2072

I remember when people wouldn't have swarmed at the sign of a moving automobile. A time when everyone had one. Had a home. Back then, we had everything, but we wanted more. That's what led us to our downfall, greed, like all the once-great historians. Only this time, it was the downfall of a whole world.

Today was the day I died-correction today is my birthday. my 65th birthday. I'm not afraid, though. I've waited patiently for this day ever since Russia and China sent the bombs. I watched everyone else go. Who would've thought this was how I'd go? Not me.

"Ma'am, please get in line."

The line was long. Nothing new. The line was always long, people lining up for death. Years ago, people would've rejoiced on their birthdays, but not now. Never again. Birthdays only mean one year closer to 65, closer to death. I'm not afraid, though.

I don't like to reminisce. But today is an exception. Today I will think and dream- of the time before all this pain. A time when smiles weren't just toothy grins from naive guards.

The streets were loud, but no laughing. Not anymore. Worn, cobblestone, dilapidated buildings, soldiers. They were all reminders of where we were, what we'd become.

I remember going to my Grandmother's when I was young. I'd sit in the back "chatting" with the calves. Kissed one once, but that's another time. Me and my cousins-may they rest in peace- would run around the eleven-acre wetlands together. We'd laugh, joke. But now they were all gone. And soon, I too, will join them in paradise.

The line moved up. Out of reverence, everyone in the line bowed their heads forward. I couldn't tell if the long line in front of me feared their fate or if they longed for it to be over, like me. I studied their faces. Most of them probably had lived a similar life as me, before, I mean. We were the generation that got a small taste of what life could've been before seeing it all crumble before our very

eyes. Unlike our parents, we never got to start our lives.

I remember when It all started going downhill. When the war began. Remember It too clearly. I was only a teen. I remember when the first bomb struck. Seeing it all over the news. The night we were taken from our family. The night my family died.

Our job in this life, or what we have been told, is to repopulate and die. You don't marry for love. Your children are sent off to who knows where, at mearly twelve. It's how it's always been. How it always should be. Of course, only survivors from my generation know the truth. But we are almost all gone.

"Next!"

I was close. I could hear the boisterous guards over the grinding noise.

I felt a soft tap on my right shoulder.

"Hi, I'm sorry, I just...can I talk to you? I need to keep my mind off...you know..."

"Oh!" The man wore the custom white shirt and pants of a gardener. His hair was silver-gray. At one time years ago, he would've been attractive. But not now, he was small, frail, old, and afraid.

"Oh, of course, I'm M1507CHARGE,"

"Please...can we...I mean I'd like to...well use our real names." He stuttered, his small body shaking.

"Oh, then I'm..." It has been so long since I said my name to anyone. Not that I'd forgotten it. I whisper the six-letter name to myself every day.

"Claire." I tried to smile, but it had been so long since I had that it must've came out more like a grimace.

"Josh,"

I drifted back into my thoughts, waiting for Josh to say something else. He didn't.

"Next!"

"Hello," The guard was tall and dark. Around his early twenties.

"You are..."

"M1507CHARGE." I mumbled.

"Okay, your next." I turned to see Josh shaking behind me before climbing up the stairs into the darkroom. Up the stairs to death.