She barely had time to wish she’d agreed to take Paul’s gun when she heard the gentle sound of the front door to the building opening behind her. She turned back towards the Union Township police department and watched as Paul walked out. His gaze was pointed straight ahead, but she could tell he was forcing himself to keep his head up. His very posture told her that what he’d seen inside had not been worth seeing.
“Paul?” she asked as he approached the bikes. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” he said, his voice thin.
“No one alive?”
He shook his head as he straddled the bike seat and knocked the kickstand up. “I couldn’t even walk in there without….I mean, I should check to see if they have some sort of armory or something, but I…no, not here…”
He trailed off here, looking to his feet. It was clear that he did not want to discuss what he’d seen inside, so she left him to his silence. He was rattled, which alarmed her; given everything they’d seen together, she had not seen him quite so shaken. She waited for him to get his bearings as he looked ahead, then left and right. After some thought, he gestured at her with his left arm, waving her to the right, to follow him as he kicked away from the curb and started coasting the bike down the street.
She followed, giving the police department one last glance and wondering just what had been inside that had so badly jarred Paul. Perhaps, she thought to herself, it was better if she did not know. She pedaled along behind Paul as Joyce continued to shift and stir awake in the little trailer behind her.
Chapter 23
Paul was beginning to understand that when faced with tremendous stress and helplessness, there were things that took shape in a man’s mind that were better left in the sludge of the subconscious. He supposed it did not help that a mind already gone dark by watching all of New York City consumed by a virus had then taken in the gruesome sight waiting for him in the Union Township police department. Even now, two hours later, he was still trying to wrap his head around it.
Eleven people, dead. At least nine of them had been police officers. Looking at it from an investigative standpoint, he was pretty sure the cop he’d found with the upper portion of his head blown off had blasted everyone within the bullpen before falling back against the wall and putting the shotgun he’d killed them with in his own mouth. That included the woman that had been shot in the stomach at close range at least three times, nearly sawing her in half. What Paul’s mind was hung on, though, was how the rogue cop had managed to pull the trigger once the barrel had been in his mouth; the human body simply didn’t bend that way. He figured there was no sense in looking for clues, that it was futile to waste too much brain power on it. It had been done and it was miles behind him.
But he could not deny that the sight had indeed pushed something within him, something that was making him very aware of the shapes forming in his mind and speaking. These were voices that told him it was absolutely fine to be irritated with Joyce for needing to take a piss every hour, and that it was also perfectly acceptable to wish he’d just left both Joyce and Olivia back at Little Learners. Who did he think he was, thinking he could play hero and protector? He already felt like they were slowing him down and every little thing they did grated on his nerves. Even Olivia’s seeming passivity about everything and blindly following him was making him want to lash out at her.
But Paul had been a cop for over twenty years and he knew that such thoughts were simply the result of pressure and impossible situations made somehow even more impossible. It did not make these deep-seated thoughts any less true, but it helped him to push them down and keep them in that subconscious mud rather than act on them.
After leaving the police department, they coasted directly through Union Township and hooked up with Route 22. While there was considerable traffic in the lanes, it was nowhere near as bad as the congestion they’d experienced at the start of their trek. Paul and Olivia were able to ride unhindered (with the exception of Joyce needing to stop for bathroom breaks and to stretch her legs) for the remainder of the day. By the time Olivia was forced to call it quits, it was 5:40 in the evening and they’d managed to make it just outside of Princeton.
He could tell that she was embarrassed that she was so worn out. But he also saw the way she winced when she got off of the bike and sat down on the pavement. They were in front of a bank on the outskirts of Princeton with about two hours of good daylight left. But it had been a grueling day, and if Paul was being honest with himself, he also wanted to stop and try to get a grip on things.
He parked his bike beside Olivia’s and they worked together to take out water and snacks. As Olivia uncapped a new water and handed it to Joyce, the little girl poked her head out of the trailer.
“Can I come out?” she asked. “I’m bored.”
Paul was surprised when Olivia didn’t even think about the answer. It came out easily, as if she’d already given it some thought. “You can, yeah. But you have to stay near me and Mr. Paul okay?”
Joyce huffed a bit at this, making Paul feel a twinge of that caveman-like annoyance stirring. It was easily stomped down, though, as he tried to fathom what all of this must seem like to a four year-old. Having to sit still all day, pulled by a bike through what was basically a weird automotive graveyard.
Paul did his best to interact with Joyce, hoping she’d become more of a priority to him. While he naturally wanted to keep them safe and help Joyce somehow get to her father, his main focus right now was reaching his grandfather’s cabin. He knew there was a very good chance that they could get there and he’d find his eighty-nine year-old grandfather dead. Heavy drinking as a younger man, two divorces, and a battle with lung cancer hadn’t killed Roosevelt Gault, but this Blood Fire virus would likely get the job done. It made Paul wonder, as he had already pondered about a hundred times before during their journey, if living somewhere isolated and out of the way would make it harder for the virus to reach someone. It was why he’d thought of the cabin as a place of refuge in the first place and why he dared to hope his grandfather might be alive when they got there.
If they got there. He chewed on a chocolate chip granola bar as he watched Olivia work with Joyce. She was making something of a game of ensuring the little girl stretched her legs. He could see a resigned sort of disbelief in the little girl’s eyes, but he wouldn’t be so cliched as to say something inside of her had died—though he supposed that might be true. What must it have done to her innocence and still-forming trust in the world to all of a sudden be faced with this living nightmare?
It was a thought that kept the sludgy dark voices in the deeper recesses of his mind. It allowed him to even take part in the stretching exercises. Olivia told Joyce to pretend that she was melting, to really give those legs a good stretch, and then the lower back. Paul participated, but it was mostly to make sure Joyce did not see the three dead bodies in the Subaru sitting right next to them, partially out of the turn lane and slightly up on the sidewalk.
As he stayed perched to the right of the little exercise game Olivia was expertly putting together, he spotted the corner of a red sign barely protruding from over the top corner of a coffee shop on the corner. He could only see a few letters from the sign, but he knew what it was easily enough. An idea formed in his mind and it filled with some of the faintest traces of relief.
“You girls ready to rest?”
“For sure,” Olivia said.
“Rest?” Joyce asked. “But I just got out of the little wagon thing.”
“I know,” Paul said. “And you’ll have to get back in, but only for a minute this time. How high can you count?”
“Twenty. But after twenty, the numbers get all funny.”
“That’s fine. Tell you what: get back in the trailer really quick and count to twenty five times. By the time you’re done, you can get out again.”
Paul supposed Joyce saw it as a game because she smiled and, nearly spilling her water, crawled back into the trailer. Olivia gav
e him a puzzled glance. He saw many things in her eyes all at once. First, she was tired. Second, she was heart-broken for Joyce. And third, she was terrified. The terror had been there since last night when he’d drawn her out of Little Learners and into the streets of New York City.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
Behind her, Joyce began to count. She did so almost uncertainly, drawing each syllable out fairly long. “Oooone…twwwooo…”
“Last night, it was a camper,” he said. Then, pointing to the fragment of the red sign he’d spotted high up in the air, he added: “Tonight, maybe a motel.”
“You think there will be room?” she asked. “You think it’ll be safe?”
“I’ll make sure it is,” he said. He hated how cheesy and postured it sounded, like something a hero might say in a movie. But he was also quite proud to realize he meant it. “Come on,:” he said. “Think you can bike another quarter of a mile?”
She was on her bike at once, looking toward the sign for the Red Roof Inn. The thought of four stable walls around her again was too much to ignore and when she thought of actually sleeping on a mattress, it nearly made her want to cry.
***
The parking lot was mostly empty, though she once again noticed several dogs sniffing around. One was a collie that looked to have been well-groomed and taken care of. It whined when it saw Olivia but didn’t come close. Even when Olivia outstretched her hand and whistled, the dog kept its distance. She wondered if the virus was taking out some of the dogs, but not nearly as many dogs as humans. She’d seen the occasional dead dog on the side of the road or in front yards, but hadn’t really given it much thought.
Seeing the empty state of the parking lot made Olivia wonder how many people had been checked in to the hotel when the Blood Fire virus had reached Princeton. And then another thought on the heels of that: how many people had died in this particular Red Roof Inn? It made the building feel more like a haunted house than a hotel. On the other hand, she supposed the mostly-empty parking lot was a sign that the place may have been evacuated when the illness first showed up in Princeton. As they drew their bikes up to the front entrance, Olivia saw a single car that had pulled up to the front. The passenger side door had been left open, but there was no one in the car.
“I’ll be damned,” Paul said as they parked their bikes on the sidewalk by the front door.
“What?”
“Listen to that…”
Olivia was confused at first but when she paid close attention, she could hear what Paul had pointed out. It wasn’t just Joyce, still counting from within the little trailer. She could also hear soft music coming from an overhead speaker built into the entrance canopy. It was at a very low volume, currently playing a song Olivia knew. Something soft and cheesy from the 80s that she could not place the name to.
“So they’ve got electricity,” she said.
“Seems like it,” Paul said. “It makes me wonder how many indicators that the city still has electricity that we passed in getting here.”
“Well, we were sort of focused on other things. Namely survival.”
Paul nodded as he hefted his packs over his shoulder and started towards the front door. When the automatic double doors slid open, they both looked at the interior on the other side with untrusting glances. The lights were all on and there was no movement at all. The same soft music seemed to be coming through speakers inside as well.
Joyce’s irritated voice broke Olivia’s concentration. She found herself jumping at even Joyce’s unexpected voice and realized that her nerves might be even more frayed than she’d thought.
“I’m done counting,” she said. And then, at a much lower volume: “I think…”
“Good,” Paul said. “You can get out now.”
He stepped through the automatic doors and into the hotel lobby. Olivia took Joyce’s hand, drawing her close but allowing the girl to walk. She still wore her mask, though Olivia was growing more and more certain that the masks could be done away with. Maybe tomorrow she’d tell Joyce it was her decision; she could continue to wear it if she wanted, or she could stop wearing it. To set a good example, Olivia kept hers on even as they walked into the lobby.
The check-in desk sat to the left, widening around in a half-arc against the wall. There were, of course, no employees there. She did see a portion of an arm sticking out from behind the bottom of the counter on the floor, though. She watched as Paul walked over to the edge of the arced counter and walked behind it. He carefully stepped over the body behind the counter and looked around for a bit.
“I don’t suppose you ever worked in a hotel?” he asked Olivia.
“Sorry, no.”
He frowned as he opened drawers and scanned the desk behind the counter. She assumed he was looking for room keys and was having no luck. She wanted to help but also wanted to stay with Joyce and keep her away from the corpse behind the counter. It didn’t matter, though; as soon as she thought to help, Paul hit paydirt. She even heard him make a little aha noise as he located a bank of key cards in a drawer located under the counter between two check-in stations. After some thought, he grabbed one and came back around the counter.
“No clue which room it’s to,” Paul said, “but according to their filing system, it’s somewhere on the first floor.”
“Can I see it?” Olivia asked.
He handed it over and Olivia wasted very little time. She hunkered down in front of Joyce and handed her the card. It was the sort that had a basic magnetic strip on the back. She just hoped it wasn’t the sort that had to be programmed with the guest’s check-in and check-out date. It looked slightly older and scuffed up, so she doubted this was the case.
“I need you to hold on to this card,” Olivia told Joyce. “It’s super important, and I need you to make sure you don’t lose it. In a little while, we need you to find the door that this card unlocks. Do you think you can do that?”
Joyce’s eyes went wide with excitement as she took the card and nodded emphatically. As she held tightly to the card and started to bounce at her knees with anticipation, Olivia looked to the hallway just ahead of them. She turned back towards the front doors and saw an identical hall behind them and to the right, feeding back further into the hotel. So they had two halls to check—which seemed a little monotonous, but she was just happy to have something to keep Joyce occupied.
The three of them tried the hallway ahead of them first, Joyce taking great pride in inserting the key card into each locked door. Paul would try the handles and give her an exaggerated groan whenever the door wouldn’t open. It was cute and Joyce was buying into it hard, but Olivia also noticed that every time he tried opening a door, his hand seemed to instinctively go to his holster. Olivia also noticed that this was all likely unnecessary, as the locks had lights on them; red meant it was still locked and a green indicator would show them that they had the right door. But she silently thanked Paul for his theatrics. She was sure he also knew how the lights worked but was just trying to brighten Joyce up.
As it turned out, they didn’t have to search for very long. The key card worked on the eighth door they came to. Olivia saw the green light and heard the click. When Paul pushed the door handle down and the door swung in, Joyce jumped up and down while clapping her hands.
“Way to go,” Paul said, opening his hand to Joyce for a high five. The way he did this made Olivia pretty sure the man had not given a single high five beyond the age of thirteen.
Joyce slapped his hand and Paul deftly used the opportunity to head into the room first. He held his hand out to them for a moment, asking them to stay where they were. He checked the room and then the bathroom before waving them in.
Right away, Olivia felt the coolness of the room. While the air conditioner was not currently running, it had been running recently. The room had two beds, one of those small and featureless dining tables against the wall, and a TV on top of a wide set of dressers. The beds were made, suggesting the last p
erson to have used this room had used it before the Blood Fire Virus had come through.
Once the door was closed behind them, Joyce made a circuit around the room. When she made it to the bathroom, Olivia walked in behind her and took in the perfect squareness of everything: the corners, the bars of generic soap, the freshly pressed and folded towels and washcloths.
“That’s a big tub,” Joyce pointed out.
Olivia looked to the tub; it wasn’t any bigger than others she’d seen in motels but was probably much bigger than the one Joyce had bathed in back at her small, slightly lower-class New York City apartment.
“Yeah, I guess it is,” Olivia said.
“Can I take a bath?”
The idea of a bath made a small part of Olivia’s body go limp. A hot bath and a glass of wine would be absolute bliss right now. It would also be a little strange, given what they’d just endured over the last two days.
Paul poked his head in behind them. “That’s not a bad idea,” he said. “I’m surprised the power is still on. Might want to use the water while the power is still on. When the power goes out, I don’t know how these hotel water pumps might behave.”
“How about a shower first?” Olivia said. “Get the sweat and dirt from the last two days off of you before soaking in water. Bathing in your own yuck is gross.” She sneered her nose a bit as she said this, a look that Joyce mimed right away.
“Ladies first, by all means,” Paul said, turning away.
Olivia followed him, got the bags she’d left on the bed, and took out one of the two changes of clothes she’d packed for Joyce. She envied the girl a bit, as the only spare clothes Olivia had managed to pack was a plain white tee shirt and a pair of jogging pants she kept as spares at Little Learners just in case of some massive spill or accident. She took these with her back into the bathroom where Joyce was already playing with the knobs on the tub.
“Okay, missy,” Olivia said. “Strip down.”
It Falls Apart Series | Book 1 | It Falls Apart Page 20