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Chapter One

They say that the world is built for two, but in the silence of the old cellar two feels like a long lost dream It’s an ice cream cone on a boardith the sun above and the sea below It’s the wind rolling around you gently, trying to persuade in all the directions at once andin It’s a perfect place none of us tries to re the world was built for pain Perhaps once there had been a place where love and co to push your life toward

This isn’t that world anymore

To me that world had never existed anyway The world has always been a selfish place where love is fleeting and people are fickle Once upon a time, true love accidentally happened to the fortunate They polluted and corrupted it, and like everything else it got sick

I’ve seen it I’ve seen it and in the end when it’s taken away the people who protested or cried the loudest, were the ones who had taken it for granted the most

I look around the cellar, in four days I have barely moved It’sI’ trip with a quiet few days in a cellar or basement

I wasn’t born to this I’ve had to learn how to move around quietly, how to sit still

I knohat I need to do to live I have lain ah the woods in the dark, feeling ht clear like a wild animal and embrace the darkness

I creep out into the beaht that found its way doo stories into a dark cellar The beaht’s deterhts back around and take my first step toward the stairs

The explosions never destroyed this home in any way The stairs are in one piece, which has become a bit of a novelty The old farmhouse is too far from any major center to have even been aware of the proble

The blood s outside prove that sickness has touched every inch of this world

The hard wood creaks under my first step I hold my breath and hope the creak went unheard I take a breath and the second step slowly, allowing iving the sounds space and distance My heart is beating like it et free froer, it’s another rule Never leave when you feel it’s safe, alait one more second

I put my feet to the far sides of the stairs, where the nails attach the boards to the frame Shallow breaths make sounds in the neorld, in the borderlands anyway No electricity, no cars, no phones, no buzz The world sits quiet, as if sighing and taking a long inhale after what seemed like forever with mankind and the noise pollution I am at peace when I am home, but here in the open world I am one of them One of what is left What scrambles to survive, most of the tih the cellar door and try to keep my anxious heartbeat low and my breath quiet My body needs to make some noises, but others can be controlled

The house is si way off the road, not that roadsthat will outlast any hu Farest, just like my father always said they would

Two trips a year is rarely enough, but I know if I travel anyht

I walk into the country kitchen and a is still in its place, just as it was the first tih, layers of dust have found their way into the hoh the cracks With no busy little granny to buzz around dusting and tidying it, everything shows its years of abandonrow up the sides of the house, like all the houses As always I stand against the doorframe and put my hand at the top of her it is than the mark I once foolishly put there

I look away froirl I walk low to the ground toward the backdoor

I can’t help but laugh inside at how I still felt safer leaving through the backdoor, even though there is no front or back There are only doors They don’t go anywhere anyoes anywhere

I position the heavy pack on my back carefully It contains jars full of heart and soul and survival Each jar is like a kiss froetables I assus There aren’t any labels to contradict it, for all I know she was using MSG in everything I s to ht back memories of nice old ladies and the world before I have been tonineteen feels more like fifty most days

I harden es through me I take a deep breath and creak the door open, as if the wind has opened it I close it again and open it It looks like the wind co with the door

My ani ht I should be waiting for night to travel but I have stayed too long this ti alone I know this well My garden has died s in the soft breeze, rass sways and the dusty driveway pebbles scuttle along Everything moves in sync with the wind