wide kitchen window and down onto the farmyard below and decided that it must have been the slight elation they’d felt last night that was making the cold reality of this morning so hard to accept.
    The baked beans he had been cooking had started to stick to the bottom of the pan and spoil.
    ‘Something burning?’ Carl mumbled perceptively.
    Michael grunted and stirred and scraped the beans with a wooden spoon. He hated cooking. The reason he was preparing the meal this morning was the same reason he’d been the first to cook food at the community centre back in Northwich. He had no community spirit and no real desire to please the others. Cooking was nothing more than a brief distraction. Rescuing the burning beans somehow stopped him from thinking about the world outside and all that he had lost for a few precious seconds.
    Dejected and distant, he served up the food and carried the first two plates over to the table. Emma and Carl looked at the breakfasts which clattered down in front of them with disdain and disinterest as neither was feeling at all hungry. Each plate had on it a large serving of baked beans, a dollop of stodgy scrambled egg (prepared from a dehydrated mix usually used by mountaineers) and three hot dog sausages which had been boiled in brine. Emma managed half a smile in acknowledgement but Carl did not. He sniffed and stared at his food feeling exhausted and nauseous.
    Emma picked up a fork and began to poke and prod gingerly at the food. She looked across at the other two and noticed that they were both doing the same. Each one of the survivors seemed to be trying their damnedest not to say or do anything that might result in them having to talk to or even look at the others. All three of them were being gripped tight and suffocated by a now familiar paradox - they each craved the security and normality of conversation, but they knew that such a conversation would inevitably lead to them talking about things that they were each doing their best to try and forget.
    As the long minutes dragged on, Emma’s patience wore thin. Eventually she cracked.
    ‘Look,’ she sighed, ‘are we just going to sit here or should we actually think about doing something constructive today?’
    Michael looked up and rubbed his tired eyes. Carl started to eat his