I was holding the unfamiliar AR rifle, as Joe called it. He showed me how to point and shoot, safe and reload it, but I'd never even fired it. I stopped and switched to my trusty shotgun. I knew how to use that one. I leaned back against the fence for a moment and closed my eyes. It seemed so long ago that I was sitting in class, trying just to make it through College Writing. Just hours ago when I'd heard the term “EMP” for the first time. When I killed my foster mom, Jean. Or “Jeanie” as she liked to be called, conjuring breakfast from her pantry and fridge: waffles, bacon and eggs, not-from-concentrate orange juice, the only kind to drink. I heard a gunshot from behind me. I opened my eyes again, pushed off the fence with my shoulders and ran down to nearly the end of the block. I came to a house without a fence. There was an old Camaro on blocks in the front. I moved up to the edge of the house and peeked around the corner.
