A Spark of Hope

The small campfire crackled and burned, providing the only noise in the otherwise dead night. It lit up about half of the small, ransacked room the two were staying in. They both had their own cots laid around the fire, both with a fair amount of stitches on them. The floor was of bare, rotting wood, as were the walls and ceiling. Most of the furniture was gone, save for a ravaged couch in the middle of the room, behind the fire, and the charred remains of a table and a few chairs scattered around the room. The floor was mostly covered in dirt, broken glass, scraps of wood and metal, and ash.
Sydney, wearing the same clothes as earlier that day, was sitting up on her cot, her ungloved, open hands facing the fire to be warmed. Her M-4 and sidearm were laying on the floor just to her right, along with the extra clips of ammunition. To her left was a small, hardback book on the history of the Vietnam War, opened to a section on the 1968 Tet Offensive.
The boy was laying face up on his cot, staring blankly at the damaged ceiling. His hands were clasped together on his chest, ungloved as well. His goggles were removed and laying on the floor to his left, revealing his handsome, albeit useless, dark blue eyes. His raspy teen voice broke the near silence.
“So America joined World War Two because the Japanese attacked them at Pearl Harbor?”
Sydney reached into the bag next to her that her companion carried, and pulled out from one of the several pouches an unopened pack of generic fruit snacks. She easily tore the pack open, making little noise, and tossed an orange piece over to the boy. He felt the piece land on his chest, and promptly picked it up, felt the texture, and popped it into his mouth.
“That’s right,” she answered, chewing, “remember what day it was?”
“Uh,” he said slowly before pausing for a moment, “Some time in December…”
Sydney turned the page in her Vietnam book, and put another fruit snack in her mouth.
“December seventh,” she replied, tossing the last piece of candy to him.
“Sid,” he began, with a curious tone, “how do you know so much about history?”
Sydney looked at him for a moment, then continued reading.
“Well, my mom always told me how important it was to know about history. She said it can teach you a lot of things. That’s why we went through that library a couple of weeks ago. I wanted to find some old history books to read.”
“So you just read old books when we’re not on the move?”
“Pretty much. Not much else to do, really. Just, read and talk.”
There was a brief silence between the two as Sydney crumpled up the package of fruit snacks and tossed it aside, hearing it touch down on the floor lightly. Then the boy asked another question.
“Do you like talking to me?”
“Not really,” she said in a casual tone, “you’re pretty boring.”
The boy sat up, and looked in her general direction. She giggled quietly, while looking at his straight face.
“I’m kidding,” she said, her tone now full of amusement, “hell yeah I like talking to you, Evan. You keep me company.”
A small smile of relief appeared on Evan’s scruffy face as he laid back down silently. He put his hands behind his head, and relaxed, sighing calmly.
“You think there’re any other people out there like us?”
Sydney looked up from her book, and closed it. She glanced down at the burning fire with eyes of sorrow, then back at her only friend.
“What do you mean, ‘like us’?”
Evan shut his eyes and replied to her.
“I mean, people that don’t steal or kill other people for food?”
Sydney’s eyes were shining with tears ready to slide down her smudged, pale face.
“Yeah,” she simply said, after a moment of silence.
“You think we’ll ever meet anybody like that?”
She blinked once, and a lone tear fell from her left eye. She quickly wiped it from her cheek with her left hand, and answered.
“I hope so,” she said quietly, “but you can’t think too much about it. We’re doing just fine on our own, too, you know.”
“Yeah,” he said with a tone of innocence, “I know, but still…”
Sid unzipped a pocket on the bag, and reached inside. She pulled out a two inch long, wrapped Hershey’s bar, made of milk chocolate.
“Here, have this,” she said, tossing it to his chest.
He sat up again, and picked up the piece of chocolate. It only took him a second of feeling it to know what it was.
“Sid,” he began cautiously, “this is the last piece of chocolate…”
“I know,” she responded, wiping her right eye clean of tears, “I want you to have it before it melts or something.”
Evan looked in her direction, the heat of the fire an arm’s length away warming his face.
“I shouldn’t take this,” he suggested, “you need it more than I do.”
“No,” Sid said, pleading him, “take it. I want you to have it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” she answered, “I’ll do just fine without it.”
Evan slowly felt the smooth paper of the wrapper with his skinny, dirty fingers. He was still staring blankly in her direction.
“Thank you,” he murmured, carefully removing the paper wrapper.
“No problem,” Sid muttered back, with a tiny smirk, “I’m gonna go ahead and try to get some sleep tonight. Remember the rules?”
“Wake you up when I’m ready to get some sleep, wake you up if the fire starts to go out, and wake you up if I hear anything outside.”
“Good,” she whispered, still smirking.
“Good night,” he said, still holding the intact chocolate bar in his fingers.
“Good night, Evan.”
She laid down on her back, and rolled over to her right side, covering up with a thick, blue blanket. Shutting her eyes gently, she tried to imagine a better world for her to dream about. It didn’t take longer than a single minute for her to fall asleep, as she hadn’t slept in four days straight, always keeping watch at night. Her soft breathing accompanied the crackling fire in the silent shack.

The adult woman next to twelve year old Sydney Lake had a rushed look on her pale Caucasian face. Her once soft brown hair was now a long, unkempt mess. A very small trickle of red blood was leaking from her right nostril. Her clothing consisted of a worn blue coat over another couple of layers of shirts, and a pair of damaged blue jeans, along with typical black tennis shoes. She was in the driver’s seat of the rusted, beaten truck, while Sid was in the seat next to her, her eyes full of fear. The young Sid was wearing a surprisingly undamaged red coat over her clothes and baggy brown pants, along with mud covered green rubber boots.
The truck sped desperately along the worn, straight concrete road, with two similarly damaged trucks only a few seconds behind it. The environment was very much the same as everywhere else Sid had seen, being brown, quiet, and dead. Sid glanced over at the instruments in front of her mother. She noticed the one that was supposed to keep track of the fuel was dangerously close to E, and one that showed speed had its red arrow pointing at 110.
“Sid,” her mother said in a loud, frantic voice, “we’re not gonna make it much further!”
Sid looked at her mother’s face, which for the first time she had ever seen, was full of fear. She tried to stay calm herself, and asked the first thing that popped into her mind in her quivering twelve year old voice.
“What’re we gonna do?”
Her mother looked in the cracked rearview mirror, seeing their pursuers gaining on them. She looked at her daughter’s visibly frightened face, then forward at the road again.
“Open the glove compartment.”

Sid suddenly woke up and violently jerked her head up, breathing heavily. She sat up more slowly after realizing she was only dreaming. Her eyes were as wide as baseballs, and were filled with sorrow, but also apparent aggression. She ran her right hand through her messy hair, her breathing slowing down.
“You okay?”
She looked to her left to see Evan, sitting up in his cot with his left elbow on the floor. His face seemed very alert. She knew he could’ve heard her heavy breathing a mile away.
“Yeah,” she answered, “just a bad dream.”
“Wanna talk about it?”
“No, it’s alright, it was just a memory.”
“You sure you’re alright?”
“Yeah, it’s good. How long was I asleep?”
Evan looked up for a moment, to stretch his neck.
“Not too long. It felt like maybe half an hour.”
“Tell you what,” she said, getting up out of her cot, “why don’t you just catch some sleep tonight? I can keep watch again.”
“Sid, come on,” he responded, “you’ve kept watch for four days straight. Let me do it.”
“No, it’s fine, I can handle it,” she answered sleepily, rubbing her eyes with one hand.
“You need to sleep, Sid.”
She stood up, and quietly picked up the M-4 from the floor, then proceeded over to a shattered window to her right. She leaned the rifle against the wall to her left, and watched out the window, silent. Evan sighed with frustration, and reluctantly laid down in his cot to go to sleep.
Hearing him lay down, Sid turned around, and saw him trying to go to sleep. She bit her lower lip, then looked over at her own cot to see if she should bring anything else over to the window. Something strange caught her eye, however. It was a small brown object next to her cot, laying on top of the shut Vietnam book.
She approached her cot, and knelt down to see what the object was. Picking it up off of the Vietnam book, she realized it was the same chocolate bar she had given to Evan a short while ago. The wrapper was peeled down, revealing a small part of the top of the bar. She could clearly see it had been broken in half. She looked over at him, to see that he was already asleep. Looking back at the chocolate in her hand, she gave it a tiny smile, and took a small bite out of it.