Dry

by Neal Shusterman

  “You were talking in your sleep,” he says. “I could hear you from my car.”

  “Oh. Sorry.” To be honest, I’m glad he woke me up. As tired as I am. I’ll take him over the hallucinations, so I open the door and get out, stretching.

  “Have you noticed that it’s snowing?”

  “What?”

  Sure enough, there are snowflakes settling gently around us. But it’s got to be almost ninety degrees. Now I know the world has gone crazy.

  “Don’t catch them on your tongue though,” Henry says. “I don’t think they’ll taste very good.”

  I catch one with my hand, and rub it between my fingers. It’s ash.

  “The brush fires have grown up,” he tells me. “They’re full-fledged forest fires now. Pretty far east of us, but the Santa Ana winds are bringing the ash our way.”

  As I look around, the cars are beginning to grow a fine layer of gray dust.

  We lean against the side of my Cadillac, watching the “snow” settle.

  “It’s so quiet now,” I say. “It almost makes you forget what’s out there.”

  “Nothing out there but people,” Henry points out.

  “People can be monsters. Whether it’s just their actions, or whether it’s who they really are, it doesn’t matter. The result is the same.”

  Henry shrugs, as if it doesn’t bother him. I wonder if he’s really so nonchalant about it, or if it’s just an act for my sake. “Sometimes you have to be the monster to survive,” he says.

  I shake my head at the thought, then grimace at the pain that comes with moving my head. “I could never be that kind of monster,” I tell him. “No matter what.”

  Rather than commenting on that, he lets another “snowflake” land on his palm, studying it for a few moments.

  “I wanted to apologize,” he finally says, “for not telling you the truth about not being the guy my jacket says I am—but with all that was happening, there didn’t seem to be a right time.”

  No apology is complete without its “but.” Well, at least he’s trying. So I decide to let him off the hook. I know it’s stupid of me to trust him, but I decide to do it anyway.

  “I get it. Common courtesies have gone the way of running water,” I tell him. “No one’s acting the way they usually would.”

  He smiles. “You’re a very forgiving person.” His smile seems genuine, and I look away from his gaze. I wonder if it’s possible to see a blush in ashen moonlight.

  “Not really,” I tell him. “I just don’t hold grudges.” Which isn’t entirely true; I hold plenty of grudges. But right now it would be a waste of valuable energy.

  “But you are forgiving,” he insists. “You let me come with you, even after acquiring your uncle’s car. And it looks like you’re beginning to forgive Jacqui for . . . well, for just being Jacqui. You even forgave Kelton after the whole drone thing.”

  I get caught on that last part. “What?”

  “You know. How he used to spy in your window with his drone?”

  But I don’t know. I have no idea what he’s talking about. My stomach begins to fill with a weird, greasy feeling.

  “Who told you that?”

  “Garrett may have mentioned it in passing. But don’t get him in trouble. I only bring it up to add evidence to my argument about your forgiving nature.” Then he grins. “I did pretend to be captain of the debate team, you know.”

  But right now, I don’t feel forgiving at all. I feel stupid. And embarrassed. And violated. My face must be turning a much more visible shade of red now, because Henry says—

  “Wait—you mean you didn’t know?”

  Why should I be the one who feels embarrassed? Kelton’s the creep here! And before I know it, I’m abandoning Henry, and I’m storming over to Kelton in his stupid little hatchback, pounding on the door, then kicking it, until he pops his nasty little orange head up and opens the door.

  “What? What is it? What’s happening?”

  “Did it feel good, Kelton?” I growl. “Did it? Was it fun? Was it everything you thought it would be?” I know, in the midst of everything going on, that this is not the highest priority right now, but it feels like it. It feels huge.

  “What? What are you talking about?” he stammers as he scrambles out to face me.

  “Did you or did you not spy on me with your drone!”

  He hesitates. That’s all the answer I need. I push him back against the car. “You lousy! Stinking! Creep!”

  “Alyssa, it was in eighth grade!”

  “There is NO statute of limitations on being a certified DOUCHE!”

  “And I only did it once!”

  “It doesn’t matter how many times you did it! The fact is you did it!”

  “Alyssa . . .”

  “Don’t you say my name!” I yell at him. “Don’t you even think it. Ever !”

  I storm away from him, because I know if I stay I’m just going to keep on screaming, and that will wake up half the people here and make them come running, and I don’t want this to be any more of a federal case than it already is. There’s a battle in my head now. Part of me wants to file this away and deal with it when we’re not in a crisis. His brother is dead. There are more life-and-death challenges we have to face. Yet there’s the other part of me that will not be silenced or ignored. The normal part, which won’t let such an unacceptable act slide just because there are bigger things to worry about. No matter what else is going on, I have every right to what I’m feeling!

  I go back to my car. I’m thirsty, and I’m angry, and I think maybe I’d rather face the nightmares than this, after all.

  Henry appears at the window. “Alyssa, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. . . .”

  “Well you did!” I snap. Then I feel guilty about it. So I speak a little more gently. “I know I shouldn’t blame the messenger, but it’s hard not to.”

  “I understand.”  Then he puts his hand on the door handle. “Can I come in?”

  I actually consider it. But right now I want to keep all of humanity at a ten-foot-pole distance. “I’ll see you in the morning,” I tell him.

  “Okay,” he says. “Sleep well.”

  But we both know there’s zero chance of that.

  PART FOUR

  BUG-OUT

  DAY SIX

  THURSDAY, JUNE 9TH

  30) Kelton

  Alyssa isn’t talking to me, Garrett won’t look at me, and Jacqui seems to find that amusing.

  Henry says nothing, silently smug behind the wheel.

  Garrett confessed what he told Henry, and Henry didn’t waste any time sharpening it into a weapon to use against me. I occupy my mind thinking of all the painful moves I can inflict on Henry once we reach the bug-out. Dislocate his other shoulder, snap his arm, kick out his kneecap. I know the moves, and am pretty confident I can execute them. All he has to do is give me a reason. Exposing my middle-school creepitude to Alyssa should be reason enough, but that was really just my own karma coming back to bite me. As much as I want to, I can’t make any sort of move against Henry until he proves himself to be the clear and present danger I suspect he is. But I can’t act on a feeling. Especially when Alyssa trusts him a whole lot more than she trusts me.

  It’s been half an hour since we left Charity’s little freeway commune. We cleaned up our camp at dawn, folded the linens and returned them. It felt good folding the linens. It felt decent. Funny how that used to be my least favorite chore. We said goodbye to some of the friends we made during our brief stay, like Max the handy biker. Then the Water Angel sent us off with more of those marshmallow sponge cakes, and then gave each of us hugs. Standing there in her embrace, in a weird, childish way, I didn’t want to let go.

  I know that Alyssa didn’t want to leave. I was actually surprised that she didn’t decide to stay, just to be rid of me. I mean, she would have gotten water there. Or at least she would when she got dehydrated enough. Maybe she couldn’t bear the thought of me getting to the
bug-out, and getting water before she did. Or maybe she didn’t want to part with Henry. Why bother breaking a limb? I could jam the heel of my hand into his nose and drive his nasal bone into his brain.

  We had to move the ÁguaViva box back to the bed of the truck to make room for all of us in the cab—which was hard to do without raising suspicion. There was a quiet discussion as to whether or not we should pull a couple of bottles from it to drink now—and this time, even I was willing to do it . . . but there was no way to open the box without revealing to Charity and her freeway folk that we had water.

  “If they know about it, you know what’ll happen,” Jacqui said. “She’ll claim it’s community property, divvy it out to her minions, and there goes our emergency supply.”

  I expected Alyssa to argue, because she’s the only one of us altruistic enough to be okay with that. But she didn’t. Maybe her anger at me has spread to the rest of the world.

  We agreed that we would pull over and open the box when we were far enough away, but now that we’re moving, Henry flatly refuses to stop.

  “We’re almost there—why stop now? We can all hold out for another hour, right?”

  “Yeah, we can wait,” says Garrett, who suddenly became Henry’s lapdog when no one was looking.

  And since no one wants to show less self control than a ten-year-old, we all accept it.

  “But if it’s more than an hour, I’m kicking you in the head until you stop the car and let us get water,” announces Jacqui. I’d be happy if she started kicking him in the head right now, but I keep that to myself.

  I look through the car window. There’s a haze that hangs in the air, thick and caustic. All of Southern California is blanketed in wildfire smoke. The dawn is angry crimson, and the sun—which has now risen enough to peer out from behind the mountains—is practically maroon, looking more like a blood moon than the sun.

  We haven’t put music on the radio this morning. Instead we switched back from satellite to the standard stations. Most stations are either offline or have triggered the emergency broadcast network, so it’s the same thing almost everywhere. Mostly stuff we already know. Evac centers are at capacity—people are to go straight to overflow facilities, blah blah blah.

  We keep listening to the broadcast, because I need to know about the fires. Three are burning far to the east—one completely blocking the road to Big Bear Lake. Two are burning in Castaic, more than fifty miles west of us, threatening access to Castaic Lake—which millions from Los Angeles are trying to reach.

  One report talks about relief coming to beaches again sometime today, but there’s no way to know how successful this second wave will be. I imagine World War II and the Allied forces storming the beaches of Normandy, but with water instead of weapons. An operation like that would take months to organize. Whatever they’re planning today, it’s doomed to fall far short of what’s needed.

  “If there’s fresh water at the beach, maybe we should go there instead,” Henry says, having no idea what the rest of us have already been through.

  “Just drive,” Alyssa says, not wanting to explain.

  We’re only down in the aqueduct for half an hour before we emerge and follow a foothill road far enough from civilization to be beyond most roadblocks. Finally we come to a sign that says NOW ENTERING ANGELES NATIONAL FOREST, with a red placard that says FIRE RISK: HIGH. Big duh.

  It looks like there actually had been a roadblock here—cones and plastic barriers—but they’ve all been pushed aside and the site is unmanned. Apparently, the personnel were needed elsewhere. We keep driving, and the road begins to wind.

  “It’s not far now,” I tell everyone. “About ten miles up, look for a dirt road off to our left. Drive slow, because it’s easy to miss.”

  “I have a headache,” announces Garrett. As if we all don’t have headaches.

  “It’s from the smoke,” Alyssa tells him, although it’s probably more from the dehydration. “I’m sure there’s Advil at the bug-out.”

  “There is,” I tell her, but she doesn’t even acknowledge that I spoke. She’s disgusted to be in the same car with me. I guess I would be, too. Of course, if it were the other way around—if she had a drone and looked in my window—I’d be flattered. Unless she was laughing. No, I guess I’d feel just as creeped out. I should probably just let her beat the crap out of me, and get it over with. But I suppose in our current situation, crap-beating is not a priority. And now I feel stupid for even worrying about it. As if my humiliation means anything in the big picture we’re facing. And yet in my moronic head, it does. Stupid.

  “Is that the road we’re looking for?” says Jacqui about fifteen minutes later.

  “Yes,” I say, although to be honest, I’m not a hundred percent sure. But we’ll know soon enough. “Turn here.”

  Henry veers off the paved road and onto the narrow dirt path. The truck barely fits between the trees, and the road is rugged. The truck’s suspension absorbs the worst of the bumps, but it can only do so much. My brain rattles against the walls of my skull. Garrett moans, telling Henry not to go so fast, but he’s not going fast at all.

  “What are we looking for?” Henry asks.

  “We’ll go over a ridge, then back down into a valley,” I tell him. “Eventually we’ll come to a dry, rocky wash. Once we’re there, turn right and follow the wash for about three clicks.”

  “Exactly what is a click?”

  “A kilometer.”

  “And then we’ll see it?”

  “We won’t see it,” I tell him. “That’s the whole point of a bug-out.”

  Ten minutes later we come to the wash, and I breathe a secret sigh of relief, because it means this was the right dirt road after all. Henry turns right, and we follow the rocky path, avoiding the boulders and ditches along the way. Finally we come to an upturned tree stump with a red ribbon caught in its dead, gnarled roots. Only it’s not caught, it’s tied there. It’s our marker.

  “Stop,” I tell Henry. “We’re here.”

  We get out of the car and I lead everyone up the embankment of the wash, and back into the forest. About a hundred yards in, I stop.

  “We’re here,” I tell everyone.

  “We’re where?” asks Jacqui. “I don’t see anything but a whole lot of trees.”

  “Is it underground?” asks Garrett.

  “Nope.” Then I just stand there, waiting, wondering who will be the first one to notice.

  Alyssa’s the first. I was betting she would be. She gasps and points. “There!” she says. “It’s mirrored!” She runs a dozen yards ahead, and the rest of us follow. As we get closer, the illusion weakens, but only because the glass has gotten dirty.

  Our bug-out is a small A-frame structure—the mirrored side walls slope so that they reflect the higher reaches of trees, instead of reflecting people who might be approaching. It’s an exceptionally successful camouflage.

  “I suddenly love your seriously disturbed family,” Jacqui says.

  Just like at home, there’s a hidden key. It’s in a knothole in a tree, although it takes me a few minutes to find the right tree, then a couple of minutes more to poke into the knothole, dislodging a spider and a bunch of other unpleasant critters that have taken up residence there. Finally, I reach in and pull out the key.

  I stride triumphant to the door—which is also mirrored—and slide the key into the deadbolt lock.

  “Welcome,” I say, “to Castle McCracken!”

  31) Jacqui

  How many lifetimes have I gone through since the riot at the beach? I’m used to life changing in the flicker of an instant, but the Tap-Out has left every single moment a threat. How I live now is not the same as any of my yesterdays, and that void that always taunts me is now a moving target, making me lose all sense of direction.

  But right now I don’t care about any of that. All I care about is having a nice long drink. Doesn’t even have to be cold. It just has to be liquid.

  Our unlikely crew of accide
ntal survivors now stands outside Kelton’s family bug-out, while Kelton makes a big production of opening the door.

  “Welcome to Castle McCracken!”

  “Just let us in already,” says Garrett.

  Finally Kelton turns the key and pulls the door wide.

  Castle McCracken my ass! The bug-out has bugged out. The place is a mess. There are cans on the ground, clothes tossed everywhere. Empty cereal boxes dumped on their sides. The place is small, but seems even smaller with all the junk spread around it. It’s like a bear slipped in through the keyhole.

  “This isn’t right . . . ,” says Kelton. “We didn’t leave it this way. . . .”

  “When was the last time you were here?” Henry asks, examining a spoon with peanut butter caked on it.

  “Maybe a year ago?” Kelton says, like it’s a question rather than a response.

  It looks like I’m the only one with the courage to speak the obvious. “There was a break-in.”

  But Kelton shakes his head. “There’s no sign of that. The lock was intact, and it’s not ransacked.”

  “Looks ransacked to me,” says Garrett.

  “Yeah,” agrees Kelton, “but not in the way a burglar would.”

  Exploring deeper, Kelton pushes open a door to a bedroom. Two beds. One is made, the other disheveled. There are comic books on the floor.

  Kelton seems to reel out of his skin. “No!” he says. “No no no no no!”

  He doubles back, pushing past the rest of us and to the kitchen, pulling open cabinet doors. The cabinets are virtually bare.

  “No no no no NOOOO!”

  He kneels, pulling open a trapdoor, and drops inside. We can only watch his panic, not wanting to make it our own. He bumbles around down there. I can hear the ponging of jugs—and he hurls up a couple of them up. When I look down, there are a whole bunch of plastic jugs down there. Empty. All empty.