The New Wild by Holly Brasher Read Free Book Online Page A

her
sleeve. I wish Sarah and May were here with me to see this—they would
love it.
    Squinting at all the other bubbles
floating around me, I spot a cherry tree inverted in one. I grab a twig from
the ground and pop it. It’s only a moment before it, too, is fully grown,
cherries ripe and dangling in the breeze like they’ve been doing it every
summer for decades. Crazy.
    I pluck one off a branch and pop
it into my mouth. It’s juicy and incredibly sweet. I run my fingers through the
branches and yank off handfuls of cherries. Soon I’ve eaten so many, so fast, I
think my stomach is going to explode. Their pink juices run down my chin. I
shovel as many as I can into my duffel. My mom adores cherries—especially
the organic, non-cancer-causing ones—and I can’t get enough of them,
either. But I can’t believe they came from a tree that came from a bubble.
    It’s so quiet out here that time
passes in breaths, not seconds. A wind comes and ferries the rest of the
bubbles away to burst in some other place. I can’t hear anything but birds and
leaves rustling, and occasionally, my own heart thudding. I don’t think I’ve
ever felt this alone. I start picturing Bernard walking with me.
    “Dude, I haven’t popped so many
cherries at once in my life .”
    “Har dee har har, very funny,”
I’d say, cracking up.
    “Can we find a soy burger tree?
Because I’m really, really going to eat my hand.”
    “Don’t eat your hand.”
    “But it would be so delish!”
    “Bernard, stop. I’m going to
puke in my mouth.”
    I hear someone yell. At first, I
think it’s my imaginary Bernard, wailing in hunger. Then I hear it again. It
sounds like it’s coming from the forest ahead of me.
    “Hey!” I yell as loud as my lungs
can manage. I wait a second for a response before desperately shouting again,
“HEY!” But there’s no answer. I must be hearing things. I need a break, but I
keep walking. I’d do anything to see Mom and Bernard again. I need to find
another person, preferably someone with a horse and buggy, a tricycle, something .
There must be someone, besides Deb, left alive to help me.
    That’s when I see the branch
stump. The trees are all in perfect shape now, so it stands out like a sore
thumb. It’s about halfway up the trunk and looks like it was sawed off. The
branch, which would be lying nearby on the ground if it had fallen off the
tree, is nowhere to be found. It’s not much, but I take it as a sign of life.
    I keep going, eyes alert for another
human being. A pear tree that must have plopped out of a bubble stands nearby and
I pluck a few. I’m appraising several more, already chomped to the core and discarded
in the grass, when something big and brown runs out from the brush. I’m so
startled by the noise that I immediately fall back on my ass in the brush,
nearly hitting a pointy boulder in the process. My heart pounds, but it’s only
a deer. I let out a long sigh. I need to learn to freak out less if I’m ever
going to make it.
    A few miles farther, I pass what
remains of a chicken coop next to a tiny blackened ranch house. Someone,
or—I shudder to think, some thing — has opened the gate, and most of the hens are squawking
around the area. I steel myself, chase after the biggest one I can see, and try
to scoop it up from behind like Deb taught me. It’s impossible! Every time I
get close, it bolts. They’re all squawking and flapping their wings like crazy.
I finally get ahold of one by its foot but freak out and basically throw it
into the air. I sigh, and repeat steps one and two, but still don’t even get
close. Thank God I have the chicken Deb and I killed together in my pack, or
who knows when I’d eat protein again? These fuckers are fast. Still, the
adrenaline rush you get chasing them is alarming, considering they’re totally
non-threatening animals. I swear on the grave of this stupid chicken in my bag
that I will do anything — literally, anything — to not run into