Chapter Eleven: Katie Wilde's Point of View

                Lois comes back downstairs and shakes her head at me.  “Let’s just stop for now.  Violet will come to her senses, I’m sure.”

                I pull out my notepad.  None of my friends are online, so I pull up my journal function and add a new entry.

            September 3

            Author: katiew333

            Bombs just went off around the community.  Colette ran away.  Violet’s leaving soon to go find her…  Just another day, I suppose…

                I have nothing more to write so I power off my notepad and set it down on the desk.  Mary, I notice, is still on the floor so I pull a pillow off the sofa and slide it underneath her head because she’s too heavy to move much. 

                I remember that Scarlett is still in the kitchen.  I go to see what she’s doing. 

                She sits at the large dining table with her head in her hands. 

                “You okay?” I ask.

                She looks up.  “Yeah.  I guess.  It’s just that… so much has happened in the last, what, five hours, and I can’t process it all.”

                I sit down next to her.  “I know how you feel.”

                She brushes her hair out of her face. 

                The timer screeches and I jump a little.

                “Oh, that’s my cookies.  He-he,” she says.  She slips on an oven mitt and pulls a tray from the oven.  The smell of cookies wafts out into the dining area and surely out to the den. 

                “So, basically, our house just narrowly escaped being burned to the ground and reduced to rubble so you decide to make cookies,” I say, raising an eyebrow.

                She smiles hugely and sticks her thumb up.  “Yep!”

                “Okay, then.  I’ve learned to stop questioning things by now, anyway,” I tell her. 

                Lois and Grace walk in.

                Grace looks like she just got the thing she’s been wishing for her entire life and Lois is smiling a bit. 

                “COOKIES.  OH MY GOD THIS PLACE JUST GOT BOMBED AND YOU MADE COOKIES.  TALK ABOUT THE COOLEST THING EVER.  WHY DID I NOT SEE THIS COMING?”  Grace shouts.

                Lois laughs.

                “They’re not for you,” Scarlett says. 

                “Aw, what?” Grace throws her hands up in exasperation and walks back into the den.

                I look at Scarlett.  “For Mallory,” she says. “I thought they might help cheer her up just a teeny bit.  She always liked my cookies.”

                “Okay then.” I reply. 

                She takes the tray up the stairs and I hear her talking to someone. 

                She comes back down a minute later, and says, “Success.”

                “Good.”

               

Violet, tired of being shut in the bedroom, let us in a bit earlier.  It’s about 2100.  I sit in my bed looking at my photos on my notepad, thinking about each one and what was going on when they were taken. 

                All of a sudden, a notification pops up on my screen.  New message, it says.  I hit the view button.  It reads:

                CM NUMBER 189457216 (Colette Petersen)

                MESSAGE AT 2107 FROM SECTOR 3, SOCIETY OF SEERS

                I’m near the wreckage of the store.  I can’t find her.  Hurry,

                Violet.

                I reply:

                This is Katie.

                Colette’s reply never comes, but her name turns red, meaning she’s no longer connected.

                I shake my head to stop its spinning. 

                Everyone goes to bed, making the silent agreement that we could all use some rest.

                I wake later that night to the sound of a door opening and shutting.

                Violet is gone.