Rocky Road by Melanie Doweiko

Author:Melanie Doweiko
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ABDO
Published: 2018-12-07T16:00:00+00:00

At some point, they end up on the roof of the van, lying on their backs and staring at the stars. They’re just far enough from a major city for the stars to be more visible than what Shawna gets to see at home. Cici is resting her head on Shawna’s chest and pointing out constellations. The poor girl is touch-starved and hasn’t even seen another person in weeks. Shawna doesn’t mind. She enjoys cuddles, and Cici’s hair is fun to play with.

“ . . . and there’s the Big and Little Dippers, but they’re also known as Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. The bears. There are a lot of legends about them. Ooo, and Leo! My favorite!”

“You know a lot about stars,” Shawna says.

“I spend a lot of time in the library,” Cici says. “Free information, warm place to stay for a while. It’s nice. Plus, I got a good place to watch them from.” She spreads her arms to indicate the sky above them.

Shawna had never thought of libraries like that, always associating them with homework and the local knitting circle (of which Cass is a secret member). Then again, she’d always associated homelessness with drunks and stupidity, not clever, funny, young girls in need of a hug.

Could this be Shawna? If she ran away—really ran away—is Cici who she’d become?

Someone’s feet crunch on the gravel and the girls sit up to see a man with no shirt walking up to the van with a crowbar. He’s the skinniest person Shawna has ever seen, in a frightening way. His too-pale skin reflects the moonlight, which deepens the shadows cast by the outlines of his ribs. His arms are covered in dark splotches, shaking with the weight of the black bar in his hands. His eyes are wide and sunken, exaggerated by the bags under them. It looks more like a skeleton is walking towards them than a man.

“Hey!” Cici shouts. The man freezes. She lets a stream of Spanish loose on him, and he drops the bar and sprints away.

“Crackheads,” Cici says with disgust once he’s gone and lies back down.

Shawna continues to stare in the direction he ran, unsure. The night had been turning out so nice, but that half-dead man had startled her out of whatever spell Cici had put her under. They’re squatting in an abandoned building. Their van could have been broken into. Their gear could have been stolen. They could have been attacked.

She needs to wake her bandmates up and leave. Now. She’ll carry Cass into the van herself, if she has to.

“Shawna? What’s wrong?” Cici asks, tugging at her arm.

“I have to go,” Shawna says.

Cici sits back up.

“What? Why? I thought you guys had a few more hours until you had to leave,” she says.

Shawna turns and looks at Cici. The fear and urgency in her eyes must be apparent, because Cici’s expression falls.

“Oh. I see. Yeah. Dangerous place I live in and all that,” Cici says, starting to climb off the top of the van.

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