Until the End of the World (Book 3): All the Stars in the Sky by Sarah Lyons Fleming Page A

weren’t kidding about not crying, then.”
    “Nope.” I lean against the sink and watch James and Mark trace routes on the atlas. James has found himself a map buddy, which allows Penny to rest rather than listen to him yammer on. Knowing where we’re going is interesting, the ratio of paved roads to dirt roads in any given map quadrant is not. “We’re going to get there, right?”
    He lifts the lid of the pot and sets it back down. “We are. Why, are you on the ledge?”
    “No, I just don’t want to miss out on a good sobfest,” I say. He watches me closely, until I start to squirm and ask, “What?”
    “You’re a nice person,” he says with a shrug.
    “Well, if that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black.” Peter has me beat any day of the week. I get emotional and cranky at the drop of a hat, while he rides along on an even keel 99 percent of the time. But I still feel my cheeks warm from the compliment.
    “I don’t know that your plan’s the healthiest, though. Especially for you.”
    “Crying’s like crack—one taste and I can’t stop,” I say. “I’m just saying no.”
    He laughs and dumps in the rice.
    Twenty minutes later, we’re at the side of the road by a tiny pond eating the extra delicious rice that Peter made. He added some dried fruit, which has plumped up and adds sweetness to the lightly salted rice.
    “Why do any of us ever bother cooking when Peter could do it?” Maureen asks me.
    “I have no idea.” I stick a bit of my rice in Hank’s and Bits’s bowls and then finish off what’s left. “I’m going to wash up.” I’ve added gasoline to my collection of odors and want to use the pond to rinse my gloves and leather jacket.
    Nelly hands me his coat and gestures at the pond. “If you would.”
    “I wouldn’t.”
    He joins me with a grumble. I squat by the edge of the water and squirt dish soap on my gloved hands, then foam them and my coat sleeves. Nelly does the same and lets out a giant sigh.
    “Really?” I ask. “All because I wouldn’t wash your coat?”
    “Not that. Adam doesn’t want me to help with the gas in Yorkton.”
    I heard them speaking in forceful whispers but ignored it because I like to maintain the illusion of privacy. I thought Kingdom Come was bad. Try living in an RV with seventeen people.
    “You don’t have to,” I say, and rinse my sleeves. “We have enough people.”
    “You have Bits and Hank. They’re kids . If anyone shouldn’t go, it’s you, Peter and Kyle.”
    “We could argue all day about who’s most important. I don’t like the idea of you going, anyway. I like to keep my eye on you.” I raise two dripping fingers to my eyes and then point at him.
    Nelly pushes me with his shoulder and brushes the water off his coat. “I just think families should be together.”
    “We’re all family. You and Adam are a family.”
    “Yeah, but we can’t repopulate the Earth if you all die.” I burst out laughing, and he rescues me from falling into the pond.
    “There’s no procreation going on in my neck of the woods, either. He’s worried. Just give him this one little thing. Next time I’ll stay with the kids and you can go.”
    I’m scared to go into Yorkton, and I’m scared not to. If I’m there maybe I can stop something terrible from happening. Zombies have given me OCD and made me a control freak. It’s another reason to despise them, not that there weren’t plenty already.
    “You sure you don’t mind?” Nelly looks across the field, jaw locked. He’s pissed, but I understand why Adam wants him nearby today.
    “Mind that wittle baby has to stay home ‘cause his Mommy won’t wet him go?”
    Nelly attempts his signature icy blue stare, but a laugh escapes the corner of his mouth. “You’re such a shithead.”

CHAPTER 16
    It’s the same old story at every gas station we come across, and it doesn’t bode well for Yorkton. We stop at every house that doesn’t look ransacked, but aside from one can of