The Bomb by Bruce Weaver

Looking out the window of his fourteenth floor apartment, Frank Scribner once again gazed apprehensively at the unruly mob below.

The mass of angry toughs – mostly young Latinos and blacks with an occasional white face showing on the edges – seemed to endlessly flow up and down the street and sidewalks, looking into smashed storefront windows in search of anything worth stealing. Many of them carried baseball bats or other weapons that were used to indiscriminately smash the windshields and tops of cars parked along the avenue. The sound of distant gunshots was almost as common now as honking horns had been a few days earlier, before it all happened.

He could hardly believe it had been just six days ago that the occasional honking horn was about the only sound that entered his comfortable world. Now all was noise and confusion, distant clouds of black smoke rising from a hundred small fires. The gunshots. The shouting, pushing, fighting, tiny figures far below. Dark smoke and occasional flames drifted out of a high-rise office building about a quarter mile away.

On that Monday morning when the beginning of the end arrived, Frank was pulled from a dream by his phone ringing at 4 a.m. He knocked his glasses to the floor fumbling for the receiver. “Shit, what the hell is it,” he muttered to himself.

“Frank.” It was his boss, George Zerconi, owner of the largest bulk food warehouse market in the Los Angeles area. Frank was general manager there. “Don’t come to work. Have you heard about the shit coming down around here?”

“What are you talking about,” Frank answered, fumbling for his glasses.

“A gang of assholes broke into the market a couple hours ago and started busting up the place – carried out stuff to the bare walls! They took shopping carts and just loaded them up with stuff and wheeled them out the door. Beat the shit out of John Sloane (the night security guard); he’s damn near dead, I heard. The whole place is wrecked. All the windows are gone. Equipment, cash registers, display cases, everything smashed to shit. Nothing left but bare walls and shelves.”

Silence on the line. Frank was too stunned to say anything at first. Then he gasped, “Holy shit, where were the cops in all this?”

“Christ, they didn’t get there ‘til more than an hour after it all started. I guess they were too busy with all the other crap that’s been going down around town.”

“What the hell . . .?” Frank stumbled to the window and looked east towards downtown LA, where the market is located. Now he saw several glowing spots of brightness in the pre-dawn gloom that could only be from fires. When he opened his thick glass window, he now heard sirens wailing in the distance. He saw almost no headlights on any of the streets. The city was shrouded in darkness.

So it had started.

“What are you gonna do now?”

George, a practical, conservative and clever man who’d worked his way up in a 32-year grocery career that began as a bag boy and ended at the head of Sunshine Bulk Foods, grunted: “Ugh. I don’t know yet. Call the attorney I guess. I talked to the cops and they say don’t go down there. I’d probably get my balls shot off. Mob rule’s the game downtown now, they told me. I’m just sittin’ on my ass waiting for the other shoe to drop, I guess. You stay away, too. Probably couldn’t get anywhere close, anyway. Nothing much left. Take some time off and we’ll see what happens, when the smoke clears.”

When the smoke clears. It’s been six days since he last talked to George. It seems like a lifetime. The smoke had never cleared. If anything, the isolated pillars of smudge on the city skyline had turned into hundreds of dark splotches as far as the eye could see in this huge concrete nuthouse. Later that first day, the power, water and sewer in his apartment complex stopped working. Frank began to really sweat.

Frank’s Santa Monica apartment was on the top floor of the rather posh Ocean View Arms, just a few blocks up from the Coast Highway and the ocean. He could in fact see the ocean if he looked sideways out the window. He had a corner spot, so he could also look up the broad Santa Monica Boulevard towards downtown LA and on a rare low smog day, could even catch glimpses of the distant mountains of Angeles National Forest.

At 46, Frank thought he had the bull by the horns before all this came down, what with his high paying job and his independence since his divorce three years ago from wife Vicki. It was a rather bloodless split, with no kids to complicate.

So Frank had started socking away cash until he had enough to buy 160 acres in remote east central Oregon. That was a year ago, the summer of 2005. Since then, Frank had made several long weekend trips to the isolated ranch north of the tiny village of Riverside, Oregon, and within an hour’s walking distance of Warm Springs Reservoir. Many times Frank drove his Toyota four wheel pickup down the long private drive after a dusty, bumpy ride from town, loaded down with supplies and bulk food. There was an old hunting cabin on the property that he’d fixed up during a long vacation. Just a few yards from it, a crystal clear creek no more than three feet broad flowed year round, originating in the nearby mountains and emptying into the reservoir. Locals called it Jade Creek. So Frank called his little part of heaven Jade Creek Ranch. It was mostly scrub pasture land with cottonwoods and an occasional oak around the cabin and along the creek. But it had what he most wanted: security and solitude.

He bought a 1000 gallon concrete septic tank and had it hauled all the way from Ontario, Oregon, to his land, and they buried it behind his cabin. But no shit would ever see the inside of this tank. Instead, Frank stocked it with all his tools, guns, supplies and bulk food and when it was filled, he moved the concrete lid onto it, covered the lid with dirt and spread some grass seed around it.

Frank had just returned from another long weekend trip to Oregon just a few days before George woke him up with the bad news. It had all happened so fast; he thought he had more time left. It had been so close. In fact, Frank had planned on giving George a short notice in a few days, clear up the rest of his affairs in the city and bug out for his Oregon redoubt.

He looked back over the events of the last few years, trying to understand how he could have blown things so badly. In the summer of 2004 Frank became a devotee of the Peak Oil crowd, a small but determined group of fanatics who spawned dozens of Internet sites on the subject of declining worldwide oil reserves and whose forum members speculated endlessly on when the flow of oil would eventually slow enough to cause worldwide chaos. He bought the videos “The End of Suburbia,” Bush Family Fortunes,” and Hijacking Catastrophe.” He read countless articles on the subject. Matt Simmons became one of his gurus. He finally decided that when gas prices reached an average $6.00 a gallon in the US, things would pretty much go to hell in the cities. In June, 2006, the month the riots began, gas in LA sold for around $5.59. Earlier in the year, a rash of brown- and black-outs hit the power grid in several states.

George W. Bush -- whose ah shucks, peanut butter and jelly sandwich personality again captured the hearts of addled seniors everywhere -- won the election in November 2004, again squeaking by with a 259 vote Florida victory. As in the election of 2000, there was a general disgruntlement and tongue wagging over the amazingly close race in brother Jeb Bush’s state.

Seymour Hersh wrote a few scathing articles on what he called the “most despicable scandal of the 21st Century.” But because of growing anti-Hersh pressure being applied to newspaper, news magazine and TV moguls by the administration, the articles had only appeared on Hersh’s website and didn’t have a wide readership.

Nevertheless, George W., in a moment of false piety, suggested to brother Jeb that it might be wise for him to step down as governor. Amazingly, Jeb did as he was told. Two months later, Jeb was appointed US Attorney General, a few days after the current AG was killed in a mysterious helicopter crash during a fact finding mission in Iraq.

Again, tongues briefly wagged and Hersh banged out more articles for his website, but the baseball season was warming up and Hersh’s website was mysteriously removed, so the short American attention span once again was diverted to pleasanter pass times.

After the election, Bush dropped all pretence that Iraq had been invaded over weapons of mass destruction, etc. With oil prices in the summer of 2005 bopping over the $3.50 hump by mid July, he now admitted -- through his mouthpiece Dick Cheney -- that getting more oil and saving the petro-dollar were suddenly very important to his administration. That and being able to use American-built bases in Iraq from which to pursue the war on terror into Iran, Saudi Arabia and any other country that: 1. Bad-mouths the US and 2. Has oil. Surprisingly, the beleaguered motoring public, their SUVs slowly turning into world class boat anchors, bought the Bush bombast and remained mostly quiet on the subject of oil conquest.

A month earlier, Seymour Hersh had quietly retired to Costa Rica.

As 2005 wore down, fighting raged on in Iraq and many oilfields were set ablaze, further crimping the oil pipeline flowing to the states. Dick Cheny went on television to announce that Iran was now suspected of having weapons of mass destruction and was bent on using them against troops in Iraq. Additionally, he claimed that the Iranians were also planning to accept only euros when selling their oil. In September, Bush authorized a strike in Iran and American bombers and fighter planes began pounding Tehran.

Osama came out of hiding and more terrorist attacks hit the US; brown-outs became almost commonplace, as did long lines at gas pumps and even some retail stores.

From his villa near the ocean, Seymour Hersh wrote a letter to the editor of his local newspaper. They refused to print it.

Now it was late June, 2006. The power was out in LA. People were rioting everywhere. No communication, little help from the cops. And Frank Scribner found himself stuck, a virtual prisoner in his trendy apartment. Trying to reach his Toyota parked in the basement lot would have been foolhardy. It might not even be there now, or it might be a smashed hulk. If it was still there in running order, trying to drive it away from here would be suicide. He thought of trying to escape on foot, but where would he go? Try hoofing it north up the Coast Highway? There probably were thousands of refugees doing the same thing right now. It was the quickest way out of the city, though. Going east or south would only get you more cities – and crazy people. Steal a boat? Yea, right. But he had to come up with a plan pretty soon. Things were getting tight.

Frank stared wistfully at his bathtub. Earlier in the evening that George had called, Frank had filled the tub to the brim and taken a long, luxurious bath. Then he’d opened up the drain and let the water out. He cursed himself for not filling the tub with water to drink. But how was he to know? He’d give his left nut now for that tub to magically refill with dirty, soapy water. He wondered what other people were doing in their apartments, but he decided against knocking on any doors. They probably wouldn’t answer anyway.

He had almost run out of food in the apartment. Not expecting to stay long, he had kept little food on hand. Now he was down to a couple cans of pork and beans, three tins of peaches, a jumbo box of pancake mix, and a couple six packs of warm beer. He had been mixing the pancake mix with beer and eating the gruel for the past couple days. He had developed a severe case of loose bowels as a result. He’d been dipping water frugally out of the toilet tank, but that wouldn’t last much longer. (He at least had remembered that water source and hadn’t used it for his last flush.)

The toilet, of course, could not be flushed, but Frank figured a way around that. He had a rather large stash of those large, white plastic shopping bags that every grocery store in America had in abundance. In his case, the bags had been liberated from the Sunshine Bulk Food store. He put one bag inside another for extra strength and put that inside the toilet bowl, closing the lid around the edge. When he had filled it about half way up, he would tie the top and carry it over to the window. Thirteen stories below, a flat roof of perhaps six or eight feet in width ran along the front of the building. When he was ready to “flush,” Frank would hang the bag out the window and carefully let it go near the building wall, so that it was sure to land on the roof. Sure enough, the first couple of times his bags landed on the roof with a rather sickening ker-blash, but did no more damage than brown-staining the roof. Soon he noticed a few more bags were appearing on the roof down the way. Someone else also had a stash of baggies and a brilliant mind!

The first time he launched his disgusting projectile, Frank thought back with nostalgia to the time as a kid growing up in a Midwest town. He and some other kids one time had climbed on top of a store along main street during a parade. They were armed with water balloons and let them fly when the mayor’s convertible went by. Then there was the time they went to the balcony of the local movie theater on a Halloween night. At the height of the fright show, they made loud barfing noises and tipped cans of chicken noodle soup onto unwary heads below. What fun!

But somehow, this wasn’t nearly as much fun.

Now, with his gut in turmoil, Frank filled the next bag with what was left in him. He let the bag get especially full this time, trying to postpone the inevitable, when he’d have to tie it up, lug it over to the window -- meanwhile hoping it wouldn’t spring a leak – then let it go. But it was time now. He carefully tied the bag top, lifted it gingerly out of the stool, and carried it to the window, supporting the heavy load with one hand on the bottom. He peered out his window. Below, the crowd seemed to have grown bigger today, with people milling around, and several fights in progress. Fires were still burning in the distance, and seemed to be getting closer. Rowdies in the crowd still carried clubs and used them against each other. There was no sign of the police.

Frank struggled to get his heavy bag of liquid filth out the window, paused a moment and let it loose. He looked down. One apartment below him, a horizontal window vent was open. The bag hit the vent, and when it did, the bag acted just like a skier going off a jump: it was deflected away from the building by at least a foot. Down, down it went, arching further out. Frank gasped. Was it going to hit the roof or not? The big shit bomb finally smacked the edge of the roof and exploded. Watery crap flew out and down, covering a large knot of angry thugs on the street with abominable stench.

Frank swallowed hard.

He wondered what would happen next? Surely, in the general chaos of street carnage, this incident rated extremely low on the violence scale, didn’t it?

There was more shouting now below his window and there seemed to be a rush towards the front of the building. Frank waited. He started to get sick to his stomach.

About five minutes later, he heard a loud crash below. He looked down just as a chair went flying through a window several stories below him. Seconds later, the body of a fat woman went sailing out the window, screaming, screaming down to the roof.

Frank stared at the scene in utter horror. His whole body was shaking like a leaf in a hurricane. He wet his pants. And he waited by the window. Less than ten minutes later, only two stories below him, another crash and a small table smashed through a window, followed shortly by a small man, arms clawing the air, screaming, screaming to the roof.

Frank ran to the door to make sure it was locked. In a frenzy, he pushed his large sofa in front of it. He started to pile other things like tables, chairs, a clothes cabinet, anything he could grab and drag to it. In a few minutes, there was a small mountain of clutter in front of the door. He wished he had a gun. But they were all at Jade Creek Ranch. Shit.

He raced into the kitchen looking for a weapon. Drawers flew open and he finally grasped a large butcher knife. Presently he heard a loud bang as the stairway exit door down the hall slammed open and seconds later there was loud banging on his door. Christ! He rushed into the bathroom and locked the door. He was drooling now and could barely hold the knife. He opened the cabinet under the sink and spied a plastic bottle of liquid drain cleaner. He pulled the top off, hoping he could at least toss some of it into on of his assailant’s eyes.

The banging and crashing at the door grew louder. Wood splintered. They must have a ram of some kind, he thought, almost abstractly. More splintering wood and a squealing, grinding noise now, as the mass of debris slowly moved inward. They would be inside in a minute or two!

He could hear them now, yelling obscenities as they squeezed past the rubble at the door. They were in! How many? Did it matter? Feet were stomping through the rooms now. One of them cried out, “Look at this!” They searched closets, then Frank could hear them at the bathroom door, talking in loud voices. One of them said, “Bet this is the dude, look at them bags.”

Frank wilted into the corner, helplessly clutching his knife in one hand and the bottle of toilet cleaner in the other. He felt like he might faint or throw up.

“Hey, rich gringo, open up, will ya?” one of them shouted.

“Asshole in there, don’t make it harder on us. We just goin’ to take you downstairs for a little trial, okay? It’s been a real shitty day for us, right?” Laughs.

Frank waited. Then they went at the door, slamming into it with whatever they’d used on the front door. It didn’t take long to bash in the thin interior door. Some kind of blunt iron railing punched a large hole through the door. Another hit at the doorknob and the door flew open. They were all crowded around the open door now, Latinos, big, tough looking gang bangers. Some carried clubs and chains, some had splatters of brown on their T-shirts and jackets. There must have been at least eight of them. Most were insanely grinning. They looked at Frank crouched trembling in the corner with a knife and the bottle of cleaning fluid.

“Fat lady had more goin’ for her than you got,” one of them yelled at Frank. More laughs.

Frank suddenly lunged at them, knife out in front. He felt a sharp sickening pain as a wooden club smashed his hand, and the knife clattered to the floor. Frank dropped to his knees then, staring at his bloody hand. The guy who’d clubbed him grabbed Frank’s hand and Frank shot his other hand up with the cleaner and squirted a mass of it into his attacker’s face. The man yelled and backed off a little but then they all rushed him and it was all over. Almost.

Three of the Latinos grabbed hold of Frank and lifted him up horizontally. Frank heard a smashing sound as someone else threw a chair through the window. Frank struggled wildly and screamed. As they struggled to the window, Frank’s mind cleared for a brief moment and, strangely, he thought about his Jade Creek Ranch, of sitting on the front porch of his cabin, watching the sun go down. Then he felt himself being lifted up, going forward, and he was out the window.

Now, Frank was only screaming, screaming, down to the roof.