Costco Run {1/3}
“I just don’t understand why you want the full layout of an apartment when the toilet isn’t even hooked up to plumbing,” he shut the dresser drawer.
“Because I want the illusion of normalcy, Benjamin, just because the world is ending around you, doesn’t mean you can’t remember the good old days,” Amie responded, sitting crisscross on the bed and watching him.
People outside the unit were walking around with supplies. Every unit so far had one gallon of water that was supposed to last a week before they could make it to the Costco across the parking lot and no one wanted to do that yet until they figured out what on earth and hell was roaming the world outside.
“Why couldn’t we just die with the hurricane-tsunami-volcano-earthquake in May?” Benjamin muttered loud enough so Amie could hear.
“Because you had insisted on building a shelter to survive the apocalypse.” Amie fell back on the mattress and rolled around, staring up at the piped ceiling. Those fluorescent lights were going to start wearing her nerves thin. She knew they would last forever, since IKEA had been one of the companies to switch to total solar energy years ago. It was a good thing too; all the apocalyptic animals were having a field day with the actual electrical wire. The volcano dragons seemed to be obsessed with chewing on it, as if it was their version of alcohol; they got tired of eating humans during the day and relaxed with some zapping electric currents by night. The scientists that survived said it was probably because Apparently, it was so bad in Shanghai that the entire city was blackened from dragons eating everything and everyone—at least, that’s what Amie’s NASA Updates showed. NASA was the only government branch still running, interestingly enough. Thankfully, they had switched to harnessing solar energy entirely by 2050, and had even gone on a space mission to retrieve a fireball from the sun. Of course, retrieving that fireball brought massive amounts of radiation to the earth that caused ants to grow larger and lizards to sprout wings and burrow into volcanoes and ocean waters to turn into black cesspools of no one knew what because they simply hadn’t had the time to analyze it before things turned to nonsensical ruin.
“Excuse me? Excuse me…hi! Hello!” a woman stood next to the entrance of the mini faux apartment. Amie couldn’t see her from her angle and so didn’t move because she decided she did not care at the moment, and that this bed was the most comfortable thing she had been on in a while.
Benjamin had a different outlook and still paid attention to social cues, so he walked over in confusion, furrowing his brows. She was wearing a unicorn shirt, looked somewhere in her mid thirties, and had one long braid of golden hair thrown over her right shoulder, stretching down to her stomach.
“Hi, can we help you out…?” he asked kindly, still of the persuasion that even at the end of the world, he would keep his manners.
“Yes, hi, I’m Annette,” the plump woman’s voice was shrill enough to interest Amie, who sat up slowly and glanced over to watch. “I like your little apartment!”
“Thanks, it was what we were going to decorate our apartment with actually…” Benjamin trailed off, glancing around. “September. Our wedding was supposed to be in September.”
“Oh, wow,” Annette responded, whistling quietly. “Wow, wow...I’m sorry, that must be hard for you.”
“Well…we’re still here. And I guess we’re still together, so it’s not that bad,” Benjamin said it in a way that actually made it sound like it was pretty bad. “I’m Benjamin by the way. This is Amie,” he pointed back at her.
“Nice to meet you,” the woman smiled, giving them both a wave with one hand. “I’m Annette. I’ve taken that far unit over there, with the couches made of faux cow hide pattern? My best friend and I are sharing it.” she pointed and Benjamin nodded to show her he was aware. “Anyway, I was just gathering some bodies for the Costco raid. We want to get in there as fast as possible and get out, so we need as many able folk to come.”
“What about our unit?” Amie wondered, joining in the conversation. “If we’re both gone on this raid, won’t someone steal it?”
“No, no, we’ve already divided up law enforcement to actual...er...former, law enforcement,” Annette reassured her with a smile. “Besides, we shouldn’t be gone long! We’ve got some IKEA bags so we can carry as many supplies as we need to.”
“Costco is big, hon,” Amie swung her legs down and stood up. Benjamin glanced back at her, trying to warn her to shut up by making his eyes bigger. Amie ignored him. “What makes you think all of us can carry stuff?”
“There’s about two hundred adults in this store,” Annette’s smile was wearing thin, like her patience probably. “We’ll carry as much as we can, take carts if it’s safe. If not, it’ll be better than depending solely on here.”
Benjamin was growing increasingly hot under his collar. Amie was starting to challenge the situation because she was interested--he just didn’t know if he was. But he knew that Amie would volunteer him because they didn’t go anywhere without each other, not even before the apocalypse. It had been cute before separating meant probable death.
“You know, you’re right,” Benjamin smiled. “I just don’t know if we’re up to”--
“You wanna live here?” Annette threw her hands up, squinting her eyes.
