A musty odor crawled into Connor’s nostrils as he climbed into the backseat of his mother’s beige sedan and proudly buckled his seatbelt. Being independent, even in the smallest ways, was the greatest gift he could give his mother. Mariah Smitty was a single parent with two young boys and several bad habits. Anything that would take responsibility off her shoulders was a blessing in her eyes. He looked at his mother’s smiling face as she buckled his brother into the seat beside him. Dylan Kove was four years younger and had been born blind. Mariah often looked like she felt her son’s disability was a curse, but to her credit, she had never said it. At least, not in front of the boys

“Thanks, Connor,” Mariah said and withdrew from the car. The door slammed shut and the driver’s side door opened quickly after. “You boys ready to visit grandma and grandpa?” They answered in unison and with enthusiasm. Visiting his grandparents was a rare treat for Connor. The kind that only came around when something exciting had happened or was going to happen. No such occasions had occurred before Dyland was born. Family turmoil stopped that. But Dylan’s blindness had brought the family back together in a way only something like that could.

Connor could barely contain his excitement. Martha Smitty made the most delicious chocolate chip cookies he had ever had. Not a difficult task given the circumstances of their living conditions, but that sort of thing doesn’t cross a young boy’s mind. All he could think of was how he could convince his grandmother to let him have more cookies than his younger brother. A near impossibility.

Typically, by the time the beige sedan was pulling away from the curb, Connor and his brother were already lost in some fantasy world they had created for their action figures or other toys. But this time, gunshots in their apartment building drew their eyes to the building as their mother stomped on the gas. Too young to know exactly how his mother was involved, but old enough to know there was a connection, Connor stared at the side of his mother’s face as she cried silently and focused intently on getting them the hell away from the complex.

The streets of Savagery were full of people, most walking on the sidewalks slowly, like the zombies he had seen in a scary movie. Others stood on street corners with their hands buried deep in their pockets. He always wondered why the same people would be standing in the same place while leaving and returning home from some errand. His mother always told him to drop it and never bug those kinds of people.

Sirens blared in the distance. Mariah, nor anyone else, made an effort to get their cars out of the way. In a city like Savagery, one his mother called filled to the brim with crime, a woman impeding an ambulance was hardly what the cops were interested in taking care of. There were lots of these types of things people could get away with in Savagery. Mariah knew them all.

While their family lived deep in the heart of Savagery, Mariah’s parents lived just beyond the outskirts of town. To the west. Where crime began to fade as the grass began to grow. “Mommy,” Connor’s brother said an hour into the trip. “Mommy,” his brother repeated. Mariah was still tense, distracted by whatever had happened in the apartment building. Connor could sense this but his younger brother couldn’t feel the tension in the car. “Mommy!”

Connor prepared for the screaming. The all too familiar screaming that his mother did whenever she was focused on anything she enjoyed more than her parental responsibilities. She shocked him. “What sweetie,” she finally said.

I need to go to the bathroom,” his brother said.

“Can it wait? We’re not too far away.”

“No. I need to go now.” Persistence seemed to live in his brother’s voice. It teetered between falling into a rage-filled tantrum and pitiful begging. Which way it fell always seemed random to Connor. The question was answered quickly though. “Please mommy, I really have to go.” Dylan sounded as though he may cry. On purpose.

Mariah’s temper began to chisel away at any soft spots that had been there before. “We’re in the middle of nowhere,” she said hotly. “Look around! We’re surrounded by empty fields! Do you want to piss in the goddamn fields like an animal?!” Hurt coated his brother’s eyes. Confusion coated Connor’s; both boys had in fact pissed in these very fields multiple times. Their mother noticed nothing.

Eventually, his brother broke the silence, “I don’t care! I’ll pee anywhere!”

Connor squeezed the figurine of his favorite crimefighter, Redwing, in one hand and his pant leg in the other. The Southsider lay face down on the seat between the boys. If only one of them was there now, they would know what to do. They could stop what his mother was about to do. Then, as if a whole new woman was driving the car, his mother began to laugh. “You’re right,” she said through her soft chuckling. “You will, won’t you?” The car began to slow down and drift toward the dirt that lined the side of the road. It came to a stop but no one moved right away.

Connor said softly, “I can get him out, mom.” When she didn’t answer, when he realized she was looking at something no one else could see, he unbuckled his own seatbelt slowly and got out of the car.

The boys walked to the side of the car that was out of view of any passerby. Though, there seemed to be no one traveling on the country road anyway. After Connor helped his brother get situated, he leaned against the car with his face buried in his arms while Dylan took care of business. When the sound of urine hitting the dirt subsided he said, “Done?”

“Almost,” Dylan said. Connor glanced through the window to see his mother talking to someone. No one, in truth. But someone in her reality. He contemplated grabbing his brother’s wrist and running into the fields. Based on the heated discussion his mother was having, they surely had enough time to get far enough away that they could hide for a while, wait until their mother recovered from whatever has changed her. But if that happened the beatings they would receive when she found them would be ferocious. Savage. Still, it felt worth it to not have to get back into the car.

He turned. “I think we-” His brother was already walking around the back of the car, feeling his way along the trunk. To his surprise, his mother’s car door was opening. She was climbing out.

“Get in!” she called over the hood of the car to Connor. There was a strange nervousness in her voice. He obeyed despite his better judgment.

Mariah sat down in the driver’s seat and wiped her brow of sweat. Even if it wasn’t quite hot outside, the car had gotten stuffy during their ride. Like always. Mariah went through cars like most people go through toilet paper. Connor had lost count over the years. This newest ride didn’t have air conditioning, but that didn’t keep his mother from insisting they keep the windows up. Rolling the windows of your car down in Savagery was like asking for a criminal to climb into your car at a stoplight.

“Mom,” Connor said before the car got moving again. “Do you think we could roll the windows down? There’s no one-”

His mother twisted around hard and fast. Like a scared animal. “Are you insane, Connor?! You know the rules! Windows up, burglars out!”

“But, mom. There’s-”

“I said no!” She wiped her brow again. She was breathing heavily. Too heavily, even more being upset. She tried to calm herself, to calm him after seeing the fear on his face. “They’re everywhere, Connor. It might look safe out here, but it’s not. They’re here. They’re everywhere.”

“Who, mommy?” asked his brother. Less fear in his voice than appropriate for the situation.

Mariah rubbed her eyes and glanced around the open fields outside the car. “The bad guys, sweetie. The bad guys. That’s why we need to get to grandma’s house as fast as we can.” She leaned across the middle console and fumbled around with the glove compartment. As always she had to smack the thing to make its insides line up. As she called it. She tossed something on the front seat and brought several napkins to her face to dab the sweat that was glistening on her forehead and cheeks. “You two just be good boys and play with your toys. I’ll get us there safely.” She tossed the paper towels onto the floor on the passenger’s side and reached for whatever was in the seat. A handgun appeared. Connor had seen his fair share of guns for a ten year old. His mother’s. Those of her friends. The ones that the people in the apartment building showed off regularly. Those of the men who visited their home often. Guns were nothing new and the quick skip of the heart that an ordinary person experiences when they see one on rare occasions was long gone. But never had Connor felt more threatened by one than he did right now.

His mother drove with one hand on the wheel and the other holding the gun on her lap for the next twenty minutes. Eventually, grass fields became cornfields which meant they were getting close to their grandparent’s house. Grandma will know what to do. Or grandpa can take the gun away from her.

His brother knocked the action figures together as if they were fighting. Occasionally making accompanying side effects. But other than that, the ride was mostly quiet. No talking. No radio. Just the churning of dirt beneath the wheels and his brother's imagination. Then, the worst happened.

“Boys,” his mother said. “Boys. Boys!”

“What?” he said nervously.

His mother was looking in the rearview mirror. Panic on her face and in her body. She spun around and looked at the empty road behind them. “They’ve found us.”

“Who, mom? There’s no one-” Connor was interrupted abruptly when the car swerved hard to the left and drove straight into the cornfields. They bounced wildly as his mother floored it into the haunting stalks of corn that stood higher than the car. He slammed his feet into the floor and pressed his back against the seat as hard as he could. His brother was screaming and crying in fear now. The action figures lay on the floor at his feet. The thump of stalks against the car felt like burglars trying to break in before being mowed down by the crazed driver.

They drove like that for god knows how long. Every second felt like it had been stretched out to the max and filled with time-freezing horror. Then, with no warning, his mother slammed on the brakes. The car slid to a wild stop. Silence. Even his terrified brother stared at their surroundings, trying his best to understand what was happening. Connor reached for his hand to comfort him. It startled the boy.

His mother lifted her gun and turned to them. “Stay here. Do not get out of the car!” She opened the door as quietly as she could and stepped out, leaving the door open and disappearing into the cornstalks.

Connor and his brother remained perfectly still, no words between them, for several minutes. Then, there was a slamming sound on the trunk of the car that made them both jump. His brother broke into tears again but tried not to scream. A moment later his mother was climbing back into the car. She tried to start it but it didn’t make a sound. Connor could see the keys were missing but the fear in his throat was like an immovable object and his courage was by no means an unstoppable force.

Mariah slammed the steering wheel with both hands and thrust herself backward into the seat. “Dammit!” The horn screamed out briefly but loudly when she punched the middle of the steering wheel. “Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!” She burst into tears. Her hands covered her face. Her voice was muffled when she said, “There’s no use. They’ve caught us.” She reached for the gun in her lap then looked in the rearview mirror again. She wiped the tears from her eyes solemnly and turned to Connor. “Connor.” He swallowed hard but didn’t actually respond. “I’ve done something horrible. And I’m going to have to pay for it.” His head shook involuntarily from the swelling denial inside him. “They’re going to do terrible things to us, Connor. All of us.” She lifted the gun and pointed it at his face. “Connor. I need you to know I’m sorry. I’m only doing this because I love you. I love you both. So much. So very, very much. But I can’t let them have you.”

Finally, he managed to blurt out, “Mom! Mom! No! Mom! There’s no one-” There was a loud bang and everything went black.