Page 92 of Five Survive

Oliver stretched out one arm, slamming his elbow down against the handle and kicking the door open.

“OLIVER, DON’T!” Arthur’s voice roared.

Footsteps crashing.

Screams.

The RV shook.

But it was too late.

The door was open into the wide-open nothing of outside. The black night ready and waiting.

Oliver’s arms were crushing her, and then they weren’t. He let Red go, shoving her forward, out through the open door.

Red landed on one ankle on the steps. She tripped, falling over herself, the momentum too much.

She rolled down, the final step jumping up to crash against her hip, sending her on.

Red crumpled, facedown, hands-down, against the dirt and gravel of the road. Spitting out a mouthful.

The door of the RV slammed shut behind her.

She was alone.

She was outside.

Not alone, actually, as she raised her head from the road, dirt and grit on her tongue, against her teeth.

There was Don, just a few feet away, folded backward in a way people shouldn’t bend. Looking toward his wife, even in death. His head was undone at the back, a mess of blood and bone, hunks of flesh and brain matter on the road.

Only shoes, that was all Red could see of Joyce. The rest of her disappeared beyond the corner of the RV, the full beams carving a path through the black of night, trees waving in the distance.

“OLIVER, MOVE!”

Red heard shouting behind the closed door.

Thumping.

Scuffling.

Red pushed herself up, onto her knees.

She stared out at the scrubland, eyes scanning across the darkness. The grass spoke to her, staggering in the wind, cool on her cheeks.

The sniper was out there, hiding in the night. She couldn’t see him, but he could see her.

“GET OUT OF THE WAY, OLIVER!”

Where was the red dot? Was it on her forehead right now, somewhere between her eyes? Last few seconds of having a face.

Her eyes flicked again to Don, those tiny pieces of flesh and skull and brain that would rebuild the puzzle of his head. Which part of the brain was it, the part that told you where you’d put down your keys or your phone? Red must already be missing that part. And where were those red feelings kept, the guilt, the shame? Red hoped those would be the first to blow apart, leave her with some of the good fragments, the better memories.

She waited for the crack, the last sound she’d hear.

There’d be no volley of rifle shots at her funeral. No bagpipes weeping “Amazing Grace.”

“Simon, help me!”