Sometimes we would talk about the scenery - the rolling hills covered with trees that would open up to flat expanses of over grown land that had all but eaten up a random house or two. Or we would talk about how warm it was and joke about how much sunscreen we would end up using by days end. But mostly we were quiet, nervous as we traveled through parts of town we weren't familiar with. We rode for hours through countryside that was unnaturally still and quiet. And then there was the b.u.t.terfly.

As we approached a tight bend in the narrow highway, I marveled at the oak trees that crowded the shoulder of the road; they outlasted most of humanity and the reality that the three of us were truly alone hit me like a punch to the gut. As my breath shuddered in and out, movement to my right caught my attention just as tears were beginning to sting my eyes. A Monarch b.u.t.terfly fluttered past my head and landed on the strap of my tank top. He sat there perched atop my shoulder, his delicate orange and brown wings moving slowly against the tame breeze of mid-day. When the golden sunshine hit his body just right, he shimmered as if dipped in fairy dust.

After a full minute pa.s.sed, I felt Kris squeeze my waist. She spoke softly into my right ear, "Oh my G.o.d, did you know there's a b.u.t.terfly on your shoulder?"

I tried to keep my body as still as possible while I laughed, despite the steady jarring from the horse. For the past hour, Kris had her ear buds in. I almost thought she had fallen asleep behind me listening to her music.

"It's been there for a bit now, just hanging out I guess," I said. I drew a deep breath in to steady my nerves and calm the sob that so desperately wanted to escape and concentrated instead on the magnificent insect that hitched a ride.

"It's so beautiful," Kris whispered. She waved her hand at Connor, gesturing for him to ride up beside us and when he was parallel with Foxy, Kris pointed at my shoulder.

"So, you have a freeloader, huh?" His laugh echoed down the empty road and bounced off the pa.s.sing oaks. The sound was throaty and honest. I took in the sight of him sitting on top of the mare, comfortable in the saddle with the reins loosely held in one hand, his other resting on the saddle horn. He looked as if he the two of them trotted off a movie poster.

"You look like a natural," I said with a smile.

"Tell that to my a.s.s later," he grunted.

For the next hour or so, the Monarch rested on my shoulder, and not until we were out in the open again with only empty fields on either side of us did it take flight into the wind. He was migrating too, south into Mexico where his kind would be waiting for him. All three of us watched as the tiny b.u.t.terfly filled the sky with hope, fluttering erratically off into the distance with only one thing on its mind - to live.

Our first night of the trek was spent on the western outskirts of Ramona. We unharnessed the horses and secured them inside an empty barn off of Horizon View Drive, a road that forked off San Pasqual Valley. We were elevated with a view, which meant we would hear or see any traffic moving on the highway. The evening air was warm enough to set our modest camp up outside, but Kris ended up sleeping in the barn with the horses.

"To keep them company," she had said.

The first night wasn't full of conversation, like I imagined it would have been. Going through the town of Ramona had unnerved all of us, including the horses. The normally calm Sunny nearly bucked Connor off twice as we pa.s.sed through the various car wrecks and cluttered intersections. Death still loitered in the air there - it was a smell that lingered in our memories, just as much as it did the bodies of the dead. And they were all over the streets. Some hung from blasted out windows of houses, some lay decomposed on front lawns and others were trapped inside their cars - burned to a crisp. The military had not been kind to the town of Ramona. And that feeling of being watched was all over; it came from every corner and every window. We may have been the only living things pa.s.sing through, but we were not alone.

Connor made a small campfire and we sat around it while he heated up a can of beans. Kris had made cornbread before we left and it was supposed to last us at least two meals. The bread was gone before the beans were.

Less than two hours after dark, Kris waddled off into the barn and Connor and I set our sleeping bags next to each other in the softest patch of gra.s.s we could find. Under normal circ.u.mstances, the star-filled night and open air would have been romantic but we were tired and sore from the day's ride. Not to mention wary of every sound and shift in the shadows.

Connor's voice, heavy with exhaustion and his Irish accent, spoke softly beside me, "You do realize from this point on, we will be walking through towns. We aren't in the solitude or safety of the mountains anymore. We won't be alone. At least, not totally."

I didn't look at him but nodded and said just as quietly, "I know."

"Alright then," he said with a sigh. I felt him roll over onto his side and shortly after that, his fingers ran along my braid and lingered on the ends of my hair. "We should get some sleep and start off first thing in the morning."

"Okay."

"I like this place, you know? That old barn and this view. It's like a picture. I could live somewhere like this."

"Yeah?"

"Good night, Riley" he whispered, leaning down to kiss my lips.

"Night," I sighed against his mouth and felt him pull away, stretching out along the top of his sleeping bag. Neither of us said it, but we knew it would be a long and restless night.

Just an hour or so before dawn, Kris emerged from her slumber, a shadowy figure against the dark red paint of the barn. I listened to her shuffle slowly toward the cold campfire and heard the subtle clink of metal against metal. I turned my head to the side to watch her work. Within a few minutes, the aroma of coffee grounds permeated the air and caused an involuntary groan to escape my mouth. Kris's shadow jumped in the darkness as I pushed myself up into a sitting position. My back and hips were sore from the hard ground and my neck was painfully stiff.

"Uhg...thirty-something year olds should not be sleeping on the ground," I complained.

She chuckled and tossed a small package at me. It landed in my lap and I fingered the plastic-wrapped rectangle. It was a granola bar - our main source of breakfast for the next week.

"Thanks, but I think I'll take coffee first," I muttered as I crawled toward the small pit. We had it lit within five minutes, and Kris set the small coffee percolator on top of the foldable rack that Connor had perched above the firewood the night before. Everything we brought was compact and light, except for the food.

With steaming coffee in our hands, Kris and I whispered over our small tin cups about the day. How far were we going? What roads were we taking? What was the weather going to be like? Where would we stop to water the horses? We were discussing who was going to navigate the map for the day when Connor's sleepy voice startled us.

"Mornin' ladies...did ya save some for me?" He was sitting upright, stretching much like I had when I woke. Looking just as stiff and haggard as I felt.

"Of course, Kris made you a cup." I stood and took the few steps to his bed, handing him his coffee with a wink. Bright streaks of purples and oranges were stretching out along the sky toward us from the east like skeletal fingers. Dawn had arrived.

"How'd you sleep?" I squatted down beside him.

"I feel like someone took a bat to my b.a.l.l.s." He winced, sipping the hot liquid too quickly.

I laughed out loud, enjoying the sound of my voice as it boomed outward into the open s.p.a.ce around us. "You should have gone with us on more trail rides before we left," I said, still giggling.

"d.a.m.n...I could really use a giant bag of ice to sit on right now."

"Don't be a baby," I teased, ruffling his already mussed up hair with my hand, "Come sit by the fire and warm up. We were just planning out the day."

Connor smacked at my backside as I walked away, making me yelp. The sharp sound was followed by a whinny from the horses. It was the first time we heard them since Kris had left the barn.

"Did you give them some hay?" I asked her.

"Yeah and water too. They'll be busy for a while."

Connor had found a gallon of water in a nearby shed just before we settled down for the evening, but the horses would drink that in no time. Water was our number one priority. Any time we stopped, we searched for it. Fortunately, many people had stocked up on jugs and water bottles in their haste to evacuate and since those people didn't get far, supplies were easy to find. At least at first.

We dismounted the horses and stood next to each other - shoulder to shoulder on the hot pavement in awe. After six or so hours on the road, two short breaks for the horses and a meager lunch of olives, crackers and applesauce packets, we made it just inside the town of San Pasqual. We planned on making it to the border of Escondido before night fell, but standing on the highway with Connor holding his horse reins, and me holding Foxy's, we knew that wasn't going to happen.

The highway was gone. A huge circular hole at least half a mile wide replaced it. The crater was full of blasted chunks of concrete, asphalt, gla.s.s and twisted metal - cars. We stood in silence a few feet from the drop off looking at the blast zone until the horses got anxious and pulled on their leads.

"What the h.e.l.l did this?" Connor asked.

"I-I don't know," I answered.

"It's amazing," Kris said under her breath. Both Connor and I shot curious glances in her direction. "Well, I mean, it is. I don't think a normal explosion did this, do you?" She stared, unblinking at the destruction and then jumped back, startling Foxy.

Her hands flew up to her mouth and her eyes widened. "Oh no," she gasped.

"What?" I reached out to grip her shoulder, but she shook me off and pointed a shaky finger directly below us. I followed it, looking at the blocks of busted-up road, b.u.mpers and blown out tires until my eyes found what she was pointing at.

Bodies. Or what was left of them. Buried beneath the rubble were hundreds, thousands of dead people. A strangled sound came out of my mouth and just before my knees buckled, I felt Connor's arm slide around my waist.

"I think we've seen enough, ladies," he said quietly. His other arm was draped protectively around Kris's sagging shoulders. As he turned us away from the crater, I followed the inside curve of it back up toward the road with my eyes and caught the image of an infant carrier lying on its side covered in black dust. It wasn't empty.

I purged the watery remains of my lunch all over Connor's brand new boots.

CHAPTER twelve.

It took us two hours to find a way around the crater. Eventually we had to double back and knock down a few property fences to make a wide berth back and around. Dusty, thirsty and frazzled, we decided to camp early. After finding the highway again and following the road back uphill we stopped at a nursery and let the horses loose to graze over the overgrown plants.

"There're some houses across the street. I'll bring back whatever water I can." Connor walked off, looking eager to be on his own legs again. It took several trips but he brought back enough water to fill one of plastic bins we found. As the horses drank, we wandered around the grounds until we saw enough. Most of the foliage was dead, but some of it had grown wild in places creating a secret garden, just for us.

"I'm not hungry," I said, as Connor handed me a small plate of food. My appet.i.te was lost hours before, when I realized there were too many bodies in the wreckage of the crater to all be from the cars. They must have been gathered there at that spot for a reason when something awful happened.

"Riley, this is just the beginning. You can't not eat after you see something disturbing or you won't eat at all on this suicide mission of yours," Connor grumbled.

I s.n.a.t.c.hed the plate away from him and made sure he saw how angry I was at his comment. The campfire shadows danced across his face as he leaned away from me.

"I know that," I snapped. "Something was wrong back there. Seeing all those bodies under that debris...don't you get it? Those people were taken out on purpose. Excuse me if that thought makes my stomach lurch."

He raised his hands up in surrender but said nothing. Kris pushed her food around on her plate but no matter how much she rearranged it, she wasn't fooling anyone. She hadn't eaten a morsel either.

"Sorry," I said quietly.

I stared into the flames till my eyes stung, trying to remember a time when my heart didn't ache for my children or when I actually felt safe. My mind was blank. Something wet hit my cheek and slid down onto my shoulder with a plop. I recoiled from it and turned in time to see Connor bite down on his lower lip. He was trying not to laugh out loud.

"What the h.e.l.l was that?" With a nimble flick of the wrist, something flew off Connor's flat camping spoon and lodged in my hair. "Connor!"

He let his laugh out and Kris joined him as I picked the instant mashed potatoes out of my hair. "I can't believe you!" I squealed. The wet flakes stuck to my strands like glue. "I'll never get this out!" Another plop landed on my arm. "Oh, that's it!" I said with feigned shock.

Using my fingers, I scooped the small heap of potatoes off my plate and threw the entire handful at Connor's face. His laugh silenced immediately. I thought he was angry and my smile faltered as I sat still, waiting for a string of curse words or something equally upsetting to fly out of his mouth. Even Kris had fallen silent in nervous antic.i.p.ation of what Connor was going to do. I barely had a chance to stand before he was up and launching himself at me. With a wicked grin, he tackled me into the dirt and began rubbing his face across mine in an attempt to kiss mashed potatoes all over my mouth.

Kris dropped her own uneaten plate of food to the ground as she laughed at the spectacle before her of the two of us wrestling noisily around her feet - covered in food. It was almost worth waking up with dried flakes of the instant stuff caked in my hair.

"Day two, are you ready?" I whispered in Foxy's ear as Kris adjusted the tandem saddle. The trusting mare blinked slowly at me.

"Feels good," Kris said at my shoulder. I watched as she tugged at the straps then hooked her foot in one of the stirrups and swung her leg up and over the saddle like a pro. I still had to bounce a bit before I could raise myself up onto the horse. My body was not as young and limber as it used to be.

Once on top of the horse, Connor handed Kris her backpack and tickled my knee. "Looks like you got all of dinner out of your hair," he laughed.

I playfully kicked at him as he skittered away and I watched his muscles ripple as he lifted himself up onto Sunny. The horse took a step backwards, adjusting herself with his weight and snorted loudly, which was her routine. She was not a morning horse.

"Ready?" I asked Connor as he wiggled around in his saddle.

"Yep. Lead the way, trail master," he joked.

"Ha ha, very funny," I quipped back.

I had one of his long sleeve tops on over my tank to shield the early morning breeze from my skin. But less than an hour after we left the nursery, I had to pull the sleeves up. An hour after that and I removed it completely. By noon, I would have preferred to strip down naked but a sunburn on my b.r.e.a.s.t.s was less appealing than sweating through my clothes.

"Let's stop here," I said, turning sideways to glance at Connor.

He was off his horse before Kris and I even made it to the shoulder of the road. There were less and less gra.s.sy areas to walk the horses since we were nearing the center of Escondido. It was high noon and we were hot and thirsty.

Kris and I dismounted and led Foxy off to the side of the road under the shade of a large pepper tree. While the horses nibbled at the gra.s.s, searching for goodies, Kris pulled out two apples to give them as treats.

"You know, you keep giving those apples to the horses and we won't have any for ourselves," Connor said. He plopped down in the shade with his pack in between his knees as he rummaged around for his water canteen. The front of his shirt was soaked in a V-shaped sweat pattern.

"We should look for citrus trees now that we're in the City again. Maybe we'll get lucky and find a yard with an orange tree or something." I sat down heavily next to Connor and let him brush his fingers across my cheek before sipping from my own water canteen.

"Lemme see that for a minute." Connor gestured to the map that Kris pulled out of her pack. After she handed it over to him, she fell back onto the dry gra.s.s with a mouthful of granola cl.u.s.ters.

"Why couldn't we hole up somewhere by the beach," she complained in between swallows. "At least then we'd have the ocean to go to when it got hot."

"Suggestion noted," I laughed. It wasn't that bad of an idea, actually, but most of the sh.o.r.eline was heavily developed which meant we risked running into living people we couldn't trust and dead people we couldn't flee.

Connor was ignoring us. He was busy studying the map with interest. "So, if we turn off the main road here and follow this for a few miles, it will take us straight to Highway 15. We can follow that north for a while."

"I thought the idea was to stay off the freeway for as long as possible?" I asked.

"Well, look," he pointed to the map, "We'll save a lot of miles taking this section of highway north. We can always leave it for a frontage road when the horses need a break, too."

"Okay. So, where should we stop tonight?"

The two of us mulled over the map until we picked our spot. We'd most likely be camping out beneath the stars again, just west of central Escondido. That second day was the hardest to get back on the horses after lunch. Two nights of little sleep had strained us all, even the horses were more nervous than usual.

As we walked through the broken streets of south Escondido, I made a point to not look at the b.u.t.toned up houses and to not turn and follow the shrill sound of the wind as it picked up speed and rushed by our heads carrying the screams of the dead. Just as I had felt wandering through downtown San Diego so many months before, I knew something or someone, was watching us carefully.

Connor wiggled his toes in the cool night air, rotating his ankles until they popped softly. It felt good to have his feet out of his boots for a bit. Riley had fallen asleep almost immediately after she put her head down. Same with Kris. But he couldn't sleep. Someone was following them, and he wasn't sure if he should tell the girls or not. So far, the only advantage to taking up the rear on most of their journey was being able to look behind him without Riley noticing.

The shadowy figure started tailing them the day before. It stood still behind the darkened windowpanes and blended into the shaded corners of buildings. Never did it show itself completely, but it was obvious it wanted Connor to know it was there...watching. Why? What did it want, this bearer of gloom that went everywhere they did?

As he stretched his feet out before him on the sleeping bag, he stared hard into the darkness of night until the fire died down to only a glow. When he was a kid, he was never afraid of the dark. One night, after his father drank too much and hit his mum, he ran off and hid in a drainage ditch that connected their property to the neighbors. He spent the night inside the rugged tunnel, being careful to keep his backside out of the trickling water. The smell of wet gra.s.s and dank mildew imprinted itself on his childhood memories and he could still remember it...all these years later. Even after that night in the ditch, he wasn't afraid of the dark.

But now...now there were things that lingered, waiting for him to close his eyes and take over his thoughts. He'd wake at night after feeling someone next to him, but it wouldn't be Riley's touch on his face or her hands pulling at the sheet...it would be that of a person long dead. A person with a bloodied and sloughed off face or hands that were rotted to the bone. His mind had become a myriad of nightmares that firmly attached onto his psyche even during the light of day. And there was not a d.a.m.n thing he could do about it.

He peered into the night around him, looking from one unlit structure to the next, playing a game with himself to see if he could name the items he spotted in the dark. A row of buildings here, the bed of a truck over there, A few spindly palm trees off in the distance. A sign that could be for the freeway or a gas station and...

What was that? He bolted upright, startling the horses that were tethered securely to a tree behind them. He was sure he saw movement. Yes, there it was - a figure walking down the road. Connor glanced at the fire, nothing but smolders left, and looked back to the road. This shadow was different. It had substance and...color. The person was wearing dark pants and a lighter shirt. The apparitions Connor had seen in the dead of night didn't have as much contrast to them. This figure was a real person. A living person walking down the streets of Escondido.