24
Annie
Hunger twisted my insides, and although I’d agreed to head off on my own, I refused to leave him vulnerable to the elements.
I built a pine bough lean-to over him. Filled the tin can to the brim, setting it close enough he could roll to reach it—but not knock it over if just thrashing around a bit. I also left his nearly empty pack and his knife alongside the cup. He wouldn’t have allowed it had he been awake. Dad’s bone-handled knife and the flint, I kept in the sweatshirt’s front pocket.
Roan lay like the dead, unmoving except for an occasional shiver.
Hotter than the night before, I knew his fever bordered on the type that caused damage.
I shoved a six-foot stick into the ground in an open area just out of reach of the river, both of my ragged socks hanging limply at its
