“Well, I’m starving,” said Mahir, dropping the towel and grabbing his jacket off the bed. Kelly and Becks followed. I brought up the rear, pausing to close and lock the motel room door.

George didn’t say anything as we walked toward the van… but in the back of my head, I was pretty sure I could feel her smiling.

It has been a pleasure and a privilege blogging for you over these past few weeks. Thank you for your insightful questions and for your commentary in the forums, where I have learned a great deal about what does—and doesn’t!—work in this form of reporting. I promise to take these lessons, and this experience, with me in my future endeavors.

Also, while I’m being sappy… thank you, all of you, for continuing to care as much as you do about the world. This is the only one we’re going to get, and I think it’s important that we continue to give a damn about every single part of it, even the ones that aren’t currently a part of our lives. You are the reason that someday, when this disease has been defeated, the amusement parks will become family fun lands once again, and people will laugh and live and love just the way they always have. Thank you for sharing yourselves with me.

Thank you.

—From Cabin Fever Dream, guest blog of Barbara Tinney, June 23, 2041

Twenty

I’m not sure any of us slept that night. We were on an Internet blackout while stationary: no uploads, no message forums, nothing that could be traced to prove we were ever here. That also meant no phone calls, since turning on our phones could activate their GPS chips. We’d been scrupulously careful since leaving Weed. We just had to hope we’d been careful enough.

It was the blood tests that worried me. You can’t survive in America without at least one blood test a day, and possibly—probably—more than that. We’d been taking blood tests at toll booths and convenience stores all the way across the country, and if the CDC was somehow tracking clean results, we were screwed.