Hey, wouldn't that be a great band name?
All kidding aside, Jason and I were watching Sweet Tooth the other night. For those not familiar with the show, it takes place in a post-apocalyptic America - so far mostly in the wilderness. In the episode we were watching, two characters come upon a family living in a gift shop/visitor's center at Yellowstone.
That took me back to when I worked in the college book and convenience store at Sewanee (middle of nowhere Tennessee, for those who don't know). I first worked there during the summer when the tiny college town was pretty quiet. Even with my cleaning and stocking duties I had lots of time to just let my mind wander. I kept a notebook under the counter where I would jot down story ideas. One of the ones I had was about a handful of people in a, ahem, small college town in the middle of nowhere, stranded when The End As We Know It comes, and how they survive and make do. One of the first places the characters went was, of course, the book/convenience store for supplies and clothes.
I've actually always been a big fan of the post-apocalyptic and/or dystopian genre. I've had ideas for stories in these kinds of settings since high school, maybe middle school. Of course, the problem I always have is that wherever my characters are holed up is a little too convenient, a little too easy for this kind of setting. They live in the Tennessee Valley and all the hydroelectric plants are still working and cranking out electricity. Or the book store had so much stock that years later they still have what they need. Or the kids who ran away from home just happened to find a pristine (as in, safe to drink) creek that also had fish they could catch. When I was younger I didn't realize these were narrative problems (or at least could be if the story wasn't crafted right).
Seeing the gift shop used in this way in another work made me feel better about it, though. While this does make it seem "easy," looking around at the gift shop, there is still a lot of stock and it doesn't seem very "lived in." The family has an 11-year-old son, but it doesn't seem like they've been there his whole life. While they didn't go into how long they'd been there in the show, it did give me the impression that they hadn't been there long, maybe stumbled across an isolated building no one else had taken advantage of yet.
Of course, it also makes sense that the characters - the parents, at least - would seek out this type of setting. They would look for somewhere with shelter and supplies, somewhere out of the way to make their permanent home. But if they were looking for somewhere like this, how were they the ones that go so lucky? Were they the only survivors in the area? Were they "on the inside" (say, maybe one of them had worked there)?
Because that's the thing - there's got to be more than just, "we conveniently just happen to have food, water, electricity, or a lifetime supply of sweatshirts." I want to know how the circumstances came together for you to ride out the apocalypse in your cozy gift shop.