Free This World We Live In (The Last Survivors, Book 3) by Susan Beth Pfeffer Page A

been easy to shop for.
    Even with nobody to hear me for miles, I didn't burst into song, but I did whistle as I biked. I liked the splashy way the bike rode through puddles on the road. And I had this great realization: I don't have to be happy al the time. With everything that's happened, no one should expect to be happy. But moments of happiness can sneak up on you, like pairs of unworn blue jeans, and you need to cherish them because they're so rare and so unpredictable.
    I even understood why Matt married Syl ten minutes after meeting her. Finding her was rare and unpredictable.
    Of course it hadn't hurt that she had long hair at the time.
    I was whistling "I Dream of Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair," a song I learned in third grade and haven't heard since, when I rode my bike straight into a pothole and went flying off.
    I landed face down in a puddle, and for an instant I was in a state of total panic. I remembered Mom in the cel ar, and I swear I thought I was going to drown.
    What shocked me to my senses was how much I hurt. When you're in that kind of pain, you almost wish you were going to drown in a half inch of water.
    I rol ed out of the puddle and moved my fingers, my hands, my arms, my legs, until I was satisfied I hadn't broken any bones. The palms of my hands were scraped and it felt like my knees were, too. My chin and jaw hurt horribly, but I wasn't spitting any teeth out. I was going to be a total-body black-and-blue mark, but no one dies of bruises.
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    I crawled back to the bike. It was lying on its side, but the two trash bags were unbroken, and both tires looked okay.
    That was when I realized how lucky I'd been the day I got lost. What if I'd had a flat tire? I'd been miles away from home, with no idea where I was, and I would have had to walk back.
    Sometimes I think al I've done for the past month is cry, but that didn't stop me. I sat by my bike, tel ing myself over and over again how lucky I was, and I sobbed.
    I didn't have to use my sweatshirt to blow my nose this time, though. I'd found a tissue packet at one of the houses, so when I was up to it, I dug through a trash bag and located it.
    That's progress.
    I was just finishing the tissue packet when Syl rode over. We were south of our meeting spot, but she must have looked around for me, and since I was on Howel Bridge Road when I fel , I couldn't have been too hard to locate.
    "You're a mess," she said, helping me up.
    "I rode into a pothole," I said.
    Syl nodded and straightened up my bike. "Which wil be easier?" she asked. "Riding or walking?"
    Either way, it was going to be a mile uphil . "How about letting me die here?" I asked.
    "Laura would never forgive me," Syl said. "Do you need a few more minutes?"
    What I needed was a completely different life. "I'l try walking," I said. "I'm feeling too wobbly for the bike."
    "Al right," Syl said. She grabbed the handlebars of her bike with her right hand and the handlebars of mine with her left, and began pul ing them behind her, while I hobbled by her side.
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    "You'l be al right," she said after a few of the most agonizing yards I've ever walked. "You couldn't make it this far if anything was broken."
    Just because I knew it was true didn't make me any happier to hear it.
    "I remember once, months ago," Syl said. "Right after the air got bad. The band I was with--"
    "You were with a band?" I asked.
    "Not that kind of band," Syl said. "When you're on the road, you find bands of people to travel with. By foot, by bike, even by truck."
    "There are trucks?" I said. I couldn't remember the last time I saw a truck.
    "Of course there are," Syl said. "How do you think food gets to Howel ? And they're always bringing supplies to the safe towns. They're not supposed to give people lifts, but sometimes they do."
    "Were you with a band of people when you met Matt?" I asked.
    "Just one other person," Syl said. "We'd split off because he wanted to try fishing in the Delaware.
    Anyway, this happened last