The Last Dreamer

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room.

Claire wasn’t being held captive, she was simply bored. The air was dangerous outside, and there was nothing for her to do in their bunker home except read the same three books, listen to the same three classical music records, or do math problems that Father would write out for her. Claire hated math, a quality that Father assured her was common for an eight-year-old. She was a dreamer.

So she dreamt up a plan to break into Father’s room. Claire didn’t know what she would find in there, but he always carefully locked the door behind him. It must be something valuable, something he didn’t want her to see. A pot of gold, maybe, or a secret stash of Twinkies.

One day, when Father had left the bunker on one of his scavenging trips, she waited for several minutes to be sure he was gone, and then scampered down the hallway. Claire inserted a special paperclip in the keyhole, wiggling until it clicked open.

Father’s room was boring, with none of the colorful touches that Claire had added to the rest of their home. A neatly made bed. A brown dresser. A picture of Mother, from when she was young. But Claire was immediately drawn to the window.

The light was so soft to Claire’s eyes, compared to the harsh fluorescents of their home. And even though the sky was supposed to be blue, she loved its deep gray color. Below their home, a rocky path led down to a dead forest, trees with no leaves. And beyond that, she could see a city, with real concrete buildings that sprawled out. Past the city, Claire couldn’t quite understand what she saw. It looked like the land gave way to water, a water that stretched out to the horizon itself.

She came to this window in secret for weeks until her curiosity couldn’t take it anymore.

“What’s out there, Father?” Claire finally asked, over soup one night. They always had bowls of soup for dinner. Tonight was cream of mushroom.

Father examined Claire from behind his thick glasses. She kept herself from glancing at his bedroom door, so as not to give away her secret. “Out there?” he repeated. “You mean, in the world outside our cabin? It’s… nothing. I go out there to get our supplies.”

“Are there other families, like us?” she tried. “Any other kids?”

“There’s no one else that I’ve seen,” he answered flatly. Claire must have looked disappointed, because Father took on a bemused tone. “And did I mention there are piles of math problems?! Dull gray rocks with math problems written on every one!”

“Nooo,” Claire giggled, dropping her spoon as Father tickled her. She shied away from him. “Hey, stop.” Claire didn’t want to be tickled right now, she was looking for answers. “I just… want to know.”

Father dropped his arms and considered her. “Someday I’ll take you out there, okay? If I can find another suit,” he promised. “Maybe for Hanukkah, we can have a little adventure. But I don’t want to get your hopes up. There’s no one else out there.”

Months passed, with Claire staring out the window. Some days if she ran to the window fast enough, she could spot Father in his faded yellow hazmat suit, descending into the forest. Father was the tallest thing that Claire knew, but seeing him walking beneath those trees, he seemed insignificant. A tiny dot of yellow among the giant pines.

She searched for other signs of life, despite what Father said. The occasional bird or critter would pass by, causing her to jump forward and press her face to the glass, but as hard as she stared, the far-off city remained still and lifeless.

On the first night of Hanukkah, something changed. It was the cold season and Claire was standing at the window, dreaming, when white specks began to fall from the sky. Claire started laughing watching them stick to the ground and transform the landscape she had gotten so used to.

She hadn’t heard Father come home, and his voice startled her. “It’s snow.”

Claire wheeled around, expecting to be told off, but Father was staring out the window as well, his shoulders slumped. They stood that way for a while before he spoke.

“When I built this bunker, before you were born, I wasn’t going to put in a window at all. I thought it made us too vulnerable, to the elements, to someone who might spot it and know we were here. I was nervous, but your mother insisted.”

Claire’s breath caught in her chest. Father rarely spoke about her mother, only to say that she was killed by the sickness, the one that changed the world.

“She was right to insist,” Father continued. “This window kept me hoping. For a long time, it kept me watching and searching, until it hurt too badly. I stopped looking. I wanted to protect you from those hopes, but I think I messed up. You have just as much right to hope as I do.”

He crouched down next to her, taking off his glasses and wiping his eyes. “Mother was with us, the first Hanukkah we spent here. We put our menorah in the window, like everything was normal… She didn’t make it to the next year.”

“Can we do that, tonight?” Claire asked gently. Father nodded.

He took out their old menorah, they lit the candles and sang the blessings. Father’s voice seemed to strengthen as they sang, and by the end, he was grinning ear to ear. They put the candles in the window.

The next morning, Father woke Claire gently. “I have something for you,” he said softly.

Father took Claire’s hand and showed her to the closet where she found a small yellow hazmat suit, a matching one to his own. He helped her into it and zipped her up. It felt funny to be in the suit, and Claire wrinkled her nose at the plasticky scent, but when Father put on his own and opened the hatch to the outside world, she didn’t notice the smell at all.

Several inches of fresh snow crunched beneath her boots as Claire bounded out onto the mountainside. They were on a mountain, she could see that now, their little metal bunker embedded into the rocky side. Above them, the mountain rolled and ascended into the very clouds themselves, and Claire almost fell over staring up at it.

The day was crisp and clear, the gray sky lighter than she had ever seen it. Father showed her how to roll the snow into snowballs and they threw them at each other, laughing. Then he had them make a snow person, with three giant balls stacked on top of each other. Claire thought they didn’t really resemble a person, but Father was insistent. He even ran inside to get buttons for eyes. It was the happiest time they had spent together in ages. Looking back up at her small window, Claire decided that it was better to be in the world than to simply watch it.

Then she heard a sound.

“Father!” she called out. He was so caught up in shaping the face of the snow person, that he clearly hadn’t heard it, and looked over at Claire in confusion.

Then he heard it too, the sound of music. Echoing across the hills, caught on the wind.

“Claire, get inside,” Father said harshly, but Claire couldn’t go back in, not yet. She turned and ran towards the music.

“Claire!” Father called after her. “Stop! It could be dangerous!”

Claire kept running, sliding on the snow, but holding her footing as she followed the mysterious sound. It was the opposite direction of the city, uphill from their bunker home, and Claire’s frantic pace slowed as her breathing became labored. She wasn’t used to this kind of physical exertion, and the hazmat suit swished and squelched with every awkward step. She kept going, trudging along even as her legs burned from the effort.

As she neared a rocky outcropping, the music was playing loud, and the beat was nothing like she had ever heard, pulsing and energized. Rounding the corner, she spotted two kids throwing snowballs at each other. Looking on was a woman, their mother, Claire thought. They each wore blue hazmat suits, of a different design from their own.

Claire was catching her breath, about to call out to them when Father grabbed her. “Shhh!” he hissed, looking out at the family playing in the snow. “Don’t.”

“Why not?!” Claire asked, struggling out of his grip. “They’re people! They’re real! They’re… Wait, did you know about them?”

“I didn’t, I promise I didn’t,” Father whispered. “But we don’t know if we can trust them. They could be infected. I can’t– I can’t lose you to that.”

“They live so close to us,” Claire retorted. “How could you never notice?”

Father grew quiet. “Every day I walked the same path,” he mumbled. “You saw it from the window. I didn’t dare risk taking another route, because I had to keep finding food down in the city, and I had to get back to you. I kept my head down and I stopped searching for others. I was scared. I… I still am.”

Claire looked over at the kids playing in the snow, their mother swaying to the music coming from her stereo. They didn’t look infected. They didn’t look scary. Their bunker sat in the mountainside behind them, blending in with the rock face, with no windows to be seen.

Claire felt a pang as she realized that, if they didn’t have a window, they had nothing to stare out of and dream. Like Father, they may have given up hope there was anyone else.

The decision pulled her forward like a magnet as Claire found herself stumbling over, waving at the two kids. “Hey!” Claire shouted to them. “Hey!” They stopped playing, snowballs sliding from their gloves as their jaws dropped. The mother ran over to the kids, protectively putting her arms around them.

Claire could hear Father approaching, crunching in the snow behind her, but he didn’t speak. For a long while, no one spoke, staring across the still snow.

“Hi, I’m Claire,” she finally said, pressing her face to the plastic window of her suit. “I think we’re neighbors.”