Free Anyone? by Angela Scott

little dish for Callie,
then poured some more on a clean shirt from my bag and dabbed at the messy cut,
wincing when the fabric touched my sensitive skin. The dried scab fell away and
a trickle of blood mixed with puss dribbled down my arm. Beautiful.
    The first-aid kit in my bag held more bandages and some
antiseptic cream, but with the redness, the inflammation, and soreness, not to
mention my growing fever, I needed antibiotics. Something I didn’t have.
    I rubbed a little bit of the cream on the wound and did my
best to close the deep cut with butterfly bandages before wrapping the entire
thing with a roll of gauze to hold it all in place. Two ibuprofens and a bottle
of water later, I shoved everything back in my bag, hooked it over my good arm,
and took hold of Callie’s leash.
    She needed to walk, and no longer fought the harness, though
she made walking a slow-going process. I didn’t mind. Slow-going sounded good
to me.
    The bright sun caused me to squint, and I dug out my
confiscated sunglasses from the bag, finding relief from the glaring rays and
giving my budding headache a break.
    “Now what? Where do we go?” I directed my questions to
Callie, but she was too busy trying to capture her own shadow, jumping on it
before turning to see where it had disappeared to. Not that she would have
answered, but it would have been nice not to be in charge for once.
    The big city was out of the question. Another nine or ten
miles would do me in. I doubted I would even be able to walk to the opposite
corner as tired and as feverish as I was. But the need to keep moving forced my
feet to take step after step. I weaved down the middle of the street, around
abandoned cars, trash cans, and garbage that covered the old highway.
    The local hospital was miles off, at the edge of the city. I
wracked my brain to remember the nearest pharmacy and figured it would be a
good three or four mile walk. At my current pace, I could plan on it taking
most of the day to get there.
    Tears trickled down my cheeks, but I kept moving. Bravery
and guts in the face of disaster was obviously not my strong suit. Tears and
whining were more like it. Toby and Dad would know what to do, where to go, and
how to make the best of this situation. They would have got a car running. They
would have found a phone. They would have been saved by now.
    Even Mom—sweet, caring, Mom—would have managed to figure out
how to live this kind of existence with a smile on her lips. She had faced some
pretty extreme situations in her shortened life and I had no doubt she would
have kicked butt during this one.
    But not me.
    I couldn’t stop crying.
    I wanted Dad to swoop in and whisk me away to my home, to my
comfortable bed, and make me soup. Soup sounded wonderful. I really
wanted my dad, but since he didn’t show, I dragged myself down the road unsure
of where I was going or what I planned to do once I got there.

 
    I dropped the duffle on the pavement, and it fell with a
resounding thump. My shoulders couldn’t handle the weight any longer. Somehow,
by the grace of God, I had managed to walk the four exhausting miles to the
neighboring town. Dazed, feverish, and a bit wobbly on my feet, I had done it,
but instead of celebrating the fact that I now stood in front of Rite-Aid’s sliding
glass doors, all I wanted to do was fall onto my bag and not move. Taking care
of myself was a lot of work.
    A few blocks over, a large crater had replaced the Five
Points Mall and the surrounding areas. Buildings large and small seemed to have
evaporated— poof —not even a hint of framework left behind. But here,
right in front of Rite-Aid and the grocery store next door, everything appeared
normal. Except, of course, for the ghost town feel. A giant tumbleweed rolling
down the middle of the street would have completed the picture. Only
tumbleweeds didn’t grow around here.
    I tied Callie’s leash to the handle of the duffle bag, and gave
her and myself some water, then