Guignard Eric J. - Smog / Baggage of Eternal Night

Smog

JournalStones DoubleDown Series,Book II

By

Lisa Morton

JournalStone

SanFrancisco

Copyright 2013 by Lisa Morton

Allrights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any meansgraphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping,or by any information storage retrieval system, without the written permissionof the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in criticalarticles and reviews.

Thisis a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations,and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the authors imaginationor are used fictitiously.

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Theviews expressed in this work are solely those of the authors and do not necessarilyreflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims anyresponsibility for them.

ISBN: 978-1-940161-01-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-940161-17-4 (hc limited edition)

ISBN: 978-1-940161-02-0 (ebook)

Libraryof Congress Control Number: 2013941614

Printedin the United States of America

JournalStonerev. date: September 6, 2013

CoverDesign: Denise Daniel

CoverArt: Alan M. Clark

Editedby: Norman Rubenstein

Dedication

To all of the 1960s denizens of 9thAvenue in Arcadia, who all share my reduced lung capacity thanks to the smog.

At least we only came out alittle crazy.

Endorsements

WithSmog, Lisa Morton has created the perfect coming-of-age story. This is atale of a magical time, with wonderful characters and a gripping plot that justwon't let go. This is Morton at her very best, and you don't want to miss thisone. John R. Little, Author of THE MEMORY TREE, MIRANDA, and URSAMAJOR

"I'msure SMOG by Lisa Morton is a true tale of terrifying horror. Or maybe she'sjust that fabulous of a writer. Evocative, provocative, and TOTALLY FREAKY.More!" - Nancy Holder, 5-time Bram Stoker Award winner and NYTbestselling author, DEAD IN THE WATER

Prologue

Iwas twelve years old in 1965. It was a year when the world felt like it waschanging: Walter Cronkite reported on civil rights every night; we were sendingtroops to a country called Vietnam; men were walking in space, and the RollingStones were making rock and roll music sound nasty. Computers filled upentire buildings at NASA; the internet was decades away; our biggest war wascold, and telephones were still things that were wired into walls.

I had the perfect family, living the Americandream: Mom and Dad, two kids, a three-bedroom house in a little suburb of LosAngeles called San Diablo, located out at the eastern end of the San GabrielValley. Fifteen years ago, the whole area had been orange groves; now it was amiddle-class neighborhood that centered on families supported by the localaerospace industry. The houses all had nice front lawns and pools in thebackyards; there were cocktail parties for the parents and birthday parties forthe kids, and the most successful fathers bought brand-new color consoletelevision sets that weighed as much as refrigerators.

It was all perfectuntil something went wrong withthe smog. It was so thick that on most days we couldnt see the foothills atthe end of our street. A lot of us kids were no good at running because of thesmogit would make your lungs burn and seize up after half a lap.

Breathing problems, however, were the least ofwhat the smog was doing to us.

Of course we didnt know that when it all startedto fall apart

Chapter 1

Themoon just blew up! That was what CJ said when he came running into the housethat day in June 1965. It was almost eight in the evening.

CJ was my older brother. His real name was CharlesRobert Donohue, Jr., but he hated Charles, Charlie, Chuck, Bob, and Junior; CJwas the only iteration he didnt hate from a young age. Of course I shouldntsay anythingI go by Joey even though my birth name is Michaela Jo Donohue, butcome on, Michaela? Back when theyd both been young and growing up inWest Virginia, my parents had known someone whod named her little girlMichaela, and for some inexplicable reason theyd been smitten by the name. I,sadly, have never been able to say the same. Fortunately I was a tomboy frombirth, so Joey suited me just fine.

CJ was pretty decent, as older brothers go. He wasfour years older than me, but hed never bullied me or been otherwise mean.When we were both little, hed let me tag along on his expeditions. True, hedonce put a Jerusalem cricketpossibly the biggest, ugliest, worst-smellinginsect found in all of Southern Californiain my bed and laughed like crazywhen Id screamed. But hed apologized afterward, and I frankly sort of thoughtJerusalem crickets were coolthey reminded me of the big plastic bug in myCootie game. Id made him take the cricket back out to the dirt trail that ranbetween our backyard and the fenced-in, concrete-lined runoff channel we allcalled the wash.

I also liked CJ because he was always popular atschool. Hed been elected class president at San Diablo High when he was stilla freshman. I liked his friends and girlfriends, and (much to our scientistfathers horror) he wanted to go into politics someday. He planned on majoringin political science at college, and he was smart enough that his counselors atschool figured hed land a scholarship with no problem. CJs popularity wasgood for me, too; because people liked him, they automatically liked me. Well,at least a few didIve never been as good at the handshaking and glad-handingthing. I had Debbie Curtis, whod been my best friend since before either of uscould even talk, and sometimes we hung out with Matthew Visser, who livedhalfway down our block and was weird enough to be both intriguing and kind ofscarybut otherwise I didnt have a lot of friends. Not like CJ did, anyway.

1965 didnt start off seeming so different. I wasin my last year of elementary school and was looking forward to starting juniorhigh in the fall; CJ was a high school sophomore. By June, all of the kids wereout of school, with three glorious months of summer freedom before us. CJ wasusually off with his friends, Mom had all of her social activities, and as for Dadwell,we never saw Dad anyway, so Id have the house all to myself for most of thesummer.

That summer had started with two events I mostespecially remember: On June 3rd, Ed White became the first Americanastronaut to step outside the safety of his Gemini capsule and into outerspace, and we watched the event on our brand-new color Magnavox televisionwhile my mother glowed with pride (and a few martinis) and told us, That fellowwouldnt be out there if it werent for your father. What exactly Dad had todo with the space walk, I dont think Mom had the vaguest idea. We only knewthat he worked in the aerospace industry, often spending weeks out at EdwardsAir Force Base in the middle of the Mojave desert.

The second big deal was the Rolling Stones. (ICant Get No) Satisfaction was released in that same month, and suddenly therock and roll music that all our parents had decided they could live withbecause it wasnt going away got dirty. Every night, as the sun wentdown on another hot Southern California summer day, all the teenagers wouldsaunter out to plop down on their front lawns with transistor radios tuned tostation KHJ, waiting for the next play of Satisfaction. You could walk alongthe street, the sky still barely light overhead, and hear that guitar riffechoing out of dozens of tinny little handheld radios. I wasnt quite oldenough yet to hang out with the rest of them, but I liked the song (which Isomehow guessed had something to do with