"...Am I making a mistake?" Jasmine asked under her breath. She was standing in front of two lumps of disheveled earth, each bearing a makeshift wooden cross. It had felt wrong to bury her parents in the yard, like as if they were family pets, but it was impossible to try to take them to a cemetery. No one manned them anymore, and with all of the deaths that had occurred over the past weeks it would likely be filled to the brim with everyone's loved ones anyway. Well, not probably, it was undeniably true considering how people had resorted to using abandoned houses to store all of the excess bodies that had been accumulating. So the back yard was the only thing the Dwyer siblings could settle for, as screwed up as it sounded. And now here Jasmine was, standing and mourning and praying in front of their graves, practically begging for an answer on what she should do.
A week had gone by since news of the outside world stopped coming in. She had been hoping that the government would send aid and fix their problems, maybe even come up with a cure for the Ashing. But with each passing day, it was becoming clearer and clearer that no one was coming, no matter how much she tried to deny it. Fall was here, and Winter was on its way. Scavenging was helpful but the neighborhood was already running dry. Everything seemed to be pointing to the fact that they needed to move on to a better location with safety and more supplies, and her brother Grant had been arguing as such with her. But she would just counter that with the fact that their home was probably the safest place they could hunker down in. Nobody seemed to be around anymore, so they didn't have to worry about other people, and it was an overall stable and secure place that they could always find safety and shelter in.
That was the biggest conflict on Jasmine's mind right now. Either option was risky, but which one was the right one? She needed to protect Grant, but both options exposed him to danger. Stay in place, and possibly die due to cold and lack of food once Winter hit, or try to find somewhere better, and possibly put him in harm's way as they moved out in the open. What killed her the most was that the dangers were "possibilities"; there may be danger but it was uncertain. It's what made it impossible to see one option over the other as objectively correct.
"I don't know what to do..." Jasmine's voice shook as he whispered down to the graves, desperation apparent in her pleas, "Please...Give me a sign."
She took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. She wasn't going to get an answer, not this way at least. This was just something she was going to have to figure out on her own, so she bade her parents a silent goodbye before heading back into the house. Once inside, she made her way to the kitchen, where she saw that Grant had already prepared breakfast for the two of them. He was currently sitting at the dining table, eating his food as he read through a book Jasmine had found during one of her looting trips.
"Fruit salad and a toaster pastry," Jasmine said, examining the plate of food in front of her as she sat down, "I feel like I'm back in fourth grade." She reached over to ruffle his hair a bit to show she was joking, causing him to recoil slightly as he patted his hair back down. He faced her as he started making motions with his hands, which instantly caught her attention. In all honesty, she could almost sense when he was trying to sign at her at this point, and she always paid attention when he did.
"I figured we should try to get rid of the fruit first," he signed, "We have a lot of perishables, we don't want them to go bad."
"Smart thinking," Jasmine smiled lightly at him, "Honestly, I'm surprised I still find fresh fruit out there at this point. A lot of it's gone rotten, but sometimes I get lucky. Canned food's probably better to find in the long run, though." She reached for the toaster pastry, but dropped it back onto the plate when she felt heat. It didn't burn her, but it was surprising to her.
"What the- it's hot? Did you toast it?" Jasmine asked in surprise.
"Kind of," Grant motioned, "I busted out Dad's old kerosene stove, I found it hidden away in the basement. It's a cheaply made model, but it works."
"Huh." Jasmine seemed impressed by that, she didn't know he knew how to operate one of those things. "Wait, was there smoke? It might attract attention if someone sees it."
"It's fine, I was careful," Grant reassured her after thinking his reply over for a moment, "No one's going to see anything." He paused, then started signing again. "Are you going out today?"
"Nice, just change the subject," Jasmine sighed, "Yeah, I'm going out. I might be gone longer than usual, I'm checking out downtown today."
"Really?" Grant's eyes widened a bit. She'd said before it could be dangerous since other people likely would've had the same idea as well, so this change of heart threw him off a bit.
"Yeah, I'm just not finding much around here anymore," Jasmine told him, "Everything to the north is basically all looted, east has the Hansson Valley but it's a long trek to get there so it's really only a last resort, and south has more neighborhoods but I saw some of the houses were being used to store bodies, so that's a no-go for me. That just leaves the rest of town to the west." Grant didn't respond, and just looked at her worriedly. "I know it's dangerous," she continued, "But you were right, we're running out of options that isn't us just getting out of here. I know there's good stuff out there though, maybe even enough to get us through Winter. Worst comes to worst, I can find a car for us if we do end up needing to get out of here." The family car had been stolen pretty early on when the Ashing Pandemic happened, so it had been impossible for them to try to travel out of Baptiste Valley.
Grant looked down off to the side, thinking over what she said. Jasmine had learned pretty quickly that he didn't like making eye contact when he was trying to come up with something to say, and just let him stew on it. Eventually, he looked back up and signed quickly.
"I want to come."
Jasmine blinked.
"What? No!" She told him forcefully, "You know I can't bring you!"
"I need to learn how to scavenge too," he signed quickly, "I need to be able to take care of myself!"
"Damn it Grant, you already can take care of yourself!" She exclaimed, but realized she was starting to raise her voice and tried to calm down. "Look, I'm heading into new territory here, ok? I need to know what it's like in town, if it's safe to even walk around there."
Grant looked down again, this time longer than before. When he finally looked back up, he sighed lightly through his nose and nodded his head in understanding. It made sense...but he really wanted to help anyway.
Breakfast went on silently after that, and soon after Jasmine left to her room to put on a jacket, as it had been pretty chilly out that morning. For good measure, she brought a scarf too, before putting on her backpack with her gear inside. She returned to the kitchen and saw Grant cleaning the dishes and then putting them away.
"Hey," she said to him, "If everything turns out ok...maybe I'll bring you next time, alright?" He didn't respond, causing her to frown. As she left out the back door, she added, "Stay safe while I'm gone."
Once outside, she made her way to the street and faced west, oblivious to the far away smoke that was rising in the sky to the south. She seriously hoped everything would be ok out in town. She began to make her way forward, wary of what she might eventually find.
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