Sky on Fire

“Shhh!” I said to Chloe.

“And to think I even ever liked you, Dean!” she was yelling.

“Chloe, shut up!” I shouted. “Look at Luna!”

And then Luna took off like a shot.

I hollered to Astrid as we followed Luna.

* * *

Luna raced toward the Kitchen.

“Who’s there?” I shouted as I approached.

I tried to sound firm, but my voice broke.

She kept running into the Kitchen and barking at something behind the main counter, then running back to me.

“Who’s there?”

There wasn’t any sound. Not any human sound.

Suddenly Luna stood stock-still, one front leg pulled up into her body and her nose aimed under the stove.

“What’s wrong with Luna?” Chloe screamed.

What was she doing? I didn’t know.

“She’s pointing,” Astrid said, coming at us from the direction of the Food aisles. “Luna’s just pointing. There’s some kind of animal under there.”

She was pointing! You think about a hunting dog pointing, like a golden retriever or a Lab. Not a fluffy little puffball like our Luna.

I shined my flashlight under the stove and, sure enough, I saw two small red eyes shining back at me.

“It’s a rat,” I said.

“Ew!” the kids screamed.

“Can I see it?” Chloe asked.

“Stay back,” I commanded. “Just stay back.”

“I’ll go get a trap,” Astrid said. “Or two … or twenty.”

“Yeah” I said. “Good thinking.”

“Don’t kill it!” Chloe protested. “We should catch it and keep it for a pet.”

“No,” I said. “That’s a horrible idea.”

“No, it’s not, Dean,” she spat. “I’m going to catch him and then we can tame him and have him as a pet!” she bragged to Caroline and Henry.

“But we already have a pet. We have Luna,” Caroline objected.

“You can never have too many pets, dingball!”

“Chloe, you stay away from that rat. Astrid’s bringing back a trap.”

But the little twerp went over to the counter and picked up a cardboard box full of straws and dumped them on the ground.

“Come on, I’ll get it out with that broom, and, Henry, you scoop it up with this box!”

“Chloe! Get away from there!”

She just wasn’t paying any attention to me at all! I went over and grabbed her arm. I didn’t want to blow my top, but really, I’d had enough of her.

“You don’t get to tell me what to do, you traitor,” Chloe yelled.

She broke out of my grip and slammed against the stove.

The rat came out, like a streak, and ran right toward Caroline. Luna barked like crazy and attacked it.

Caroline screamed and took a step back, but the rat and Luna got all tangled up with Caroline’s legs, and somehow, that godforsaken rat bit Caroline.

Then, finally, Luna got that rat between her jaws and shook the life out of it.

Chloe and Henry and Caroline were all screaming. I grabbed Caroline and lifted her into my arms. She was clutching her leg.

Luna dropped the rat at my feet and sat down.

“Bad dog! Bad dog,” Chloe screamed at Luna. “We were supposed to catch it, not kill it.”

Luna cowered away from Chloe.

“Shut up, Chloe,” I hollered. “That stupid rat bit Caroline! If you’d just have left it alone, none of this would have happened.”

Chloe started a different type of wailing now—a you-hurt-my-feelings kind of cry.

Luna began to lick her wounds.

“It’s not my fault!” Chloe sobbed.

But it was. It totally was.

“What happened?” Astrid yelled, rushing back with the now-useless traps.

* * *

Astrid shined the way for me as I carried Caroline back to the Train.

There were first-aid supplies right in the living room.

The wound was small. Two sets of puncture marks. It was more of a nip than a bite, really.

I cleaned it with Bactine and applied some antibacterial ointment and a big neon-orange Band-Aid.

Caroline’s freckled face was pale and tear streaked.

She and her brother were so dreamy, most of the time.

Sometimes I had the feeling that they didn’t really know where they were, even, or understand how serious the situation was.

They were five years old.

Five.

“I hate rats,” she said to me quietly.

“Everyone does. They’re horrible.”

“I’m glad it’s dead,” she choked out.

Her face was twisted up.

“I don’t care if God will be angry at me. I’m glad it’s dead.”

I hugged her to me.

“God’s not mad at you, Caroline,” I told her.

But I had the thought that if you were a person who believed in God, and you lived in Monument, Colorado, in the fall of ’24 you really had to wonder.

* * *

We tried to clean Luna’s wounds but she scooted between the back of the futon couch and the wall of the Train.

Astrid had gathered a shopping cart full of lights that ran on batteries.

To Henry’s and Caroline’s delight, and Chloe’s, once she stopped pouting, there were some battery-powered Christmas tree lights.

Astrid let them string them up all over the walls of the Living Room.

I was rooting through the cart, trying to find batteries for the lanterns when I felt Astrid’s hand on my shoulder.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey,” I answered. I’m cool like that.

“Can I talk to you?”

“Sure,” I said.

She nodded me toward the Train.

I went in, bringing a lantern. I hadn’t been in the Train in … how long? More than twenty-four hours, to be sure.

It was easy to remember that these had been the dressing rooms of the Greenway, before they became our sleeping quarters. They still looked pretty commercial, no matter how homey Josie had tried to make them when she redecorated.

On the doors to the rooms were written the names of the kids who’d slept there.

“Max, Batiste, and Ulysses” read the door to my right in Josie’s handwriting.

That made me feel sad and scared. I missed Josie. I missed all of them.

Astrid followed my gaze.

“Do you think they could be there yet?” Astrid asked me.

“Maybe. I sure as hell hope so.”

“Yeah, me, too,” Astrid said. She was looking down at her feet. She was still wearing the knit hat I’d given her after she’d had me cut her hair.

I smiled, remembering that moment—probably the only nice thing she and I had ever shared.

Suddenly Astrid looked up and the glow from the lantern lit up her face.

A gleam of gold glinted off her nose ring. The nose ring made her look cool, but also a little fierce, too.

I must have been staring at her, wondering what she would look like without it.

“I’m not going to sleep with you,” she said.

And I nearly swallowed my heart.

“Wh-what?” I stammered.

“I just want you to know. I figured you might think that because you stayed, I would, like, sleep with you. And I’m not going to.”

Then she turned and walked out of the Train.

* * *

I just stood there like an idiot, with my mouth on the floor, for at least ten minutes.

Then I got angry.

* * *

I caught up with her in the Kitchen. She was starting to go through the shelves, pulling out food we didn’t need to heat up to be able to eat.

“Astrid, I never expected you to sleep with me! I never said anything about that. I would never think or expect something like that!”

“Fine,” she said. “Good. Then we’re straight.”

“I stayed because you were right. It was too dangerous for the other kids, to have us with them. And I stayed because you told me you’re pregnant. And staying was the decent thing to do.”

“And I’m grateful,” she said, overarticulating her words, like she thought I was an idiot. “But I’m not going to sleep with you just because I’m grateful.”

“I can’t believe you’re saying this,” I stammered. “Do you think I’m some kind of animal?”

“I just wanted to get the facts straight,” she said, turning her back on me.

“Well, they’re straight.”

“Good,” she said, returning to her sorting. “I’m glad to hear that.”

I was furious. She was acting so cold and so …

I don’t know. I turned and walked away.

Had I been nursing a dream we’d get together and fall in love, and one day, one day far in the future, maybe we’d have sex?

Yes. Dur. Of course I had. That’s what you do when you have a horrible crush on someone.

Now it felt like she was calling it out. Just saying it right in the open. It wasn’t kind and it wasn’t fair.

I stormed away into the dark, messy aisles of our stupid, commercial refuge.

I needed a project.

CHAPTER FOUR

ALEX

53–42 MILES

Niko had blisters coming up all over his face. I guess the mask got pushed to the side during the fight with Josie.

I guess the blisters were in his mouth, too. Or his lungs.

Niko rooted around in the plastic storage tub of medicines and found a bottle of Children’s Benadryl.

He broke the seal and chugged straight from the bottle.

“Can’t drive,” he gasped. “We’ll rest. Ten minutes.”

He slumped in a seat and bowed his head, trying to breathe.

“Can we take our masks off?” Max asked.

“NO!” Sahalia and I both shouted at once.

“Only people who are type B can take their masks off,” Sahalia said.

“Who’s that again?” asked Batiste.

“You and me and Alex,” Sahalia said, rolling her eyes.