Crossroads

“Get out of the car.”

Donnie didn’t look at the man who spoke.  He just reached for the door handle, and was glad to get out of the car.  The man gave him the creeps.

“If this is what it’s going to be like on the outs,” he thought, “then I’m in trouble.”

The car ride from the correctional facility had been mercifully brief, but it was still long enough to set Donnie’s teeth on edge.  They’d barely pulled out of the parking lot when his new guardian looked at him and asked, “You’re afraid of being out here aren’t you?”

“What?” Donnie said, slightly incredulous.

This wasn’t exactly encouraging talk.  And Donnie was a little nervous about being free for the first time in almost a year.  Well, more than nervous, but he wasn’t about to admit it to a total and complete stranger.

“I’d be afraid too,” the man continued. “You heard about what’s happening. The sickness. The plague.  Whatever it is.”

“Yeah. I guess,” Donnie admitted. “I think I heard something about it when I was locked up.  Not much though.  I didn’t get to watch the news.  But the officers talked to us. Well…some of them talked to us.”

In truth, Donnie knew very little of what was going on in the outside world.  Being locked up made him forget there was a world outside the fences and razor wire.  The man looked back at the road and shook his head.  After a moment, he muttered, “Probably safer inside a prison.” Then continued louder, “Well, you’re free now. Free to die like the rest of us.”

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What will you do when the dead have risen?  When the outside world has gone crazy? You'll do the only thing you know how to do…survive.

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Details

Length: 27,054 words, 92 pages

Genre: Young Adult fiction

Published: 2018

Author: J.D. Lavelle

Format: digital publication - PDF and EPUB

Cost: $3.00

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