Cryptococcus... something

“This is it,” Lilah says to Sal, who's panting heavily in the back seat. Lilah reaches a sweaty arm over the seat and runs her hand over Sal's smooth chestnut head. "This is the best mailbox I can find," she says, "and if someone lives to find my letter, it'll mean something, even if it's to just that one person." Sal's tongue disappears into her mouth and then reappears lolling over the side of her jowls.

It's too hot and it's too muggy. The sun stings Lilah's cheek, and the bottom side of her arm burns as it sweeps over the car window's lip, but she's way past cursing climate change. After three days assessing what's left of the mailboxes that once lined every country road, she's finally settled on a sturdy pipe mailbox on a stone pedestal not far from her hometown. She grabs the handle and yanks open the mailbox door. All around her -- on the sides of trees, on the ground covering the upward slope of the hill, even on the mailbox's stone pedestal, there are toadstools and other fungi flourishing in the moist heat. Lilah tries not to think about it. She knows the deadly spores are already aloft in the air, already being sucked in through her nose and populating her lungs. She purses her lips and lays her envelope squarely inside the mailbox, closes it, and puts up the flag.

“Well, that's done,” Lilah says with finality. She says this for herself. She says it to mark her acceptance of her coming death. She's surprised she's lasted so long. Most everyone else was already dead. She'd been careful not to draw attention to herself. With no rules or laws, no leaders or communication devices, Lilah had to protect herself from people who would kill for her things. A cabin hidden high on a hill where the midday sun slipped in between the trees to dry the fungus, made the perfect hideaway. But, it was easier to hide from people than it was to hide from the fungus. She'd covered over several crops of it with dirt already.

****

Not long before Lilah wrote her letter, she was tending to her sprouted seeds beside the window at her cottage when she felt a peculiar hair-like protrusion on her tongue. Her sensibilities kept her calm while she stood in front of an old mirror and stuck out her tongue. She gazed briefly into the small gray eyes looking back at her and then into the dark cavern of her mouth. There it was—a thin white filament growing out of the back of her tongue as if to match her fine white hair. Lilah sighed heavily. It would not be long before that strand and others bore their way through other parts of her body-- through her heart, lungs, and liver-- through her nasal cavity and into her brain. The name of her ailment tiptoed around in the darkness of her thoughts: Cryptococcus something. The fungus had found her. And soon she would join the masses of people already devoured by it.

"God damn climate change," she muttered. She reached into her mouth and plucked the hair out. It would do no good, she knew, but she would not leave it be. If she were to succumb to the fungus, she would do it on her own terms.

Lilah noticed then, the loud chirping of the birds. How she loved the birds. She hoped Cryptococcus—she said the word aloud slowly and deliberately—would spare the birds—and Sal. Lilah had begun to wrap up what small affairs she had. And having been a mail carrier prior to the fungal onslaught that killed so many, she wrote a letter.

Dear future mail carrier:

It means so much that you found my letter! If you’re in business again, you probably already know about all that happened—the spores. The fungus. I have been a grateful survivor. There are a few of us out here, making our way like hunter gatherers picking through a world of abandon homes.

But we have no way to communicate so far as I know. So, I’m sorry to say, I don’t even know what year it is, and I have no way of knowing what is happening in the rest of the world. Perhaps now that you've found my letter you can help others with that. There’s nothing but nature out here away from the city. I had to leave the small town my family lived in because of the looting and fighting among the survivors, but I found a cottage to call home, and it’s just me and my dog Sal now.

Gangs have taken over the cities. This I know. But I don’t know if they have the means to restore electricity or not. Sometimes from the top of Willis Hill, I think I see a soft glow in the sky over the city. It could be lights, or it could be the city on fire. I prefer to stay in the country. I used to deliver mail, so I’ve taken it upon myself to check the old mailboxes hoping to find forgotten things from the material world. After today-- after leaving my letter for you, however, I will retire and wait. I don't know where I picked up the spores, but once they've inhabited the flesh the filaments quickly burrow through blood and bone. Which brings me here, to this letter. There are a few things I’d like to tell you before I go.

1. A lot of houses out here in the boonies are vacant and have been ransacked. So go carefully. The smart gangs have set booby-traps at some of the places they stay when they come to collect useful things from dead people’s homes. So, make sure it’s a real customer before you go bumbling around some house trying to find someone. The good news is that it’s not as bad here as it is in the cities where they steal children to train up so the gang can keep their numbers up. Usually, when they venture this far out, they’re all about gasoline and guns, and they completely overlook the mailboxes. That’s good for me, because abandon mailboxes have provided me with seeds and medicine. As long as these things are in plastic containers, I have found them useful. Mailboxes are like time capsules waiting to be discovered. I’ve been able to trade seeds with a few Amish farmers and use some of the medicine I’ve found to heal infections and cleanse wounds. Though, there is no medicine that eradicates the fungus, medicine is still a good find.

2. I found a car and I found gas. You can too if you dare venture along the overgrown roads to homes where owners have died. It isn't stealing. Possession is ownership in this new wild world. But do check the homes for death before entering. If you see bodies fuzzy with millions of tiny silk fungal hairs, do not enter. The fungus is deadly. Understand? Those seemingly delicate filaments can penetrate solid rock, just as they did millions of years ago when fungal life began on the rocky shores of the oceans. If you see the fungus growing under some tree bark or in the soil, which is where it normally grows here, don’t disturb it or you’ll unleash more spores into the wind.

3. Vines and weeds and trees have sprouted and flourished, buckling paved roads. Roads will need to be cleared if you plan to deliver mail by car or truck. Powering your vehicle is another challenge. But most of the road signs are still up. I’m sure the job will become smoother as you iron out problems.

4. Find a dog and befriend it. Take your dog everywhere. Having a dog is like enhancing your eyes and ears and nose, not to mention they are loyal protectors. Mail carriers of the future need companion dogs.

5. This fifth and last item won’t help you, but it helps me. Enclosed with my letter is a heart-shaped locket containing a picture of my family and me. In the village of Palmyra, there is a small cluster of white birch trees near a statue of a Great blue heron in the public park. Seven of those trees will have a plaque for my baby girl Claudette. Seven are marked for my son, Benton. He was just eleven. There are seven for my husband, Zeke, and seven more are my own, all embedded with identifying metal plaques. These are the trees we bought, planted, and nurtured, required by the U.S. Government to help mitigate climate change before the fungus spread. As you may know, though, there were several factors contributing to climate change, and the program wasn't able to draw down enough carbon to prevent the warming that proved conducive to the deadly fungus.

Our trees are now our headstones. If you go to the park, and I hope you will, I would so appreciate it if you would take the locket I’ve enclosed with this letter and hang it with my family’s trees in remembrance of the love we once shared. Thank you, from one mail carrier to another -- Lilah Emissary

After leaving her letter in the mailbox, Lilah and Sal climbed to the top of Willis Hill while evening settled in. By the time Lilah chose a spot, stars dotted the sky. Moist air filled with all the scents of the earth moved in and out of her lungs while a gentle wind tossed the fine thread-like filaments that now covered her arms and face and chest. She put an arm around Sal and looked out over the wildness. With the side of her hand, Lilah wiped away a crop of tiny fungal stems sprouting from her lips before speaking. "It's been beautiful, Sal, hasn't it?"