Edge of Collapse Series | Book 6 | Edge of Survival

by Stone, Kyla

  The world intruded, demanding her attention.

  Pushing away the sorrow, she forced a cheerful note into her voice. “I know it’s time for your nap, but first we need to check on your brother. Right after we freshen you up. Boy, do you stink, little girl.”

  Humming Prince’s “When Doves Cry,” Hannah changed Charlotte into a fresh cloth diaper and dumped the used one in a nearby bucket to take care of later. Washing cloth diapers by hand was a pain, but it was better than the alternative.

  Sliding her into a fresh blue onesie featuring dancing puppies, she sat back and took in her daughter’s full head of chocolate-brown hair, her velvety skin, her tiny fingers and toes with their pink shell nails.

  She tickled her daughter’s tummy and blew on her neck. Charlotte squealed in delight. How beautiful she was, how perfect and vibrant and alive.

  Once she was clean, Hannah tucked her into a blue jacket and a second layer of socks. The weather mid-March in Michigan could vary wildly. Temperatures were in the low thirties, cloudy and brisk, drifts of slushy snow still blanketing the ground.

  With Charlotte in tow, she exited the house wearing a jacket with the Ruger in her pocket. No matter how safe she felt, it went with her everywhere.

  The chilly air stung her cheeks. The street was quiet—other than the sentries at the barricade, everyone was busy working, either preparing for Trade Day, volunteering for various security patrols, or working the community garden they’d started at the middle school baseball field.

  She had a key to Molly’s house, as did Milo, since he was always vacillating between the two households.

  Letting herself in, she wandered down the hallway to Quinn’s room. Valkyrie, the sleek black cat who was usually outside hunting, wound around her legs, purring.

  Milo lay on the messy, unmade bed, the earbuds from the iPod tucked into his ears. Typical of a teenager’s room—clothes, books, and drawing bric-a-brac scattered everywhere.

  Not so typical were the sharpened flechettes on the dresser and the box of ammo on the nightstand.

  Ghost napped in the center of the wood floor, several cats piled on top of him like he was an Afghan rug.

  “Who died?” Milo asked.

  Hannah shot him an alarmed look. “What makes you say that?”

  He gave a little shrug. “Everybody’s dying.”

  Her chest squeezed. She laid Charlotte down beside Ghost, who snorted in his sleep and instinctively curved his paws around her small form. She cooed and reached for him, curling and uncurling her tiny fists in the fur of his neck and chest.

  With Charlotte happily occupied, Hannah sat on the edge of the bed beside Milo. “It feels that way sometimes.”

  He gazed at her beneath his mop of unruly black curls, his dark eyes bloodshot and red-rimmed. He’d hidden in here to cry in privacy, she realized.

  Hannah didn’t want to tell Milo about his grandparents. He didn’t need to know yet, and it would only make things worse for him.

  He’d lost his father three weeks ago. Since Noah’s death, he’d been quiet and withdrawn. Most nights, he woke up crying or plagued by nightmares. It took hours to calm him, if he calmed at all.

  “Don’t worry. Everyone here is okay. It’s all right.”

  He blinked, the tension easing in his face.

  “What are you listening to?”

  “Elvis. ‘Can’t Help Falling in Love.’ Quinn pretends she doesn’t like it because it’s all romancy, but it’s her favorite.”

  With a sigh, Hannah let her gaze drift around Quinn’s room, taking in the monsters, aliens, and mythical creatures the girl had so painstakingly painted.

  She had incredible talent. The paintings were detailed, lifelike, and terrifying.

  “Where is Quinn, anyway?”

  That pained little shrug again. It gave away so little—and so much. “She’s never around anymore.”

  “I’m sorry, honey. Everyone deals with grief in their own way.”

  “She doesn’t want to play with me.”

  “She’s not trying to hurt you, I promise. She just needs some time.”

  Hannah made a mental note to talk to Quinn again. She’d spent five years unable to mother a child. Now she felt responsible for three.

  And Milo wasn’t wrong. She’d hardly seen the girl in weeks. Where Milo was lost and weepy, Quinn was hard and angry, withdrawing further into herself with every passing day.

  Noah had left waves of devastation in his wake. They were all still reeling.

  Milo blinked hard and stared at the ceiling. “Okay.”

  He was only eight and so slight, so small and fragile, yet he’d been through so much. His beautiful olive skin that highlighted his Venezuelan heritage was still pale from his bout with adrenal crisis and the five-day coma.

  They had a few more months of the hydrocortisone medication that controlled his Addison’s disease, but they’d used the last emergency injection.

  Finding more was high on the list of priorities.

  She leaned over and rubbed his shoulder. He hated being asked if he was feeling okay, so she tried to suss out his health in other ways. “Are you hungry? Molly is helping with the new community garden, but when she’s finished, she promised to help us make potato skins in the solar oven.”

  “Mom?”

  “Yeah, honey?”

  “Was Dad a bad person?”

  Hannah went still. “Why would you think that?”

  Milo turned his head and stared at the wall. A painting of a beautiful white unicorn rose above the bedframe, its tail and mane streaming in the wind. In a room of monsters, the unicorn was the only “good” creature.

  “I asked Quinn, and she said he was. Quinn doesn’t lie.”

  She choked down the grief. Not for herself, but for her son, for the burden he was forced to bear.

  How could she explain it when her own feelings were a complex tangle of anger, heartbreak, grief, bitter disappointment, and loss?

  Noah was dead. His part in this life was over, but not the legacy he’d left behind.

  He had loved Milo, loved her. He’d been a good cop, a loyal friend, a loving father. She mourned who he was, but more than that, who he should have been.

  Every misguided step he took, he could have stopped. Instead, each step took him further and further from the man he’d claimed to be.

  Hannah understood that he’d done it all for Milo. He’d believed that the end goal justified any means, no matter how ugly or brutal. He had traded justice and morality for a counterfeit peace, a false security that had never existed.

  Hannah swallowed and licked her lips, thinking of what to say, praying she didn’t make things worse. “Your father loved you very much, Milo. He loved you more than any person in the entire world. You know that, don’t you?”

  He nodded.

  “He was trying to protect you. He was trying to protect all of us, but he was afraid, and his fear drove him to make some mistakes.”

  You couldn’t know another person, couldn’t crawl inside their skin and feel their thoughts, see their darkest fears or driving needs. All you could do was wade through the fallout and try to comprehend why the person you loved had made the choices they had.

  “He didn’t try to stop the militia,” Milo said. “The militia hurt people. Nana—I mean, Mrs. Sinclair—caused what happened at the church. She hurt people, too.”

  “Yes,” Hannah said around the lump in her throat, “they did. She did.”

  “Dad was on their side.”

  “Fear can make people do awful things. Some people will give up a lot for things they believe in. Peace is a good thing. Safety is a good thing. But people can give a little here and there until one day they’ve given so much in the name of that thing that they don’t recognize themselves. They’ve crossed lines they’d never thought they’d cross at the beginning. And in the end, the very thing they wanted so badly is the thing they’ve lost.”

  With a pang, she thought of how des
perately Noah had wanted them to be a family. How much he’d sacrificed to keep the town safe.

  And yet, in the end he’d let the wolves in himself.

  Milo stared up at the ceiling, saying nothing, silent tears sliding down his cheeks. She didn’t know how much he understood, but it was important to keep talking, to face it head on and not bury it, to embrace the process of mourning and accept the pain.

  “Is it wrong to feel sad? Am I bad for wanting him to come back?”

  Hannah scooted onto the bed, laid down beside her son, and drew his stiff little body into her arms. After a moment, he relaxed against her, his narrow shoulders quaking.

  “There is nothing bad or wrong about you, or your feelings,” she said into his hair. He smelled like dirt and pinecones and baking soda shampoo. She felt his heartbeat, his warmth, every precious breath as his chest hitched. “Your dad was your dad. You loved him and he loved you. Full stop. You’ll understand more when you’re older, but for right now, that’s all that matters. When it comes to you and your dad, that was all that ever mattered. It’s okay to love him. It’s okay to feel angry or disappointed, too. It’s okay.”

  They cried then, both of them, together. Milo’s body curled like a comma against hers, his fist nestled against his cheek like when he was a baby.

  And then she sang to him, filling the room with her pure voice, surrounding him with music, something good and lovely and bright to chase away the darkness.

  She sang their favorites, Guns N Roses’ “Sweet Child of Mine,” Elton John’s “Your Song,” U2’s “One,” and of course, “Blackbird” by the Beatles.

  Milo had lost his father. She had lost her husband and now her parents. Even though she was a grown woman and hadn’t seen them for years, she felt their absence like a permanently missing piece of herself.

  She had read once about the mathematics of grief—how what was taken always weighed more than what remained.

  Even if that were true, she couldn’t allow it to remain so.

  Charlotte and Milo were here, now, in the present. They needed her. She wouldn’t leave her children motherless and unmoored.

  Hannah would be strong for them, as strong as she needed to be.

  7

  Quinn

  Day Eight-Seven

  Sixteen-year-old Quinn Riley pointed over the water toward the opposite bluff. “What’s that?”

  Jonas Marshall stood and shielded his eyes, fishing pole in one hand. “You mean the McMansions?”

  “No. It’s something else.”

  Quinn swiped her blue-tinted bangs out of her eyes and grabbed the binoculars from the bench of the fishing boat they’d borrowed from Jonas’s mother, a twelve-foot rusted tin can that barely kept them afloat.

  Tiny waves lapped the boat, rocking gently beneath them. Chunks of ice bumped the sides. The diesel motor chugged along, quiet enough to hear crows cawing in the trees.

  Quinn, Jonas, and Whitney Blair were fishing along the St. Joe River north of town, somewhere between Fall Creek and the lakefront city of St. Joe. Most of the river had melted, though small icebergs floated here and there, the banks swollen with snowmelt.

  In the morning, they’d spent several hours clearing the middle school baseball field to create the community garden for hardier, cool weather vegetables like potatoes, onions, and carrots. In the newly-built greenhouses, they’d planted zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, and spinach until their fingernails were black with dirt.

  At Molly’s directive, they’d also planted seeds for bell peppers, broccoli, and cauliflower in cups, which they would transfer outdoors in May and June.

  As far as the dismal fishing trip went, all they’d caught were two gross catfish and one meager perch.

  Quinn raised the binoculars to her eyes and scanned the bluff above them. Tall brown trees scratched the gunmetal gray sky. Elaborate docks dotted the riverbank, steep wood staircases leading to extravagant houses featuring wrap-around decks and floor-to-ceiling windows.

  Many were the second or third vacation homes of rich cats from Chicago and Detroit, visited in the summer and on weekends, remaining empty in the winter.

  Now, most of the windows were shattered, graffiti scrawled across the exteriors. Fancy furniture littered the back lawns, the patio furniture bent and broken.

  Some had clothes scattered across the once manicured lawns—blouses and tank tops snagged on the deck railing, pillowcases puddled across the stairs, pants, shorts, and towels caught in tree branches and manicured bushes.

  A woman’s white bra fluttered like a flag in the wind.

  Ice water trickled down Quinn’s spine, raising the hairs on her neck. It was one thing to scavenge out of necessity, but this felt like something different.

  This felt like a desecration—destruction for the sake of destruction.

  “Who would do something like that?” Whitney asked after Quinn handed her the binoculars. She wore loose jeans, combat boots, and a bright purple jacket that contrasted with her pale skin and hollow eyes.

  Three months ago, Whitney had been a bubbly cheerleader, the prom queen of Fall Creek High, always dressed to the nines. That girl was long gone.

  Now, she was withdrawn, grief-stricken, and fearful, a shadow of her former self.

  But then, so was Quinn.

  They were all different.

  Some not for the better.

  Jonas shrugged. “Who knows? As long as they don’t dare come to Fall Creek.”

  “We should head back,” Whitney said tremulously. “I don’t feel good about this. We shouldn’t be out this far.”

  Jonas tugged on his empty line and sighed. “Nothing’s biting, anyway.”

  They hadn’t yet turned around when the sound of voices reached them. The scent of smoke from a campfire carried on the wind.

  Quinn tensed as she and Jonas exchanged a wary look.

  Jonas had a hunting rifle balanced next to him; she had her pistol and slingshot. They could defend themselves.

  The fishing boat puttered around the bend in the river, and a group of about a dozen people appeared between the thin leafless trees, huddled around a bonfire at the edge of the water.

  Several felled logs spread with blankets provided seating along with a few battered camping chairs. Trash, empty bottles, and pop cans littered the muddy, trampled clearing.

  This hideaway had been well-used.

  A few guys turned to face them as the boat motored closer. They stood at the edge of the water, skipping rocks. She recognized their burgundy and gold Wolverine jackets. Fellow high schoolers from Fall Creek.

  One of them hurled a rock much too large for skipping. It sailed through the air, narrowly missing Whitney. Water splashed the hull as the rock sank to the bottom of the river.

  “Watch it!” Jonas said.

  The teens laughed and raised their mugs and glasses. A few hooted and waved to Jonas. “Let us on!”

  “Give us a ride!”

  “Where you been, man?”

  “Don’t you wanna hang with us anymore?”

  Two girls rose from their log seats and stared at the little boat, their gazes lasering in on Whitney and Quinn. Their cheekbones were sharp as glass, eyes huge in their gaunt faces, designer jeans dirty and hanging off their hips.

  The popular girls in school were always competing to be the skinniest waif, as if achieving bean-pole thinness was the epitome of human accomplishment.

  Well, now they’d gotten their wish. Were they finally satisfied? Or were they as hungry as Quinn, their stomachs like shriveled pits gnawing on itself?

  Probably hungrier, she decided. Thanks to Gran’s foresight, Quinn still ate two sturdy meals a day. Though eating was for nourishment, no longer for pleasure.

  Her mouth watered at the thought of cheeseburgers, potato chips, and mint chocolate chip ice cream.

  “You shouldn’t be out this far!” Whitney called over the water. “It’s dangerous!”

  One girl sneered. “So dangerous. Wa
tch out for those snapping turtles. Oh no! Maybe a tree branch will fall on us!”

  Quinn gave them the middle finger.

  A few boys laughed and returned the favor. A couple others threw more rocks, one striking the stern with a dull clunk.

  Jonas cursed as he steered the boat further from the shore and out of their line of fire. “What the hell, man!”

  “They’re worthless tools.” Whitney brushed her lank red hair back from her face and blew out a breath. “All they do is sit around their bonfires and whine about how hungry they are, how the booze and weed are all gone, and how life is pointless and too hard. Forget them.”

  Unlike most of the town, these indolent laggards spent their days doing nothing, as far as Quinn could tell. Apparently, their parents still fed them a little. It was more than they deserved.

  Principal King had put most of the high schoolers to work as couriers carrying messages throughout the town or as “resource managers”—which basically meant scavenging empty homes for anything useful that other residents could use, like baby gear for Hannah and Charlotte, or batteries, wires, and motherboards for Jamal and Tina to tinker with.

  The fishing boat motored past the shiftless teens. Their too-loud voices and braying laughter carried across the water. They were careless and stupid; anyone could sneak up on them, and they wouldn’t hear a damn thing. And she hadn’t noticed a single weapon among them.

  “You don’t think they’re the ones who vandalized the houses on the bluff?” Jonas asked once they were clear of the group.

  “I don’t think so. They’re lazy and bored, not exactly malicious. That would take too much gumption.” A fresh wave of dread shivered through her. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but she couldn’t deny the creeping sense of trepidation. “It was someone else.”

  8

  Quinn

  Day Eighty-Seven

  Jonas glared back the way they’d come and shook his head in disgust. “I can’t just sit around like that, doing nothing, complaining and waiting for other people to fix things. I need to do something.”