Free The Survivors by Will Weaver

you talking to that creepy Ray?”
    Sarah clears her throat. “Yeah. Sort of. We were both getting some popcorn, so, you know, it’s not like I could avoid him.”
    â€œRight,” Mackenzie says flatly. Her eyes turn back to the game.
    â€œWant some?” Sarah asks, holding out the bag.
    Mackenzie ignores the popcorn. “Ray O’Keefe is from this really crazy family. They live in this little house right in town. His dad bikes everywhere, even in winter, and his mom is this old hippie or something. They’re, like, totally poor.”
    Back at Mackenzie’s house they get ready for bed. Mackenzie’s room is nearly half the size of the cabin and has its own bathroom. Mackenzie and Rachel go in to brush their teeth, and Sarah goes to wash in the hall bathroom. She takes her time, washing her face and then running the warm water over her hands for a few extra minutes, savoring the luxury of indoor plumbing. Of hot water.
    Heading back to Mackenzie’s room, she pauses in the hallway before a wall full of family photographs, all framed. Mackenzie’s brothers in their letter jackets. Mackenzie with her tennis racket. The entire family posed together in the backyard, smiling and happy. All the pictures look so … normal. So BV.
    When Sarah returns to the bedroom, Mackenzie and Rachel are sprawled on the queen-size bed poring over their sixth-grade yearbook. “Come on, Sarah,” Mackenzie says. “This will be very educational for you.” Rachel giggles. Mackenzie starts flipping pages and pointing to pictures; her mood has improved.
    â€œThat’s Dylan,” she says, pointing to a skinny boy with his hair in his eyes. “He was a total loser last year; but he sits behind me in algebra this year, and I noticed that he got cute over the summer.”
    â€œI always thought he was cute,” says Rachel, staring at the picture.
    â€œReally, Rachel,” Mackenzie says. “You have such low expectations.”
    â€œAnd there’s Kara Lindberg,” Rachel says. “Remember her?”
    â€œIck,” Mackenzie says with a shudder. “She and her family came here last fall from Colorado. Her parents lost their jobs after the volcanoes and then their house was foreclosed on, so they had to move.”
    â€œThat’s horrible,” Sarah says quickly.
    Mackenzie shrugs. “They were camping in the state park here. She had to shower in the school locker room.”
    â€œNo way!” Sarah says, as if that was totally disgusting.
    â€œDefinitely a Traveler,” Rachel says. “And we could tell anyway, because Traveler kids always tried to charge their cell phones at school.”
    â€œRemember how Sharelle ‘accidentally’ stepped on Kara’s phone and smashed it?” Mackenzie says.
    Rachel laughs wildly.
    Mackenzie wrinkles her nose. “Anyway, there were lots of icky homeless people from the cities who just showed up thinking they could freeload on all of us who actually live here. I’m really glad they passed that law so they all had to leave.”
    â€œMe, too,” Rachael says. “Most of them smelled funny.”
    â€œThey should never have put Kara in the yearbook,” Mackenzie says.
    â€œFor sure not!” Rachel says.
    Sarah fakes a yawn. “I’m tired,” she says, flopping onto her sleeping bag.
    â€œMe, too,” Mackenzie says. “And I have a tennis lesson in the morning.” She flicks the light switch as the girls snuggle down under comforters and into sleeping bags. They giggle for a while longer about Dylan and Django and other cute boys and then, slowly, the room grows quiet. Eventually Sarah hears Mackenzie’s deep, rhythmic breathing and Rachel’s tiny snoring sounds. But she is wide-awake.
    Icky homeless people . That would pretty much be her.

CHAPTER TEN
MILES
    ON SATURDAY MILES TAKES HIS mother to town on his Kawasaki motorbike. It’s his