Chapter 8
I WALKED down the center of abandoned residential roads to get to Main Street. I didn’t see anybody, and tried not to jump nervously at distant clangs and the occasional muffled shout. Others lived, somewhere in town. How far would a shout carry when everything went silent?
Main Street was just as still, lifeless except for trees planted between the sidewalk and the road. I saw very few cars, but that wasn’t a surprise—cars had grown increasingly rare with gasoline rationing. I walked down the center of the asphalt, between silent mismatched buildings built one against the next, until I got to Jack’s.
Strange yellow-green fruit the size and shape of soccer balls hung from the willow tree outside the bar. I leaned back in distaste, shook my head to dislodge the image, and went
