[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/65aa9891c369c53be3c30080/1706214811066-125XXJZHZ5TN8HXDXLF6/cocomon__novel_cover._Ten_year_old_girl_in_t-shirt_and_jeans_sl_d4cc212f-507e-4a78-a680-5a5621cd2f6e.png?format=2500w]

Ozzy followed his father through the forest in the dew-covered morning. The sun had barely risen.

Yellow and pink light streaked over the pale gray mountains, greeting the coming day. He carried a bucket of traps, and his father had a shotgun slung over his shoulder.

Ozzy had a nightmare and was spooked that morning. Every cracking twig and broken branch made him jump, and his stomach twisted with anxiety.

His father looked down at him, a gruff expression on his face. As his father's only remaining child, his son, Ozzy wanted to live up to the man's expectations. Instead, he was swathed in his father's shadow. Disappointing his father seemed to be his primary occupation when he wasn't doing chores or sitting in the cool shade of the house with his mother.

She'd been fading away since the death of his little sister. Maggie had caught a fever in the dead of winter. The three-year-old couldn't recover, no matter how many herbs and tinctures his mother poured down her throat.

Ozzy could never forget the peaceful look on his sister's face the morning he found her motionless in the bed across from his. He stood over her, unable to breathe. His trembling hand reached for her as if it was controlled by someone else. His fingers touched the exposed flesh of her upper arm. She was cold. Too cold.

He couldn't remember what happened after that. Had he screamed? Fainted? The next thing he knew, he was lying in his bed and his sister was gone. His mother's wailing echoed through the house.

Ozzy had climbed out of bed and looked out the window. Below, in the back yard, his father drove a shovel into the hard packed red soil. With each shovel full, the small rectangular hole grew bigger. He'd known what the hole was for. Others had been buried in that same patch of ground. First his grandmother, then his grandfather. Now his little sister Maggie too.

He'd wondered what hole would come next. One for his parents or one for him? If his mother and father died first, would he be able to dig their graves all by himself?

Ozzy was small and plump at eleven years old. He'd been a sickly baby, his mother had told him. It was a miracle he'd made it this long, his father had said. Ozzy gripped the handle of the bucket full of traps and followed his father's footsteps. He wanted to grow into a man his father would be proud to call son. Wanted it more than anything.

He'd learned to read and write. He'd learned to count and arrange the supplies they kept below ground in the fallout shelter. But that never seemed to be enough. He needed to try harder to be a man like his dad. His father was always prepared. Despite his desire to impress his father, Ozzy loved to listen to his mother's stories about the old world. The way her face lit up when she talked about music and dancing, films and TV, made Ozzy's heart light up too.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

But his father didn't like to talk about the past. He said it did no good to think about it. Their job was to survive. To be strong. To stoically hold on until humanity found a way to overcome. His mother told Ozzy that his father preferred the new world. He hadn't agreed with the values of the old society. But she never explained what that meant.

Ozzy's father stopped in front of him in the path, his body going rigid. He pressed the gun to his shoulder and aimed into the distance.

“What is it, Dad?”

“Shhh...” his father hissed.

Ozzy bit his lip. His father's finger pulled the trigger. There was a click and a blast as the bullet left the barrel and propelled toward its target.

Ozzy saw a large gray squirrel twitch its tail before the shotgun blast blew it off a tree trunk. “Good one,” Ozzy said, proud of his father.

His father glanced down at him and grunted. Ozzy followed his father's long strides. The man grabbed the squirrel off the ground and tied it up by the hind legs. He grabbed the bucket from Ozzy's hand without a word and began to set up a trap at the base of the tree. “This will catch the others that live here,” his father said. “There's no need to waste bullets on squirrels.”

The boy drew his eyebrows together, not understanding why his father had wasted a bullet on a squirrel if he didn't think it was worth it. His father said things that didn't make sense sometimes, and it would leave Ozzy confused all day. But his father was his primary teacher and role model, so understanding his thinking was the most important job in Ozzy's life. It wasn’t always easy. “You got it though,” he said. “It would have been a bigger waste if you'd missed.”

His father gave him an irritated look as he finished setting the trap. Ozzy wished his father would trust him to set the traps. He'd been practicing for months, and he knew he could do it almost as well as his dad. It was one of his only real skills. Reading old books to his mother by the firelight was another, even if his father didn't really approve.

When his father stood from his work, he took several long steps deeper into the forest, leaving Ozzy to rush to catch up. His father stopped suddenly as he rounded a wide old tree. “What the...”

The man was rarely surprised or afraid, but Ozzy recognized a hit of both in his father's voice. “What is it, Dad?” he asked, coming up beside him.

When he saw what his father was looking at, Ozzy took a step back. It was a girl about his age, wearing a gray short-sleeve shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots. She lay motionless on the ground, eyes tightly closed. “Is she dead?” he whispered, not wanting the answer.

The girl's light brown hair was matted with the same blood that coated her forehead and elfin face. Her clothing was caked with dirt, and her full lips were pale and cracked.

His father pressed his fingers to her neck, checking for a pulse. “She's got a heartbeat. But it's weak.”

“Why isn't she waking up?”

“Dehydration, most likely.”

“What are we going to do with her?” Ozzy asked. A deep yearning for companionship tightened his chest.

His father checked the girl's exposed flesh, looking for bite marks. “She's scraped up, but it doesn't look like she's infected. We'll take her back home and quarantine her for a few days. If she doesn't turn, she'll be a good help to your mother.”

Ozzy's father slid his arms under the girl's neck and knees, hoisting her off the ground. Ozzy grabbed the bucket of traps and followed his father back home.[midjourny]