She Has A Broken Thing Where Her Heart Should Be - J.D. Barker Page 0,184

of about fourteen or fifteen on board. Although a good distance away, he was heading in our direction. His small motor churning as he peered over the side, shifting from right to left.

I ran back to the Mercedes, opened the trunk, and rooted around in my backpack. I had spent my share of nights sleeping outside and learned long ago not to travel without a good blanket. The one I carried wasn’t very thick but was made of wool and extremely warm. I took the blanket back down to Stella and carefully wrapped it around her body, covering her exposed arms and neck, creating a makeshift barrier between us before I scooped her up and carried her back to the car. I settled her gently in her seat before remembering her gloves.

I ran back down.

The kid in the small boat drew close to shore now, and he perked up when he saw me come back. “All the fish are dead!”

The grass and weeds around the shore where Stella had knelt were black, too, a patch at least eight feet in diameter—all dead, already stinking of rot and decay. I grabbed Stella’s gloves.

The boy shouted, “The water’s poisoned or something!”

“Looks that way!” I yelled back, taking one last look before shoving the gloves in my pocket and racing back up and over the hill to the Mercedes. I jumped into the driver’s seat, twisted the key, and hit the gas, kicking up dirt and gravel behind us. Back on CA-88, I saw the boy from the boat crest the hill and hoped to God he didn’t get a good look at me, Stella, or our car.

Traffic on US-395 was light—mainly long-haul truckers, RVs, and a handful of cars. Using the cruise control, I kept our speed five miles per hour over the limit—not fast enough to risk getting pulled over, but enough to keep up with everyone else.

Stella woke for the first time near Stockton, California. Prior, she had mumbled several times in her sleep but nothing really coherent. The color had returned to her cheeks, and gratefully, the sweating stopped. If she was feverish before, she didn’t appear to be any longer, but I had no way to know for certain. I considered waking her, particularly when her condition appeared to be improving, but thought better of it. Whatever this was—this condition, this illness, this curse, this hunger—the lake had helped, but she needed to rest, and as comforting as hearing her voice might have been for me, I needed to think about her and let her rest.

As signs for Stockton began appearing, Stella stirred beneath the blanket, her head rolled from left to right and back again, and her eyes fluttered open.

“Thirsty,” she managed to say.

I handed her a bottle of water.

“I stopped for gas about an hour ago and got us some supplies. We’ve got water, Kit Kats, a bag of Oreos, and some Cheetos.”

“Not much for nutrition, are you, Pip?”

“Auntie Jo used to say it’s better to eat junk food. It keeps your immune system from getting lazy.”

“I’d like to believe you were kidding, but I’m fairly certain you are not.” Stella twisted off the cap and drank nearly half the bottle before setting it down in the center console. “How long was I asleep?”

“About two hours.”

“How bad?”

“The lake?”

She nodded.

“I think you killed all the fish.”

She leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes again, drawing in a defeated breath. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Someone saw us. There was a kid in a boat. He didn’t get close enough to see our license plate. At least, I don’t think he did.”

At this, Stella eyes popped open. “He was on the water?”

I nodded. “About halfway out. Pretty far off when it started, then he saw us and started toward shore.”

She turned toward me, the belt across her lap and chest holding her back. “But he was okay? He didn’t die?”

I realized then what was going through her head. If the fish were all dead, why not the boy? If he was on the water, too. “He wasn’t in the water. The boat must have protected him somehow.”

Stella dropped back into her seat and sighed.

A slow-moving semi in the single westbound lane forced me to tap the brake and release the cruise control. Our speed dropped to sixty. “It helped, though, didn’t it? The fish?”

Stella raised one of her hands and held her palm out between us—no longer trembling.

“How long do you think…how long did it get you?”

She lowered