How could she see June like this? Touch her with festering hands? Kiss her with bleeding lips? Hold her with arms that held death?Įach name on the list weighted her steps, opening the wound on her leg further. Afraid to stop moving, she pulled a warped water bottle from her backpack and took a sip. She couldn’t even tell if she was sweating anymore. Tears stung at her eyes, but her body had no water to spare for such frivolity. Three days inside had started her sunburn peeling, but being back on the road had turned her hands into raw blisters and her neck into flaming skin.
![popshot golf popshot golf](https://golfdigest.sports.sndimg.com/content/dam/images/golfdigest/fullset/2015/07/21/55ad98d4b01eefe207f7ba0d_instruction-2014-06-inar01-butch-harmon-pitching.jpg)
The dying trees offered little protection. Trains would be on schedule even if the sun wasn’t. She looked up at the sky, the sun hanging in the same place as when she had last checked. She didn’t notice she was clenching her jaw until her teeth started to ache. It dribbled down her leg from beneath the rusty brown t-shirt, mixing with sweat and pooling in her boot. Limping through the wasteland, her blood seemed the most colourful thing around. Every new day as hot and ugly as the one before it. The whole world was a nightmare, empty and brown. A cool breeze turned her sweat into goose bumps for a moment, hurting worse than the heat. Her leg slowed the pace, but that wouldn’t matter when the train came by. When a train came through, she would be at a good height to jump on top with ease. This time she could stay in the mountains.īy midday she was hiking along the forest ledge beside the train tracks. The last one was cut short when everything started to end. She limped down the road towards the railroad tracks, whispering a promise to June.īefore, they had spent every summer together for eighteen years. Speckles of blood appeared on the fabric.
![popshot golf popshot golf](https://www.fullfat.com/wp-content/themes/fullfat_black_1/timthumb.php?src=https://www.fullfat.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/FlipGolf_Screenshot_3.jpg)
She ended up with one of Uncle Isaac’s old t-shirts, torn up and tied around the wound. There was water in the mountains, plenty of it. There was no water to waste washing it better to bandage it and hope for the best. She moved away from the trailer to sit on the dead grass near the mailbox and sort through her backpack.
![popshot golf popshot golf](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/VkoAAOSw~gRViEa~/s-l300.jpg)
Blood poured down her leg, almost refreshing against her sun-damaged skin. The splintered wood dug in, leaving a gash from ankle to knee. She slammed to the porch, catching her leg on the broken rail. As soon as she put her weight on the rotting rail, she knew it would break, but it was too late to catch herself. On unsteady feet, she climbed down from the roof. Her stomach dropped with the horrible feeling that she had already wasted too much time in that trailer. Maybe she wouldn’t have to cross out the last name on her list. Even if they had, why would the people there leave? It had to be safer up there than in any camp. Maybe the mountains hadn’t been evacuated. If the freight trains were still running, people were alive out there. There, disappearing into the valley was a train, heading east. She scrambled to the front stairs, using the railing as a boost to get on the roof. Sunlight was already pouring in, turning the place into an oven.
#Popshot golf skin
The girl’s skin stung as she startled, pulling it sharply away from the nylon couch. The distant, unmistakable rumble of a train.
![popshot golf popshot golf](http://www.charlottestreetnews.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/FINE-ART-CONNOISSEUR-FEB-15.jpg)
At least down in the dirt it would be cool.įar off, she heard a sound. Waking up in the summer down here was like waking up in a coffin six feet under, but worse. That’s how every morning came now, a rude reminder that her body hadn’t yet given out. She awoke on the fourth morning thinking she might be dead, vaguely surprised when she realised she wasn’t. The days dragged on, suffocating her in painful humidity. It looked like robbers had done it, maybe soldiers. She and Isaac stayed loyal to their hometown until the end. Almost everyone had the good sense to evacuate, but not Aunt Carol. The whole town smelled like ash and decay. Three days since she had tried to give them a decent burial, scrub their blood off the floor, get rid of the smell. It had been three days since she crossed off her aunt and uncle’s names. The girl was still sitting in her Aunt Carol’s trailer. Abigail Hodge’s post-apocalyptic short story follows a girl trying to find the one person left who means something to her.