Sandra limped into the building, shutting the door quietly behind her. Panting, she leaned against the door and listened. In the distance, she could hear shouting, growling, and groans, but the noises seemed to move away. Carefully, she eased off the door and checked for a lock. No luck. It was an exterior stairwell door and probably had to remain unlocked during business hours.

Looking around the room, Sandra saw a denim-blue computer chair and eased down into it. She leaned forward and rolled up her left pant leg. Yup, swollen and bruised. She poked gingerly, feeling for anything unusual – a bone sticking up or crunchy sounds – and found nothing. Probably just a nasty sprain. She needed to ice and elevate for a few days, and that was a problem. Ice was nowhere to be found and staying in one place too long was almost certain death. If she was going to stay, she had to find some place better than the bottom floor of a half-demolished office building.

What was of greater concern was the deep scratch on the same leg. The scratch didn’t communicate with the swelling; so it wasn’t an open fracture, but it was deep and dirty. She needed to clean it before it became infected. She could survive with a sprained ankle, but she couldn’t say the same for an infection and no medical care, and to make matters worse, her first aid kit was in her backpack, which was lying out in the street. She had dropped it when she had started to run.

At one time, the 25-floor building was state-of-the-art. It looked like the sort of place where casual Friday was every day and employees played Hackey Sack during breaks. There was probably a workout room somewhere on site, so with any luck, there’d also be a med station of some sort, hopefully not on the side of the building ruined by the bombs.

After wrapping her ankle with the bandana she had used to tie off her hair, Sandra heaved herself up. Ironically, she was in the best shape of her life, if a little thin. If she was going to camp in the building for a few days, she needed to bite the bullet and scavenge, no matter how much it hurt to walk.

Sandra checked the area around the reception desk—a horseshoe-shaped monstrosity in mahogany—but found nothing useful. She hobbled to the hallway as quietly as she could and listened. She didn’t hear movement or sound in the building. Yet. The creatures were far from quiet, but at times they did seem to sleep, or rather recharge. It wasn’t like they fluffed up a pillow and took a snooze. They simply stopped moving and stood dead still in a group, heads down. It was possible to sneak past them in that state, but waking them would mean death.

Sandra figured the higher up she went, the better off she was. If worse came to worst, she could always jump. Anything was better than being eaten alive. She found the interior stairwell and cautiously opened the door. The smooth hydraulic hinges kept the door quiet. With resignation, Sandra eyed the staircase and started working her way upward. She estimated it would take all day to limp up 24 floors.

The last 10 floors were the hardest, and the slowest to climb. By that time, Sandra was sitting on the stairs, using her good leg to scoot backwards up the stairs, one step at a time. It was slow-going, but her arms were strong, and she made it before nightfall. As she emerged from the stairwell, afternoon sunlight lit the way. The entire top floor—obviously, the VIP section—was almost entirely open with floor-to-ceiling windows. Despite the damage down below, this smaller top floor had no sign of structural compromise.

Sandra worked her way around the perimeter of the room, listening and looking. Her long brown hair was still wet with sweat, and her ankle throbbed, but she couldn’t call herself safe until she had checked the entire floor. Next to the reception desk, right off the elevators, Sandra found a mail cart. She dumped the correspondence out, kept the bins, and used the apparatus as a walker/shopping cart.

Sandra shuffled from desk to desk, opening drawers and rifling through personal belongings. Just like every place else in the world, this building had been abandoned suddenly and quickly. People hadn’t stopped to grab personal items.

Sandra found Tic Tacs, some chocolate white with age but still edible, and a couple of energy bars in purses and backpacks, and even found a couple of unopened water bottles. Pay dirt, however, was found in the break room.

There was a vending machine, still full. Most of the items would probably be stale, but you can’t go wrong with Corn Nuts and honey peanuts. It took little effort to smash open the glass front and load the mail cart bins with bags of food.

Sandra also found a case of bottled water in the cabinet under the sink, along with a first aid kit, some more chocolate in various bags and backpacks, and best of all, a bottle of amoxicillin in someone’s gear. It wasn’t a full bottle, but probably enough to help avoid infection. There were even a variety of birthday decorations in a drawer; a black candle in the shape of the number 50, a banner saying, “Lordy, you’re 40!”, and dozens of individual cake candles. All the candles, and a box of matches, joined the food, water, and first aid kit in the mail cart bin. Sandra picked the largest backpack, dumped it out, and added it to her booty; it would come in handy when she was well enough to leave, and later she could scrounge for clothes and other things that might help her survive.

Leaving the break room, Sandra finally turned her attention to the back of the office floor. There, behind oversized mahogany-looking doors, was the VIP office. Sandra had spent her pre-disaster days serving slop to truckers on I-5, so she wasn’t sure about office hierarchy, but given the size of the doors and the size of the matching desk standing guard in front of the doors, the VIP was probably the company president. CEO? Whoever he was, he carried clout.

The doors were locked.

Too tired to attempt prying the doors open, Sandra laid down behind the desk, using an abandoned jacket as a pillow. She cleaned her wound, took an antibiotic pill with some water, ate a Hershey’s bar, and dozed off, her foot elevated on an overturned mail bin.

Sandra awoke with a start. She could hear movement on her floor. Grateful she hadn’t used a candle, she quietly scooted under the reception desk. If They found her, there was nothing she could do. She clutched the letter opener she had taken from the desk, anyway.

A faint light appeared across the room. Sandra peaked under the front edge of the desk and saw a flashlight beam sweeping the area. It wasn’t one of Them, then. They didn’t use flashlights. Scavenger? Raider? Another lone wanderer? It didn’t matter. Sandra wasn’t trying to win friends and influence people. She preferred being alone.

Sandra must have gasped or breathed too hard – something – because the flashlight suddenly went out. She held her breath, trying to hear where its owner had gone. She found out when her foot was grabbed, and she was dragged out from under the desk. Sandra cried out in surprise and pain.

“You took everything from the vending machine.” It was a man’s voice. He sounded older, maybe in his 40s or 50s. Beyond that, Sandra couldn’t see or hear anything to judge who had a hold of her injured leg. He must have felt the swelling in her ankle and associated it with her yelp of pain. Sandra felt her foot drop. She gasped again. “Sorry.”

“I didn’t see your name on any of it.” Sandra shielded her eyes from the flashlight beam that was suddenly directed in her eyes. “Do you mind?”

“Sorry.” The flashlight lowered to the ground. Sandra heard some rustling, smelled matches, and suddenly there was a soft light illuminating them both.

Sandra sat up. “I was here first.”

“What, are we in grade school?”

“I don’t want company.”

The flashlight turned on again, and the man directed it towards her ankle. “Is it broken?”

“I don’t think so. I just need to rest for a few days.” She scooted over until her back was propped up against the desk drawers.

The light moved towards the double doors. “There’s probably a couch in there.”

“It’s locked.”

The man approached where Sandra was leaning. “Excuse me.” He reached past her and started opening drawers. In the long, skinny drawer directly center, he found a ring of keys on a purple wrist coil. He turned to the door and tested key after key. It wasn’t long before there was a soft snick as the locking mechanism moved. “Wait here. You know, just in case.”

Sandra nodded.

A moment later the man returned, grabbed the lantern, and took it into the office. He came back out and without asking, picked Sandra up and took her in, as well. He deposited her on a leather couch and went back out. A moment later he returned with her letter opener and handed it to her, chuckling. She had been so startled; it hadn’t even occurred to her to defend herself. A few more trips and Sandra’s entire horde was sitting on the floor next to the couch, and the man was closing the doors, locking them.

“Jason.”

“Sandra. Thank you, but I think I’d feel better if you opened the door.”

“Hey, Sandra. Look, I watched you run from those things and come in here. I saw you limping. I waited, and I didn’t see you come out, so I thought I’d come see if you were hurt. OK, my curiosity got the better of me, but never mind that. If I saw you running down the street screaming, so did others. They could just be waiting for dark. We’re keeping the door closed and locked.”

Oh, it’s “we” now, is it? But he was right. Sandra knew it and hated it. She didn’t enjoy feeling vulnerable, never had. This was her worst nightmare. Almost.

“Let’s see what we have in here.” Jason started going through drawers and pulling likely useful items out. He turned and pushed on a panel in the wall. It was in fact a hidden door for a bathroom, walk-in closet included. Jason seemed to know his way around an executive suite. Another panel on the other side of the desk hid a liquor cabinet. Jason whistled and disappeared from sight.

Moments later, Jason returned to the couch and moved all the newspapers from the coffee table. The Wall Street Journal was useless for anything other than kindling at this point. He laid out a towel he had found in the bathroom, set two wine glasses on the table next to two small china plates, and finally, with a flourish, he produced a bottle of wine.

“For your tasting pleasure,” Jason opened the bottle, placed the cork next to Sandra’s plate, and poured a small amount in her glass. “A fine Merlot, 1997.”

Sandra played along. She sniffed the cork, then picked up the glass, swirled the wine around and pretended to check for sediment. She took a tiny sip and swished it in her mouth, eyes closed, finalizing the deal with a hearty gargle. Jason bowed and busied himself with opening bags of corn nuts and pretzels and dividing up a chocolate bar for “dessert”. He pulled up a recliner and sat cross from her, tucking a hand towel into his shirt like a bib.

It was okay, Sandra reasoned, to feel normal for a moment.

They toasted.