Fun Times

I climbed into the back seat of the car, to be closer to Emmalise. She shook with fear and squeezed my hand tightly. Our house was at least an hour away by foot. The rush hour traffic didn’t take us far from my old job.

“Let’s go back,” I told Search over the blaring car horns and screaming people.

He shook his head rubbing his hands in his hair. I knew hwat he was thinkning.

“These people are driving crazy, how are we going to get off the highway? Traffic isn’t even moving anymore.” He said, looking over his shoulders.

Another truck drove in the emergency breakdown lane, speeding and driving into the guardrail in the process. The sound of metal scraping filled the air as the truck tipped over the edge of the guardrail, falling off of the highway. I covered Emmalise’s eyes, and enlarged mines, looking to Search for his cue. He nodded his head and reached for the door handle jumping out into the bumper-to-bumper traffic. Every second he was out of my sight felt like a million of years. Emmalise cried in my ears, I held her close to my body squeezing her to tight. Silence filled the air as the ground shook again.

Cracks are etched across the car windows and I can feel what’s coming next. Search opened the door, grabbing Emmalise in his arms, and pulled on my hand. I met his eyes with desperation.

“What now?” I asked him looking in both directions. Cars drove down the breakdown lane at speeds that we could not outrun.

“On top of the cars,” Search said. He climbed on top of our car and I followed him. My feet pounded the metal atop the car and we jumped from car to car until we were close to the exit. Cars lined the exit and Search continued to use them as a way for us to get out of the traffic. I stayed close by, my eyes on Emmaline. She reached her little hand out to me and I brushed it with my fingertips every so often as I neared her.

“C’mon,” search reached out to help me down off the last car. We finally hit the street and my feet slammed into the pavement.

Behind us, I see two people doing the same as us. A man and a woman jump from car to car, nearing the street by us. Farther back more people exit their cars, doing the same.

“Colby, we gotta go.” Search says. The ground shakes again and I fall to my knees. Whatever fell from the sky was getting closer. Dusting my hands and knees off, I get up and grab Search’s hand.

“It’s this way,” I say tugging him in the direction we just spent an hour crawling away from.

“Mind if we tag along?” A man says from behind me. I turn to see the man and woman that were jumping cars after us.

“Why not head home?” Search asked him, grasping Emmalise closer to him.

“Home’s a long way off, and I don’t think she’ll make it that far.” He says nodding his head to the woman. I glance down at her swollen belly. She was maybe six months pregnant.

“Search,” I nug him and start to walk. “She’s pregnant, we should try and help them find an emergency shelter or something.”

“We don’t even have one ourselves,” He said. “Besides, no one even knows what’s going on, what that thing that fell from the sky was.”

Search shakes his head and motions for the couple to follow us, and they eagerly comply.

“Don’t get too friendly, remember pregnant or not they’re strangers.” Search hissed in my ear as the couple walked closer to us. I rolled my eyes at him and tugged on Emmalise’s little hand. She smiled behind her tears, and I knew that I was blessed to have such a strong little girl.

“Names Macum, this here is my wife Cara.” He said waving at his wife. His thick country accent suited his well-built tanned frame well. I smiled at Cara, curious about if she was having a boy or a girl.

“Watch out!” Search pushed me with his free arm hard, right before a motorcycle ran into me.

Emmalise cried and reached out for me. Scrambling to my feet I grabbed her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. Screams came from the distance and I looked over to see the motorcyclist drove into a storefront. The windows crashed and glass shattered into the street.

“We need to get off the main roads,” Macum said, eyeing the crowd of people that began to form in front of the storefront.

Taking the closet off-street I spotted I ran, with the group close behind me. Looking over my shoulders, I made sure Emmalise was okay. Snug in her father’s arms, she screamed but was safe. The Parker’s live about a twenty-minute walk from here, and I was ready to run for it. If we were lucky we could make it in ten.

Another whit firey ball fell from the sky, this time behind us and to the south of where the first one fell. A wide beam stretches out from its center across the sky farther than I could see. Gasping for air, I slowed my run, and let my feet come to a complete stop. Macum and Cara stood side by side and Cara held her stomach in pain.

“Sorry,” I told her, “But we have to keep running,” I grabbed Search’s hand and we ran down the street until we met the back of the Parker’s property.

“I can’t,” Cara said, stopping at the edge of the property.

Lights flashed in the sky and the ground shook.

“You have to,” Macum to her, pulling her hand and following close behind us.

Cara held onto her stomach as we walked across the Parker's property.

"The house isn't too far from here," I told her without turning around. Outside the property and the house looked completely normal. Inside, howver I knew that was a differnt story. Chaos had struck inside the Parker home, before the moons fell from the sky.

"Nice place y'all got here, thanks for letting us tag along," Macum said, looking around the property. It stretched for acres and the Parkers took good care of it when they were here.

"It's not our place," I say to Macum smiling. "It belonged to my old boss."

"Well, what are we doing here, won't they mind?" Cara interjected, stopping in her tracks.

"No, they moved out. The place is empty." I told them reaching for my keys. Out of habit, I had forgotten they were on my key ring earlier today. I should have taken them off and locked them inside the house. Good thing I didn't.

Inside the Parker's house, my old lpace of employment for the past eight years, it felt emptier than it had earlier. The house was in the same state that it was the first time we came. I couldn't help but wonder if the Parker's had left in a hurry because they knew what was coming.

"You guys can sit in there," I tell Macum and Cara pointing to the living room. I head upstairs, dragging Search along as he holds Emmalise tight.

"What's going on?" I ask him as we close the door to the master bedroom. I plop down on the bed and smooth my curls out of my face. Emmalise crawls over to me from Search's arms.

"The heck if I know, I watched the thing fall from the sky right with you." He said. He had a point. I guess I thought he would have an opinion on what was going on.

"They got a radio here?" He asked me. I put Emmalise down and planted a kiss on her forehead.

"Look in the closet in the hall by the back entrance. They always kept an old radio in there, with batteries in it already."

"Be right back," He said and walked out the room. I plopped down on the plush white carpet next to Emmalise and gave her my chapstick fom my back pocket to play with. She was getting restless, and it was time to feed her soon. Maybe even a nap, if she could sleep after everything that's happened.

The bed vibrated, sending a jolt of surprise through my body. I looked up onto it and saw that it was just Search's phone ringing. I didn't recognize the number. I slide up the answer bar and put the phone to my ear.

"Baby? Are you okay?" A females voice said from the other end of the line.

"Who is this?" I asked. Vertigo hit me in the stomach and hung there.

"What do you mean who is this, just put Oliver on the phone." She said. I shook my head, though I knew she could not see me and hung up the phone.

Search walked back into the room with the old hand radio turned on, the station playing a message on loop. I couldn't make out what the message was saying over the screaming going on inside my head.