Jaded high-school best friends ditch their struggling hometown and set out to explore the modern American West in search of a better way.

And so it was with the kind of wide-eyed, slack-jawed wonder that only those who have been lovers in springtime know that he beheld the vision of Eden who flitted out from the shadows of the forest into the dappled sunlight on the road.

The sun sank behind the smokestack. Despite his unease, Ben felt a cold thrill. That morning, they had been warehouse grunts. Tonight, they were explorers squatting on the ruins of another world.