Todd Read Online Free PDF Page B

murmured.
    Alan leaned against a cash
register, fighting for control. He couldn't break right now. There simply
wasn't time.
    "Yeah." He coughed and turned
away, slapping at the tears on his cheeks. "Well, at least we know there's
no one in here." The joke fell flat and died in the darkness. "Help
me find some light."
    There was a stack of lanterns
close to the front, right next to the batteries needed to run them. They opened
two—one for each of them—and made their way into the back of the store,
spelunkers delving the depths.
    14
    A pretty woman smiled at him from
the side of the generator box, the shadows from Todd's bobbing lantern crawling
over her like ants. Displacement 420cc, the box read. Bore: 90. Alan
had no idea what it meant, and didn't much care. The price on the tag was
nearly $800. It would probably work.
    He went searching for a loading
cart, Todd in tow. Piles of desolate clothing pockmarked the floor like cairns. Each threw a
shadow: long at first, then shorter as his lantern drew closer.
    All these people were in the
store, he thought. This pile was khakis and a polo shirt; that one a Mountain
Dew t-shirt and jeans. Next to the loading carts was a stroller with an empty
one-piece inside. The one-piece was green, with a cartoon chimpanzee. It read: Silly
Monkey.
    "You used to be small enough
to fit in one of these," he said, pointing at the stroller. Todd didn't
answer, but a familiar voice in his head did. It replayed his own words and put
them in context, helping him understand exactly how pointless they were. So
what if Todd used to ride in a stroller? He was too big now. Why say it? What
was the point?
    What a dumb thing to say.
    He'd fought that voice for a long
time. It had been hard, but Brenda had supported him, and eventually it grew
quiet enough that he could usually ignore it.
    Of course, Brenda was gone now.
    Allie's gone, too. Everyone is gone. None of this matters.
    What's the generator for? To
mark time until you die?
    "I know," Todd finally
said. "Mommy told me."
    15
    Once the generator was loaded,
they went back to the house.
    Ultimately, he couldn't resist the
prospect of finding out who had sent him that text yesterday, even if it was a
risk to go back. Those words—
    (okay stay)
    —were the only sign of other life
he'd seen since yesterday. He had to know where they'd come from.
    He was careful, though. He grabbed
the best weapon he could find—a little gardening fork from the garage—and eased
the door open. The house was dark and quiet, the air a stale reminder of
yesterday's air conditioning.
    Todd didn't wait for him; he
darted toward his room and his games. "My 3DS is still here," he
reported from around the corner, "but the power's on red."
    "Get back here," Alan
ordered. "Don't run off like that, I told you."
    "Can I plug it into the
generator?" He ambled back into the living room, clutching his game system
and looking pensive.
    "Just... come here. I want to
finish checking the house. Be quiet. No more running off until I say it's
safe." Alan considered asking him to wait in the kitchen, or maybe even
the car, but he didn't want him out of sight. There was probably no one in the
house, but if there was, he didn't want to find out by having them take his
son. "Stay close and stay quiet."
    They went room to room. The house
was clear. Alan went back to the car, brought the generator inside, and cursed.
    "What?"
    "It... needs gas."
    "We have gas for the
lawnmower."
    "Yeah, I know, Todd."
That wouldn't be enough.
    He felt like an idiot. How had he
thought it generated power? Magic? Where the hell was he going to get gas, with
all the power out?
    His own incompetence staggered
him. His mind broke loose, a dog off its leash, and ran down the path of wild
speculation.
    Even if he got the generator
running, then what? There was only so much food they could keep cold.
Eventually nothing that needed to be cooled—meat, vegetables, milk, butter, nothing —would
still be good. There