Free Eruption (Yellowblown™ Book 1) by J. Hughey

situation, but also because of her eclectic tastes. She walked straight to a pair of striped bell-bottom jeans in autumn colors, something out of the 1970s. They were absolutely hideous on the hanger, and I already knew she’d rock them. She’d pair them with chunky boots and a fuzzy brown top, she said. If I tried the same thing, I’d look like I’d raided some hippie’s closet.
    I held Mia’s umbrella while she flicked through the racks. I’d bought clothes here a couple of times, but ended up with a pilled sweater the color of the inside of a hot dog and a pair of jeans with a zipper so stiffly resistant I’d nearly peed myself the first time I wore them. Now I left the hunting and gathering to the pro.
    “Looks like Pucci .” She draped a flamboyantly swirled scarf around her neck. She grabbed another scarf in sedate blues to tie it in a headband around my skull, fussing until she’d made a jaunty bow by my left ear, the tails hanging down over my wet shoulder. She turned me toward a full-length mirror. The bottom half of me looked confident, with the bright boots and bare knees, one hand stuffed in a pocket while the other held Mia’s umbrella like a walking stick. The top half? Questionable.
    I smiled at Mia in the mirror , and she smiled back.
    “You know, sister-friend, you are the last person who should worry. If the world was blowing up, your parents would already be here to rescue you. And I think Boone isn’t the type to make a big deal out of things. Kin d of like you,” she said with a nudge to my shoulder. “I mean, if you want a dozen roses or something, I can send him a text.”
    “Don’t you dare, ” I said, appalled.
    We returned the scarves to the rack. “I hope I don’t get lice,” I muttered.
    She laughed. “Stop worrying . You can come to Jersey with me for the apocalypse. We’re resilient, like cockroaches. We’ll be the last living humans on earth, believe me.”
    She paid seven dollars for the jeans and two tight tops. The rain had almost stopped so I unzipped my coat, letting the warm, humid air slip under the waterproof layer. “Look at how high gas has already gone,” I said, pointing at a mini-mart.
    “ Probably the hurricane. The gulf is all jacked up.”
    “The news said last night some states are pulling their emergency power crews out of the southeast to be ready for the ash, if it comes.”
    “What does ash have to do with electricity?” Mia asked.
    “Who knows?” I said, wishing ignorance really was bliss. It mostly felt like blindness.
 

 
    Restlessness. I had loads of studying to do on Sunday. I had a paper to write. I had tons to read in everything except calculus. I caught myself cruising the Internet over and over, reading the same news, checking Facebook, texting Dad. Mom ran him ragged as the ash cloud nudged north and west of them, like dye poured into the jet stream. A wave of it oozed less noticeably over Nebraska and other states south and east of Yellowstone.
     
    Text from Sara:

     

     

     
    I stared across the room. A shiver went down my spine. My parents didn’t garden. Had they gone completely off the deep end, or were we really headed for subsistence agriculture within forty-eight hours of blast off?
    The uncertainty made me crazy. Was kale, one of those disgusting veggies Mom made for her and Dad but I’d never eaten?
    I leaped off the bed to change into some biking clothes and fill the water bladder of my small backpack. My biking shoes, with their metal clips under the balls of my feet, alternated between tap dance clicks and death skids on the vinyl stair treads. The derailleur —the thingie to move the chain to the selected sprocket—clanged with the rear wheel’s descent of each step.
    I rode south, toward the open countryside. After a few miles of light traffic, I cranked along a two lane country road, maintaining the same cadence while changing gears with the rolling landscape. Initial goose bumps from the wash of cool