Page 11 of Before Their After

The Beginning

AMAIA

Fifteen months had passedsince the bombs had dropped. My twenty-third birthday had come and gone. It was an eerie feeling. The people I’d celebrated with only a year prior would not live to see their own. Would never see what this world had become.

The air had become easy to breathe without a gas mask, no longer squeezing and releasing your lungs with every step. Each day grew warmer than the one prior as we moved further south. It was bearable, nothing that changed the overall ecosystem too much, though the oceans had yet to recover from the algae lost.

Thirteen months ago, I’d blown the cover of my saving grace. A man of virtue and patience, an ill fit for this world, but his presence alone had spared me from my own demise. Our time on the road created a formidable bond. One I had grown to cherish. Value beyond what I’d conceived as possible in the remains of who I’d been before.

I respected him, loved him like family. Appreciated him for opening my eyes to the idea of forgiveness, not only of myselfbut toward others. He’d recognized the triggers of my power and helped me learn to control it, learning to listen to myself and my body. I was lucky. Most people had just started to figure their gifts out, but I knew what I was capable of now. Was confident in my abilities.

I’d never run again.

Prescott and I had spent time traveling with a few groups for weeks at a time, never sticking around long. It was nice to stay connected with others. No matter how dark minds had gone, there were still good people out there too.

The rumor mill that ran rampant among groups was an added benefit. You’d hear things. Things that made you question whether it was worth sticking around to see how depraved humanity could get. Watching society feed their beast instead of killing it. There were times when I wondered if humanity deserved to survive at all. Some humans … most of us truly, were not worthy of this next phase of evolution.

Of course, there were moments of hope, as fleeting as they may be. Word had spread of the government setting up survivor camps outside major cities. We hadn’t come across any yet. Nonetheless, we’d started heading in the general direction of Los Angeles, wanting to find a home of our own, no longer having the desire to stay moving all the time. There was no security in that.

“How sad,” I said, the acrid smell of smoke and burning materials filled my nostrils. “Was on my bucket list before this. Kind of place you’d stop through on a road trip and take pictures, interact with endearing locals. Sucks I’ll never get to really take in its beauty.”

The city of Monterey was devastated, wrought by fire. Most of the buildings had been reduced to rubble, the smoldering charred remains still emitting smoke. Debris littered the streets, evidence of the people who’d fled either before or during theflames. A haunting reminder of what my gifts could do if I lost control.

It wasn’t the first city we’d come across that had succumbed to flames and was likely not the last. Between people who had turned with flammable material in their surroundings and others with gifts similar to my own, fire departments had quickly become too overwhelmed to put them out. The big ‘if’ being ifthe fire department had even remained and hadn’t scattered immediately, abandoning all hope.

Prescott wasn’t seeing it that way. Where hope had long been lost in a city covered in ash, his eyes glittered with it. I studied the tall, red-haired man on the other side of me. Hope filled his eyes, too. He’d joined us halfway through our journey. We’d been traveling with a smaller group through the Redwoods and for some reason, he just seemed to fit. Our makeshift family of two had become a trio.

He understood me. Related to the loss I’d felt since he’d suffered through his own. Jax provided a sense of safety and security I thought unattainable for our reality. The connection between us healed wounds we’d assumed would bleed forever. There was solace in each other’s company.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Prescott murmured absentmindedly. “All I see is the perfect place to call home.”

When Jax turned his head down to look at me, his meek grin caused my heart to skip a beat. It wasn’t simply a matter of him being timelessly attractive, because there was no doubt about that. But there was something more, something deeper that drew me to him. His reassuring smile was a small comfort in the midst of the chaos of our lives.

I groaned, “Here we go. Pres, it’s nothing but rubble.”

“San Diego put up walls,” he said, speaking out into the distance. Jax didn’t react. It was news to me, but clearly, they’d been talking.Their optimism will be the death of them, I swear.“They’re rebuilding,” he continued. “Why join someone else’s cause when we can start our own? Control our own future, shape history.”

Jax chuckled, turning back to face us after focusing on the horizon. His finger rose, accent thick as he pointed toward the distance on the far left. “I’ll be damned. It’s not population zero after all.”

A small cluster of homes stood out in the distance, smoke snaking out the chimneys indicating signs of life. This wasn’t a city that had crumbled, but rather a city of resilience.

“You know the history, don’t you? There’s no such thing as a coincidence, Amaia. This is a sign.” A few steps and Prescott’s warm hand placed over my shoulder, encouraging the tension to leave my body.

San Diego had been the first European settlement in the state, setting the forefront for what would become modern day California. Monterey followed in its footsteps. Had already thrived as a political and religious capital in Mexican California. After Mexico had ceded the state over, it’d become a place of many firsts. Firsts that could happen here again—a new society could thrive, one that I’d always envisioned. A society my friend Sloan and I naively believed possible before. What a significant portion of our college years had been spent fighting for.

Monterey had set the stage for entertainment, creating the first theater in California; they’d publicly funded their schools and libraries. California’s first printing press. I let myself see what Prescott and Jax saw, let my veil of pessimism drop for a moment. Jax’s gaze lingered on my face for a moment longer than necessary. My cheeks flushed red-hot under his scrutiny.

“As much as I’d love to understand what the hell your two eyes are glazing over about, I’ve accepted that I just wasn’t meant to.”

My mouth opened. Though I was quick, ready to offer a snarky response, he beat me to it. “And before you say ‘Jaxyboy, if you don’t take the time to remember history, you’ll simply make the same mistakes of the past,’ I get it. Doesn’t matter. If you’re in, then I’m in. I don’t have to understand, or even know, what you and Prescott have already conjured up inside your overly imaginative minds, but I’m so in. Whatever the future is here, it’s surely better than the world we live in now.”

His eyes met mine as he moved to squeeze my hand, dropping it at the awkwardness before moving on to Prescott, playfully shoving his shoulder. “Would be nice to see the good guys in charge for once.”

Good. He thinks I’m good.

We’d had two tents to travel with, one with the capacity for a singular person, and one that held two. Prescott snored, which meant there’d been many, many nights for Jax and I to drown out our misery and air our dirty laundry. I’d bared my soul to him and he still believed there was good left inside. Admired me even, put me on a pedestal. Always pushing me to see what I was capable of. That the past was the past, I didn’t have to let it define me or shape me. That I could create something beautiful from the trauma and that some of the most beautiful art in the world was built with broken pieces.

I scrunched my nose, letting my skepticism twist their nerves as I signaled to the view at our backs. “Cliffside over therewouldplay to our benefit defensively during whatever inevitable war or political pissing match happens. Especially once the greedy assholes jump on your land grabbing bandwagon in a few months. Beach too. Something tells me that’ll come in handy one day.”

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