Chapter 1

Captain Hardesty,

You've probably already heard that things didn't go quite like we planned. Two of the girls were sick, so Mom didn't come to the restaurant, more about that later. So there we were at the table, waiting for them to bring our pizza out to us. I'd had half a glass of beer, but dad had already polished off the rest of the pitcher, and was calling for more. I think he'd started before he got there too.

Our usual server, Marcy, brought out a full plastic pitcher and set it on the table. I don't think you know her, but shes twenty-five, seven years older than me. She looked older though and was kind of overweight, probably because she got to take home free pizza at the end of her shift, and she needed it, with two little kids to feed. "Your food will be right out," She waved to the empty seat next to me, and her sleeve rode up showing the scars where she'd been burned. "Tammy not coming tonight?"

I started to tell her Tammy wasn't feeling good, but stopped when I saw the expression on Carmen's face. You know that my sisters, Carmen and Lucy, the sixteen and fourteen year-olds, were there with us. Mom didn't need to be there, like you said, they would have picked her up ... but like I said, I'll get to that later. Carmen got a really funny look on her face, and Lucy got real busy looking out the window. Marcy is always nice, even to the little kids when they get noisy or make a mess. She noticed my sisters and moved away to give us some privacy. She got stopped by a table of women, all of them older, wearing clothes that were too tight, meant for women twenty years younger. It wasn't one of her tables, but they yelled at her about their order anyway, real snotty like.

Dad hadn't noticed, he was too busy drinking and staring at some coeds at a big table near our booth. To be honest, I couldn't blame him. They were hot, all of them in halter or crop tops, and wearing shorts. Two blondes, one lighter than the other, a redhead, and another with short black hair. Their boyfriends didn't seem to be too happy with dad's attention, but they didn't say anything, just gave dad dirty looks. I turned back to my sisters. "Okay, spill it, what's up?"

Carmen shook her head, "Nothing." Her hair fell around her face, hiding her outbreak of zits. It was blue today, she'd dyed it with cool-aid again, some of her friends had probably talked her into it. I'd liked it better when it was its natural brown, almost the same color as her skin, and halfway down her back; the way it was before she cut it short last year right after the announcement about the swarm.

I reached over and brushed it back with my fingers so I could see her almond eyes. She's got mom's features and coloring, but dad's height and build, so she wound up nearly as tall as me, but she looks smaller because she's always trying to hide her face. I've always thought she was pretty, zits and all, but that's not the kind of thing you can tell your sister. "Hey," I said "you know something about Tammy, what is it?"

She pulled away, out of reach. "You don't want to know."

So she did know something. It figured she would; Tammy's a senior this year, so I don't see her all the time like before I graduated. There'd been something going on with her for the last couple of months, but I hadn't been able to figure it out. She'd been distracted, even when we were making love. If the girls knew, I had to find out. It was Tammy, after all, that talked me into getting retested so I could volunteer. You know I only got a 6.4 on my first CAP test; you're the one that helped me bring it up to the 6.8 I have now. You know about my sisters' scores too, how Carmen improved from 5.2 to 5.4 and I'm sure Lucy would have scored a LOT less than her 6.1 without your coaching. Carmen looked down at the table, but while Lucy kept her head turned to the window behind us, I could tell she was watching me. "Look girls, I need to know what's going on."

Carmen shook her head. "You'll get mad."