Rock the Baby - Episode 6

New episodes of Rock the Baby are posted each week. Read from the beginning here.

Around the Corner

I could hear my parent’s names. Someone was calling for them and hollering, “Heeellllllooooooo”? Slowly, the voice dragged me out of my slumber. I was still clutching a rock as I padded toward the back door. Then the voice turned cold and said, “Hold it right there.” I saw the barrel of a shotgun sticking in through the space where I had broken the window. I guess I should have covered that yesterday. Too late now. I froze and peered through the broken pane.

Note to self… do not bring a rock to a gun fight. The gun was pointing right at my head. At the opposite end I saw a shock of white hair and a milky eye that I recognized as belonging to my parent’s next door neighbor. I yelled, “Don’t shoot, Mr. Evans. It’s me, Ray. Do you know where my parents are?” Mr. Evans doesn’t always hear too good.

He withdrew the gun and I let him in the back door. He told me he didn’t know where my parents are. He was on his way to get the news when he saw the broken window. It’s nice to know that in my parent’s neighborhood neighbors still look out for each other. Had I taken a face full of buck shot I might not think it so nice.

I walked with him a few blocks. There was this group of people milling about on the corner. I recognized some of them and gave them the head nod of greeting. Old Mr. Evans was talking a mile a minute. I think he was really happy to have someone new to talk to. He explained that there were spots like this in pretty much every neighborhood now, spots where people gathered to share news. A few people would walk from one spot to another and back again. They would pass on any news they had and gather what they could to take back home.

I asked him how anyone knew where to go. I thought we would have to go to city hall or something to get official news. He laughed and laughed at that. The elected politicians, he said, were the first to abandon every neighborhood they had heard from so far. There were simply certain houses in every neighborhood where people naturally congregated. It didn’t take long to find them because everyone would be out on the front lawn. The network grew organically.

So far, we knew that the problems extended as far as anyone could walk in three days. This might really have been the end of the world. That’s pretty scary. But no one knows what caused this. Speculation runs the gamut from aliens to terrorists. Personally, I’m pulling for the aliens. It will make this notebook a lot more interesting. While we waited for news, I took out my yo-yo and wondered what aliens look like.

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Please come back next week for Episode 7, Flying Saucer.

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