Half Lives by Sara Grant Page A

two. Why are you going to Vegas? Why not sit by the pool? If it is the end, I’d rather have a beer in one
hand and a lady in the other.’
    I didn’t like the way he was sizing us up as if he were Dracula and we were O-negative. We didn’t look like the type of girls men wanted at the end of days – Marissa with her
bald head and piercings and me with my dreadlocks. I’d rather die a virgin than be this guy’s apocalyptic sweetheart. Marissa and I pushed ourselves as far back into the seat, and as
far away from Lobo, as we could.
    ‘You’re safe,’ Lobo said with a chuckle. ‘I don’t believe it’s the end of the world.’ He winked at us in the rear-view mirror and I noticed he was
missing one of his front teeth – one that would be pointy if he were a vampire.
    We drove in silence. Marissa and I tried to sleep. The temperature rose with the sun. The white-hot sunlight felt like a laser on my skin. It wasn’t only the rays bouncing off the barren
landscape, it was also the anxiety that was triangulating among the three of us.
    Lobo kept switching the radio on and off. ‘Just checking,’ he’d always say. Static would blare through the speakers and mimic my nerves.
    We stopped at a gas station with huge queues at every pump. The guys working the pumps didn’t look official, but they demanded, and we paid, five hundred dollars to fill our tank. Inside
the shop there was a guy with a gun who was threatening anyone who tried to steal anything. Marissa and I took turns guarding our stuff and going to the bathroom. People were acting crazy. Maybe
hiding away from all this was the best option.
    ‘Did you hear what they’re saying?’ Marissa asked when we were back on the road. Her skin was pale, as if she’d applied a lighter shade of foundation. ‘A few people
said that terrorists have released a virus. That can’t be happening, right? I mean, that’s nuts.’ She dug around in her handbag and pulled out a mini-pump bottle of hand gel. She
squirted some in her own hands. I held up my hand and she squirted a huge glob in my palm. We both rubbed our hands together like comic henchmen. Did we really think some lethal virus was going to
be stopped with hand gel? I guessed it couldn’t hurt.
    Should I tell her what I knew? I spotted Lobo checking us out in the rear-view mirror again, probably listening to every word we said. I might not mind being stuck with Marissa underground, but
I wasn’t about to be buried alive with Lobo.
    I gave my new friend the gift of ignorance. ‘It’s all rumours. Everything will be fine tomorrow. Could be some computer virus. That could shut everything down, couldn’t
it?’
    She accepted my feeble explanation and distributed cheese and crackers, chips and cans of Coke we’d purchased for a mere two hundred dollars.
    When we finally passed the road sign that said we were only thirty miles from Las Vegas, I began to think I might make it after all. The billboards changed from food and fuel to boobs and
gambling. The closer we got to Vegas, the more I got the distinct impression that we were headed in the wrong direction. Everyone appeared to be going the other way. Marissa was pretending to
sleep. I could tell she
wasn’t
sleeping because earlier her snore had sounded like a hog riding a Harley.
    I slipped the map Mum had given me from my messenger bag and uncrumpled it as quietly as I could. I turned the map to orient myself. I realized that my mountain wasn’t far from here. I
noted the name written near the dot closest to the mountain. I tucked the map back in my bag and watched the road signs for my dot.
    As soon as I spotted the exit with the name from the map, I yelled, ‘Stop the car!’ Lobo ignored me in his highway-induced coma. ‘Stop the damn car!’ I yelled louder.
‘Stop the car. Stop the car. Stop the car.’ I kicked the back of his seat until he pulled over.
    Marissa and Lobo stared at me as if I had morphed into an alien. ‘I’m