Garbage Day
By Daniel Lemieux
It began in an instant on a Tuesday morning. I know it was a Tuesday because Tuesday was garbage day. Since then, this information has become, for the most part, largely irrelevant for two reasons: first, the garbage trucks - as much as I would like them to - no longer come around to pick up the trash; second, I do not know what day it is.
At one point, Tuesday mornings were fairly predictable. I drank my coffee while watching the sky lighten, then carried the week’s worth of trash out to the end of the driveway. For reasons I cannot explain, it is at this point that this particular Tuesday alternates. I flipped the lid of the green bin and tossed our collection of food scraps when a shrill whirring perked my ears. Suddenly, a speeding red blur came hurtling from the sky like a coal-fired fastball and touched down right on top of last week’s stale bread. It struck with such ferocity that the lid slammed itself shut and sent the green bin flying into a dizzying helix of backflips and pirouettes, hurling a barrage of eggshells and bread crusts all over the lawn.
My foot pinned a blackened banana peel where I stood, overlooking the capsized green bin. For a moment, I stared, aghast at the coincidence of it all. A perfect hole-in-one from the Almighty golf course in the sky! What a coincidence indeed. As a stargazer myself, I anticipated that I’d just won the astronomical lottery, but when I set the bin upright and peered inside, I realized that I was merely the new owner of a pair of smoldering red Converse and the curling stench of burning rubber.
If the fear and confusion I felt were any indicator of the expression on my face, I imagine that I looked a little bit zombified. In the disarray of emotions spiraling around my brain, the only words I could pull from memory in that moment were,
“What the hell?”
I think it was in the silence that formed between the words “the” and “hell” that the school bus landed on my neighbor’s house.
And then came the downpour.
Now the rotting, oppressive junk is a thick layer of icing suffocating the old world, and it keeps piling on. Most of the buildings have collapsed under the weight, and those that are still standing will fall. Out on the road, I’ll occasionally happen upon a survivor like myself. We exchange glances. Thin, disheveled glances. We don’t have bandits or raiders in this wasteland, and no one ever gives me any trouble - there isn’t any need to.
There’s enough food falling from the sky for everyone.
abou the Author
Daniel Lemieux is a student and writer based in Hamilton, Ontario. When he’s not studying or writing, you can usually find him at the library, partly because he likes books, but mostly because he works there.
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