The Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King
He never would have expected doom to be so lovely. The weather was warm and cloudless. In the old days, Lake Pocomtuck would have buzzed with powerboats and Jet Skis (which were killing the fish, the old-timers grumbled), but this summer it was silent except for the loons . . . only there seemed to be fewer of them crying each night. At first Robinson thought this was just his imagination, which was as infected with grief as the rest of his thinking apparatus, but Timlin assured him it wasn't.
"Haven't you noticed that most of the woodland birds are already gone? No chickadee concerts in the morning, no crow music at noon. By September, the loons will be as gone as the loons who did this. The fish will live a little longer, but eventually they'll be gone, too. Like the deer, the rabbits, and the chipmunks."
About such wildlife there could be no argument. Robinson had seen almost a dozen dead deer beside the lake road and more beside Route 19, on that one trip he and Gandalf had made to the Carson Corners General Store, where the sign out front--BUY YOUR VERMONT CHEESE & SYRUP HERE!--now lay facedown next to the dry gas pumps. But the greatest part of the animal holocaust was in the woods. When the wind was from the east, toward the lake rather than off it, the reek was tremendous. The warm days didn't help, and Robinson wanted to know what had happened to nuclear winter.
"Oh, it'll come," said Timlin, sitting in his rocker and looking off into the dappled sunshine under the trees. "Earth is still absorbing the blow. Besides, we know from the last reports that the Southern Hemisphere--not to mention most of Asia--is socked in beneath what may turn out to be eternal cloud cover. Enjoy the sunshine while we've got it, Peter."
As if he could enjoy anything. He and Diana had been talking about a trip to England--their first extended vacation since the honeymoon--once Ellen was settled in school.
Ellen, he thought. Who had just been recovering from the breakup with her first real boyfriend and was beginning to smile again.
*
On each of these fine late-summer postapocalypse days, Robinson clipped a leash to Gandalf's collar (he had no idea what the dog's name had been before June Sixth; the mutt had come with a collar from which only a State of Massachusetts vaccination tag hung), and they walked the two miles to the pricey enclave of which Howard Timlin was now the only resident.
Diana had once called that walk snapshot heaven. Much of it overlooked sheer drops to the lake and forty-mile views into New York. At one point, where the road buttonhooked sharply, a sign that read MIND YOUR DRIVING! had been posted. The summer kids of course called this hairpin Dead Man's Curve.
Woodland Acres--private as well as pricey before the world ended--was a mile farther on. The centerpiece was a fieldstone lodge that had featured a restaurant with a marvelous view, a five-star chef, and a "beer pantry" stocked with a thousand brands. ("Many undrinkable," Timlin said. "Take it from me.") Scattered around the main lodge, in various bosky dells, were two dozen picturesque "cottages," some owned by major corporations before June Sixth put an end to corporations. Most of the cottages had still been empty on June Sixth, and in the crazy ten days that followed, the few people who were in residence fled for Canada, which was rumored to be radiation-free. That was when there was still enough gasoline to make flight possible.
The owners of Woodland Acres, George and Ellen Benson, had stayed. So had Timlin, who was divorced, had no children to mourn, and knew the Canada story was surely a fable. Then, in early July, the Bensons had swallowed pills and taken to their bed while listening to Beethoven on a battery-powered phonograph. Now it was just Timlin.
"All that you see is mine," he had told Robinson, waving his arm grandly. "And someday, son, it will be yours."
On these daily walks down to the Acres, Robinson's grief and sense of dislocation eased; sunshine was seductive. Gandalf sniffed at the bushes and tried to pee on every one. He barked bravely when he heard something in the woods, but always moved closer to Robinson. The leash was necessary only because of the dead squirrels and chipmunks. Gandalf didn't want to pee on those; he wanted to roll in what was left of them.
Woodland Acres Lane split off from the camp road where Robinson now lived the single life. Once the lane had been gated to keep lookie-loos and wage-slave rabble such as himself out, but now the gate stood permanently open. The lane meandered for half a mile through forest where the slanting, dusty light seemed almost as old as the towering spruces and pines that filtered it, passed four tennis courts, skirted a putting green, and looped behind a barn where the trail horses now lay dead in their stalls. Timlin's cottage was on the far side of the lodge--a modest dwelling with four bedrooms, four bathrooms, a hot tub, and its own sauna.
"Why did you need four bedrooms, if it's just you?" Robinson asked him once.
"I don't now and never did," Timlin said, "but they all have four bedrooms. Except for Foxglove, Yarrow, and Lavender. They have five. Lavender also has an attached bowling alley. All mod cons. But when I came here as a kid with my family, we peed in a privy. True thing."
Robinson and Gandalf usually found Timlin sitting in one of the rockers on the wide front porch of his cottage (Veronica), reading a book or listening to his battery-powered CD player. Robinson would unclip the leash from Gandalf's collar and the dog--just a mutt, no real recognizable brand except for the spaniel ears--raced up the steps to be made a fuss of. After a few strokes, Timlin would gently pull at the dog's gray-white fur in various places, and when it remained rooted, he would always say the same thing: "Remarkable."
*
On this fine day in mid-August, Gandalf only made a brief visit to Timlin's rocker, sniffing at the man's bare ankles before trotting back down the steps and into the woods. Timlin raised his hand to Robinson in the How gesture of an old-time movie Indian.
Robinson returned the compliment.
"Want a beer?" Timlin asked. "They're cool. I just dragged them out of the lake."
"Would today's tipple be Old Shitty or Green Mountain Dew?"
"Neither. There was a case of Budweiser in the storeroom. The King of Beers, as you may remember. I liberated it."
"In that case, I'll be happy to join you."
Timlin got up with a grunt and went inside, rocking slightly from side to side. Arthritis had mounted a sneak attack on his hips two years ago, he had told Robinson, and, not content with that, had decided to lay claim to his ankles. Robinson had never asked, but judged Timlin to be in his mid-seventies. His slim body suggested a life of fitness, but fitness was now beginning to fail. Robinson himself had never felt physically better in his life, which was ironic considering how little he now had to live for. Timlin certainly didn't need him, although the old guy was congenial enough. As this preternaturally beautiful summer wound down, only Gandalf actually needed him. Which was okay, because for now, Gandalf was enough.
Just a boy and his dog, he thought.
Said dog had emerged from the woods in mid-June, thin and bedraggled, his coat snarled with burdock stickers and with a deep scratch across his snout. Robinson had been lying in the guest bedroom (he could not bear to sleep in the bed he had shared with Diana), sleepless with grief and depression, aware that he was edging closer and closer to just giving up and pulling the pin. He would have called such an action cowardly only weeks before, but had since come to recognize several undeniable facts. The pain would not stop. The grief would not stop. And, of course, his life was not apt to be a long one in any case. You only had to smell the decaying animals in the woods to know what lay ahead.
He'd heard rattling sounds, and at first thought it might be a human being. Or a surviving bear that had smelled his food. But the gennie was still running then, and in the glare of the motion lights that illuminated the driveway he had seen a little gray dog, alternately scratching at the door and then huddling on the porch. When Robinson opened the door, the dog at first backed away, ears back and tail tucked.
"I guess you better come in," Robinson had said, and without much further hesitation, the dog did.
&nb
"You're Gandalf," Robinson had said. "Gandalf the Grey." And then burst into tears. He tried to tell himself he was being ridiculous, but he wasn't. He was no longer alone in the house.
*
"What news about that motorhuckle of yours?" Timlin asked.
They had progressed to their second beers. When Robinson finished his, he and Gandalf would make the two-mile walk back to the house. He didn't want to wait too long; the mosquitoes got thicker when twilight came.
If Timlin's right, he thought, the bloodsuckers will inherit the earth instead of the meek. If they can find any blood to suck, that is.
"The battery's dead," he told Timlin. Then: "My wife made me promise to sell the bike when I was fifty. She said after fifty, a man's reflexes are too slow to be safe."
"And you're fifty when?"
"Next year," Robinson said. And laughed at the absurdity of it.
"I lost a tooth this morning," Timlin said. "Might mean nothing at my age, but . . ."
"Seeing any blood in the toilet bowl?"
Timlin had told him that was one of the first signs of advanced radiation poisoning, and he knew a lot more about it than Robinson did. What Robinson knew was that his wife and daughter had been in Boston when the frantic Geneva peace talks had gone up in a nuclear flash on the fifth of June, and they were still in Boston the next day, when the world killed itself. The eastern seaboard of America, from Hartford to Miami, was now mostly slag.
"I'm going to take the Fifth Amendment on that," Timlin said. "Here comes your dog. Better check his paws--he's limping a bit. Looks like the rear left."
But they could find no thorn in any of Gandalf's paws, and this time when Timlin pulled gently at his fur, a patch on his hindquarters came out. Gandalf seemed not to feel it. The two men looked at each other.
"Could be the mange," Robinson said at last. "Or stress. Dogs do lose fur when they're stressed, you know."
"Maybe." Timlin was looking west, across the lake. "It's going to be a beautiful sunset. Of course, they're all beautiful now. Like when Krakatoa blew its stack in eighteen eighty-three. Only this was ten thousand Krakatoas." He bent and stroked Gandalf's head.
"India and Pakistan," Robinson said.
Timlin straightened up again. "Well, yes. But then everyone else just had to get into the act, didn't they? Even the Chechens had a few, which they delivered to Moscow in pickup trucks. It's as though the world willfully forgot how many countries--and groups, fucking groups!--had those things."
"Or what those things were capable of," Robinson said.
Timlin nodded. "That too. We were too worried about the debt ceiling, and our friends across the pond were concentrating on stopping child beauty pageants and propping up the euro."
"You're sure Canada's just as dirty as the lower forty-eight?"
"It's a matter of degree, I suppose. Vermont's not as dirty as New York, and Canada's probably not as dirty as Vermont. But it will be. Plus, most of the people headed up there are already sick. Sick unto death, if I may misquote Kierkegaard. Want another beer?"
"I'd better get back." Robinson stood. "Come on, Gandalf. Time to burn some calories."
"Will I see you tomorrow?"
"Maybe in the late afternoon. I've got an errand to run in the morning."
"May I ask where?"
"Bennington, while there's still enough gas in my truck to get there and back."
Timlin raised his eyebrows.
"Want to see if I can find a motorcycle battery."
*
Gandalf made it as far as Dead Man's Curve under his own power, although his limp grew steadily worse. When they got there, he simply sat down, as if to watch the boiling sunset reflected in the lake. It was a fuming orange shot through with arteries of deepest red. The dog whined and licked at his back left leg. Robinson sat beside him for a little while, but when the first mosquito scouts called for reinforcements, he picked Gandalf up and started walking again. By the time they got back to the house, Robinson's arms were trembling and his shoulders were aching. If Gandalf had weighed another ten pounds, maybe even another five, he would have had to leave the mutt and go get the truck. His head also ached, perhaps from the heat, or the second beer, or both.
The tree-lined driveway sloping down to the house was a pool of shadows, and the house itself was dark. The gennie had given up the ghost weeks ago. Sunset had subsided to a dull purple bruise. He plodded onto the porch and put Gandalf down to open the door. "Go on, boy," he said. Gandalf struggled to rise, then subsided.
Just as Robinson was bending to pick him up again, Gandalf made another effort. This time he lunged over the doorsill and collapsed on his side in the entryway, panting. On the wall above the dog were at least two dozen photographs featuring people Robinson loved, all now deceased. He could no longer even dial Diana's and Ellen's phones and listen to their recorded voices. His own phone had died shortly after the generator, but even before that, all cell service had ceased.
He got a bottle of Poland Spring water from the pantry, filled Gandalf's bowl, then put down a scoop of kibble. Gandalf drank some water but wouldn't eat. When Robinson squatted to scratch the dog's belly, fur came out in bundles.
It's happening so fast, he thought. This morning he was fine.
*
Robinson went out to the lean-to behind the house with a flashlight. On the lake, a loon cried--just one. The motorcycle was under a tarp. He pulled the canvas off and shone the beam along the bike's gleaming body. It was a 2014 Fat Bob, several years old now, but low mileage; his days of riding four and five thousand miles between May and October were behind him. Yet the Bob was still his dream ride, even though his dreams were mostly where he'd ridden it over the last couple of years. Air-cooled. Twin cam. Six-speed. Almost seventeen hundred ccs. And the sound it made! Only Harleys had that sound, like summer thunder. When you came up next to a Chevy at a stoplight, the cager inside was apt to lock his doors.
Robinson skidded a palm along the handlebars, then hoisted his leg over and sat in the saddle with his feet on the pegs. Diana had become increasingly insistent that he sell it, and when he did ride, she reminded him again and again that Vermont had a helmet law for a reason . . . unlike the idiots in New Hampshire and Maine. Now he could ride it without a helmet if he wanted to. There was no Diana to nag him, and no County Mounties to pull him over. He could ride it buckass naked, if he wanted to.
"Although I'd have to mind the tailpipes when I got off," he said, and laughed. He went inside without putting the tarp back on the Harley. Gandalf was lying on the bed of blankets Robinson had made for him, nose on one of his front paws. His kibble was untouched.
"Better eat up," Robinson said, giving Gandalf's head a stroke. "You'll feel better."
*
The next morning there was a red stain on the blankets around Gandalf's hindquarters, and although he tried, he couldn't make it to his feet. After he gave up the second time, Robinson carried him outside, where Gandalf first lay on the grass, then managed to get up enough to squat. What came out of him was a gush of bloody stool. Gandalf crawled away from it as if ashamed, then lay down, looking at Robinson mournfully.
This time when Robinson picked him up, Gandalf cried out in pain. He bared his teeth but did not bite. Robinson carried him into the house and put him down on his blanket bed. He looked at his hands when he straightened up and saw they were coated with fur. When he dusted his palms together, the fur floated away like milkweed.
"You'll be okay," he told Gandalf. "Just a little upset stomach. Must have gotten one of those goddam chipmunks when I wasn't looking. Stay there and rest up. I'm sure you'll be feeling more like yourself by the time I get back."
*
There was still
His last neighbor was sitting on the porch of Veronica in his rocker. He was extremely pale, and there were purple pouches under his eyes. When Robinson told him about Gandalf, Timlin nodded. "I was up most of the night, running to the toilet. We must have caught the same bug." He smiled to show it was a joke, although not a very funny one.
No, he said, there was nothing he wanted in Bennington, but perhaps Robinson would stop by on his way back. "I've got something you might want," he said.
*
The drive to Bennington was slower than Robinson expected, because the highway was littered with abandoned cars. It was close to noon by the time he pulled into the front lot of Kingdom Harley-Davidson. The show windows had been broken and all the display models were gone, but there were plenty of bikes out back. These had been rendered theft-proof with steel cables sheathed in plastic and sturdy bike locks.
That was fine with Robinson; he only wanted to steal a battery. The Fat Bob he settled on was a year or two newer than his, but the battery looked the same. He fetched his toolbox from the bed of his pickup and checked the battery with his Impact (the tester had been a gift from his daughter two birthdays back), and got a green light. He removed the battery, went into the showroom, and found a selection of maps. Using the most detailed one to suss out the back roads, he made it back to the lake by three o'clock.
He saw a great many dead animals, including an extremely large moose lying beside the cement block steps of someone's trailer home. On the trailer's crabgrassy lawn, a hand-painted sign had been posted, only two words: HEAVEN SOON.
*
The porch of Veronica was deserted, but when Robinson knocked on the door, Timlin called for him to come in. He was sitting in the ostentatiously rustic living room, paler than ever. In one hand he held an oversize linen napkin. It was spotted with blood. On the coffee table in front of him were three items: a picture book titled The Beauty of Vermont, a hypodermic needle filled with yellow fluid, and a revolver.
"I'm glad you came," Timlin said. "I didn't want to leave without telling you goodbye."