Broken Silence (Currently Re-Writing)

Chapter 9: Out For Something

Chapter 9: Out for Something

Day Four, Week One

 It was morning. The sun shined through the blinds like the stained glass windows at church. The thing I miss about spring mornings was the Cardinals, Blue Jays, Sparrows, and Finches outside my window. They would wake me up and sing to me out side my window. Nature, Gods greatest creation.

“Good morning!” Abby said at my door.

“Yeah, good morning.” I say.

“Get up, come eat breakfast.”

Breakfast? They made breakfast? Impressive. I got out of bed and started down the stairs.

I ate some cereal they made for me. It was just plain Corn Flakes. They were kinda stale, but it was still food. They didn’t crunch like they were supposed to, and the milk wasn’t so good either, kinda changed colors. I hope this wasn’t what we were gonna have to live off of for a few weeks, possibly months or years. As I always say, I hope.

When I was done we all gathered up all our stuff, and went upstairs, grabbed the rifle and my two pistols. I came back downstairs and they sat waiting in the car for me. I opened the trunk and put all the remaining food there, about nothing but stale Corn Flakes, old milk and some other stuff. I took both pistols, and stuck them in my pockets. I sat the rifle in the back seat with Abby. I drove. I pulled out of the driveway and started south.

“You good with that in the back?” I asked Abby.

“Yeah, I feel more safe with it anyways.” she replied. 

I always had a different outlook on Abby than Hannah. Hannah was the cute junior that went to my high school, temporarily. She was afraid of her shadow sometimes. She was really tall almost six foot, and me being me, I was only 5” 8’. I was one of the shortest in school. I always thought she had a little crush on me, too. Now Abby was as tough as nails, no fear. She was a tomboy, and she hunted. I was surprised the girl we found laying on the street, burned. She didn’t care, all she cared about was to be living. She was about my height and she lived far away from me. Two very different characters I was now friends with.

I got up front in the drivers seat. Now, I always thought this was a stupid idea, hopping town to town, house from house, but, we had to. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be able to find other survivors. I jumped in and started it. This car actually had the keys in the car starter. It was parked in the garage, where we pulled out on to the dirt driveway. 

The car was a white Explorer. Rust all over, and about two different wheels on it. This would have been Aaron’s car when he turned sixteen and got his license It was wide and it took awhile for it get up to speed. It was from the last two decades and it didn’t turn well. The SUV was slow but it still drove. 

“Where should we go now?” I say. I knew a place but I needed some sort of input from either one of them. After a while of pure silence, a voice said.

“I have an idea, and I’m glad we got up early. Lets go to my first hometown. Get on I-80 and just drive until you see signs for The Mojave.” Abby said all this. She wanted to go to the desert. I was about to suggest my idea, but I agreed and so did Hannah.

I found I-80. I pulled on as the car leaned to the left, throwing my head to hit window. Not the best car ever. 

“How long, till we hit the desert?” I asked.

“Eight-and-a-half hours.” she said.

Eight hours! Longest I ever drove, let alone rode in a car was for about two hours. New experiences everyday, and sometimes, I hate them. 

I waited, and waited and waited and waited. After two hours, The Rust Bucket, Lean-to on wheels needed gas. I pulled of I-80, slowly and carefully, not hitting my head on the glass window this time. I found a gas station, about a half mile from I-80.

I filled the tank with gas and payed with that guys credit card from his wallet that we took from him. As I filled up, the girls went in the little store and got anything that we could eat or use. We ended up with a trunk full of food and drinks.

We all got in and I drove towards I-80. 9:32 was the current time. Two hours down, six more to go.

***

We stopped for gas two more times, and finally, after eight hours of rocking back and forth, we finally, at around 4:17, I saw the sign for the Mojave desert, and I carefully pulled of the the Interstate. I came to a stop light. 

“Right.” Abby said.

I turned a hard right, hitting my head again. As I drove for about twenty-minutes, when the road turned into a color. It was the sand, sand of the Mojave. Off in the distance mountains lined the skyline. We pulled slowly until we came to a dead end at a town. The town was called Roadrunner. It was small only about two mile long. It had old, historical like buildings. I slowed the car down to about 20 miles an hour. As we drove through the town, Abby started to talk.

“This town has the saddest story about it. In 1981, my parents lived here. This was also the year of the “The Day of The Red Desert”. A man grabbed a automatic gun he had been holding in his home and stood at the east end of Copperhead Road. Anyone that walked or drove in the road was shot and killed, including my father. With a starting population that day of 128 people, it was brought down to about 93 people. A very brave police man grabbed his pistol and shot many times. The reason he did this was because in 1889, his great-grandfather was killed by the U.S Marshall for something he was framed for. He never did it. Ever since that day, only a select group of people still live, or lived, here. They say bad things still happen here on Copperhead Road.” 

“Well, you know your history. What kinda bad thing?”

“One time, this was.....” She started. 

All I remember was a semi truck air horn, then losing conciseness.