Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 430(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 430(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Then I’m alone. Truly, truly alone for the first time in weeks.
It’s weird.
It’s really quiet, oddly enough. I can hear birds chirping in the distance, and the air around me seems more still than ever. It’s like when Zohr left, he sucked all of the air out of the room, too. It’s doubly ironic because I’m not in a room. I’m outside in the fresh air and sunshine…and yet, it feels like there’s a huge piece missing.
Strange. I have to admit I didn’t feel like this when Jack died. By the time he reached the end, it was a relief that he’d gone. I loved him, but he was in such pain and it was so time-consuming to take care of him that all I’d felt was a sense of guilty freedom after I’d buried him. I expected a bit of that today.
Hasn’t kicked in yet. Huh.
I can come back…
Nope, I send to him. You eat up. I’m fine. It’s just an adjustment. I put my hand on the knife at my belt and focus on what we came here to do—shopping.
The sliding pharmacy doors are cracked open and stuck, always a bad sign. I manage to unjam the tracks of the debris and shove the door back a foot or so, just enough to wedge my way through. It’s dark inside, so I pause to dig my flashlight out and then get to hunting. It’s a disappointing mess inside, though it’s not surprising. In the After, if you find medicine of any kind—even expired aspirin—it’s a godsend. The drug aisles are completely torn apart and emptied, with more boxes on the floor than on the shelves. I pick through them anyhow, because a good scavenger always hopes for a forgotten pill bottle somewhere in the back. When this turns up nothing, I head for the second most important section in any good store—snacks.
I’m ashamed to admit that I have a terrible sweet tooth and even years in the After haven’t cured me of it. I will tear up some expired-ass cookies. There are certain candies that stay decent despite years of expiration, like jelly beans, whereas chocolate is a mere dream of the past and usually melted into sludge and caked with a yucky, chalky white coating if it’s not. I’d still eat it, of course, but sometimes in my dreams, I find a perfect package of chocolate bars and get to eat them all by myself.
Unfortunately, it looks like the local rats had the same dream I did, because everything here is covered in cardboard shreds (a hallmark of rodent nests) and droppings. It’s not safe to eat any of this. I’m disappointed, but it happens. I dig through the cookie packages in vain, hoping for a plastic-wrapped sleeve of Oreos that’s escaped destruction, but no dice. Oh well.
On to my real task—lotion.
Bath goods are one of the easier things to find in the After. Guess bathing’s not a high priority on the survival list, and when you have limited space, you don’t exactly carry a bunch of different bath products with you. There’s shampoo and conditioner everywhere, along with makeup. I grab a few packages of razor refills because the blades always come in handy, and then find the lotion. The bottles are intact, if dusty, and I pick one up that says “jojoba” because it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten what jojoba even smells like. When I open the bottle, though, I’m disappointed to see the contents are completely dried out inside. There’s nothing but a hard hunk of what used to be lotion, and opening a few other bottles proves the same. It’s been far too long and far too hot for the products to survive.
I’m not about to give up, though. I grab my bottle, add a few sips of water from my canteen to it, and then re-cap it. I slosh the water around and shake it as I leave the store. I’ll make this work, even if I have to spend hours working a paste into Zohr’s wings.
Thinking about Zohr makes me pause as I go out on the street. His thoughts have been quiet and it’s been at least an hour since I started in the pharmacy. He immediately touches minds to me, and it feels oddly comforting to have that quick reassurance. His mind is full of deer and their delicious taste—he’s caught one, scarfed it down, and is hunting another.
Take your time, I tell him when his thoughts turn toward me. He sends a silent question, asking if he needs to come back and give up his second meal. There’s no hurry. Eat up because we’ve got another long day of travel tomorrow. I’ll be at the bookstore. I send him a visual as I approach it. Don’t worry about me.