Fluid Justice
I clenched tightly to a rotting front door as it sifted down the murky water. Flecks of fire-engine red were peeling back and I recognized the door as my neighbor’s. In my desperation, I was relieved. I thought it was a blessing from G-d that their house was demolished so that I might survive; there was no time to mourn the dead. The stench of the slow, sweaty decay of human flesh, and the stink of my own fear coated my nostrils with a grimy film. At first I joined a group of other drifters who had managed to stay put by clasping the white concrete columns that once were monoliths at the entrance to the Ralph’s grocery store. The highest archway that once loomed over our heads was now small enough to act as a tiny tunnel for a young child to tread water beneath as he attempted to escape the searing sunlight.
We waited for the water to push some groceries to the top. The first item to break the muddy surface was an apple. When a young mother plucked the apple, the sludge ran off it in a thick cream. She went to hand it to her child, the troll beneath the bridge, and many onlookers tried to stop her. In an attempt to keep the woman from feeding her son what was essentially raw sewage, a man grabbed her by the arm the apple was in. The woman must’ve thought he was trying to steal it from her child, for she quickly drove her manicured daggers into the man’s eyes. Pulling her hand from his face, ruby rain trickled down his chin. It was then I knew I would need protection.
I let go of the column and drifted toward a third story pawn shop I hoped was still intact. Though not destroyed by the flood, it lay in ruin. The glass was shattered sending a stream of diamonds down the canal. I grabbed the frame and hauled myself in through the window. The musty interior was cluttered with knick knacks and memories one could not afford to keep. The walls were swollen, the insulation waterlogged. I was fortunate enough to find an antique knife that slid beneath a broken shelf. All the other weapons were missing.
I took the blade and cast out again, hoping to drift someplace where the waters were less deep. I passed a woman who was swimming along in a makeshift harness. Ropes crisscrossed in front of her chest and over her shoulders. The tethers ran behind her and attached to a broken piece of sky-blue plastic that may have once been a Fisher Price slide. On the craft there lay a child. The woman’s breath was labored and tears were streaming down her cheeks. The area below her brow was swollen and pink, her lips cracked and bleeding. Who knew how long she’d pulled that weight? As she struggled passed I looked at the child in tow. The naked toddler was curled in a ball; lids wide open with enormous, hollow pupils, staring with eyes that would never see again. I wondered if the mother knew the child was dead, or if that knowledge would even matter.
A certain kind of serenity surrounded me. There was so much silence, and the gentle whooshing of water like a CD you buy to help put you to sleep.
Wouldn’t want to be one of those sleeping, I thought and chuckled. How revolting! How could I chuckle at death?
It’s because I’m still alive, I told myself. And when you’re still alive you sure as hell better find something to chuckle at or else you’ve missed the point of surviving. As a black man living in Louisiana, I had long since learned how to laugh at things that appeared too cruel and unfair to be funny.
Dead bodies, stiff and natural like logs in a river, came floating by. First it was one or two. But as I pushed my tired limbs onward, warning my weary muscles to keep flexing, the corpses came as regularly as the debris. The nearness of that fate was suffocating. When my body began to pulsate in excruciating, irregular beats, I knew I had pushed myself as far as I could. I treaded slowly, letting the current take me wherever it pleased. I watched the scenery go by, a town stripped of its identity. Streets I had walked my entire life were unrecognizable to me, a Picasso of architecture.
The buildings were getting taller. No, that wasn’t it. The water was getting lower. I was moving with the flood, heading for drier pastures the water hoped to conquer. Before long, my feet brushed against the ground, a stable feeling I realized I thought I’d never feel again. By the time the liquid was down to my waist, I was running. Or at least trying. Either the ground was slippery or I had forgotten how to move on dry land. I stumbled and splashed and sputtered green filth, spitting out the unknown chunks I was drinking in.
Throwing up seemed inevitable; my stomach was turning in knots begging for expulsion. But upon heaving, the emptiness became clear. There was nothing left in me. My soaked clothing was barely in tact, my exposed chest quivered and quaked. I put one soggy Converse beneath me but could not apply the pressure required to stand. I continued to crawl, feeling needlessly foolish.
Strong enough to survive a flood, but not strong enough to stand on your own two feet? I asked myself. Jeez, you’re pathetic.
The scene here was dry, but just as bleak. It was too quiet to for comfort. Before, the silence seemed serene, but now, on the usually bustling streets of New Orleans, the emptiness was terrifying. Am I the only one left!?
It wasn’t long until I confirmed I wasn’t. A man, shirtless and sunburned, was trying to plow through a pile of bricks. He heaved, but the bricks only scooted a few inches with each effort. He felt me watching him.
“Please…” he cried, “Please help me.”
I couldn’t figure out what he was doing, but my instinct was to help. What if we are the only people left in the world? I thought, recognizing the absurdity, we need to be able to count on each other. I did a half crawl/half crouch over to the pile and started using whatever strength I had to help.
After pulling one brick down from the top of the heap, I finally saw what he was trying to get at. I threw myself backward in utter horror, skidding along the cobblestone. Two feminine legs stretched out from the pile like a nightmarish scene from the Wizard of Oz. The hem of a skirt was visible, as blood red as the brick. I looked at the man sympathetically.
“It’s not…”
“No,” he said with conviction, not looking up from his labor. “I need to keep trying.”
I couldn’t stay and watch the futility. A cynical smile could get me through death and destruction, through loss and pain. But this was something sinister, something demonic. His bloody fingers tearing away at those bricks ate away at my soul. He didn’t acknowledge me as I scurried away.
The more I crawled, the stronger I felt and soon I was able to stagger along using a stucco wall as a guide. Sliding my hands along, the friction burned, but there was only one thing on my mind; I needed to eat. I spotted a mini-mart much in the same poor shape as the pawn shop. I didn’t even bother with the door. I let myself in through the broken display window and shuffled through the shards.
There was little left on the lopsided shelves. It was mostly spicy and salty foods, the last thing my cracking lips and sandpaper tongue needed. I was sifting through the snack size bags, when I heard a roar. I froze. Would the water come again? A flash of blue, yellow, and red; a sea of white, strong, dry arms, and cool metal; my body was pulled four different ways, something hard cracked into my spine. Then I was on the floor, watching my bloody nose spill nickel-sized droplets on the linoleum floor. The cold metal encased my wrists as a hostile voice recited,
“You have the right to remain silent.”