by Keith Soares
“We only wanted a place to sleep out of the rain tonight,” I said. “Can we at least get that? We’ll leave in the morning and give you no trouble.”
Hector stared. I think because I wasn’t speaking like a raving lunatic, he didn’t know what to say at first. It didn’t last long.
“Oh, and we’re just supposed to trust that you’re not infected yourself? No way. Out. Now.” Hector puffed himself up as big as possible.
“We’re not infected!” Rosa said.
“And just how do you know that?” Hector chided.
“Fine. We’ll leave,” I said. “If you can help us with one thing.”
“What?” Hector’s surprise was obvious.
“You know this area, I assume. It’s raining like hell out there. You must know some place close by where we can shelter for the night.”
Hector thought about it. He seemed very reluctant to give up any information. Everyone was silent, looking back and forth at one another for a moment.
“The supply shed. Behind the bleachers.” It was David who spoke up. “It stays dry, and we’ve been in there, so we know there aren’t any zombies.”
Hector put on a sour expression for effect and to maintain his air of control, but acquiesced. “One night,” he said. “And you go there now.”
In minutes we stood at the back door, gauging the rain and the best route to run to the shed. David pointed the way. “Sorry for, you know, knocking you in the head.”
“Don’t worry about it, kid. Thanks for trying to help us.” I looked back at the gym, the warm beds and bright lights and plentiful supplies, and gave a regretful sigh. And we ran into the rain. The distance was maybe a few hundred yards, enough for us to get pretty soaked on the way. The shed was large and dry, but not built for comfort. As the storm intensified outside, we slept on the concrete slab floor. In the end, it may have saved our lives, despite the hours we spent shivering in our cold, damp clothes.
* * *
The next morning the rain had stopped. We awoke, ate some canned food from our provisions, and started back toward the highway. As we went past the gymnasium, a door flung open and Hector appeared. He ran toward us. He was holding a pistol.
“You killed them!” he shouted. Others piled out behind him, including David and Siobhan.
“It’s not their fault!” David yelled, pushing past people to get to Hector.
Shocked by the scene, I stood in place as Hector approached. It was one part fear that running would mean a bullet in my back, one part good old-fashioned inaction in the face of danger. Hector charged right up to me and trained the pistol on my forehead.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked quietly. Beside me Rosa gasped and leapt forward. Hector slid the pistol over toward her and she stopped short. He pointed it back to me.
“Last night,” Hector panted. “Because of you, we were attacked. Zombies everywhere. Goddammit. We were holed up all night. We ended up killing all the damn things — 23 of them. Eight of my people died. Just because you had to show up.” He cocked the pistol. From what we saw the day before, there were only 30 or 40 people living there in the first place. The community had gotten a heck of a lot smaller in one night.
“Hector!” Siobhan shouted. “She’s dead. This won’t bring her back.” Hector paused, and the pistol dipped a bit. Then he raised it in fury, back at my head.
“Please. Anna wouldn’t want this.” Siobhan extended her hand for the gun. I could only guess who Anna was. Hector’s wife or girlfriend or mother or sister. The specifics didn’t matter at the moment.
Wheeling around, Hector changed his focus. “Actually, I suppose it was you two who are really responsible.” He looked toward David and Siobhan. “Pack up your things, you’re out of here today.”
Siobhan stepped back. “No! We’ll die outside!”
I looked at Hector, into his eyes. He was on the edge, maybe on the edge of sanity. Anything could happen.
Quickly, he shifted the pistol’s aim and fired, three fast shots, chest, shoulder, face. Siobhan dropped, dead. David leaped on top of Hector and they fell, rolling and fighting. Everyone scattered. The gun went off again, once, twice. If this was The Oasis, it was crumbling. There was nothing we could do to fix it. We ran.
13
Interstate 95 runs up and down the entire East Coast, connecting most of the big cities. In between long stretches of pavement sided by nothing but trees, there were clusters of strip malls and office developments sitting along the highway. If you couldn’t find it along 95, you couldn’t find it anywhere. We weren’t really looking for anything in particular, except food and nightly shelter, but then we saw it: an RV dealership. The sign promised comfortable living and happy families traveling across the country. The appeal was instantly overwhelming: our own vehicle, to make the travel faster, to carry our gear, to keep us out of bad weather... and most importantly, to sleep in safely every night. Unfortunately, we weren’t the only people to think that. The dealership was pretty much cleaned out. There were a couple of huge vehicles left, but peering through the window I could see I didn’t have a clue how to drive them. There was a pickup truck with a camper trailer, but that would mean two separate, self-contained spaces to worry about — the truck cockpit and the camper interior. Around back, we got lucky, coming across a smallish integrated RV that might have been the owners’ private ride. It was locked. Rosa went to the dealership office and tried the door. It, too, was locked, so she broke a small window, reached through, and let herself in. She had to step over a dead body, desiccated beyond recognition, with wisps of clothing and the last remnants of skin and hair clinging to its greyish form. She tried drawers and cabinets, and ended up with a ridiculous number of keys. Back at the RV, she tried nearly every one until finally the door opened, and she jumped into the driver’s seat.
“Okay, now what?” she asked.
I checked the tires and found them in passable condition. “Do you know how to drive one of these things?” I asking, moving over to look at the range of dials and controls in front of her.
“I don’t know how to drive. Period. I never got a license because I lived in the city.” Rosa smirked.
“I used to drive a ‘luxury sedan,’” I said. “That seems like another lifetime.” Rosa hopped out and I got behind the wheel. I put the key in the ignition and turned it. Nothing.
“When I was a teenager, my parents made me learn a little bit about cars,” I said as I reached under the dashboard, looking for the hood release. I pulled it, and the RV’s hood popped free with a kachunk. I moved to the front of the RV. “I’m thinking it’s the battery. I doubt it could sit here for 10 years, or even just a few years, depending on the last time it ran.” I opened the hood and there was the dead battery, mottled with corrosion, mocking me.
“What do we do?” Rosa asked.
“Well, two ideas come to mind. First, we push this baby over to a downhill slope and hope that we can pop the clutch and get ’er started.” I could tell that my sarcasm was lost on Rosa, the non-driver. “But given that this is an automatic transmission, that’s out of the question.”
She peered at me from the driver’s side window. “Plan B?”
“I have a thin hope that our RV dealer friend was also into disaster preparation. Let’s look around.” We went back to the office and dug around, then wandered through a door and into a small workroom. Looking carefully, I found something I hadn’t seen in several decades: a trickle battery charger. I put it on a countertop. I found some tools and was able to disconnect the battery from the RV and bring it back into the workshop, where I placed it next to the charger. I headed back outside with increased purpose, and followed the outer edge of the building. Tucked in a back corner where most people would never look, there was a thicket of overgrown bushes. Underneath I saw the glint of metal and began pulling away the leaves and branches, revealing an old gas generator tied into the office building.
With a rush of excitement, I ran back to the workroom and r
ummaged about, eventually coming up with a small gas canister and a hose. Back at the RV, I prayed there was enough gas inside for us to steal some, then opened the tank, inserted the hose, and placed the canister on the ground. Pushing the hose inward, I heard a liquid spoosh. My heart raced. Rosa looked at me like I had gone mad. In my haste, I’d neglected to tell her anything about what I was doing. Now I put the loose end of the hose in my mouth and sucked. I jammed the hose into the canister and after a second watched as it filled with a clear brown liquid. Gasoline, thank God, pouring into the canister. I tried my best to estimate how much it would take to power up the generator and get some charge on the battery, while still leaving enough to drive the RV. In the end, as a total guess, I siphoned off maybe two-thirds of a gallon of gas.
Next I had to worry about the generator. I brushed it off and opened the screw top to the fuel tank. Delicately, I poured the gas into the opening, splashing a few times, cursing my jittery old hands. With the canister dry, I had a quiet, almost desperate moment of reckoning. I closed the screw top, reached for the pull chain to start the engine. “Wish me luck,” I said, winking at Rosa.
“Luck,” she said drably.
I pulled. Nothing.
I pulled again. Nothing but the slightest sluggish whir. I checked the choke, thanking my parents silently for insisting that I know something about this when I was young. Pulled it open. Tugged again. Nothing. Once more. A little rumble. Hope sprang. Again I pulled, feeling the strain already in my shoulder and arm. The motor sputtered, coughed, almost gave up... and then ran so high I thought it might blow. Rosa stepped back, surprised. Remembering something else about the choke, I rushed to push it in, almost too quickly. The engine slowed, came near to stall, but finally evened out. I looked at Rosa, unbelieving. A wide grin spread across my face, and she couldn’t help but follow suit. Then I ran back inside. “Are you going to tell me what you’re doing?” she yelled.
In the workroom, I flicked on the light switch, checking for power, but nothing came on. In the fading light of day, I saw the bulb was missing from the overhead fixture. I’d have to leave it to luck. I plugged in the battery charger, turned a switch. A tiny red light appeared, and I laughed out loud. “We’re going to charge this battery!” I was giddy. “Or, well, I hope we are. If the gas holds out.” I connected the battery to the charger, checked the gauges. It really did seem to be working.
“How long does it take?” Rosa asked, peering over my shoulder.
My smile faded. “That’s the problem. This is a trickle charger. It’s called that because it trickles the charge into the battery a little bit at a time. My guess is, as much as eight hours.”
“Eight hours?” she asked. “You really think that little bit of gas will last that long? And what do we do in the meantime?”
“I guess we wait.”
* * *
We holed up in the workroom, afraid that the noise from the generator might attract undue attention. It was a nervous night, but we finally dozed. It must have been around three or four o’clock in the morning when something suddenly woke us up. It was silence.
“What happened?” Rosa asked, groggy but wary.
“The generator died. Ran out of fuel.”
“Now what?” Her eyes looked at me in confusion, hope, tiredness.
“In the morning, we try it out.”
* * *
As the morning light filtered in, I unhooked the battery and grabbed a tool. From the office, I peered out the window to make sure the coast was clear. It was. Carefully, I walked to the RV and reconnected the battery. If this failed, the idea of trudging on foot another day made me feel so weary I couldn’t move. I looked at Rosa, nodding for her to try the key. Though she didn’t drive, she understood. She sat in the driver’s seat and turned the ignition.
Somehow, the engine started. I rushed over and checked the fuel gauge: less than a quarter tank. A lot less. That was going to be a problem. We’d need to make finding fuel a priority, on top of finding food. We let the engine run, wasting gas but further charging the battery. Using the canister and hose, we checked all the other vehicles we could find on the lot and came up with another gallon and a half of gas, which we poured straight into the RV’s tank. Then it was time to check out the rest of the RV’s interior. What a lucky break. It was totally tricked out. Here we were in the ruins of civilization, and we would be driving an RV with leather seats, a refrigerator, stove, bed, even a bathroom. And it was clean. That was a relief after days of living in conditions that life behind the wall had taught us to fear. We didn’t talk about it, but I’m sure Rosa was as afraid as I was that we might be exposing ourselves to the disease. The RV was tidy, and a place we could reasonably keep clean by ourselves.
* * *
Rosa was interested in learning how to drive. I found that I reacquainted myself with driving pretty quickly, and so I taught her. It was easy, since the car was an automatic. And it didn’t hurt that there was a complete lack of other cars on the road. We had to navigate around potholes, frequent pileups, and abandoned cars, but that mostly just broke up the boredom of the drive. The freedom and exhilaration of driving was just about the most fun thing we had done in years.
All of the gas stations we checked were bone dry, so when we stopped to scavenge for food, we also looked for smaller stashes of gas. Given the state of the world, the desperate, aborted migrations that followed the disease, there were a lot of junked cars with spare gas cans in the trunk. We hoarded these and were able to fill up the tank. The small RV got decent gas mileage — about 24 miles per gallon — but even still, with 500 miles or so to go, we’d need more than 20 gallons. And that was assuming our destination was where we thought it was.
While scavenging, we also topped off the RV’s water tank and loaded up the refrigerator and cabinets with anything remotely edible that we could find. We checked stores and houses near the RV dealership and off the next few exits along 95. With water and food, and a brand-new moving shelter loaded with a full tank of gas, we felt great.
Before we hit the road in earnest, I decided to try out the toilet, but wanted to be sure it worked first. The toilet fed into a tank labeled Black Water. I found out, much to my dismay, that it was already partially full. We decided the rest of the world wouldn’t mind too much if we simply let the toilet drain out onto the road.
After all, we’d been doing our business outside since we began the trip. We doubted anyone would mind too much.
* * *
Having spent most of the day searching for supplies to fill the RV, we made little progress on the road, and the tension of the previous night made us tired early. As dusk settled in, we found a place to stop, on an overpass where we could see every approaching direction fairly well. We decided to get some sleep. Rosa went to the back while I locked up the RV and shut down the engine. I turned to go back to where the bed was located... and stopped. In the fading light, I saw Rosa slip out of her worn shirt and pants, standing in her underwear, her lean, olive-toned body reflecting the sun in warm curves. She looked up and paused, her eyes on mine.
I noticed I was holding my breath. “Uh... sorry,” I said, turning and taking in air.
After a pause, I heard her say, “Don’t worry.” She got into the bed and turned toward me. “There’s only one bed. We’ve slept side-by-side each night now. It’s okay.”
I looked at her, then looked around the RV.
“Come. Lie down. Here.”
So I did.
14
We made great time all the way through to Richmond. But we had to be careful once we got there — last we heard, Richmond was a functional, walled city, like DC. We continued on 95, driving straight toward its heart. As we approached the Route 1 overpass, we saw that the space between the bridge and the street below had been filled in, walling off the entrance. Cars and trucks were heaped along the shoulders of the road, like they had been deliberately swept aside to clear the way. It was impossible to tell if the fortifica
tions were guarded; if anyone still kept up the city’s defenses. Rosa drove ahead. Slowly, carefully.
A blast tore open the ground just ahead, to the passenger side of the RV, with a sound loud enough to cancel out everything else and leave my ears ringing. My nose filled with an acrid smell. Tiny bits of pavement rained onto the RV. Rosa swerved left, more a flinching move than actual defensive driving, sending me flailing toward into the passenger door. The RV wasn’t moving all that quickly, but it was tall and the turn was sudden. For a moment we skittered up on two wheels before thudding back down to the road, Rosa zigging to try to regain control. The RV slammed against a low concrete wall dividing the two sides of the highway and dragged to a stop, throwing sparks.
Rosa turned to look at me. “What the hell was — ?” Another shot missed overhead, cutting into an abandoned car in the opposite lane. There must have been some gas left in its tank; the car jumped into the air in a fireball explosion, making a low whump.
“Go!” I shouted. “Back the way we came! Turn us around!”
With a ripping of metal on concrete, Rosa drove forward. She had to get off the wall before she could turn around. “How far can they shoot?” she asked.
“I have no idea, just keep going!” Somehow she turned the RV around. Another blast, now behind us, lifted our back end. For a moment, it looked like the extra push of the explosion would send us crashing directly into a pickup truck that angled out from the side of the highway.
At the last minute, Rosa swerved. I was sure that I hadn’t taught her anything like that. I think it was just her good instincts. Then she did something even smarter. She drove toward the shoulder, where a large tractor-trailer jutted diagonally into the road. She put it between us and the city wall, buying us the seconds we needed. As I looked back, I saw the barrel of the mounted gun — a huge thing, I have no idea what to even call it — turning to aim at us again. But as Rosa sped away, it didn’t fire.
Maybe we were out of range, maybe we no longer appeared to be a threat, or maybe they just wanted to conserve ammunition. Either way, we lived.