by Ryan Casey
The lock didn’t budge.
“Watching still,” Jenny said.
Jack frowned at her. Tried to wriggle the lock some more.
“I picked locks on Skyrim,” Sam said. “I can help.”
Jack smiled at Sam. Struggled some more with the lock. God, what kind of criminal was he?
“Have another clip?” Jack asked.
Jenny’s smile widened a little, like this was all a game that she was winning. She reached into her pocket, handed him another clip.
Jack folded this one back. Put this one in the lock too. Turned slightly to the left, then to the right, then…
Pop.
The lock turned.
The chemist’s door opened as he pushed it.
Sam’s eyes widened. “Woah!” he said. “Where did you learn to do that? Can you teach me?”
Jack pushed open the door, adrenaline coursing through his body. Jenny looked stunned, and a little impressed too. “You don’t want to know where I learned it. Trust me. Now stay close behind me, okay? Need to check this place out first.”
Jack walked in through the door. Held the torch out in front of him, looked all around the chemist’s.
The place looked empty. Dark. The counters were filled with cough sweets, plasters, bandages, food. Over the counter, a CCTV camera rolled, nobody watching on the other side.
It was strange being in a shop like this after dark. Not that Jack wasn’t used to breaking into places—that’d been his forte a few years back, when he was younger and stupider. But now, every move felt riskier than it did back then, even. Like one wrong step would bring a whole world of pain on him, on his kids.
Jack blocked the front door of the chemist’s with a counter filled with sunglasses and summer equipment. He turned the blinds, flicked the “Closed” sign around just for effect. The kids stuffed their faces on chocolate from the counters, on bags of crisps—a breakfast they’d no doubt dreamed about while stuck with Candice and her health-mad fads.
“Won’t we get done for stealing?” Sam asked.
Jen rolled her eyes. Sighed. “Have you even seen the outside? No one cares about stealing anymore.”
Sam looked at his Galaxy chocolate bar with guilt. Didn’t stop him chomping down on it, mind.
Jack walked over to him. Rummaged around in his pocket and pulled out some loose change. “Tell you what, why don’t you leave this on the counter? Write them a little thank-you note too, in case anyone ever does come back here. But this place is ours for now.”
Sam seemed to like the idea. After Jack cleaned and bandaged his hand, plastered his feet, he took one of the pads from the bottom shelf of a cabinet and started writing a note.
Jack walked over to Jenny. She was on her own, sitting back against the main counter.
“How’s your foot?” Jack asked.
Jenny glanced up at him. Reached down for her ankle. “Alright. Bit sore.”
Jack crouched down beside her. She shifted up slightly.
“How did you… how do you know?” he asked.
“Just feels a bit achey,” Jenny said. “But it’s better.”
“Not about the foot. About… about who I am.”
Jack glanced at her. They held eye contact for a few seconds before both of them looked away.
“Just… I remember you. I remember seeing a picture of you on Mum’s old computer. I asked who it was and she was all shy about it and I knew right then.”
Jack nodded. Stared over at Sam as he wrote away on the pad. “Your mum kept pictures of me? Quite flattering.”
“She deleted it.”
“Ah. Makes sense.”
They were quiet a few more seconds. Behind the blinds, Jack could tell that it was getting lighter outside, gradually and gradually. He snacked on some Walkers crisps. His eyes were tired, felt like huge bags were underneath them. God, when had he got so old?
“Does Sam know?”
“No,” Jenny said. “He never remembers you. We talked about you sometimes but he just doesn’t remember.”
Jack scratched the back of his neck. Felt his stomach turn. “Does… Are you gonna tell him?”
Jenny took a crisp from Jack’s packet. “Why would I? I know you’re just gonna leave us again. That’s why you won’t tell him the truth.”
Jack clenched his teeth together. Felt sick, the salt and vinegar tang stale in his throat. He watched Sam scribble away on the pad in his little blood-soaked Chelsea shirt, curly locks filled with sweat, but contented smile on his face.
“I don’t want to leave you,” Jack said. “It’s just… I’m not a good dad. There’s better people that can look after you.”
“How do you know you’re a bad dad if you’ve never tried?”
Jack looked at Jenny again. She looked back at him. Held eye contact.
He smiled at her. “I—”
He stopped speaking when he heard the door behind the counter rattling.
Sam looked up. Panicked look on his face. “What’s that?”
After a few more rattles and thumps, the wood of the door to the staff room cracked.
A bloodied fist punched its way through.
THIRTEEN
“Both of you get over behind the shelves at the front. Quick!”
Jack’s heart raced as the fist pounded at the wooden staff door at the back of the chemist’s. Shit. He hadn’t checked through that door. It’d been locked, so he hadn’t really worried about it. He’d check it in time.
He heard his kids mumbling to one another. Heard their confused footsteps, as the hand stuck through the sharp wood of the door, cutting and splintering itself, pushing and pulling pieces of loose wood away.
Jack stepped back. Looked around the chemist’s as the banging on the door continued. He needed something to protect himself. Outside, it was getting lighter, he could see that through the blinds.
He couldn’t go outside. He couldn’t leave this place, not at the break of dawn. He had a bad feeling about the break of dawn.
He fumbled around the shelves. Fumbled through the plasters, the cough sweets, the bottles of over-the-counter medicine.
Past the nail files.
Onto the scissors, the hand pulling more wood away from the door, the angry gasps getting louder, more strained.
He grabbed the sharpest scissors he could find. Tore them out of their plastic packaging with his shaking hands. Opened them up, held them so the sharp end of one of the blades pointed out like a knife.
And then he looked up and saw another arm poking through the door.
Another right arm.
He froze. There was more than one of these things in the back room.
He stood there with his scissors. Knew now he had little chance of fighting these things off with one scissor blade. Knew that if he didn’t act fast, those struggling runners would be through this door and on him and his kids and they’d be dead. Their story would be over.
After they’d suffered.
“We need to go outside,” Jack said. His voice was shaky. He could hardly speak.
“But the bad people,” Sam said.
Jack rushed over to the shelf in front of the door. Grabbed it, started to pull it away. “Help me with this, kids.”
Sam and Jenny stood still, watching the hands tear away the wood, watching the glazed eyes and angry faces of the runners appear in the crack.
“Now!”
Jack’s shout rattled his kids. They ran over to the side of the shelf. Both pressed themselves up against it, started to push. He didn’t like shouting at them, but if he didn’t shout then they’d die. There were new rules in this world. New, tough rules to adjust to.
Adjust or die.
The shelf moved. Inched away from the door, Jack’s kids straining away. Jack had a good grip of it now. He could see the slight light of the early signs of dawn peeking through, covering Sam and Jenny, as he moved the shelf away.
The wood of the door cracked completely.
The ru
nners tumbled over one another. Poured out of the destroyed door at the back of the chemist’s.
“Out the door! Now!”
Jack ran. His kids ran.
He pulled open the glass front door of the chemist’s.
Let his kids go first, as the footsteps of the runners got closer.
Turned around. Waited until the runners—a blonde woman and a skinny, greying man with gold jewellery, both naked—were just feet away.
“Get away,” Jenny called. “Get away!”
Jack waited. Waited until they were just steps away.
And when they were inches from the door, he slammed it as hard as he could in their faces.
They both fell back, both of the runners, but Jack didn’t have time to watch.
“Down Beech Drive,” he said. Grabbed his kids’ hands. Started to run.
“More of them.”
He saw them just after Sam spoke. Saw them in the first light of day, all congregating at the bottom of Beech Drive.
All looking up the street in Jack’s and his kids’ direction.
He turned away. Turned away, his kids in hand, and ran down the pavement of Garstang Road, of the main road. He didn’t want to be on this road for long. It was the busiest road in town. The link between the city centre, the suburbs, the countryside.
The most densely populated road in Preston.
“Keep hold of my hands,” Jack said. He was running fast. Running so fast that he felt like he was going to pull his kids’ arms out of their sockets.
Behind him, he heard footsteps.
Gasping and footsteps.
He didn’t look back. He just kept on moving down Garstang Road. Kept on running down the pavement, past the little row of estate agents that he’d go past every day when he used to jog. Past the old video shop that’d closed years ago, nobody bothering to buy out the space.
He looked for an alleyway. Looked for a road—just somewhere he could hide down.
“They’re getting closer,” Jenny said. She sounded more scared than her brother now, who was surprisingly silent. “They… they’re so close. Please.”
Still, Jack didn’t look over his shoulder. He just tightened his hand around his daughter’s. Kept on running, his heart pounding, his muscles weakening.
Up on the right, Jack saw a row of detached houses. Posh houses, that he’d never had the money to step inside but had the contacts to steal things from once upon a time. The front gates were wide open. Blood splayed out over the pavement in front. Around the house, there were tall brick walls—tall enough to keep people out.
Tall enough to keep the runners out.
“The gate,” Jack said, struggling for breath. “We… we’ll go through that gate. Push it… push it closed. Okay?”
His kids just nodded. Didn’t say a word—too scared, too out of breath.
He took that as an “okay,” and he ran some more towards this gateway.
When he’d passed through the thick wooden gates, he tried pulling them shut. Tried, but realised they were stuck.
“Shit,” he said. Electronic gates. Which meant there was a keypad around here somewhere. There had to be.
He pushed his kids in through the gates. Listened to the sound of footsteps and cries getting closer, felt the warmth of the first of the morning sun on his skin, warmer than any September sun he could remember.
When he turned to look for a keypad, he saw the runners coming his way for the very first time.
They were fast. Fast, like athletes. Men. Women. Teenagers. All running down the centre of the road, around the abandoned cars, over the dead animals.
All running towards Jack, towards his kids.
The thing that scared Jack the most wasn’t the blood on their hands, or covering their flowery dresses or white shirts. It wasn’t the shouting, the clawing out of their fingers in his direction.
It was how distinctly human they looked behind the anger in their eyes.
“Got it!” Jenny said.
Jack broke from his trance. Looked at Jenny. She was standing to his left by a metal keypad console.
He rushed over to it. Time was running out. “Good job. Let’s have a look.”
He stood opposite it.
Fuck. A numerical pad. Posh bastards had a numerical pad installed.
Footsteps getting closer. Sound of bodies tumbling over one another. Sam stood right by the front of the tall detached house, his fingers in his mouth, completely still.
“We don’t know the code,” Jenny said. “How can we lock the gate if we don’t know the code?”
Jack tried to thaw his mind like it was ice. He knew something about these locks. Kingston locks. They had a default code. An emergency code, just in case they ever needed to be reset. A few burglaries had taught him some handy lessons like that in the past.
He hovered his shaking thumb over the number 2. Pressed it. Then hit 4, then 1, then 2, then 5 then 7 then 9 then 4.
A little red light blinked.
A pair of beeps emitted.
“Fuck.”
“Dad… Jack, we need to get away,” Jenny said. She tugged on Jack’s sleeve. “They’re coming. We need to run.”
Jack focused. Took a few deep breaths, fought through the aching in his joints and the smell of sweat covering him, and he focused. He’d always been good at remembering numbers. Picturing them in his head, right from being a kid. He had to get this right.
2, 4, 1, 2, 5, 9, 4, 7.
Again, a little red light.
A pair of beeps.
He was about to enter a slight variation on the code, which he was convinced was right, when a man ran past the gate in the middle of the road.
He froze. Couldn’t move. They were here. They were going to see them. It was over.
And then he saw this bald, chubby man had fear in his eyes—fear, unlike the runners. And he was screaming in a distinctly more terrified tone, too.
He stumbled in the road. Fell face first onto the tarmac. Turned onto his back. Looked over at Jack, caught his eyes.
“Help,” he called. “P-please! Help!”
Jack looked away from him. Focused on the code, as the bald guy continued to cry for help, continued to scream.
Took deep breaths as the bald guy shouted out louder, as the sound of his skull being beaten into the concrete thumped its way through his mind.
2, 4, 1, 2, 5, 7, 4 9.
A little green light.
A longer beep.
The gates started to close.
Jack stepped away from the keypad as the gates closed. He took a glance through the narrowing crack outside the gate, out at the road where the bald man had fallen.
A short blonde woman had her thumbs stuffed into his eyes, blood dripping down the sides of his head as he let out little whimpers.
Over his stomach, three men jostled around to tear open his belly, his shirt pulled over his waist as they ripped open his pale flesh and played with his snakelike intestines.
Jack put an arm around each of his kids.
Pulled them close to his side.
When the gates slammed shut, he heard the sound of a skull cracking, and he knew for certain what kind of world he lived in now.
FOURTEEN
Jack held his children and listened as the shouting got louder and chaos erupted on the streets again.
They sat down by the side of the house. Held one another, staring at the tall wooden gate, praying none of the runners would even think to scale it. Jack had tried to get inside the detached house beside them. Tried the doors, but they were locked. Too tough to crack.
And Jack hardly wanted to go smashing any windows just now. It wasn’t worth risking the racket.
A sickly taste lingered in Jack’s mouth as the memory of the bald guy’s head exploding played around his thoughts. The gates had closed. Just as the guy’s skull cracked under the weight of that manic blonde woman, the gates had creaked shut.
But it was the sound that stuck in Jack’s
mind. The popping noise, like popcorn in a microwave.
The sound of everything falling apart.
Quite literally.
“How long do we stay here?”
It was Sam who spoke. He was shaking. Shaking, even though it was ridiculously boiling for September again. Bundled right up to Jack, real closely. Jenny cuddled up to him too, although there was more of a rigidity to her. A reluctance to get close.
Shit. Couldn’t blame her.
Jack gulped. He wanted to answer Sam straight. But he couldn’t. Not now the smell of burning had returned to the streets. Not now chaos had awoken again. “I don’t know, buddy. I don’t know.”
Sam tucked himself even closer to Jack and Jack felt a warmth inside him that he hadn’t felt for years.
They sat perched beside this house for God knows how long. Time was irrelevant, now. All that mattered was that it was light, and light was bad. Darkness was when they moved. When they travelled. When they did what they had to do—found food, water, ate.
But there was no way they were sleeping here. Not outside.
Not with the footsteps and the shrieks and the scratches so close.
“Why did…” Sam started.
He stopped.
“What was that?”
Sam shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”
Jack saw he was pale. His eyes were really wide. They’d been that way since they’d seen the bald guy get brutalised on the main road outside the gates. Jenny had gone quiet, too. Less cynical.
He pitied his children. Pitied their poor ten-year-old minds for having to witness the things they’d seen. It was enough to scar them for the rest of their lives.
Shit. This was scarring Jack for the rest of his life, and he was in his late thirties.
“If you want to talk about anything,” Jack whispered, as more footsteps pattered past the wooden gates, runners grunting away, “You… I’m here. We’ve all seen some… some horrible things. So if you’ve got anything on your mind—”
“Why did Jenny call you ‘Dad’?”
Jack’s chest tightened. He looked at Jenny, then back at Sam, then back at Jenny again. His words were frozen in his trachea. “She… What… When—”
“When we were coming away from the chemist place. Jenny called you ‘Dad’. Why did she call you ‘Dad’?”