The Last Place on Earth (28 page)

“You mean the world to me,” he said. “I don't want to lose you.”

I'd always considered Henry the most original person on the planet, and here he was, spouting canned phrases from all those sappy romances I'd made him watch. I didn't say anything, just crossed my arms and waited for him to point me in the right direction. He pulled out his compass and peered at the dial.

“It's that way.” He pointed.

I nodded once.

He turned. I followed, keeping half a pace behind. We said nothing.

When we got back to the house, the Dunkles' RV was gone from the front yard. A quick check around back revealed that they had taken the school bus, too. At first, panic seized me—all of my stuff must be gone!

And then I remembered: I didn't have any stuff. And anyway, stuff didn't matter anymore. All that mattered was that my family was healthy and that we would all be together, hopefully soon.

 

Thirty-Nine

“MY MOTHER TOLD
me to give you these.” Henry held out beige trousers and a shirt made of some moisture-wicking material.

After a brief hesitation, I took them. “Thanks.” I'd pretty much had it with the Hawkings' “favors,” but the My Little Pony shirt really needed to be washed. Or burned. One of those.

Henry lingered in the doorway. Since the bus was gone and the Platts weren't coming, his parents were finally allowing me to sleep in the room with the couch.

Henry said, “Dinner's at six. But my mother is cooking, so don't expect much.”

Twenty minutes later, clad in my awesome new beigeness, I found Mrs. Hawking in the kitchen, banging pots around and muttering bad words under her breath. When she saw me, she didn't look pleased, exactly, but she looked less displeased than usual. If her opinion still mattered, I'd count that as progress, but at this point I really didn't care what anyone thought about me. I just wanted to go home and hole up with my mother and brother and Randy. Maybe not Randy.

“Dinner is at six,” Mrs. Hawking said. “Or whenever it's ready. I'm making spaghetti.”

“Okay.”

She banged a couple more pots. “I was not supposed to be in charge of cooking. Ever. I have a lot of skills, a lot of expertise to contribute to this community. But cooking—I made it clear from the beginning that someone else would have to take responsibility for meal preparation.”

“You want me to make a salad or something?” I offered.

She froze, looking baffled. “Yes. Please. Except. There's no lettuce. Except. I guess. The garden. You can pick something. That would work. Right?”

A broken egg lay in front of the chicken coop. Gwendolyn and her mother stood nearby, bickering with each other and stressing out the animals. Instead of her
DRILL
shirt, Gwendolyn wore a long-sleeved, baggy gray T-shirt that probably belonged to her father. The stench from the rabbit hutch permeated the air. I held my breath and hurried over to the garden patch without making eye contact.

The first lettuce head I picked was laced with bug bite marks. So was the second. I'd just have to pick through the leaves. Most of the tomatoes were wormy, but I finally managed to find a big juicy one without any obvious tenants, along with a spiky cucumber.

Back in the kitchen, Mrs. Hawking stood hunched over the giant island, sobbing. I tried to sneak back outside, but she had already seen me.

“It wasn't supposed to be like this.” Her face was red and puffy, and her glassy eyes looked possessed.

“Can I do anything?”

“Turn back time.”

We held each other's gaze. Finally she took a deep breath and drew herself up straight.

“The salad,” she said. “You can make the salad.”

At dinner, everyone spread out around the enormous plank table, the Hawkings clumped at one end and the Waxweilers at the other, except for Martin, who sat in the middle. I took a seat next to him.

“Your brother's really here?” he asked when I put my plate next to his.

“In the bunker.”

He chewed his lip. “Could be worse, I guess.”

“Could be better. He could be in the house.”

“Yeah.” He sighed. “Did he say anything about the outside?”

“He said … it's bad.”

“How bad?” I wanted to tell him everything was going to be fine, but I couldn't lie.

I said, “People are sick. Dying. And…”

“What?”

“Everybody is just waiting for it to be over. Just like we are. Peter said something is going around the Internet about a possible cure, but who knows if that's true.”

“Did Peter mention anyone in particular? Who's sick? Or … anything?” He looked scared.

I shook my head. “Sorry.”

He nodded and jabbed at the overcooked pasta swimming in a watery sauce.

*   *   *

“I'm on lookout duty tonight if you want to hang out.” Henry had followed me into the kitchen, where I was attacking the dinner mess by myself.

“I think I'll just go to bed early. I haven't slept much in the past few days.”

“I'll bring my guitar,” Henry said.

“Okay.” I filled the sink with cold soapy water and slid in a pile of dishes.

“You'll come?”

“No. I meant—it's okay for you to bring your guitar if you want. Or not. Whatever. But I'm going to bed.”

He nodded and stood there while I picked up another dirty plate and scraped bits of uneaten pasta into a compost jar.

“You shouldn't have brought me here,” I blurted out.

“I'm sorry.”

Some lettuce and a chunk of tomato went into the compost jar. “People should finish what's on their plates,” I snapped. “It's not like this food will last forever.”

“You want me to help?” he asked.

“I really just want you to leave.”

He stared at me with those sad, dark eyes and then wandered off into the night.

 

Forty

I SHOULDN'T HAVE
bothered cleaning up the kitchen.

When I finished putting away the dishes, I headed upstairs. The house was quiet. No TV tonight. No hanging out or sneaking off into the woods. Instead, everyone had retreated to the bedrooms, eager for the escape that only sleep could provide. After two days in the cave, the stiff couch in my new room felt so luxurious that I fell into a deep sleep the instant my head hit the cushion.

And then.

“Daisy! Wake up!”
It was the dead of night. Someone was shaking me. A girl. Gwendolyn.

My first reaction was irritation. If Martin was allowed to sleep through these stupid evacuation drills, I could, too.

“Daisy! Get up! We need to go!”

I squeezed my eyes shut, but she persisted.

“Fire!”

All at once, I smelled the smoke. My eyes popped open. Gray wisps drifted past my open door.

“Gwennie! Come on!”
Her father ran over and yanked her arm. Together they fled the room, without looking back to see if I was following. Family first, family second, family third.

I scrambled off the couch. I pulled the beige shirt up over my mouth and nose, grabbed my pink sneakers, and followed the Waxweilers down the wide staircase.

Thick, black smoke gushed from the kitchen. We ran away from it, past the dry fountain in the foyer and out the front door, into the clear, cool night.

“This way!” Mr. Hawking urged, motioning for us to move away from the house, toward the front gate. Martin hopped in his little car, still parked dangerously close to the house, and drove it over to the other vehicles, farther out in the yard.

The house was really burning now. Beyond the dining room window, orange flames thrashed and danced.
Where is Henry?
Panic gripped me until I remembered that he was on lookout duty, safely away from the inferno.

“Looks like it started—” Mr. Waxweiler paused to cough. “In the kitchen.”

Everyone looked at me, the last one in that room. This is what I get for doing the dishes.

“Everything was off when I left,” I said. But … had I actually checked the stove? I couldn't remember. I hadn't done any actual cooking; that had been up to Mrs. Hawking.

“I turned everything off,” Mrs. Hawking added. “I always follow safety protocol. Must have been faulty wiring. We never should have trusted Kurt Dunkle with the electrical.”

“What now?” Mrs. Waxweiler's voice quavered.

“We leave.” Her husband put his big hand on her little shoulder. “As according to plan. Go to the evacuation location. Reconvene here in twenty-four hours.”

“We have to get my brother,” I said.

But before anyone could respond, the house's front windows blew out with a flash and a boom. Gwendolyn screamed. Flames spewed out of the windows and slithered up the facade. The blaze had moved upstairs. Orange flames taunted us from behind the upper windows.

“The roof is fireproof,” Mr. Waxweiler said, as if trying to convince himself that things weren't so bad. But he'd barely spoken before the fireproof roof collapsed, sending sparks shooting through the night sky and toward the dark, dry, sleeping trees.

“We need to get Henry!”
Mrs. Hawking shrieked, all attempt at composure abandoned. She ran for her SUV.

“Head for the road,” Mr. Hawking instructed the other family. “We'll get Henry and meet you at the evacuation zone. Dunkle should be there, too, if he follows protocol.” As an afterthought, he added, “Take Daisy.”

Just beyond the fence, a treetop caught fire like a towering birthday candle with a ghastly wish. The fire spilled onto the next treetop and the next, until a clump burst into flame, lighting the forest with an eerie glow.

The Hawkings' SUV bumped over the gravel and out the front gate, their headlights almost unnecessary in the firelit night.

“Daisy! Get in!” Mrs. Waxweiler yelled from inside the giant pickup truck.

I hurried over. Gwendolyn was in the narrow backseat, strapping herself in. Next to us, Martin waited in his car, windows rolled down so he could hear the plans.

“Who's getting Peter?” I asked, still standing in the dirt.

“The bunker is fireproof,” Mr. Waxweiler said. “He'll be safe.”

It took a moment for his words to register. “We are not leaving my brother.”

“He could be contagious,” Mrs. Waxweiler said.

“We are not leaving Peter!” I slammed the door and ran through the yard and out the front gate.

Car lights flashed behind me. A horn sounded. The little blue car pulled up next to me.

“Get in!” Martin yelled. “I'll take you.”

We barely made it out the gate before the Hawkings' taillights stopped us. A figure stood next to the car. Henry. He'd come back from the lookout tower. When he saw us, he ran into the glare of Martin's headlights.

Ahead of us, his mother jumped out of the SUV. “Henry! Get back here!”

Henry yanked open the door. I scooted forward, and he squeezed into the backseat. I shut the door before his mother reached us.

“We getting Peter?” Henry asked.

“Not leaving without him,” Martin said.

Henry's mother pounded on the car window. She was crying. I couldn't look at her. The Waxweilers' SUV came up behind us, its headlights flooding the inside of Martin's car. Unless the Hawkings continued down the road, all three vehicles were stuck, and the fire was spreading. Mrs. Hawking gave Henry a final, pleading look and then ran back to her car.

The black Expedition lurched forward, and we followed it, traveling as fast as the little car would allow. Its shocks protested with squeaks and groans. Martin stayed silent, his hands tight on the wheel, as his parents followed close behind, their headlights pouring through the rear window like a beacon. Or an accusation.

“I saw him,” Henry said from the backseat.

I twisted around. “Who?”

“Kyle. Running through the woods. Toward the house. But I didn't do anything, because I thought he was going to see you.”

“When?”

“I don't know. Forty-five minutes ago? An hour?”

Kyle. Of course. In my head, I could still hear him saying, “I burned down a house.”

“Did you see him run past you a second time?” I asked.

Henry shook his head. “I could have missed him. I was playing my guitar, so I didn't hear anything, and he could have cut through a different way.”

“Your guitar…” He had left it behind.

“Doesn't matter. It's just a thing. But Kyle—I should have been paying attention. I could have stopped him. You all could have died.”

I reached my hand back between the seats, and he took it. “But we didn't.”

At the clearing, Henry's parents turned off the road, and Martin followed. The remaining Waxweilers continued their journey down the road, away from the flames. Henry's parents were already out of the car. Behind us, toward the house, the night sky glowed a sickening orange.

Mrs. Hawking called out, “They can get him, Henry! They don't need you! Come here!”

Henry didn't answer, just ran over the rough terrain with Martin and me, the Hawkings close behind. A flashlight would have been helpful, but for all the time and money spent prepping, they had neglected to bring one along.

The clearing seemed bigger in the dark. I tried to remember where exactly Peter had descended. If he'd had the lights on, little beams would shine through the solar tubes, but it was the middle of the night.

If we'd had to rely on sight, we never would have found the opening. But Henry knew where it was in the way that Henry knew so many things. He darted to a seemingly random spot on the ground, fell to his knees, and pulled opened the hatch.

I caught up with him just as he began his descent and followed him into the darkness. Just a few more moments and we'd have Peter in Martin's car, and we'd all be on our way home.