Everyone’s dead

So I wake up and there is a letter by my bed. Just two words on it. Two little words in a small and modest typeface. Blurry eyed and fogged brain, my eyes see them, but my brain hasn’t quite received the message. But I’m holding the little bit of paper in my hand. Holding it. Starring at it. Slowly coming round from a silent sleep that nestled me away from the big bad world.

Everyone’s dead.

Was this one to be thrown among the heap of bills and junk mail and all those other bits of unwanted paper that manage to flood their way into your life?

I kinda knew this wasn’t one of those, but something just a tad more pressing.

Everyone’s dead? What kind of sick joke is that. I look to the window and see ordinary people walking past continuing with their ordinary lives. A twinge of disappointment tugged at my stomach, quickly followed by guilt as I fell back to bed.

The phone rings.

I ignore it once, twice, three times. The ringing swells up a deep a dark rage inside my whole being. I pick it up but do not say a word.

Silence.

I wait, impatiently for a little while longer until I spit out a small but sharp “What?”

A voice I didn’t recognise answers in a calm almost calculated manner:

“Everyone’s dead”