Carlos had been at work when it happened. There was nothing to even suspect it on the radio or television stations, though. It was almost as if it came out of nowhere and immediately left with the rest of Carlos's heart.
"Goodbye, sweetie," Carlos called through the tiny apartment. As he was stepping out the door, he heard a shout of "Wait!" and footsteps scrambling to meet him at the door.
Cecil bounded through the apartment, literally sliding to a stop in front of Carlos with his socks on the smooth linoleum floor. Steadying himself with his hands on Carlos's biceps, Cecil looked at his boyfriend with a grin spreading across his face.
"Look," he told Carlos as he held out a piece of scrap paper in his hand. "It's going to be you and me that night that we were sitting under the lights at the Arby's. Remember that?"
Carlos smiled as he scrutinized the simple sketch. It was exactly that: just him and Cecil sitting on the car's hood, Carlos's arm around his now-boyfriend. The crescent moon was very big and right in front of them, encased in a circle with things around it that were related to their small town, like the Arby's sign, and cacti, and even two-headed dogs, stuff like that.
"It's going to be beautiful, Ceec," Carlos said, watching as Cecil's smile somehow got even bigger. Cecil kissed Carlos goodbye and Carlos left their apartment, not knowing that it truly was goodbye.
After an extremely busy morning in his lab working on experiments with his team of scientists, Carlos went to take a lunch at Big Rico's next door. However, right as he stepped outside, Carlos felt it. The earthquake. There weren't any government-scheduled ones for today, so Carlos figured that it must be an actual one this time.
Carlos didn't know much about the Richter Scale, but if he had to take a shot in the dark, he would say that this earthquake was well-over a seven, probably closer to an eight. The ground was shaking so much that Carlos fell off of the curb, almost getting hit by a car that was trying to pull over. He knew that he shouldn't go back into the lab because it could be dangerous. For some reason, he felt compelled to check on his team and their experiments. He just couldn't stand up from the constant shaking.
As the earthquake stretched into several minutes, Carlos began to realize its severity. Buildings around him were physically shaking and some of the taller ones were beginning to become unstable and crumble. Carlos could see that the Museum of Forbidden Technologies, being three or four stories high, was collapsing. It was complete chaos.
Then, finally, thankfully, the shaking ceased. Trembling himself, Carlos stood up and started walking towards the lab, but his team burst through the doors before he could get there.
"Carlos!" Rachelle shouted, supporting a disoriented-looking Dave on her shoulder. "Oh thank goodness you're okay! We have to get out of here! There radio said that there could be aftershocks for days and that they're relocating everyone in the city!"
Carlos was stunned by everything that was happening so quickly. Firstly, he went to help her support Dave, asking what had happened to him.
"The ceiling began crumbling inside and something must have pushed over one of the tables," she told him whilst stuffing Dave into the backseat of her car. "The microscope crashed down on him."
"Oh god," Carlos gasped. "We have to get him to the hospital."
"We have to get him and us out of here!" Rachelle shot back. "There could be more aftershocks any minute!"
"Okay, you're right," Carlos conceded. "Let's get out of here." As soon as they all got into Rachelle's car, she pulled out into the road.
"We have to get Cecil," Carlos told her. Rachelle snapped her head in his direction before focusing back on the road.
"Are you insane?!" she asked. "We have to leave town right now! Cecil has probably already left. The Sheriff's Secret Police are rounding up everyone to get them in their cars and out of town."
"I took our car this morning!" Carlos argued back, which made Rachelle pause. Carlos continued. "He has no way to leave town right—"
Suddenly, the earth began to shake again, but it was more subdued than last time. However, Carlos knew that it was about to grow to be much, much worse.
"Please Rachelle!" he shouted over the sounds of buildings beginning to crumble again.
"Alright!" she yelled back and took the next turn to head towards the apartment complex that Cecil and Carlos lived in. As they approached, Carlos took in the damage done to the damningly old building.
Half of the building had already collapsed. Carlos looked for their window and saw that it was thankfully still intact. At least from the outside it was. Carlos had no idea what the place looked like inside and he didn't really want to find out.
Rachelle parked the car far enough away in case something happened to the rest of the building, but close enough for Carlos to get out and run to find Cecil. As he exited the car, however, the ground moved again, enough to knock Carlos off-balance again and into the side of the car. The sudden shift in movement right under his feet was also enough motion to send the rest of the apartments crumbling from the ground up, leaving Carlos staring at it horrorstruck.
The ground wasn't about to stop anytime soon, so Carlos couldn't really move very far from the car, but he shouted Cecil's name over the rukous.
Shouts of "Cecil!" and "Where are you, Cecil?" were drowned out over the sound of destruction all around him. Eventually the shaking got to be too much and Rachelle shouted at Carlos to get back into the car. Carlos complied and Rachelle drove the three of them far away from Night Vale.
They eventually made it to Desert Bluffs. It wasn't their first choice, but it was the closest one. And it seemed that the town hadn't gotten the brunt of the earthquake like Night Vale had.
When Carlos and Rachelle exited the car outside the hospital in Desert Bluffs, they looked around, noticing that everyone else from Night Vale had had the same idea as they did. Quickly, they pulled Dave from the car, who had woken up briefly and periodically throughout the car ride, and dragged him inside to get admitted.
Once a doctor had taken Dave into the triage center, Rachelle turned to Carlos and said, "I'll stay here. You go look for Cecil."
Carlos scoffed half-heartedly and told her, "If Cecil had gotten out of Night Vale, he probably wouldn't have come here."
"But he would have known that you would," she countered and Carlos agreed with her statement, so he began to look for his boyfriend around the hospital. He couldn't find any sight of him and none of the people from Night Vale had seen him after the earthquake started.
It didn't make sense to Carlos. Cecil would have helped as many people as he could have . . . if he had been in the condition to help people. Their building had entirely collapsed. Carlos hadn't wanted to even consider it on the ride out of town, but now he had to address it; the glaring possibility that his Cecil, his wonderful, perfect, beautiful boyfriend, could be . . .
No, Carlos told himself as his eyes began to water. But what if . . .?
"Oh god," Carlos whispered as he slid down the wall outside of the hospital and began to cry. He stayed there undisturbed by anyone until Rachelle had come outside to look for him. She sat down next to Carlos and put her arm around his shoulder, letting him cry into hers. They stayed there for who knows how long; that is, until Rachelle suggested they check on Dave. Carlos agreed and followed her back inside.
Almost a year later, Carlos was working with what was left of his team of scientists on experiments in Desert Bluffs. Fortunately, the town was eerily similar to Night Vale in the case of strange goings-on. Unfortunately, it turns out that the scientists had lost all of their work and equipment in the earthquake.
A couple weeks after the frightful day, Carlos and Rachelle had driven back to Night Vale, only to be stopped at the edge of town by a Sheriff's Secret Police officer, telling them that they couldn't enter the city for a while; not until they got the dangerous debris cleaned up and knocked down the unstable buildings.
The pair had tried again in a few weeks, this time with Dave after he had healed enough from his concussion and broken arm. The trio drove into town without a problem and immediately stopped at the apartment complex. Well, what was left of it.
The entire thing had been decimated, just completely destroyed, now a pile of rubble, littered with the stuff of the people that had lived inside. Carlos had been crushed, yet there was still no sign of Cecil or where he may have went.
They had stopped at their lab next, but found the same results. Unwilling to pick through the remnants that day, they had driven back to Desert Bluffs where they had all rented a cheap apartment with the money that they had.
And that brought them to today: the anniversary of the disaster. Carlos had taken to staying home all day even though Rachelle and Dave had driven back to Night Vale to try to find more of their notes in the pile of rubble. Once they had left, Carlos pulled out the bottle of wine from under the sink. It had been a 'Welcome to the Neighborhood, Sorry Your Home was Destroyed' gift from one of their neighbors. The roommates had kept it even though none of them really drank and now Carlos was grateful.
He ended up downing the entire bottle in a matter of hours. Luckily for him, Carlos had passed out on the kitchen floor by the time that Rachelle and Dave returned, so he didn't have to explain anything to them. They just put him to bed for the night and let him sleep it off. But when they woke up the next morning, they found that Carlos and his stuff were gone.
As soon as Carlos woke up, very early in the morning, he couldn't stand any of it anymore; the new apartment, the new town, the constant lingering thought as time went on that Cecil had to be dead or else he would have been looking for Carlos just as Carlos was looking for him. So he got on the first bus out of the city and left.
He got off on the furthest bus stop and bought a train ticket out of the state. He fell asleep on the ride and didn't know what time it was or where he was, but Carlos didn't care. Just as long as he was far, far away from the memory of his boyfriend and his old town.
Carlos would never tell Rachelle or Dave this, but he had been missing Cecil more and more lately. They knew that he was still looking for him, but Carlos had taken to spending almost every waking and non-working minute calling people around the area, sending out letters and e-mails, and putting up posters in Desert Bluffs in case someone had seen him somewhere, anywhere. He just needed his Cecil back.
That was why Carlos had left. He couldn't deal with the normalcy returning if it didn't include Cecil. It would have been easier if he had something of his boyfriend's, like one of his paintings of them. Those were always his favourites, even though Cecil had implied that they never came out just perfect. Carlos didn't think that he could see what Cecil had seen in them, but he didn't care. Carlos still loved them, and he still loved Cecil.
He had tried to look at other artists' works, thinking that it might make it easier for some reason. It never did, but Carlos kept trying anyways, almost delusionally. Which is why Carlos was overjoyed when he came across a Starving Artist exhibition in the first town that he got off in.
Carlos didn't know all of the styles of art that Cecil always talked about. Don't get him wrong, Carlos tried. He looked up stuff, asked other artists around town, which wasn't a lot, but he really tried to impress Cecil. Carlos even recognized some of the styles when he entered the exhibition hall, momentarily proud of himself.
As he walked around slowly, Carlos stopped paying attention to most of the paintings. They just weren't what Carlos wanted to see. . . . They weren't Cecil's. That is, until Carlos came across a single painting on one of the smaller walls in the back hall.
The painting was a beautiful purple colour surrounded by a darker navy or black; Carlos couldn't tell. But the colour wasn't what had caught his attention—it was the depiction. In the center of the painting was two people. One of them was leaning against the other, who had their arm around them. They appeared to be sitting of the hood of a car, facing away from the viewer. In front of them was a circle with a crescent moon on the left side. All around the circle was the types of things found in an old desert town, like an Arby's sign, and cacti, and even two-headed dogs . . . stuff like that.
Carlos took in a breath that caught in his throat. It was Cecil's. He'd know it anywhere. Cecil was the figure on the right with Carlos's arm around his shoulders. It was that time . . . that night that we were sitting under the lights at the Arby's. Remember that?
Suddenly, Cecil's voice filled Carlos's head. He could hear exactly what his boyfriend had said that fateful day over a year ago. Carlos began to hyperventilate as he looked around for the artist. They usually stood somewhere near their paintings, but there was no one in the back room at all. Quickly, as if his life depended on it, Carlos began searching for a security guard or someone else on duty at the exhibition hall to help him find his love.
Carlos ended up back at the front desk.
"Leaving so soon?" the woman at the front asked him. Carlos quickly shook his head and told her that he was looking for an artist.
"Well," she mused. "Most of the artists are in the back right now taking a break. Do you know which one you want to speak with?"
"Um, Cecil Palmer?" Carlos tried. The woman slowly shook her head.
"I don't know anyone by that name. . . ." she trailed off. Carlos tried again.
"I was looking at the painting in the back. It's purple and black and has two people sitting on a car in front of an Arby's and the moon."
"Oh! You're looking for Carlos."
Carlos was stunned. "Carlos?" he asked and the woman nodded. Taking a deep breath, Carlos said, "Okay, I really, really need to see Carlos. It's urgent."
"Alright, I'll go get him for you. Stay here please." And she walked into the back room, leaving Carlos to his impatient and worried thoughts.
A minute later, the woman returned. And she had Cecil in tow. As soon as Cecil saw him, he stopped in his steps and put one hand to his temple as if he had a headache. He blinked rapidly a couple of times and then stared at Carlos once more. Slowly, carefully, he took a few more steps, closing the space between them at a snail's pace.
"Carlos?" Cecil whispered, looking as if he had just remembered something that he hadn't before.
"Hi Cecil," Carlos said quietly. Cecil's back straightened at the mention of his own name and he whispered Carlos name under his breath twice more before jumping at him and wrapping his arms around his boyfriend's neck.
Carlos was overjoyed and wrapped his arms around Cecil's waist, pulling him close. Cecil was still whispering Carlos's name in his ear as if he was going to forget it and he buried his face into Carlos's shoulder who did the same. They stayed like that for some time, not noticing when the front desk lady left to give them privacy.
Eventually, they pulled apart and Carlos just stared at Cecil. His hair had gotten slightly longer but, otherwise, he was still the same-old Cecil. And it was the most beautiful sight that Carlos had ever seen.
Neither Carlos nor Cecil knew what to say. They were both simply staring at the other, completely wonderstruck. So Carlos did the only thing that he could think of; he leant forward and kissed Cecil, who returned the kiss immediately, wrapping his arms around Carlos's neck again. Carlos was so glad that he had finally found his Cecil.
They had driven back to Desert Bluffs in Cecil's car. On the way there, Carlos found out that, after the earthquake, Cecil had woken up in a hospital in a town kind of near to Night Vale. However, he couldn't remember what had happened, who he was, anything. He had spent weeks in the hospital, healing physically as well as speaking with the psychiatrist there, but the only thing that he could remember was a name that he had presumed was his own: Carlos.
The hospital staff had found a piece of scrap paper clutched in Cecil's hand when he had come in and gave it to him after he had woken up. It was the painting. Cecil told Carlos how he had had no clue as to what the picture meant, but he was strangely attached to it. After he had left the hospital, he found several odd jobs around the town to raise some money to buy a canvas and some paints and brushes. And then he got to work.
One of the art exhibitioners had seen him painting one day in the local park, looking across the street at a few of the telephone poles and transformers for his painting. She had loved it and told him about the Starving Artist exhibition in a few months. Cecil had agreed to display the painting as long as he finished it by then. And lucky he had or else Carlos wouldn't have found him.
Throughout the ride, Cecil would stop talking for a few minutes and then ask Carlos a question about his life or their life together. And Carlos would always answer it, causing Cecil to nod thoughtfully and say, "I remember that."
Carlos was glad that his memories were returning so quickly and, by the time that they returned to Desert Bluffs, he was almost Carlos's old Cecil again. A few mere blank spaces remained in Cecil's mind, but Carlos would help him as much as he could to get him back to normal.
Carlos was reunited with Rachelle and Dave, both of whom were worried sick about their friend, but glad that he was back. And they were especially glad to see Cecil once again, to the point of Dave's eyes welling up with tears.
And Carlos and Cecil's life returned to normal; well, as normal as normal in Desert Bluffs could get. But it was all worth it to Carlos because he had his Cecil back and he couldn't have been happier.
Person A is a painter who fell in love with Person B, but they are separated in some kind of disaster and Person B believes Person A to be dead. Years later, Person B attends an art show and discovers most of the art contains paintings of a person who looks exactly like them. It turns out that Person A survived, but lost their memory and has done nothing but paint pictures of Person B ever since in an effort to remember them.