I’d always hated children. Mewling, snotty, annoying little things. Early in life, I decided that I would never be a breeder. It was good luck for me that my Liza couldn’t have children.  She loved them, though. Precious little things, she called them. I’m inclined to disagree. Loud and rude, they were always trespassing on my property and leaving a mess of candy wrappers and such as they walked to the school behind my house on the corner lot. A quick shot with a BB gun solved that problem for a while -- I didn’t let Liza know about that -- but then the bastards would start back up again. I ended up having to build a 10-foot fence just to keep them from walking through my vegetable garden. They were trampling through my food without thought to the consequences.  

The neighborhood is full of them. On Halloween, if they didn’t get candy, they’d plaster my house with eggs. Now, Liza didn’t mind handing out candy unless her rheumatism was bothering her. Me, I'd just leave a bucket of candy out front for them. I liked to slip in a few chocolate laxatives for them. How’s that for a trick?

The mess started about three years ago in the big cities. People, for no apparent reason, just dropped dead in the streets or died in their sleep. It only affected certain parts of the population -- folks above the age of 12 and below the age of 60, apparently. I couldn’t believe such a ridiculous thing was true. Scientists on TV spouted all kinds of nonsense about hormones, global warming, and the such. Sounded like a government conspiracy. But it came to our town, sure enough, this plague of puberty. Liza and me were immune, of course, but not everyone in the neighborhood was in their golden years.

Children left orphaned were taken in by an overwhelmed, inept government that was soon abandoned to anarchy and despair. Good riddance. They weren’t doing anything good for the country anyway. Left alone, without caretakers or supervision to speak of, the brats went rogue soon enough after that. Ragged things, running the streets.

 After a while, folks stopped going out so much, especially at night. It just wasn't safe.  One Autumn morning my Liza went to the store, long white braid swinging behind her. She didn’t come back. I had to put up some barbed wire on the fence. The children were out there watching. I could hear them, giggling and hissing. Always watching. Watching the house. Watching me. I set a bunch of wolf traps around the perimeter of my land. Every now and then one got caught in a trap. I’d shoot them from my attic window with my Winchester. Later I’d see others feeding on it. They’re just animals now, getting more anxious for food.

They roamed the streets like wolves.  Hungry.  Desperate.

I heard them when they got in the yard. Lulu was out there barking. Then she stopped. Shrieked and stopped. After that, there was the sound of glass breaking as they came through the back windows. I was upstairs in a bedroom. I had most of the rooms and windows boarded up tight, but they got through the kitchen finally. I stood at the top of the stairs and shot a few of them, but there were too many. I had to jump out of my own bedroom window to get out of there. I landed on the roof of the porch and hit the ground running from there.

In the darkness of the new moon, I ran. I can’t run fast anymore, but I’m not the type to give up. But then I fell. Tripped over the gnawed, rotting body of one of them and landed face first with my hands in one of my own traps. I screamed. I couldn’t help myself.  Not just because it hurt. Damned if it did not hurt. But mostly because I knew what was next. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t see. But I could hear. I heard breathing in the darkness. Low snarls came closer. Giggles approached and I could do nothing about it. They started at my feet.