After the Devastation

By Paul M. Lewis

In 2024, the world is on the brink of nuclear war and environmental disaster. Nora Del Bosque tells her husband, Aden Delaterre, she must go to Chicago, to the new headquarters of the UN, to report on a crucial meeting. With the world situation looking grim, Aden fears for Nora’s safety. As an environmental specialist, he understands the danger all too well.

His fears are confirmed when global disaster strikes during Nora’s trip, and the two are lost to each other. In the ensuing years, they each lead lives in isolated communities without modern technology or the conveniences once taken for granted. Both become leaders within these fragments of civilization, facing a wide range of conflicts. In the process, Nora and Aden discover their own intuitive awakening and come to know and rely on their personal spirit guides—in hopes of one day finding each other.

In this tale of romance, political intrigue, and mysticism, humanity faces a post-apocalyptic crisis of devastating proportions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu Publishing Services
• Release date: May 19, 2015
• ISBN: 9781483429557

Book preview

Hopkins

Prologue

The first mate of The Princetown, a Liberian registered freighter leaving Montevideo and making for the Port of Long Beach, California, noticed something strange. He had just entered the time and date into the ship’s log: 11:48 p.m., Monday, October 28, 2024. It was a clear night with a full moon.

The ship had rounded Tierra del Fuego and sailed through the Drake Passage at the tip of South America; it was now steaming northward along the Chilean coast and was just opposite Isla Madre de Dios. The wind had freshened considerably, and large swells were coming from the south at irregular intervals. The first mate banged on the door of Captain Domingo Portola, who was sleeping in his cabin at the time, and informed him in a panicked voice that the island of Madre de Dios had suddenly disappeared beneath the waves. Thinking at first that there had been a massive undersea earthquake and expecting a major tsunami, they immediately contacted the Chilean Navy to find out the magnitude of the quake. They were informed that there had been no earthquake of any magnitude in many weeks, and it took them only a short time to realize, so far from the island sinking, that it was the sea itself that had risen and engulfed the rocky island.

Within days, port cities up and down the coast of South America as far north as Lima and beyond reported rapidly rising sea levels. Governments struggled to reassure citizens and to contain the growing hysteria. Some who lived near the coastline and who could afford it had already made plans to evacuate. Others, unable or reluctant to leave their homes, nervously remained. It soon became obvious that low-lying areas were no longer habitable. No one was sure whether water levels would continue to rise and, if so, how much and for how long. Thousands began moving inland, or to higher ground near the coast, quickly overwhelming camps and other accommodations, which governments had set up to house and feed the throngs of people that continued to stream in. Rioting broke out in several areas when newly arrived high-water refugees tried to enter already overcrowded camps. Army units were quickly called in to restore order, but that did not solve the problem of where to put the recent arrivals. Some made their way further inland in hopes of finding accommodations, while others simply set up their own tents outside the camps or made whatever shelter they could from what they had brought or what they could find.

Meanwhile, police and army units struggled to patrol parts of coastal cities, which had been abandoned, using military vehicles where the water was shallow enough and boats where it was already too deep. Looting was a continual problem, as were fires, which started in a number of buildings. Arson was strongly suspected. Whole rows of houses burned—surrounded, ironically, by water—because firefighters were unable to get to them, or—in the event that they were—because fire hydrants were no longer operational.

Cardinal Oswaldo Maldonado, Archbishop of Santiago, celebrated a special mass in the cathedral, seeking protection and deliverance for the country from the rising waters. Some believed this was the beginning of a new flood of biblical proportions, sent by God to cleanse the world of sin and corruption. Evangelical preachers warned their congregations to repent and foresaw the coming end of the world. They reminded their flocks: What good does it do a man to gain in worldly possessions, only to suffer the loss of his soul? Most, however, saw it for what it was: the relentless and unavoidable outcome of the catastrophic warming of the planet, due almost in its entirety to the monumental ignorance and hubris of humankind.

The devastation had started, and fear began to fill human hearts with ominous and menacing foreboding.

Part One:

The Devastation

1

Beginning the Ending

Nora left her office in downtown Los Angeles that afternoon feeling guilty. Usually, she loved the drive home to the small house she and Aden, her husband of three years, were renovating in the hills of Echo Park. By rights, she thought while getting into the car, I ornught to be feeling great. It was one of those clear, autumn days, crisp and almost magically inviting, that belied all the recent bad news about global warming. The sun was low in the western sky, and long shadows cast by towering royal palm trees crept across Sunset Boulevard. In backyards, twisted poplars, straight out of a Van Gogh painting, seemed to reach up yearningly toward the sky.

In spite of the enchanting beauty of it all, her gloomy mood only darkened the closer she got to home. At some point, she wasn’t even sure when, the poplars began to take on the look of so many ruined columns in an ancient Greek temple, the dead remnants of a civilization long gone. She even found herself frowning and shaking her head, as if trying to get rid of a sense of foreboding that just wouldn’t go away.

She had news to tell Aden once she got home. News he would not want to hear. She felt both eager and reluctant to get there, eager to get off her chest what she had to say and reluctant because she knew only too well what his reaction would be. When Nora made the last turn and was driving down the street to the house, she actually grimaced when she saw their neighbor’s dog, Sergius, lying in the middle of the road.

Come on, baby. Come on, Sergius, Nora said, leaning out the car window. She was trying to keep a calm and even tone to her voice, despite the tension she felt. He really was a sweet dog, and Nora was very fond of his owner, Philip, their artist neighbor. Although Aden had never said anything directly, Nora suspected that he was maybe just a little jealous of the close friendship she and Philip had, which was ridiculous, especially given the fact that Philip was gay.

You have to move, or you’ll get hurt, Nora added, as if expecting that Sergius might reply with something as reasonable as, But it’s nice and warm here on the asphalt. Instead, he looked at her quizzically. Then, to her surprise, he dutifully got up, wagged his tail, almost seemed to smile at her, and went over to his own yard.

Good boy! Nora called out.

As she pulled into the driveway, she noted that Aden’s car was already there. Seeing it, she felt again that sense of apprehension; really, culpability is what it was. She knew Aden hated it these days when she traveled, and there was no choice but to tell him that she was leaving the next morning for Chicago.

The truth was that some major part of her really didn’t like going either, but another part of her psyche, equally vital, also very much wanted to—or, more accurately, felt a need, even an urgency to do so. She wanted to prove to herself that she was independent and capable of achieving whatever she set her mind to.

It’s stupid, I know, she said half out loud while getting out of the car, continuing this latest installment of a long-standing, sometimes enormously frustrating and tedious conversation she’d had with herself over the years.

Nora—actually Elenora, though she always went by the shortened version—was named after her maternal grandmother, Elenora Beatriz Maria Dos Santos, a Yaqui Indian woman who had come to Los Angeles with her husband from northern Mexico some sixty years earlier. Nora adored Abuelita, as she always called her. Old family friends even said that Nora looked exactly like her grandmother when she was young: of average height, with thick hair that gleamed with the bluish-black sheen of coal and a strong, sturdy body. She could keep up with Aden on any hike he chose to take, and she never tired.

Not classically beautiful, she’d decided years earlier that this was of no interest to her anyway. As a child, her best friend, a Chinese girl named Lily, was overweight and walked with a limp. When another girl asked her why she was friends with a fat girl who couldn’t walk straight, Nora looked at her and asked what she meant. It hadn’t even occurred to her that Lily was overweight, and she’d just naturally adjusted her own speed to what was comfortable for Lily, without even thinking about it.

The most outstanding feature anyone noticed on first meeting Nora was definitely her eyes, which shone with a luminosity and a radiance that was mesmerizing. There was a life force, a kind of inner vibrancy that emanated from her like an aura, and which many people—her husband, Aden, in particular—found utterly irresistible.

Abuelita had died when Nora was eleven years old. It was then, she realized, that the trouble had begun with her own mother. She could never live up to whatever potential her mother thought she had. Abuelita had been Nora’s protector from her mother’s criticisms, and once the old lady breathed her last, she felt she could do nothing right. But all that was a very long time ago. Why was she even thinking about this anyway? Was she just tired from a busy day? For some reason, she always thought about her childhood when she was tired.

I had to shoo Sergius out of the road again, she said as she walked into the house and gave Aden a hug. Since Bacchus isn’t here anymore, he just mopes around. I think he’s ready to go soon too.

I don’t know how those dogs ever got such ridiculous names, was the only comment Aden made in reply.

Nora sensed that her husband had his own preoccupations that afternoon. Was he worried again, she wondered, about one of those conversations he’d had of late with his department chair at the university about all that was happening in the world? Yet, she was somehow unwilling to let the topic drop.

Well, she went on, as if taking his comment about the naming of the dogs literally, you know Philip is nuts about early Christian art. And he told me once that Sergius and Bacchus were fourth-century martyrs, who—according to Philip, anyway—were also lovers. She felt his impatience as he waited for her to finish, but somehow, she couldn’t help herself.

Philip showed me some pictures of those early icons, she continued, obviously a way, she knew, of postponing the serious conversation she needed to have with him. I have to admit that the two saints looked just like any married couple. A lot like Philip and Constantine, in fact, before Connie, you know … Nora paused and looked away.

Ever since her parents had died when she was seventeen, she had more and more trouble with separation. She could hardly bring herself to use the final word, as she’d come to call it. Death. What, after all, was more final than death? She was able to write about it. That gave her the distance she needed. But somehow, saying the word itself, in any but its most euphemistically oblique forms, stuck on her tongue like a burr whenever she tried to get it out.

She and Aden had been living in Echo Park ever since they had gotten married. The neighborhood had been changing steadily for years. Originally Latino working-class, it was now a post-modern mixture of gays and straights, middle-class Latinos and whites, with a strong dose of Chinese, Vietnamese, and Indians. Both Aden and Nora loved it there. They loved the hills, the heady mixture of peoples and cultures. They’d been amazed and delighted when they qualified to buy a house in the area, a tiny fixer-upper though it was, which they never would have considered if Aden weren’t so handy. He was able to fix or build anything, and the house was finally beginning to feel like it was their own.

Nora, look, I’m sorry for Philip, Aden finally blurted out. I like him. I really do. I’m sorry Connie died. Hell, I’m even sorry for Sergius, but there’s a lot more going on in the world right now than that!

Nora recognized the strident, almost argumentative tone. For a moment, she had to admit it grated, yet she could see where it was coming from; the worry, the concern was evident in his face.

You’re right, of course, she said, trying to sound conciliatory. Let’s go make some dinner.

The first time Nora had met Aden, she could see that he was handsome, but she remembered thinking, Not quite my type. He’s maybe even too good-looking, like some of those athletic boys I knew in high school. Aden was six feet, two inches tall, had sandy-brown hair that curved into waves when it got too long, and piercing blue eyes the color of Lake Tahoe, or what Tahoe had once looked like. He even had a square jaw that, she had to admit, gave him the look of an old-fashioned Hollywood leading man. The one saving grace was that he wasn’t overly muscular. He had a slim, sinewy body, with veins that stood out like barely covered rivulets tracing their way up his arms, disappearing beneath the short sleeves he liked to wear. He was never cold.

What attracted her most to him, and which she thought overcame his almost too classically good looks, was how private he was. It could at first be read as shyness, but soon enough, she realized that wasn’t it. There was a depth, a profundity, of privacy about him; she couldn’t think of another way to say it. Moreover, it was clear that he was totally unaware of the impression his looks made on people. Nora liked that, liked that he appeared self-contained, not arrogant, but quietly present, as if that were enough. His hands too—she loved his hands. Although he’d never learned to play any musical instrument, he had the delicate hands of a pianist, with his long, slender fingers and warm, clean handshake.

She didn’t know why she’d thought of it as clean the first time he’d taken her by the hand, but that was the word that came to mind. There was a power and a grace there that communicated something subliminal to her, that made her tingle and feel like a girl again. But at the same time, he also made her feel like a woman. She blushed when she remembered the line from a poem by Dylan Thomas that popped completely unbidden into her head that first time she’d met him: He promises a secret heat. And once she got to know him, she realized she wasn’t wrong.

Dinner that evening was quiet. By way of apologizing, of trying to smooth things over, Aden even brought up Sergius and Bacchus again, but by then, Nora had moved on, or more accurately, back to her original preoccupations.

They sat for several moments in silence, watching the candle flames flicker as darkness enveloped the house. She insisted on lighting candles whenever they had the chance to actually sit down and eat dinner together. It’s the least civilized thing we can do, she always felt.

Finally, Aden began to talk. Honey, I had a long chat with Hilda today, he said, referring to his colleague and department chair. You know she’s a world historian with a pretty amazing mind, and she’s definitely not someone who’s easily spooked. Well, she’s convinced that things are looking really grim. She believes that the US and the Europeans are planning on sending troops into the Middle East and helping themselves to whatever oil is left, whatever they feel they need. According to her, now that Iran has completely taken charge, Western countries will use whatever excuse is needed. In particular, that UN resolution about ‘the equitable distribution’ of needed world resources.

Nora didn’t answer immediately. How can I respond to this? she thought. What can I say that might soothe his anxiety? Nothing. What I need to tell him will make him even more anxious. But what choice do I have? Aden, she finally said, I have to leave for Chicago tomorrow. I know you don’t want to hear that and that you don’t want me to go. And believe me, part of me really doesn’t want to go either. But this story is huge, and Abe says I’m the one to cover it for the paper. And he’s the editor, after all. So, if he’s got that much faith in my reporting, how I can I turn it down?

Aden said nothing. Getting up quietly, he blew the candles out and began clearing the dishes from the table. Nora let the silence drift between them like smoke from the snuffed-out flames. Once in the kitchen, he flipped on the switch. After the soothing glow of candlelight, the electrical fixture was harsh and uninviting, as if it were something unnatural. Nora had followed him in and stood next to him by the sink. You’ll see, it’ll be all right, she said, realizing as soon as she said it how lame it must have sounded. I’ll call you every day, I promise. Then, after a pause, she added, I have to do this.

Aden filled the sink with hot, soapy water. He plunged the dishes into it and began washing. She could see he was scrubbing the plates harder than he needed to and that his jaw was set tight.

When I got my degree in journalism, Nora continued in a soft voice, as if trying to convince herself, I made a promise to myself that I would never turn down an assignment that I knew in my heart was one I needed to take. Well, this is one of those.

At first, Aden said nothing in return. Instead, he began rinsing the soap from the dishes and stacking them evenly in the drainer, putting one carefully behind the other: the plates, the salad dishes, the glasses. Nora wondered if this tidying up was a way of trying to put at least this little corner of his world in order. She almost commented but thought better of it.

Yes, I know, was all he said. It came out softly enough. She smiled, or tried to, and rubbed his back for a few moments before heading off into the bedroom. Sitting down at the computer, she continued the background reading on the story that she’d started earlier in the office.

She could still hear Aden finishing up in the kitchen, turning out the lights, and then returning to the dining room. He sat at the table they’d just cleared and began slowly working his way through a pile of essays. She smiled, remembering how he always complained about how badly written they were. And she wondered if this particular evening he found the process, if not soothing, at least distracting, just as she did with her work.

Later on, when they got into bed, Nora lay on her back next to him, staring up into the darkness. The distance she had felt from him earlier had melted away, like snow in the warming light of spring. Sighing deeply, she took hold of his hand, hoping—no, sensing—that he too had moved on from their earlier argument, if that’s even what it was. They lay there in the darkness for a while, hand in hand.

Nora, Aden finally said, almost in a whisper, I’m afraid. The world feels like it’s falling apart faster than anyone ever thought it would. The sea levels are rising, and who knows how long cities like LA will even exist? And now this business in the Middle East …

I know, she replied after a bit. I know we should probably just stay together and hold onto each other for dear life, but … She didn’t finish the thought. She realized he didn’t need her to.

Nora rolled on her side, faced him, and stroked his cheek, and they kissed in the quiet night. She held him, feeling the tightness of his body, turning suddenly ravenous for him, for the mystery of this man she knew so well and yet realized she could never fully fathom. What mattered was only that they were together, at least for that moment—the two of them in the infinity of their own limitless universe. They made love, deeply, passionately, in the cool light of the moon, each of them reaching an intense, moaning, sobbing, shuddering climax they had never before experienced with one another.

Afterward, Nora lay listening to Aden’s soft breathing. For what felt like a long time, she could not sleep. Her mind would not stop spinning scenarios, imagining worlds she never wished to inhabit. Finally, exhausted, she fell into a deep sleep, disturbed by dreams she was unable to remember. Rising early the next morning, she kissed Aden in her mind, out of fear of awakening him, and crept silently out of the house. Holding onto this memory of him, lying alone, at peace in the soft warmth of their bed, she hurried off to the airport to catch her plane for Chicago.

2

Day Has Come

As soon as he awoke, even before opening his eyes, Aden knew she had left. The bed felt different to him, cooler, even colder, as if it were an alien place where he didn’t quite belong. The sun had not yet risen, but a bright-orange line was already beginning to appear along the eastern horizon. Aden could never sleep in, could never stay in bed once the sun was up. It had nothing to do with any subliminal puritan ethic, he told himself. It was more because something in him felt that he was going to miss an important event and that he would somehow be less if he missed that one thing which could only be witnessed if he were to rouse himself from the comfort of a warm bed. Maybe it was as simple as curiosity.

He looked out the window to see the moon setting in the west. He loved these sunrise-moonsets. There was something magical about them, the everlasting beginnings and endings, the in-between time, when it was neither night nor morning. He dressed hurriedly, made a pot of coffee, and sat on the front steps, Nora’s note in hand.

Sweetheart,

I couldn’t bring myself to wake you before I left for the airport. You looked so peaceful sleeping there, I just wanted to remember you that way. I will call you this evening, I promise. Have a good class today and good luck with your book.

Love,

Nora

Why did he read it three times? Why did it fill him with a kind of uneasiness? Probably just that odd phrasing of hers, of her wanting to remember him that way, as if there were a kind of finality about it. More likely, it was just the fact that there would soon be two thousand miles separating them. He thought of calling her on her cell phone but decided against it. She was probably in a crowded airport waiting room, and their conversations always wound up feeling and sounding stilted and unnatural under those circumstances.

Morning, Aden. So, Nora’s off to Chicago?

Philip’s voice shook him from his worries. How the hell did he know she was off to Chicago? He liked Philip well enough. He was a good neighbor, and more than that, a nice person, but Aden was definitely not as close to him as Nora was. Whenever she had free time and she was not doing something with Aden, she seemed more and more often to be sitting in Philip’s garden drinking tea with him. There’s no jealousy involved, obviously, he’d actually said to himself once. How could I be jealous? When he had even hinted at anything, as subtly as he could muster, Nora dismissed it with an annoyed look.

Oh, for God’s sake, Aden, Philip’s gay! You know that. We’re just good friends. She had a way of putting things sometimes, and you knew the topic was completely closed to further discussion.

Yes, Aden said, finally replying to Philip. She left early this morning. Not sure exactly when she’ll be back. He tried to sound nonchalant about it.

I know. We had coffee yesterday in the garden after you left for the university, before she went to work. She was telling me. Said you’d probably be worried about her.

And isn’t this exactly the kind of thing that’s so annoying, he thought. My goddamn neighbor knew before I did that my wife was going to Chicago! But he said nothing. Instead, he began to pet Sergius, who came up to him, wagging his tail and licking his face.

Yes, she’s very excited about getting assigned to this story, Aden replied, trying to cover. It’s definitely a big one—for all of us, I guess. She felt like it was quite a coup too, that the editor picked her to go.

Oh, yeah, Abe Rabinowitz. Did you know that he and I grew up in the same neighborhood in the Valley? We went to school together as kids. He got his degree in journalism at USC, and I went off to do my MFA at UCLA.

Aden nodded, annoyed again that Philip had yet another connection with Nora he hadn’t known about. Feeling a little guilty, though, maybe even a bit ridiculous, Aden made himself say, with as much conviction as he could, Would you like a cup of coffee?

No, thanks very much, Aden. Very kind of you, but I have to give Sergius his morning walk and then get back to that painting I’ve been working on. It’s turning out to be such a dark thing the only time I’m able to work on it is in the daytime. Otherwise, it’s too depressing. I’ll see you later. Philip gave a half-convinced laugh, waved, and walked off down the street. Sergius followed him, stopping here and there to sniff something that Aden couldn’t identify.

*       *       *

An hour later, in the car on the way to the Cal State campus where he worked, Aden turned on the news.

The NPR report was discussing an upcoming talk to be delivered by the US president: "Administration officials indicate that President Rothman is arriving later today in Chicago. Although he is speaking at the annual meeting of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, it is believed that his remarks may be addressed as much to the UN Security Council and to member nations as they are to the assembled veterans. Sources indicate that the topic of the speech will be the apparent refusal of the Middle Eastern Oil Cartel to sell needed petroleum both to the United States and to the European Union. There is speculation as to whether or not he will specify action on the part of the United States and its allies in the event of further refusal.

"The secretary of state said, in a speech last week in Brussels, ‘We will not be held hostage by anyone. There is ample agreement on the part of NATO and other allies that all appropriate options, including the use of force, remain on the table.’ Meanwhile, Iranian President Aiyoob has made it clear the Cartel has the right, if it wishes, to sell the bulk of remaining Middle Eastern oil to Muslim nations first and foremost, and whatever is leftover may then possibly be offered to the United States and other Western countries.

On a related note, the Security Council meets tomorrow in emergency session at its new temporary headquarters building in Chicago. Secretary General Lin has made it clear that he believes that New York City is no longer safe, due to continually rising sea levels. UN personnel are far from the only evacuees, as many people have begun abandoning lower Manhattan, as well as parts of both Brooklyn and Queens. More on these stories from our correspondent in New York—

Aden clicked the radio off; a jumble of thoughts and anxieties tumbled through his mind. Often, of late, he found himself turning off the news, giving himself time to think while driving to campus, feeling guilty that he was driving at all. For all his knowledge about global warming and the effects of greenhouse gases on the environment, he ought to know better. He had tried many times to use the bus, but even in 2024, public transportation in Los Angeles was hopelessly slow. It took him a minimum of an hour and a half to get to work by bus, while driving his own car, even in traffic, he could get there in less than forty-five minutes. That, plus the fact that he was often at the university late into the evening working on his book, and the buses ran that much less frequently then. Even so, the feelings of guilt persisted.

He was in the final edit of a history of the first decade of the twenty-first century, which outlined in painful detail the slow reaction of many nations, the United States in particular, to the ravages of climate change. He had been able to obtain a number of documents through the Freedom of Information Act, which conclusively showed how repeated US administrations had attempted to hide both the causes and the known effects of continued reliance on petroleum.

What was it that Hilda was saying yesterday? he was thinking, as he drove. He’d wanted to tell Nora last night, but things just got so strange once she told him she was leaving for Chicago. He wanted to tell her he thought that Hilda was right, that they ought to be planning how to get out of LA and where to go and how to get there in the event of … well, whatever. He couldn’t bring himself to quite formulate the whatever scenario.

Wasn’t he just talking the other day to his colleague in the department, Frank Myers, who lived in Long Beach? Frank was saying that the beaches there had completely disappeared and people who lived nearby were panicking. The same was true all up and down the California coast. The Antarctic ice field was only a quarter the size of what it had been just three years ago, and it was apparently shrinking rapidly. And if the Greenland glacier finally slipped into the sea, it was all but inevitable that many cities on the East Coast and elsewhere would have to be abandoned. And now this business of possible war in the Middle East! What the hell was anybody thinking? And yet, as he looked out the window of his own car, at all of the other cars—in spite of the fact that they were an eclectic combination of electric and hybrid, and that there was a hefty tax on old-fashioned, gas-powered vehicles—he thought, What would any of us do if we were completely without oil? How would any of us survive? Despite the progress we’ve made, and all of the alternative forms of energy, we’re still desperately dependent on oil.

On that pessimistic note, he arrived at the university. He drove across campus to the one area, far from his office, where he was reasonably sure of finding a parking place after 8:00 a.m. The typical Cal State mix of students streamed past him—all races, all colors, and more and more combinations of races, ones that would have been thought of as shocking a few generations ago.

He headed to his office, where he found a note taped to his door.

Aden,

If you have a moment before your 11:00 class, can you stop by and see me? I want to introduce you to someone.

Hilda

He didn’t particularly feel like meeting anyone, but he was fond of Hilda, so he put his laptop and briefcase on the desk and walked down the hall. He went through the outer office of the History Department and mumbled a quick hello to Hector, their student assistant.

Oh, Dr. Binder and her visitor are waiting for you, Hector said. She told me to tell you to go right in.

Aden, Hilda called out, already hearing his voice, come in, please. I want to introduce you to Dr. Liam O’Donnell from the University of Rouen. If you remember, I mentioned at the faculty meeting last week that Dr. O’Donnell will be with us for a couple of months on a Fulbright.

Please, I hope you’ll call me Liam, he said, shaking Aden’s hand. His brogue, while not heavy, betrayed his Irish roots. I know that no one normally expects a person by the name of O’Donnell to be teaching in Rouen, he continued, but these days, professors go their merry way around Europe, much as they did in the thirteenth century.

I see, said Aden, a kind of new-style Irish missionary to the continent?

Indeed. Uncouth heathens as they still are, replied Liam with a laugh.

I think I’ll like this guy. Out loud, Aden added, I understand you do similar kinds of research to what I have been doing in regard to early twenty-first century government energy policy. I enjoyed reading your recent article on how changes in the Gulf Stream have affected Ireland.

And not just Ireland, countered Liam. Much of the UK and a good part of northern and western France, as well. Ireland was the first to feel its most devastating effects, though. When I was a boy there, it seldom even snowed. Now my nephews are hitting hockey pucks on the Boyne.

I’m afraid the US has played a major role in their taking up that particular sport, said Aden.

That’s probably true, Liam sighed, though there’s blame aplenty to spread around. Life is becoming harder in Europe, certainly harder than I remember it being. Winters are much colder, with blizzards like we’ve never witnessed before, and summers are hotter and wetter. Naturally, that affects the price of everything, food in particular, but heating and cooling and much else, as well. And while I haven’t seen a purely gasoline-powered car there in years, I wonder if it’s too late for us to unscramble this noxious omelet.

Well, Hilda interjected, I thought you two might have a lot of depressing things in common. Personally, I prefer my dejection in larger and more immediate dosages. I have to tell you that I really am scared about what our government—and even the Europeans—might do if the Iranians don’t relent and begin selling us some of that Middle Eastern oil again. I’m sure you heard what the secretary of state said last week about all options being on the table, including force.

Aden, to his own surprise, was beginning to enjoy talking about all this devastation. At least it served as a temporary distraction from his gnawing worry about Nora. He wished again for the hundredth time that day that she hadn’t gone to Chicago.

The three of them continued talking until Aden had to excuse himself to get ready for class. Hilda had invited Liam to dinner that evening and asked Aden if he’d like to join them. Maybe he would. He could call Nora later from his cell phone, and there seemed no point in rushing home to an empty house.

*       *       *

After teaching his classes and meeting with the students who needed to see him, Aden shut the door to his office. He went over to the blinds and closed them. He wanted to just sit and think for a while. He hesitated to call this meditation, since that sounded too religious to him, and he did not think highly of any organized church. Still, he had to admit that what he did was something akin to meditation. He’d been doing this more or less spontaneously, if erratically, ever since the accident, when he was seventeen years old. He knew the exact date when the accident had occurred, October 31, 2012, both because it was Halloween and because it was the day before his eighteenth birthday.

He had been driving. His grandfather, Peter Fallon, was seated next to him. Ever since he was a little boy, Grandpa Peter had been his favorite in the family. He was at an age when he felt everyone else was against him, and only his grandfather understood and believed in him. He’d decided to fly up to Montana, where his grandfather lived, to spend his birthday with him. His parents, and certainly his friends, all thought him crazy; but he figured they thought that no matter what.

It was dusk, he remembered vividly, and they were driving down from his grandfather’s cabin into town for dinner. Aden asked if he could take the wheel, and his grandfather had agreed. All he’d said was, Be careful, the standard grown-up thing to tell a teenage driver, Aden thought. The road was deserted, anyway, so what was there to be careful about? A thick wall of pines and firs lined the two-lane highway on either side. He recalled that feeling of peace and calmness he experienced whenever he was around Grandpa Peter. They never had to talk very much; somehow, Aden always felt there was a deeper and more immediate level of communication between them.

His grandfather’s pickup truck rode quietly and easily on the smooth pavement. As they drove along, the road felt like a gentle roller coaster going up and over small hills. It was so peaceful that he was in no hurry to get to town, and he couldn’t have been going more than thirty-five or forty miles an hour. They’d just crested one of the bigger hills. As soon as the front end of the truck began to angle downward, and he could begin to see the road ahead of him again in the half-light, he sensed something was not right. The next thing he knew, a large animal seemed to appear on the road. Aden swerved, and they careened into a ditch. The truck flipped over and rolled toward the fir trees on the side of the road. He could only think of what happened as a kind of fast slow motion. He remembered his grandfather grabbing hold of him and hearing the thud when the truck rammed into the ditch, but there were no sounds after that. The pickup rolled over and over, he didn’t know how many times. Oddly, inexplicably, Aden felt calm—he would even have said comfortable.

When the vehicle finally came to a standstill, it was somehow upright. He looked over at his grandfather, who was slumped in his seat, a gash in the side of his head. Out the broken side window, just beyond his grandfather, he saw a large bear standing there, looking in. The creature stared at him with dark, loving eyes. It did not seem at all hurried, agitated, or even concerned about the accident. After a moment, it stood on its hind legs and Aden heard a sound he could never accurately describe to anyone, which came from the bear. It was a combination of a sigh and what was almost a chuckle. Comforting, soothing, lulling him to sleep. Aden said to the bear, he would never forget saying, Goodbye for now, Grandpa. Then he lost consciousness.

He was in a coma for several days. When he awoke, his parents were there in the hospital room, and they did their best to be soothing and upbeat, but he could read his mother’s eyes. Finally, he simply said, more to put her at ease than to confirm anything he didn’t already know, It’s all right. You don’t have to pretend. I know he’s dead. That was all he said. He didn’t utter a word to anyone about what he’d seen that night, at least not until much later, when he met his friend Henry and then, later still, to Nora.

In his office, with the obscure hum of student conversations vaguely perceptible outside his window, eyes still shut, Aden sat and thought. In his mind, he saw the accident again. For the thousandth time, he went through the achingly familiar range of emotions, from guilt, to fear, to anger, to crushing sadness, to a kind of quiet calmness. He tried to picture his Grandfather Bear, as he came to call whatever the creature was. He tried to