Taoree: Taoree Trilogy #1 Read online

  When I shifted my angle a little, I saw an entire row of those huts along the fence line. Movement caught my eye and I looked forward again. I held my breath as a vehicle that looked like a miniature version of a spaceship and a human car combined passed along the line of huts. I couldn’t see the aliens inside.

  I was about to step back and make my way home, but something was telling me to wait, so I did. I waited for another couple minutes as I examined the huts and the strange lights coming out of them.

  I nearly jumped out of my skin when an eyeball popped up on the other side of the fence, right against mine. It had startled me, but I wasn’t scared of the alien, even though I knew he was looking right at me. His dark eye examined me and I suddenly felt like it was judging me, seeing into my soul, but I still wasn’t uncomfortable. No, I wasn’t uncomfortable at all. In fact, I felt great standing there across from him. I could only see his one eye, but for some reason, I knew it was a male on the other side. When he finally blinked, I realized the aliens had two sets of eyelids, one horizontal and one vertical, and they took turns blinking, one then the other.

  But still I didn’t step back. Something was telling me to stay there. Something was calling to me again. I felt safe there, though I had no idea why that would be. Surely I could get into trouble—probably with the government—if I got caught out there, spying on the Taoree, but I didn’t care about any of that. I was stuck in this foreign creature’s gaze and I didn’t feel the need to move. I felt safety and comfort coming from him… and it was a feeling I didn’t want to lose.

  I had no sense of time in that moment. We could have been staring at each other for seconds or days, for all I knew. I wished there wasn’t a fence between us. I wanted to move even closer to him.

  Suddenly, the creature spoke, breaking the moment, breaking the spell. His voice was low, soft, and drawn out, like he didn’t know if he was saying the right word, “Jeremy.”

  My head snapped back in shock and I took a small step away from the alien.

  “Jeremy,” he drawled out again.

  I took another step back.

  “Do not go,” he said slowly.

  I stepped back another couple of feet.

  This time his voice was loud, like he was yelling or panicked, “Jeremy.”

  I jumped at the sudden change in his tone and I tripped over the root of a tree, falling on my ass, but still able to see the eye in the fence.

  “Jeremy, no.”

  I started shaking in fear. How did this thing know my name? Why hadn’t I moved away sooner? Did it do something to me to make me stay there? Did it mess with my mind?

  I got back to my feet without looking away from the threat and started backing away, holding my hand out behind me, searching for a tree without looking where I was going. When I finally bumped into one, I stopped and gave the creature on the other side of the fence one last look.

  “Please, don’t go,” it said to me.

  I turned and ran as fast as I could.

  The alien cried out, screaming, “Jeremy!” It was a horrible sound laced with pain and fear. “Jeremy!”

  I bolted up in a panic, breathing hard as if I had just run all the way home, instead of it happening two years ago. I hadn’t had one of those nightmares since I moved away from home. I used to relive that night almost every night, but I hadn’t in months.

  “Are you okay?” Colt asked sleepily from next to me. I had knocked him off of my chest when I sat up.

  “I’m fine. Just a dream,” I told him, which was partially true. It was a dream… it just happened to be a memory, too. “Sorry I woke you,” I added.

  “’S fine,” he said groggily. He reached up and started pulling me back down. “Come back to sleep.”

  I lay back down and shifted a little so he could put his head back on my shoulder. Then I kissed his forehead and tried to close my eyes. He was soon snoring softly, but I lay awake in a mixture of strange emotions.

  Every time I had that dream, I felt strange and uncomfortable for a long time afterward. That night brought back such a myriad of emotions. I was so excited and anxious when I first saw that fence, and even after the alien pinned me in his gaze. I had felt… content? Comfortable? Maybe even hopeful at first.

  But then, when he said my name the first time, I was hit with ice-cold fear. Running away from him had been terrifying. He had scared me, but there was also an underlying fear that I was running away from something I shouldn’t. I couldn’t explain it… and I didn’t want to.

  I tried to shake the feelings off. I ran my hand through Colt’s curls and kissed his temple, then settled into him. It took a while, but I finally drifted back to sleep.

  ***

  I woke up with my legs asleep and tingling uncomfortably and there was a definite chill in the air, but Colt was still lying on my chest. Totally worth it. When I felt him move a little, I squeezed him and he lifted his head up to look into my eyes. He slowly leaned forward and placed a chaste kiss on my lips, making me smile.

  “Ugh, your breath is awful,” he whispered against me without moving away.

  I laughed. “So is yours,” I told him as I kissed him and tried to shove my tongue into his mouth.

  He pulled back a little. “You can’t kiss me, then.”

  I grabbed the back of his head and pulled him back down to me. “I don’t care. I want to kiss you, so I’m going to.”

  He still looked unsure, but I just leaned up and pressed my mouth onto his and held it there until he started to relax a little. As soon as I had the opportunity, I forced him to open his mouth and let in my tongue. I kissed him hard, bad breath and all.

  Colt and I both jumped at the sound of wailing close by. He was half on my chest and my legs were still tingling a little. The wailing continued, so we wordlessly sat up to look out the window. I scanned our surroundings as both Cal and Nolan popped up to do the same. We were mostly surrounded by fields with a few sparse trees here and there, but I couldn’t find the person who was yelling.

  “There,” Cal said as he pointed to the trees we were parked next to.

  I had been looking farther out, so I must’ve missed the woman who was wailing, crying, and screaming in agony. The woman was clutching a little girl who couldn’t be more than ten. The little girl looked like she was chanting, even though we couldn’t hear her through the windows. There was a man tugging on the woman, trying to pull her away from the little girl. It was obvious that the little girl was the woman’s daughter.

  The man’s yelling voice made its way to us, “She’s been like this for hours, Patricia. We can’t keep carrying her.”

  “No!” the woman screamed at the top of her lungs, “I won’t leave my baby.”

  As the pair continued to argue, I turned to my friends, unsure of what to do or even what to say about it.

  Cal spoke first, “Throw me the keys, Colt. I’m getting us out of here.” He started throwing bags from up front to the back seat and climbed into the driver’s seat without getting out of the car. I was all for that plan.

  Colt threw the keys to his brother once Cal was in the seat and Cal started the car and pulled onto the road, away from the screaming and arguing couple with their poor little girl. None of us said anything for a long time, but I leaned back against the side of the trunk and pulled Colt’s back to my front. He came willingly.

  I wrapped my arms around him again and rested my cheek on the side of his head. He leaned into me as I closed my eyes and just breathed him in.

  We drove for about fifteen minutes in silence before Cal announced, “The GPS isn’t working.”

  “What do ya mean?” I asked from my spot in the back. I couldn’t see the GPS from back there.

  “There’s no signal or something, so it’s not giving me directions and the map keeps flickering in and out,” he answered.

  “Everyone check your phones,” Colt said before we all dug in our pockets.

  My phone still had no signal and was almost dead. I
looked at Colt’s and saw the same thing. “Nothing back here,” I said.

  “Neither of our phones have a signal, either,” Nolan said as he inspected both his and Cal’s phones.

  “Shit,” Cal murmured.

  “Okay,” Colt said, “we need to find a gas station, fill up, and buy a map.”

  “Okay,” Cal called back, “Any idea where we are?”

  Colt grimaced. “No, not really.”

  After a long, tense moment, Cal decided, “I guess I’ll just keep going straight on this road until we recognize where we are or we see a main road or something. The signs say we’re heading south, so at least we’re going in the right direction. Everyone keep an eye out.”

  That seemed like as good a plan as any.

  After another few minutes of passing fields and houses that didn’t look familiar I said, “Nolan, why don’t you get some food out so we can all eat? I’m starving.”

  “Okay.” Nolan huffed out a breath as he scooted forward to grab my duffle bag from the front passenger’s seat. He opened it and passed out some granola bars and water bottles.

  “Cal, can you pass me my hat? It’s on the dash,” Colt said.

  “Sure,” Cal said dismissively as he threw the hat back to Nolan, who gave it to Colt.

  “We should get as much food as we can, too,” Colt suggested as he put his hat on.

  “Yeah, probably,” I agreed as I gulped down some water. “Nol, pass back the bags so we can organize everything and take stock. I don’t think we should stop unless we have to, so we’ll just have to eat this shit for today.”

  Nolan wordlessly started passing back the bags which Colt and I placed around us and on our laps. We packed all the food and drinks in my duffle, and admittedly, it wasn’t much. We put other supplies, like toothpaste and deodorant, in Colt’s backpack, then condensed all our clothing into two other bags and passed all our sweatshirts out to everyone. We didn’t need them in the car, but we would once we stopped and got out at the gas station.

  After a half hour of driving with no direction and passing only three other cars, we finally saw a shopping strip with a gas station in the distance. Cal pulled into the surprisingly busy parking lot. As we looked around, it seemed that everyone had the same idea as us. There was a line of about ten cars waiting for gas and it looked like people were raiding all the stores in the strip.

  When Cal got in line, Nolan said, “I’ll run inside now before they run outta maps.” Then he opened the door before anyone could protest.

  “Maybe one of us should go with him,” Cal said quietly.

  “I’ll go,” Colt volunteered before climbing over the backseat and following after him.

  I climbed my way to the front passenger’s seat while we sat in the line. There was no point in sitting in the back now that Colt wasn’t there with me. Cal was being eerily quiet, which was a clear sign that he was stressed out. I reached across the console and patted his shoulder, and he looked at me with a small smile.

  “So, you really like my brother, huh?” his voice was almost teasing, but I thought I heard something else there, too.

  “Yeah, I do,” I said simply.

  He chuckled a little. “You’ve had a crush on him forever.”

  I glanced at him. “You’ve known about my crush? For how long?”

  He laughed out loud now. “I dunno, years, I guess.”

  I punched his shoulder. “Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

  “Why didn’t you?” he asked back.

  “Touché.” We both chuckled.

  We had only moved up about three cars when Nolan and Colt jumped into the back seat.

  “We literally got the last map,” Colt said. “I had to elbow some punk that was trying to steal it from me.”

  “You mean that old man?” Nolan asked him.

  Colt mumbled, “Maybe.”

  I snorted. “Are you serious?” I asked him.

  “Yeah. It’s pandemonium in there. I’ve never seen anything like it.” His eyes were wide.

  “People aren’t even paying for anything. They’re just walking in and grabbing whatever they want,” Nolan added as he dropped a bunch of snacks on the seat between him and Colt.

  “That’s fucked-up,” I commented, watching Colt add drinks to their loot.

  I continued watching him as he got up on his knees, facing the trunk, and bent over reaching for the food duffle. I kept my eyes on his ass the entire time he added all the new food and drinks to the bag, much to the amusement of Cal and Nolan who chuckled at me. All I could do was shrug without looking away from the sexiest ass I’d ever seen.

  When Colt finally looked over his shoulder and caught me ogling him, he smiled and winked at me, making me wish my friends weren’t in the car with us. Oh, what I wouldn’t do for some privacy.

  When he finished and turned back around to sit, I said, “Come here.”

  He slid forward on his seat with a smile. I reached behind his head and pulled him to me to plant a kiss on his soft, plump lips. I didn’t kiss him for as long as I would’ve liked because of the awkward angle and the chorus of moaning and laughing coming from my friends. As Colt slid back into his seat, I could see the reluctance in his eyes, so I winked back at him before turning around to the front.

  I was surprised to see that we only had two cars in front of us in the line.

  Colt cleared his throat. “After we get gas, I’m driving.”

  “Whatever, bro,” Cal responded dismissively. I looked him over and took in the way he was squeezing the steering wheel so tightly, his knuckles were white.

  “You doing okay, Cal?” I asked him.

  “Fine,” he ground out angrily. After a second he amended, “I just have a bad feeling about all of this.”

  I reached across the console and tugged on his ear. “We’ll figure it out.”

  He swatted my hand away. “Don’t you fucking start that shit again.”

  I laughed loudly. I’d discovered that he hated having his ears touched when we were kids and I’d always used it against him. You’d be surprised what you could get him to do as long as you promised to stop pulling on his ears. I hadn’t done it in months, though, maybe even a year.

  Just for fun I reached across for one more tug, then jumped away, pushing myself up against my window, as far from him as I could go.

  He punched me really hard in the shoulder and shouted, “Dick!”

  I watched in amusement as Colt reached both his hands around the driver’s seat headrest and tugged on both of Cal’s ears at the same time, making me, Colt, and Nolan burst out laughing.

  “Fucking assholes. I will get you back, dickheads. I’ll kick all your asses when we get out,” Cal threatened.

  We just laughed at him until we finally made it up to a pump. Cal got out and pumped the gas while we sat inside, periodically chuckling at him. He flipped us off from the window.

  When he finished, Colt jumped out and with a passing punch from Cal, they switched seats so Colt was next to me again. He threw the map on my lap before he pulled out of the gas station and back onto the road. It took a few minutes, but I eventually found where we were and mapped out our path home. After we drove for about ten minutes, we were stuck in traffic again, just like last night.

  Our drive, on a good day, took about eight and a half hours from school to home. At this rate, it was going to take for-fucking-ever to get there. I looked over at Colt. At least I have somethin’ nice to look at.

  Chapter Five

  We drove for several hours, not making it very far, before I was hungry again. Cal passed me the food bag, so I passed out some chips and peanut butter crackers to everyone.

  “Ugh, I can’t wait to get home. I need real food,” Cal said. “Mom’s gonna have to cook us all a huge meal when we get there. I’m gonna get sick from eating all this shit.”

  “You are—” I cut myself off when something in the air changed. I couldn’t explain why it felt different, exactly, but it was almo
st like an electrical charge filled the air.

  “What is that?” Nolan asked from behind me. I guess I wasn’t the only one that noticed the weirdness.

  No one answered him since none of us knew what the hell was going on. After a tense minute, there seemed to be a murmur in the air. Like everyone in the cars around us were talking, getting louder and louder. Then we heard screaming.

  Not the same screaming of the crazies—like it was painful—but the screaming of people in terror. It was coming from somewhere in front of us, but we couldn’t see anything.

  “Run!” someone shouted up ahead.

  Then all of a sudden, there was a crowd of people running toward us in the street, screaming and crying while swerving around the cars. I kept looking up ahead, waiting to see what all those people could possibly be running from.

  I was confused at first by what I saw. It looked like people were simply running from other people. I didn’t understand the threat until a man was thrown onto our hood, followed by a teenaged girl who jumped from the ground onto the hood, landing on her feet. She had a knife in her hand and before I could blink, she stabbed the man right in the chest… over and over and over.

  “Oh my god,” I said shakily as blood squirted and splashed all over the windshield.

  The girl then squinted at us with white eyes, used her elbow to wipe away some of the blood from the windshield and stared at us for a few seconds. She suddenly started banging on the glass, like she was trying to break it.

  “Oh god, oh god,” Nolan kept saying.

  “What do we do?” Cal yelled. “What the fuck do we do?”

  Just then another crowd of people ran by, yelling, “Run! Get out and run!” They distracted us from the insane girl on top of our car hood.

  The girl jumped down on top of a passerby, making them crumple to the ground right outside my door. She started stabbing them in the head, spreading more gore around. When another unsuspecting victim ran past her, she ran off, chasing them.