by Ashley Nemer
"We were going for a walk." Sam stated.
"Just a walk?" Anthony inquired.
"Is that really any of your business Anthony?" Sam retorted.
"When it involved my sister, yeah, it kinda is." His tone growing sharper.
Sam shook his head back and forth, "She has a mind of her own, she can make her own choices, you know."
"I am not going to like this am I?" Anthony declared.
Sam looked at his best friend, who was like a brother to him. He couldn't deny what was happening, but at the same time he didn't want to hurt Anthony.
"Not really, but I won't hurt her I promise."
"You can't promise me that." Anthony rebutted.
"Okay I promise you this; I won't intentionally do anything to hurt her, how's that?"
Anthony shrugged, "Better I guess."
"She and I have been building up to this for a while now Anthony. I care for her a lot."
Anthony nodded at his friend. That was all he could do.
When the two guys turned to head back into the house the chain of events that followed would haunt them longer than the dead bodies they had seen. One by one house after house in the area started to explode. Debris and fire was falling all around them. They raced inside and shut the door. The girls came running back into the living room eyes wide open.
"Let's go upstairs and watch." Sunny said, right before she ran up the stairs.
The three of them followed the young six-year-old as she opened her window in her room and they watched as most of their neighborhood went up in smoke.
Sunny had her eyes glued to the series of houses that took turns exploding. It started out in the direction of the original explosion. Amelia pictured the gas lines traveling underground and as they diverted off to each area explosions occurred.
"Guys, we need to turn the gas off to the houses next to us. We don't want our house to accidentally catch on fire." She said.
Sam and Anthony looked at each other and nodded.
"On it," Sam said.
Anthony quickly replied with "Girls you stay here we only have two wrenches anyway, we're going to shut the gas off."
All Amelia and Sunny could do was agree as their men raced out of the house and out into danger. No one knew when their subdivision would start to explode. Amelia held Sunny's hand as the two of them watched Sam and Anthony racing around at the different gas mains.
From the second floor Amelia noticed that some of the other neighborhood children were coming outside to watch the explosion. She noticed Sam talking to some of them and pointing. Anthony was on the other side of the street yelling commands. From her estimate it didn't appear there were too many older teenagers around. Possibly five outside of the three of them. She had a feeling that this would be the event that moved them into taking more people into their home.
"Amelia?" Sunny's voice sounded shaky, and that broke Amelia's heart.
"Yeah sweetie."
"I can help the fire from the explosions by not letting it get any worse."
Amelia didn't know what to say so she just didn't. She held the child closer as the sky turned black and rain started to pour from it.
Sunny clung to Amelia and didn't let go as she cried, the rain intensified as each drop on her cheek ran down her face. Amelia couldn't deny what she was witnessing, but she also couldn't explain it.
Chapter Six - And Then There Were More...
SUNNY STAYED IN BED for the following three days after the CFG explosion. Her body needed the rest. No one talked yet about what had happened with the rainstorm that spurred after the explosion. Sam and Anthony had managed to save twenty or so other houses in their neighborhood from taking off in smoke. All the houses that surrounded their property and the others on their same street. Anthony had been meticulous over the last two days going to each house and taking inventory. Whether it was how many survivors were living there or how much in way of resources they could find in each house. He now had a log and had become the assumed leader of their area.
Sam had taken it upon himself to declare it a war zone. He wasn't still convinced that there wasn't something more nefarious going on besides the CFE gas lines having a domino effect. He took a couple engineering booklets to the front of the subdivision and two of the other teenagers left to try and find a way to build a security fence.
The afternoon of day two came around and the three of them, less Sunny, were eating dinner. Everyone remained quiet until Amelia couldn’t stay silent any longer.
“Sunny is really powerful.” She blurted out.
The two guys looked over at her, questioning what she was saying.
“I know I am crazy, but she is like super powerful. She brought the rainstorm down on everyone and saved the houses. She’s a hero.”
Sam shook his head back and forth but didn’t say anything. Anthony wasn’t as smart.
“I can’t believe you believe that stuff Amelia, it’s such phooey.” Anthony took a couple more bites of the food before he pushed his plate away.
“It is not Anthony and I am going to help her. I am going to prove to you both and then who will be eating their words.” She pushed her chair back from the table and stormed off, marching right upstairs. It was time for her alone time with Sunny anyway, who needed men, certainly not them!
Amelia spent at least a few hours of each day sitting on Sunny's bed stroking the child's hair, reading her a book or other general motherly concerns for the young girl. She had watched the girl's body go from a typical coloring to pale white in a matter of twenty minutes. The darker the clouds became outside the less color Sunny had. If Amelia was honest with herself, or anyone, she would say that Sunny scared her. Not in the way that she was afraid for her safety, but in the way that she was scared for their future as a family with the obvious power surging in the girl's veins.
"Amelia" Sunny's throat sounded horse as she spoke.
"Yeah sweetie."
"Please don't make me leave."
That was all she said before she went back to sleep. Amelia knew as soon as Sunny was awake she and Sam would have to sit down with her and discuss what their relationship was developing into. Even if the two of them didn't work out as boyfriend and girlfriend she wouldn't kick them out. They were all in this together.
By the end of the third day Amelia had prepared dinner for the three teenagers. She had asked Anthony for an update on what was going on in the neighborhood.
"The Wilkinson house three doors down was a jackpot. Sadly no one survived probably because all their kids were older. I found them all sitting in the living room dead. But their garage and kitchen had a ton of stuff. We have distributed all the excess supplies we found evenly among all of the families."
"Like socialist do." Amelia jokingly said.
"Yes, actually." Sam responded.
"What?" Amelia now seemed confused.
"We men have been discussing it and we all agree the only way our community will maintain its safety is if we treat it like socialism."
"So now you're Josef Stalin?" Amelia said curtly.
Anthony palmed his face and shook his head back and forth. "I told you not to tell it to her like that, she never gets being subtle."
"We are all going to share responsibilities as a household. So, our house will be responsible for a certain portion and the next house the next thing. Individual houses will be responsible for their whole items as a family. But the community will depend on each other."
Amelia nodded, "Okay can you give me an example."
Anthony then continued for Sam, "Yeah. So, our house is responsible for infrastructure development and implementation."
"Gee just give us the hardest crap ever." Amelia rolled her eyes.
"In a way yes." Sam said.
Anthony chimed in "But in other ways no, we have the hard part at first, but after it's done, it's just maintaining."
"Okay I am listening." She stated, looking at them with a bit more patience.
The two guys continued to explain their plan. How they would develop a way to collect rain water by creating a water tower. The neighborhood agreed to move all the living families to the houses next to one another. There were six collective families counting them. So, three houses on each side would be occupied. The other houses were going to be used for practical things. Like look out's, storage, supplies.
Since no one lived in the two houses at the end of the street they would disassemble those homes for supplies to build the water tower.
“One of the other teens parents worked for a construction company who had a job-site not too far away. They have access to forklifts, dozers and other equipment on their job-site. He even had his parent's keys and access to the supplies. Tomorrow we are all going to the site and bringing back the heavy machinery to start their build out.” Sam explained to her.
"Wait a moment." Amelia interjected. "You're telling me that you two are leading a construction crew now?"
Both guys grinned ear to ear. "Yep," they said in unison.
Amelia sighed, "And what is my role in all of this?"
The guys shook their heads no, Sam spoke. "None. We want you taking care of our home and Sunny. Whatever you think we need here is your purview. You have a hundred percent control of our house."
She had to admit that wasn't what she was expecting but she did like the sound of it.
"We're going to need to set up water to our house first." She stated.
They both nodded. "We're one step ahead of you." Sam said. "First we will make our own water tank in the back yard separate as a backup at night while the others aren't watching."
"Why in secret?" She asked.
Anthony spoke, "Because at the end of the day we want to make sure our family is safe above all else."
The two guys looked at each other in a certain way that made Amelia nervous.
"What aren't you two telling me?" Amelia looked between the two of them, "You can't keep me in the dark."
Sam looked to Anthony and then said, "It's about the other night."
"You mean the fire being controlled?"
"We worry about Sunny." Sam finally said. "If anyone found out about her, they would probably try and hurt her or us. So, we want to make sure our home is re-fortified just in case we end up back on our own and with enemies all around us."
Nodding Anthony continued, “Even if we don’t understand the ability or how she can even do it, or any of the situation we know Sunny, we know her heart and we know she is good. We have to make sure we always protect her.”
"Oh." Amelia said softly. "I hadn't thought about that." Her voice almost sounded meek as she spoke.
The three of them ate their food in silence for a few minutes thinking about what was just talked about. Their silence was broken when Sunny's weak voice said.
"Maybe you all should leave me somewhere else."
All three of their heads turned in her direction and said no emphatically at the same time.
"I don't want to hurt anyone." She mumbled to them.
"And you won't sweetie. Come on come eat." Amelia quickly said, as she stood up and walked over to her placing their hands together. "I promise Sunny."
Amelia put together a plate of food for Sunny, she added an extra serving thinking she would be famished from the energy exerted putting out the fire.
The four of them spend the rest of the meal in silence. All of them knew the weight of the situation, even though they hadn't talked about the elephant in the room.
"You know the big benefit, right?" Sam said to Amelia as they lay in the back yard looking up at the stars together later that night.
Their hands were intertwined together, and shoulders were touching as their backs pressed against the wool blanket that was their only barrier against the cool ground.
"I am scared to ask what benefit you found."
"We will never be without water."
"Excuse me?" Amelia laughed. "How do you figure?"
"Sunny." Sam laughed, as he said his cousin’s name.
Sam didn't need to say anything else. Amelia knew what he was talking about.
"It's scary isn't it?" She eventually said.
"Yeah, but it is also cool."
"Has she always been able to do that?"
Sam shook his head back and forth, "No clue. No one I have ever known can do that. How about you, know anyone?"
Amelia giggled again, "No way, I thought that stuff was only in movies."
"She is scared you can see it on her." Sam's observation was mirrored by all of them. They were all scared of not just Sunny having power but the implication of what the power could lead to.
"There isn't anything we can do about it other than keep her safe." Amelia pulled his hand to her heart and held onto it more tightly. "Can we change the subject?" She asked.
"Of course." He turned onto his side propping himself up with his arm. "What's up?"
"Anthony talked to me this morning before you were awake."
Sam rolled his eyes, "He talked to me the other day too."
"I don't want anyone to get hurt Sam. I love Anthony, he's my twin. And I love Sunny too, like a little sister."
"Amelia, I am not planning on hurting you. Don't you know that?"
She agreed, "Yes but we're only almost eighteen, hardly the age to make such huge declarations."
"Not that huge, it isn't like I said I love you."
Her eyes widened at the words he just said. She held her breath for a few moments and then managed to whisper out, "Do you?"
She watched patiently as Sam sat there blinking a couple times and then looking down. She saw his arm start to move then he took her hand into his and brought it up to his lips to kiss.
"Amelia, I have loved you for about four years now. How's that for a declaration."
It was her turn to sit there and blink. What was she supposed to say to that?
"We've been friend’s all our lives. How do you know it's been four years?"
An evil grin passed over Sam's lips, "Because that's when you got boobs."
Amelia screeched a laugh and then playfully slapped Sam's chest calling him a leech. After they rolled around playfully laughing and tickling each other Sam held her under him. His weight mostly balanced on the ground and not on her. "When did you know you loved me?" He asked in a soft-spoken tone.
"I never said that I did." She quipped back teasingly.
"It's your eyes; they say it every time I am in the room with you."
"About a year now." She said quietly.
"Oh, why a year?"
It was her turn to grin, "Because that's when Jenny Longer and I noticed that your arms started to have muscle."
"You're just as bad as I am!" Sam noted, and then he leaned his head down and kissed her. Their lips locked and for a few moments nothing happened. Then Amelia pushed her body off the ground and rolled Sam over onto his back with her on top of him. She placed her hands on either side of his face and held him in place. They laid there making out under the stars for who knew how long. It was their first time saying they loved one another. They wanted to tune out the entire world's problems and focus only on one another. At that moment, nothing else mattered. Not the explosion, the rain, the families in their care. Just the two of them.
Amelia's heart was racing, and she knew Sam's was too. She could feel it under his skin. His hand traveled down her back and found its way under her shirt. He only placed it on the small of her back, but it was flesh on flesh. His hand on her skin, in a place no one else had touched her. This made her body quiver with excitement. A feeling she had never felt before. The more they laid there together, the more she realized that being an adult and having a relationship was going to be more complicated than she originally thought. Because now she could also feel how much he was enjoying this too.
And that lead to a whole other slew of possibilities with Sam, that Amelia just wasn't ready to explore just yet.
Chapter Seven - One Year Lat
er, Let There Be Light
NEARLY NINE MONTHS had passed since the group decided they would give the entire neighborhood electricity through solar panels. Sam spent almost two weeks at the library researching how to build a solar generator large enough to make this work. The group went through seven attempts before landing on one that could manage the entire neighborhood.
One of the other teens, now almost an adult, in the community, named John, his father owned the construction company. They went to his father's job sites and pilfered all the generators they could. It took the group a significant amount of time to understand the difference in the kilowatt hours that each generator produced. But the big problem with the ones they took, each machine required gasoline or diesel.
Eventually, they managed to find solar powered generators. After moving all the generators that they could Anthony and Sam found a way to transfer electricity to each house in the neighborhood. Anthony and Sam originally agreed, if they could simply pick up an item and implant it into their community, it would be easiest on all of them. As opposed to creating something from nothing. Anthony said he didn't see any reason to reinvent the wheel when they could just use a wheel from another source.
As it stood now, of the twenty homes that they saved, three became deconstructed and used to build the three cisterns. The main one located at the center of the subdivision which held the largest amounts of water. The second one was placed at the very back of the neighborhood of homes. An irrigation system was created and attached to it. John had found a solar timer at his father's job site that Sam converted to apply for this application. They made an automatic watering system that provided water to every home's garden. That way there was no need for anyone to remember to water their crop. If for whatever reason they didn't want to water their yard, they all had a shut off switch in their yards.
The third cistern was placed at the front of the community. The older teens all agreed that the younger children would need a safe place to play and congregate. Someone suggested making a playground. Amelia took that idea and expanded on it creating a play area that also maintained water fountains, water slides and other water activities. She argued that doing this would help with the summer heat, while making sure water for cooling off the children, became easily available.
