Just Hold Hands

Chapter 12

Catherine was shaking, standing amongst the corn like an impressionist painting. From the ground, the stalks brushing against her shoulders, Theo watched her. With her hair rippling in the wind and her back to Theo, the strange pink light washing over her, she was definitely beautiful, if not for the shaking so violent Theo feared she'd collapse.

Theo didn't know what to say, not in the new silence following the unearthly cry that filled the air, and, following that, the screaming of people, still running away from what they didn't understand, but knew to be a threat.

Eventually, her sister broke the silence for her, turning around to face down at her. With the pink light behind her, it gave her a sort of halo effect, like an angel in sweatpants. "Do we keep walking?" she asked, her voice uncharacteristically small. She'd always had a loud voice, her and Theo both, they'd often been quieted as children. Catherine had been growing meeker, however, over the last two weeks. It made Theo uncomfortable.

"Yeah, we should." Theo stumbled to her feet, fruitlessly brushing the soil off of her jeans, which were already hopelessly stained. She tried to think of which way to go, or what they should even be doing, but she couldn't see past where the green plants met the pink sky. They needed shelter, she decided. And they should probably try to find their mother, likely lost on her way to Wyoming in a car that barely worked. "We should keep walking until we hit a town," she continued. "Do you have any money?"

Catherine reached into her pockets, groping around until she pulled out a crumpled twenty dollar bill and some loose change, out one. She had nothing but pretty rocks and a stray pencil in the other.

Theo sighed. "Okay, no hotel. We'll walk until we find some nice people we can stay with or, like, a nice park bench or something."

"Okay."

They walked, on and on, pushing through the green stalks until their arms both itched. Theo's feet hurt, and her left knee hurt. She'd probably pulled something while running, but she didn't want to stop or ask Catherine for a break. Her feet were impossibly sore and she was getting colder, as the sun lowered towards the horizon they were wandering in the direction of. Her cheap polyester tank top was no match for the cold evenings of spring. Her back, meanwhile, was beginning to ache from the strain of the weight she was carrying.

They walked in silence for at least an hour until they reached the end of the field, and for a second, Theo thought it was the end of it. The sky was darkening, the pink sky morphing into a fuschia. But then, at the end of the corn field, was another corn field, looking just as expansive. She heard Catherine choke back a groan. She wanted to tell her that it was okay, they could stop, she could rest, but that would be a dangerous lie to tell.

So they kept walking, on and on. Theo thought there might be a town on the other side, but she couldn't be certain; she was used to driving in her mom's beat-up Honda, not walking across farmland. Every attempt to pull up a map on her phone thus far had failed, which she assumed was due to the lack of phone service typically available in the middle of a corn field.

Theo was agonizingly cold throughout the trek across the second field, and just ahead of her, she saw Catherine shivering. She was growing increasingly certain that they'd need shelter as soon as they could find it. She regretted not bringing a blanket, or a jacket, or anything of warmth. She should have been thinking clearer, or prepared better, or something.

Theo wanted to talk to her sister, she wanted to check in on her, or ask her questions, but she was out of breath and cold and tired. So they kept trudging on, for hours, as the sun dipped below the horizon and they had to illuminate their way with the flashlights on their dying phones. Theo's entire body hurt and her brain was in a fog, but she couldn't stop, not now.