PostScript

Now that the story has ended, I wanted to follow up with some of my thoughts on the story and “the process”. Basically, what’s up here is a first draft. There are a few kinks I want to work out namely:


• Developing Lennie’s character more


• Figuring out a more realistic way for Dexir to be distributed (for example, it would need to go through the FDA and whomever else before they would just mass distribute) and describe how that would happen. I would probably need to do a little research for this.


• Describing the nature of the beast in more detail—I wanted the “afflicted” to be indistinguishable during the day (I think this is scarier); more scenes showing how this plays out


• Clarify what exactly happened to Lennie: unbeknownst to the reader until Lennie’s demise, the “afflicted” not only seem normal during the day but retain daytime memories after nightfall. Michael had ingested some Dexir before meeting Lennie, but it hadn’t taken effect until the third day. Presumably, he went to go find something (food, supplies, etc.) and went too far, choosing somewhere else to rest for the night. Then, he reanimated but was not mindless—he remembered that Lennie was around and probably returned to the barn to kill her. Not finding her there, he went to her house.


• Give Lennie a nicer death, or at least close the story with a nice memory of hers—the one I was considering was of her riding on the Coney Island Cyclone on a teenage first date


It’s a work in progress!

Ok, ok, there will be one more after this...

Occasionally, Lennie would hear someone walking outside her house. In those moments, she would freeze completely, holding her breath and not making a sound. She tried never to draw attention to her home—she’d been living off canned goods for a while now, so there was no need for fires, and, it being September, it was still warm. Last time this year, the leaf peepers started to show up in droves, booking all the rooms at Rosy Inn Bed and Breakfast. Lennie remembered one year when she nearly hit one of them with her car: camera glued to his face, the peeper was completely unaware of his brush with death, looking up only after Lennie honked to remind him that he was standing in the middle of the street. She’d been impatient that day but, looking up at the maple hanging overhead, with leaves of crimson and pumpkin pie, she’d understood. What she would give to see that peeper now! What she would give to see a face not warped by terror or fury.


Over the past few weeks, a knot had begun twisting in Lennie’s stomach: food was running low. Her pantry shelves slowly emptied, despite her efforts to conserve every tiny pea at the bottom of the can, each tiny morsel. She would have to venture out soon, probably to McCrary’s, assuming it hadn’t been completely plundered already. If she cut through the Adams’ back yard, it was only about a mile from her house. Taking her car was out of the question—the roads were choked with abandoned cars and other apocalyptic detritus—so she would have to go on foot, or risk taking her bike on the road. She decided to take the bike: if anything happened, she’d be able to get away faster. Plus, she’d be able to bring back more food in her bike basket, as opposed to just in her backpack.


Lennie had always been a biker. A former advertising executive and native New Yorker, she’d sought out Croydon, New Hampshire for its tiny population (724) and seclusion. Roughly the same time “Meat Me” was taking place, Lennie sat in her living room with a class of champagne: she’d successfully escaped the city for one year. She’d plowed (helmet on, head down) through Manhattan streets and enjoyed the constant battle between taxis, horse-drawn carriages, and those detestable rickshaw offspring that took up the bike lane. She called them the SUVs of the bicycling community—tourist limbs spilling out from all sides, they were usually manned by cocky young men who ignored you when you rang your bell to pass.


Though she missed her two-wheeling street combat, nothing compared to the long bike rides she took in Croydon. Sometimes going 20 or 30 miles, biking on those empty, flat streets that first autumn was like a slow sip of cool water—it breathed air into Lennie, made her feel alive. She would fly past the changing trees so quickly they looked like they were burning, the colors so vibrant against the clear blue sky.


Lennie closed her eyes, inhaling her stale bedroom air. Mentally, she traced her route and made a list of the essentials. Finally, she forced herself to stand and walk downstairs. Her bike was in the foyer, with her helmet. She breathed deeply again before heading through the kitchen to the back door, where, after peeking out through the cracks to ensure no one was around, she began removing the boards. Her stomach turned as each one came down. Obviously, she would lock the door, but if anyone knew she was in there, they would come for her regardless. She also considered the fact that, if anyone chased her home, the time it took to unlock the door might cost her life.


Wearing leggings and a tight black shirt, she hopped on her bike and began to weave through the streets towards McCrary’s. She tried to keep her eyes on the road while looking for any movement. Although the symptoms only manifested during the night, her former life had collapsed and the world was in chaos—people, afflicted or not, couldn’t be counted on not to act like animals. Halfway there, Lennie had to walk her bike through the intersection of Main and North Street: there was a four-car pileup. As the fall breeze blew through a shattered windshield, a rotting arm slumped out of the front passenger seat. Lennie’s heart stopped before she realized that the puppetry of the draft was behind its animation.


Finally, McCrary’s came into view, and Lennie was almost surprised not to see little Milo, missing cheek and all. She walked her bike into the store and leaned it against the front wall. She needed to check if she was alone. The thick silence of the store should have fortified her confidence, but instead it spooked her further. The scene was too familiar to her nightmare. The McCrary’s of her dreams was much better organized, however, with way more options. Lennie smirked at her dark joke, feeling a little more comfortable. She took her backpack off and went to the canned foods aisle.


Lennie was loading the last can of ancient SPAM into her backpack when she heard someone enter the store. She froze.
“Hello?” a young man’s voice echoed through the empty store. “I know you’re here. I saw you come in.” Lennie crouched petrified. The intruder walked further into the store, and she heard his footsteps first before his face came into view, “Lennie Hammerstien!” exclaimed Michael Horton. Suddenly, he suspended his excitement and said, “You’re not one of them, are you?”
Lennie swallowed, “Are you?”
Smiling reassuringly, he said, “I’ve been hiding out across the street,” Michael continued walking closer and Lennie tensed, her fingers tightening around some canned corn. He stopped his advance, held his hands up and said, “I’ve been vegan since college.” Lennie smiled and then started to cry.


“We have to go! We have to get out of here,” she said, glancing to the sky and quietly noting the advancing dusk. She wanted to invite him over, to talk to someone, have another body in the house, but she was afraid. She remembered the locked door, the vulnerability.


“Come stay with me tonight. It’s so close—” he paused, searching for words, “and it’s safe! I promise.” Lennie grabbed her bike and they scuttled across the street, Michael’s arms full of another load of cans.


Deep down, Lennie knew it was a bad idea, but she couldn’t turn away company after so much time alone. After seeing Michael, she couldn’t bear the thought of another silent night, her terrified thoughts rousing her from sleep over and over again. He hadn’t been a friend, but, in such s small town, people just know each other. Because she was new, everyone knew Lennie. She’d known Michael’s mother, Tracy, relatively well. She didn’t dare ask about her.

TO BE CONTINUED.

Ok, so I said this would be the last one, but things are playing out a little differently than I thought they would, so there will be one more. After that, no disembodied arms, murder or meat discussion for a bit...

Third Installment of "Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes": The How

As the incidents of nocturnal violence increased, so did police presence—that is, until it became clear anyone, regardless of age, race, job or sex, could be the next perpetrator. People were advised to stay indoors, but then more families ended up killing each other. The last televised warning advised, “total isolation in a secure setting” i.e. no one, not even your toddler son or ancient grandmother, was to be trusted.

The general public didn't know how the information fingering Dexir was released, but by the time it was common knowledge—roughly three months after “Meat Me”—more than three-fourths of the American population had ingested Dexir in some way: used on nearly all commercial livestock, the chemical was not only in the beef, but in the chicken, the milk, the eggs.

At first globally assumed to be a contagious pathogen afflicting Americans, the rest of the world was hesitant to step in. These fears were increased by episodes like the group of Americans visiting Paris who, in the middle of the night, brutally murdered the front desk staff at their hotel. Again, they claimed not to remember anything, but after a handful more of similar occurrences—traveling Americans committing horrific nighttime crimes—the country was put on lock down.

The real difficulty with identifying the source of the problem was that, during the day, everyone was “normal”. The symptoms only emerged while the afflicted was asleep. Sleep was recognized as the enemy fairly quickly: stores sold out of No-Doze and pharmacies were looted for amphetamines. However, the necessity of sleep was impossible to deny and the population sought other solutions. One man handcuffed himself to his bed—neighbors found him several days later, having bled out after ripping his arm out of the socket and chewing it free. That is how the final solution became “total isolation in a secure setting”: protect yourself from everyone and protect everyone from you. If afflicted, the least thing you could do was take yourself out.

Not all vegetarians were safe—if you drank milk or ate eggs, you were vulnerable—but most vegans were. And, of course, there was the small contingent that only ate organic. Still, towards the end, before American television went dark, it became clear that it was something in the animal products. This message echoed through Terrence Grummer’s penthouse, images of the carnage flickering across the television screen as he ran to his computer—the internet held out about as long as cell phones—to send an email. The windows rattled as the loud banging on his bedroom door became fiercer, more desperate. He threw himself under the bed, laptop and all, typing quickly, his mind racing, trying to simplify the science of what was happening into a format that everyone would understand. His bedroom door began to splinter as he finished the email, sending it to the news station he’d been watching. He closed his computer quietly, hearing his wife finally break through the door, covered in blood from the effort but undeterred. Terrence had just started to pray—“Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name…”—when his wife grabbed his leg, pulling him out from under the bed. They made eye contact. She was holding a brick.

TO BE CONTINUED

note: there will probably only be one more installation

Second Installment of "Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes": The Why

Painting 1946, Francis Bacon

"If I go into a butcher's shop I always think it's surprising I wasn't there instead of the animal" --Francis Bacon

“The key question we have,” projected Nancy Carolin, President of Beef Producers of America (BOPA), “is will it change the taste of the meat?” Affirming murmurs echoed through the conference center as she returned to her seat.

“It will,” answered a commanding voice from the podium. Terrence Grummer, the scientist behind the chemical in question, raised his arms to silence the outcry that erupted after his answer. “It will enhance the flavor of the meat, not detract from it.”

This conference (“Meat Me in America”) in Tulsa, OK, would permanently alter the lives of every American—and eventually every person on the planet—but very few of them knew or cared about the introduction of the new chemical, Dx32h, or “dexir”, in American meat processing. It was a miracle drug, part antibiotic, part vitamin-laced elixir, designed to improve the quality and taste of the product. As “The Food Movement” advanced, introducing newer, more palatable competition—free-range hens; organic beef; acorn-fed ham—the larger industrial counterparts were suffering. Dexir was designed to allow them to sell meats equally tasty to the organic/hand-fed/hand-massaged product for half the price.

Needless to say Dexir was a hit. All the meat served at the conference was Dexir-infused, but there were also blind tasting stations scattered throughout the room so the representatives could see for themselves the astonishing effects. Of course, there were also stations explaining, with daunting charts and thick booklets of scientific evidence, how the drug worked, but those stations went mostly unvisited in favor of the widely popular “Foie-Gras” and “Veal Cutlet” posts.

Basically, using incomprehensibly complex science, Dexir affected the neuro-receptors of both the animals it was used on and those who consumed it. It employed the brain as well as the usual suspects—the stomach, liver, intestines—in the digestive process. The difficulty in explanation was far outweighed by the extremity of its effectiveness—factory-produced, low quality pork treated with Dexir was rendered as delicious as that snobby Spanish Jamón ibérico. It was the fairy godmother of the meat processing industry and the unwitting angel of death for the rest of us.

Dexir was not extensively tested on humans. They used dogs, rats and pigs, mostly, to test the effects it had on the brain, digestive system and body as a whole. In that way, the attendees of “Meat Me in America” were the first human guinea pigs of the Dexir experiment. One of these guinea pigs was chemical engineer, John Temmor, hailing from Jupiter Island, Florida. He would go on to murder his family in his sleep ten days after the conference. Another attendee was Marianne Dupre, of Ridgewood, New Jersey who, an evening just over a week after “Meat Me”, killed 13 motel guests and herself. In fact, all of the instigators of that night-time violence were somehow connected to thefirst batch of Dexir consumers. However, by the time those dots were connected, most of America was riding the Dexir train unbeknownst: it was widely introduced into the majority of meat producing plants just three days after “Meat Me in America”.

TO BE CONTINUED