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“Mm hmm, just what I wanted after a hard day’s work! Beef jerky and trail mix. This sure will hit the spot.” Josh joked sarcastically.

No one was happy with the supper but they all understood it was better to be cautious about advertising what supplies they had. As they were eating, they discussed what their plan was for the next day. Looking at the map and trying to figure out distances wasn’t all that easy. Alex couldn’t help wishing for Google earth to zoom in and see what was ahead of them.

She wondered if she would ever see a working computer with internet again, or if someday her future children would. It was those thoughts that finally brought the whole situation home for Alex. She had to quickly leave the table and race for the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before throwing up what little she had eaten. Alex flushed the toilet and splashed some water on her face. She stood shaking in front of the mirror trying to get herself under control.

A knock on the door and Dara came in, “Are you alright Alex?”

Staring at Dara through the mirror Alex let out all she was thinking. “No more Google, no cars, no planes, no grocery stores, malls, cell phones, Facebook, new jeans, prom, Glee, no more iTunes and damn it, we will never see the last Twilight movie.” she ended with a half laugh half sob. Dara’s eyes had gotten wider as Alex listed the things that were gone.

“Oh My God! I think I’m going to puke.” She covered her mouth.

“Feel free, I already did.” Alex told her. “It just hit me. We’ve been go go going since the moment this happened that I finally realized that it’s done. All the things in our lives that we took for granted everyday are over. If we want music we’ll have to make it. If we want food we’ll have to grow it. It’s like we just got cast in a really bad Pioneer Village reality show.”

“Oh shit, do you think we’ll end up sister wives, pumping out babies and farming?” Dara exclaimed.

Alex couldn’t help it. It was all too much to process and she burst out laughing and couldn’t stop, even with tears rolling down her face. Dara started giggling and they both ended up howling with laughter and holding onto each other. The boys must have thought that they had lost it because none of them came to check on them. After they settled down and caught their breath they washed their faces and went back out to the main room.

All the guys were staring at them, afraid to say anything, and that set the girls off laughing again. The table had been put back and the food cleared away. There were two mugs of steaming hot chocolate sitting on the night stand between the beds and the girls immediately claimed them, sitting back on one bed to drink.

“Sooo, you guys ok?” Quinn asked. When Alex and Dara only nodded he continued. “Alright, Cooper is taking first watch until midnight, then me until three AM and then Josh until six. You two can have tonight off and take a turn tomorrow night. Josh will wake us in the morning and we should try to be out of here by six thirty. Hopefully the drunks won’t cause any trouble and will be sleeping it off when we get away from here. I say we bike for an hour and then stop and cook a good breakfast. We are aiming for somewhere between the two small towns, Yermo and Baker for the end of the day. That’s only the best guess we can make. It will depend on how the road is and what we run into on the way. It’s going uphill a lot so that will slow us down. We also have to be careful about our water and keep an eye out to fill it up whenever we can. We’re really lucky it’s only April so it’s hot during the day but not scorching. That’s about it. We should get to sleep as soon as we can, tomorrow is going to be even harder than today was.” he finished.

Alex and Dara made up two more mugs of hot chocolate for Josh and Quinn and Alex put a little more water on the camp stove for Cooper to have his on watch. When Quinn and Josh finished their drinks they laid down on the double bed closest to the door. Alex and Dara climbed on the other bed and settled down to sleep.

Alex was so tired that she thought she would be asleep in a second. The belly full of warm chocolate and soft bed should have done the trick but she couldn’t stop thinking. Her thoughts were full of her parents and brother. “What was happening at home? Were they all ok or hurt? What if they were driving at the time and had a crash?” After a hundred what ifs Alex couldn’t bear it anymore and switched her thoughts to Emily. “Where was her best friend right now? Did they make it to a boat? Would she be ok with the jerks she was traveling with?” Alex couldn’t stop thinking and didn’t think she would be able to sleep. After tossing and turning she gave up and just stared up at the ceiling.

She could hear Josh snoring and Quinn’s breathing and Cooper shifting on his chair by the window. Just as she thought she might as well get up and do something like fill the water bottles in the bathroom, she felt her hand being held. Dara gave Alex’s hand a squeeze of comfort and then just held it in the dark. Alex realized that her parents and best friend might be far away but she had a friend right beside her, one that she didn’t even know she had been missing so much. With that thought, Alex fell asleep still holding her friend’s hand.

Chapter 7

Everything must have been quiet during the night because when Alex woke up, there was a soft light coming in around the curtains and everyone was still asleep except for Josh by the window. Tilting her watch she saw that it was ten minutes to six and decided to get up. She tried to quietly slide off the bed but as soon as she stood up a groan came out at the pain in her legs and butt. Alex staggered to the bathroom trying not to whimper and it was made harder by Josh’s muffled laughter. He obviously knew just how sore she was because sitting on the bathroom counter was a container of Advil and a bottle of water. Alex imagined that they all would be starting their day with the painkiller. While waiting for the drugs to kick in Alex put the lid down and sat on the toilet seat beside the tub. She started filling up the gallon jugs from the tub and topping up the bike water bottles. Once that was done she limped back out to the main room and grabbed some dried fruit and half a power bar to eat. Having thrown up her supper last night she was starving. The food took the edge off but she was definitely looking forward to a big camping breakfast down the road. They had enough food for all of them to eat for five days and after that they would have to start looking elsewhere. It would be a good idea to stop in a small town today and see if they could still buy some food. Alex still had almost two thousand dollars in her pocket and they might get lucky in a small town.

The others were all up by then and Quinn was passing out foldable camping toothbrushes that the girls had grabbed at the last minute from the store. It didn’t take long to pack the trailers back up and Dara came out of the bathroom with an extra toilet paper roll and stuffed it into her pack. Then they quietly wheeled the bikes out to the parking lot and hooked up the trailers. Alex went back in and did a quick last check of the room to make sure they didn’t forget anything. The pillows on the beds were tempting but with no extra room she wistfully left them and closed the door. Just as Alex turned from the door to get on her bike the older man that had lent them his bucket came out of his room. He lit a cigarette and walked over to the group.

In a lowered voice he asked, “Getting an early start, aren’t you?”

Quinn seemed to think about it and replied, “Sir if I could give you some advice, things are going to get really bad. We came from Disneyland yesterday and nothing’s moving. Planes fell out of the sky and burned with no one trying to put out the fires. We saw two policemen who had been shot. It’s going to be even worse today. People are going to get scared and scared people do stupid things. No one is coming to help. I don’t think anyone can come to help. You need to get out of here. There’s no food here and when those drunken guys realize that there are no cops around, it could get ugly. You should check with the lady that runs this place and see if she has anything with wheels like a stroller, wagon or even a grocery cart and fill it with as much water as you can and then the four of you should head to the closest town.”

The man puffed on his smoke and then dropped it and ground it out with his shoe before replying, “I think you nailed it son. I didn’t sleep much last night thinking about it. I appreciate you warning me and I’m going to wake up the girls and get moving. Good luck to you kids. I hope you make it to wherever you are headed.” and with that he nodded at the group and went back into his room.

As they biked out onto the road Josh started singing, “On the road again. Just can’t wait to get on the road again.” which was met by a chorus of “Shut ups.”

For the first ten minutes it was very slow going. Everyone was feeling the effects in their legs from the day before but once their muscles warmed up it got easier. As they biked down the road Alex asked the group about stopping to buy food.

“If we stop at the first small town or service station we come to we might still be able to buy more food. Yesterday most people would have been waiting for help to come and still be fairly calm. As time goes by today, people are going to start to panic and make a run to stock up on supplies. If we stop early enough we might get in before the panic.”

“I think you’re right Alex.” Cooper said and the others agreed. “Let’s watch for a small town with a grocery. Service stations will have been overrun yesterday and most only have small amounts of grocery items. They mainly stock junk food. A small town food store will be better.”

As their muscles warmed up they started making better time. There were lots of dead cars on the road but some had been able to pull off before crashing, leaving space for the bikers to get through. They passed by a few service stations with fast food restaurants and gas stations, but they kept going. Not many people were out and about but it was still fairly early in the morning. About eight o’clock they started seeing road signs for a town ahead, advertising privately owned diners and small businesses with nothing showing for the bigger chain stores. They biked past the exits and stopped about a mile past on a service road.

Quinn opened the conversation with his ideas, “I don’t think we should all go into the town. Two of us should stay here with the bike trailers and three should go in. One person needs to stay outside the store to guard the bikes and two to go in and get what they can. Dara I think you should stay here with me. It’s hard to say how nervous the people in town are and with your hair they might judge you as a wild child.”

Dara was pissed off at that but understood that there are a lot of small minded people in the world and her punkish hair colour might make them wary. “Fine, but if it’s going to be a problem then Alex, get me a hair dye kit and we can do camping beauty salon when we stop tonight.” she said in a huff.

“Hey, I like your hair the way it is!” Josh defended with a smile.

“Thanks Josh, but Quinn’s right. Getting home is going to be hard enough without us having to worry about small town red necks getting bent out of shape over blue streaked hair.” Dara conceded.

“Sorry Dara and thanks for understanding. We’ll stay here and try to repack the trailers to make room for anything you guys get. Empty out your back packs and saddle bags so you can fill them up in the store. Try for dried food and easy make stuff and get some drug store things if they have any. Try to go fast and be very polite, it might make a difference. Josh, keep the jokes to a minimum. These people may be trigger happy and we need to be in and out as fast as we can. So make like a good little farm boy and say “Yes Ma’am” and “No Sir” to everyone you see.” Quinn warned.

“Hey, I can be respectable when I want to be!” Josh protested.

Everyone laughed and started to empty out their packs. Alex was half nervous, half excited to be going into a town. Other than the sports store they had shopped at yesterday, they had been avoiding contact with other people as much as possible. She hoped that they could get what they needed without any trouble. They helped Quinn and Dara move their bikes and trailers further off the road so they wouldn’t be seen and then headed back towards the town.

Cooper and Josh both had guns tucked away where they couldn’t be seen and Alex had her can of mace. Entering the town they were surprised to hear the sound of a truck engine. They followed the sound until they came to the main business section of the town where an old pickup truck was dropping men off up and down the street. The men all had hunting rifles or shot guns and were setting up to guard each of the business on the street. The men all watched as the kids biked past but they didn’t confront them.

They biked into the parking lot of a fair sized grocery store that also had a pharmacy inside. There was a small line up at the main doors and six armed men blocking the way. Two of the guards were wearing sheriff uniforms and were talking to each person in line before passing them through. The kids parked their bikes off to the side in a bike rack and Josh stayed with them as Alex and Cooper got into line.

There was a commotion at the front of the line and Alex heard a man shouting at the guard. “I’m good for it and you know it!” She couldn’t hear what the guard said to the man but he stormed away from the store.

Alex and Cooper exchanged worried looks. Alex was afraid that the guards were only letting locals in and that they would be turned away. When they finally got to the front of the line the guard looked them up and down and said, “I don’t believe I’ve seen you kids before.”

“No sir, we biked in. We would like to buy some food for our family please.” Cooper told the guard with a respectful tone. Alex gave the guard a small hopeful smile.

It seemed like forever that the guard considered them when he finally nodded. “Cash only.”

Alex was quick to agree, “Yes Sir, we have money.”

“Let’s see it. Everybody has to show that they have cash or they don’t get in.”

Alex pulled out the five hundred dollars she had in her pocket and Cooper did the same. They had split the money between them before coming into town.