Ashen Winter (Ashfall)

crashed.”
    “You were—”
    “The other two crashes, well, I was driving.”
    She was momentarily speechless. “You are not allowed to drive on a learner’s permit without me or Dad in the car, Alex.”
    I gave her my best what-the-hell look. Like anyone cared about driver’s licenses in the midst of all this chaos? “I think I lost my learner’s permit when our house burned, Mom.”
    “Our house? Never mind, what’re those?” She pointed at the spots on my arm and belly where I’d been shot. It looked like they were healing okay—a bit puffy and red, but scabbed over nicely.
    “Oh. That’s where I got shot.”
    “Shot? You got—?”
    “Look, Mom. A lot of stuff has happened since Darla and I set out to find you. Don’t stress about it. I’m okay. And I found you, thank God.”
    “Who’s Darla?”
    “My girlfriend.”
    “Ah.” She nodded, accepting that bit of information way more easily than the three truck wrecks or the fact that I’d been shot. “Pleased to meet you.” She held her hand out to Alyssa.
    Alyssa took her hand. “Pleased to meet you, too. But I’m not—”
    Dad rounded the corner of a nearby tent at a run, Flash trailing behind him. “Alex, you’re—!” He crashed into me with a bear hug that forced tears from my eyes—both from my joy at seeing him and the pain of his embrace. Neither of us could speak.
    “Doug,” Mom said, “he’s hurt.”
    Dad pulled back and looked at me. “Jesus. You look like you lost a fight with a grizzly.”
    “No, just a truck.” I pulled him back into a hug with one arm, and drew my mother against us with the other. I wanted to stay there, to squeeze them both until they’d soaked into me and could never leave again. Even the stale scent of their sweat smelled heavenly.
    “This is Darla,” Mom said, “Alex’s girlfriend.” She freed one arm and gestured at Alyssa.
    “My name’s Alyssa. And this is my brother, Ben.”
    Mom looked at me. “But you said—”
    “The Peckerwoods got Darla. Shot her.” Something caught in my throat, making my eyes water. “I’m going back for her as soon as we get out of here.”
    “What?” Mom said. “You can’t go charging into the middle of a gang. That’s not safe.”
    Before I could even start to protest, Dad said, “She might not be alive. There’re rumors all over camp about those gangs. Say they’re eating human flesh.”
    I dropped my arms from behind their backs and leaned out of the embrace. “Yes, Dad. They are eating people. They deal in slaves, too. But Darla was alive three days ago. Alyssa saw her.”
    “It’s too dangerous,” Mom protested. Okay, maybe I didn’t miss the mothering all that much.
    “If the Peckerwoods had Mom, would you go after her?” I stared my father in the eye.
    “I would.”
    I nodded and tried to fold my arms. Just the attempt hurt my right, so I picked up my shirt instead and started trying to struggle into it.
    “I’ve known your mother twenty-six years. I owe her a different kind of loyalty than you owe a girlfriend.”
    I couldn’t get my right arm jammed through the shirt-sleeve. “Piece of junk!” I tossed it aside.
    “It’s a hard world we live in now,” Dad said mildly.
    “It is the same,” I said. “Exactly the same. If you knew what we’d been through, you’d understand.”
    “Guess you’d better tell us,” Dad said.
    “How’s Rebecca?” Mom asked.
    “She’s okay. Darla and I left her at Uncle Paul’s place. That was, um, almost two weeks ago.”
    Alyssa plucked my shirt out of the snow and helped me get dressed. Ben wanted to watch the guards, and Alyssa didn’t want Ben to be alone, so when she finished helping me, they left. Mom sent Flash with them, instructing him to return in time for dinner. The fact that she’d mentioned dinner was heartening. When Darla and I had been imprisoned in Camp Galena, we’d gotten only breakfast—and not much of that.
    Mom, Dad, and I ducked into one of the tents out of the wind.
    “My brother’s still making out okay?” Dad asked.
    “Yeah,” I said. “Doing great. We grow and trade kale—it’s worth a fortune. Get pork from Warren in return.”
    “Why did you leave?” Mom asked.
    “We found Dad’s shotgun. But I’d better start at the beginning.” I told them about the house fire in Cedar Falls that had started my trek over ten months ago. About my thirsty trek across northeastern Iowa. About skiing into Darla’s barn, and how we had come to