Phase Two: The Road (Part 3)

"They found some utensils and a few pieces of clothing. A sweatshirt. Some plastic they

could use for a tarp. He was sure they were being watched but he saw no one. In a pantry they came

upon part of a sack of cornmeal that rats had been at in the long ago. He sifted the meal through a

section of windowscreen and collected a small handful of dried turds and they built a fire on the

concrete porch of the house and made cakes of the meal and cooked them over a piece of tin. Then they

ate them slowly one by one. He wrapped the few remaining in a paper and put them in the knapsack." pg.26

"A face was looking at him. A boy, about his age, wrapped in an out-sized wool coat

with the sleeves turned back. He stood up. He ran across the road and up the drive. No one there. He

looked toward the house and then he ran to the bottom of the yard through the dead weeds to a still

black creek. Come back, he called. I wont hurt you. He was standing there crying when his father came

sprinting across the road and seized him by the arm.

What are you doing? he hissed. What are you doing?

There's a little boy, Papa. There's a little boy.

There's no little boy. What are you doing?

Yes there is. I saw him......

The boy was pulling at his coat. Papa, he said.

What?

I'm afraid for that little boy.

I know. But he'll be all right.

We should go get him, Papa. We could get him and take him with us. We could take him

and we could take the dog. The dog could catch something to eat.

We cant.

And I'd give that little boy half of my food.

Stop it. We cant.

He was crying again. What about the little boy? he sobbed. What about the little boy?" pg.26

Look at the puppies! I'm not crying at my desk right now! Honest!

    Hours of watching MacGyver finally paid off. Looking through absolutely everything and finding some not-so-obvious conclusion.

    The boy, though only alive for a few years before the apocalypse, still has an ounce of humanity left in him. Unfortunately, that makes him weak, and if not for his father, he would have probably died a long time ago. I find it odd that humans take care of their young for 20 years after birth. Some insects only live for a couple of weeks, and some turtles lay their eggs on the beach and let their offspring figure everything out on their own. Human children are at a severe disadvantage when it comes to surviving in a world like this. Without the father, the boy would be hopelessly lost and misguided, surely left for dead...

Oh yeah, did I mention that the father's dying?

"Oh God! It looks like it could be dead!"

    Yep, the father's slowly dying of the consumption, tuberculosis. He's keeping this from the boy. Every now and then, McCarthy writes in a small coughing fit ending with a spray of blood. "Kittentastic!" It's a constant reminder that the two are on a short time limit to make it south for the winter. If they don't make it before the father dies, the boy will eventually freeze to death. It's up to the man to teach the boy anything he could use before he passes on. The man can't tell the boy out of fear that the boy will worry too much (he worries too much as it is).

    Oddly enough, the boy is still more mature than most modern kids his age. He's an interesting character. He's been forced to grow up faster than most, but he still shows signs of childhood weakness at times. As a reader, you know that McCarthy is going to include a death scene, and... oh god....

That's right. I just used a "kitten cop out."