You wake, pour yourself a cold press, begin to smile, and then it hits you: everyone died last night. It’s not your fault, and there’s nothing you can do about it, so you take a sip of your coffee. It’s warm out, possibly because of the heat from all of these decomposing bodies, so condensation drips on your lap as you move the glass to your mouth.

“Fuck the apocalypse,” you think. “Fuck that shit.”

You grab the latest issue of the New Yorker–yeah, you know it’s your last–and you head out to the sunporch, where the streaming rays of light act all beautiful despite the mass human die-off, and the chirping birds make you feel as though you’re in the forest. And then you notice your cat, Norman, slumped over dead, his tongue sticking out of his mouth as though he’s mocking you. Fuck. The apocalypse took him too.

No worries. It’s not your fault, and surely there are other cats who made it; they’ll need homes. After all, cats don’t fix their own Fancy Feast, do they? You do wonder why Norman was taken. It’s possible that he was just a bit too human. But fuck he looks precious when dead. You consider taking an iPhone photo of his cuteness for Facebook, but then you realize: All of Facebook is dead. But you take a picture anyway; you know his appearance is not going to improve, and you’d like to remember this face. Adorable little puss.

You flip through the New Yorker, skipping most of the bullshit, until you get to an amazing and intricately weaved profile of Yurine Van Vlook, heiress to the largest shale mine in Texas. Now dead, you presume. You read the profile as an obituary. She had a decent life, aside from the paternal rape issues and that time she lost her leg in a mine. You wish you were an heir. But now that everyone is dead, does it matter? No, you decide, and you smirk crookedly. Fuck heirs.

And then you remember your roommate Carl, presumably dead. You’ll have to do something with the body before your house starts to stink. You walk down to his bedroom and crack open the door. His fan whirs. He’s there, in bed, looking like he’s asleep. You know better. You walk up to him and tear off the sheet. He’s not wearing anything. You feel ashamed until you realize that your new life does not need to involve shame. You smile once again–no shame? How freeing–and you go into a complete twirl, unashamed. You look in the mirror. You know that soon enough you’ll age and get ugly, but it won’t matter once all of the world’s mirrors deteriorate and crumble and fall to the ground. The world’s reflective surfaces will slowly dissipate as you get older and uglier. That sounds perfect.

“What are you doing?” Carl asks you. You pause.

“You’re not dead?” you ask casually.

“No…”

“I’m sorry,” you say. “There’s been some kind of mistake.”

You shut the door and wonder what Norman’s deal is.

–Jason Zabel

Photo from Celesteh.