Damage Read Online Free PDF Page B

gasoline and the wet earth of the riverbed. Sour ash and burning rubber. Smoke. Somewhere outside, the bus is on fire. Even if that B movie explosion I’ve been imagining since we crashed doesn’t happen, this bus is going to burn and we’ll all burn right along with our unnecessary possessions if we don’t get out.
    “Get out of the bus!” I yell, voice pinging off the crushed metal walls. “Get out! Get as far away as you can! The bus is on fire.”
    “Fire!” Someone sobs the word, stirring up another round of fear-echoes, but I don’t wait around to see if the few conscious people take my advice. I turn back to the emergency exit and the dragon that waits for me with its red eyes and bloody teeth, and I run.
    I slam into the handle with my side and jump, legs churning through the air, hoping to get some distance between me and the bus. I hit the ground hard, muscles clenching around the shard still stuck in my calf. Agony jolts up my leg and I cry out, but I don’t stop. I don’t dare look back to see if the monster I’ve cleared is already coming after me. I just run. I run as fast as I can, faster than I would have thought possible with glass in my leg, a sliced-up side, and carrying another person. Dani can’t weigh more than a hundred and twenty pounds—a hundred thirty at most. Still, it’s a lot more weight than I’m used to.
    But you wouldn’t know it by the way my feet eat up the sandy ground between the bus and the concrete pillars of the bridge. I’m Vince Young in the 2006 Rosebowl, I’m Superman on speed, so fast the wind stings my eyes and makes tears run down my cheeks. If the college scouts were watching, I’d score a fat scholarship on the spot.
    Instead, I make an even bigger score. I keep Dani and me alive for a few more minutes.
    The explosion rips through the air, filling the world, booming through the narrow riverbed. It crashes into my ears, rattling the loose piece in my brain. The heat comes a second later, burning against my back, so hot I start to sweat even though the front of my body is freezing cold.
    The bus exploded. It really did, just like I was afraid it would.
    Wouldn’t Trent have loved to see that?
    It’s my last thought before something hits the back of my head and more warm blood spills down my neck. The gray light filtering into the riverbed flares white, then yellow, and then blackness sweeps in. I fall, the arms holding Dani clenching one last time before my vision snuffs out.
    Dani
    So tired, so cold. But still, I’m sweating. My forehead and upper lip are freckled with little beads, just like when we have ballet rehearsal in the theater during the summer.
    The owner insists a theater in upstate New York doesn’t need air conditioning. Maybe that’s true at night—when the temperatures drop and the patrons come inside wearing sweaters and jackets they can take off if they get too warm—but for the dancers practicing in the eighty-degree heat of midday, it’s stifling. My leotard is always drenched and sticky by the first break.
    But I’m not wearing a leotard now. I’m in my school uniform. It’s the crisp cotton of my white button-up that’s glued to my clammy skin, not the soft fabric of my ancient dancewear. And I’m not inside … I’m outside. Cold, winter air stirs the hair on my neck, trying to freeze the drops sliding into my collar into sweat-cicles.
    What am I doing outside? And why does my body hurt all over?
    With way more effort than something so simple should require, I open my eyes. I catch a glimpse of rocks and dirt before my lids slam closed, shutters made of lead.
    Where am I? What happened? And why can’t I keep my eyes open?
    Images tease at the edges of my brain—glass shattering, wide, frightened mouths, strong arms that hold me tight as the world spins—but I can’t seem to hold on to the pictures long enough to make sense of their message. I am so tired. So, so very tired. Too tired to think, too tired to talk, too