The Zenith

Chapter 2: Grey

Sometimes the best stories are the most tragic.

Chapter 2: Grey

"I don't bother wondering if she's made it to heaven, because I have no doubt she's there."

Every day I tell myself that we're going to live one more day. We have to. I really believe it. So far, I've been right.

The chaos took my mother on the first day. She was wonderful. I miss her more than anything. I can still remember the way her wispy hair curled around the sides of her round cheeks, and how I felt truly at home in her rosy-smelling embrace. She was my life. We didn't have much, but at least I had her. I don't bother wondering if she's made it to heaven, because I have no doubt that she's there.

About a week after she left me, I was trying to hold myself together. Stay stable. Gather food. Drink enough water. It was hell to even stay alive in the midst of the chaos.

That day, I gathered a few things into my pack: some water, a pocket knife, paper and pens, my mom's leather braided bracelet, biscuits, fruits, and mostly canned beans and soup. We didn't own many material possessions.

I didn't know anything back then.

That was the day I met her.

She was just a scrap of a person, crouched in a tattered light-brown army jacket and cargo pants a few sizes too big under the wheel of an abandoned wooden food cart. My eyes simply glanced over her, until I heard a small, high voice say, "Hi."

I turned around, unsure of what was happening. Where was her common sense? Why would she speak outright to someone? Didn't she know how easily she could be killed?

Her chocolate eyes seemed to bore deep into my soul. With her pale face and stringy hair, she looked like a small animal. She couldn't have been more than nine years old.

I crouched a few feet away from her. "Don't come any closer," I asserted. She nodded her head. I placed a few crackers on the ground and stepped a few paces away, watching her the whole time. She crawled greedily towards the meager food as I stepped away, and she stuffed the food into her mouth in one bite.

"What's your name?" I inquired tentatively.

"462," she blurted out.

"That's no name!" I exclaimed. Honestly, who is given a name like 462?

"What's that?" She pointed her stubby finger at a tattered flower that had fallen from the cart as she had leaned against it.

"That's a rose. Haven't you ever seen one‽" I wondered.

"No," she said, her dark eyes lighting up with wonder. "It's beautiful."

"I can call you Rose."

She crawled over, disobeying my former instruction, and placed her small hand in mine. She sighed quietly, content, and nodded firmly.

"I need you."