Adam squinted against the baleful glare of the red sun as he walked down the deserted street. Dead leaves carpeted the road, drifted across the sidewalk, crunched under his feet, and mulched in the gutter. Darkened storefronts scowled sadly through their broken windows as he walked by. A few solitary cars were parked here and there, remnants of the hustle and bustle that had once filled this street and a thousand others like it. The rest were gone, vanished like a strange herd of mechanical beasts of burden that had crept away to die in some hidden place. Adam had long since given up checking the abandoned vehicles to see if any would run; only a few had viable fuel cells, but nearly all retained armed anti-theft capacitors that would hold their “not-quite-lethal” charge indefinitely. After his own vehicle had finally stalled out a few miles previously, Adam quickly concluded that walking home was the least-painful option available.
Home. Now that it was only a few blocks away, Adam considered the finality of what he was doing, and wondered if he would live to regret the decision he had made. He turned off the empty high street and marched into what was left of the familiar Perennial Oaks subdivision. Adam knew that the residents of this neighborhood would have been among the first to join the exodus, but he was unprepared for what four years of neglect under a dying sun had done to his childhood stomping grounds.
Tangled hedges of undergrowth and grass sprawled across the prize-winning lawns and flower gardens. Oak leaves covered everything that had not been overtaken by weeds. A considerable section of the road had subsided over a broken water line, and Adam had to skirt the resultant lake to turn onto Constant Circle. His father’s house came into view, and Adam was suddenly doubtful. Would his father really have stayed here while the world departed around him? But his choice was made, and there was nothing for him but to follow through and walk the final hundred yards home.
The electronic locks did not work, of course, but Adam was gratified to discover that his key to the old-fashioned deadbolt was still perfectly functional. He eased the door open and wrinkled his nose at the smell of mildew, and wondered again whether he had made an irreversible decision for nothing.
“Hello?” he called. “Dad?”
Silence threw his voice down the hallway and buried it in the thick, dusty carpet on the stairs. Adam closed the front door and took three steps into the gloomy foyer when he heard the click of a pistol safety snapping back into place. He turned to see his father standing in a doorway, putting a gun back into its holster.
“What are you doing here, Adam?” he asked. His face was hidden in the shadows, but if his voice was anything to go by, Adam’s father had aged badly in the years of their separation. Adam couldn’t blame him.
“I … had to come … come back, sir,” he faltered. “I walked out on you once. I couldn’t do it again. I’m so sorry, Dad.”
Adam’s father stepped forward into the pool of light from the window over the front door, and Adam saw that he had been correct: his father was a lonely old man.
“I’m so sorry, Dad,” he whispered again.
Tears welled up in the old man’s eyes. “I’m sorry too, Adam. I’m sorry I drove you away.”
The two men embraced, and forgiveness wrapped her arms around them both. Adam discovered tears in his eyes too, and buried his head in his father’s shoulder like the little boy he suddenly wished he could be again.
They stood there for a long time and when Adam’s father finally broke the silence, his voice sounded much closer to the strong baritone that Adam remembered from his youth.
“We should get on the road if we’re going to leave together.”
Adam shook his head.
“It’s too late, Dad. The last ship lifted off this morning. We can’t go anywhere.”
Confusion reigned on the old man’s face. “Last ship? But … you have so much still ahead of you.”
Adam smiled at his father. “I had to come back. I was getting ready to board when I realized I couldn’t leave you behind again. Bad blood is poisonous, I suppose. Leaving without taking care of it would have killed me.”
“Staying behind will kill you too,” his father said dryly.
“I know. You’re more important than that.”
“Well, then. We’ve got some catching up to do. Let’s watch the sun die.”
Adam grinned and followed him outside. Father and son sat together on the porch and watched the red giant in the sky sink below the horizon, and waited for the end of the world.