Page 47 of The End of the World As We Know It

Ricky held out his hand. She looked at it, and then took it. He led her higher up the hill, where the woods were rich with pines and oaks and tangled with vines.

It took some time to climb to the higher reaches of the hill, and a lot of effort on the woman’s part. She had probably been hiding out, not using her muscles a lot, and of course, she was frightened. So was Ricky, but he had learned to be much calmer from living in the woods with only his wits and deadeye with the slingshot to survive.

As they climbed, Ricky looked back. Gene and the other two were looking up. They saw him and the woman.

“You bastard!” Gene yelled out.

Ricky and the woman reached a temporary ledge of greenery and went to the left, and then up a zigzag trail, and then through trees and around an unusual pile of large rocks that had once been a chimney when someone had inhabited the spot in the old days. Now trees grew tight to it.

They kept climbing. For the moment, they had lost their pursuers.

On the hilltop Ricky located a roll of vines he had found before. They had made a kind of tunnel. Push aside a brush, and you could see there was a mouth you could slide into. The tunnel was thick all over, almost enough to keep rain out. It was not tall enough to stand inside, but you could get around easily on your hands and knees.

Ricky put his finger to his mouth again. The woman nodded. He slipped the slingshot off his hip, opened the ammunition bag, found a smooth rock, and slipped it into the pouch of the slingshot. He pinched the pouch and held it in place.

Gene hurried up the hill, holding his pistol, followed by his bat-wielding partners. Through the brush at the fore of the greenery tunnel, Ricky could see them pause and look at the ground. That gave Ricky worries. The ground was damp, and most likely Ricky and the woman had left their footprints, and that would lead right to them.

He turned to the woman, put his mouth against her ear. “Go to the far end of the tunnel and wait. I’ll be right there. If not, go outthe other side and down the hill. There’s a trail down there and you can make good time. But don’t stay on it. Get off of it after a while and hide.”

She nodded, and on all fours crawled away from him.

Gene and the men were coming nearer. Ricky took a slow breath, raised the slingshot into the launch position.

And then the great boar that had treed Ricky charged out of the woods and went right at Gene and his thugs.

The man that slouched as he ran was hit by the hog and it was like being run over by a Mack truck. Slouchy was knocked to the ground in an explosion of mud and pine needles. The hog, nimble as an acrobat, wheeled and used its sharp tusks to catch him under the head. A stream of blood leapt from the man on the ground, widened and sprayed.

Gene shot the hog twice. The boar squealed, but it was as if he had shot into a bag of rocks. It was squealing with delight, not pain, as it mauled the man on the ground. Gene and the other man panicked, ran for it down the hill.

The man they left, still alive, tried to get up, but the hog had him again. Tore at his legs with its tusks, bit like a lion. The man was screaming and yelling for help.

Ricky decided this was his cue. He put his weapon and slingshot back in place and crawled through the vine tunnel after the woman. The man was still screaming and the hog was still grunting and squealing as Ricky made his getaway.

Ricky recognized the woman after she cleaned her face at the little spring he used for fresh water. He had been so involved with survival, he hadn’t taken great note of her features. He realized now he had gone to school with her. She was two years younger than he was. Jett Marsh. She looked a lot better with the dirt gone, though she appeared near-starved. Her cheekbones looked sharp enough to be listed as lethal weapons.

Ricky and Jett hung in the woods, quiet, listening. They heard the distant sound of a boat, and braved creeping through the woods to where they could see the river. The big boat was moving away from the shore and the one Jett had come in had been smashed.

Waiting to make sure the big boat didn’t come back, they crept down to the deer stand, but didn’t climb up into it. Ricky left Jett waiting, went down and through the trees and brush, out to the water, and what was left of her boat.

It looked as if Gene or his partners had taken an axe to Jett’s ride, and they had pushed the outboard motor into the river.

Ricky listened a moment for the sound of the boat returning, heard nothing, and went back to join Jett.

Jett took to the tomato soup Ricky had left, cold as it was. She drank it right out of the can as soon as he cut the top off with the can opener on his utility knife.

“Sorry,” she said when she lowered the empty can, tomato-red coating her top lip like a scarlet mustache.

“Not at all. That’s all the canned goods left, but I do a bit of hunting.Wecan do a bit of hunting.”

She studied him, wiping her ragged sleeve across her mouth. “I can stay?”

“Yes.”

“And you get what out of the deal?”

“Your sterling company. No obligations beyond that.”

They talked for a while, Ricky with one ear cocked to the water, waiting to hear that damn boat and Gene coming back, but the day fled and there was nothing.