End Times Read Online Free Page A

sax,” suggested a grandmother with a big bag of knitting in her lap.
    The bus driver shook his head. “The sax has more groove,” he insisted.
    “And it ain’t no tuba, either,” the woman who’d been eating coconut flakes said firmly. “Not low enough.”
    “It’s trumpets,” the army guy said firmly. “Sounds just like ’em—and I’d know. I used to be in a marching band.”
    The bus sputtered through a turnaround, past a sign welcoming them to the town of Carbon County (pop.: 3,901; elev.: 6,394 ft.), and into the dusty parking lot of Elmer’s Gas ’n’ Grocery. A recent rain had washed through town, and a single, golden ray of sunlight peered through the still-steely sky.
    “You got a bag under here?” the driver asked as Daphne climbed off the bus, the trumpet blasts growing shriller with the first cool breath of fresh mountain air.
    She nodded.
    “Well, hurry up and get it out—those horns are starting to give me the creeps.”
    Daphne grabbed her duffel from beneath the bus and stretched her legs. A sudden high note sounded as she glanced around at the parking lot’s cracked pavement and the tree growing through the window of the abandoned Sleep-EZ Motel across the street.
    “There she is!” Uncle Floyd called from across the parking lot. He lumbered toward her, his face open in a wide, affable grin, and wrapped her in a bear hug. His hair had gone gray around the temples, and he walked with a bit of a limp, but he still had the same broad shoulders and mile-wide smile she remembered from her childhood. The same as her dad. “Just in time to witness this miracle from God. Good to see you again, niece!”
    Burying her face in the wood-smoky smell of his plaid flannel shirt, Daphne felt her shoulders relax for the first time in months. To Uncle Floyd, she wasn’t a burden or a victim or a murderer. To him, she was still just Daphne.
    He held her at arm’s length. “Lookit you: a grown woman. Little skinny, but a couple weeks of Aunt Karen’s cooking will fix that.” He laughed good and deep.
    “Do you know where that noise is coming from?” she asked as the bus pulled away, kicking up a cloud of dust as it turned onto Buzzard Road.
    Floyd grinned. “Isn’t it amazing? It just started, practically the moment I got in the truck to come pick you up. It’s like a sign from God, coming from the heavens.”
    Daphne frowned as she followed him to his ancient, rust-spattered pickup. “But there has to be an explanation,” she said. “What about the high school band? Maybe they’re practicing?”
    “Doubt it,” Floyd said amiably, hoisting himself into the driver’s seat. “Music got cut from the school budget years ago.”
    Daphne rolled down her window, letting the long metallic notes sweep in on a brisk, clean breeze. “Maybe it’s a trick of the wind?” she suggested. The air felt so fresh and pure on her face, it seemed almost possible that it could manufacture a sound exactly like a trumpet fanfare.
    Floyd’s laugh rolled deep and rich from his chest. “Could be,” he surmised. “But I’ve lived here my whole life, and I’ve never heard anything even remotely like it.”
    He swung the pickup onto Main Street, passing the movie theater where Daphne remembered going to see cartoons with the Peytons as a child. It was boarded up, a lone P hanging haphazardly from the marquee. Beyond it, more stores were shuttered permanently, with dusty For Rent signs in the windows and tattered awnings flapping in the wind. She noticed with a pang that the ice cream parlor where she’d always ordered a chocolate cone with double rainbow sprinkles had been converted to a pawnshop—and even that looked like it hadn’t been open in months. The village that she remembered as a candy-colored vacation mecca seemed more like a sleepy town ravaged by the recession, a drive-by on Highway 80 somewhere between Cheyenne and Salt Lake City.
    “Hey, Hal!” Floyd called to a man sitting on a bench