Prologue
It was a rookie mistake. Honestly. You'd think that after seven years of surviving in an apocalypse, mostly alone (but not totally alone - Boy is great company), that I'd know not to try to clear a landing into gravel.
You'd think.
It's like the universe froze me in the air for a second after I jumped, and said, "Nora, you're an absolute idiot. Injury incoming."
It's a humbling experience, actually. Realizing how stupid you're being mid-execution.
Now, I'm curled up on the ground, wondering how the hell I thought I'd clear that.
It'd been happening a lot. Silly little mistakes. Forgetting to plan the next week's meals. Thinking I locked the bus overnight when I didn't. Loudly clunking around outside, not nearly as cautious as I used to be about making noise.
There have been a lot of close calls.
And because of it, I'm now in a shallow pit, roughly a twenty-minute walk away from home. The sun is starting to set, and the warm day will turn into a chilly night soon. My foot is shooting in pain and my stomach is growling with hunger.
The real pain, though, is knowing Boy is waiting for me back in the bus. I can picture him with ears perked, paws crossed, ready to offer me kisses and tail wags in exchange for the rabbit I've caught for him.
I lock my elbows and try to steady myself up, but as soon as I put a bit of weight on my left foot, I tense up in excruciating pain. Now my body is the one calling me an absolute idiot.
I grunt to myself in frustration. How could I make such a stupid mistake?
Granted, I'm exhausted after outrunning that gargantuan rattlesnake a few miles back. But I used to be sharper. Stronger. I'm starting to think I'm losing myself, and in turn, Boy is losing me, too.
He's been the last thing keeping me going these days. I've come to terms with the fact that I rely on him more than he does on me.
I grit my teeth. I've been through worse, and the least I can do is limp my way back to the bus that holds all my belongings and my only friend in this messed up world.
I desperately scan the dirt and rocks beneath me, finally spotting a stick that seems strong enough to act as a makeshift cane. I drag myself towards it, gripping the stick and using it to steady myself. Shaking and wincing and groaning, I finally stand, all my weight on my right foot. At least it's not my dominant side that's sprained.
I quickly deduce that I'm being way too optimistic - a sprain doesn't send you back down on the ground once you step forward, forcing hot tears out of your eyes.
It's a fracture. At least.
Panic sets in, flooding my entire body. I can't afford this. For the time it'd take for this to heal, I don't have enough food in the bus. If I even make it to the bus. And if I do, Boy and I will go hungry, and this entire battle for survival will end with me pathetically lying in a bus and wishing I stocked up on more dead rabbits.
Climactic.
I muster up another bout of courage. I get to my knees, dragging myself forward.
Every inch I move sends a pang of pain through my leg, and I realize I won't make it in one go.
I enter an old, ransacked home that I'd already scouted out many times before. All that's left after me and who knows how many other survivors is rundown furniture and torn up papers, mementos of the family that once lived a normal life within these walls, before an asteroid and rocket debris irreversibly changed life as we knew it.
The first time I came to this specific house, I grabbed everything I could hold: a landline phone, bags of food, and clothing. The bags of food were long gone now, and most of the clothing was still in my bus, along with the phone. I had told myself I was keeping the phone if I ever wanted to find a way to communicate with other survivors out there, but after what had happened that first month post-apocalypse, I never wanted to, nor could, trust anyone again.
I stumble in to the home, shutting the door behind me and making a bee-line towards the ratty, plaid couch in the corner of the living room.
I don't know how many hours it's been when I wake up on the floor. Or how many days. My head is pounding. I must have passed out or hit my head on something. Or both.
Once I can get back outside and continue my slow, staggered journey home, quickly clueing in that it's dawn, I'm anxious over the fact that I don't even know how long it's been.
By the time I make it to the bus to see the door wide open, I'm shaking with every breath I take. I wait for Boy to greet me, and when he doesn't, I realize this is the second time in my life that the world has ended.
