Blaze

1. Rationing Day!

It's Sunday.

I think.

We lost track of days after the Blaze, so it could be Friday or Monday or Saturday, for all I know--not that it really matters. I do know it's morning, though. And, according to the homemade calendar tacked to the living room wall:

Rationing Day!

Austin wrote it, which explains the strange, sloppy handwriting and exclamation mark. God. The words are all bent out of shape, like his hand sprouted a mouth and vomited the letters as he went, instead of gripping a pencil and tracing them.

Mother's in no condition to leave the house (and we know she hates the thought of anyone seeing her in a wheelchair), so Austin rummages through the kitchen and brings out the small pail, while I go through the bathroom and bring out the large pail. The drinking water pail is mostly clean, but the large one--we use it for bathing water--has crusty things no one can scrub off caked up inside, making it more brown than blue. We've gotten used to this, though; you get used to a lot of things when you can't do any better. After mother takes her share, there's just enough liquid left in both buckets for Austin and I to guzzle two sips each on the way to the water station. Plus about half a sip of crusty things.

"Love you, Mom," Austin says, bending down to kiss her clammy cheek. She whispers something I don't catch and he pulls away, a tight smile on his lips. She's smiling, too. The kind of smile she only gives him.

"Auz," I say. He nods. The fat water pail slaps my chest as I walk away, and Austin follows with his springy steps, like a shadow made of light. I can hear the tap-tap of his bucket. His periodic sighs as the sun brands our skin. The click of his tongue. The clinking of chains as he frees his scooter from our fence. I can hear him, but I can't hear her--and I know she's there. I feel her eyes on me.

I know she sits in the shade and watches us leave.

---

The air's the kind of thing you could choke on; even with the cooler breeze our speed provides, my T-shirt is damp and dark. I look up, toward the sky, and am temporarily blinded by a shimmering, white haze of heat and sunlight. There used to be a season called winter. I think. Now, there's nothing but hot days and hotter days. Blurry waves rising from cracked gravel. Sweat in my eyes.

Thirst.

Austin is a few paces behind me--his shorter legs and weaker stamina work against him--and I make sure to spare him a glance every minute or so. He's red, very red, and I must be the same colour, but we already took our two sips. I wish we didn't; my tongue and throat are starting to feel rough. The water was tangy and impure and a little too warm for relief, but I would give anything for another quick sip right now. Something to de-fluff my tongue.

Inhaling sharply, I swerve my scooter, trying to ignore my thirst by swallowing. Bad idea. The dryness in my throat only swells, the little saliva chafing a painful path down my esophagus. We're not too far off from the Claytons', I tell myself. Maybe they'll have some water to spare...

Who am I kidding? I know they won't. No one ever does.

Austin seems to be egged on by the possibility anyway, though, because his strides lengthen, his kicks growing stronger, until he reaches my side, long hair flapping against his cheeks. Tarzan. I read this book once--I read a lot of books--about some guy called Tarzan. He swung from vines, and his hair was the same as Austin's: brown, wild, and overgrown. His eyes had more light in them, though. I think.