As the sun started to set, I picked up my basket full of strawberries and headed home on foot.

The tiny cabin I lived in was set in the foot of a small mountain and I hadn't walked that far away from it.

It barely had space to move, but it was my home. A safe haven to avoid any other possible survivors.

As I walked by the garden, I silently paid my respects to my passed family.

Every day that I saw their graves, I couldn't help but feel a deep sorrow and guilt. It has been barely over four years, and I still wasn't fully over their deaths.

When the war began, my family moved from South Texas to Mexico. It was the reasonable thing to do at the time.

After all, it seemed as if Mexico had been the only country to avoid the nuclear war that would tear the world apart.

That changed, however, when a bomb hit Mexico City several months later. Ruining the momentary peace anyone had.

After that, it was just a game of survival.

Nuclear bombs flew across the skies as if they were common airplanes.

People hid in their homes and never came out again. Others lived on the streets and died from the cold.

To this day I, Ashlyn Dervez, still wonder how I had been saved. Of course, there was so a lot of pain and suffering, but I managed to live until now.

I shook my head to clear my negative thoughts and pushed the creaky, wooden door open to my cabin. After stepping in and closing the door, I swiftly locked it with a flick of my wrist.

A somewhat dusty scent greeted me and I couldn't help but smile a little at my laziness.

I always hated cleaning, since I was a young child to now. Thus my cabin wasn't the cleanest out there.

Although I have to admit that my mom's death did make me a bit conscious about it.

She was always insisting I learn to cook and clean everything. Me being your typical thirteen year old, I tended to talk back and refuse to do anything but be on my phone.

But as you have guessed, events made me realize that I couldn't afford to be a spoiled teenager anymore.

Now, I'm nineteen, and lived alone. Well, sort of.

As I placed the basket of strawberries on the small wooden table, my faithful companion bounded over to me and hugged me with her medium sized paws.

Mira was my Husky. She had been my grandma's dog, but she was now mine since I was the only one left to care for her.

I scratched her ears and waited for her to get off me so I could go take a shower.

With a couple of steps I reached my bedroom with Mira trailing behind. She flopped on my bed and decided to take a brief nap while I got ready to sleep.

I scavenged through one of my three drawers until I found my only set of pijamas.

They were a soft cotton fabric, and lavender colored with yellow butterflies scattered around the shirt and pants.

I grabbed my underwear from another drawer and was about to go shower when I remembered the note.

I slipped my hand in the pocket of my jeans and pulled out an old, yellow sticky note.

It read-

Soccer field at noon!

My heart clenched as memories once again flooded back to me. The fact that I read it every day and kept it with me didn't change anything.

You see, the eighth graders in my middle school had a small system set up once news of students leaving became public.

As the war kept threatening the safety of everyone and families left their towns, lots of schools started to close down.

The thing was, our eight grade group was very close to one another. It made sense though, seeing that our school's total student population had only four hundred students.

Compared to other middle schools, it was quite small.

A group of three friends had the brilliant idea to give out a sticky note to every parting student.

When it was my last day at Lagoon Middle School, I of course received one too. A girl named Penelope had explained to me what the words in the note meant.

But... I was always a very forgetful person.

After a couple of years I had forgotten what 'soccer field at noon' meant. The only clue I have now is the knowledge of the location where the soccer field was.

I sighed with desperation and placed the not-so-sticky-anymore note on top of my tiny dresser and went to go take a refreshing, cold shower.

•••

The candle I had set earlier to be able to see in the dark bathroom was starting to dim, so I had to hurry.

I finished putting on my pijamas and started brushing my damp hair.

I considered myself very lucky.

Having an abundance of water in these times was very rare.

On the other side of the hill that my home was placed, was a large creek where most of my water came from.

When the bottled water had run out, I had taken a trip to the city for more.

Although it was more in hopes of finding other survivors.

After every government nearby had collapsed to nothing and the war ended, there was less than five hundred-thousand living people in each country.

Most that survived the bombs were left to die in agony from all the radiation going around. Cancer and radiation burns were the most common cause of death.

My whole family died from the after effects as well.

Mira and I are the only family that we have left.

I grabbed my hair and twisted it over the sink to get rid of excess water.

As I stood straight, my reflection stared back at me from my cracked mirror.

There had been a time when my skin had been of light color. Now, it was an olive tone due to so much time out in the sun.

My dark brown hair had grown out to my waist, but it was uneven. Back when the first deaths of my family had occurred, out of depression my fifteen year old self had cut out half of it with a knife.

Dark, brown eyes greeted me with a hard tone to them. I forcefully smiled and my expression changed to one I used to have six years ago.

With disgust I returned my face to its neutral state and stepped out of the bathroom. There was no reason to be happy now, and it hurt to see myself content after the deaths of so many humans and loved ones.

Mira was already deep asleep on the left side of the bed.

I carefully found my way to the dresser as I couldn't see anything.

My brain may have found a way to make my own plumbing and let showering be an available luxury, but electricity?

Nope, I wasn't going to deal with that when it wasn't really needed. I could easily start a fire and cook my meals and such outside.

I reached for the middle drawer and took out several blankets to cover myself and Mira.

Out in the mountains, night came with freezing winds. And like I said, no electricity for a heater either.

I was about to walk back to the bed when I remembered the note once again. I grabbed it and tossed the blankets to Mira who woke with a bark.

"It's okay girl," I said soothingly.

She sat up and waited for me to get in the bed. Her tongue was hanging out of her mouth and her big blue eyes looked at me with pleading.

I held the yellow note close to me as I climbed in the bed and spread out the blankets with my feet. I was too lazy to sit up and use my arms.

Mira laid down next to me and soon fell into a deep sleep.

I hugged her furry body with one arm while the other held the note close to my chest as I fell asleep.

____________________________

A/N

So, I'm trying something completely different here than what I usually do.

My WoF fanfics are the reason why I get a handful of followers and views, but I want to do my own thing.

I'm not going to promote this on any of my books, simply because I want it to start new. Just like how The Color of Night did.

And since this might not get lots of views, I might not update as often.

This is going to be like a side project.

Also, this might the only AN I'll do for a while.

So please, if you're reading this, please tell me how it is so far.

Okie Dokie

-Sofi