(song: "Skydiving" - Lights)

"It's not over, kids!" Clementine calls back to us.

      I quickly have to turn away from Serena and focus on whatever problem Clementine is faced with. In the distance, I can see more shooting meteors, but these look strange. They're long . . . and coming from the ground, not towards it.

      "Missiles?" I say in surprise.

      "Yup." Clementine thumbs at the seat next to her. "Get up here and be my co-pilot, kid. Looks like the military is trying to combat the bigger ones with firepower. Not long before the planes will probably join them too."

      Serena nods to silently let me know that she'll be fine in the backseat on her own. I hate to leave her side, but what other option is there? I unbuckle myself, work my way up into the front, and put on the headset. It's completely intimidating. There are so many buttons and gauges, I don't even know how I could begin to help Clementine.

     "So what do we do?" I ask.

      Clementine takes her time with answering me. She rubs at her nose and sniffs loudly to clear her sinuses. "Well, we got another problem. We didn't finish that list remember?"

      "Yeah, you said there was no time," I stress.

      She waves away the reminder like a fly. "Yeah, yeah. One of the things we didn't get to do was refuel before take off."

      I groan loudly and it takes everything in my not to bang my head against the yoke of the plane. "I'm so sick of gas always being our problem."

      She reaches out a hand to roughly pat my shoulder a few times, her face is filled with wrinkles that form several happy lines. "Chin up! Don't get all mad yet, we might have enough to make it. Where do you kids need to get to?"

      "Summersun, it's south of San Antonio. It's where my mother and my Aunt are," I say.

      Clementine hums with thought, probably analyzing the gas-to-mile ratio in her head. "San Antonio I might be able to do, but south of that is going to be a stretch. I'll get you as far as I can."

      "We don't have much of a choice, we'll go as far as you can get us. Thank you." And I am grateful, more than I can really express. It's nice to have someone else helping us get to my family again. Even though it'd only been a few days, it felt like we'd been on the run forever.

      "You remind me of my grandson," Clementine says.

      "Quirky and cute?" I provide her with my cutest attempt at a smile.

      "Nah, reckless and in love," she says with a wink. "He was supposed to go to one of them fancy colleges in New England, but he fell in love with a girl and ran off to Peru to be with her. His parents and I were pretty mad with him, but looks like that decision saved him."

     A guy falling in love with a girl and following her to the end of the earth isn't my story. I wish it was my story.

     Clementine is nothing like my grandmother, but there is something about her that feels safe and trustworthy just like Grams was. I feel like I can tell her anything at this point.

      "My situation isn't as clean-cut as his. I stole my best-friends girlfriend and she's the best friend of my girlfriend," I confess.

      Clementine's mouth opens wide and at first, she doesn't make a sound. After a second a hard smoker's laugh escapes her.

     "Dammit kid, you have the worst timing in the world to figure out you were with the wrong person."

      "I know."

      "I hope you two don't become a victim of karma," she adds.

     I leave mysticism to the mystics. I only care about reality. In reality, Grams is gone, my parents may or may not be safe, I abandoned my best friend, stole his girlfriend, and left behind the first girl who didn't think I was a weirdo.

      "I don't believe in karma. I believe in my family and I believe in her," I say.

      Clementine barely touches the yoke and somehow we effortlessly move through the few low-hanging clouds.  "Karma isn't some cosmic force, kid. Sometimes karma is just guilt. When you take something that isn't yours there are always consequences, physical or emotional. I hope yours stay emotional."

      "I won't let anything happen to her."

     At this point, I feel like there isn't anything I wouldn't do just to keep Serena safe. I've never felt that way about anything or anyone in my life before.

      "Why would anything happen to her?" Clementine looks away from the cockpit glass to give me a firm stare. "You're the one that stole her. I'm saying you're the one that needs to be careful."

     I open my mouth, but there's nothing I can say. Maybe she's right. I don't know and I don't want to think about it.

      She squints her eyes to look at the instrument panel. On the screen, there are little shapes of planes. One is clearly us, but there are two other planes moving much faster than ours. "Hang on kid, we have company."

     The headset clicks a few times until I can hear a voice.

     "This is Lackland Air Force base. All air traffic was suspended, please land your air craft immediately, over," the man over the communication system requests.

      "Copy that. This is Cessna N342 Tango, we're just trying to get to San Antonio, we're almost there, over," Clementine responds.

      "This is a direct order from the United States Air Force. Your plane puts others at risk if it's struck, over."

      She tightens her lips with frustration and presses the microphone a little closer to her mouth. "I've been flying since you were sucking on your mamas' teats. I can out maneuver these meteors. . . over."

      "This is for your own benefit, it's not safe. We're having to use defensive force up there and can't take the risk of hurting more civilians, over."

      "And if I refuse?" she asked.

      "The military will be waiting and ready to arrest you on arrival to San Antonio, over."

      Clementine takes a deep breath and smiles at me sadly. "Well, It's the end of the line, kids."

     If I can trust my ability to interpret a plane's GPS we're still too far from Summersun, and Serena and I no longer have a vehicle. How are we supposed to make it on foot? There has to be a way we can get out a few more miles.

      I shake my head.  "We're not close enough."

      "Sorry kid, this is the best I can do. Even if I wanted to disobey them, we don't have the fuel to get there. You two are smart and resourceful, you'll make it."

      "What will you do?"

      Clementine gives me a reassuring grin and lifts up her thumb. "Don't worry about me, I'm going to try to buy you two some time. I'm sure the military will show up if I land at an airport and if you get picked up by them they'll take you to a shelter and you might not see your parents again. I'll land on a road or something, drop you two off real quick and take off again and head to the nearest airstrip."

      "Isn't it risky to use the roads like that?"

      "As I said, don't worry about me. You two keep each other safe."

     From our altitude, most of the larger roads look congested with abandoned vehicles. There seem to be blockades and military order. The streets between neighborhoods and homes look empty. Trash hasn't been picked up and all businesses are closed. It's so strange to see how much everything has changed in just a few days. Just last week I was concerned about how to communicate with Kaylee on our dates, and now everything has changed forever.

     Clementine aims the nose of the plane towards a straight 2-lane road that has enough clear distance for her to take off again. The plane sways and rattles the closer we get to the ground until the tires roughly bump up against the asphalt.

     On instinct, I glance back to see if Serena's okay and she nods her head, even though she looks uncertain.

     The two of us collect our bags. Feeling the ground beneath my feet never felt so good.

      Clementine sticks her head out the window. "Word of advice. This experience you're having now you'll never have again with anyone else. It will either bond you together or pull you apart. Make sure it's the first one, okay?"

     I nod and lift up my hand to wave goodbye to her.

      "Good luck you two!" she calls out.

     We watch Clementine's small plane speed down the road and gain just enough strength to pull up before it could reach a large pothole in the road. The buzzing sound of the single-engine lasts for a few seconds and then she is gone.

      "Now what do we do?" Serena asks.

      I study the road ahead and where it leads and then the turn in the road behind us and where it goes. "We're too far from Summersun to walk there. Getting too close to San Antonio though is dangerous."

      "And we don't have a car," she points out the obvious.

      "I have an idea, but you aren't going to like it."

      Serena hesitates. "What is it?"

      "We need to steal something . . . "