He found himself missing her.
I hope your baby is beautiful and perfect, he thought. He tried to picture it in his mind, and for some reason it looked a little like himself. On Savina’s face was that big wide grin of hers, proud of the child, holding it casually and then looking up at Dodd.
Dodd quickly put it out of his mind, thinking of something else.
While waiting for the train, Dodd struck up a conversation with the woman who had reminded him of Savina. No, she told him, she wasn’t sure she believed Jesus was coming back. It was too convenient, she said. It was all happening during a period where JTV’s ratings had fallen to an all-time low.
“Where’d you hear this?” he asked.
“The Politico Network,” she told him. Her voice was sweet and soft.
Dodd nodded, his expression thoughtful. “Do you ever watch Travels?”
“No.”
“Have you ever?”
The woman shook her head. By her expression it seemed she considered Travels beneath her. “I hardly ever watch television,”
she said. “I read. And if I do watch television, it’s either the free speech program on Politico, or some of their editorial hours, or pornography on one of the broadcast networks.” With the last comment came a teasing smile; then she was off, her train had come, and she stepped aboard and it rushed away.
Dodd looked around, his hands in his pockets. He was now the only one in the subway station. This had never happened to him before, not even during the rare occasions when he was getting off the train in the middle of the night. When his train came hissing out of the tunnel Dodd was startled. It buzzed to a halt in front of him and he stared at it with no desire to get on. The doors slid open, beckoning.
I could call in sick again, Dodd thought. I can just go home and call in sick. But then I’d have to fight with Sheila to gain control of the television … hell, I’d rather go to work.
The doors remained open, waiting. They would close any second now, he had to make a decision. He thought that he could go somewhere other than his apartment and watch the Second Coming, but that thought made him mad, he told himself that he was NOT
going to miss a day at work just so he could watch a goddamn TV
show. He put one foot forward, followed by the other, forcing himself to enter the subway car before the doors closed. The doors closed right after he got on, as if they were waiting specifically for him. The train hissed, and made a clicking sound. It smelled freshly-cleaned, even antiseptic. Dodd looked up and down the car, not knowing what to think. He was the only one aboard. With a gentle nudge it began moving, gaining velocity, rushing on out of the empty station and into the black of the tunnel. Dodd had an eerie feeling that he shouldn’t have boarded.
He walked slowly down the blue-carpeted aisle to the rear end of the car and peered through the glass doors into the next. It, too, was empty. He opened the separating doors and stepped through, hearing for a moment the outside rush of air. He walked swiftly though the next car to the trailing end and peered through the glass doors into the last car on the train.
Empty.
Nervous, Dodd made his way forward, going from car to car, until he was in the front right behind the robot engine. He was the only person on the train. The only one. This had never happened to him in his life.
There was a long, low beep over the loudspeakers, and the onboard computer announced the next stop. Holding on to the railing as it decelerated toward the next station, Dodd watched the windows, looking for something, anything. The red-tiled station slid into view. The train came to a stop and opened its doors. Dodd could see no one in the station, and no one boarded the train.
Nobody is out there, he thought, amazed. Bits and pieces of his King James Bible came to him, and he fought it because it scared him. The Rapture. The Rapture which was not included in the United Church Bible, but here it was. The Rapture which took all those who were faithful to God away from the Earth to spare them from what was to follow. They would disappear into thin air, and then the world would end. The Earth would stop turning, the sun would be blotted from the sky. The stars would fall from heaven.
The air would turn to poison. Those who were left would suffer beyond their worst nightmares, and then God would come to judge them.
It’s happening, Dodd thought. It’s really happening.
And I’m still here.
There was a hissing and a click as the train doors closed, and the train pulled out of the station and back into the darkness of the tunnel. Dodd looked away from the window. He felt like he was living a nightmare. I shouldn’t have gotten on this train, he thought. Somehow I failed God. I went to work instead of watching for Him to arrive …
Dodd made his hands into fists, clenching them tightly. I’m working myself into a hysteria, he thought. Why should God care if we don’t sit around watching for Him on TV? Jesus isn’t going to arrive until noon, anyway. But according to the King James, those who would be raptured would be gone before Jesus returns. So, then, what happens to those sitting around waiting for Him to appear? Are they already gone? Then who’s going to see him arrive?
No, this is dumb, he thought. Dumb! Nobody is on the train because everybody is at home watching JTV. They’re all staying home. That must be it! This rapture stuff is nonsense, it’s not real.
Regardless of what he told himself, Dodd was frightened.
Being the only person on a normally crowded subway train was enough to unnerve most people all by itself, but being that it was on the day of the Second Coming it seemed especially weird. Dodd was so used to standing on the subway that, despite having a whole train to himself he was still standing, holding onto the rail.
At the next stop Dodd was relieved to see several people on the platform waiting. A few boarded his train. One, a woman with curly grey hair and a puffy face, stepped into Dodd’s car. The way he was staring at her must have made her nervous; she looked away from him, seating herself at the far end away from him. This doesn’t prove anything, Dodd thought. These people, like me, could be Left Behind. This doesn’t prove there wasn’t a Rapture. Not to me. Not while I’ve got the goddamned idea in my head.
The world was not the same today. Whether the Second Coming was real or not, the world was different. JTV had created an illusion with its announcement, made it vivid with publicity, penetrating and infecting the world with it – and now Dodd no longer knew what was real.
When Dodd reached the Honda Aerospace plant he saw a vast empty, unmoving space beyond the chain-link fence. A notice attached to the main gates announced that since so many of the employees had called in sick or had simply not shown up that they had closed the plant down for the day. In the yard even the autonomic machinery was silent. It was as quiet as a graveyard.
Dodd turned away, shuddering, and walked back toward the subway station.
Now what, he thought. I don’t want to go home. I don’t want to go to Toby’s, either; it was hard for him to face Toby anymore.
The whole thing about Savina, and about Savina’s boyfriend going to prison … Dodd just couldn’t handle it. Not today.
Dodd reached the railing around the entrance to the subway and stopped, leaning against it. The morning was so alien, it was getting to him. He felt sick to his stomach, and he kept getting the impulse to cry. It’s my nerves, he thought. The things running through my head. Second Coming, the End of the World, Beware the Anarchist AI, the Rapture, the Rapture, and you’ve been left behind …
He reentered the subway station and boarded the first train that came in. It had four people on it, and none of them seemed to want to talk. Dodd rode, not caring where he was going, and got off at a stop that was near Bob Recent’s place. It was perfect, he could talk to Bob about this, he found himself really wanting to see Bob and Denise. Dodd stepped on the moving walkway that brought him into the enormous complex and rode until he reached Bob’s building. Bob and Denise had a penthouse up at the top, a place much nicer than Dodd’s. Dodd could have afforded such an apartment had he not been saving for a kid.