The Beginning of An Apocalypse

A man named Arnold Jenks continued to make visits to the management office to complain about one of the employees. His coworker.

Shane Willgate could care less about what someone was doing because most of the time the complaints were about a smell or a bad mood. But he tried not to make that into such a big deal. But he cared when it broke into a fight. He cared when they started messing up their work and taking their bad day out on customers. But not much like that had happened in this store.

Arnold was saying that the person who was bagging his groceries was dropping things. That this woman busted a jug of milk and it spilled everywhere. And when he tried to talk to her, she snapped at him and stormed off.

“Alright,” Shane finally said. “I’ll deal with it. Who is it? Shelia?” She’s always causing problems, he thought.

“No,” Arnold told him. “Cassidy Tyler.”

Shane stopped and looked over at him now serious. He didn’t have much interest in this before, but now… now he was interested. “Which line?”

“Aisle 6,” Arnold said following Shane to his isle. He thought he should rant about all the things that Cas had screwed up today. He blabbered on about how she was cursing under her breath and making kids complain to their parents and end up complaining to him. Arnold was one of those jerk employees. He watched everyone and told every little thing. For fun, it seemed.

They walked to aisle 6 and he saw Cas standing there ripping up a bag after how many tries trying to open it up.

“Just continue working, I’ll take care of this,” Shane told Arnold.

Arnold just groaned and went to go check out some waiting customers. Shane walked over to Cas and grabbed her arm. He got her to walk with him. “We need to talk.”

Cas pushed his arm off her and she walked with him. Shane walked her back to his office. He closed the door and pulled out a seat for her. “Sit down, Cas, please.” Shane sat down in his seat and waited for her to do the same.

Shane took one look at her and he knew something was wrong. She always seemed sleep deprived, but right now it was showing. Her hair was in a messy bun. Her lip looked like it had been chewed up, there was dried blood along her lip and on her chin.

“Are you okay?” Shane asked her. Shane looked at her hands and saw that she was gripping onto that bag she was ripping up for dear life.

“I’m… I’m fine,” Cas said nodding her head until she couldn’t do it anymore. “I mean I’m fine, but Marcus… I can’t— I can’t find him.”

Shane moved his seat closer so he could listen better and so she could know he was there. They were friends and Shane had met Marcus a few times. He’s a good kid. “What do you mean?”

“I went to the library yesterday, where he always sits to wait for me to get off work but he wasn’t there. He wasn’t there so I got worried.” Cas took out the ponytail in her hair only to scratch her hair back and put it back into a ponytail. “I ran back to the alleyway we were sleeping in–”

“Wait, your sleeping in an alleyway?” Shane asked. He knew she was extremely poor, but she told him she had a roof over her head. That she got a place for cheap and was making good on the payments.

“It doesn’t matter right now,” Cas snapped. “I went there and he wasn’t there. I walked through every place Marcus could be. He wasn’t there.”

“Did you go to the police?” Shane asked. “They may be able to help.”

“Yeah, I did,” Cas said. “They said that he will probably just come back, I have to wait. They said they would file a missing person report though, so maybe they’ll look for him. They just told me in the meantime to go to work and wait for them to come to check up with me.” Cas laughed at that. “I told them the store’s phone number by the way because I don’t have a phone right now.”

“That’s fine,” Shane told her. “But why are you at work right now? You should have told me, Cas. We can go now and look for Marcus.”

Cas stood up and walked over to the window. She held a hand on her hip and her other hand rested over her head. “I didn’t want to lose my job. I’ve taken too many days off and if I lose my job now… I feel like a terrible person for thinking about my job right now, but I need this job.”

“You aren’t going to lose your job, Cas,” Shane said. “I won’t let that happen. Get off work now, I’ll call in someone else.” Shane got up from his seat and walked over to stand beside Cas. “I got to take care of a few things here, but then I will meet you at the library where we can look together. I have a car, we’ll be able to cover more ground.”

“Shane,” Cas said. “You barely know me. You can’t risk your job or your life. I’ll be fine,” Cas said. “Just deal with work and thanks for letting me off. Once I find him, I’ll work overtime got it?.”

Cas nodded knowing this was her only way to pay him back. She had no money and nothing else to offer him. She wasn’t the best employee, everyone knew that, but she could not lose this job. He needed to let her keep her job and if she offered to work the hours she never wanted to work, maybe he would let her. “I’ll work overtime and I’ll be the best employee there can be. I’ll work holidays and weekends. I’ll take in everyone’s shift at least once. Just don’t let me get fired.”

“Cas–”

“Thank you!” Cas said. She forced herself out of Shane’s office. She rested herself against the door for only a few seconds more. She ripped off the red vest and carried it while she walked to the time clock to punch out.

She was grateful to Shane for letting her off work early. She was grateful that he was a nice person and a good friend. But she still didn’t feel right about him trying so hard to help her. She could do this by herself anyway, she thought.

Cas walked out of the store without another question or pause. She grabbed out a list of places that Marcus liked and could be.

There were fourteen places on the list and Cas checked out eleven of them. She was going to check the Golden Gate Bridge if she had the time to. He always drew pictures of it but never said if he wanted to go there or not.

Islais Creek was the first place she went to. She took him there and ever since then he said he liked going there. It wasn’t the most beautiful site to see, but he said that’s what he liked about it. It took her almost two hours to get there.

Cas started asking anyone she ran into about Marcus and each of them said they didn’t see him. After she talked to at least two dozen people she started to lose hope that he was there. That she would ever be able to find him.

The losing hope did not stop her from combing every inch of this creek. Once she was sure he wasn’t here, she left. As she walked along the sidewalk she couldn’t help but think of the possibilities of where Marcus was and what could have happened to make him disappear.

She hoped that he ran away because that would mean there was a chance that Marcus would come back. But if Marcus didn’t run away, that meant he either got lost or got kidnapped. She hoped he would be lost, he would be able to ask someone or find his way back. If he was kidnapped he could never come back. He could be dead or worse.

The mere thought of that made her heart race and break all at the same time.

After hours of walking around and finding nothing, she decided to head back to places that she knew. She knew where she came from so she wasn’t lost, but she needed to see familiar things. She needed to think that she would find Marcus there. In all those familiar places.

She looked at her list and she saw she had everything marked off beside one. The one that she was trying to convince herself Marcus wouldn’t go. But the more she thought about it the more she believed he might have gone.

Marcus never showed any interest in the house since they were kicked out of it, but it was his home. He lived there for about fifteen years before he was thrown out with only Cas to take care of him.

Cas made her way back to the library. She smiled when she thought that maybe he would be sitting there and when he saw her in the distance he would wave to her. She imagined him telling her about the book he had read that single day and how much he liked it. She wanted to see that smile on his face when he seemed excited and did not remember their situation. She wanted to see Marcus beside her instead of God knows where.

Cas walked over to the small library and sat down in the seat Marcus always sat at. He wasn’t there.

Cas dropped her head in her hands and rested there. Her body was exhausted and her mind was fighting for peace and panic. She wanted to get up and question everyone in this city and see if Marcus would be found. She wanted to break into every house and store in the area to find him. But she also wanted to lie there and let the police find him. She wanted this pain and all the other emotion to get out and let her rest peacefully.

And she hated that. But right now, she could barely get off this chair.

“I had a feeling you would be here.”

Cas looked up without even worrying about who could be saying this to her. She didn’t care anymore. She looked up and instead of seeing some jerk off the streets or some person that would cause her problems, she saw Shane.

“What are you doing here?” Cas asked. She dropped her hands and leaned back in her chair.

“I came by a couple of times looking for you, but you were gone. I told you I would come to help you find your brother once I was done with work.” Shane set his car keys down on the table and sat down beside her. “Any leads?”

“You shouldn’t–” Cas took a deep breath in and sighed. She didn’t see any use in fighting. Shane didn’t take her last suggestion for him to stay out of it, he wasn’t going to listen to a second one. “No. I went to every single place that I thought Marcus would go if he ran away, but he wasn’t there.” Cas took out her list and threw it on the table for Shane to see. Shane took the list and smoothened it out.

“His art things and his books aren’t here or where we are sleeping for a while. He must have them with him. So, he may have taken them with him when he ran away. He wouldn’t have been able to take them with him if someone kidnapped him. They’d leave it. Right?”

“I’d think so,” Shane said. “Kidnappers usually don’t care for anything but who they are kidnapping,” he explained.

Cas nodded. “I’ll find him, I know I will. Even if he was kidnapped, I’ll hunt whoever did it down and kill them myself.”

“Okay, murder and violence aside, there’s only one unmarked place on this list,” Shane said. He turned the list so Cas could see it. “Home.”

Cas grabbed the list and crumbled it up and stuffed it in her pocket. “I don’t think he would go there. Plus, it’s owned by someone else now I’m sure.”

“Are you sure he doesn’t want to go there or that you don’t want to go there?” Shane asked. He looked at her and saw that look in her eyes. The one look that said that he was right in what he said. “I’m sure it’s not going to be easy going there with all the history.”

“I just haven’t gotten there yet,” Cas said. “I’m not avoiding it.”

“Sure, sure,” Shane said. “I don’t know where your house is, but I have a car and I can take you there easily. If you go there, maybe Marcus will be there and it’ll all be worth it.”

“I told you you didn’t have to help me,” Cas said. She got herself to stand up and brush off everything with a few shakes of her body. It didn’t work, but it got her to be able to control it for the time being.

“I know I don’t have to,” Shane told her. “But I want to. We are friends after all. What is a friend for if not to find the brother that may or may not be missing?”

Cas couldn’t help but give a small laugh at Shane’s words. He was able to make her feel better and he did give her some of the confidence she very much needed back.

“If you want to, you could… take me to my old house,” Cas said. “Or you can drive until you regret the decision and drop me off mid-way. Either way’s fine.”

Shane laughed, “No way.”

Shane opened his car door for Cas and she got in. He went to close the door for her, but she took a second to do it herself before he could. Shane walked over to the driver’s side and got in. He turned his keys into the car and smiled when the engine came on.

It was only a Lexus car, but Cas was looking at it with amazement.

“Long time since you’ve been in a car I’m guessing,” Shane said after Cas gripped the handlebar when the car started driving.

“It’s been a while,” Cas said. “I lost my car a few days after I lost the house. And I’ve never wanted to use the bus system.”

Shane asked for directions and Cas told him the next few directions to save some time. It was silent for the most part. The only noise was the low volume of an eighties rock station. Shane looked over at Cas and then back at the road.

“You could have told me you were homeless you know,” Shane said.

Cas sat up uncomfortably and sighed. She shrugged her shoulders and said, “I can deal with it just fine.”

“I know that,” Shane said. “I’m just saying that I wouldn’t have judged you or whatever.”

“Yeah,” Cas said not knowing what else she could say in this conversation.

“Just don’t ask me for money though,” Shane said. “I don’t have the money to help you get something big. I got this car from my brother and my bank account isn’t the… fullest. But a place to crash is always an option.”

“Thanks,” Cas said as she looked at him with a smile.

“Don’t mention it,” Shane said.

“No,” Cas said, “Thank you. Really.”

Cas requested back down and thought about the day she’s had. “I’ve had at least a few dozen people push me out of the way, curse me out, and ignore me. I’m just trying to say thanks for not being a slob to me.”

The two of them sat there silently until they had gotten just outside of San Francisco. Cas and his family lived up on a small desert-like hill with a few other houses close by. They had enough land for Marcus to have somewhere to play when he was kicked out of the house, but not enough land to go exploring.

Cas could see that the new owners painted over the house. The house used to be light blue and now it’s completely white. The roof is redone and now a darker brown. There was a red truck in the driveway and a stack of firewood inside the truck bed.

“Someone’s home,” Shane said.

“Maybe we should go then,” Cas said. “Marcus wouldn’t barge into a home with people living there.”

“Don’t lose hope,” Shane said. He pulled up the driveway and parked. “Marcus could have showed up and they let him in for a sandwich or called the police and the police took him.” Shane shut his door when Cas forced herself to hope and get out of the truck as well.

“Just because he may not be here doesn’t mean we won’t find ourselves a lead of some kind,” Shane explained.

“I hope so,” Cas said.

“See, a little bit of hope can go a long way,” Shane said. He walked up the steps of the porch decorated with way too many plants and knocked on the door. He walked over and hurried to get Cas to stand beside him at the door.

They heard footsteps and Cas felt almost like it would be her parents opening up that door. The many times she went out past curfew and they locked the door so they would know how many hours she went past curfew.

She looked behind her and wished she was back in Shane’s car and driving away. This wasn’t a place of bad memories, but it was a place that she couldn’t keep. The last place she saw her parents.

The door opened and a short woman stood at the door. She wiped her mouth with a napkin and looked up at them. “Who are you two?” She asked looking at them with a raised eyebrow.

“Hi, mam,” Cas said. “My name is Cas Tyler, I used to live in this house. Right now, we are looking for my little brother, Marcus. He’s missing and we thought maybe he would come here.”

“There’s no one besides me here,” the woman told her.

“Okay, but you might have seen him walking around here,” Cas said. “He’s got shaggy dirty-blonde hair. He’s about 5’7 and he carries around books and a sketchbook a lot. The last thing he was wearing was–”

“Look,” The short woman said. “I’ve had enough of your family and I don’t want any more of it.”

Cas stared at her because she had nothing else to say. She didn’t understand what this woman meant. Cas wasn’t sure she ever saw this woman, how would she know who they were?

“What do you mean?” Shane asked when Cas didn’t reply fast enough.

“Every single week some government people come combing through my house thinking that the late owners of this house stored something. They go on and on about things that I don’t care about. They tear my home, my life apart thinking that they can because they are the government.”

The short woman snorted a laugh. “Let me tell you young idiots about the government. They–”

“Thank you for your time,” Shane said cutting her off before she started ranting. “If you ever see the boy, please call the police or…” Shane ripped a half off of Cas’s list and wrote his number on it. “Or contact this number.”

Cas looked over at Shane and then hurried to grab the paper and write her flip-phone number. She didn’t use it very often, but she felt better having her number there too.

Shane nodded once the short woman took the paper and held it in her hand. “Thanks for your time and know we will be so grateful if you can watch out for the boy. Thank you.” Shane nodded and made himself and Cas turn and walk away.

Cas was relieved she was getting away from this place. Her entire body shook and shivers were becoming more constant as she saw that house.

She thought about the entire conversation with that woman. She said people, and government agents come and ask her questions about them. Her family. Her parents.

What could the government want with them?

Cas looked back once more before she turned and focused on what was happening now. “I don’t know how you can be so nice to people,” Cas said. “Especially people that don’t even try to be nice to you.”

Shane chuckled at her words. “My parents believed that you should be kind and polite with everyone you meet. It took me a while to stop being nice to the complete idiots. They mean people. But people that that short lady in there, piece of cake.”

“I’m jealous,” Cas said. “You annoy me and you’ll feel like you were just burnt alive.” Cas laughed, “Probably why I barely ever work at the register.”

“Maybe,” Shane joked and they both laughed.

They both made it back to Shane’s car and got in. They drove for almost two minutes before Shane spoke. “Anywhere else we should go look. It’ll be… an hour and a half before it gets dark. We could look–”

“I should probably get back to the library,” Cas said. “Maybe Marcus is sitting there waiting for me or something.”

“Yeah, that could be likely.” Shane nodded and said he would drive her there. Cas turned and looked out the window. She had driven down this road so many times. She walked Marcus to school every time he missed the bus down these roads. “Why not instead buy us some dinner after this long day?”

“No, no, Shane, I can’t do that. I should just get back.” She wanted to believe that Marcus would be at the library when she got back. And if she believed it, she had to get back there now.

“Come on, it’s dinner. And we can split the bill even. It’ll be some stupid restaurant that has too much grease.” Shane chuckled at his own words. Come on, think of it as… a payment for gas and for my time if you want to.”

Cas took a deep breath in and nodded her head. “But we order to go and head for the library while eating,” Cas told him.

“Fine, but we go inside the restaurant to order. There will be no drive-thru,” Shane told her playfully.

“Deal,” Cas said and they both smiled and laughed. Cas rested back down in her chair letting the smile on her face stay till it went away. She turned and looked out the window into the scenery.

She knew every bit of land here it was kind of shocking. She could make it through this entire land and not get lost. Even though she barely explored the barren lands and the woodlands. There were so many memories that she could recall.

It made them want to curl into a shell and never come out more likely to take over. She wondered how Marcus would feel seeing all this again. Would he feel happy or would he feel sad?

Shane and Cas went into a local steakhouse. Cas forgot the name of the second they went inside. It was too long of a name for a restaurant she thought. She ordered a rare steak and a side of mashed potatoes. Shane got steak and fries with a Pepsi. They went around the room looking at photos they had framed. There were quite a few.

Once they got their food they got back to Shane’s car and started to dig in. Shane drove while he ate and Cas gladly feasted on the steak. She forgot what real cooked meat tasted like. She loved it.

The two of them had talked mostly about the first days of working with each other. The trouble Cas had caused for him. They talked about anything and everything that didn’t have to do with Marcus. And it worked, for a time. A time before Cas saw the library up ahead. But she didn’t see anyone standing there. The building was dark and there was nobody that could even be similar to Marcus around.

Cas didn’t let her disappointment show. She wanted to get back to their alleyway and maybe see if he went there. She wanted to at least find one valuable lead before the day is over.

Cas got out of the car and walked around to stand beside Shane’s window. “You didn’t have to go through all this.”

“Cas–”

“Yeah, yeah,” Cas told him. “See you later.”

“See you at work tomorrow,” Shane told him. “So we can talk and maybe find a better way to find Marcus.”

Cas smiled and nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Night.”

“Night,” Shane said and Cas walked off. He watched her walk to the library and sit down before he sighed and hurried to drive off to get to his apartment.