Zommunist Invasion by Picott, Camille (ebook reader ink TXT) 📗

As she watched Dal drive away in her son’s old brown pick-up, her granddaughter Lena by his side, she stayed strong. Knowing her grandchildren were dispersing across the county while war boiled around them was was not easy to bear.

A weaker woman would have wept. Nonna didn’t waste tears on possibilities. She saved her grief for the times when it really counted. Tears were reserved for moments of finality.

Except for Stephenson—who had become her constant companion in the past week—the Cecchino cabin was now deserted. Stephenson stood beside her on the deck of the family cabin, staring at the empty dirt road after Dal, Lena, and Amanda had disappeared in the brown pick-up.

The idiot boy was in nothing but jeans and a T-shirt. He shivered in the foggy, crisp morning air, trying to balance on the ball of one bare foot. He went shoeless much of time while in the cabin. Nonna wasn’t sure if that was because Cassie had shot off his little toe, or if it was because he just liked being barefoot.

“What are we going to do today?” Stephenson asked. “Make pasta? Reorganize the supply room?”

Nonna looked him up and down. He reminded her so much of her brother, Luca.

It wasn’t his looks. Stephenson looked nothing like her stocky, muscular older brother with thick dark hair. All the village girls had swooned over Luca when he’d been alive. He could have had any of them.

Stephenson was long and skinny, more bones than muscle. His hair looked like he combed it with a cheese grater. The boy hid behind her apron strings. He spent his days living in stark terror of himself.

And that was precisely why he reminded her of Luca.

“Today, you’re going to learn how to shoot a gun,” she declared.

Stephenson flinched, eyes widening. “But—what about lunch? And dinner? Who’s going to get food ready for everyone?”

She poked him in the shoulder. Hard. “You need to learn how to defend yourself.”

“But . . .” Stephenson cast his gaze around the porch, as though he might find a suitable excuse under the eaves or on the picnic table. “But everyone else knows how to shoot. We don’t really need one more gunman, you know? But food—everyone needs to eat and—”

“Stephenson.”

“Yes, Nonna?”

“My grandson and Tate Craig went to Rossi.”

Stephenson’s brow furrowed with sympathy. “I’m sorry, Nonna.”

He didn’t understand.

“Have you thought about what’s in Rossi?” she asked.

“Um. Russians. Zombies. Probably mutants, too.”

“That’s right. The Russians have the Craigs. Have you thought about why the Russians took them prisoner?”

“They think they have a connection to the Snipers. To us.”

“That’s right. If Anton and Tate don’t watch where they step, they’re going to end up prisoners, too.” Nonna was careful not to let it show just how much this potential reality hurt her. Being weak wouldn’t do an ounce of good for anyone. “If the Russians have four of our people prisoner, it spells bad news for us, Stephenson.”

The boy was already pale. In the weak dawn light, he went two shades lighter.

“Do you think Soviets are going to come here?” he whispered.

“Are you ready to learn how to use a gun?” she replied.

“Uh, yeah.” Sick realization stole over his features. “Yeah, I think I’m ready to learn how to shoot.”

“Go inside and put some shoes on. I’ll get the guns. Oh, and Stephenson?”

“Yeah?” He paused in the doorway to look back at her.

She saw Luca shining out of his dark eyes. It made her throat tighten. “You can put on the clothes I left out for you.”

He froze. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You can put them on anyway.”

“Nonna, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The kid was a bad liar.

She’d seen him out in the living one night when he thought everyone else had been asleep. He hadn’t accounted for the fact that grandmas had weak bladders and had to get up in the middle of the night—multiple times, usually—to use the bathroom.

He hadn’t noticed when Nonna had shuffled out to use the facility. He’d been too busy staring at his reflection in the window.

Luca had been a poor liar, too.

28

Pink

Stephenson tried not to throw up all over his shoes as he put them on. His nerves felt fried just thinking about guns. Did Nonna really think he had what it took to wield one? What did he look like? Rambo?

The other guys had the gun thing covered. Any one of them could pass for Rambo in a pinch. Heck, with their machine guns and badass moves, they were like an entire band of Rambos. Leo, Anton, Dal, Tate, Spill, Griggs, and Bruce. Heck, even Jennifer and Lena made better Rambos than he did.

As he bent down to grab his second sneaker, he glimpsed the neat pile of clothing tucked under the bottom bunk—the pile he had surreptitiously shoved all the way to the back and hidden behind his shoes.

There were the Jordache jeans with the zippers at the back of the ankles. The black mesh top and the pink spaghetti-strap tank top. The matching pink Converse shoes.

The worst part was that it was all a perfect fit.

It had only been a week ago when he saw Nonna go into the boys’ bunk room with the clothes. From his position at the kitchen table, where he’d been hard at work picking stems out of a colander of dried lentils, he’d had a clear view of her with the neat stack of clothing in her hands.

It was the pink spaghetti straps that caught his attention. Pink had that effect on him. It was impossible not to see pink things. Scrunchies. Socks. Shoes. There had been a lot of pink all over his high school.

He’d assumed Nonna had been on her way into the girls’ room with the clothes. Her stop in the boys’ room was just a detour. But she came back out of the room without the clothes and looked straight at him.

“Your bunk is a mess,” she’d said as she strode