Silver Horizons (Silver Horizons #1)

Silver Horizons | 3

"Why is it beautiful that humanity keeps coming back? So does herpes." – Isaac Marion, Warm Bodies

 

It had been five days, and according to Kyle the Map Reader, we were in California already. He told me that we were going to get to the address today if we kept driving without distractions. We’d been just driving for the past five days, and we’d grown extremely bored and tired. We took a lot of naps though, and that most likely cut into our driving time, but Kyle told me that it wouldn’t matter.

            Nobody was on the roads, and that made the driving so much easier. No traffic, no crashes, no big deal.

            “Okay, turn right up here,” Kyle instructed me, turning the map in his hands all different directions. A look of confusion was evident on his face. “No, left. Yeah, turn left up here.” I was about to turn left when all of a sudden, Kyle shouted, “No, turn right!”

            I barely made the run, but somehow I managed to swerve and turn right before I ran into anything. “What the hell, Kyle!” I yelled. “You said turn left!”

            “No, I said turn right,” Kyle said calmly, folding the map back up and putting it in the glove compartment. “You just weren’t listening.”

            “Why did you put the map away?” I snapped at him.

            “Because I remembered where we had to go.”

            “Oh yeah? Where’s that?”

            Kyle sighed. “Just hang a left—and yes, I said left—up here.”

            Rolling my eyes, I just continued driving until I made it to the road where I turned left. It was a long dirt road that led to what I was assuming was a house. When we finally got to the actual house, I found that I was right.

            It was a red farm house, and there was a barn to the right of the house. The ensemble of the property was adorable, to say the least. Whoever lived here obviously preferred the countryside opposed to city life.

            “Well, what are you waiting for?” Kyle asked, pushing open the car door and getting out. “Let’s go up to that door and explain ourselves.”

            He started walking to the front door, and I followed in suit. Like I had said before, the entire place was just so cute. On the front door, they had flowers and plants growing. I was going to take a leap and say that they grew their own vegetables in the back yard.

            Kyle pressed the doorbell and we waiting. There was some scuffling on the inside, but soon enough the door came flying open.

            Much to our surprise, the man on the other side of the door held a shotgun, and it was poised in our direction. That was definitely not the greeting I was expecting. I was pretty much expecting a little old lady to open the door and offer us cookies and tea in a country accent. Maybe I was expecting a little too much.

            “Who the hell are you?” the man demanded in a deep, threatening tone. “Why are you at my house?” He jostled the shotgun a little, and it appeared even more terrifying than it did a few seconds ago. “Answer me!” he shouted. “Why are you at my house?”

            Kyle, whose eyes had widened a great deal, managed to stutter out a response. “U-uh, w-we’re Steve a-and M-marge’s c-children.”

            When the guy proceeded in shoving the shotgun closer and closer to our faces, I blurted out, “My name is Elijah Jean Hollis, and this is my brother Kyle Wesley Hollis.” I remembered what Mom said about us having to give them our full names in order for them to trust us.