by Holly Hook
We hugged the school building at first, and then a chain link fence. The dust was still thick and even with the flashlight we could only see about twenty feet in front of us. It pelted my goggles, but they were doing their job, keeping the grains of sand out of my eyes. I could face the dust without fear and I couldn't feel my skin burning, either, so the insulation armor was also working. It was still hard to push against the wind, and I found myself grabbing onto the fence every several seconds or so to keep moving against it. Mina was doing the same thing right in front of me. All I could do was hold the flashlight so she could find her way.
We didn't talk to each other. Even though the wind seemed to be below hurricane force, it still wouldn't be productive. It would steal my voice away as soon as I said something. That would have to wait until we reached the mechanic.
So instead, we moved in silence, conserving our energy. The night was so much darker during the storms. At least if the sun came up before we got back, we'd still have some protection, right?
There was a lull in the wind when we reached a hole in the fence where the spectators would come watch the Colton Coyotes win or lose the football games. Those people were all gone now. There would be no more games, no more school pride. Mina kept her head down as she squeezed through the hole in the fence, getting her insulation armor stuck on the chain link in the process. I helped free her and she held up a hand in a silent thank you.
The school parking lot was the worst part. There was nothing to grab onto and we had to walk right across the pavement, past teachers' cars that were ruined and would never take home their owners. Then we passed the students' cars which were even worse. Some of the owners were inside, bloated and rotting.
Mina waved me through the lot faster. I struggled to keep the flashlight steady in the wind. The memories were too horrible here. Too painful. I missed all these people and I didn't even know a lot of them. I just missed people, period. I'd never been a huge loner in school, even after Mom died. Distant, but not a loner. I sometimes hung out with Alana's friends and with the people in the Math Team. It had been more to pass the time than anything. Pizza parties. Going to the Ice Scream once in a while after school. That kind of stuff. Then I'd go home and pull out my sketchbook.
Now I wished that I hadn't. This was too awful. I might have even tripped over some of those people I once sat with around ice cream on my run from the potential David still in the school. Lily. Daniel. I didn’t want to think about it.
At last, I spotted the school sign rising out of the blowing dust and quickened my pace. Straight ahead was downtown. I had lived in Colton all my life and didn't need these directions. Mina and I walked out onto the street. We stood in an expanse of dust and wind and emptiness. I felt like we were standing in some dead, brown cloud in space and this dust was the remnants of a million destroyed worlds.
And I stopped, gripped by panic.
"Laney," Mina said. "Keep going."
I coughed. "Sorry." I followed her into the cloud, watching the pavement under me pass. I stepped over a handprint that someone had made in wet concrete years and years ago when I was in elementary school. Mom and Dad had told me to never, ever do that. They had even stopped me once and pointed it out. The person who had done this had never gotten caught.
That meant we were between downtown and the school. We were almost to the mechanic.
The wind blasted again. It was going in and out, not deciding if it wanted to sleep or roar. I staggered, trying to keep my footing, and reached out for anything I could grab to avoid going down. I had the feeling that if I fell in this armor, it would be hard to get up again.
"Mina!" I shouted.
She grabbed my flailing arm. "We have to get inside," she said. Right now, she was the leader, not me, and I was fine with that. It took some responsibility off my shoulders.
We staggered towards a wall rising out of the dust, a wall with windows, two of them broken. A tattered awning spat and waved. The pizza place. The Colton Pizzeria. It was just as dead as everything else but it was the closest thing. The mechanic was a few more buildings down--right? I couldn't remember. That belonged to another world.
We had to climb in through one of the shattered windows because the front door was locked. The insulation armor did its job protecting me from any broken glass I crawled over to get into the safety and darkness of the pizzeria. Mina climbed in right behind me. The roar of the wind died a bit, or maybe it was just because we were inside and not right in it. I slumped against a round table for a second, then moved back to a booth and took the goggles off my face. Dust fell off them when I shook them out and tightened my grip on the flashlight.
"This isn't going to be easy," I said.
"Really." Mina threw her goggles down on another table. She breathed. "No one died in here. Funny how you can tell how many people died in one place, huh?"
I inhaled. There was a musty smell that might be old food sitting out. I counted to five, but no stench came to me. "The pizzeria didn't open until four on most days," I said. "No one was here when the pulse hit. That's why the door was locked."
"At least there's a cooler," Mina said, pointing at a glass door with tons of two liters behind it.
"And a clean bathroom," I added. "I think only Christina and Jasmine were in here before. I wouldn't eat any of the food." I shined my flashlight on the broken windows. Dust whipped past and I caught the outline of something tumbling down the street. "This storm is coming in waves and they're getting worse every time. What happened to the atmosphere?"
"All the reason we can't stay," Mina said. "This could be the new normal for all we know."
"At least the dust isn't blowing in," I said. A little was gathering on the table closest to the broken windows, but the wind was heading in another direction: straight down the street. "I think there's an alley behind this building. We can head down that way if things stay bad. The wind might not be as bad. It'll be protected." There was a fence between the backs of all the buildings and the stores themselves. I had walked down that way plenty of times to take shortcuts home from school and to avoid the creepy old guy who always sat in front of the bar. I imagined he was dead, too.
"Good idea," Mina said, strapping her goggles back on. She didn't mention the drinks in the cabinet again. We didn't have time for that. At least I didn't have to pee. I was sweating out all the water in my body from wearing this makeshift armor.
The back door opened okay for us after we found our way through the kitchen and past smells that were a ghost compared to the death and decay we'd encountered before. Most of the spoiled food was locked away in failing freezers and fridges, but there were a couple of unfinished pizzas lying out. The employees had done some prep and went home when they started feeling sick. The illness must have been so bad that everyone had no choice but to stop what they were doing.
The wind wasn't as bad in the alley, nowhere near. Mina and I kept our goggles on and ran the rest of the distance to the low gray mechanic on the end of the street. We circled around and found the front entrance after battling the wind for another couple of minutes. I fell inside after her, falling over her feet and catching my breath. Even with the scarf over my face, it was still hard to breathe out there, not because of the dust but because of the wind itself.
"Someone died in here," Mina said the second she closed the door and lowered her scarf from her nose.
"A few someones died in here," I said. I had been hoping that the mechanics had the knowledge to go home, or at least the time to leave, but I was wrong.
"I'll find a gas container as quick as I can," Mina said. "They're red. Look around."
I shined my flashlight to find no one at the little lobby desk. There were golf magazines and a fishing magazine on the table by the waiting room chairs, but nothing else except for a coffee cup with congealed brown sludge on the bottom. The door to the shop itself was open with a wooden wedge between it and the lobby.
The horror was in there, then.
/> "There's got to be a siphon pump," Mina said, peeking her head into the garage. "I don't want to go in there. How about you hold the flashlight, and I'll hold my breath? I'm going to have to run in spurts and look around."
"That's fine," I said, relieved that I wouldn't have to be the one to search. I was out of this one. "Ready?"
"Ready."
I approached the door and held the flashlight. Mina ducked her head back into the lobby, took a breath, and darted inside.
I followed her like I was manning a spotlight. There was a van up on a jack and an old Cadillac. Mina tore open drawers, metal cabinets, huge bins. She searched everywhere she could and ran back towards me after I had counted thirty seconds. I lowered the flashlight and backed away as she burst back into the lobby and took a breath. "There's a lot in there to look through," she said. "It might take a few times."
I tried to blink away the bloated body I'd seen underneath one of the raised cars. Yes. People had died very quickly. At least I could be comforted by that. I had imagined it had taken a long time for everyone to keel over. Time meant pain. These people hadn't died without it, but at least it hadn't lasted that long. Maybe longer for others, depending on whether they were inside or not.
It took us two more tries for Mina to pull something with a couple of plastic tubes attached to a red hand pump out of one of the many drawers in the garage. It was hard for me to shine the light on her with the two raised vehicles in the room. She ran out, kicked the wedge out of the door, and closed it. We both let go of our breath and breathed the air that was disgusting but not overbearing.
"You don't want to know how bad it was in there," she said. "I can't wait for these bodies just to become mummies or skeletons. They won't stink as bad then."
"There are no animals left to eat them," I said. “It’s going to take a while.”
I expected Mina to look at me in horror, but she just nodded down to the pump. It was simpler than I imagined. Just two tubes, like something Alana's mom used to use to clean the bottom of the fish tank they had years ago. "We also need a gas canister," she said.
At least Mina didn’t need any reality checks. She'd already had hers. I could tell. She was like Gina. You just had to roll with the punches and keep going. "Hey," I said. "It's possible only one of us is going to make it back to the school." The wind had died down again, but that could last from seconds to days. The uncertainty was the worst. It was always the worst because you didn't know what to expect and there was no way to prepare. It was like the time the doctors didn't know how far Mom's sickness had progressed. The waiting game sucked out your soul.
"I know it is," Mina said. "How are we going to deal with that?"
Yes. She didn't need reality to hit her. She had put up a wall of her own. We were in agreement here.
"We still need to get to the truck," I said. "If one of us gets blown away out there, or gets lost, someone still needs to get back to the school. The group can't wait here any longer to get out." I hated what I was saying. I didn't hate Mina and the thought of leaving her out here in the storm, even if I had no choice, was awful. I was letting my wall down, so I sucked in a breath and did my best to put it back up. Survival first. Always survival first. "We just do what we need to do."
"I get it," she said. "Tony would understand. I think. What about your friend? Alana? I think she needs you."
I imagined Tony losing Mina. He had already been injured by the storm. He'd dwell over her loss for probably the rest of his life. He knew what it was like to lie out here, waiting for death. How the sand felt, blasting against his skin. How the thirst could make you sick and drive you mad. Leaving Mina would mean destroying him, too. I didn’t care for the guy, but we needed all the hands we could get and he was probably the strongest.
"I don't know about Alana," I lied. If Mina left me, she'd be leaving Alana, too.
"We should get out there before the wind picks up again," Mina said, pulling her scarf over her face. She slipped her goggles back on. "You'd better get yours on, too."
"I guess we have an agreement," I said, heart racing. If the storm got bad out there again, we'd be screwed. The truck was right on the side of the street, right in the path of the wind if it was still even there. Trucks didn't stand up to wind well, did they?
I got my goggles on. Mina opened the door and I held the gas can that she'd brought out from the shop. She kept ahold of the pump and I managed to keep the flashlight in my other hand. The dust still blew, but this was another lull in the storm and we had to take advantage of it. I had the feeling these storms would get more and more common the longer we stayed.
The truck was another several buildings up the road, where the curve divided downtown Colton from the residential area. My house was beyond there. I wanted to go back there and grab Dad's number. I hadn't been there since the night of the game. I missed home. My bed. Even Chester's empty cage. I wanted to go back there one more time, but it wasn’t a good idea. Besides, I had memorized the address of Dad's hotel. That might be good enough.
We found the truck, blue and curvy and new-old like before, like something you'd see driving around in Cuba.
And it was off the boulders.
The wind had been so strong at one point that it had gotten under the truck and pushed it right off for us.
Even the dust hadn't managed to touch its shine and Mina ran towards it, hunting around for where to put the gas. She found the cap after a couple of desperate minutes, then opened it and motioned to one of the cars parked on the side of the road. "Gas!" she shouted. "Do you know how to siphon?"
She was heard to hear under the scarf. The wind blasted again, then calmed. There was no way to tell if the storm was ending or just getting ready for another punch. "No," I said, but I thought I could figure it out. "I think I can do it.”
She handed me the pump and popped the hood on the front of the truck. Mina struggled with getting the bent metal to obey and slowly lifted the hood. "I should have had Tony do this," she muttered.
But I was already running for the car. I popped off the gas cap as another blast of wind threatened to knock me over. It was picking up again. I held my breath and counted. I slipped the plastic tube deep into the car, put the other end in the gas can (which I had to hold in place against the tire with my foot) and began to pump.
I lost the can twice, spilling gas in the middle of the road. It took some pumping gas into it before it would stand up against the wind. The storm calmed, allowing me to see Mina holding onto the truck for dear life, to see her holding onto the crank, ready to get it started. I grabbed the siphon hose, getting gas all over the insulation armor, and ran towards her as fast as it would allow. There was no room for error out here. Sand blasted my goggles and some managed to get in through the cracks on the side. I blinked. My eyes hurt.
I handed her the can. I'm not sure where Mina poured the gas in, but she threw the can down, which tumbled down the street. "We have to crank," she shouted as if I didn't know that already.
It was even harder starting the truck this time and it had been bad enough back in Marlon. We took turns trying. But at last, on my attempt, the truck roared to life and its round headlights shone in the dark. We could see. The boulder glowed in front of it.
"The wind blew the truck off the rocks," I shouted.
"That’s lucky," Mina said.
The truck had been upright earlier tonight right before the storm hit. What kind of wind could push something that big around?
"Come on," Mina shouted. I could tell from the tone of her voice that she'd come to the same horrible realization.
It was then that we found out.
One second, we could kind of see, and then the next, a massive gust turned everything to moving dust and sand. It beat against my goggles, blinding me and pushing me down onto the pavement. I felt the air getting sucked from my lungs. I reached out and scraped the side of the truck. It still ran and there was light somewhere, but where? I tried to scream but the storm
sucked it out of me. Someone's leg kicked into me and vanished. I kept holding on.
Mina.
She didn't have a grip on the truck. I kept mine around the tire, holding myself in place as the wind continued to howl. I felt like I was underneath a speeding freight train. Something crashed not far from me. The truck moved a little, shifted. Mina was gone. It was the one thought that screamed through my mind.
The onslaught calmed a bit, enough for me to stand. I ran around the truck and opened the driver side door. I closed it behind me. We had a deal. If one of us survived we had to get to the others.
I put the truck in reverse and backed up, half expecting to hear a thump. But there was none.
She had vanished.
The dust stilled for a second like it wasn't sure what it wanted to do and I could see the boulders again. I turned the truck around and faced the street, hood out of the wind. Then another gust happened and I almost felt the truck's back side lift. This was dangerous.
She was out there.
Still alive.
If I left, she’d die.
It wasn’t my fault. We’d made a deal.
But I couldn’t leave her.
I put the truck in drive again and inched forward, studying the pavement for any signs of life. A piece of sheet metal catapulted down the street, settling against a light post. If she was lying in the open something would hit her. Mina would have to wait for death. It probably wouldn't come quickly.
It would be like Mom's, long and drawn out and sucking every ounce of hope from your body.
I turned the truck side to side a little, covering the entire street with its headlight glare. Sand blasted against the glass and I wondered if it would break. There were no windshield wipers here. I was staring through a brown film. The truck shifted again in the back. The wind would knock it over or flip it if it stayed in the street much longer. If that happened we would all die.
But still, I slowed.
The long deaths were the worst.
At last, hugging a light post next to what I thought was the Ice Scream, stood Mina in her insulation armor. The wind beat against her, ruffling all the pink fabric and threatening to tear it off. Her leg piece had come undone. She stood there, back to the wind, bracing herself for death.
