Hungry and Scared

A few months earlier and a thousand miles away two young losers scrounge through a broken country:

"Man, I'm hungry!" said Dirk. I nodded in agreement. I had been dreaming about a Big Mac and fries for the last week. Peanut butter and late summer black berries just weren't enough.

We continued walking through our old neighborhood, looking for a house, any house, that didn't look like it had already been broken into.

My folks took off when the economy collapsed and they both lost their jobs. Never said a word to me. Just took off.

Dirk got out of detention last week and when we met up we decided we would do better together than by ourselves.

"Hey," I exclaimed excitedly, "there's the Olsen's house! They were sort of nutso about food storage and stuff like that."
"Don't bother," said Dirk. "Haven't you heard? About a month ago, they just up and left. Didn't say nothing to nobody; just left."

"Where did they go?" I asked. "Who knows? They had talked about going to a place of refuge, but that sounded crazy, like Chicken Little, "The sky is falling!" You know. That kind of stuff. Things were tough, but not bad enough to go live in the mountains or something. Just sounded crazy to me."

"Yeah, their kids were kinda stuck up, too. I dated Tammy Olsen, once," I said. "Once was enough; I tried to cop a feel and she really freaked out. Dressed funny, too. No hip hugger jeans or tank tops. Too bad, really. Good lookin' chick otherwise."

"Tommy Olsen was the odd man out," said Dirk. "Not cool. I offered him a drag offa my joint, real good stuff, and you woulda thought I'd offered him poison! A real drag, that one."

As we approached the Olsen's, we noticed that the door was hanging open on one hinge. We entered cautiously, noticing that furniture had been ripped open, tossed around, and graffiti spray-painted on the walls. We finally found their storeroom. The marks of where they had stored their food and supplies were still evident on the floor and walls. Nothing left but bare shelves.

We noticed that they hadn't taken their TV, Video games, stereo or anything like that. Weird. Maybe they were going to live in the mountains after all.

"What now?" I asked Dirk. "I dunno," he said. "Maybe we should go to Albertson's or one of the other grocery stores," I said.
"We tried that once already, man. Remember? Not a thing left," Dirk said. "No food, anyway."

"How do you think roast dog would taste," I asked jokingly. "An old Granny over on the next block used to have a nice, plump wiener dog. Might be real nice roasted over a slow fire, slathered with barbecue sauce."

"Don't tempt me, man. Right now I could eat a horse! And quit talkin' about food, will ya! My stomach's hurting as it is!

"Oh, oh!" I said. "Look at what's comin' 'round the corner over on the next block!"
"Damn!" Dirk said. "That's gotta be the biggest gang I've ever seen. Maybe, 20 or 25 mean looking dudes. And they're carrying guns. Best we make ourselves scarce!"
"That explains all the smoke up ahead. They're burning stuff as they go," I guessed.

We tried to duck behind the split level house to our left, but someone in that gang musta had good eyes, 'cause he yelled and pointed at us and the whole rag-tag lot started running toward us.

"Oh, crap! Here they come!" said Dirk. We ran through the back yard and scrambled over the wooden fence into the next lot, heading for the street. Breathing hard, we turned left and started running.

"Ka-ching!" A bullet ricocheted off the sidewalk close to us. Some of that gang was coming down this street, too. Fear gave our feet wings and we dodged behind a row of dumpsters behind some apartments and then hurtled over a chain link fence into a yard with backhoes, road graders, and other equipment. We ran behind a galvanized iron shed and collapsed, gasping for air. We looked at each other. Dirk was wild-eyed with fear.

"We ought be safe here for awhile," I said in a hoarse whisper. "I don't hear nobody in the yard out front."

"I wish I had a gun," Dirk said, "even worse than I wish I had a hamburger!"
"Hell, as long as your wishing why not wish for an Army tank and a machine gun!" I replied.

We started laughing hysterically. We tried to muffle the sound, but it only made us laugh harder. "Man, you shoulda tried out for the track team," Dirk said in a breathless whisper. . . The 440 for sure!"