Rocky River Bridge: A District 89 Prequel
Author: D. J. Molles
Date: 2017-05-16 00:00:00+00:00
Description: Two young boys set off for the Rocky River Bridge through their war-torn North Carolina hometown, both with something to prove - an adventure that will quickly teach them the realities of the raging world around them, in this prequel to DJ Molles' newest novel: The Purge of District 89.
Publisher: Brilliance Audio

ROCKY RIVER BRIDGE

A Grower’s War Prequel Story

The two boys slipped out the back door while Grandpa Clarence napped. A bottle of cheap whiskey sat on the table by his chair. They went quietly, sneakily. But Grandpa Clarence wouldn’t have cared. He was always trying to shove them outdoors anyway.

He would mumble at them, “Chaps’re s’posed to be outside getting dirty.” Then he would squint and aim a palsied finger at them. “You ain’t no fuckin’ urbys. You’re growers. Have some self-respect.”

No, their drunken grandfather wouldn’t have cared. But sneaking out made everything more exciting. It made what they were doing more illicit.

Outside, the sun was as hot as it was going to get that summer. Their little house was surrounded by the cornfields. The rich green stalks were over their heads now. Roy led the way and Walter followed—the older, and then the younger.

Eight and ten, that summer.

Young for the trouble they would soon find themselves.

But kids grow up fast in the middle of a war.

Roy had the longer legs, and Walter had to press his own pace to keep up. And, of course, he also had to act like it wasn’t tiring.

They hit the cornfields at a sprint and kept going straight through, heading for the woods, slipping through the narrow rows and carefully jumping the hydroponics lines and dodging the regulator posts.

School was out, they were free, and they had just over two hours before Pops’ pickup came down the narrow gravel drive to their front door.

Roy had something planned. Walter could see it in his eyes. And he was wearing a backpack, which Walter could only interpret as being a bad thing, since it was out of the norm. So Walter was both excited about its contents and a little terrified.

Just inside the woods, the two brothers stopped.

Walter’s heart was pounding and his lungs felt ragged. He was already pouring sweat in the heat and stifling humidity. The shade of the woods made it only marginally more bearable.

Roy grabbed a tree branch and swung himself up easily to get a look at their house over the tops of the corn. Just to make sure that they weren’t being followed. A needless precaution, but it engendered the excitement of doing something they weren’t supposed to be doing.

Looking over your shoulder is what makes the stolen bread sweeter.

Roy hopped down, brushing loose bits of bark from his tans.

He wore his with the overall straps down around his waist, like the cool kids.

Walter wore his the same to copy him, but he thought it was incredibly uncomfortable. He had to keep hitching up his tans to keep them from falling off his ass.

“What’s in the backpack?” Walter finally asked, breathlessly.

He was unable to keep his eyes off of it. He was trying to see if there was a bulge, or something that might give him a clue as to what was inside. He wanted to know. But it was Roy. So in a way, he kind of didn’t.

Roy didn’t look at him. That big-brotherly way of looking over a younger sibling, like the minor annoyance that they are. “Nothin’. Don’t worry about it. C’mon.”

They continued at a slower pace this time, making their way through the strip of woods that ran toward the highway.

As they neared the highway they could hear the cars going by every once in a while. The roar of a couple big diesels. The whisper of a couple small solars. They were heading east just then but then Roy peeled a right and started heading through another field, parallel to the highway.

“Where we going?” Walter groan-whispered.

“God, just shut up for once.”

About halfway across the field, Walter heard a sound different from that of the passing cars. Roy heard it too.

They both looked up into the sky at the same moment, searching the blue-white haze.

“Shit,” Roy said.

The sound grew rapidly.

“Low-fliers,” Roy said, matter-of-factly, as though he was well-versed in all things military. But to his younger brother, he was an expert. So Walter stared at the sky in frightened wonder.

Roy decided to hit the dirt rather than making a run for the trees. “Get down!”

Walter followed his big brother’s example and got down.

The two of them shimmied out of the row space and into the corn stalks to better hide themselves.

Walter’s heart felt like it was about to explode. “Roy!” he whispered to him, the nerves in his voice now undeniable, as well as a very significant feeling that he was close to peeing his pants.

Walter was huddled against his brother’s feet, so he earned himself a kick. “Shut up!”

Walter punched back, but half-heartedly, just to show that he wasn’t going to take it.

Though he was.

The rotor noise became sharp and overpowering. They watched the green stalks and leaves start to writhe, just a few yards ahead of them, and encroaching quickly.

Roy had been right. They were flying very low.

They usually weren’t so low that the downdraft would disturb the fields.

Roy and Walter simultaneously poked their heads out from under the little canopy of corn leaves and looked up at the sky as the gunships roared over them. It was terrifyingly loud. The corn around them shook and bent almost to the point that it should have broken. The downdraft kicked up dust from between the rows and the two brothers squinted against it.

One…two…three, Walter counted. Three gunships.

And then they were gone, leaving a settling pall of dust all around them, and a few corn stalks tilted just a bit more than they should have been. The sound of the rotors faded fast, and then it was gone. Back to just the sound of cars on the highway.

Walter looked at his older brother.

Roy was still looking up at the sky. He looked scared.

That wasn’t what Walter wanted to see on his big brother’s face, but then Roy squirmed out from underneath the plants and dusted himself off again, letting out an impressive string of swears that would get his hide tanned if Pops had been around to hear it.

“That was close,” Walter said.

Roy finally looked at him, acknowledging his existence, but only to observe the fact that Walter’s feet were fidgeting and he looked like he was about to beat a retreat. Roy had managed to stow his own scared expression. Now it was time to act tough.

“You fucking scared?” he laughed, but his laugh was a little too forced. “If you’re gonna go cryin’ to Grandpa Clarence, do it now. But you’ll never see what I got in my backpack. And I’ll never tell you. I’ll be a damn legend, and you’ll never know why. Unless you wanna be a legend with me.”

“I’m fine,” Walter shot back, trying to sound convincing. “I just hit my knee when I dropped down, that’s all.” He kicked at one of the hydroponics lines, as though it had been the culprit, and muttered, “Piece of shit.”

“Aigh’,” Roy said, hitching his backpack up again. “Let’s go then.”

They continued on through the cornfield.

Walter noticed something else as they alternately jogged and walked: Roy kept on checking his watch. It was a new watch that he’d got for his birthday a few weeks ago, so maybe he was just showing off. When he first got it he spent the night sending voice texts on it to his other friends from school. When Walter had tried to eavesdrop, Roy would throw something at him.

It was a cheap toy, but their family didn’t have much money.

By that time in the hike, Walter had a feeling that he knew where they were going. They were tracing along the side of the highway, just out of view of the road. But they were going south. And south meant the river.

Sure enough, after maybe another mile in the cornfields, they dipped into another section of woods that started to slope downwards and then Walter could hear the steady movement of the Rocky River, and he could see glimpses of the bridge through the trees.

He was out of control with excitement and nerves. He worked hard to keep it under wraps.

This was where the older kids like Roy went to hangout sometimes, to get away from cranky grandparents and boring summer days while their parents were at work, trying to make just enough money to keep the family afloat.

Walter followed Roy down a steep embankment to a well-worn path that led under the bridge. The substructure of the bridge was covered in graffiti. The municipal maintenance no longer made any attempt to cover it up. These were the Agrarian Districts, the hotbed of the nation’s woes, and excessive bridge graffiti was the least of the government’s problems.

Under the bridge, it felt significantly cooler. There was a steady breeze coming in off the water, and the shaded cement felt almost chilly. They were surrounded by red clay, and from the red clay, sprouting like old artifacts from other geological ages, there were beer cans and liquor bottles, and a good carpet of cigarette butts.

Roy stepped up to one of the cement pillars, the water just coming up to the base of it. He pointed to a crudely spray-painted penis with a large set of hairy balls attached. Along the shaft of the penis was painstakingly written, FUCK THE COAX. Roy pointed proudly to this bit of artwork. “I did that one.”

He laughed.

Walter answered with a laugh of his own.

Penises are high comedy at eight years old, especially when they’re drawn in public places. But the caption worried him a bit. What if someone sees it? What if one of the other kids saw Roy draw it and what if their parents are loyalists?

But in all likelihood, all the other kids that came down here to hang out were from that silent majority that did not actively collaborate with the resistance, but they sure as hell weren’t loyal to the Fed or the CoAx.

Still, he tended to worry about these things.

Maybe he felt like he had to worry. Like he had to be the conscientious one, because Roy was so devil-may-care.

It was a difficult balance to strike, to walk the line between being the voice of reason and also being badass enough to hang with your older brother.

Safely underneath the bridge, Roy finally slung the backpack from his shoulders.

Walter stood with his hands together in rapt anticipation. Of course, Roy could see this, so he left the bookbag where it was. To increase the drama.

Instead, he fished into the cargo pocket of his tans. He seemed to take hold of something, but then left his hand in his pocket while he took a furtive look around.

No one upstream.

No one downstream.

You didn’t really have to worry about fishers anymore. Pops said Grandpa Clarence used to take him fishing there. He also claimed that the water used to be a kind of dark, greenish brown, rather than the ruddy orange-ish color it was at that moment. Pops said that was because of the runoff from the hydroponics.

Walter had once asked him if they could still fish in the Rocky River and he said, “Ayuh. If you wanna eat nuclear catfish.”

Satisfied that they were alone, Roy pulled his hand out of his pocket. He was holding something in his palm. He opened his hand with a smile, very proud of himself.

Walter stared, slightly disappointed. “A cigarette?”

“Ain’t no fuckin’ cigarette,” Roy said. “It’s weed.”

“Oh.”

He held it up between his thumb and forefinger. A prized possession for a ten-year-old. This was some high-school stuff. “Got it from Meredith,” he said. “Her dad works at the grow shop.”

“Damn,” Walter said, trying to sound mature. “She must like you.”

Roy shrugged, and it wasn’t lost on his brother that there was a fleeting expression of hope on his face. “Well…I had to pay for it.”

“How much did you pay for it?”

“Don’t worry about it. God, you ask a lot of questions.” He produced a lighter and lit it. It was a factory-rolled cigarette, not a joint cobbled out of tissue paper. He took a drag, eyes squinted against the smoke rising off the tip, looking just as cool as he could. He tried to inhale the drag, but ended up coughing it out. He stifled his coughs as best he could. Took another drag to show he wasn’t shaken, then offered it to Walter.

They’d been down this road before.

Last year, Roy had raided Grandpa Clarence’s cigarette stash. One for each of them. They’d snuck off into the woods and they’d lit them up, hacking and coughing and dizzy.

Not only was it a miserable experience for Walter, but despite all of the attempts they made to cover their tracks—the delicate way they put the pack of cigarettes back just so, and the airing out of their clothes, even rubbing dirt and grass on themselves to get the smell off—when they walked in the house again, it was like they had signs on their heads.

Also, Grandpa Clarence kept a good count on his cigarettes.

He’d whipped them both. Then when Pops got home, they were whipped again.

All while suffering through the nauseous aftertaste that clung to Walter’s tongue for the rest of the day, and even into the morning.

So, when Roy offered him the joint, he took a step back, hands raised.

“No, no,” Walter said. “Pops is gonna whoop you good.”

Roy shrugged, went back to looking cool. “Whatever. Fuckin’ pussy.”

“You’re the one bein’ an idiot. You know you ain’t gonna get that smell out.”

Roy shook his head. “I’ll take a dip in the river.”

“Pops says you’ll grow a third eye.”

“Pssh.” Roy rolled his eyes. “He’s pullin’ your leg.”

Walter looked doubtfully at the orange water. “Whatever. Don’t cry to me.” He kicked red clay. “Besides, Meredith prolly won’t like you with three eyes.”

He fully expected some sort of physical retaliation for this comment, but Roy was distracted with his watch again. He was staring at it, and Walter could see by the way he was opening his eyes real wide, and then squinting them down again, that he was starting to feel the weed.

“You aigh’?” Walter asked.

Roy blinked rapidly. “Ayuh. I’m fine.”

Then he pinched the cherry off his smoke and stuck it behind his ear. He turned to go to his backpack, seemed a little loopy, but regained his balance.

Walter was watching him attentively now, seeing if he was actually going to open the backpack, or if he was just playing with him again.

He bent to the backpack.

Walter hurried forward.

He unzipped the main compartment. “Virgil just texted. Said there’s a squad coming through. Two guntrucks and a personnel carrier.”

Walter would never be able to quite put into words how his heart dropped in that moment. Just hearing those words come out of his brother’s mouth sent an explosion of fear through him and he would always remember, quite clearly, the way his vision sparkled and narrowed down to a pinpoint.

“What…what are you gonna do?” he stammered.

Roy delved his hand into the backpack and came out holding a clear plastic bottle with some suspicious liquid in it. A small vial of some other suspicious liquid was taped to the side.

Just the sight of it made Walter shake his head.

“Roy, this is a bad idea,” he muttered nervously. “You shouldn’t do this.”

“Oh, relax you fuckin’ pussy!” Roy’s face was irritated for a second. “It’s not a fuckin’ bomb, you dumbass. It ain’t gonna blow nobody up.”

“It’s not? Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.” He sloshed the contents and looked at it, admiringly. “Little bit of soil conditioner, little bit of regulator cleaner.” He tapped the vial on the side. “Then you just add this bleach. And it explodes. Makes a bigass boom. But it won’t hurt anyone.” Roy busted out smiling. “Virgil said he made one. Tossed it under one of the patrols. He said the Chicom in the bunch fucking pissed his pants!”

None of this was making Walter feel any better.

Roy had basically just told him that it was going to explode, but supposedly wasn’t going to hurt anyone. The objective, of course, to see if you could get one of the Chinese troops to piss his pants. Although Walter was sure that Roy would have thought it equally funny if one of the Russians, or even the Fed troops pissed their pants.

Walter’s chances for protest were suddenly ripped away.

From their spot under the bridge he could hear the distinct rumble of the patrol, coming down the highway. The vehicles were muffled to not be overly loud, but they had powerful engines that sounded very different from the big diesel trucks that ran down these roads. Anyone who grew up in the Districts could pick them out a mile away.

Just like Roy and Walter did in that moment.

“Shit, that’s them,” Roy said. Then he hurriedly started to unscrew the bottle top.

“I still don’t think this is smart,” Walter said, trying to sound stern and failing miserably.

Roy looked up at him, and in that moment he was just another angry youth. Angry with the way things had shaped up for his family. Angry for the families of his friends. Angry that their fathers worked in the dirt all day and had nothing to show for it. Angry that their mothers came home late at night, worn to the bone. And also, hugely, deeply offended that the Russians and the Chinese were here. Had been invited here, no less.

Of course, those were just the simple things that an eight and ten-year-old could wrap their young brains around.

“Walt,” Roy called him by name because he was pissed. “You wanna go, go now.”

Then he bent to his task as the patrol neared the other end of the bridge. Their engines were louder now, coming through the trees, and Walter was staring up at the opposite end of the bridge, waiting for the sound of their tires to hit that first metal support.

Working quickly, almost like he’d done it before, Roy pulled the cap off the vial and simply dropped it into the bottle. Then he put the bottle top back on and twisted it down tight. Then he began to shake it vigorously as he stood and sprinted, up the hill to the side of the bridge as it met the highway on the other side.

Walter, seeing no other recourse, ran after him.

On the other end of the bridge, the tires of the first guntruck hit the first metal support.

Roy was stupid and impetuous and courageous. He stood at the side of the bridge in plain view and reared back as the convoy roared across the bridge, the bottle already swelling in his hand, and he threw it with a good overhanded arm, putting arc and speed on it. Walter watched it fly through the air.

“Fuck the CoAx!” he screamed brazenly at the top of his lungs.

Walter was terrified, but he wanted to see what would happen.

He never saw the bottle. Maybe it hit the ground. He couldn’t tell. Everything was suddenly drowned out by the screech of truck tires, then a microsecond later, a horrific, ear-shattering boom that made them both flinch.

Walter moved past his brother and grabbed hold of the bridge abutments with just enough time to see a little cloud of smoke or steam quickly dissipate into the air.

And then the three vehicles—a guntruck, a personnel carrier, and then another guntruck—rocked to a halt on the bridge.

The lead guntruck was less than twenty feet from the two boys. The huge, armored grill seemed so massive to them, suddenly, like metal teeth on a beast that could swallow them whole.

Walter could see through the reinforced windshield, and he saw the driver. He was American. The Fed was usually the lead vehicle. The driver was wearing his helmet, but not his battleshroud because he was behind the armored walls of his guntruck. He was wearing sunglasses. There wasn’t an ounce of fear on his face. He just stared right back at Walter, his mouth pressed down into a thin grimace of disgust or irritation or both.

Walter again felt that it was possible that he might piss his pants.

He and his brother, standing dumbly at the side of the bridge, as the chemical smoke from Roy’s little homemade firecracker blew away on the breeze coming off the river. The convoy, laid out in front of them—guntruck, personnel carrier, guntruck.

The hatch on the top of the personnel carrier slammed back. Walter’s eyes were drawn to the movement and the sudden noise. A figure burst out of the top of the machine, and Walter could tell from his fatigues that he was Chinese, though his face was covered by his battleshroud.

The Chinese soldier had a long, black shotgun in his hands. He lifted it to his shoulder, yelling at them in Mandarin. Walter thought maybe he was telling them to get off the road, though he didn’t speak a lick of the language. He reached over to grab Roy and try to pull him away.

Roy lifted both arms, giving the Chicom soldier both middle fingers.

And then the soldier shot him in the gut.

Walter watched his brother double over with a grunt and collapse forward onto the bridge abutment.

Walter panicked. Started screaming his brother’s name.

His feet were moving underneath him, wanting to run, but he wasn’t going to leave his brother there, lying on the bridge.

The world shrunk down to Roy. Walter didn’t register the vehicles, or the opening doors, or the sound of boots. He was focused on his brother, his chest hitching, at first trying to breathe, and then letting out a pathetic groan.

Walter grabbed him by the shirt with every intention of trying to pull him to safety, imagining himself backpedaling up the embankment, hauling his brother’s body along with him. He didn’t know how he was going to do it, but he had to…

Roy came upright and gasped for air. He clutched his chest and coughed.

“Fuck…” he groaned, his body kind of wilting to one side so that Walter could see his stomach. There was no blood. Roy was staring down at his stomach, too, his eyes mystified.

The sound of boots scuffing on concrete.

“Don’t you fuckers move.”

Walter looked up.

It was one of the Feds. He stood there in front of Walter, his compact battlerifle pointed at the boy’s head, his shroud undone so that they could see his face. He was not the driver that Walter had seen earlier.

“Lemme see your hands!” he shouted.

The two boys complied.

The soldier grabbed them by the back of their necks, a second Fed coming to keep them under cover of his rifle while the first effortlessly planted them face-first into the ground.

Then Walter was staring at concrete, feeling the smart of his chin after it scuffed against the ground.

He fixated on pebbles and dirt on the road. He wondered when his brother’s mortal chest wound was going to start bleeding. He wondered how long he had until Roy died. He was on the verge of tears, and probably would have been there already if it hadn’t been shocked out of him.

Roy was still coughing, but he seemed to be slowing down, almost like he was getting his wind back.

A new voice: “What the fuck is this? Some fuckin’ freedom fighters?” The voice was American. Northern. It was full of sarcasm and personal amusement.

Walter craned his neck to see, but he couldn’t see the soldier that had spoken.

Instead he saw a Chicom standing a few yards away, picking up an orange bean-bag round off the roadway. He waggled it in the air and laughed at Walter and Roy.

A gloved hand pushed Walter’s face back into the ground. “Don’t fuckin’ look at us, you little shit.”

The first voice again: “PDs?”

“Nah, too young.”

They checked the boys’ arms to make sure, even though nobody could get a Personal Device before they were fifteen years old. Legally, anyway.

“Sit them up.”

Walter felt himself lifted completely off the ground, and then set back down so hard that his head hit the concrete abutment of the bridge. He was staring at two Feds, the Chicom that shot his brother with the bean bag round, and a little gathering of Russian soldiers off to the side, noticeable by their plain blue-gray fatigues and lack of battleshrouds.

The Fed soldier with the northern accent stood closest to them. He looked down, his face full of irritation. “Names. Now.”

Roy had regained a little breath now. “Don’t give ‘em our names!” he blurted to Walter.

The Fed responded with a kick to Roy’s legs. “You shut the fuck up! You think this is fucking funny? You think this is a goddamn game? You come out here with your fucking poppers and try to scare my guys and now my command tells me I can’t keep rolling, I gotta hang my ass out in the wind and get your fucking names! Fuck you, and fuck your backwoods pops if he’s sitting up in those trees with his fucking deer rifle. Let him take a goddamn shot. I’ll turn your daddy to pink mist before he loads a second round, you hear me you little redneck shit?”

Walter was crying now.

Roy was trying hard not to.

The Fed kicked his legs again. “Fucking names, or I swear to God, I’ll send you and your entire inbred family off to Sweetwater, I shit you not. I will have you disappeared.”

They’d all heard the horror stories about the Domestic Terror Internment Camp in Sweetwater, Wyoming. They came up in the news occasionally, but domestic terrorists have no rights. They are barely even human, and the stories were glossed over and quickly forgotten.

Being “disappeared” was the greatest fear. It was the boogieman under everyone’s bed. Because “domestic terrorist” could be applied to whoever the Fed wanted it to apply to, so in that moment, it seemed very real to Walter that this soldier might actually report them as domestic terrorists for making a homemade bomb and have their entire family sent to Sweetwater DTI.

Walter couldn’t handle the idea.

Pops with his hands dirty and stained from regulator cleaner, his Ma smelling like fry grease from the diner…he couldn’t handle the thought of someone coming into their house in the middle of the night and throwing black sacks over their heads, hauling them out to a waiting gunship to be whisked off and never seen or heard from again.

“Walter!” he sobbed. “I’m Walter Baucom! He’s Roy Baucom! Please don’t send us to DTI!”

“And where’s your pops right now? Huh? He in the fucking woods with a gun?”

“No, no! He’s working in the fields! He’s just a grower. That’s all. That’s all we are.”

Beside him, Roy’s face had gone stoic.

“Is there anyone in the woods? Is this a trap? Don’t fuck with me, kid.”

“No. It’s just us. I swear. I’m sorry. We’re both sorry.”

The Fed looked at Walter’s brother. “Yeah, he don’t seem too sorry.” He reached out a gloved hand and just kind of mushed Roy’s face in irritation. Not hard enough to cause any pain. But enough to show his displeasure. “How old are you?”

“I’m eight, he’s ten.”

The Fed straightened a bit. He keyed his coms. “Hey, copy the names of these two little shitheads, please.”

Walter figured he was speaking to someone in the lead guntruck because he looked over his shoulder at it. Walter saw the driver—the one with the sunglasses—lean over and access a monitor that glowed inside the guntruck. He watched the soldier’s lips move as he transmitted something back.

“Yeah. One: last name Baucom, first name Roy, all of ten fucking years old. Two: same last name Baucom, first name Walter, eight.” He waited for a second, eyes scanning the trees all around them. A bead of sweat was making its way down his nose. He swiped it off. Heard something on his comms. Then looked back to the two brothers. He pointed a gloved finger between the two of them. “You two. Go the fuck home. I’ll be forwarding your names to the sheriff. He can decide whether your family needs to go to DTI or not.”

He seemed to just notice the marijuana cigarette still hanging on Roy’s ear. He bent down and swiped it off. Gave it a sniff. “The fuck is this?” he asked with a smirk. “Chaps can’t be smokin’ the Devil’s lettuce.” He tucked the cigarette in a sleeve pocket of his uniform. “Mine.”

Then he turned and started walking back to his guntruck. The Russians were already in their truck, and the Chicom was backing up towards the personnel carrier, grinning at the two boys and saying something neither could understand.

The lead guntruck driver had his window rolled down. As they passed by, the driver shook his head at them. “Hope your family ain’t goin’ to DTI, boy,” he called out as he passed by.

Then they slammed on the gas, their big engines hurtling the heavily armored guntrucks forward. The three vehicles got tight again, got back up to sixty miles per hour, and disappeared around the corner of the highway.

Walter helped Roy up. The older boy shrugged him off as soon as he’d gained his feet. Walter wasn’t quite sure why Roy was mad at him, or even if he was mad at him, but it seemed that way. Probably because things had not gone as intended. Probably because Walter was someone that Roy could exact his control over. And that was what he needed in that moment—control.

On some juvenile level, Walter understood all of this. And a part of him wanted to fight against it, wanted to push back. But he was the good boy. He didn’t rock the boat. He preferred to let things lie.

Roy kept glaring at the road where the patrol had disappeared, rubbing his stomach. Then he whipped around and faced his brother again. “You don’t ever fucking talk about this.”

“But—” Walter stammered.

Roy jabbed him in the chest. “No! If Pops finds out about this shit, he’ll beat us both ‘til Sunday. You want that? You want to get your ass beat by Pops?”

“No,” Walter said, holding his chest where it’d been punched and backing up a step.

“Then you better hush-up.”

Roy gingerly lifted his dirty shirt, looking down at his stomach with a morbid, wincing curiosity.  Just above his navel was a swollen, off-color mark. Walter could tell just by looking at it that it was going to be nasty and purple-yellow by morning.

“How you gonna explain that?” Walter asked.

Roy just shoved his shirt back down and made his way back off the bridge and into the woods. “We was playin’ baseball and one of the other kids hit me in the stomach with a fastball. That’s it.”

It was a weak story, but Walter simply followed his brother off the bridge and said nothing.

He was the good boy.

He didn’t want to rock the boat.

Thank you for reading!

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The Purge of District 89

A Grower’s War – Book 1

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