The End of Eden (Water Worlds 1)

Chapter 19

19

The next morning, we started out early and followed the road west. Kasey and I didn't talk much. I looked out the window and watched the world go by.

Route 70 was a perfect example of early American superhighway construction and traversed some beautiful country. Although there were many areas sadly overlooked for decades, and in dire need of repair and reconstruction, the road itself was well-engineered, and it linked the communities, both large and small, that had grown up around it.

At first, people were welcoming everywhere we stopped. They could tell we were survivors. We had a stunned look and nothing seemed important to us except moving on. They acted normal but I knew it was just a mask. They saw us and were afraid for themselves. For what might come of this. Little did they know, soon there would be chaos beyond imagining.

For now, basic supplies were still ample, but they would quickly begin to dry up. Major trade had been disrupted, and little was coming out of the east beyond a trickle of survivors that slowed the farther west we went. Everyone was living on existing supplies, for now.

Father insisted we stock up on whatever we could. We got off the highway at many smaller towns in the rural areas. The giant supply stores were still well-stocked. He purchased more plastic petrol containers, when he could find them, and kept them filled, and bought motor oil and car fluids of all sorts. Whatever he found on the shelves, he decided he had a need for. 

Kasey bought solar batteries and torches, and Mother, enough dried and tinned food for a year, it seemed, but only enough fresh food for one or two days. I bought water purifiers, and Joo Chen found cases of bottled spring water and fruit juices. 

Some shop keepers thought we seemed a bit too desperate.

"It's okay," one said, trying to calm Father who was upset that there was no soy milk in the store. "You're safe now."

Father glared at him and walked out.

I'm sure the man was just trying to help, but Father had more than survival in mind. He wanted to thrive.

Slowly, the shock began to wear off. Kasey and I talked more and he made me practice my English. He was very easy to talk to, and really a young man, still, not more than nine or ten years older than I.

Many of our experiences in the last days seemed like a dream. We didn't talk about it much among ourselves in the car, but our stories came out in a torrent when strangers coaxed us. The farther west we traveled, the more fascinated people were by our first-hand accounts, and we began to tell them things we probably would have forgotten with time.

I was shy and still embarrassed by my broken English, but Joo Chen was fearless and happy to share his memories. Kasey joined in, too, when he had something to add. In the excitement of the telling at one food store, people gathered to listen. 

Even I added to the story, and had to interrupt twice to disapprove of Joo Chen's exaggerations. Really, the bare facts were shocking enough. And we had survived! There weren't all that many of us, after all, and the few who didn't escape, well, they had no stories to tell at all. 

Credit links had stopped working almost immediately after the flood and almost every shopkeeper apologized about it as soon as we walked in the door.

"Sorry, no charges, today, folks. I'm sure they'll be back up soon, though. Come back tomorrow?"

When they realized we had cash, there was no problem getting just about anything. It just cost more than normal. News was that the authorities made it clear people caught running up prices would be harshly dealt with, but the government was busy elsewhere now, and with the sudden great demand, prices went up anyway.