In the After

exhausted and miserable.
    When I woke several hours later, I couldn’t figure out why I was on the kitchen floor. I opened my eyes and saw the mess I had made, instantly remembering everything. I wanted to stay there, but the smell finally got to me. I sat up and rubbed my deadened arms. Sobbing hysterically wouldn’t help my dad or my friends. It wouldn’t help me. Something inside me shifted or maybe just broke. I had to take care of myself.
    I stood carefully, my legs still shaky, and went to retrieve the cleaning supplies from under the sink. When I was done cleaning the mess, I numbly grabbed a book from the shelf and hid in my room, unable to face my own thoughts. I needed to escape, if just for a short while, into a story from long ago.
    My first night alone, I still assumed things would settle down. I stayed glued to the TV, watching the news report the same thing over and over. People were dying, and I was sick with grief, but I knew that we would overcome the invaders or whatever they were. We were the strongest nation on earth.
    The second day passed and the TV was out, but there were still people on the radio. I was comforted by their voices, even though they spoke of mass chaos. People tried to run away, but They were everywhere. People tried to hide, but They found them.
    Then on the third day, the radio went silent. I stayed in my room and obsessively read one book after another, to keep my mind on anything other than what was happening. I’d always escaped into books, but now reading had become something more. It allowed me to be somewhere else, to feel something else, not just the numbness that overtook my body and made me wonder if I was still alive.
    My father loved Shakespeare; he would read passages with me and discuss all the intricacies. I reread Romeo and Juliet and cried my eyes out over their loss. Before I’d always argued with my father that the star-crossed lovers were idiots who should have coordinated their plans better, but this time they got to me. I completely broke down and crawled into my parents’ bed. Draping their covers over my body, I sobbed myself to sleep. I was like that back then; my mood would swing between an almost hysterical sense of loss and having no feelings at all.
    On the fourth day, I made myself eat and then tidied the house, trying to do the normal things that people do. I put out all the pictures I had of my friends and parents, gluing a collage to my bedroom door. I ransacked every photo album, placing each picture with great care, keeping my mind occupied. It was so much easier than facing reality. Sometimes I found it hard to concentrate, what with the world ending and all. I wanted so badly to leave the house, to see if anyone else was around, but I was scared of Them.
    I finally decided to go out on our rooftop deck, and watch Them chase people down the street. They were faster than I’d thought possible, a blur of green, the color of pea soup. Glowing yellow eyes sometimes caught the light and flashed gold. The creatures pounced, not bothering to kill their prey before feeding. They ripped skin and flesh from their victims, who screeched in agony. The cries always brought more of Them, eager for their next meal. Those first few days were full of screams. It was terrible, but the real terror came when there were no more shrieks, when the world went quiet. I thought I was the only one left on the planet. There was only me and Them.
    The fourth night, I turned on all the lights in the house. My block was dark, except for our home, my home. No one else had electricity, but I still did. I silently thanked my father who wanted to live footprint-free by installing solar panels and insisting we always put more into the grid than what we took out. We were as close to self-sustaining as current technology allowed.
    I didn’t know then that They were drawn to the lights, like moths to a flame. I didn’t know that they couldn’t see very well. They were attracted to anything bright, especially once they realized that where there was light in the darkness, there were humans, which for Them meant food.
    The electric fence saved me, and that was my mother’s doing. Even though we lived in an excellent, safe neighborhood in Chicago, she needed to protect the work she brought home. She had the fence installed behind our beautiful iron gate, the one They ripped up and destroyed in just a few minutes. She needed to make our house a “secure area.” My mother