Earth

My name is Ara Winbourne the poet, artist, writer, musician and last human being left standing on planet Earth.

From my bed of sand on the arid desert floor, I look up.
Above me the sky seems so tragically beautiful. A graveyard of stars; the same spectators that looked on as our world perished, engulfed in flames.
Both my parents worked for NASA where their entire existence revolved around an impossible task: save humanity before its self-destruction.
As a little girl I used to sit in my Father’s office, legs dangling from his book-scattered desk and watch as eager eyes darted from detailed notes to frantic scribbles chalked on a blackboard. It wasn’t long before I realised my Dad didn’t have time to pause and acknowledge his daughter’s new haircut. He couldn’t muster a smile when she bought home her SATs results or laugh when she ran around the park like a bird about to take flight. He didn’t wave her goodbye on the first day of school, nor was he there to shed proud tears on her last.
Oscar Winbourne was a shadow, absent from my life.
Every year I would take a seat in his study, every year desperately trying to impress him with my growing knowledge of his assignment. But, every year I was seen as a distraction; I became the shadow in the eyes of my parents.
At first, it didn’t bother me. If Mom forgot to pack lunch it was easy to think she was off, busy saving the world. However, I was present at the beginning of the end, there to witness my parents’ faces fall; Mother’s head sinking in defeat. After a combined eighty years of work, it was my family who discovered there was no place left in the galaxy for us to flee.
We were ill-prepared for the apocalypse but it was right outside our door, scratching its way in through the gap beneath the doormat.
From that point forward, the life drained from our home. It was as if someone had blown on a candle, snuffing out all sense of perseverance and hope. Some nights I woke to Mother’s screams, her dreams crowded with images of brutal winds, threatening to rip our house from its foundations. I heard her whispering to Oscar about nightmares of freak sandstorms, flooded crop fields and billions of starving humans, turned to savages, butchering one another for food.
I think my parents expected the world to suddenly slip into a frenzy of panic but being the naïve mammals we are, life carried on as normal. Mankind does not easily deviate from routine, as I learnt, but simply closes its eyes and ears to anything it chooses not to hear. No one realised the seriousness of the situation; the consequences of thirteen billion people inhabiting a planet that could only sustain seven. We remained calm until the last day, up to the moment hell blasted its hot flames and scorched earth’s surface black.
I’m still not entirely sure how I survived the blaze or why I was to be the sole survivor of Earth’s undoing. Never had I assumed myself special; I’d always been your unexceptional, struggling writer, veering far from the path carefully constructed by her parents.
Throughout my teenage years I became an expert at concealing emotions. They were ‘wild’ and ‘foolish’ as pointed out by my Father the day he saw me drooling from the car window at Dexter Fosston, school’s head boy. All desires were cloaked, along with a guilty pleasure for writing which, after my first advanced English class, I surrendered to.
No longer was my aim to follow in the revered footsteps of my parents. Freedom of expression, exemption from formulas and biological observation; it was just me and my words.
Astoundingly, twenty-six insignificant dots of ink could be strung together in a million different ways, creating things so beautiful they held the power to make my heart physically hurt. All of a sudden, possibilities became infinite, my eyes opened to different worlds. They gave me the power to travel light years away in a single second.
Sadly, my new-found love left a bitter taste in Father’s mouth. Whenever mentioned by one of his colleagues, I was referred to as a ‘silly girl, wasting her potential’ on a fictional mirage.
God, wouldn’t it be great to hear their thoughts now? I wonder how Oscar would react to knowing his daughter’s words described the only account of our planet’s final stand.
One day, my journals will become artefacts, if not saved, then discarded; dissolved in rising sea levels or forgotten, decomposing beneath layers of thick moss.
Anyway, that’s enough of my cynical thoughts, I better start moving. I pull the rucksack from beneath my head and heft it over my shoulder, legs buckling from the unnecessary weight. Before leaving the world behind, I managed to pack half the content of my house. Photographs, toiletries, filtration tablets and some of Oscar’s old books followed me into hiding. Three years’ worth of supplies were left to be carried by a non-athletic, unqualified twenty-something who struggled to walk up the stairs without breaking a sweat. I guess that’s one thing the apocalypse has aided me with: muscle.
It’s been two years since I left my hole underground and began searching for survivors. Truthfully, being alone for so long has given me chance to think about the things everyday life didn’t give time for. Nevertheless, there are still questions I wrack my brain to solve. Why was my mom exposed to the outbreak responsible for wiping out three quarters of earth’s population? What stopped all the genius minds of our planet resolving a problem that could’ve easily been avoided? And why did my Dad leave when I needed him most?
I begin to fill with anger, hatred rising with each step.
I stood back and watched as my mother choked up her insides, the red stains blossoming over her bedsheets. My home reeked with the smell of sick for weeks after her death which could be heard through the walls as she shrieked in agony. Everywhere I turned were Mom’s eyes, grey and lifeless, much like the rock Oscar placed above her grave. There was a great gap inside of me when she passed, a black hole that I tried to supress every time I was alone. I couldn’t write, couldn’t eat. Both Father and I locked ourselves away, as if shutting down would stop the other seeing how badly it hurt.
Then came the day I emerged from my room. I crept downstairs for food, keeping my eyes on the floor to avoid passing the few photos of mom we had. I halted at the kitchen door, ready to retreat when I saw Oscar sitting there, head in hands.
“Don’t leave, Ara,” he whispered, his voice gruff. “Please, don’t go.”
Nervously, I took a seat opposite him, looking up long enough to study the gaunt features of his face. Dark rings highlighted the burst blood vessels in his eyes and a greying beard hid his chin. Never had I seen Oscar like this, in a month he’d turned into a shell of a man.
“Do you want a drink?” I asked, making any excuse to leave the table.
“If you wouldn’t mind.”
I nodded and stood up, busying myself at the sink. The already awkward silence stretched on for what seemed like eons until I heard a muffled sob. “Why don’t you ever call me Dad?”
I raised my head and met Oscar’s gaze. A silent tear slipped down my cheek but I brushed it off, locked my jaw and shrugged. I slammed his coffee on the table and made my exit to the stairs.
He yelled after me, “We can’t live like this Ara. Your Mother’s gone. She’s gone and she’s not coming back. It’s just you and me now.”
I halted in my tracks, contemplating what to do. My heart slammed against its rib cage, a month’s worth of tears escaping my eyes. And then, without a second thought, I ran back to the kitchen, straight into Dad’s arms. He grabbed me fiercely and held me tight as our bodies shook. We wept until our throats were hoarse and our eyes sore. He stroked my blonde curls, breathing “I’m sorry, Ara. I’m so, so sorry.”
In two weeks, I knocked down the brick wall I’d shut my Father out with for nineteen years. We spent hours together, laughing and crying, reminiscing about the good times and trying to make sense of the bad. For the first time in my life I felt I had a Dad; a protector.
And then, he left.
It was my fault for letting him get too close because, just like every other man, Oscar broke my heart. I woke one morning and dragged myself downstairs, expecting to find him in his usual seat by the window but, to my surprise it was empty. I thought he might’ve been down the shop, stocking up on food; it was only twenty-four hours later I realised that wasn’t the case. What at first manifested itself in my brain as panic slowly turned to loathing. How dare he leave me. How dare my own Father gather up his work and drive off to safer ground.
I stayed inside for a month, surviving on stale bread and canned food. I had no money to shop and no protection from the increasingly toxic air outside. I watched from the window as my neighbours, one by one, abandoned their houses and left; where to, I’ll never know. By the end of February, the only two inhabitants of our street were myself and Ms Finn, one of Oscar’s work colleagues. Although fully aware of the intensifying hurricanes and acid rain our country was experiencing, she refused to leave her cats. I admire that lady to this day, even more so since she practically saved my life.
The only time Ms Finn left the comfort of her musty, old home was to wheel a trolley, packed with supplies, to my porch. I scrambled from my seat on the floor infront of a science textbook and raced to the door, only slightly disheartened to find the frail women on the other side. She pulled me into her arms, planting a sticky kiss on my cheek.
“I don’t have long Lovely, but there are a few things I need to tell you. Now help me get these groceries inside.”
After stacking supplies on the kitchen table, Ms Finn sat me down and began to rummage through her handbag, finally producing a pile of coffee-stained paper. She thrust me the notes that I read through carefully. “This is my Dad’s handwriting.” I said, voice cracking on the word dad.
“It is indeed,” She took a seat on the coffee table, resting a hand on my shoulder. “By the looks of it, your Father hasn’t been home for some time and seeing as you’re still here, he didn’t get a chance to tell you where to go.”
“These documents are about deep-earth bunkers.” I gulp. “Is that where Oscar is?”
Ms Finn shook her head. “There is no way your Father would leave you here if he was planning to take refuge in one of those stupid things. He, himself saw how daft the idea of those shelters was. True, they exist but the latter half of your Dad’s career was spent trying to prove how they hadn’t been dug deep enough. When pockets of the ozone layer start to collapse, they’re said to poison the Earth’s rock up to 1.4 miles deep. The bunkers the UN created match the depth of Krubera Cave in Georgia which is only 1.36 miles beneath Earth’s surface. Your father proposed they find caves deep enough to minimize the body count but, nobody would listen.”
I inhaled sharply. There was so much to take in. The fact that the whole of the human race was to be potentially wiped out. Ms Finn must’ve sensed my fear because she continued talking. “When the government told Oscar his research had come about too late, he began to study different caves around the world. Your dad plotted the exact coordinates on these papers. Four rock fissures, 1.6 miles deep on three different continents. Now I’m not saying you’re definitely going to wind up finding your dad in one of them but, I urge you Ara, follow this map to the Montfill site. Hide yourself in the deepest point possible, close to a fresh water supply and stay there until you hear the very first bird tweet. Don’t emerge before then. Do you understand?”
And that’s exactly what I did. Ms Finn refused to join me but handed me the keys to her jalopy and an old WW2 gas mask she’d kept in the loft.
That old woman’s words come back to me every day as I watch the eastern horizon where haunting pinks and golden clouds heal the purple bruise of night.
I stop to stare at my surroundings. I’ve reached the outskirts of what used to be a city. The frames of cars are barely recognisable beneath a blanket of sand, skyscrapers block out rays of the rising sun and a familiar sound of whistling wind fills my ears. I press on, still mesmerised by how different everything looks now. Mannequin limbs scatter the streets and shards of glass protrude from the dirt. I take my time stopping to look inside grocery shops, careful to pick up every tinned food can I find. I thought scavenging for food out here would be harder; I couldn’t have been more wrong.
When the sun is at its highest point in the sky, I take, quite literally, the last remaining seat in Costa and pull out my note book. Its packed with newspaper clippings I’ve found dancing around in the breeze and add to it today’s find. The poster’s headline reads:
‘NASA’s last hope. Rocket to be launched into space carrying some of Earth’s greatest minds’.
I scoff and drop the article. That’s the sort of stupid plan Oscar would’ve concocted; that was, if he was still alive.
I sit picking at my nails for a few minutes until a loud crash startles me.
Instinctively, I jump up and pull out a pocket knife. My posture is stiff; I’m careful not to move, not to breathe.
There’s something around the corner of the street. I drop to the floor and crouch behind a pillar, aware that the footsteps are getting closer. If it’s a stag, it’ll make one hell of a meal tonight. A second passes, then two, then three. My brow is drenched in sweat; I am a tiger, this is my prey.
And, finally, when everything falls unnaturally silent, I push away from the wall and whip around, holding my knife against the neck……of a boy.

Author's Note

any and all feedback will help! Thank you

Reviews

[D.L. Thompson]

I liked what you have going on here. You have great imagery and you capture the feelings and thoughts of the narrater very well. Describing the way she feels like a shadow is done fantastically in here. If I were to offer some criticism, it would be this. At the beginning, you describe the narraters location as a desolate desert floor. This is a little confusing to me because I'm not exactly sure were she is at. Whether she is lying in a desert, whether she is just lying on the floor of some building which just happened to have sand everywhere, or if the whole world was nothing but sand. I think you should either expand on that or remove it completely. As for the world itself ending, I want to know more about what exactly happened. It almost sounds like you were going for an ozone disappearing, sun radiation burning the whole world kind of thing. Either way, I would suggest expanding on that, because I think it could greatly add to your story. You could even tie that in with the desert floor your narrater is laying on. Either way, it's a great piece. Good luck.

[tanmay7551]

This one looked like a setup in future. A peep inside the life of human beings and about how it will be in the future. Though conveyed through personal relationship of a daugther and parents it has a universal appeal to human being about saving the planet.

Good work.

[Brandon Wernke]

Very much enjoyed reading this short, sad, tale. Thanks for sharing!

[Hannah]

Your wording is very good, and the concept it interesting. The ending really touched me. (By the way, you have a cool name)

[matrixmark]

Loved the imagery of the daughter sitting on her fathers leg which followed on from a great yet sad start to the short piece.
Towards the end - you sued you words in such a beautiful way on which was such a sad and tragic end.

Rally captivated me and had me ints it hold right to the end.

Mark.

[matrixmark]

Descriptive language is in the eye of the beholder. I pesonally think that when describing buildings and the like - that is when you can get wasy with using it a lot. Other stuff like a persons features - keep it short and simple but enough to make the reader understand what the perosn looks like.

You have balanced it out pretty well in this piece - Its just right.

Mark.