Page 19 of The End of the World As We Know It

“She’s a rich girl, not a street kid. She pulled the claws out of a kitten with pliers. Threw muriatic acid on a girl in school. Expected never to face consequences. And didn’t.”

“That’s… horrifying.” And alarming. A red-alert threat.

“Daddy’s lawyers got her community service. And then…” She waved her cig at the world.This happened. “Her name’s Amber. Think of her as… Amber waves of pain.”

She scanned the street, the maddened world that felt like a set of teeth coming at them.

“If you leave, don’t let anyone see you go. This place will fire back up, but till it does, Amber and her crew can set the rules, and declare your existence a crime they get to punish.”

Them—off-kilter, but finally finding their axis. One that spun toward night.

“Maybe it’s safer to stay.”

“It’s not. And forget the notion that Miss Mollie could stay here with me while you split. I ain’t up to it.”

Dani felt a brush of shame. She tried to hide it.

“When I say watch out,” Eleanor said, “I mean they’re putting bounties on folks who try to leave. Be careful who you tell, who sees you.”

“Bounties.”

She gripped Dani’s wrist. “Hear me, girl. Take care, ’cause people will snitch on you.”

Hiking back to the motel, a cold stone seemed to lodge in Dani’s throat. Amber was doing more than watching shit burn. She was prepping.

It’s coming. Soon. Can’t you feel it?

Something was inbound and Amber wanted to be ready for it. To have…offerings. Spoils that would prove her chops and buy her a place in a new power structure.

The next day Dani saw a spray-painted billboard.EXIT FEE = $10,000.

Her stomach knotted. Below that, on the wall of a building:OR UNTOUCHD YOUNG BLOOD TENDER.

Beneath that:OR ELSE.

On the dirt below lay the man who walked the Strip picking up litter. His trash-poking stick was stabbed into his neck like a whaling harpoon.

That night she and Mollie climbed to the roof of the Mirage. Distantly they saw a patrol on dirt bikes chasing down people in the desert. Headlights, circling, screams, gunfire.

Dani felt the impulse, visceral.Take wing.

Back in the oppressive heat of the motel room, she sat at the window eyeing the chittering night. She desperately missed Seattle. Mollie lay hard asleep in the moonlight.

Dani wasn’t her mother, her teacher, her social worker. She half thought that the girl looked up to her because she wore a uniform. Anow funky, grime-streaked airline uniform. She needed to get the girl help. Shelter. Something. Something other than herself.

Covers rustled. Mollie sat up and hugged her knees, eyes dark. “You’re thinking about leaving, aren’t you?”

“No!” That was exactly what she was thinking. “I would never leave—”

“Because we can’t stay here. We have to go.”

We.“This is your home. I could stay, a while. See if help arrives. The power comes back on, phones. Don’t you want—”

“Staying isn’t safe.”

They stared at each other. Mollie seemed to vibrate with urgency.

“Then we leave,” Dani said.