The Big After by Gary O. Bennett
INT ABANDONED BUILDING NIGHT
The CAMERA is low. There is garbage, paper, rags, broken bottles, everything covered in dust. A man is on the floor, his back to the wall, his head slumped over. He is wearing an overcoat, and his feet are wrapped in bags and duct tape. Surrounding him are cans of a variety of foods, from vegetables to fruit. Into the FRAME of the CAMERA arrives a pair of work boots. The CAMERA cranes up revealing a gloved hand holding a handgun. The person walks toward the man on the floor, kicking his legs to jostle him. The man, his name TOM, wakes.
TOM: What.
Tom is startled. We now see the person with the gun. It is a woman. Her name is KAYLENE. She is wearing a surgical mask. She partially removes the surgical mask to speak.
KAYLENE: You sick?
TOM: No.
KAYLENE: When was the last time you vomited?
TOM: I haven’t.
KAYLENE: Bullshit.
TOM: No, really.
Kaylene removes the surgical mask from her face completely.
TOM: You going to use that? The gun?
KAYLENE: Food. You seem to have lots of food. Where’d you get it?
TOM: You want some?
KAYLENE: Is this all you have?
TOM: The food?
KAYLENE: The food. The food. You have more cans?
TOM: Yes.
KAYLENE: Where?
TOM: OK, now see, you’re going to use that gun, aren’t you?
Kaylene holds the butt of the handgun up showing Tom an empty magazine slot.
KAYLENE: No ammunition. But it gets people’s attention.
Kaylene places the handgun in her coat pocket.
TOM: You have any alcohol? Beer? Wine? Whiskey?
KAYLENE: Vodka. A truckload.
TOM: A truckload? There’s a truck?
KAYLENE: It’s twisted and burnt and crushed. But the rig in the back survived the blast. And it was filled with vodka.
TOM: Was filled? It’s not there now?
KAYLENE: What do you think?
TOM: Yeah. OK.
KAYLENE: But I have some. About twenty bottles.
TOM: Russian?
KAYLENE: What’s that?
TOM: Russia. The country.
KAYLENE: Are you trying to get smart with me?
TOM: I have books.
KAYLENE: Yeah. So what?
TOM: I’m just saying, I try to read up on stuff. What happened.
KAYLENE: I know what Russia was. A country. Right?
TOM: Yes. And they had the best vodka. The bottles, the glass was clear. The name of it began with an “S.” On the label. A building.
KAYLENE: The bottles have no labels. And the glass is blue. Like the dead.
TOM: You mean green. The dead are green.
KAYLENE: They turn blue first. Then if you they don’t get cooked, they turn green. More difficult to cook.
TOM: Cook?
KAYLENE: The problem is usually starting the fire.
TOM: They cook the bodies? For food?
KAYLENE: How long you’ve been shut in here?
TOM: I try to stay within a few buildings. Near my stuff. Is that the smell? There’s a really bad smell I can’t place. It comes and goes.
KAYLENE: Cooking the greenies smells bad.
TOM: You ever eat…you ever eat that?
KAYLENE: Once. Maybe twice. Sometimes you don’t know. It gets mashed in with other stuff. Can I sit down?
TOM: Yeah.
Kaylene sits next to Tom on the floor, her back to the wall.
KAYLENE: You don’t have an odor.
TOM: Well, gee, thanks.
KAYLENE: There’s a distinct odor to the sick. They try to hide it so they don’t get killed.
TOM: They’re killing the sick? For food?
KAYLENE: No. The sick can’t be eaten. No matter how much you cook them. So they say. Say, how many cans of food do you have?
TOM: You asked that already.
KAYLENE: I am just making small talk.
TOM: There is no small talk. Everyone wants something. That’s why I stay away from people.
KAYLENE: You let me in here pretty easy.
TOM: You had a gun.
KAYLENE: You let me sit down.
TOM: I haven’t seen a woman. Well, I haven’t seen a woman up close in a long time.
KAYLENE: So the cans of food. You got lots of cans?
TOM: Like I said, there ain’t no small talk.
KAYLENE: You want to make love?
TOM: What?
KAYLENE: Everything’s a trade. Sex for a case of food. Deal?
TOM: I don’t know. There’s a catch.
KAYLENE: So you have a case. More than one I bet.
TOM: Was that like a trick? To get me to admit something.
KAYLENE: What’s that bruise on your arm?
TOM: A birthmark.
KAYLENE: Yeah. It looks like you’re sick.
TOM: I’m not sick. I have had that all my life. Were you serious about the sex for food thing?
KAYLENE: Yes.
TOM: How do I know you’re not sick?
KAYLENE: You don’t.
TOM: Well, then, maybe I’ll pass on this trade.
KAYLENE: All you have to do is tell me how much food you have. How many cans of food?
TOM: I tell you how many. Then you’ll want to know where I keep them. Then you won’t need me anymore.
KAYLENE: You have a can opener?
TOM: I wish.
KAYLENE: You have a can opener, don’t you?
TOM: What good is that if you don’t know where the cans are?
KAYLENE: I don’t need your cans.
TOM: It’s every man for himself.
KAYLENE: I’m a girl. And did you forget about my offer of sex?
TOM: If we have sex, and then I do not give you any food, then what?
KAYLENE: Then I kill you. And eat you.
TOM: Right.
Kaylene starts to touch Tom on his belly, removing his jacket and shirt, but it is more of a medical examination than sensual. Tom does not know what to do, but he watches.
KAYLENE: You are quite…quite large.
TOM: Thanks.
Kaylene removes her hand and smells it. She then rises and removes the handgun from her jacket and points it at Tom.
KAYLENE: Sorry. I just had to make certain you weren’t sick. Oh, the gun. No magazine, right. Well, I have a full magazine in my pocket. See.
Kaylene reaches into her pcket but can’t seem to find what she is looking for.
TOM: You looking for this?
Tom holds up a magazine.
TOM: You sat next to me. It was easy. Reached into your jacket pocket and took it out. You think I am stupid?
KAYLENE: I wasn’t going to use the gun, silly.
Tom removes a gun of his own.
TOM: When I noticed you had a semi-automatic, the same kind I have, I figured the magazine would come in handy.
Tom places the magazine into his gun and he points it at Kaylene.
KAYLENE: You got to understand something…
TOM: Let me just say one thing. When an animal gets stressed out, it releases all sorts of hormones into the bloodstream that make the muscle acidic and a bit tougher. So I do not want you to get stressed out.
KAYLENE: I was not kidding about the sex. And I was not going to use the gun. I was playing. I like to play. Rough sex. Do you get it? Do you get it?
TOM: Rough sex? Sex with a gun?
KAYLENE: I like it dangerous. Dangerous. Now put the gun down.
TOM: I thought you like it dangerous?
KAYLENE: If we are playing, yes. Are we playing? Are we playing?
TOM: Calm down. Are you calm?
KAYELNE: Yes. I am calm.
TOM: Good. Relax. Because this is not a revenge thing. It’s just…dinner time.
Tom fires the gun, but it just clicks. He pulls the trigger again, and then again, and then again. Just clicks.
KAYLENE: Empty magazine.
TOM: Shit.
KAYLENE: So you were going to eat me, huh. You’d rather eat me than have sex with me. Love it. Quite frankly, the way you look, I’d say your more in need of sex than food.
TOM: I was just joking. I knew the magazine was empty.
Kaylene then removes a magazine from her other pocket and places it in her gun.
TOM: I had a cold last week. I did. Blowing my nose. Threw up once.
KAYLENE: Yeah. OK. So we’ll saute the sinuses.
TOM: Look, there’s a barn. Not far from here, with a storage facility in the basement with a freezer. There are more than a thousand cans of food. Why me when you can have all those cans of food? Really. I’m serious.
Kaylene fires the gun, the bullet enters Tom’s forehead and Tom falls to the ground, dead. Kaylene puts the gun away. She then goes through Tom’s pockets and pulls out a can opener. She smiles and kisses it, placing it in her pocket along with a can of food or two. She then leaves.
THE END.
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