Chapter 2: The Food Store, and Another Terrifying Storm

The Faimly takes a trip to The Food Store, and Stella begins to wonder if she's going crazy too. Once at home, another terrifying storm rolls in, and Steven is no where to be seen.

 

There was a woman on the floor with a bloody nose. Apparently these fights were getting out of hand. I ignored it and went right to the cash register. The old lady behind it rang up my gum and cat food, without saying anything, but “$5.99” and “please come again” with a dull annoying voice. Walking home with a heavy bag of cat food, and a pack of gum, I couldn’t stop thinking about Elliott. Who was he? Would I ever see him again? He seemed so nice…. in a weird way. All I knew was that I wanted to see him again, and soon. Thinking of him made my walk seem quicker, and I almost passed my house. I could’ve probably walked on for miles without noticing that I had passed my house, if it weren’t for my mother who was driving in a red van behind me. She had beeped the horn and I almost dropped the bag of food. Suddenly the cat food seemed a lot heavier than it was a few seconds ago. I trudged into the house and dropped the bag on the floor, and threw the gum on the counter.

“Mmmmm! Juicy Fruit! My favorite! Thanks Stella.” My dad said. He has no idea what I went through to get him that pack of gum.

“So, how was your day at school?” My mom, Rosemary, asked coming into the room. Even though she was my mom, she preferred to be called Rose, or Rosemary. She was the coolest mom I knew. (But then again I didn’t know many moms…) 

“Umm…It was okay I guess,” I said remembering that I had tripped over the teachers’ foot and went flailing to the ground. The teacher, Mr. Hudson, had made a big deal about it, and kept asking if I was all right. For the rest of the day everybody went around imitating him, asking if I was all right. Just a regular ordinary day in the life of a seventeen year old girl who didn’t fit in. She sat down her bag and looked at me.

“Okay? Did Johnny ask you out in front of all those kids again?” she asked shaking her head. Johnny was the number one nerd at our school. He was practically the most hated person in the whole city.

I glared at her, “No, he did not.”

She giggled, and walked out of the room leaving me alone. I sighed and climbed onto the counter.

“And that’s not all, Kristy, it has been reported that locals are getting a little crazy over there food. A store in Wilmington, North Carolina, has been shut down after the death of a twenty-three year old woman who got in a nasty fight with a man. This man will be taken to court and will be char-”

I walked into the den to see that the TV had gone blank.

‘Stupid cable network’ I thought. ‘I was listening to that!’

“Were people like that down at The Food Store?” my dad said surprising me. I hadn’t known he had walked into the room.

“Uh... not necessarily. It didn’t get that bad” I answered not looking at him.

“Your lying.” He stated.

I looked at him, “No! It really wasn’t that bad! There were just a lot of people there and…. Sure there were some fights, but it didn’t turn that violent.”

“But it could get that way very soon. Things aren’t looking so good right now.” He muttered.

He didn’t want to tell me this, but I knew it already. I suddenly wanted to cry, knowing that the world could all be over in a few seconds, and I wouldn’t even know it. Nobody would. It was a terrible thought,

‘Who will I be with when I die? What if I’m alone? I don’t want to see other people die! Especially not my family.’  

The torture of seeing loved ones dying would lead me into a state of madness. But that wouldn’t matter because I would soon follow them. I would never grow up, or get married, or have kids. I would never know what it felt like to love someone. I wouldn’t have a family. I wouldn’t have anything. There wouldn’t be a me at all.

 

I woke up to see Stevens pale face in front of me. He looked so much like me; that’s what everyone said. We were both pale, with a few freckles around our noses. Straight light brown hair, (except he rarely combed his) and we were both average weight. We weren’t beautiful, but we weren’t ugly. We were… fair.

“WAKE UP!” he screamed to my face.

“Shut up, I wanna go to bed.” I mumbled.

“Rosemary said we have to get up! We have to get some food before it’s all gone!” Steven yelled. This made me wake up a little. If Rose was worried about food, then we all should.

“Okay, okay, you go away first and then I’ll get up.” I said playing our little game we used to play. I would always say something like that and then he would go away and come back a few minutes later to see that I was still in bed. He would pull me out of bed by my feet then. I smiled remembering those days. Then the smile disappeared when I noticed that there wouldn’t be many more of those days left.

“No Stella! Get up!! I know what you’re trying to do!” Steven laughed.

I smiled again, and got up, pulling on a pair of ripped jeans and a black tank top. I brushed my hair quickly and ran downstairs. Dad was already having his morning coffee and Steven was running around saying the world was coming to an end, and laughing. I sometimes worried about him. Was he mentally retarded!? This was not a laughing matter! But he was too young to really know anything. (Well, I thought so anyway.) “So, we’re going to The Food Store to get food before it runs out?” I asked my dad.

He took a sip of his coffee and said, “Well, if it was up to me I wouldn’t let you two go down there, but your mother seems to think that it will be okay just this once.”

I opened the cabinet and grabbed a granola bar as Steven ran out of the room asking Rose when she would be ready to leave.

 

 

A few minutes later we were at The Food Place. The whole parking lot was filled even though it was 8:30 in the morning. As I climbed out of the red van I could already hear the fights that were going on inside the store. I had to admit, after hearing that a woman died because of it, I was kind of scared.

“Okay, kids, we have to stay together. No running off unless I tell you otherwise.” Rose said.

            Once we walked into the buzzing building, I stopped dead in my tracks. All of the food was already gone! Nothing appeared to be in stock, and it looked like the workers had quit. It was scary to see all of these fights going on, and not one person was trying to stop it. No workers, no policemen. It was madness! People were trying to steal other peoples foods out of there own carts. I turned to Rose. She was taking in the whole scene, but I knew she didn’t have a clue what we were going to do about food. I wanted to throw up. This was complete nonsense! What happened to all of the nice people in our city? Had everyone seriously gone mad with fear?

            Finally Rose caught me staring at her, and said, “Let’s just walk through the store, and maybe there will be something we can eat.”

            We nodded, and started walking through the aisles. After five aisles of nothing on the shelves I knew we weren’t going to find anything, but we kept looking, all staying together. And then, in aisle nine, my stomach did a black flip as I saw dark black hair up ahead.

            ‘I can’t let him see me!’ I thought. I turned in the other direction and started to walk away, but Rose caught me.

“Where do you think your going?” she called out. I knew that Elliott was probably staring at me now. ‘Great idea, Stella, just walk away,’ I scolded myself for doing something so dumb. I turned around slowly, glancing at Elliott, but he was gone.

            “I, uh, just thought I saw a box of pop tarts over there.” I said hopeful that she would accept my explanation. She stared at me suspiciously but didn’t take things any farther. She watched me carefully after that making sure I didn’t run away. ‘Why would I run away? Where would I go?’ I bet Rose was wondering the same things.

Had that really been Elliott back there? Or had I just imagined it? Did I really want to see him that bad, so I imagined him? What if I was going crazy too, just like all the other people here? After we went through the aisles and finding nothing, we headed through the fights and out to the car.

“So much for finding food,” I muttered.

“Don’t talk like that, Stella. We’ll find food. We will survive.” My dad said. I stared out the window the whole time we went home. Nobody said anything. I was beginning to feel really depressed. The only reason I would feel happy was if I could at least see Elliott again. ‘Who am I kidding; I’m never going to see him again. Just give it up. I. Will. Not. See. Elliott. Ever. Again.’  

The rest of the day was fairly boring and I was being lazy, just lying around watching some TV, and hanging around on the internet. But then, around dinner time, another storm blow around to our street.

“Stella, get off the computer, it’s storming.” My mother had said and then went into the kitchen. “Has anyone seen Steven?”

I didn’t answer, because now that I think about it I hadn’t seen Steven in a while. I turned the computer off slowly because I knew I wouldn’t have anything to do afterwards. I walked into the den as my mom opened the front door and screamed for Steven. My heart started to beat faster as I noticed that he wasn’t here. I turned back around, and headed towards the door as thunder roared outside.

“Mom?” I asked forgetting to call her by her name in my desperation of finding Steven. “Where’s Steven?” I asked. She turned around with the door still opened and I saw her face was full with fear. “I don’t know,” she sounded like she was going to cry. My dad walked into the room and put on his raincoat. “Where are you going?” Rosemary asked him even though she knew the answer.

“Steven was just saying that he wanted to help find food.” He sighed. “I told him that he could go help find food.”

My mothers face turned red. “What!? Why did you tell him that?!” she yelled.

“I wasn’t paying attention! I was watching the news!!” he yelled right back at her. They fought, bickering back and forth, while I ran to my room and grabbed a coat. If they were to busy fighting I would go find Steven myself. I pulled the window in my room open, and looked at how far down I would have to jump. Below me were concrete stairs that led to the basement. It had already started raining, and the wind was blowing really hard, making a whistling sound. I would have to find another way out. I ran to the bathroom, closed and locked the door, and ran to the window. It was still a long drop but I could hold on to that tree limb, and climb down. I pulled open the window, and jumped out, nearly missing the branch. The wind was blowing so fast it was moving me and the branch in midair. The branch wasn’t that strong and if I didn’t move and move quick then it would surely break. Something flew in my eye and, like a reflex; my hand flew to my eye. I lost my grip on the branch and fell landing on my knees. My knees ached, and for a second I didn’t think I would be able to get up. But I stood shakily, rubbing my eye. Rain hit my face, as I ran to the road.

“STEVEN!!!” I yelled as loud as I could, but I could barely hear my own voice over the noise of the rain and wind. The rain was pouring down and I didn’t know where I was, but I kept walking, not once even thinking of going back home without him. Squinting through the rain I saw a pair of headlights in front of me, and I dived out of the road just as a car raced through the road. I gulped noticing that if I hadn’t seen it than I would have been dead right now. I walked on calling for Steven, but I never got an answer. I felt dizzy and I couldn’t see straight. I felt like I was in a dream, and thought for a second, ‘I must be dreaming.’ But this wasn’t a dream. It was all real. Lighting and thunder cracked, and I jumped. I kept walking but I didn’t feel like I was getting anywhere. I was closing my eyes now, but still walking not caring where I went. And then I slipped, my feet flew from underneath me as I fell and rolled into a ditch. I didn’t get up. I didn’t want to. Steven was somewhere out here, and I had to find him, but I didn’t have enough strength to. I layed there and wept. Not wiping away my tears but the tears kept coming and coming. I was covered in mud and water, and I felt nasty. But I still lay there, barely breathing, and still crying.

Author's Note

Ignore grammer problems, I will do that when I finish the whole book. Please give me some constructive critisism!

Reviews

[Wolfwind Words]

I love the story line! The plot is thick; filled with lots of action.
I think that it might be a little more suspensefull, if the overall pace was slowed down a bit.

It's got a lot of potential.

Aaron

[Morgan]

i luved it