Sam met Xibal in a snowstorm when she was 5 years old. The wind was driven and wet with cold, and she lost her mothers hand. Xibal appeared in front of her, chubby pink hooves hovering an inch above the snow. He licked her face with a bright purple tongue and nudged her backward, stumbling into her mother’s calves and giggling all the while.
Xibal was a perfect friend for Sam; his coat fuzzy and sparkling white, his eyes round and curious, his horn razor-sharp and massive, protruding from his head like the stick on a candied apple. When Sam had night terrors, Xibal would spring into action, burrowing under the covers and cuddling the fear away. When monsters came out of the closet or under the bed, Xibal would turn from friendly little weevil into violent and merciless dynamo, slicing their heads off and bellies open and feasting on the sweetmeats.
Sam told Xibal everything, from her greatest fears to her secret desires, and he asked for no such consideration in return; he simply listened, and giggled at the right points, and nodded encouragingly while Sam ducked to avoid impalement. It never bothered Sam that Xibal was imaginary, but then, it never does bother children. He was a faithful friend first and foremost. Eventually, as you might expect, Xibal was around less and less, and Sam never quite had a chance to miss him…the world was changing around her.
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Sundowning, they called it. The psychological phenomenon associated with increased confusion and restlessness in patients with some form of dementia. Then it wasn’t just patients with dementia, and it wasn’t just restlessness and confusion. It was violence, it was aggression, it was everywhere and no one seemed to be able to explain it. Sam’s stepfather worked long hours at the hospital, and after he came home, he was unwilling to tell his wife, let alone the kids, the stories of what he had seen. Sam’s mother, working at the University, had to fail students who missed class after class, although some emailed her afterward to explain they were simply scared to leave home.
Curfews were enforced; more violence. People were looting in most major cities by the time Sam moved out to the Midwest for college. Her plane ticket cost an arm and a leg, since most airlines wouldn’t fly anymore without clearance and protection from the government. In turn, many government workers refused to go to work, and the amenities that we take for granted became commodities to be coveted and hid away. Sam’s first semester in school, the water fountains were removed from campus; restaurants rarely served it anymore unless you asked and paid for it. Water became hard to come by, even in private homes. Everyone had a full bathtub with as much potable water as they could keep.
By the time the schools and hospitals shut down, Sam was only 19, living alone in a nice apartment in North Chicago, just off the red line. She had a bed and a couch and a big TV her mother sent her from amazon.com, and that was enough for her. Growing up in a home where she usually made dinner for herself and her little sister, her pantry was stocked with tuna, condiments, soups and pasta with sauce, all easy things to make and keep.
She stocked up on medicine for her condition when the school shut down, the on-campus pharmacy wasn’t open, so she went to the Walgreens down the street instead. The line for the pharmacy was longer than she had ever experienced, and people were jumpy, rude, downright bitchy. She asked for a double prescription, or even 90 days if they could just fill all her refills at once. The pharmacist refused, explaining unnecessarily that they had a limited supply and a helluva demand. Sam said she understood, but doubted, as the browbeaten pharmacist cried out after her, that she would ‘see you again soon!’.
One night, she found herself watching cops beat a homeless man to death. He was out after curfew, wailing and lunging at shadows, in the alley outside her apartment window. She didn’t call it in, but she knew someone in her building must have, and she was ashamed to say it was a morbid relief to hear his wailing and caterwauling at the moon replaced with sirens. At least at first. The sound of nightstick on flesh and bone took some getting used to.
From her third-story window, Sam could hear her neighbors muttering and moaning, watching and doing nothing to stop it, just like her. The cops didn’t stop hitting him after he was down; they didn’t stop hitting him until he stopped screaming, which took a remarkably long time. Even when his arms were twisted and broken, they seemed to thrust up at the officers, not protecting his head or face, but reaching out to attack.
The cops didn’t scare Sam. She knew how to avoid authority if needed. The homeless man, fighting back senselessly and unyieldingly, that was what scared her. It scared her, too, that the body would remain in the alley for over 3 days, before someone took it away.
The next morning, she went to the corner store, a veritable fortress even in the best of times. She used the last of her cash to buy all the canned food they would give her, trading half-a-month’s rent for one half-filled grocery bag. She had a pretty decent supply of food at the apartment, but something told her that she wouldn’t regret having more.
Walking back home, she passed a mother and child sitting on her stoop, eating what looked like raisins out of a paper bag. Actually, only the mother was eating, the child (about 10 years old, skinny, filthy, huge green eyes) was watching her gobble up the contents of the paper bag with something resembling horror on her face. Sam stopped at the door, once it was unlocked, and turned back.
The woman was eating roaches by the handful.
Kindling: Xibal, Sam and Tom 