Walking the Ruins

Archery, and a routine establishing itself

Leaving our house, I head east, following the shore of the lake. As described by Steve and Jenny, I soon reach the outskirts of what used to be a city of considerable size, covering the slope ascending from the water to the hills on my left. The ruins are in a state similar to those in the first city we saw. If anything, nature has established an even stronger foothold here, maybe because of the favorable climate at the lake's north shore.

After some trudging through the rubble, I find myself on a square surrounded by old stone and concrete, with a single tree standing in its center. It's the kind of place I have been looking for.

I take off my backpack. Then I nock an arrow from the quiver into the string of my bow and place myself at a distance of about ten paces from the tree.

I position myself, with my feet on a line pointing towards my target, my right arm outstretched, holding the bow, my left hand gripping the arrow, drawing it back. I ignore the pain in my shoulder. The vibrating power of the weapon resonates in my muscles, it's the weapon's chant of its readiness to propel the projectile into its target. I close my right eye. The gaze of the left one follows the shaft of the arrow and visualizes its future trajectory intersecting the tree trunk, exactly a hand's width above that knothole. I breathe in. Then I start to exhale slowly, letting any conscious thought ebb away, and everything around me becomes eerily silent. Even the birds suspend their morning's cacophony.

I release the arrow. It leaves the bow with a whooshing whisper.

As if in slow motion, my eyes follow its path, observing how it unceremoniously misses its target by at least two meters. It embeds itself into a slope behind the tree.

Darn! I walk to the slope and retrieve the arrow. The birds' twitter has resumed, and it seems to have acquired a mocking quality.

I repeat the experiment. Again and again, until my arm tires and the pain in my shoulder makes me stop. If that slope behind the tree were an elephant, it would be dead for good by now. I have managed to hit the tree only once, about one meter below the knothole.

I look at my target in frustration. Shooting arrows looks so easy when Katniss is doing it. 

My hurting shoulder tells me to stop, to give it up. But I shake my head, take another arrow and resume my position. 

I continue my training until I have blisters on the fingers of my left hand, and my right hand is scratched bloody by the arrows passing it.

The last three shots all have hit the tree, one of them a few inches from the target.

Not good enough! But I can't go on, I'm exhausted and hurting. I sit down on a concrete boulder and eat an apple. My hands hardly have the strength to hold it.

Later, I walk the streets of the city, searching its ruins and looking out for animals. But the only thing I see are shadows cast by ghosts.

Towards evening, at the lakeside, I see fish in the water. I manage to spear two of them.

As the sun reaches the horizon, I wonder if I should return to our house at all. I could spend the night here in the city. I could find myself a new home. The others would be happy enough without me, they have all they need, and it would probably be easier for them, too. I am the fifth wheel of this car. I am a ship without a mate.

But then I shake my head. No, I tell myself. We belong together, me and those others, the last humans in this deserted world. Not returning now might be easier, for the moment at least. But to be strong, we must stand together. And I want to be strong.

When I enter our home, the others are already assembled in the main room.

"Leona ..." starts Steve, but his voice fails, and he stares at my short hair in disbelief.

Rose is the first one to say something intelligible. "We were worried for you!" She gets up and hugs me. Then she looks at me. "What have you done with your hair?"

I grin. "I had an appointment with my hairdresser. And he was angry." I stand proud and straight, the spirit of the warrior giving me strength. I look at my friends one by one.

"Are you well?" Kevin asks. "You look feverish."

Well, that sprit of the warrior may not have worked as expected. I grin, in resignation, and let myself relax. "I am good, thanks."

With a relieved sigh, I take off my backpack and get the two fish, which I have wrapped in large leaves. I offer them to Rose.

"Great, thanks! Kevin and I are trying to find out how to smoke fish. We can use them."

"And now, please tell us what you've been doing all day," adds Steve, pointing to the bench beside him. "We were real worried."

As I take a seat, realize how I exhausted I am.

I start telling them about my day, carefully censoring certain parts of my archery experiments.

Later, in my 'bed', feeling warm and fed, I smile into the darkness. Yes, I will be strong. But this does not mean that I have to do things alone. My friends and I, we belong together.

Over the next few weeks, the days start to assume a regular pattern. Mostly, I spend them alone. I train with the bow, and slowly my accuracy improves. I forage the slopes of the nearby city. I collect the few still useful remains of our failed civilization. I hunt and search for things to eat. I not only see rabbits, hares, fish and birds, but also wolves, which I try to avoid. And one morning I see a bear from a distance. At the sight of the animal, my fingers move to the scar on my cheek, and I get a feeling that I have some unfinished business with this species.

And the days are turning colder. Sometimes, in the morning, the ground is covered by frost. Gathering food becomes more difficult. Usually, we find enough, but a fear of hunger becomes my constant companion.

Still, I feel stronger each day. And this strange life, a life at the edge of survival, this fight for the next day and the next week, eye to eye with the wilderness and the invisible, enigmatic ghosts from the past, they slowly turn into routine.