by K. M. Fawkes
Chapter 7
Brad didn’t see another soul for the entire day and exhaustion had almost completely overtaken him by the time he pulled into the small town of Patten, Maine. The population listed on the sign was 1,560, but of course, that was no longer the case.
Things must have been a little rougher here back when the apocalypse was just a panic. It had been that way in some towns, especially the smaller ones. Whole towns had been wiped out when the virus began to spread. Patten seemed to be one of them.
If he’d thought that the flora and fauna had gotten out of control in Bangor, it had nothing on Patten; the town looked like it had been abandoned years ago. Light filtered through the overhanging branches of the tall trees and speckled the cracked and weathered asphalt of the two-lane highway. He dodged the potholes carefully. He couldn’t afford for anything to happen to the bike now.
As he cycled into the town itself, he saw a sign to his left. It was nearly hidden by weeds, even though it was almost as tall as he was. He had to get closer to read it, but upon inspection the faded and peeling blue lettering said “Anderson’s Bed and Breakfast.”
That could be promising. They would have been used to cooking for a lot of people. Maybe there would be something left…
He walked up the steps cautiously and paused on the porch to listen. He’d seen the danger of encroaching on someone else's territory today, and he wasn’t eager for a second lesson. He stayed quiet and as still as possible, but he didn’t hear any noises from inside.
He opened this door like he would have before the world went to shit—his shoulder still hurt from his last heroic door opening. It was lucky the place wasn’t locked up, as his lock-picking skills were definitely rusty. That was something else he’d have to work on in the upcoming days. He added it to his mental list.
That list was already growing longer and longer. He needed to remember how to pick locks and jimmy windows. He should probably also refresh himself on using a gun. He wasn’t going to be able to do any target practice, obviously—who knew when he’d be able to get more bullets? But he could practice loading it quickly and he could certainly clean it.
A gun doesn’t do you any good if it won’t fire, so be sure to take care of it.
He touched the gun at his waistband guiltily as the words echoed through his memory. He’d made sure to take it apart and clean it up as best he could either tonight or tomorrow morning. A bed and breakfast probably wouldn’t have the proper supplies, but he could at least make sure that no dirt had gotten in. Then, when he got to the cabin, he could do the job right.
“Hello? Anybody here?”
No one answered the tentative call of greeting he gave as he stepped into the cool front room. He sincerely hoped that the lack of response meant that no one was there.
He leaned his bike against the nicely wallpapered wall of the reception area and walked further into the room. One thing was for sure: if the floorboards were as creaky through the rest of the house as they were in this room, he wouldn’t have to worry about being snuck up on. Things were looking up.
He creaked across the front room, past the check-in desk, and into the back of the house. He passed a small room filled with bookshelves and a little side table. There was a pitcher filled with what had once been cheerful flowers on the table. He could see the remains of the petals on the lacy white tablecloth and some on the floorboards as well.
The sight of it made his heart ache. His mother had picked wildflowers and put them around their apartment every week in the early years of living without his father. Later, when the money situation had loosened up just a bit, she’d splurged on some orchids. She’d treated them like her babies until she’d gotten sick. He couldn’t remember what had happened to them.
He turned and left the little room, looking for something to distract him from his memories.
He found it in the dining room. When he pushed the door open, he saw the remains of a full meal laid out on the table and stopped in his tracks. Were there people here after all? People that wouldn’t be pleased to have their meal intruded on?
Brad took a step back quickly, glancing around as if he expected survivors to come out of the woodwork. None did, and his panic subsided just a bit.
That was when he noticed the hum and buzz of the flies that circled the food. No one was going to be ringing the dinner bell for this meal anytime soon. He stepped forward and looked more carefully, hoping that what was laid out here would give him a better idea of what he might find in cabinets or pantries.
There were the remains of eggs, scrambled and over easy, as well as strips of bacon and pitchers of what had probably been orange juice and milk. The liquids had long since gone moldy.
Even if any of that was still around, it wouldn’t do him any good. The plate of toast sitting in the center of the table with the pretty little butter dish wouldn’t help, either. Bread didn’t last very long, even when there weren’t insects feasting on it, and the butter had long since melted and overflowed the shallow dish, staining the tablecloth with grease.
He glanced down and saw the footprints he was leaving on the dusty floor. They were the only set that showed in the thick coating of dust. This had probably been one of the last gathering places when people began to huddle together, but there was no way anyone had been here lately.
He relaxed so suddenly that he had to brace himself on the back of one of the big chairs. There had been too much stress and not nearly enough sleep or food in the past forty-eight hours, and he could feel that he was going to crash hard if he didn’t remedy those two situations as soon as possible.
The rest of the downstairs was free of bodies, living or dead, which made him feel much better. Once he made sure that the upstairs was the same, he could eat in peace and maybe get some rest as well. He walked up the stairs and looked into the guest rooms one by one, being as quick as he could be while still being thorough.
There weren’t a whole lot of rooms, but Brad could tell that the owners had been proud of the amenities they offered. There were nice little touches like handmade quilts in different patterns in each room, and the wallpaper dictated the color scheme.
“Mom would be proud,” he muttered to himself as he realized he was debating the merits of the rooms by the quilt designs.
Brenda Fox hadn’t had much free time. She’d gone from working three jobs immediately after the divorce, to two jobs when Brad had entered middle school and they’d found a more affordable apartment. When he was in high school, she’d finally managed to drop down to one that took up far more than forty hours of her week, but she’d always quilted in what time she had to spare. She didn’t like to turn the thermostat very far above the lowest setting no matter how much snow there was on the ground, so she tended to swathe Brad and herself in layers of linen for most of the winter.
After he’d checked every room and even poked his head up into the neat little attic bedroom, he chose a second-floor bedroom with a blue quilt and green leaves-printed wallpaper. He told himself that it was because the windows were right next to the bed and he could get some fresh air, but the truth was that the quilt reminded him of one his mother had made when he was in high school. It had been his favorite. Blue had been his favorite color since he was a kid. His dad hated blue.
The windows creaked reluctantly when he pushed them open, but it was worth the cringe-inducing sound when a fresh breeze obligingly blew through and swept the musty smell away. He stood right where he was, enjoying the air for a moment, before he headed back down the stairs.
Now that he’d figured out that he was alone and planned where he was going to sleep, he really needed to take care of the fact that he was starving. If luck remained on his side, he could fix that problem without needing to choke down any more cold, canned pasta. At least, for now.
Brad went into the kitchen and began to dig through the cabinets. There weren’t quite as many nonperishables in there as he’d found in the pretty little home in Bangor, but s
omeone who worked at the B&B had definitely had a taste for the processed food. He found several bags of cheese puffs and chips, along with some Pop-Tarts tucked behind some bags of organic whole-grain flour.
When he came across an unopened two-liter of soda, he cracked it open right then and there. He’d been a caffeine fanatic before the EMP. Standing in the kitchen, he took several long, slow drinks of the warm soda, letting the taste of it linger on his tongue before finally putting the bottle down with a sigh of happiness.
Exhaustion washed over him as he examined the rest of the cabinets, trying to find something that might be considered at least marginally healthy. He didn’t feel like cooking—all he really wanted to do was stuff himself with easy food and then go to sleep in a real bed. So, that was exactly what he was going to do.
Pushing and shoving, he managed to work one of the big antique dressers that had been in the front room in front of the door after he’d locked it. Then, he braced a chair under the doorknob of the back door, gathered some snacks he’d found with the two-liter of soda, and turned to head up to the room he’d chosen.
Suddenly, Brad doubled back and ducked into the little library off to the side of the dining room, where he perused the shelves carefully. He hadn’t had many books in his small apartment because he didn’t like having too much stuff lying around, but he’d been a regular at his local library. He was pleased to find a good cross-section of interests represented here.
He wouldn’t be stuck with the cheap romances and true crime books that people who wanted to stock a library without actually reading anything themselves tended to stock a library with. He examined the titles carefully and then pulled a few books free, holding them under one arm so that he wouldn’t lose his grip on any of his food as he climbed the stairs.
He opened a bag of chips, twisted the top off of the two-liter once more, and flopped down onto the bed right in front of the open window. He flipped one of the books open to the first page and began to read as he ate. It felt strangely normal—probably because it was how he’d spent every summer in high school.
By the time the light had faded so much that he was forced to squint to make out the words of the mystery he’d chosen, all the chips and soda were gone. So were half the Pop-Tarts.
He stuffed the trash into the biggest empty potato chip bag and arranged all of it neatly on the side table. Then, he eyed his bedroom door, thinking hard.
He didn’t think anyone was going to be coming through, and he’d done everything he could do to secure the entrances. However, it was better to be safe than sorry. He got up, locked his bedroom door, and pushed a chair in front of it as well. Then, he undressed and climbed into bed, pulling the covers up and sighing in satisfaction as the cool linen hit his overheated skin.
This time, surely, he would drift right off. After all, he had an actual bed to go with his pillows and blankets this time. But it didn’t happen.
For one thing, he’d eaten entirely too much junk food and his stomach wasn’t pleased with him. But more than that, he couldn’t help but wonder what had happened back at the safe house when he hadn’t returned last evening.
He really didn’t think that they would have gone looking for him. He wasn’t really close with anyone there, and no one else had been willing to leave in the first place, even when they were facing starvation. But he had promised to bring food. That might get a search party up and moving.
It wouldn’t really end well if they did head out looking for him. The people he’d lived with hadn’t exactly been what he’d call well-prepared. What would they do in the face of danger from the soldiers? Or when they saw death hanging in that pretty little house? Or if someone put a shotgun in their faces?
He didn’t like to think about it, but he couldn’t stop. Had he owed them more than this? If he had, what was it?
The cabin he was heading for was small. It only had two bedrooms and one bathroom. He couldn’t have taken all forty-nine of those people with him, even if he’d wanted to.
And he couldn’t have taken a few without risking the rest finding out. Even if he’d wanted to take that chance, how would he have chosen who got to go and who would be forced to stay? Who would get a cabin perfectly designed for an event just like this one, and who would be stuck waiting on the mercy of a government that might not even exist anymore?
Even if the cabin had miraculously been big enough to hold all of the people he’d spent the past six weeks with, what would he have fed them? There was no way that there would be enough supplies to get them all through the winter. Was he supposed to give everything away?
Have some humanity!
He could see the dead man’s eyes suddenly. He shook his head again, as if that would help his argument. This wasn’t about humanity or the lack of it. It was about survival.
He’d been within his rights to leave. He’d done what he had to do to keep himself alive. In a situation like this, it was every man for himself.
None of those axioms helped. Guilt stayed at the back of his mind like a persistent itch, even long after sleep claimed him.
Chapter 8
The sound of a bird chirping happily woke Brad up. His newly rested brain informed him that it was an eastern phoebe. He didn’t need to dig deep to remember what the next one was; the blue jay’s shriek was unmistakable.
The temperature had dropped overnight and he felt pleasantly cozy where he was. Maybe he could just stay here. He could reopen the bed and breakfast if this all blew over, he thought drily. Brad’s Bed and Breakfast was alluringly alliterative. Of course, on the other side of that coin, there was hardly anything to eat here and the cabin would have a well-stocked cellar.
It was the thought of food that motivated him to get out of bed. He closed the windows, thinking of the things his father had stocked. Lee had made the yearly grocery trip every summer. By the time Brad was seven, his father was showing him how to plan out the supply list. He also spent a fair amount of time telling Brad that people couldn’t live on cheese puffs, even if they did last through almost anything.
As he began to make the bed out of sheer force of habit, he did some mental calculations. If he really pushed himself, he was almost sure that he could get to the cabin tonight. His leg muscles screamed at him when he bent down to grab his clothes off of the floor and he winced. His sunburn had faded to a slight flush and an annoyance, but the tension in his muscles had only gotten worse overnight.
He pulled his shirt over his head slowly. Did he really want to push himself? Honestly, no. But he didn’t want to eat unheated canned pasta again, either.
It would also be a whole lot more practical to make one long ride and land somewhere safe than it would be to take his chances going along the road more slowly. He could run into anything between here and the cabin.
Territorial survivors were only one of the problems. There were also bears, and if they were getting as brave as the rest of the wildlife he’d seen, he really didn’t want to risk running into one.
His jeans were cool against his skin when he pulled them on and he wished that he could find a way to make that feeling last. The temperature would probably approach eighty degrees by the afternoon.
That was another plus, actually. The cabin was built in a shady spot in the woods. The temperature tended to stay the same pretty much year round there because of a combination of insulation, shade, and solar panels that delivered a livable amount of heat in the winter and ran a few fans in the summer.
With so little advice having been issued by the government prior to the EMP, whether or not the solar panels would work was iffy at this point. Brad doubted that they would, but he’d have to figure it out when he got up there.
If they didn’t, it wouldn’t be all that bad. There was a big fireplace in the living room and a wood-burning stove in the kitchen. They would both keep him warm enough in the coming winter if the solar panels were down.
Brad glanced around the room to make sure that he wasn’t leaving anyt
hing behind and realized how strange it probably was to take the time to close the windows and make the bed. But what could he say? He liked the routine of civilized habits. Of course, he also planned on looting the place before he hit the road. He could only hope that one would cancel out the other.
Downstairs, he looked through the cabinets once again and found a few water bottles. They were empty, but he stowed them in his pack anyway. He was almost positive that there was a stream nearby and he intended to check it out before he left. If the water was drinkable, he’d have some extra for the road. And if it wasn’t, he’d have some to pour over his head when it got too hot.
As the front door closed behind him, he took a deep breath and stretched. Maybe an easy walk to find the stream would loosen his muscles. He walked across the street, pushing his bike along beside him, and plunged into the overgrown front yard of the house directly across from the bed and breakfast.
There had been a neat little garden in the backyard at one point, but now weeds and slowly encroaching ivy ran rampant through it. From some flattened areas and telltale tracks, he knew that deer had run through it as well.
His foot got caught in a tangle of vines and he swore under his breath, hoping that poison ivy hadn’t joined the mix. When he bent down to free himself, however, his eyes widened and he traced the vine back eagerly.
He’d been right. Cantaloupes. He thumped the one closest to him and grinned at the hollow sound it produced. He snapped it off the vine and continued through a little more carefully.
Most of the produce was gone by now, either rotting on the ground or picked clean by wildlife. Near the back fence, he found a blueberry bush that the birds hadn’t yet gotten to and filled one of the plastic water bottles he’d been hanging onto with the ripe berries. He filled another bottle when he came to the thorny vines of the blackberry bush and pushed both bottles down into his backpack along with the cantaloupe.