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Jeremy reached for a clean shirt from the closet. It’d be a better way to start the day than wearing the same old shirt for three days straight. Even though there was really nobody to dress up for these days, it made Jeremy feel good when he could get a nice outfit now and then.
Jeremy was one of the last few people on Earth. Possibly the very last person for all he knew, but Jeremy liked to think that there were still a few people out there. Maybe a few men and women were walking under the same blazing sun and on the same burning Earth as Jeremy.
Jeremy splashed water in his face from a bucket in his kitchen and thought about all the people that could be on the other side of the world. Today, he imagined a beautiful Bolivian woman who was all alone, just like him. She liked to sing and cook. Her hair was long and dark and kept in a bun. Yesterday, he imagined an Austrian woman. Jeremy imagined beautiful foreign women most days. Even years before the meltdown happened.
Through a clean spot in his cracked mirror, Jeremy thought about how much his life had changed since the global reactor meltdown two and a half years ago. For some reason unknown to him, Jeremy was the only person to survive a catastrophic nuclear reaction that killed most of the planet. There was nothing special about Jeremy. At least, nothing that he knew of.
Jeremy guessed that some certain DNA allowed him to breathe through the smog while watching his friends struggle to gasp for air. Within a few weeks, everyone in his town was dead. A few years later, the smog isn’t as thick, and things are back to normal. Besides the scorched earth, things are mostly normal.
As he began his stroll to the shore, there could be zombies, mutated monsters, or raider factions, Jeremy thought. Luckily for Jeremy, none of that was real. All that survived were him and the crabs in the ocean, pretty much. After all this time, the crabs reproduced to establish a population that became a nuisance for Jeremy.
Jeremy kicked past the dry crabs crawling in the sand and walked closer to the water. He scooped a bucketful of crabs that swirled in the water. For a moment, he looked at the bubbles popping and thought again about how things had changed.
On the way home, Jeremy tried to distract himself with crab recipes so he wouldn’t think about the past. That was difficult when some of the best crab dishes he ever had were from long ago. Nowadays, crab stew was the main entrée unless Jeremy could find the courage to try making something new.
Once Jeremy returned home, he threw the red shirt in the hamper and decided to do laundry after dinner. He looked at the pile of clothes he hadn’t touched in a few weeks and felt ashamed that he had let himself go. Just because there is no one around is no reason to become a slob, he thought.
Dinner was a mess. Jeremy used unregulated fumes seeping from a large crack in his driveway to cook, and tonight was especially hot. The pot boiled over, and most of the ingredients burned at the bottom. At least, the water would be hot enough to give his clothes a proper wash.
Jeremy scraped his pot clean and got more water from the shore. Heaving the heavy bucket of water was the main excuse Jeremy used to convince himself out of doing his chores. He finally returned home, set the pot on the fumes, and went to grab his laundry while the water began to boil.
Jeremy looked through the pictures he had drawn over the years in his room. Since there was no reliable electricity, Jeremy had to make his own entertainment. The art was really bad, but it still brought him comfort. The water should be boiling by now, so Jeremy grabbed his laundry and headed downstairs to the driveway.
A green film had materialized on top of the bubbling water. Jeremy gathered it on a wide stick on tossed it aside until the water was clean. Then Jeremy started tossing in garments by the handful. Once he got closer to the bottom of the hamper, Jeremy started to find clothes he forgot he had. They were a bit crusty, but he found some classics.
There was also half of a rotten crab in the pocket of his denim shirt. He threw the denim shirt in the pot and went to grab another shirt when he saw the claw from the other half of the rotten crab.
Jeremy jumped back and dropped the crab when he saw a white mouse dangling on the other end. It had been a long time since Jeremy had seen a mouse. Jeremy focused on cleaning the clothes already in the pot and decided to leave the rest for later.
The clothes swirled around as Jeremy poked and agitated them with a stick. He thought about how the mouse made him jump back in fear. He pulled the clothes out, hung them up, and decided to go back and finish the laundry.
Jeremy grabbed a little bit of crab leftover from dinner and held it over the hamper. He inched closer and closer until he saw the clothes begin to shift around. The mouse lurched out and tried to snatch the crab, but Jeremy pulled it back just in time. The mouse froze, looking confused, then went back into the clothes.
Jeremy tried again and dangled the crab over the clothes. This time, the mouse slowly inched his head out of the clothes, sniffing around cautiously. Jeremy gently pulled the crab back further and further until the mouse was fully out of the hamper. He laid the meat on the ground, and the mouse began nibbling, but it kept a paranoid muscle tension the whole time.
Looking at the creature on the ground, Jeremy felt a strange connection with the hungry rodent. A core piece of Jeremy identified with the hurried breath and frantic eye movement of another soul just trying to survive.
Lost in reflection, Jeremy reached to touch the mouse. The mouse was instantly aware and kept Jeremy’s finger at sniffing distance. After a few sniffs, the mouse seemed content and went back to nibbling on the crab meat. Jeremy chuckled and reached to pet the mouse. As soon as his finger met the white fur, the mouse snapped around and bit Jeremy’s finger. Jeremy jumped back and screamed. The mouse scurried back into the clothes hamper.
“You fucking piece of shit!” Jeremy yelled as he kicked the side of the hamper.
The hamper tumbled over in the driveway, and Jeremy went into the house to treat his bleeding finger. He wrapped a paper towel around the bite and sat on the ground beside his bed. Exhausted, Jeremy fell asleep on the floor with tears in his eyes.
The next day, Jeremy woke up wondering why he was on the floor. He looked at his finger and remembered what had happened. The tip of his finger was swollen and red and stiff to move. Jeremy wondered if the mouse was still hiding in the hamper. He got mad all over again when he thought about the mouse biting him after he had been generous and given it some crab meat.
Jeremy went out to gather the laundry hanging from the wire. He draped the clothes on his left arm and looked out of the corner of his eye at the hamper lying in the dirt. Jeremy took the clothes back into the house, folded them up, and put them away.
Deciding to get started early, Jeremy dressed and headed off to the shore with his bucket. As he walked down the driveway, Jeremy glanced at the hamper. There was no sign of the mouse, and Jeremy got annoyed that he continued caring for what he thought was an ungrateful creature.
Jeremy got down to the shore and sat on a rock looking out at sea. He spent a few moments reflecting before the crabs crawled up and began nipping at him. Jeremy hopped off the rock and lost his balance in the shallow water. He fell into the water, losing one of his boots. He jumped up quickly with a few crabs hanging onto his shirt and pants. He pulled a few crabs off and waded into the water to get his boot. Finally gathering himself on the shore, Jeremy put on his boot and let out a yelp when his toe was pinched by a crab hiding in the boot. He broke both of the crab's pincers and threw it far into the ocean.
Breathing heavily, looking out to the spot in the water where the crab landed, Jeremy started laughing. He scooped a bucketful of crabs and headed back home.
By the time he returned home, Jeremy was still chuckling to himself. He placed the bucket on the floor, changed into dry clothes, and prepared to make dinner.
Jeremy grabbed the crabs and the big pot. He threw the pot on the heat crack in the driveway and poured the crabs in. He flipped the crab bucket over to sit down and let out a big sigh. He began to chuckle again, thinking about falling into the water.
The pot began boiling, and Jeremy threw in whatever spices and vegetables he could gather that looked okay to cook. Potatoes and carrots were the most resilient to environmental conditions. Jeremy spotted a white blob moving in the dirt from the corner of his eye. The mouse stood in the dirt at the driveway's edge, sniffing the air.
“Smells good, huh?” Jeremy looked at the mouse. For a moment, Jeremy swore the mouse nodded its head in agreement.
Jeremy plucked a crab out of the stew with some tongs and tossed it on the concrete. He crushed the shell with his boot and pulled off some of the shells. He moved to grab some of the meat, but the mouse scurried over and began eating before Jeremy could bend over to grab it.
The mouse looked up at Jeremy as if to acknowledge the kind gesture and went back to eating the crab.
“We’re friends now?” Jeremy asked.
He reached to pet the mouse again, and the mouse backed away. Jeremy kicked the crab closer to the mouse, but it kept its attention on him.
“Whatever.” Jeremy shrugged and walked back to sit on the bucket by the stew.
Jeremy feigned indifference while stirring the pot and looked at the mouse from the corner of his eye. The mouse returned to eating the crab, occasionally looking up at Jeremy before diving back into the food.
The stew finished, so Jeremy took the pot off the hole and grabbed a bowl from the house. He sat on the bucket and ate his stew under the stars with the mouse. The mouse finished its crab and tried to walk up beside Jeremy unnoticed. Jeremy didn’t make any sudden movements to scare the mouse away until it had came up just beside his leg. He turned his head to face the mouse, causing the mouse to jump back.
Jeremy laughed and thought about falling into the water earlier in the day. The mouse didn’t move. It just looked nervously at Jeremy, awaiting his next move.
“Don’t worry. I’ve been there too, bro.” Jeremy said.
Jeremy dropped a potato chunk on the ground next to the mouse. The mouse approached the potato and began nibbling away.
Jeremy looked up at the night sky and then down at the mouse. He reached to pet it again, but the mouse pulled away. This time, Jeremy was not offended.
“Man, let me tell you about what happened when I went down to the shore today…”