The Summer the World Ended (19 page)

“You mean OCD?” Riley pushed eggs around her plate.

Dad shrugged. “Not the worst condition for someone in my line of work.”

She dropped her fork with a
clank.
“Dad, I can’t do what you do. I can’t just sit here alone in the middle of nowhere, cut off from everyone. Why can’t I go make some friends? Mom always yelled about me only having one friend, and spending more time with her online than in person… and now I can’t even do that.”

After a moment of him contemplating his toast without answering, Riley jammed her fork into her eggs and packed her mouth.

“I wasn’t expecting it to happen this fast, but I suppose the world works by learning. I expect you will at least make him use a condom.”

Eggs exploded out of her mouth, all over the table. When she stopped coughing, she gaped at him, unable to decide between screaming or crawling under her bed and not coming out for a week.

“I suppose living in New Jersey has eroded your sense of humor.” He picked a bit of her egg from his cheek.

“That wasn’t funny.” She glared. “You think I’m like, easy or something?”

“No… no… Just trying to make a joke.” He sighed. “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t offer to take you to town if I didn’t trust you. You’re a lot like your Mom.”

“It’s not a ‘date,’ it’s just hanging out with the
only
other kids within like, a hundred miles.”

“T or C is a big city, there’s kids there. Albuquerque is less than a hundred miles away.”

“It might as well be a thousand when I can’t drive.”

Dad got up and put his plate in the dishwasher. “Go on, get ready then.”

The tan ‘98 Silverado pulled over at the corner closest to the Hernandez Grocery. A few people wandering by gave Dad suspicious looks. Riley smirked at them. When they spotted her, wariness became worry.
What’s their problem?
She thought about the waitresses mistaking her for an abductee.
No wonder Dad doesn’t like the people here. Dicks.

“Meet me be back here at 6 p.m., unless you want me here earlier.”

“Oh, dammit, I left my phone at the house.” She sighed. “Probably don’t have reception out here anyway.”

“You sure you want to do this?” Dad gripped the wheel as if preparing for a breakneck car chase away from a flock of foreign assassins. He turned his head toward her, squinting. “We can still go back.”

“Dad… you’re a drama queen. It’s not like you’re about to send me behind German lines or something. I’m just gonna hang out.”

He fumbled his wallet out and handed her a ten-dollar bill. “For lunch.”

“Why are you freaking out?” She stuffed the cash into a pocket on the side of her right leg.

“I guess I am a little paranoid. It feels like having you back in my life is some kind of second chance to make up for the biggest mistake I ever made, and I’m so worried something is going to happen.”

“Love you too, Dad.” She hugged him for a moment, and opened the door. “Oh, what’s with the backpack in my room?”

“It’s a ‘go’ bag. In case they find us and we have to bug out in a hurry. It’s got clothes, couple MREs, and some survival stuff.”

She looked left and right at the all but deserted street, imagining a black car full of spies screeching out from behind a scrub-covered hill. How easy would it be to grab her from behind and drag her into the back seat?

Get a grip. The Russians aren’t coming for you
or
Dad.

“Six p.m. Got it. I’ll be okay, Dad.” She leaned in, kissed him on the cheek, and jumped out.

He hesitated for a few minutes before pulling away, driving slow enough to give her a chance to wave him back. Riley looked around at a town that could’ve been an abandoned film set. The people had vanished. Nothing moved except for her and Dad’s truck.

Unless I get bored to death.

iley wasn’t quite sure what she was supposed to do. Even if she hadn’t forgotten her iPhone at the house, it’s not like she even knew Kieran’s number. Her toenails had less polish than the last time she’d thought to look, a visual reminder of Mom slipping farther away. She wiggled her foot, tapping the flip-flop against her heel. Another few days, and she could no longer say, ‘Mom was alive this month.’ Eventually, she wouldn’t be able to think, ‘Mom had been alive
this year.
’

She looked up, squinting past sun glare on some cars parked by Tommy’s Restaurant a little more than a football field’s distance away. At Perkins, Amber had suggested Riley move in with them. She’d still be in familiar surroundings, with familiar people, going to the school she’d been alternately looking forward to and dreading. A fair number of her classmates who teased her for being ‘too thin’ would have stayed with her. The extra pressure of having them hound her in high school on top of losing Mom would have sucked.

On the other hand, with ninth grade came more freedom. She was supposed to be looking forward to staying up late, getting a job, and having money of her own, but all she wanted to do was crawl
home
and cling to her mother. Amber’s offer, unrealistic as it was, had been tempting. It would’ve been a huge thing to ask of her parents, something they probably would’ve declined as gently as possible. Of course, with Dad already back in the picture, she couldn’t have accepted anyway. Quirky as he was, he
did
love her, and she couldn’t turn her back on him.

Well I suppose I can just walk in.

Riley looked both ways before stepping onto the road and hurrying across. She caught a glimpse of the skinny biker in front of the mechanic shop, unpacking a number of small metal cases from the trunk of a battered car that looked like it cost less than the equipment it carried. Riley looked away and scurried across the parking lot in a shuffling drag-step intended to move fast without losing her flops.

The smell of cooking meat and Mexican seasonings surrounded Tommy’s bar, stirring a growl in her belly even though she’d had breakfast a little over an hour ago. Old license plates clattered against the door when she pushed it open. A twinge of worry caught her when the man behind the bar cocked his eyebrow at her. Would he throw her out for being too young to enter a place that sold booze?

“Hey, Riley.” Kieran waved her over from a backwards chair by a round table in the corner opposite the bar.

Four other teens―a girl and three boys―looked up to check out the new arrival. The girl had a soft, rounded face, skin a bit lighter than Kieran, and long, dark hair. Riley figured her for seventeen at least. She leaned out of her chair to the left. Her posture teetered on the verge of giving the room a peek under her short camouflage skirt, and thrust her breasts through a tight grey tank top. She afforded Riley only a brief glance before returning her attention to a boy who looked like a senior, or perhaps a year graduated, kissing him as if they were the only two in the room.

Of the group, he seemed to be another outsider, white as a sheet with freckles and unruly brown curls. He adhered to the local uniform code, a plain white tee and jeans with work boots, and paid little attention to her.

Next to the pair sucking face, another older boy with bright green hair and a goatee busied himself with a small sheet of paper and green flakes of chopped leaves. His ribs poked out of the bottom of a black half-shirt covered by a mesh top. Metal studs glinted from his earlobes, and two small chrome cones stuck to his chin a quarter inch below the corners of his mouth. He looked up at Riley, flashed a dazed smile, and resumed rolling his joint.

Riley stared at it.
That’s not oregano. Holy shit!

The youngest of the lot clutched a beat-up video game and had wide cheeks and a short, dense mop of hair that made his head look spherical. She took him for twelve if that. He too wore a white t-shirt and jeans, though no shoes.

She walked over to Kieran, staring at the boy with drugs out in plain sight.

“Hey guys, this is Riley.” Kieran gestured at her. “She’s the new girl I was talking about.”

The lovebirds broke lip lock long enough to say, “Hey” and “‘Sup.”

“Riley, this is Jesse.” Kieran indicated the small boy. “You can call him El Bicho if you want.”

“Pendejo.” Jesse seemed to like that about as much as she liked Squirrel. “I ain’t no little kid. I’m gonna be in high school next year.”

“You’re fourteen?” Riley blurted. “Uh…”

The other girl laughed.

“Thirteen.” Jesse puffed out his chest.

“He looks like he’s nine, doesn’t he?” cooed the girl. “He’s adorable.”

“Adorable gonna get his ass kicked next year,” said the kid with the metal on his lip.

The older girl squirmed about to keep talking through her boyfriend’s attempt to jam his tongue in her mouth. “Oh, I won’t call him that at school.”

Kieran looked at the bar as the man behind it yelled for him. “Uh, sec. That’s Lyle”―he gestured at the white boy―“that’s Luis”―he pointed at the one with green hair―“and Camila. Be right back.”

She stood in awkward silence. Her only link to these people jogged across the room leaving Lyle and Camila exploring each other’s tonsils and Luis finishing his engineering project. At last, he held up a homemade cigarette.

“Is that…” Riley fidgeted.

“Weed?” asked Jesse. “Yeah, he smokes so much his hair turned green.”

“But isn’t it? Like, um…” Riley blinked.

“It’s legal in Colorado,” mumbled Luis.

“Yeah, man, but this ain’t Colorado.” Lyle yawned, and flashed a weary smile at Riley. “Luis here thinks he’s some kinda celebrity since he’s played two live shows in T or C.”

“Three.” Luis held up four fingers.

“Your cousin’s garage don’t count,” said Camila. She crawled into Lyle’s lap and nodded at her chair. “Go on, sit. Don’t stand there like a post.”

Post? Is she calling me too thin?

“Probably weird like her old man,” said Luis.

Riley accepted the seat, even though she didn’t much want to. “Dad’s not weird, he’s just… private.”

“He’s one of them doomsday prepper dudes,” said Luis. “Ready for the end of the world.”

“I heard ‘em sayin’ he’s got a nuke bunker.” Pure adoration lit Jesse’s eyes. “That’s so cool! I wanna see it. Probably packed it full of guns and missiles and food and water and stuff.”