It’s November thirtieth, in our thirty seventh year. In the old calendar which only us old people use now, the year is twenty forty five, and today is my sixty fifth birthday.
The days starts normally, my routine with Alice now cemented with years of repetition. I wake before her in the hour before sunrise, stumbling into the bathroom to wash, shower, shave and worry over my retreating hairline. Where there was once a thick head of rich brown hair, now only thinning grey remains, pulling back from my forehead and temples into a long pony tail that I keep tied with a band that Alice made for me when I first started growing my hair out long some twenty years ago.
I dress quietly to avoid waking my sleeping lover, a tactic that fails every morning, and she rises gracefully to wrap her arms around me and deliver a morning kiss. Our bodies are sagging and wearing with age, but her touch is guaranteed to elicit the same response as it has done these past thirty five years. We embrace, with a promise of more to come later in the evening, and Alice disappears in to the bathroom for her morning ritual. I dress with deliberate slowness, picking out a pair of jeans, shirt, and a pair of boots that are so far from fashionable these days that they’ve already been “retro”. Twice.
The morning sees Alice at the school, her duties as headmistress keeping her busy and amongst children, where she belongs. After raising three of our own and guiding our daughters and son through their own trials of parenthood she still manages to find a smile and encouraging word for every child in the settlement. After thirty years of teaching she knows every one of her charges, past and present, by sight and name, and her favourite past time is catching up on the gossip from any one of her hundreds of surrogate families.
For me the morning is spent amongst my books, guiding pupils that have graduated beyond the constraints of the village school in their own studies, whether that involves poring through the many thousands of books or searching for information on the extensive computer systems that are the constantly evolving repository of our knowledge and culture. Today I help a young woman in her twenties with some of the more obscure medical texts that date their knowledge to the nineteenth and early twentieth century, and then a man in his thirties with locating a design plan for a Honda diesel engine that he plans to restore. Nearly forty years of wear and tear have diminished our fleet considerably, and new parts are in constant need. Unlike Alice, I can barely remember a name until the end of a conversation, and though I recognise faces well enough, the majority of my visitors are anonymous to me.
In the afternoon I leave the library in the hands of my assistant Henry, a very capable student of literature in his forties. He was one of the first children to be taught at Alice’s school, a survivor who was barely ten when the events of two thousand and eight left roughly only one in ten million still alive. Henry loves the library, it has consumed his adult life, and I know that when I finally leave it to him it will flourish.
I walk through the village, which could more rightly be called a city now. Construction work to expand it is a ceaseless effort, and in the last twenty years almost every original building, pipe, wire and paving stone has been replaced, upgraded, and supplemented. The city is now truly under control of a central council, following Joshua’s early death in the fourteenth year. We go from strength to strength, a true community with a common purpose and vision that unites us. We are humanity, all that is left, and we will survive.
I walk through the avenues in the shade of houses that now occupy several stories, concrete and brick where once wood and clay stood. People wave to me and I return their greetings, old friends wishing me a happy birthday, jokes about my waist line, hair line, and number of wrinkles interspersed with genuine affection. Out in the meadow I know my family are awaiting me, wrapped warm against the winter chill, a celebratory picnic spread for our afternoon meal.
Alice will be there, her preparations a barely concealed secret these past few days, surrounded by Chris, Clare, and Millie. They will each be with their partners and children. Chris with his wife Helen, and their sons David and Peter. Clare will be with her partner Jack, their teenage daughter Alice throwing some tantrum or other but secretly enjoying the chance to spend time with her grandparents. Millie, the baby of our brood, barely twenty five but with her boyfriend Nick and their young son Michael. I can imagine the noise that they will be making, the conversations that will be shifting back and forth amongst the group.
Another headache is beginning, a constant annoyance these days, and I mentally lock the dull ache away in its corner, determined not to let anything spoil my day. The walk through town is long, and my legs aren’t what they once were, but the thought of my family waiting for me keeps a spring in my step. I bump into Cam and Mike along the way, they’re coincidentally taking a walk out to the meadow, a bit of planning that is typical of Cam and Alice. If anything they’re getting worse in their old age, but I dare not say that to their faces.
Mike slaps my shoulders and greets with with a “happy birthday old timer. Isn’t it about time you thought of retiring?”
“Oh Mike, leave him alone. Besides, you’re almost seventy and it has done nothing to slow you down.”
Mike grins at me and winks, making sure Camille sees him. She smiles and calls him a dirty old bastard under her breath. He pats her on the rear, and I find myself admiring his energy. Then I think of myself and Alice and what we still get up to. I guess old age isn’t as bad as I always thought it would be.
We reach the edge of the meadow, and I wave to my family. A couple of the younger kids come running over towards me, yelling my name. Something must be going with my ears, because I can’t hear them too well. I guess I must be getting old and tired, because a sudden urge to sit down comes over me. I stumble, and Mike grabs my arm. I look at him, and then at Camille, and I know then that something is wrong.
I can feel a twinge work its way up my left arm, a creeping numbness that causes me to lift my hand and stare at my palm. I’ve read enough medical texts to know what’s happening, and that there’s almost nothing that can be done. Our medical facilities are always improving, but they’re just not good enough.
Mike says something, and when I don’t understand him he turns to Camille. She looks worried, getting up close to me and putting her hand on my shoulder.
“Alice.” It’s the only word I can manage.
She moves off as fast as she can, and I can hear a distant calling. My family get to their feet as one, the kids stopping in their tracks as son and daughters race towards me. Chris vaults the little wooden fence at the edge of the meadow as I drop to my knees.
Things are fading fast, but there’s something I have to hold on for. Time becomes liquid. One moment Chris is rushing towards me, the next I’m surrounded on all sides by concerned children and grand children. Alice is hugging me as I feel myself lofted into the air. There’s no ceremony here, my kids are hauling me as fast as they can carry me towards the hospital.
It’s too late, I know this already. I’ve had a good run, lived a life beyond anything that chance or fate could have offered. I just have to say good bye.
Tears are pouring down Alice’s face. It seems so cruel to leave her now, after so much time, but there’s no choice in the matter. I have just moments left, and I whisper a hoarse goodbye. I can barely hear my own words, but the movement of her lips is unmistakable.
“Don’t leave me. I love you.”
It’s too late.
My sight clears for one last moment, and I can see my family arrayed around me. Their faces are not streaked with tears, but clear, smiling, and wishing me a fond farewell. Then everything fades.
The world is ours, and one day we will set out to reclaim it. Until then, we build, biding our time.
There will not be long to wait.