Acid Rain by R.D Rhodes (ebook reader txt) 📕

and factories. My body felt light and full of nervous energy. A guitar rhythm started in my head, and I realised it was the song I’d just heard in the car park, the Rage Against the Machine one. The intro rhythm gave out to the lyrics of a song I’d probably only heard about five or six times in my life,

Nuthin proper bout ya propaganda,

Fools follow rules when the set command ya.

Harry and Alex sat quietly in front, calmly looking through the windscreen as intermittent raindrops landed on it. But I felt like I was getting pulled further and further away from both of them, almost as if by some invisible force. I felt totally alone, yet I didn’t feel like speaking. I was wrought with nerves and didn’t know why. I squirmed. My mind was pacing. I looked left at the cars on the opposite side of the motorway going the other way, and I can’t explain it, but I got the sudden strong impression that it was the right way that they were going. That we were going the wrong way. Like we were going against the tide or something. I tasted a burning acidic phlegm in my throat. I couldn’t understand the fear and energy that was taking hold. Was it a premonition? I don’t know. But I had the feeling that this would be the last time the three of us would be together.

Cellular phone, sounding a death tone,

Corporations goin, turn ya to stone

Before you realise!

That vision again! That ladder. What does it mean? Are we all on the verge of breaking through some collective consciousness? What does it mean? Maybe I should ask them? But I don’t want to. Oh God, what is with me? Why do I feel like this?

“Can I have a sweet?” Harry said.

“Sure.” Alex’s eyes remained on the road.

Harry opened the cylinder tin that was next to the handbrake and took out a boiled humbug. He offered Alex then turned to me and stretched out his arm.

Red and green and yellow. I took a green one.

But Harry didn’t draw his arm back. “You okay? You look a bit…pale?”

I swallowed. I didn’t know whether to say it or not. “I’ve got a bad feeling.”

The back of Alex’s neck stretched up. Harry’s brows narrowed.

“About what?”

“I don’t know. I just do.” I said.

Harry’s face waited. “I just feel a bit sick.” I lied. “It’s nothing.”

McDonalds flashed by the window on my right.

“It will just be the crowds, mate.” Alex reasoned. “I struggle with them too. It’s hard, isn’t it? Especially after being in nature for so long!”

Harry smiled to back him up. “We’ll be on our way back to Affric in twenty minutes. Right, Alex?”

“Sure!

“See. Don’t worry.”

I looked away from his smiling face. I just wanted to go back. I wished I’d never left the forest. I felt terrible, and was filled with a horrible sense of foreboding, but I didn’t know why. We went through a roundabout and onto the other side,

…So serene on the screen

you were mesmerized.

Cellular phone,

sounding a death tone.

Shut up, Aisha, I said in my head, but that song went on playing like my brain was trying to distract me,

Load the clip in, omnicolour.

Fire at the prime time.

Sleeping gas every home like it was Alcatraz-

And mother fuckers lost their minds!

We passed KFC, Pizza Hut, crossed a bridge over the river.

Is that River Ness?

No escape from the mass mind rape.

Maybe it is.

Play it again Jack, and then rewind the tape

And then play it again

and again

and again

Until ya mind is locked in.

I bit down into the sweet. The outside world felt exactly like London, just without the skyscrapers.

They say jump and ya say how high!

Ya brain-dead!

Ya gotta FUCKIN’ BULLET IN YA HEAD!

Everything got greyer. And darker. The clock on the dashboard said 4 o’clock.

“Alex?” I said. “You got Rage Against the Machine?”

His eyes darted to the mirror then back to the road. “No, sorry. Check out my CD’s if you want though. Could you pass them to her, please? They’re in the glove compartment.”

Harry handed me the CD case. Fratelli’s. R.E.M, Kate Bush, P.J Harvey. But Tesco’s red and blue letters had already appeared.

It was even busier than the last place. The cars in rows after rows like intestinal gutters leading up to the jaws of the entrance. First all the food had gone from the land to the store, and now all the people had too. I just wanted to be back at Affric already. Not in this apocalypse.

Alex’s head turned left and right “Jesus. No spaces anywhere. Ah, here’s one!”

He tried to maneuver between a van and a Range Rover.

“Do you need help getting in?” Harry asked.

“You saying I can’t park?”

“Yes.”

They both laughed. Alex managed to squeeze through. We clicked off our seatbelts, but we stayed in the car.

The rain came down heavier on the windshield.

“Will we have a look at the bins first?” Alex enquired.

Harry looked towards the store. “Nah, no point. They will definitely be closed. I’ve checked them all at least five different times in the past few months. They are always fuckin locked.”

“Must be company policy.”

“Aye. To waste food.”

Tesco’s glowing lights waited. People shunted trolleys below the big red letters. “I’m just gonna stay in the car.” I said.

“Fair enough. I’ll leave the keys in for you, mate.” Alex said. He opened the door and got out and waited outside. Harry stayed and looked back at me. The world inside and outside of the car was dark under the shadow of the sky.

“It’s away to tank it down.” his black eyes observed. “Look, we’ll