What Comes After

August 15

I finally understand what May's plan was.

In the morning, May started complaining about stomach cramps.

"I want to throw up," she told Mom as Mom checked her temperature with the back of her palm.

"You don't seem to have a temperature."

"Well, I'm feeling super sick right now," she said and rolled in bed. "I think I'm going to throw up now."

"Maybe she has the stomach flu," I said. "Remember the last time I was sick, I didn't have a fever, but I had really bad stomach pains."

"Should I get some hot water?" Mira asked, looking at May with her eyes scrunched up with concern. "Maybe make some soup or something?"

"That's a good idea," Mom replied. "Maybe make her some tea and use one of those mixed vegetable cans for soup. See if we have some canned chicken in the back of the pantry. I think I spotted a couple cans a few days ago."

"Should I make it just for her or for everybody?"

"Make some for everybody. I think it'll be nice to eat something different for a change."

Mira nodded and walked out of our room, almost running to the kitchen, nearly bumping into Dad as he entered our room, all dressed up in his outdoor clothes, clad in a mask with the small axe in his hands. "What's happening?"

"May's sick," Mom said and pointed to May, still clutching her stomach in bed.

"How?"

"What do you mean how?" Mom asked. "She just is sick."

"What could've made her sick?" Dad asked. "It can't be the water because then we'd all be sick. It can't be the food because it's canned food. It can't—"

"So what are you saying?" Mom asked. "That our daughter is lying to us?'

"Sometimes she can be overdramatic," Dad exclaimed. "And it just happens to be today, on the day we're all supposed to go wood gathering. On the day that she complains about every single week."

"She is not well." Mom pointed at May. "Look at her."

Mom and Dad were at a standstill, glaring at each other with bright red faces as gray light seeped through the window of our room. Dad let out a harsh sigh and gripped his axe tighter. "Well then I'm going by myself."

"No," Mom said. "We stick together."

"Someone had to gather wood," Dad said.

"We can go some other day of the week. Wednesday or Thursday, when she gets better," Mom said. "It's only the stomach flu."

"Who knows if it's going to start snowing tomorrow?" Dad asked rhetorically. "We can't afford to delay a single day, not when conditions are getting worse and worse."

"Just stop," Mom said. "Just stop this stupidity. We've already had this conversation before. One—"

"One more log won't save us. Yes, I already know that. But maybe that one log will keep us warm for a couple of extra hours, so that we could find the stamina to gather more wood to stay alive. Or maybe that one log will help keep the fire going for just long enough that we make it through a deep freeze. Or maybe—"

"Stop with your maybes," Mom said. "All those maybes and what ifs may never happen. But what we know is this: Our daughter is sick right now, and we have no clue what made her sick. That's what we should be focusing on. The right now problem."

"I think I know what made her sick."

Mom and Dad both looked at me. I don't think they noticed that I was just sitting there. Mom blushed. "Sorry you had to see all that."

"It's fine I guess," I replied, scratching my head. What else was I supposed to say? "Anyways, I was thinking that it could be the either her food—"

"But it's canned," Dad said, cutting me off. "How could it get spoiled?"

"I don't know, maybe there was a dent or something. Or maybe it was the can itself."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Dad asked.

"I don't know, but I read something a long time ago that the cans themselves are super dirty because when they're being stored, rats and other insects like cockroaches crawl over them, sometimes spreading all kinds of diseases with their fecal matter."

"And you never told us this before because..."

"I never really thought it'd come true," I replied. "I mean we've never gotten sick from canned food in our lives, and I just assumed that the writers of that article were exaggerating or something. But I guess not."

"So let's get can cleaning," Mom said and turned to Dad. "If you really wanted to help the family, this is your chance."

Dad sighed, rubbing his hand over his stubble. "Thursday. We're going to go and collect wood. No exceptions."

"Fine," Mom replied. "Hurry up. We've got a lot of work ahead of us."

"Fine," Dad said. "But I have to change first."

"Fine," Mom said and left our bedroom.

"Fine," Dad mumbled as he lumbered towards the garage to put the axe away.

I turned towards May. "Well that was a weird end."

"Our parents are weird," she said and rolled in her bed, pulling the comforter to her face.

"This was part of your plan, right?"

"You think I just happened to get sick today," she replied in a whisper. "Of course not. I had to sacrifice my dignity and pretend to be sick so that Dad wouldn't go wood gathering today."

"But why?"

She sighed and turned her head towards me, her hair matted and tangled. "For a smart person, you're awfully bad at figuring things out. There was no way that I was going to let Dad keep chopping the trees with his tiny little axe instead of the big one that we're going to give him awfully soon, especially since Dad's lungs aren't doing so great, so I did what I had to do. To protect Dad and the rest of us."

I guess I must've had a shocked look on my face because May said, "Don't act so surprised. Now go and check if the soup is ready. I'm so ready for breakfast in bed."

I turned around and left the room, gazing at the ashy sky fogging up our memories of summer blue skies. Who knew May thought so far ahead? I knew she didn't want Dad to keep using the small axe, but I never knew that she would hatch something to stop Dad from actually going out and hurting himself unnecessarily. Maybe I don't know May as well as I thought even though we've been cooped together for months now. I wonder if she always had this in her, and I just never noticed or if this came from the whole Mooncrash.

Nothing much happened for the rest of the day. I thought I saw a flash of blue skies in the middle of the afternoon, but after I blinked, it just disappeared itself. There was plenty of free time today, so Mom made me do the dishes while Mira did the laundry and the whole afternoon smelled like laundry detergent and chicken broth and a tinge of orange blossom soap. It felt so normal that I could almost pretend that everything was normal, that the grey skies were from winter storms and the ash coating the ground was just from a once-in-a-hundred-year snowstorm.

But then I felt the growling of my stomach and I saw the tinge of sadness in Mira and the flurries of dark ash coating the ground in the late evening, and I know that I have to convince Dad to take the Hunters' axe because I just have to. I just hope tomorrow goes well for the good of everyone.