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who’d released a poison monster upon the world. Comfort came when she heard Justin’s voice, encouraging her to stay awake, like she’d done with him earlier. Her arm fell, and she felt his tiny warm fingers wrap around hers, tugging on them.
    “Dad will be here soon,” he told her. “Daddy will be coming, just like you said, Emily.” And in that moment, she decided to never tell anyone what her father had done. She’d never say a word about the catastrophe he’d caused. Instead, the story she’d tell would be about the tragedy of two lovers, dying together, yet separated by a disaster. And she’d tell of the great accident, and how a young brother and sister fought and survived the day when the skies first went gray.

Into the Dark
    BOOK II

V
     
    THE DEAD DON’T MOVE
     

    Her last memory was the taste of blood: copper, like a penny. But there was more in that memory, wasn’t there? The warm touch of her little brother’s fingers. His voice chirping in her ear like a sparrow calling from their yard. And there was a sense of being lifted—carried like a leaf in the breeze. Pain. There had also been a terrible pain. And the sound of hissing static after hearing her father’s last words.
    Emily licked her lips.
    The taste of damp salty air.
    She wasn’t in her memory anymore.
    In real-life, the dead aren’t at all like you see in the movies. On the silver screen, they are crumpled and broken, flying like rag dolls through the air. Or their limbs are stretched awkwardly, making blood angels on the black-top and pavement. But sometimes, the dead are made up like porcelain figurines, cleaned and pristine, hair combed back flat with their faces painted to look forever calm. That isn’t at all what Emily saw when she first opened her eyes. Cordwood was the closest thing she could think of. Stacked cordwood.
    Emily peered ahead, staring at a dead body. It just laid there. No sound. No movement. No memories to get lost in. Dead. She told herself to turn away, but couldn’t. It was the first time she’d ever seen a dead body—up close, anyway. Yet there were countless dead all around them now. Her father, her mother, just to name a few. But the fog kept them hidden like a dirty secret. A thousand secrets? A million? She cringed. They’d all died from the poison promise that her father released upon the world. I survived though … I survived, and so did Justin .
    Blink , she insisted. Blink and take the image away. The dead man was older, his silver hair revealing a few youthful streaks of color. His front was soiled with sweat stains and blood that had dried stiff. She wondered how long he’d lived. How long after he’d reached the safety of the mall? And, she thought, how awful it was for him to have made it this far, only to die.
    Emily eased back to sleep, curling her knees up to her chest, telling herself that she was back in her bedroom—that is, before her world imploded. But a stir of activity kept her close to the edge, pulling on her like a wave. And when she fell deeper, letting go, she saw Justin with her father and mother, and heard their voices. A garden of fond memories was hers to pick from.
    Noise.
    She narrowed one eye open, only to find the dead man watching: guarding.
    Drifting.
    A thump against the car door. Her breath is gone—she doesn’t want to see the memory.
    Nightmare.
    Her mother’s hand, crawling across the glass.
    On the car window, a bloody stain in the shape of a heart—the word GO scrawled beneath it.
    A scatter of pots and pans crashed to the floor, jarring her.
    Sleep would have to wait—no matter how badly her body needed it to heal, it would have to wait. Her companion agreed; that’s what she imagined he’d say if he could.
    There was something familiar about his dead eyes. Baby blues that she remembered from a lifetime ago. Like the fallen clouds, they had gone pale, gray and lifeless. But still, she knew them. And in her past, they’d been like a summer sky,