Will to Survive (10 page)

He shook his head. “I know it.”

There was a certainty to that odd statement that was shocking.

“Look, I'm old. Let's just leave it at that. All I want to say is, we're going to need people like you—not just to help us survive but to put things back together again.”

“I'd like to think I could be part of it.”

“What I'm talking about is more than you just leading this neighborhood. I think there's a bigger role you're going to play in the future. It's uncertain when it's going to arrive and what it's going to look like, but you're going to be part of shaping it.”

I didn't know what to say to any of that.

Herb smiled. “When that time comes you'll be able to handle it. Of that I'm certain. But in the meantime, I'd like you to stay in the neighborhood, take a break, get some sleep, be sixteen years old again.”

“That actually sounds pretty good to me right now.”

“I'll ask your father to take up the plane tomorrow.”

“You've
already
talked to him about this, haven't you?” I asked.

“I asked if he'd be willing, and of course he said he would.”

“A break would be nice, and then I'll be fine.”

“We all need a little downtime. Yours starts now.”

Herb started walking back toward our house. After a few seconds, I called out to him. He turned around and I pointed to the horizon. The moon had come out from behind some trees. It was big and bright and full.

He waved, and then I stood and watched as he walked away. I noticed a limp I hadn't seen before, and a slight hunch to his back.

I waited until he was lost in the darkness, the sound of his feet against the pavement growing distant and then fading to nothing.

*   *   *

When I arrived Lori was waiting on the front porch of the house where her family was living.

“No flowers tonight?” she asked, looking peeved.

I stammered, trying to spit out an apology.

She broke into laughter and gave me a big hug and a kiss. “I'm kidding, you big goon. The ones you just gave me are still in a vase in my bedroom. You know, giving me flowers really scored big points with my mother. She started giving my father a hard time about when the last time he brought her flowers was. Do you know what he did?”

“Went and got her flowers?” I asked.

“He brought her a bunch of carrots!”

“That's probably better. You can't eat flowers.”

“But you can't get inspired by carrots. My father is not exactly a romantic. I love my flowers.”

She kissed me again. I had to thank Todd once more. I took her hand and we started off to the school where movie night was being held. As we got closer, we were joined by others heading in the same direction.

“Is Todd coming tonight?” Lori asked.

“Nope. He's taking a turn on the south wall.”

“I guess duty calls,” she said. “Speaking of which, when do you have to go up or out?”

“It was supposed to be tomorrow morning.”

“Supposed to be?”

“Herb wants me to take a little vacation. My father is going to go up on recon instead tomorrow, which means I can stay out tonight as long as I want.”

“I like the sound of that. Maybe I could get your father to milk the cows for me as well.”

“I hadn't thought of that. Do you want me to ask him?”

For a split second she seemed to think I was serious.

“You're not the only one who can joke around,” I said to her.

“I guess I can still stay out late and get up early. After all, I'm not having problems sleeping.”

I knew what that meant. “So you're a big part of the ‘everybody' who's worried about me?”

“It's not everybody. You always act like nothing is wrong, so some people don't know you well enough to be worried.”

“I'm sorry you're worried.”

“Don't be sorry. Besides, tonight I'm not worried about anything except this bad movie we're going to watch,” Lori said.

“It's badder than bad. But I thought you wanted to see it?”

“I thought
you
wanted to see it,” she said.

We both laughed.

“I just wanted to spend time with you,” she said. “But I have a better idea. Come with me.”

She led me away from the school, away from the direction everybody else seemed to be flowing. We nodded or said hello to people we passed.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“I'm taking you to a place where we can have some privacy.”

“Privacy? It's here in the neighborhood, right?” I had a terrible thought that she was going to suggest we go outside the walls.

“You're not afraid of heights, right?”

“Of course I'm not afraid of— Oh, very funny.”

She laughed and led me along the street. It got quieter as we got farther away from the school and closer to the strip mall. There would be guards posted all along the walls around it, so we weren't going to get any privacy there, but rather than going through the passageway leading to the front of the stores, she took me to the back. We stopped at a ladder leaning against the back of the bakery.

“You first,” she said. “Don't be afraid—I'll catch you if you fall.”

I placed a hand against the ladder and gave it a little shake. It seemed pretty solid. I started to climb and within a few steps I felt the whole thing vibrate as Lori started up after me. I reached the top and climbed up onto the flat roof of the building and then offered Lori a hand as she climbed the rest of the way up, too.

“Alone at last,” she said.

We walked across the roof, gravel crunching under our feet, to where there was a set of patio furniture, including a pair of lounge chairs and a freestanding porch swing. She sat down on one of the lounge chairs and I perched on the other.

“I didn't know this was up here,” I said.

“Some of the kids in the neighborhood managed to drag this stuff up here so they could have a place to get away from everything. It's sort of like a secret tree house,” Lori said.

“It's probably a nice view during the day.” Beyond the waist-high wall was a clear vista overlooking the parking lot, still packed with dead cars, and in daylight you would have been able to see well into the houses on the other side of Erin Mills Parkway.

“It's not safe to go out there, but it's safe to look out there,” she said.

“Do you?”

“Sometimes, but I'm pretty busy between feeding the livestock, helping in the fields, and doing some guard duty.”

“I'm sick of being busy. I mean, it's not so much being busy as, well, being occupied … in my head. I think I have too many thoughts sometimes.”

“I agree.” She paused. “Sometimes you just need to lie back and relax.”

“Maybe we could even do that relaxing thing together,” I suggested. I leaned back on my lounge chair and gestured for Lori to join me. She got up from the other chair and settled in beside me. It was a tight but wonderful fit.

“Is that a new top?” I asked.

“Yes, I didn't think you'd notice.”

“I noticed. It looks nice, you look nice in it.”

“Thanks. Of course, it's not new, just new to me. I got it at the swap meet.”

“My brother and sister got some stuff at the last one,” I said.

Every second Saturday there was a swap meet at the school gym. Clothes and shoes and other personal items that people didn't want or had outgrown or that had been brought back by the away teams were all laid out on the gym floor. People were able to take things that they could use. For lots of people this wasn't just practical but was as close to shopping as they could come.

I thought back, almost in amusement, at how some people used to spend so much time “prowling” the malls. For them shopping was like a lifestyle, or a sport … or like hunting. Hunting—and being hunted—had changed so dramatically in our new world.

“The stars are amazing,” Lori said.

“You're the second person tonight to mention the stars to me.”

“Should I be jealous?” she joked.

“It was Herb.”

“Then I
am
jealous. He gets to spend more time with you than anybody else does. I just hope he wasn't whispering romantic things in your ear.”

“Herb isn't so much in my ear as he is in my head, and what's he's saying is never even remotely romantic. Although he does like it when I bring him flowers.”

“Uh-huh.”

We lay together on the chair, my arms wrapped around her. I was suddenly tired. I laid my head on top of hers.

After a few minutes of quiet, she cleared her throat. “Have you drifted asleep back there?”

“No, just thinking.”

“I thought you were going to try to avoid that,” she said.

“I'll do my best to—”

A popping sound somewhere close by cut me off.

In the old days, I'm sure my first thought would have been that someone had lit a firecracker. But now I knew that sound all too well. Not fireworks.

A gunshot.

 

10

There was a second shot and a third, and then the general alert siren went off. The shots were coming from the section of the outer wall right in front of us, maybe fifty yards from where we were sitting. Instantly I thought of Todd; then I remembered he was on duty on the other side of the neighborhood.

I jumped to my feet, pulling Lori with me, and we crouched by the edge of the roof. From behind the shelter of the bricks, I peered out, trying to see where exactly the shots were coming from. The siren kept blaring. Soon people from around the neighborhood would be here—my mother and Herb and Howie would be on their way.

Another gunshot rang out and I caught a glimpse of the muzzle flash. It was coming from outside the perimeter, from the partially burned-out condominium tower across the parkway, at the corner of Erin Mills and Burnham. It had always been one of Herb's fears that the building could be used as high ground against the neighborhood.

The emergency lights on the wall came to life, bright greens and reds and whites, strings of Christmas lights gathered weeks ago from people's attics and basements, powered by car batteries.
Merry Christmas, everybody.
The tiny bulbs lit only the area directly in front, along Erin Mills Parkway; the light didn't reach into the houses and spaces on the other side.

I saw a series of flashes—muzzle bursts from different parts of the building—followed instantly by the sound of gunfire. One of the guards on the wall crumpled to the ground.

“Oh my God!” Lori exclaimed.

Almost before the words had gotten out a second guard was hit, his body spinning backward at the impact of the bullet. There were more and more flashes from the tower, but nobody else was hit—at least not that I could see.

“Turn off the lights!” I screamed. “Turn off the lights!”

Lori jumped to her feet and started yelling again and waving her arms in the air—and making herself a perfect target.

“Lori!” I yelled. I jumped forward, knocking her over. She groaned as we smashed heavily into the gravel.

There was a loud impact—a bullet smashing into the rooftop right by our heads—then a second. I grabbed her and rolled us back over until we were sheltered by the wall again.

“Are you all right?”

“I'm … I'm okay … The bullets … We were almost shot.”

“Please don't move,” I said. “Stay here.”

I disentangled myself and started to crawl away, still sheltered by the edge of the building.

“What are you doing?” she demanded. “Where are you going?”

“I have to warn them. We can't have people heading across the open space toward the wall. The shooters have too good an angle. Don't move until I come back to get you!”

I scampered along with the protection of the bricks until I was well away from where we'd been shot at. I now had no choice. I had to move across open roof space to get to the ladder and down. If I moved fast they probably couldn't draw a bead on me. I took a deep breath and then ran as fast as I could. Grabbing the top of the ladder, I swung myself over the edge—almost falling, desperately grabbing with my feet and hands and securing a hold. I slid down the ladder, landing at the bottom with a loud thud, almost tumbling over with the impact.

I ran along the back of the stores, completely sheltered from the snipers. People were coming on foot, their flashlights marking their arrival, like signal beacons for the shooters.

“Cut your lights!” I yelled. “Get down, get down!”

Flashlights snapped off as people took cover. In the dark they'd be safe—unless the shooters had night-vision goggles. The first of the guards joined me along the wall.

Then a pair of headlights came up the road—another perfect target, even more visible than the flashlights of the people on foot. It was my Omega, which meant either my mom or my dad was driving. I ran straight toward the car, right into the beams of the headlights, waving my hands. The car skidded to a stop in front of me. Not wanting to waste time explaining, I leaned inside the open window, over my father at the wheel, and pushed off the headlights, throwing us into darkness. My mom was in the passenger seat and Herb was in the back.

In the sudden gloom, I told them we were under fire.

“Where is it coming from?” Herb asked.

“Snipers in the condo tower! They've been picking people off. At least two guards down.”

“Let's move behind the stores, get out of the sight lines,” Mom said to Dad as I stepped back.

My father bumped the car up over the curb, crossed the sidewalk, and pulled in right beside the back of the buildings. I ran after them and got there as they were climbing out.

“Turn off all the lights!” my mother called into a walkie-talkie.

“We should signal for the reserves,” Herb said.