Is it tomorrow yet?

I’ve been pondering the ideas for a novel for years, and i decided to start writing tonight. Here’s the first thousandish words, tell me what you think.

February 3, 2008 at 12:12 pm (Social Commentary, Writing) (America, Apocalypse, Culture, Drugs, Hippies, Renewable Fuels, Social Commentary, War)

“I guess we should enjoy it while we can,” he said, graciously accepting a puff from a tightly and fatly rolled spliff. As he passed the illicit cigarette to the man at his right, he asked his gathered friends, “Anyone wan’ another beer?” Nobody said no. The name of the game that night was bacchanalia. Beer and rum flowed as if from fountains, and unlike past Saturday nights, tonight they drank as though they could afford it, despite their meager college budgets; the buds they smoked were smuggled into the states from B.C. It was the best and most expensive ‘dank’ they could find on such short notice. It was very expensive, but tonight Kowalski and the merrily sordid cast of freaks he called his friends didn’t care – for they were stranded in a crumbling industrial wasteland in eastern Indiana, and they collectively understood it to be the eve of the apocalypse.

Arthur Kowalski and his friends had long talked about “going off the grid,” but he always had suspected that he would be the only one among them who actually would. Though he and his closest friend, Jeff Cohn, shared dark sensibilities about human nature, Artie had always expected that when Jeff graduated, he would either get a “real” job and accept the reality of modern society, or not, and work on the Cohn family farm until he grew old.

Artie had struggled with the realities of modern society all his life. He had graduated high school, but only barely, and had dropped out of college twice. All his teachers, professors, shrinks, had the same thing to say about him: “He has the ability, the knowledge, the skill; but not the drive to succeed.” It wasn’t that he didn’t want succeed, either, but as far as he was concerned, he had more important things to think about. He excelled in all things outdoors, and all things intuitive. During high school, he spent all of his weekends in the woods of western New England. Indiana came as a shock to him – suddenly he found himself surrounded by unfamiliar plants and animals. For miles around his flat in Richmond, there was derelict concrete jungle, but by visiting the country with Jeff, he quickly became familiar with Midwestern wild food stocks.

He and Jeff both watched international news-feeds like vultures, starved for any scrap of new information they could find. At first Artie didn’t know what he was looking for as he compulsively scanned the AP ticker on his computer screen year after year, but as he grew older he realized that he sought a harbinger of the end of the epoch. As he listened on the radio to President Turgidson announcing plans for another invasion, he loaded his essentials into his old and trusted surplus frame-pack, bought as much dank as he could get his hands on, and headed to the liquor store to stock up for the long haul. He suspected this war would be the one Einstein had warned about. Once his amenities were meticulously stowed in a hollowed tree behind the college he’d been asked to leave years before, he headed to his friends’ house to announce the news and begin their last real party before the driest storm.

~+~+~+~+~

They awoke the next day around noon, in various uncomfortable poses in the living room where they had passed out. It was quiet outside – too quiet. At first, Artie worried something terrible had happened while they’d slept, then he realized it was Sunday.

“So, what’s the plan,” asked Dave, sipping a cup of tea at the breakfast table.

“Well, we need to get as many supplies as we can afford,” suggested Jeff, though he thought it obvious. Artie was surprised at his friends’ competence considering the situation at hand.

He wondered whether they realized what they were getting into, or whether he had underestimated them all along. After all, they had agreed to go off the grid come this juncture. Perhaps they were paranoid enough to survive. Though they were the ones he trusted most to survive with him, he remained watchful of their judgment. “Not all you can afford.. all you can fit in your cars. We need to be mobile at an instant’s notice. Also, stock up on tobacco.”

“I don’t smoke,” responded Dave, inviting a glare from Artie.

“They aren’t for smoking. They are bartering tokens. There is no telling what an addict in withdrawal will give for a pack of Marlboro’s. Your dollars ‘ll be worthless once the economy hits the shitter. And gold i’n't gunna help neither.” Artie whipped his head around to see whose words of wisdom had saved him the trouble, but he knew before he saw her.

“Chelsea! I’d hoped you’d know to come, but I never thought you would!”

“Are you kidding? Its the end of the world, I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” she grinned wildly, obviously pleased with her own wit.

“Welcome, and nice meet you in person – Arty has told me all about you,” Jeff let slip. Artie’s cheeks turned crimson.

“Oh, he has, has he? You must be Jeff. I was planning to fly in as soon as Turgidson announced.. but the airports were all closed… something about a ‘terror warning’… so I drove.”

“From New York? Overnight? You must be crazy” interjected Dave in disbelief, gazing unwittingly at her bosom.

“Well you shouldn’t be surprised that I’m crazy, since Artie does fancy me. And I didn’t drive from New York, I was in Boston when I heard – I was at a concert….So yeah… isn’t it great how adrenaline can substitute for sleep? Oh, and Artie, be a good boy and get me a cuppa.” Artie was not used to following anyone’s orders, and was especially not used to being called a boy, let alone good, but when Chel demands, Chel gets, and so Artie obliged.