Page 46 of The Last Stars in the Sky
“Still, I found some good stuff.” She gives me a canary-eating grin as she shows me her loot—a bottle of over-the-counter sleeping pills, a six-pack of soap, a box of condoms, and a tube of ointment for vaginal thrush.
“Seriously?” I ask, and she shrugs, still grinning.
“You never know,” she tells me. “Either way.”
I let out a reluctant laugh as I shake my head and start the truck.
I reverse out of the parking lot as Kerry says, “Let’s try the school, down by the church.”
“Has everywhere been looted?” Mattie asks. “What about the hospitals? What about the cancer patients?” For the first time in a long while, she sounds troubled, frightened. “What’s happened to them?”
“Nothing good,” Kerry returns flatly. “I mean, anyone on life support has already bitten the dust, for sure. It was probably a mercy.”
“Kerry,” I admonish, and she gives me one of her looks.
“What? You think a fourteen-year-old should be shielded from that kind of common sense? The world as we know it is over, Alex.” For the first time, she sounds angry about that fact; her insouciance really is a cover. “I think Mattie gets that more than you do.”
“Maybe it is better to go quickly,” Mattie says quietly. What a sentiment for a fourteen-year-old to have, and yet I think I agree with her.
We drive to the parochial school attached to the big Catholic church, which looks empty, its windows still intact. My hearts lifts in hope, just a little.
“It looks like it hasn’t been touched,” Mattie says excitedly. “And they’ll have so much stuff. Books, papers, art stuff…you could homeschool us! Or at least Ruby,” she amends quickly. “I don’t need to be homeschooled.”
Of course not. “We’ll see,” I reply, still apprehensive. I just want to get back to the safety of the cottage. We shouldn’t have come out at all.
We park behind the school, facing the woods and the river, where no one can see us. As far as I can tell, the school still looks secure.
“How do we get in?” Mattie asks. Her cheeks are flushed, and she’s springing up onto her toes, clearly excited by the prospect of finding out what’s inside.
“Break a window,” Kerry says decisively. “Quietly.”
How do you break a window quietly? I find out when Kerry shrugs off her coat, wraps her hand in it, and then, in one swift, certain movement, punches through a classroom window by the back door.
“Ouch,” she says ruefully as she massages her fist. “That hurt alotmore than I thought it would. I saw it in a movie, and it looked way easier.”
Mattie is already clearing the rest of the broken glass away with a stick she found somewhere. I’m watching, struggling to keep up with their cool-headed sense of authority and purpose.
Just a few minutes later, we are in the school. It is eerily quiet, the air both frigid and stale. Our shoes squeak on the floor. I pause by a notice for an audition for a play, two weeks ago.Please prepare a monologue, no more than two minutes long. I trace my fingers over the words; a world forever gone.
“Mom.” Mattie has stridden ahead of me, toward the classrooms. “Comeon.”
Within a few minutes, it’s clear we have, in some senses, hit the jackpot here. There are textbooks, pens, papers, paints, craft supplies. Mattie is stacking it all by the door while Kerry ventures farther into the school, no doubt looking for the kitchen.
I follow her, casting my eye at the empty classrooms; there is something ghostly about it all. “What about a nail gun?” I ask. “Do you think there might be one, in a janitor’s closet somewhere? Or if the school has a carpentry shop?”
“I don’t know.” Her tone is diffident, distracted; she’s found the kitchen, and she strides forward, past long, industrial counters made of metal, to a walk-in pantry in the back. As she opens the door, she whistles softly. I stand behind her, peering over her shoulder.
There is a lot of food in there—gallon vats of tomato sauce, cans and cans of vegetables, sacks of flour, five-kilogram packets of pasta and rice. For a second, I can only stare; then my heart fills, swells. There is enough food here to last well into summer, I’m sure of it.
“This is awesome,” Kerry breathes. “We’ve got to move quickly, though, in case someone sees us. Do you think there’s a dolly somewhere, or something?”
“I can look.” I turn, intent on finding a janitor’s closet. There must be one around here somewhere. I start opening doors, peering into cupboards, focused on securing all this wonderful food, when the silence of the empty school is pierced by a terrible, jagged sound.
My daughter’s scream.
SIXTEEN
DANIEL
