So Long, Lollipops (An Until the End of the World Novella) Read online

  Two ounces in the morning, one in the afternoon, one in the evening and one for tomorrow. It was amazing he could even pee into the pitcher still. Where was his body getting the liquid? Why wasn’t it using it? He wanted to punch his bladder, but instead he read his book in between naps, and then fell asleep for the night.

  Day five’s ounce of Pepsi was bittersweet. That was it. He ignored the pitcher on the counter and ate the packet of barbecue sauce that was in the MRE. It moistened his mouth, but the salt was probably going to make it worse. He sucked on a mint from his beef ravioli MRE and stared at the ceiling. He didn’t know if it was his imagination or he really was weak and tired. He had no energy. Whether that was because he was dehydrated or because the Lexers outside were going to outlast him, he didn’t know.

  They were going to win.

  The thought made him sit up. No, they weren’t going to win. Fuck them. He was going to see Bits again. If they were still there tomorrow he’d drink some Kool-Aid pee and run. It would be all right. He lay back down and drifted into a sleep filled with dreams of running faucets and coolers full of ice cold beverages.

  He woke up at dawn thinking about hot water heaters. If it had been a dream, he couldn’t remember it. His brain was fuzzy and begged for a few more minutes of rest. No sense in rushing into what was next on the menu; might as well rest for the big event.

  Hot water heaters.

  Peter jumped off the couch so fast that the large coffee table vase crashed and broke. He cursed and peeked through the blinds. At least the Lexers hadn’t heard.

  Cassie and John often had enthusiastic discussions about random survival tactics. Heating rocks in a fire and burying them under a thin layer of dirt in a makeshift shelter to stay warm, starting fires without matches, that kind of thing. They were both kind of crazy, if you thought about it. But he recalled a conversation about hot water heaters. Even after the main water ran dry, the water in the heater’s tank remained. Every house had gallons of potable water there for the taking. He moved down the hall on unsteady feet and found the tank in the closet that held the stackable washer and dryer. It wasn’t huge, but thirty gallons was a lot of water. He could outlast the Lexers with thirty gallons.

  There was the spigot on the bottom; now he needed a bowl from the kitchen. The hand that held the bowl shook as he turned the spigot and waited for that rush of cool, life-sustaining water. A trickle ran into the bowl and stopped. Peter drank the water before he did something ridiculous like spill it. It was so good that he groaned, but it was a tease. That couldn’t be all there was. If he hadn’t wanted to conserve every ounce of liquid in his body he would have cried in frustration. There should be water in there.

  Then he remembered—it was a vacuum. Sometimes you had to open a faucet or valve so the water would drain. He closed the spigot, turned the bathroom tap on, sat with his bowl at the ready, and turned the knob. Nothing. Now he was getting pissed. There was water in there, and it was his, damn it. He’d hack open the top if he had to.

  But he started with busting the hot water pipe on the top, since he couldn’t find some valve he thought John had mentioned. He said a silent prayer, turned the spigot and exhaled at the solid stream of water that flowed into the bowl. It wasn’t the cleanest-looking water on Earth, with tiny grains of sediment that settled in the bottom, but it wasn’t pee, and that was good enough for him. He guzzled the bowl and went for a refill. God, it was amazing stuff, that water. Later he’d drain part of the tank into containers to see how much he had in total, but for now all he wanted was another bowl. He’d known it would be all right. And he would never, ever make fun of Cassie and John again.

  By nightfall, he thought he saw fewer Lexers outside but couldn’t see far enough into the darkness to be sure. He readied his pack, just in case he could leave in the morning, and stuck the book he was reading inside. He knew it would work out all right, but he still wanted to finish it.

  In the morning he made Kool-Aid, something he’d never had as a kid. It was tantamount to poison, according to Mom. He enjoyed every drop of it along with some crackers. There really were fewer Lexers out there. Maybe a couple dozen left, all spread out. He could outrun them, especially if his bike was still on the road outside the entrance.

  He tapped his fingers on the kitchen counter and mixed up more Kool-Aid. He had to leave soon. It was almost a week here, which meant it was approaching October. He could get stuck like this again, it could snow, and then he might never make it. Although, if the Lexers froze before he did—and with no heat that was a crapshoot—he’d be able to walk there without worry. This might be his best chance. He made sure his bottles were full, dumped his pee down the kitchen drain, and filled a container with Kool-Aid. It was pretty good stuff, although he’d never feed it to Bits. He’d read the ingredients; Mom was right.

  Peter buckled his pack, slung the rifle over his shoulder and held his machete. Then he strode to the door, took a breath and ran onto the asphalt. He shoved one who got too close, dodged the others and pounded past the homes he’d passed on the way in. The bike lay on its side where he’d left it. He glanced behind him to be sure he had time and bent for the handlebars. He ran alongside it, swerving around the few Lexers in the road, before jumping on and pedaling like a madman, widening the gap with every rotation. The mirror on the handlebars had twisted when the bike fell, but now he straightened it out in time to see the Lexers from the park reach the road.

  “So long, lollipops,” he called. Then he turned his gaze north and didn’t look back.

  By noon he was less than ten miles away. There had been more than a few pit stops due to all the water and Kool-Aid, but he’d made good time. The thirty miles he’d biked had been a cakewalk in comparison to the rest of his journey, since he’d only run into a few Lexers here and there, but his thighs burned from the long, relentless hills. The cars had been pushed aside in a few places, and now, so close to the farm, the roads were completely clear. He hoped that everyone had come the same way, that the pickup had gotten them there.

  Just outside the tiny town before the farm, his bike tire blew with a loud pop. Peter used his feet to swerve to a stop, narrowly avoiding a nasty fall, and looked at the clouds that floated in the sky.

  “Really?” he asked them.

  The tube was torn beyond repair, not that he had a repair kit anyway. He tried riding on the busted wheel, but he could walk faster. His backpack wasn’t too unwieldy when he was going fast, but he looked like Cassie learning how to ride a bike with all the wobbling he did riding on the wheel’s rim. He smiled at the mental image. She was such a dork; who couldn’t ride a bike? But she could, now that he and Bits had taught her.

  Cassie had gained some grace this summer, though, like she’d finally gotten the hang of bike riding. She still managed to step on someone’s toes or spill something at least once a week—that would never change—but she could fight. Her eyes glowed light green when there was a threat, and the set of her mouth left no doubt that she’d kill if she had to. Maybe it was shooting Neil that had changed her, along with Ana’s constant nagging for a sparring partner. When you watched her and Ana practice together, Ana’s dark, gold-flecked eyes even deadlier than Cassie’s, you were very glad to be on their side.

  Picturing the two of them made Peter more confident that they were safe. They would kill anything in their way, alive or dead. He put his boots to the concrete and walked. The road was clear, the sun was bright, and the trees were more colorful than in southern Vermont. The weeds that should have been fields of corn or wheat or whatever they grew up here were turning brown. A flock of geese flew overhead in a messy V. It was a gorgeous fall day, the kind that people used to pay a good bit of money to visit.

  At the outskirts of the tiny town, he kept as close to the shadows as he dared. He didn’t want to draw the attention of the Lexers that were surely lurking. But he was astounded to find the village green empty. It was like a ghost town, in a good way. The general store up ahead
had a sign out front that offered gas and food inside, as well as lodging at Kingdom Come. He continued up dirt roads and past a farmhouse with a serious-looking fence, and then took a left onto Kingdom Road. He’d listened to the directions so many times on the radio that he could recite them verbatim.

  There was a cabin up on legs at the side of the road. A guy, no more than twenty, sporting a platinum ponytail and rifle, came down to greet him. “Hey, I’m Caleb.”

  He shook the kid’s hand. “Peter.”

  “You coming to stay?”

  “I think so.” Peter glanced up at the woman with short, dark hair who stood on the cabin’s platform, leveling a rifle at his head. Her mouth twitched in greeting at his smile. “It was a long trip.”

  “It looks it, man,” Caleb said with a laugh.

  The jeans Peter had washed at Chuck’s for his one-day drive had been clean. Now they were brown, and the button-down under his coat wasn’t in much better shape.

  “You want a ride to the gate?” Caleb asked, and pointed at a pickup. “It’s about a quarter mile.”

  Two minutes later, Caleb left him at the metal gate with a guy named Dan, who let him in a side door. Dan shook his hand and introduced him to a woman and a man who sat at a folding table. Peter was so preoccupied with his next question that he didn’t catch their names.

  “We usually have a truck down here,” Dan said, “but they drove it up today. I’ll walk you if you want. It’s not far.”

  Peter nodded. They all looked so tranquil, but he couldn’t relax until he knew. He pulled off his jacket and threaded it through a strap of his pack, sweating more than he had during the bike ride. “Did someone named Cassie Forrest come here with a group of people? They know Adrian.”

  The creases around Dan’s eyes deepened when he grinned. “Sure, they got here maybe a month ago. With Bits and the others. You know them?”

  Bits was here. Peter felt so light he could’ve sworn his boots had left the ground. Everything grew blurry, but this time he didn’t bite his cheek to stop the tears. Bits was here. He didn’t ask who the others were, just in case Dan left someone out by accident. He was afraid to ask about Ana. If it was bad, he wanted Cassie to be the one to tell him.

  “Yeah,” Peter said. He wiped his eyes. Dan looked so pleased for him that it was impossible not to smile back. Reunions were rare these days. “I know them.”

  “Call Cass on the radio,” Dan said to the guy at the table. Then he put a hand on Peter’s shoulder and motioned up the road.

  Dan said something. Peter nodded along, but he wasn’t listening. He was watching the gold and red leaves float to the dirt road and praying they were all there. Then he heard something besides Dan’s friendly voice—the sound of bare feet slapping the ground. He only knew one person who ran around barefoot as much as she could.

  Peter looked up as Cassie rounded the bend. She stopped—mouth open, eyes wide—almost like she hadn’t been sure it was him she was going to find.

  “Peter!” she called, and ran toward him.

  Her laugh was so carefree and her smile so wide that he was almost positive they’d all made it. But, no matter what, he still had a daughter and a best friend. He still had a family. He was home.

  About the Author

  Sarah Lyons Fleming is a Laura Ingalls devotee and wannabe prepper, which has resulted in an unhealthy obsession with home-canned food and Bug Out Bag equipment.

  Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, she now lives in Oregon with her family and, in her opinion, not nearly enough supplies for the zombie apocalypse. But she’s working on it.

  Sign up for the spam-free mailing list: http://eepurl.com/FZhVz

  Visit Sarah at http://www.SarahLyonsFleming.com

  Stay tuned for the rest of the Until the End of the World series:

  AND AFTER (Book Two) in Spring 2014

  ALL THE STARS IN THE SKY (Book Three) in Fall/Winter 2014

  Acknowledgements

  I’m gonna keep this short and sweet—you know, ‘cause it’s a novella. Thanks to my parents, who always read and then read again. Recently, I was surprised to find that many writers’ families don’t read their work. I already knew I was lucky, but man, I must’ve hit the jackpot!

  To my lovely friends/beta readers, who dropped all other books to read mine. Thanks to Allie, who suggested I write this novella and then, when it was done, proceeded to tell me she dislikes novellas (but read it anyway-ha). Danielle, who read it twice while her bathwater grew cold. And to Jamie, who greets everything I write with such excitement that it pleases me to no end.

  Tons of love and appreciation to my husband, Will, who reads with a keen eye and an understanding of the craft of writing that I’ll never have, and who forces me to dig deeper and then come up with the words to describe what I’ve unearthed.