“Don’t look at him for permission. He’s not your dad. If you want a drink, have a drink,” Eva said. “It’ll help take the edge off the horribleness of all of this.”
Again, I hated it, but Eva wasn’t wrong. It also wasn’t ideal to drink alcohol when we didn’t have water. That didn’t stop me from walking over to Eva and pulling the bottle from her hand, taking my own much-too-long, drink.
I winced as I swallowed down the fruity sourness. Wine was not my favorite and especially not whatever this particular dark red wine was.
“Look at you,” Eva said with a laugh.
Chloe stepped up next to me and took her own drink. She wore a similar expression to mine as she gulped down the beverage.
“I think I actually feel more thirsty than I did before having this,” Chloe said gently wiping her full, pinkish lower lip. Chloe had that beautiful girl next door look except with a big dash of doe in headlights added in the mix.
“Same,” I said with a chuckle.
Eva shot me a look. Her nose was scrunched up and she blinked slowly. I knew the look. I’d done something that annoyed her.
“Let’s see if we can find some water in the back,” I said jerking my chin toward the swinging door behind the bar. “Looks like they probably served food here too.”
“I’m not going to be able to fit much more in this plastic bag,” Eva called as she watched Chloe and I walk into the back room.
We stepped into a large kitchen. There was an office to the left and what looked like a walk-in fridge at the back of the room. If the room had been organized, it wasn’t any longer. Everything was scattered on the counters and floor.
“Look at this,” Chloe said pointing to a rather large box that contained beef sticks. There was another below it with the word peanuts printed on the side. Chloe looked around as if she was worried someone was watching her before she stuck her hand in the box and pulled out two beef sticks. “Want one?”
“Please,” I said stepping over to her.
We opened them at the same time. My eyes closed when I felt the saltiness touch my tongue and erase the taste of wine from my mouth. I don’t think I’d even realize how hungry I was.
“How are we going to take all this stuff with us?” Chloe asked before snapping off another bite.
“That’s a good question,” I said. “Maybe there is something in the office.”
Chloe nodded and reached into the box for a second beef stick. I walked over to the office, carefully pushing open the door. I waited for a few seconds as if I was afraid the ceiling would crash down on top of me.
There were papers strewn about and a jacket hanging over the back of the office chair. On top of the desk was a stack of gray t-shirts with the bar’s white and green logo printed in the center. I grabbed one and quickly pulled off my shirt.
“What are you doing?” Eva asked standing in the doorway. Chloe was looking at me over Eva’s shoulder.
I ignored them and pulled on the t-shirt. The dry fabric instantly made my body less itchy.
“Here,” I said tossing a shirt to Eva.
She scrunched up her nose as if it was the worst thing she’d ever smelled but shrugged and started to change into it anyway. I handed the third shirt to Chloe and turned my back to them to give them privacy.
“Thank you,” Chloe said softly before stepping out of the office.
Eva stayed positioned in the doorway as if she thought I wouldn’t be able to control myself and would charge out of the door to watch Chloe change.
“Anything in here we can use?” Eva asked.
“Still looking,” I said peeking under the desk.
I pulled out a laptop bag and removed the computer from inside, setting it down on the desk.
“Wasting your time,” Eva said walking away from the door. Her eyes landed on Chloe. “I can’t believe we all match. I shouldn’t have even bothered when it’s just going to get wet the second we go back outside.”
“Feel free to put your wet shirt back on,” I said. The laptop didn’t power on. “Shit.”
I dumped everything out of the laptop bag and while it was small for carrying supplies, it was still rather large for a laptop bag. It would fit a decent amount of beef sticks inside.
“There are some plastic bags back here,” Eva shouted from the other room. “We can each carry two.”
There were bottles of water in the back that I stuffed into the laptop bag. I’d packed so much inside that I couldn’t zip the bag.
Standing at the front door of the pub, I looked at the three of us carrying far too much. I didn’t say anything as I turned and stared out at the rain falling down from the sky into large puddles.
There was so much water everywhere. I was hesitant to walk back out there but I knew we needed to get moving if we wanted to make it to Colorado.
Eva pointed at a garage off on the west side of the property. “We should check in there.”
I nodded and led the way before Eva could. My shirt was wet before we even reached the door.
The garage was packed so tightly that not much had moved around. Things were tipped this way or that, but everything was mostly still standing.
“Look at this?” I said pulling back a blue tarp. Underneath was a custom-built motorcycle. The chrome was polished and there were bright teal green flames on the sides.
Chloe shifted her weight back and forth. It was as though I could read her thoughts.
I dropped the tarp back in place. Eva stared at the bike and I was almost certain I was able to read her thoughts.
Eva didn’t know how to drive a motorcycle but she knew that if Chloe hadn’t been with us, we’d have a quick way to Colorado.
“Oh, check this out,” I said grabbing the handles of a circular shaped portable tent. “This will come in handy.”
“Who’s going to carry that bulky thing?” Eva asked. Her eyes were still on the motorcycle.
“I will,” I said.
“And your two bags too?” Eva asked.
I drew in a long breath. “I appreciate your concern, but I think I can manage.”
“It looks like we’re going camping, not trying to survive the end of the world,” Eva grumbled.
I couldn’t hold in my snort. “And what surviving the end of the world supposed to look like?”
“Not like this,” Eva said.
Something rustled near Eva. She screamed as she quickly turned and rammed the fireplace poker into whatever had moved.
“Oh, my God!” Eva said backing away until she bumped into a stack of packed boxes. “What did I just do?”
I couldn’t speak. I just stared at her.
Eva shook her hands like they were covered in mud. She started dancing her feet around.
I cautiously made my way closer, setting my eyes down toward the ground. There was a dark lump on the ground in a pool of blood. It wasn’t moving.
“Is it a person?” Eva asked her hands folded together under her chin.
My shoulders relaxed. It wasn’t a person.
“It’s a raccoon.” I blew out my cheeks and pulled the poker out of the raccoon. “You killed a raccoon.”
“Oh,” Eva said turning around to face her kill. A tear rolled down her cheek that she quickly wiped away. “Well, I didn’t mean to kill it.”
“It’s okay,” I said handing the poker to her.
Eva shook her hand and turned away from me. “No, I don’t want that. I… I can’t.”
She ran out of the garage and into the rain. I would have been lying if I had said I trusted her not to put the poker through my head. I’d seen how quickly she’d moved.
“Come on,” I said holding out my hand for Chloe. Her arms were wrapped around her middle but she let go to take my hand. She held my hand so tightly, my fingers numbed.
Eva was pacing back and forth in the yard. Perhaps she shouldn’t have finished off the bottle of wine back in the pub.
The sky was growing darker by the minute. We wouldn’
t make it far before night fell.
Eva stopped when she saw Chloe and me holding hands. I quickly let go and looked away from her toward the pub.
Eva wiped away her tears and stomped over to me. She yanked the poker out of my hand and glared at Chloe.
“Let’s go,” Eva said turning sharply on her heel.
I didn’t move.
“Adam!” she whined. “I said, let’s go.”
I shook my head. “No, Eva, we’re not leaving. We’re staying here the night.”
21
Stevie
I was exhausted but I was anxious to keep moving. There would be time to sleep once we got somewhere safe.
Or rather, safer.
Or whatever it was that was waiting out there for us.
Our new life.
All I knew was that for now, I couldn’t sleep, at least not enough that it would make much of a difference. I was just going to have to get used to my tired body and mind. Finding more of those coffee drinks was definitely at the top of my to-do list.
Gage and I walked the entire morning, only stopping to pick through random buildings that we thought would have supplies. Our backpacks were packed so tightly I worried the seams would break.
It was hard not to take everything we saw that was in decent, usable condition. I was afraid there would come a time when we’d run out of supplies. If I would have found another backpack, I would have been tempted to carry two.
With all the rain that continued to fall, the puddles were inches deep. There were a few places that weren’t underwater but still, we were lucky that the ocean hadn’t come flowing back in to drown us. There wasn’t a tall building in sight. If the water came back, there wouldn’t be anywhere we could hide.
“Whoa!” Gage said. He started jogging to the right, glancing back at me every few seconds. “Check it out.” His eyes widened with excitement. “Bikes!”
I was excited about the bikes but I was more excited by the fact that Gage had spotted them from half a block away.
“Gage,” I said but he didn’t respond.
He kneeled down and started looking over the bikes… spinning the wheels and turning the pedals. It was almost as if he’d never seen one before.
He stood and placed his hands on his hips. “This is really going to help us out, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, it is,” I said stepping up beside him. I couldn’t take my eyes off him and he couldn’t take his off the bikes. I placed my hand gently on his shoulder. “Gage?”
“Hmm?” he said turning to look at me with a smile from ear to ear stretched across his face.
“You saw those bikes from way over there?” I asked.
Gage blinked several times, as if he was trying to make sense of my words. It was like they hadn’t entered his ears in the right order.
“Yeah, I guess I did,” he said.
“Your vision is improving every day,” I said.
Gage chuckled. “Maybe. It’s still blurry. I think I’m just getting more used to it. Recognizing shapes better.”
“Or maybe it really is improving,” I said.
“Either way, we now have bikes,” Gage said. “We will be able to travel so much faster now.”
I nodded. “Too bad they weren’t horses.”
“Horses, huh? Never even crossed my mind,” Gage said. “Guess the bikes will have to do until we can find some horses.”
We took the bikes and headed down the road. Gage rode like he was a twelve-year-old on his way to his best friend’s house.
The miles went by much quicker but still, I wasn’t about to get my hopes up. If the water kept rising, our bikes wouldn’t suffice. Eventually, we’d need to find a boat.
“Look at that thing,” Gage said pointing as he coasted forward. “It’s a beast!”
It took a few seconds for me to realize the big lump wasn’t swamp weeds and rocks. There was a massive alligator strolling through one of the larger puddles… or technically, it might have been a pond.
“I guess not everything was pulled into the ocean,” Gage said.
“Yeah, we need to be more careful,” I said. “That thing could rip us in two in a matter of seconds.”
“We need a weapon of some kind,” Gage said.
I stared at him. Not because I was shocked at the idea but surprised, I hadn’t thought of it sooner. We had no idea what kinds of things we were going to run into.
“I have an idea,” Gage said riding next to me. “Something I saw on TV once. We can fashion these spears with knives and like broomsticks or something.”
“How do you attach it to the stick?” I asked.
“You slice the wood in the middle, stick the knife in, and then you can tie rope around it or duct tape would probably work too,” Gage said, his eyebrows rising. “We can also make these like spears for catching fish. They are like these four prongs carved out of the wood and you sharpen the ends to points.”
We started stopping at more places to check kitchens for knives. It didn’t take us long to find what we needed.
Gage was able to fashion a spear in less than thirty minutes. He tested it out and was surprised by how sturdy it was.
“You’ll want to aim for the back of its head,” Gage said handing me the first spear.
“You know far too much about this,” I said shaking my head.
“I watched a lot of TV, I guess. Maybe too much. All the jumbled pieces in my brain are starting to come together somewhat,” Gage said. “If you have to spear it, make sure you’re going to kill it otherwise you’ll just make the thing even more angry.”
I chewed my lip. “I hope I won’t have to use this at all.”
“Me too,” Gage said. “But we’re better off having something than nothing.”
I pushed at the handle of the knife we’d found and made sure it was securely wedged into the wooden stick. It didn’t budge.
The spear was a lot lighter than I thought it would be but I had to hope that if we got in trouble with an alligator, it would get the job done.
After Gage finished with the second spear, he used the rope to create a strap so that we’d be able to bike with the spears on our backs.
I don’t know what would have happened to me if I wouldn’t have been stuck with Gage. Maybe I’d saved him when the big wave came rolling in but he was the one keeping me alive each day since.
“What’s wrong?” Gage asked when he noticed I was staring at my feet.
“Nothing,” I said. “I’m just glad I’m with you is all.”
Gage chuckled. He looked at me for a long moment and his smile faded. “Wait, you’re serious.”
“Yeah.” I swallowed hard. “You made a fire. You created weapons. I hate to think where I’d be if you weren’t with me.”
“Aw shucks,” Gage said lightly hitting my arm with his closed fist. “I wouldn’t be here at all if it weren’t for you.”
“That was luck. This stuff you’re doing… well, that’s a skill.”
Gage shrugged. “You are giving me far too much credit. I’m just trying stuff.”
“You haven’t given up,” I said.
Giving up would have been easy to do. In fact, if Gage hadn’t needed me to help him see, things might have gone a lot differently.
“We’re not going to give up,” Gage said. “Let’s get moving.”
A gentle roll of thunder filled the silence between us. The rain hadn’t changed its steady pace and I hadn’t seen lightning. If there was a storm, it was off in the distance.
The puddles on the road continued to get deeper. It didn’t seem as though there was going to be an end in sight to the rain.
I was glad Gage wasn’t going to give up but I wasn’t sure I had the confidence he had. It wasn’t like I would just give up but something would happen sooner or later that would force us to throw in the towel.
There wasn’t anyone else around. It was just the alligators and us. How would we survive once our food ran out? It wasn’t like we
could just plant a garden. There weren’t wild animals wandering around except for the alligators, which I already knew we didn’t want to mess with unless we needed to defend ourselves.
There was so much we were going to have to figure out that it was overwhelming. Giving up would have been easy.
But as long as I had Gage at my side, I couldn’t give up. I had to keep pushing my feet down on the peddles.
22
Joss
When morning came, I was surprised. I was frozen but I was alive.
“Caleb,” I said shaking him awake. He didn’t move. If I hadn’t seen his slow breathing, I would have thought he was dead. “Caleb!”
“What?” he said his eyes popping wide open.
“Sorry,” I said in a soothing voice. “I didn’t mean to startle you. It’s morning.”
Caleb looked at me for several seconds. It was like he had no idea where he was or who I was.
“Dammit,” he said.
I cocked my head to the side.
“I was kind of hoping it was a dream,” he said with a heavy sigh.
“I wish,” I said swallowing hard.
An image of Lexi being pulled away popped into my head. Even though I couldn’t imagine what had happened to my family, I could still hear their voices as they screamed for help.
I coughed and stood to stop myself from bursting into tears. “We should probably get moving, right?”
“You know,” Caleb said getting to his feet. He brushed off his bottom but it was stained with mud. “I never had a chance to wish you a happy birthday with everything that had been going on.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I didn’t even remember myself. Birthdays seem a little silly to even think about now.”
“Maybe,” Caleb said with a shrug. “But I got you something.”
My eyes narrowed. “When?”
“Before all this,” Caleb said. “It’s not a big deal but you should have it, otherwise it’ll just be in my pocket forever.”
“What is it?” I asked.
“Well, I’m not going to tell you,” Caleb said pulling out a small flat box from his back pocket. “It’s nothing that special or anything.”
The Reset Series (Book 1): Flood Page 11