Annie’s fingers opened and closed, but Lilah kept her pressed against her. She didn’t want to see her sister open her eyes and not find Annie in there.

  I promise to never ever leave you.

  The rain washed over her face and stole her tears.

  It would be so easy to do nothing. To let Annie wake up. To let Annie have what she needed. To be there for her sister. And, afterward, if there was enough left of her, maybe Lilah would rise, too, and they would go off together. Two sisters. They were already strange, and they were already killers. Why shouldn’t they be monsters together?

  God, it was better than the unbearable thought of being alone. Without Annie. Without George or anyone. Alone.

  Annie began to struggle now. She was awake. Her fingers clawed at Lilah, grabbing at cloth, at hair. Her mouth opened, but Lilah held her with crushing force, not allowing her to bite.

  Not unless that was the right thing to do.

  “Please,” she said, begging the night and the storm. “Please.”

  I promise to never ever leave you.

  “I love you, Annie,” she said in her raspy, ghostly voice. “I will always, always love you.”

  Annie thrashed in her arms. All Lilah had to do was ease the pressure just a little. Just an inch. Make the decision and join her sister. It was the only choice that made sense. Every other choice was completely insane. She could not live without Annie. She didn’t want to.

  I promise to never ever leave you.

  Lilah held her sister with one arm, holding on with all of the love she had left in the cold furnace of her soul.

  And with the other hand she reached for the rock.

  It rained the day the world ended.

  When I was fourteen, my best friend, Joe Larson, developed leukemia. I remember a conversation we had where we talked about the future. For me, the future was wide open and packed with unlimited potential. For my friend, Joe, the future stretched maybe as far as Christmas. He talked a lot about how great that Christmas was going to be. The differences in how we viewed life and its potential was so vastly different that it forever changed the way I looked at the world. Joe passed that year four days before Thanksgiving.

  Jack and Jill

  -1-

  Jack Porter was twelve going on never grow up.

  He was one of the walking dead.

  He knew it. Everyone knew it.

  Remission was not a reprieve; it just put you in a longer line at the airport. Jack had seen what happened to his cousin, Toby. Three remissions in three years. Hope pushed Toby into a corner and beat the crap out of him each time. Toby was a ghost in third grade, a skeleton in fourth grade, a withered thing in a bed by the end of fifth grade, and bones in a box before sixth grade even started. All that hope had accomplished was to make everyone more afraid.

  Now it was Jack’s turn.

  Chemo, radiation. Bone marrow transplants. Even surgery.

  Like they say in the movies, life sucks and then you die.

  So, yeah, life sucked.

  What there was of it.

  What there was left.

  Jack sat cross-legged on the edge of his bed watching the weatherman on TV talk about the big storm that was about to hit. He kept going on and on about the dangers of floods and there was a continuous scroll across the bottom of the screen that listed the evacuation shelters.

  Jack ate dry Honey-Nut Cheerios out of a bowl and thought about floods. The east bend of the river was one hundred yards from the house. Uncle Roger liked to say that they were a football field away, back door to muddy banks. Twice the river had flooded enough for there to be some small wavelets licking at the bottom step of the porch. But there hadn’t ever been a storm as bad as what they were predicting, at least not in Jack’s lifetime. The last storm big enough to flood the whole farm had been in 1931. Jack knew that because they showed flood maps on TV. The weather guy was really into it. He seemed jazzed by the idea that a lot of Stebbins County could be flooded out.

  Jack was kind of jazzed about it, too.

  It beat the crap out of rotting away. Remission or not, Jack was certain that he could feel himself die, cell by cell. He dreamed about that, thought about it. Wrote in his journal about it. Did everything but talk about it.

  Not even to Jill. Jack and Jill had sworn an oath years ago to tell each other everything, no secrets. Not one. But that was before Jack got sick. That was back when they were two peas in a pod. Alike in everything, except that Jack was a boy and Jill was a girl. Back then, back when they’d made that pact, they were just kids. You could barely tell one from the other except in the bath.

  Years ago. A lifetime ago, as Jack saw it.

  The sickness changed everything. There were some secrets the dying were allowed to keep to themselves.

  Jack watched the Doppler radar of the coming storm and smiled. He had an ear bud nestled into one ear and was also listening to Magic Marti on the radio. She was hyped about the storm, too, sounding as excited as Jack felt.

  “Despite heavy winds, the storm front is slowing down and looks like it’s going to park right on the Maryland/Pennsylvania Border, with Stebbins County taking the brunt of it. They’re calling for torrential rains and strong winds, along with severe flooding. And here’s a twist … even though this is a November storm, warm air masses from the south are bringing significant lightning, and so far there have been several serious strikes. Air traffic is being diverted around the storm.”

  Jack nodded along with her words, as if it was music playing in his ear.

  Big storm. Big flood?

  He hoped so.

  The levees along the river were half-assed, or at least that’s how Dad always described them.

  “Wouldn’t take much more than a good piss to flood ’em out,” Dad was fond of saying, and he said it every time they got a bad storm. The levees never flooded out, and Jack wondered if was the sort of thing people said to prevent something bad from happening. Like telling an actor to break a leg.

  On the TV they showed the levees, and a guy described as a civil engineer puffed out his chest and said that Pennsylvania levees were much better than the kind that had failed in Louisiana. Stronger, better maintained.

  Jack wondered what Dad would say about that. Dad wasn’t much for the kind of experts news shows trotted out. “Bunch of pansy-ass know-nothings.”

  The news people seemed to agree, because after the segment with the engineer, the anchor with the plastic hair pretty much tore down everything the man had to say.

  “Although the levees in Stebbins County are considered above average for the region, the latest computer models say that this storm is only going to get stronger.”

  Jack wasn’t sure if that was a logical statement, but he liked its potential. The storm was getting bigger, and that was exciting.

  But again, he wondered what it would be like to have all that water—that great, heaving mass of coldness—come crashing in through all the windows and doors. Jack’s bedroom was on the ground floor, a concession to how easily he got tired climbing steps. The house was a hundred and fifteen years old. It creaked in a light wind. No way it could stand up to a million gallons of water, Jack was positive of that.

  If it happened, he wondered what he would do.

  Stay here in his room and let the house fall down around him.

  No, that sounded like it would hurt. Jack could deal with pain—he had to—but he didn’t like it.

  Maybe he could go into the living room and wait for it. On the couch, or on the floor in front of the TV. If the TV and the power was still on. Just sit there and wait for the black tide to come calling.

  How quick would it be?

  Would it hurt to drown?

  Would he be scared?

  Sure, but rotting was worse.

  He munched a palm-full of Cheerios and prayed that the river would come for him.

  -2-

  “Mom said I can’t stay home today,” grumped Jill as she came into Jack’s room. She dropped her book bag on the floor and kicked it.

  “Why not?”

  “She said the weatherman’s never right. She said the storm’ll pass us.”

  “Magic Marti says it’s going to kick our butts,” said Jack.

  As if to counterpoint his comment there was a low rumble of thunder way off to the west.

  Jill sighed and sat next to him on the edge of the bed. She no longer looked like his twin. She had a round face and was starting to grow boobs. Her hair was as black as crow’s wings and even though Mom didn’t let her wear make-up—not until she was in junior high, and even then, it was going to be an argument—Jill had pink cheeks, pink lips and every boy in sixth grade was in love with her. Jill didn’t seem to care much about that. She didn’t try to dress like the middle school girls, or like Maddy Simpson, who was the same age but who had pretty big boobs and dressed like she was in an MTV rap video. Uncle Roger had a ten-dollar bet going that Maddy was going to be pregnant before she ever got within shooting distance of a diploma. Jack and Jill both agreed. Everyone did.

  Jill dressed like a farm girl. Jeans and a sweatshirt, often the same kind of sweatshirt Jack wore. Today she had on an olive drab U.S. Army shirt. Jack wore his with pajama bottoms. Aunt Linda had been in the Army, but she died in Afghanistan three years ago.

  They sat together, staring blankly at the TV screen for a while. Jack cut her a sly sideways look and saw that her face was slack, eyes empty. He understood why, and it made him sad.

  Jill wasn’t dealing well with the cancer. He was afraid of what would happen to Jill after he died. And Jack had no illusions about whether the current remission was going to be the one that took. When he looked into his own future, either in dreams, prayers, or when lost in thought, there was an end to the road. It went on a bit further and there was a big wall of black nothingness.

  It sucked, sure, but he’d lived with it so long that he had found a kind of peace with it. Why go kicking and screaming into the dark if none of that would change anything?

  Jill, on the other hand, was different. She had to live, she had to keep going. Jack watched TV a lot, he saw the episodes of Dr. Phil and other shows where they talked about death and dying. He knew that some people believed that the dying had an obligation to their loved ones who would survive them.

  Jack didn’t want Jill to suffer after he died, but he didn’t know what he could do about it. He told her once about his dreams of the big black nothing.

  “It’s like a wave that comes and just sweeps me away,” he’d told her.

  “That sounds awful,” she replied, tears springing into her eyes, but Jack assured her that it wasn’t.

  “No,” he said, “’cause once the nothing takes you, there’s no more pain.”

  “But there’s no more you!”

  He grinned. “How do you know? No one knows what’s on the other side of that wall.” He shrugged. “Maybe it’ll be something cool. Something nice.”

  “How could it be nice?” Jill had demanded.

  This was right after the cancer had come back the last time, before the current remission. Jack was so frail that he barely made a dent in his own hospital bed. He touched the wires and tubes that ran from his pencil-thin arm to the machines behind him. “It’s got to be nicer than this.”

  Nicer than this.

  That was the last time they’d had a real conversation about the sickness, or about death. That was nine months ago. Jack stopped talking to her about those things and instead did what he could to ease her down so that when the nothing took him, she’d still be able to stand.

  He nudged her and held out the bowl of cereal. Without even looking at it she took a handful and began eating them, one at a time, smashing them angrily between her teeth.

  Eventually she said, “It’s not fair.”

  “I know.” Just as he knew that they were having two separate conversations at the same time. It was often that way with them.

  They crunched and glared at the TV.

  “If it gets bad,” Jack said, “they’ll let everyone go.”

  But she shook her head. “I want to stay home. I want to hang out here and watch it on TV.”

  “You’ll be in it,” he said.

  “Not the same thing. It’s better on TV.”

  Jack ate some Cheerios and nodded. Everything was more fun on TV. Real life didn’t have commentary and it didn’t have playback. Watching a storm beat standing in one while you waited for the school bus to splash water on you. It beat the smells of sixty soaking wet kids on a crowded bus, and bumper-to-bumper traffic waiting for your driveway.

  As if in response to that thought there was a muffled honk from outside.

  “Bus,” said Jack.

  “Crap,” said Jill. She stood up. “Text me. Let me know what’s happening.”

  “Sure.”

  Jill began flouncing out of the room, but then she stopped in the doorway and looked back at him. She looked from him to the TV screen and back again. She wore a funny, half-smile.

  “What—?” he asked.

  Jill studied him without answering long enough for the bus driver to get pissed and really lay on the horn.

  “I mean it,” she said. “Text me.”

  “I already said I would.”

  Jill chewed her lip, then turned and headed out of the house and up the winding drive to the road where the big yellow bus waited.

  Jack wondered what that was all about.

  -3-

  Mom came into his room in the middle of the morning carrying a tray with two hot corn muffins smeared with butter and honey and a big glass of water.

  “You hungry?” she asked, setting the tray down on the bed between them.

  “Sure,” said Jack, though he wasn’t. His appetite was better than it had been all summer, and even though he was done with chemo for a while, he only liked to nibble. The Cheerios were perfect, and it was their crunch more than anything that he liked.

  But he took a plate with one of the muffins, sniffed, pasted a smile on his mouth, and took a small bite. Jack knew from experience that Mom needed to see him eat. It was more important to her to make sure that he was eating than it was in seeing him eat much. He thought he understood that. Appetite was a sign of health, or remission. Cancer patients in the full burn of the disease didn’t have much of an appetite. Jack knew that very well.

  As he chewed, Mom tore open a couple of packs of vitamin-C powder and poured them into his water glass.

  “Tropical mix,” she announced, but Jack had already smelled it. It wasn’t as good as the tangerine, but it was okay. He accepted the glass, waited for the fizz to settle down, and then took a sip to wash down the corn muffin.

  Thunder rumbled again and rattled the windows.

  “It’s getting closer,” said Jack. When his mother didn’t comment, he asked, “Will Jilly be okay?”

  Before Mom could reply the first fat raindrops splatted on the glass. She picked up the remote to raise the volume. The regular weatherman was no longer giving the updates. Instead, it was the anchorman, the guy from Pittsburgh with all the teeth and the plastic-looking hair.

  “Mom—?” Jack asked again.

  “Shhh, let me listen.”

  The newsman said, “Officials are urging residents to prepare for a powerful storm that slammed eastern Ohio yesterday, tore along the northern edge of West Virginia and is currently grinding its way along the Maryland-Pennsylvania border.”

  There was a quick cutaway to a scientist-looking guy that Jack had seen a dozen times this morning. Dr. Gustus, a professor from some university. “The storm is unusually intense for this time of year, spinning up into what is clearly a high-precipitation supercell, which is an especially dangerous type of storm. Since the storm’s mesocyclone is wrapped with heavy rains, it can hide a tornado from view until the funnel touches down. These supercells are also known for their tendency to produce frequent cloud-to-ground and intracloud lightning than the other types of storms. The system weakened briefly overnight, following computer models of similar storms in this region, however what we are seeing now is an unfortunate combination of elements that could result in a major upgrade of this weather pattern.”

  The professor gave a bunch more technical information that Jack was pretty sure no one really understood, and then the image cut back to the reporter with the plastic hair who contrived to look grave and concerned. “This storm will produce flooding rains, high winds, downed trees—on houses, cars, power lines—and widespread power outages. Make sure you have plenty of candles and flashlights with fresh batteries because, folks, you’re going to need ’em.” He actually smiled when he said that.

  Jack suddenly shivered.

  Mom noticed it and wrapped her arm around his bony shoulders. “Hey, now … don’t worry. We’ll be safe here.”

  He made an agreeing noise but did not bother to correct her. He wasn’t frightened of the storm’s power. He was hoping it would become one of those Category Five things like they showed on SyFy. Or a bigger one. Big enough to blow the house away and let the waters of the river sweep him away from pain and sickness. Being killed in a super storm was so delightful that it made him shiver and raised goose bumps all along his arms. Lasting through the rain and wind so that he was back to where—and what—he was … that was far more frightening. Being suddenly dead was better than dying.

  On the other hand …

  “What about Jill?”

  “She’ll be fine,” said Mom, though her tone was less than convincing.

  “Mom …?”

  Mom was a thin, pretty woman whose black hair had started going gray around the time of the first diagnosis. Now it was more gray than black and there were dark circles under her eyes. Jill looked a little like Mom, and would probably grow up to look a lot like her. Jack looked like her too, right down to the dark circles under the eyes that looked out at him every morning from the bathroom mirror.

  “Mom,” Jack said tentatively, “Jill is going to be all right, isn’t she?”