His head hurt, but above all else was the sinking feeling in his gut. It was like that time his mother told him not to eat all the gummy worms, but he did it anyways out of spite. It just wasn't as nauseating. But that set one thing straight, he had a mother- whoever she was.

   He raised his head from the sandy ground, his fingers running through the parched soil around him. Where was he? That was the first question to be answered. Then came the next one. Who was he?

   He raised up on his forearms, staring at the bare sunburnt skin of his hands. Those hands were calloused and scarred, worn from years of hard labor. That meant something, it had to. His hands dug into the parched soil, cold striking the tips of his fingers.

   "Hello?" He whispered into the dirt. He looked up into the heat, a mirage appearing from the waves. "Is anybody there?"

    A town shimmered into existence and he stood. His clothes were shredded and dirty, he wasn't wearing shoes. The sun tore through his eyes and he shielded them with his shredded hands, crying out with pain. He stumbled forward like a zombie, his feet burning from the earth. He stumbled to a stop as the parched dirt turned into perfectly manicured grass. 

   Falling to his knees he collapsed onto the ground. Everything was silent. No birds. No children playing. No adults gossiping. No music.

   The town was a Norman Rockwell painting. The small shops lining the typical Main Street, USA were all vibrant with colors, sporting big flowerpots that held bright pansies and black-eyed Susans. A church at the end of the street sprayed multicolored light onto the street from huge stained glass windows depicting scenes from the Bible. The Christmas story. The Crucifixion. The Resurrection. Revelation.

   A wind-chime swayed in the small breeze, creating a melody of colliding steel bars. The shops were all open, their blinking signs on and doors wide. It was the perfect scene, except for one thing.

   The whole street was absent of any life.

   The man stood to his feet, grabbing onto a nearby streetlamp for support. "Hello? Is anybody there?"

   Silence answered.

   He cursed and walked slowly to a diner with the red checkered logo typical of the fifties. He entered with a small knock and froze. A fan teetered overhead, a replica jukebox played something fast. Ice cream sodas melted at empty tables, half eaten burgers and fries sat at the bar, purses and wallets lounged where their owners should've been. It was as if people were here at one point but left abruptly.

   He walked inside, unplugging the jukebox to plunge everything back into silence. The only sound was the spinning of the fan. Where was the kitchen staff? Surely they wouldn't abandon their post. "Hello?" He called out again. "I'm afraid I don't know who I am or where I am really. I must've hit my head. I have-" he dug into his pocket to find a small silver watch and a ring. He stopped, staring at the tiny engraving on the underside of the ring.

   "To my Thomas, our love undying." 

   He slipped the ring over his finger and nodded as it fit perfectly. "My name is Thomas, I must be married to somebody. I have a watch, I'll trade it for food or information! Hello?"

   Nobody answered so he slipped behind the counter. Melted ice-cream soaked his feet as he stared at the empty kitchen. A few burgers were abandoned on the grill, tough as shoe leather now. A rolling pin and freshly made dough sat forgotten beside the bottom of a pie.

   Thomas- that was his name and he couldn't let himself forget it- stuck his finger into the pie filling. It was lukewarm, which didn't say much. It was also cherry flavored, which didn't say much either, but caused his stomach to grumble with hunger

   He came face to face with a person in shock before realizing it was only a mirror. Examining his reflection he nodded, calloused hands running through the mop of dirty blond hair on his head. The man in the mirror was middle aged, sunburnt, handsome even- in a rugged way, with a bit of a beard beginning to litter his sharp cheeks and jaw.

   "I guess it's just you and me. You don't look half bad yourself," he joked, winking at the reflection. The reflection winked back and he lowered his eyebrows. "Don't get fresh with me, mister. I think I'll look for company elsewhere."

   Thomas took the pie filling with him on his way out. Surely there were people in this town, it was just a matter of finding them.

   He started in a bookstore. Everything was out of order, books were tossed in piles on the floor, pages crinkled and messy. It was as if a stampede of angry bulls broke out in the aisles. Thomas solemnly walked to the counter, finding an old landline phone. He picked up the receiver and slowly dialed random numbers. The phone didn't even ring with a dial-tone. He set it back down and walked back into the street.

   He ran from shop to shop in a frenzy. The antiques dealer? Empty. The jeweler's? Abandoned. The pharmacy? Utter disarray but empty.

   "Where did everybody go?!" He screamed desperately.

   The only thing to respond was his echo and even it seemed to mock him. 

   Thomas ran into the church at the end of the street, shouting names. He didn't even know what this church was. Who ran this place? Preacher? Priest? Father? Mother Superior? Reverend? Pastor? He called out for all of them but eventually stopped and fell to his knees in the vestibule. Pie filling splattered across his dirty clothes and the blue carpet. The cherry filling almost looked like blood in the stained glass light.

   Tears covered his face and he grabbed a bulletin with shaking hands. Thomas stared at the date. June 21st. What year?! Why didn't they print the year?! It didn't matter anyways, he supposed, collapsing back into his blubbering.

   A sound rang out from all around him. He jumped, his heart a drum in his chest. Bells. The church bells. They chimed slowly, five times. But if the bells chimed, that meant someone had to ring them!

   He rushed around the church again stopping at an office to hear the soft sound of pages turning. He burst through the door. "Hello! Finally, somebody is here I can-" Thomas stopped.

    Nobody was there, it was a small fan oscillating back and forth on the pages of a well worn Bible. Every time the fan came across a page it fluttered excitedly before relaxing, only to repeat in a matter of seconds.

   Thomas hung his head in defeat and walked back into the street in silence. Perhaps he really was alone.

   As he paced down the street again, a dog ran towards him, yipping with its happy stupidity. He reached down and the old dog nuzzled his hand, licking his calloused hands. He grinned for perhaps the first time since he woke. "Well, ole boy, you seem to know me. There's that. I must have lived here, or maybe I've been here at one point. I don't know, ole boy."

   The dog yipped again, running off into the shadows despite his cries for it to stop. The dog left him alone again. The wind chimes were chiming again.

   "Where did everybody go?" He muttered to himself, leaning against a streetlamp. The sun was setting faster than he ever imagined, soon it would be dark and he'd be alone in this ghost town. Who knew what lurked in the darkness?

   There was no one in the town. The phone didn't work. Maybe he was the last man on earth. He thought about the stained glass windows on the church. Maybe he was left behind, maybe everyone else had been taken as the prophesy foretold in Revelation. That would explain the lack of people.

   Suddenly, there was a flicker of light from the barber's shop. Thomas turned, sending a silent prayer up to the heavens. There were people in this nightmare. Maybe they knew him. They could help him, that was for sure. Somebody had to know what was going on. He couldn't be the last man alive.

   He walked on, his feet slapping against the concrete. The light was moving slowly from one curtained window to the next. It was a person! It had to be! The thought banished away the rumbling of his stomach and the pain in his feet, he ran faster.

   Jerking the door of the barber's shop open, Thomas gasped. There wasn't just a person. There were people, flesh and blood people. But the ones that weren't hiding had their weapons pointed at him. They were all terrified.

   "That's him, mommy!" A small child yelled, his ice cream smudged face pressing into his mother's bosom with a cry. "I told you it was Tommy!"

   Thomas raised his hands and his eyebrows in placation. How did they know him? Why were they afraid? "You know me? I seem to have hit my head, I can't remember anything. Where am I?"

   Thomas watched the townspeople quiver with fear at the sound of his voice. He took a step forward as a blonde woman raised her voice, "stop it Tommy! Don't take another step forward!"

    He obeyed as the men brandished their rifles, fear ablaze in their eyes. "What's wrong with you people? Can't you see I just need help?!"

   "Tommy, you can't come back here anymore." The blonde haired woman stood with fear shaking her voice. She began to take a step forward, but a hand around her arm stopped her. "Please just leave me alone, Thomas! I may have said our love was undying, but I didn't mean it like this! Please, Tommy, go away!"

   "But why?" He took a step towards her and she screamed in fear. The men loaded their rifles as the woman let out a cry of what- shame? Fear? Regret?

   She collapsed into the arms of an older woman, her face looking up meet his. There were tears in her eyes. "We buried you last week. Tommy, you're dead."