Happy Thoughts… (part 2)

She upended her boot pouring out the sand, the small hole in the side was widening but she couldn’t figure out how so much sand was getting in there. Using the rag she’d picked up a ways back; she dusted the sand from between her toes taking care to not wipe too hard. The blisters on her big toe and the back of her heel were starting to bleed again and she needed to cover them before putting the sock back on. If not, the boot was going to really tear her foot up this time. She sighed as she sat there for a few more minutes letting her foot dry out a bit.

She was tired, and it was hotter than usual today. She sat in a shady doorway letting the breeze dry her foot, the air hot and dusty, was making her thirsty. She imagined she could feel it sucking the moister right out of her, along with adding to the grit collecting in the corners of her eyes. Speaking of, she swiped her eyes and put her goggles back on, it was far easier to see anyway, changing the glaring sunlit courtyard into a tinted shadow of itself.

She leaned back against the wall, crossing her bare foot over her knee, staring out at what used to be a gated opening, down the deserted street. This place was like so many she had come through in the last eight months. Empty towns, abandoned years ago, by the last people living between St. Louis and most southern coastal towns. Amazingly, this one still had buildings with glass windows. In most places the buildings were hollowed out shells, every scrap that could be taken, hauled away with the inhabitants. Still, she made a point of checking for stuff she could use, there was always something; once, she had found an old box labeled “rags” in a storage room, under a pile of junk. It had several perfectly good shirts in it.

She dug around in her pack for the antibiotic cream she had taken from an old man back in Denver. She’d met him shortly after leaving Mike and Nikki; he seemed nice at the time and had shared his camp with her. She had left him unconscious after he had tried to grope her while she slept. She didn’t know if he was really a creep or if he had been looking for the cream she had lifted. At any rate, she had to keep reminding herself that she couldn’t trust any of them, not even the ones that seemed kind.

Jesse was sixteen, and had left home almost a year ago, looking for something better to do than working in the desalinization plant. Hooking up with a couple of her friends, they had set off north for Flagstaff, Arizona on their solar-bikes with full packs, water converters and no real plan in mind. Off on a wild adventure to visit the “ghost towns” of America. They had found all kinds of stuff like old DVD movies she had never heard of; they were “treasures” because nobody made movies like these anymore. Everything was a “reality” show; nobody believed in or wanted to see fairy tales and superheroes anymore. The funny thing, there was no reality in “Reality TV”.

Things had gone well with them for the first couple of weeks, exploring each of the towns as they rode through. They managed to make it all the way to Denver before the trip started to go sour. Mike and Nikki were a couple, which meant Jesse was a third wheel when they were feeling “romantic” and out-voted nearly every time decisions had to be made. Once in Denver though, they had decided to go their separate ways. Mike and Nikki going off towards the mountains with a couple of guys they had met and she continuing her trip east. Jesse had begged Nikki to come with her because she didn’t like the guys Mike was now calling “friend”. One had tried to corner her in an abandoned building the night before they parted ways. He would have trouble walking for a while, she was sure she had jacked up his knee with a lucky side kick.

Now she was on the outskirts of a place called Baxter Springs, Kansas trying to make Mt. Vernon, Missouri before the end of the week. Supposedly, she had family there but it was tough going; she was hoping to find a little water somewhere between Oswego and here but her WF270 gave no indication that there was water anywhere. She checked her reserve tank, it was nearly empty and here she was letting the hot dry air suck it right out of her skin. She slathered on the antibiotic, covered the blisters with torn pieces of a clean rag and put the sock on. Wincing as she shoved her foot back into the boot she thought it was snug enough to not rub if she had to walk the bike again.

She pinched off a piece of the protein bar from the last of her rations, popping it into her mouth and closing her eyes. It tasted like creamy peanut butter and dark chocolate, at least that’s what she wanted it to taste like this time. Packing everything back into the container, she stood, taking one last look around. This had probably been a nice town back in the day; she could see the remnants of an advertisement for some festival and imagined that it was something the whole town would’ve turned out to attend. Looking at the energy display, she thought she should have a good charge by now; she had come close, stopping with just enough power for the bike to hover while she pushed it into town. The batteries were full, she rarely used the quick charge option because it eventually burned them out and these had to last. Storing the container, she climbed on the bike and started it up.

Soon she was headed down the “highway”, the soft hum of the engine barely audible above the wind blowing past her ears and only because she knew it was there. The bike was a whisper model, very quiet, hovering above the ground no tires to make noise on the road. The occasional sting of a bug hitting her face was barely noticeable anymore; there were so few in this climate. She didn’t have to worry about wild animals; most of them that might have survived, died out years ago or were hunted to extinction.

Most people she knew didn’t travel this far north, not over-land anyway. Leaving the water was a hardship, even salt water was better than no water. Huge desalinization stations had been built to supply water to the coast but as it became clear that global warming was getting worse, people began putting more effort into “greener” technologies. Funny, they still called it green even though everything was brown now. The landscape between her home and the southernmost northern town was nothing but sand, rocks and mountains with little or no snow left on them. Anything green had ceased to exist outside specially designed hydroponic buildings almost a decade ago..

She had crossed over to highway 44 headed northeast about two hours ago, and it was the same as with everywhere she had been since leaving the small settlement east of Denver; miserable just like she felt right now, numb with fatigue that had more than settled in, she wished Nikki had come with her. At least she’d have someone to talk to; you could only listen to the same playlist so many times before you started hating the songs. The sun was starting to go down and she thought she should start looking for a place to set up for the night. The sign ahead said “Fidelity 25”; she didn’t know how far she had come, since she had forgotten to write down what the trip odometer said at her last stop. Maybe when she reached St. Louis, she would find an old map that could tell her how far it used to be between Denver and this place.

She checked both sides of the road as she slowed down to punch in commands on the display. Putting the bike into “auto-drive”, she looked around as she waited for the computer to come back with the info. There was nothing for miles, no trees, no bushes, no nothing, just flat open, dry land. Not the safest place to camp, especially alone. It was only 25 miles to that town, she could probably find a better place to sleep there, and at least she’d have something other than “sky” between her and anybody else that might be out here. 
It was rumored that people lived out here, deep underground, they came out and “snatched” up unsuspecting travelers in the middle of the night. A children’s story she knew but she didn’t want to become less than a footnote in some “survivor camp tale”. Just then, a little blue light in the lower right corner of her goggles began flashing, water had been found. She clicked the button and the display read “Fidelity 20 Miles”. Finally water and near where she was going to be staying for the night.

She took the bike out of auto-drive and readjusted the speed, she would make it there in less than ten minutes, water first then she’d find a place to sleep. She checked the power levels, she had more than enough to get there and take off in the morning. If she was lucky, there would be plenty of sunshine tomorrow to recharge the bike, she smirked, there was always plenty of sunshine.

~Marisa