The Bees: Snow fall

Second installment of The Bees...

 Snow Fall

A light dusting of snow fell silently on my town. Just a few centimetres, barely enough to whiten the tarmac. Just enough to give the Christmas tree a genuine festive look. Just enough to render the corpses anonymous, their features indistinct. Like sculptures they lay, littering the streets, icy angels in Santa hats.

Like the snow, death had fallen swiftly, in silence, gently. The streets, full of bustling shoppers laden with bags, overexcited children, frustrated drivers and loitering teens. All these people, so much energy. As the snow fell the energy seemed to drain away and the people grew lethargic. Stopped. As if their time had slowed, their ticking clocks finally wound right down.

People dropped to the floor. The first couple drew attention, drew assistance. Frantic instructions to ring for ambulances. Sentences unfinished as the good Samaritans collapsed. Expressions of confusion and fear blanking, relaxing into death.

A curiously undramatic genocide.

I stood at the window and gazed upon this oddly peaceful tableau. My dead wife upstairs in our bed. My dead son beside her. As if sleeping, they rested peacefully together. They’d been preparing dinner when death took them. In the kitchen, soot now stained the ceiling above the hob, the ruined saucepan in the bin. They were already dead when the smoke alarm sang out its shrill lament.

Night fell. No-one came to retrieve the bodies.

On the TV there was news. No instructions, no explanations but the constant retelling of what I already knew. The net was ablaze with theories and panic. But not for long. Pretty soon most sites were displaying nothing but server errors. Then the connection died. The power lasted a little longer, but shortly before dawn, all the lights went out. I tipped the last drops of whiskey down my throat and regarded the blackness beyond the window. I wondered just how painful suicide would be.

Bottles and blister packs can fill a drawer, but the contents fit into a melamine Fireman Sam bowl with room to spare.  Bowl in hand, and a glass of water to wash them down, I returned to my family. I lay beside my son, reached over him to take my wife’s hand. Still warm, pliable.

She shivered.

Startled, I fell from the bed. Pills and caplets spilled to the floor, water dripped down the bedside table.

As dawn lightened the room, I watched as my son sat up. Blinked. A new day had begun.