XVIII.
Blargh, Matt thought again. He was worn out, having written almost 50 pages in one night. There was little time to edit the whole mess. It read like stream-of-consciousness. Still, Matt was hoping for at least a B. The whole night had been long and emotionally draining. Matt was depressed as well. Thinking about the deaths of friends and various disasters didn’t improve his mood any. The Columbine attacks, the 2008 election, the 420 Blight, Hurricane Matthew, the Railway bombings, the CDC raid, the whole half-decade of memories was hell to even think about. And then there was Matt’s good friend Jose to consider.

Matt looked at the clock on his desktop one last time. It was quarter after nine in the morning. If this were Tuesday instead of Monday, he would be in his Plant Environment class right now. Matt was both alert and asleep at the same time, the feeling one gets when one spends the entire night awake drinking coffee. Matt knew there was no way he could get to sleep this way, but he would still try to get a couple hours in. He lay on his bed, and his mind began to wander.

How the 420 Blight formed had never been determined, but it was thought to have been a different plant bug that mutated. This was a likely explanation for a lot of diseases, such as HIV. Matt thought about the last part of his paper, where he mentioned another bug that could turn up. But unlike the 420 Blight, this one could affect grain or wheat. That would potentially starve the world. Or who was to say it wouldn’t forget plants altogether and wipe out humanity? But the disappearance of any foodstuff would be bad enough. There was always the food chain. Matt found it painful to consider. The absence of his beloved pot was bad enough.

Miraculously, Matt managed to fall asleep. He awoke twenty minutes before noon, looked at his clock, blurted out “holy shit!” and got to his computer. He got the paper printed out and stapled in just ten minutes. He then raced to the door, and ran outside to his Botanical Diseases 634 class.

He made it with about a minute to spare. He turned in his paper, and sat down in his seat in the back of the room, while the professor lectured about blackspot, a disease which affects roses. Matt only half-listened, taking notes from time to time. Three hours later, the class ended, and Matt walked back to his house outside Durham. It was chilly outside and windy. Matt loved days like this. He thought more about the 420 Blight, wondering what would become of it.

Matt got home around twenty after, and sat down. He was just about to doze off when the phone rang. Grumbling, he picked it up.

“Matt Jablonski, how may I help you?”

“Hey Matt, it’s Chuck.” Chuck Covington, Matt thought. Chuck was a friend of Matt’s, and worked as a tobacco farmer. The tobacco plants were starting to grow. The thing Matt loved most about North Carolina was the smell of the tobacco farms.

“Hello, Chuck. What’s going on?”

“Could you get to my farm? It’s urgent. I need help.”

“What seems to be the problem?”

“It’s my tobacco plants. Just get over to my farm. I’ll explain when you get here.”

“All right. See you then. Bye.”

Damn it, Matt thought. He was hoping for some time to himself. Matt got in his car, and drove to Chuck’s home outside Chapel Hill. He reached the tobacco farm, and looked out the windshield.

Outside, as they blew in the wind, the tips of the tiny tobacco plants were beginning to wilt and turn yellow.