Page 8 of Hollow Valley

“We were at our house in Vancouver when the virus broke out, and we ended up in a quarantine zone for a long time,” Ryder explained.“And then it took me even longer to get here and find the place again.It’s a lot harder doing it on foot, especially when I hadn’t been here since I was ten.”

“Your parents aren’t with you?”I asked.

Ryder’s expression darkened.“No.I’m the only one left of my family.”

“What is going on?Why are you all standing out there talking?”Another voice in the background, and another young woman appeared.She looked to be my age, and her black hair nearly reached the knees of her long legs.She was wearing a t-shirt of Max’s paired with a skirt I had made from old curtains – both things we’d left behind when we left the Lakehouse because there had only been so much that we could carry.

“Bianka, I told you to stay back until we cleared it,” the shorter brunette chastised her.

“Well, I figured since you’re chatting it up that it was cleared,” the taller woman – Bianka, apparently – replied.Then she looked over to us.“Are you gonna kill us or rob us?”

“No, we don’t mean you any harm,” Boden said quickly.

The short brunette rolled her eyes and muttered something under her breath.

“What are you doing here then?Do you need help or something?”Bianka asked.

“They said they’re looking for someone,” Ryder answered for us.

“You been walking a lot?You look tired and dirty.”Bianka eyed us up with her hands on her hips.“Why don’t you come in and rest up?You could tell us about your missing person.”

“That would be great,” I replied before Boden had a chance to decline the offer.These people seemed nice enough, especially Ryder, and I wanted to find out if maybe they’d seen Remy.

“Bianka,” the brunette said in her low husky voice.“We’ve talked about this.We can’t invite strangers into our house.”

“Oh, come on, babe,” Bianka retorted, shrugging off the brunette’s concerns.“We haven’t talked to anyone in a while.I wanna find out what else is out there, and these two might know.Besides, we oughtta help people when we can.Pay it forward, that kinda thing.”

Ryder stepped to the side and opened the door wider, ignoring the brunette’s protests.“Come on in, meet the rest of us, and we can have a chat.”

By Boden’s hesitant expression, I knew that he didn’t want to, likely because he didn’t trust the situation.But Bianka was welcoming us in, and I didn’t want to leave here without anything.We’d come so far.So I went inside the home that had once been mine.

6

Stella

There were five of them in total living together in Ryder’s house.Three we had met – Ryder Tremblay, the tall Bianka Novak, and the stocky Murphy Parsons.The others were waiting for us in the living room.

They were two young men, looking to be about Ryder and Bianka’s age.Murphy appeared a bit older, but that could’ve just been her serious expression.

The first to greet us was Leandro Reyes.He got up from the couch, extending a hand and a crooked smile.His eyes were a dark russet, and his skin was a warm umber brown.He wore his hair in chin-length twist locs, and a bear claw hung on a leather strap around his neck.

The other was Cole Wagner.He was pale and lanky, with a pronounced overbite and nervous eyes.As he stood, he kept his distance and stayed at the far side of the room in front of the wall of windows.Other than a diffident nod of the head after Ryder made the introductions, Cole hadn’t really acknowledged us at all.

“So you used to live here?”Bianka asked.She sat in the plush sitting chair near the fireplace, her legs and long skirt draped over the arm of it, and she watched Boden and I with curious blue eyes.

“Yeah, we did,” I said.“For about seven years.”

“That’ssowild!”she exclaimed.

Murphy sat down on the other arm of the chair, putting a protective hand on Bianka’s shoulder.“Why did you leave?This place has everything.”

“We needed medical care,” Boden answered so I wouldn’t have to.“That’s the one thing that’s missing from way out here.”

“Well, that’s missingeverywhere, isn’t it?”Murphy asked.

“We’d heard about medicine and a helpful community out in Emberwood, so that’s where we went,” Boden elaborated.“And it worked out for us, so we stayed on.”

“It worked out for you?”Murphy scowled and let out a skeptical laugh.“I heard that place burned to the ground.”