Waterfall

by Amber Garr

  “Zach, you’re here,” I breathed.

  “Family friends,” my dad must have explained to Josh.

  Josh muttered something about my mom’s ankle, and I briefly sensed him leaving the seat beside me. Zach instantly sat down, hands never leaving my body. “Are you okay?” he asked. Replacing Josh’s assessment, Zach began to look at every injury.

  “Yes, just hit my head a little too hard I think.”

  Zach pulled me into a hug again, speaking to my parents over my shoulder. “Is she really okay?”

  “Josh thinks so,” my dad said.

  “Who’s Josh?” Zach asked a little sharp.

  “One of the deserters. An EMT.”

  Zach scoffed and then pulled back just far enough to look me in the eyes. “I’m so glad you’re here.” He hesitated just one moment more before pressing his lips to mine. In my stupor, I let the warmth of his touch seep over my skin like a healing spell. With eyes closed, and heart racing, I let myself slip into the kiss.

  Someone cleared their throat, and Zach and I smiled at each other. I could feel the blush, but I didn’t care.

  “Welcome,” a petite redheaded woman said to all of us. “We’re glad you all made it,” she said with sincerity. “There’s a cave about a mile up the path. We’ll be heading there at dusk.”

  “Thank you,” my dad said. “We’re really grateful.”

  The woman nodded and walked away with that giant man following closely behind. “So what do we do now?” I asked anyone who would answer.

  “Well, looks like we have a place to stay,” David said, and I smiled at Zach’s parents.

  “At least they talk to us,” Zach grumbled.

  His parents checked on my mom, and that left just the two of us sitting alone on the strangely flat boulder.

  “Maybe it won’t be so bad,” I said only to Zach. He kissed my forehead and pulled me into another embrace.

  “We can survive this,” he said.

  And for the first time today, I believed that maybe we would.

  Survival didn’t come easy. At least not for those of us on the run.

  In the one year that we’d left the comfort of home, we’d faced, endured, and suffered devastating losses. Both of our fathers had been missing for three months now. They’d left for a supply run, the day after my birthday, and never returned. I’d volunteered to help search for them, but no matter how many times we’d retraced their steps, they’d simply seemed to vanish into thin air. Max thought the government had taken them, but Sasha argued it was the other deserters. Others like us who, despite being on the same team, now fought with each other just as much as we rebelled against the government soldiers. And at this point, we’d already traveled hundreds of miles away, giving up all hope that Vee and I would ever see our fathers again.

  “Is she going to be okay?” Josh asked.

  So deep in thought, I hadn’t even heard him approach. I shook my head. “I don’t know.” As I stood on the small hill overlooking our camp, my heart broke for Vee. Down in the little nook we currently called home, Vee sat with her mom who was dying of pneumonia.

  “I suppose there’s a part of me that should be thankful I lost my parents before the war,” Josh said.

  Snapping my head to look at him, I noticed the sadness etched in the lines around his eyes. When did he get those? “You’re an orphan?” I asked.

  Josh sighed. “Yeah. Like you.”

  Pain clenched at my chest. My mother only made it two months on the run before she was killed. We’d buried her somewhere in West Virginia. Max and my dad hunted down the man who took her from us, but he refused to tell me what they did to him. At the time, I just wanted him dead. But after my father disappeared, I found it hard to even feel anything anymore. Instead I worked with Max every morning, sweating out my anger and training to be a better fighter so that I could protect the most important person left in my life now.

  “How?” I asked after a brief pause.

  “Car accident,” Josh said, knowing what I meant.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  We both watched over Vee like her guardian angels. Josh’s interest in her bordered on irritating, but each time I would find them together, I’d have to remind myself that he was simply another person that wanted to see her safe. And that was a good thing. Even if I wished they weren’t such good friends.

  Josh suddenly began to cough, a jolting sound in the relative silence of the forest around us. He hunched over, the croup sounding painful with each exhalation. After a minute, he finally sucked in a deep breath and wiped at his mouth.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Yeah, just a cough.”

  Considering that Valerie was not the first of our group to get deathly sick, I wondered how long Josh hadn’t been feeling well. With the damp weather, a miserably cold autumn, and no medicine, our immune systems had been put into overdrive. We’d already lost one last week, and I feared Valerie wasn’t going to be with us much longer.

  As though hearing my thoughts, Vee lifted her head and looked up at me from the distance. Her hand rested on her mother’s forehead, and even from here I could see the tears in her eyes. She shook her head ever so slightly, and I took that as my cue.

  “I’m going to go check on her,” I said to Josh as I began my descent through the dirt and leaves. Josh didn’t reply, but he didn’t follow me either. I wondered if he worried about his own health. One of the first symptoms seemed to be the cough.

  I jumped across several larger rocks in the creek that trickled past us. Even here, this far away from the major nuclear blasts, wildlife was scarce. With no communication to the outside world, it was hard to assess just how bad the damage had been. But we rarely saw the sun anymore from the dust in the air, and the closer we’d get to a city, the more death would seep out from its core. Dead trees, poisoned streams, maybe a lone bird…evidence of the nuclear war that couldn’t be contained. This was our world now.

  I knew the time to raid another government check point was getting closer, but I wondered how one more loss would hurt the morale of the group. We were barely holding it together as it was. A supply run that ended in losses might just break the proverbial straw. Tensions between each other grew as fast as the sickness had spread. Those that weren’t avoiding the sick were busy arguing with each other over the best course of action. Sasha barely had control anymore.

  “I need to get out of here,” Vee said as I reached her side.

  Looking down at her mom, I noticed her short, choppy breath moving in and out of her unhealthy lungs. “Are you sure you should leave?”

  Vee wiped her eyes, trying to hide any sign of emotion. Over this past year, Vee had developed a hardened shell devoid of feelings. I think it was her way of dealing with our life now, but I mourned parts of her I feared were lost forever. I guess I feared those human parts of me were long gone too.

  “There’s nothing I can do right now. She’s sleeping. And I need some air.”

  I looked around at our outdoor camp even though I knew what she meant. She needed to be away from everything. “Okay, I’ll go tell Max that we’re going for a walk.”

  Vee nodded, and several minutes later when I rejoined her, she’d collected her sword and stood at the edge of the creek. “She’s not going to make it through the night,” Vee whispered.

  “Your mom?” I asked and she nodded. Wrapping my arm over her shoulder, I tried to think of something to say that would comfort her. But there was nothing. Nothing that could ease the pain of watching someone you love die. I knew that now. Too many of us did.

  Vee shrugged off my arm and jumped over the rocks to reach the other edge. As we climbed up the hill and left the camp behind, I followed, giving her some space. Once we reached flat land, she started jogging through the trees. I let her run, and when she abruptly stopped and swung her sword at an unsuspecting sapling, I finally said so
mething.

  “Vee!” She continued to swing so I kept my distance. “Vee, stop.”

  “I hate it!” she screamed.

  “Hate what?”

  “This place! This whole fucking world. I hate it!” The sword fell from her furious grip as she dropped to the ground. Knees grinding into dirt, her sobs echoed around the trees. With tear-stained cheeks, she looked up at me as though I had all the answers. “How much longer do we have to live like this?”

  Kneeling down beside her, I squeezed her trembling body. “Forever,” I whispered.

  “I don’t think I can, Zach,” she mumbled into my chest. “I don’t want to live like this forever.”

  “Well, you don’t have a choice, Vee, because I’m not letting you go.”

  Her shoulders shook as she cried. I knew this was about her mom but I couldn’t help ask the same questions. At what point would some normalcy be restored to the world? When would civilization be…civilized again?

  “Sometimes I wish we could just give in,” she finally said.

  “Give in?”

  Vee lifted her head and stared out into the forest. “Give up. Stop fighting and let fate do what she will with us.”

  “You mean give up and die?” I snapped. “Because I’m pretty sure that’s the exact opposite of what your parents would have wanted you to do!”

  At the mention of her mom, Vee pushed away from me. “How dare you?” she spat. “You have no right!”

  “Stop complaining and think about it, Vee!”

  “Shut up, Zach!”

  “Are you mad?” I yelled right back at her.

  “Yes!”

  “Good! Now stop feeling sorry for yourself!”

  “Fuck you!”

  “Fuck you, too!” I caught the hint of a smile skirt across her face and I had to chuckle. “Are you finished now?”

  “No, I’m mad at you,” she said a little softer, a tiny glimpse of amusement in her eyes.

  “It’s not me you’re mad at, Vee.”

  “I know.” She stood, lifting her sword off the ground in the process. “I just don’t know what I’m going to do without her.”

  Stepping forward, she let me pull her close again, her back resting against my chest. “You’ll survive. Just like you always do,” I said.

  Vee reached up and clasped my hand resting on her shoulder. “I’m tired of surviving,” she said.

  “But you’re good at it.” I kissed the top of her forehead, smiling when she nestled closer to me. “Plus, I need you to take care of me.”

  Her shoulders bounced in laughter a second before we heard the scream in the distance. A child’s scream, high-pitched and terrifying, broke the relative silence around us. The hair on the back of my neck stood up in warning.

  “What the hell was that?” I asked, stepping away from Vee and grabbing a knife in each hand.

  Vee glanced at me, then looked at my weapons and shook her head. “Do you even know what you’re going to do with those?”

  While I was happy to see Vee’s snarky wit return, I was more concerned with the horrifying scream we’d just heard. “We need to help him.”

  “How do you know it was a him?” Vee asked while I ran past her.

  Light footsteps followed closely behind as I dashed through the trees and toward the scream. A few seconds later, we heard the sound again, and I quickly readjusted my path off to the right.

  “Zach, wait!” Vee shouted. “You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into—”

  I lifted my hand to stop her protests. “Did you hear that?”

  She shook her head and we both paused in silence. And then the distinct rumble of an animal’s growl overpowered the stillness.

  “Dogs?” Vee mouthed and I shrugged. Dogs or coyotes would have been my guess. Last I’d heard, all of the wolves that had been pushed east were now extinct.

  “Help me!” A small, frightened voiced called out from somewhere nearby.

  “Jesus,” Vee mumbled as we tried to pinpoint the noise.

  I took a few steps forward, noticing how the ground sloped down toward a steep drop-off. In the distance, I heard running water. A waterfall maybe? A large branch snapped somewhere over the cliff and the child screamed again. The dogs barked and growled, the sound tearing through me like a knife.

  “Where is he?” Vee called out, peering over the edge while she hung on a rotten tree stump. “I can’t see anything.”

  Wondering if Vee’s panicked look mirrored my own, I shouted into the air, “Where are you?”

  My voice echoed through the valley, the only noise filling the void. Until he cried out. “Down here! Help me!”

  With a quick glance at Vee, I scrambled to find us an easy way down to the boy. “There!” I pointed to a barely-there animal path that zigzagged back and forth over the steep embankment. As we slid and tripped down through the woods, we still couldn’t see the boy. He’d screamed several more times, the savage growling getting louder the closer we got. It wasn’t until we ran around a group of boulders jutting out from the side of the mountain did we get truly understand the gravity of the situation.

  A boy, no more than seven or eight, clung to the lowest branch of a naked pine tree as a pack of six dogs surrounded their prey. They snarled, and jumped, and growled at him like an irresistible piece of meat dangling from a hook. The boy’s eyes were red and swollen from crying, but he’d wrapped his arms and legs around the branch to keep as much of him as possible off the ground. One of his shoes had fallen off, the dogs already ripping it to shreds. A red sneaker.

  “Help me,” he cried when he spotted us. His blondish hair hadn’t been cut in a while and his clothes were dirty. Too young to be this way, the kid was a survivor.

  “Hang on!” I shouted back, drawing the attention of the dogs.

  “Zach?” Vee asked quietly, shifting from side to side and waving the sword back and forth in front of her. “I really don’t want to do this,” she whispered.

  One of the dogs, a black, ratty looking one that appeared to be the leader, focused his yellow eyes on me. His lip turned up in a snarl, the hair rising along his hackles. When he took a step forward, the others caught on to his intentions.

  “I’m afraid we have to,” I said to Vee, my eyes never leaving the alpha male. Somewhere in my brain I thought I remembered learning that you weren’t supposed to challenge a dominant dog. But I wasn’t about to roll over and submit, and even from here, I could see the boy’s muscles shaking with fatigue. “Get out of here!” I yelled. Waving my arms above my head, I stomped my feet against the ground trying to intimidate.

  The black dog growled at me, drool dripping from his mouth in a froth of white, bubbly liquid. I took another step forward. “Go! Don’t make me stab you!”

  Behind me, Vee huffed. I’d yell at her for that later. All six dogs now bore their ferocious gazes on me and Vee. I slowly reached to my sides, finding the interior pockets of my jacket where I stored my knives. I only had three left now. At one point I’d been up to five. The short, smooth hilts felt welcomed in my hands, and when I pulled them free, I let the light catch their deadly meaning. Not that the dogs would actually understand that. I think Vee made another noise at my attempt at dominance.

  “Wait! Don’t—” Vee shouted at the boy who had started to lower his legs to the ground. At her words, the dogs turned and set their sights on the child again. In less than a second, they tore after him again.

  He screamed when the first dog sank his teeth into his pant leg, but with the way the boy pulled free, I guessed it had only captured fabric. Before I even knew what we were doing, Vee and I were running toward the tree. Vee’s long legs beat me there and with a swing of the large broadsword, she effectively placed herself between the lead dog and the boy.

  “What’s your name?” she shouted at him without turning around.

  “Hunter,” he whimpered.

  “Hunter, just hang on a
little longer, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Vee looked at me and I instantly moved to the other side of Hunter. The three of us stood, or hung, in the center of a battlefield surrounding by animals that only wanted to kill us. Just a typical day now.

  “Go away!” I yelled at the dogs. Only one of them cowered.

  “Get!” Vee shouted.

  The lead dog seemed to size up the situation in a way that felt a little too humanoid. His eyes flitted from me to Hunter to Vee…several times over, weighing his options.

  “Don’t even think about it,” I growled at him and lifted my knife a little higher.

  The dog titled his head, lips spreading even further revealing abnormally sharp canines. He growled, a low rumbling sound that vibrated my entire body.

  And then he attacked.

  Somewhere between the time his paws left the ground and before his teeth sank into my neck, Vee swung her sword. The lethal piece of metal sliced through the air just inches from my arms as I threw them up in defense. A sharp howl, warm liquid, and my own screams filled the air. A moment later I found myself on the ground, covered in blood and holding up the top half of the once alpha male dog. Its tongue lolled out of his mouth, his eyes glazing over in death. I screamed again and tossed the body to the side.

  “Zach I need you!” Vee called out.

  Sitting up, I tried to ignore my spinning head. It took me a second to gather my wits but then I realized that the other five dogs had no intention of leaving quietly. I looked down at the partial body beside me and almost gagged. But then, without a second thought, I picked up the mangled piece of black fur and bloody flesh and tossed it at the rest of his pack.

  “Do you want to end up like this?” I yelled. Vee gave me a look. I guess it probably sounded like I was taking credit for the kill, but really, I didn’t want to have to kill a dog.