The Color of Jade (Jade Series Book 1) by Mae Redding Read Free Book Online Page A

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    He debated quietly with himself what exactly to tell me. I busied myself, waiting for his response. Water sprayed with bursts, followed by pockets of air from the end of the garden hose as I pumped the leaver for pressure to our underground well. After a minute, it flowed freely and I filled the horses’ barrels. The dry, dusty air in the barn itched at my throat and I took a drink, waiting for his response through the buzzing silence. The well provided clean, drinkable water, more than enough year round and supplied our house included.
    “Please, Kane? I want to know,” I asked again, and then wiped my lips with the sleeve of my shirt. He sighed with defeated resolve and shut off the leaver to the pump.
    “There isn’t much out there as far as stores and shops. The buildings still stand, but they are empty… Broken into… Trashed. There was nothing left from the riots and it looks like a war zone. There are people out there,” Kane sighed. He grabbed the pitchfork and poked at the straw. I could tell this subject weighed on his mind. “There’s a lot of rebuilding that needs to be done everywhere.”
    “I could help you, you already send Trey out.”
    “No,” he answered, his response quick and definite. My face burned with frustration.  He leaned against the stall as he gripped the pitchfork and looked at me. “I don’t want you to see it, Jade. You really don’t want to see what I’ve seen,” he said, sounding more like my dad than my brother. “I know you think you can handle it… But no, you can’t go. It’s just not safe. Let’s just leave it at that.” We finished the chores in silence. My resentment towards him and his strictness hung heavy in the air.
    “What’s out there?”
    “Bodies… too many of them… You saw it on TV, but it affects you differently in person. Those images burn into your mind and they don’t ever leave,” Kane said, then looked intently at me. “I hope you don't ever have to see it.”
    “What are you doing with them?”
    “We're incinerating them at the burn plant or… wherever… open fields, parking lots. I have to gear up and wear a gas mask to keep from breathing the smell and protect against disease. You really don’t want to go.”
    “Have you been to the hospital?”
    I thought about the last time I talked to my mom after we found out she caught the virus. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach at the idea that my mom died alone, with none of us around her. Only to be surrounded by hundreds of other dead and dying people. The thought of my mom tossed along with the others at the burn plant was too much. I fought back the tears but a few escaped me and with the back of my hand, I wiped them away. I picked up a brush and smoothed it over Fire’s long winter coat for a distraction.
    “Yeah… We are going through the public buildings and clearing them out, but the bodies are unrecognizable, so I wouldn't know if there was anyone we knew,” he said cautiously as he watched me with sympathetic eyes. They filled quickly with deep sadness and something else that sent a chill through me as if he held something back but was unable to hide the pain he felt. I wondered what he just kept from me, if he found my mom but didn’t tell me to spare me the details.
    I turned from him and continued to brush Fire. My eyes glistened with moisture as tears continued to threaten with the increasing knot in my throat. I wanted my mom back.
    “I still don’t understand why I can’t go outside?”
    “There are a lot of shady men out there, men that I don’t know if I trust yet. I haven’t seen very many kids out. I’m sure they’re out there, but probably just being cautious, too.”
    “I’m not a kid, Kane.”
    “I know, but you still need to be careful. Probably more so, since you’re at that age…” Kane’s words hung in the air unfinished and I didn’t pursue his point. “I’m not sure what kind of government there will be, we don’t have law