The Breadwinner Trilogy (Book 1): The Breadwinner

by Stevie Kopas

  The night came quickly and their heads buzzed from the alcohol. They had eaten an unhealthy meal of snacks and spent almost an entire day drinking. Juliette softly snored in the corner near the pharmacy door and Ben checked the front once more. It was too dark to tell if the eaters were still lurking around but he didn’t hear anything. They didn’t dare use a flashlight or anything in the store for fear that the lights might be seen. The windows toward the ceiling were too high to reach without making a bunch of noise and frankly not worth covering up for only one night. They sat in the dark, chatting with one another until Clyde soon drifted off into a deep slumber. Andrew, somewhere in the dark thanked Ben.

  “For what?” Ben didn’t feel like anything he’d done deserved a thank you. If anything he still owed everything to Andrew and Clyde. They’d come out of nowhere and helped him fight off that horde.

  “I don’t know man. Everything happens for a reason, so just, thanks. We might have never left. Juliette might have never left. I have a feeling this will be good for her.”

  No one said another word as they closed their eyes and let the booze take them away into a deep sleep.

  The sun cast a sliver of light down into the room and across Ben’s face through one of the windows. Everyone else seemed to be up and rummaging about the store. Clyde was figuring out how to fit snacks and wine into a bag that already had food and water in it while Andrew went through first aid supplies and Juliette packed up some great antibiotics and painkillers from the pharmacy. Ben shrugged his shoulders and popped four Advil into his mouth and washed them down with water. He walked up behind the registers and grabbed several random cartons of cigarettes and shoved them into one of his big bags. He looked around the counters for anything else that might be useful and decided to take a few bottles of lighter fluid, an extra zippo and a utility knife.

  They all cleaned up with the plethora of personal hygiene supplies they had on hand and took some extra deodorants, cleansing wipes and hand sanitizer. Juliette and Clyde both thought of taking extra personal hygiene supplies and argued over who got what as if there wasn’t enough for the both of them. Ben was at the front again, peering out the window.

  “Is the coast clear?” Andrew joined him in his watch.

  “Looks like it, but who’s to say they don’t come a runnin’ at the sound of that gate coming up? Or worse yet, some more of those looting thugs.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t call them looters, we’re kind of uh, lootin’ now don’t you think?”

  “Finders keepers bro, that’s how it goes.” Andrew and Ben snickered at the window while Clyde and Juliette finally decided to ignore one another and finish packing their stuff up. They were all relatively close in age. Juliette and Clyde were both 23, Ben was 25 and Andrew was 28.

  “So how long you been outta the service?” Andrew asked Ben while continuing to scan the street for any movement.

  “How could you tell?”

  “Oh you just scream military, that and I can pick ‘em out of a crowd, a lot of my family served and a lot of the cops around here have been in.”

  “Ah, just over a year. Went in right out of high school.”

  “We’re ready when you two are.” Juliette came up behind them. Her bleach blonde hair was pulled back tightly in a neat bun. For a personal trainer she didn’t have a very athletic build, she was very tall and thin, and with her hair like that she reminded Ben of an anorexic ballerina. She waved her hand at the smoke from Ben’s cigarette and obnoxiously coughed. Ben rolled his eyes and threw the cigarette to the tile, stepping on it.

  “Let’s give it a try.”

  With everyone all packed up they looked like a group of gypsies. Andrew very slowly removed the wedge he had placed from under the front door and opened it. Everyone held their breath as he raised the security gate, the metal grated and clicked loudly, sending shivers down everyone’s spines. They stood frozen in the doorway, awaiting the feral cries of the hungry dead but they never came. They looked at one another and figured now was as good a time as any to head out. They didn’t bother pulling the security gate down, it would have made too much noise and there was no point to locking anything up anymore. The group carefully made their way across the street and Andrew went up ahead to peek around the corner. He motioned for them to follow after a moment and they made their way up the last block before reaching the road that would lead them to the highway. Ben had already noticed that the streets were more congested with cars in this area. Some had crashed days ago into telephone poles, street lights and other cars. Some had doors open with blood stained steering wheels. He swore he even heard one still running off in the distance. Andrew ran ahead again to check out their final turn. Ben almost didn’t notice him give the okay to continue. He was lost in his thoughts for a moment, hoping Veronica had made it out of the city, hoping that he wasn’t putting her in any danger by taking his sweet time with this new group of people.

  VI

  They slowly closed the gap between Columbia City and Columbia Beach’s Franklin Township. The highway was a vast graveyard of vehicles and they took the east bound lane with less cars left on it so it was easier to walk without having to weave in and out so much. The highway’s shoulder even had cars in it, hindering their ability to conveniently get from point A to point B. The day was absolutely beautiful despite all the death in the cars around them. The remnants of the day the whole world went away surrounded them. Bodies lie decaying in the road, birds picking at their skin, every so often they’d come across an eater either hopelessly wandering the highway with nowhere to go or crouched, greedily munching on something terrible. The group figured they were lucking out, but the way Andrew saw it was that the highway was still a highway, just a place for things to travel.

  “Nobody hung out on the highway when the world was normal. So why would these things be here now? Ya know? When Hank and I were headed back into the city, the things were comin’ up behind us, runnin’ around in front of us, but the only reason they ever stopped is because the people were stopped. When there weren’t any more people out here, they moved on, either back to the city, or back to the woods.”

  “Yeah, they’re pretty ADD if you ask me. Sal used to watch them when they were still runnin’ aimlessly up and down my street. They would literally run into each other, into cars, into walls. He said they were nothing but stupid animals. They can’t talk, don’t care about anything but eating and can’t even figure out how to get to their food. He said even dogs were smarter, dogs could at least figure out how to chew through a bag.” Ben mimicked Sal’s accent as he quoted him. He missed his friend and wished they were making the journey to Paradise Bay together.

  They reached the bridge and Ben was reminded of Marco. “Do you mind if we stop for a few? I just want to look around.”

  “Look around for what? There ain’t nothin’ but dead people up here.” Clyde dropped his bags and stretched. “I knew you was a freak.”

  He didn’t know what exactly he was looking for. He didn’t know what kind of car Marco’s friends were driving that day, or even if he would find some remnant of Marco or his friends. Maybe a part of him hoped Marco was hiding in one of these cars somewhere but he knew it was highly unlikely. He hopped the guard rail to the west bound side and walked around, aimlessly peering into cars and not knowing what he might find in each one. He looked out at the water that ran into the bay. It seemed to almost sparkle under the sun and it was like a mirror that reflected everything around them. The trees, the sky, everything could be seen twice in its clear flowing beauty. He peered over the side and the mirror was shattered. On the concrete of the foundation below were the splattered bodies of people who had jumped to escape the eaters. But he knew that they didn’t accidentally land there, if they had any intention of living they would have jumped out and into the water, hoping to be washed away somewhere with less nightmares. He wondered if any of them were Marco, he wondered if they had been bitten and had enough sense to keep themselves from tur
ning and contributing to the spread of the infection. He wondered if any of them were Veronica. He felt himself get angry and came to the conclusion that he had seen enough. It was time to keep moving.

  He rejoined the group back where they had stopped. “Everything alright?” Andrew was sitting next to Juliette in the road, applying sunscreen to her fair skinned face. She placed her oversized sunglasses back on once he was done.

  “Yeah,” he finally said. “Everything’s fine. Break’s over, are we ready to keep moving?”

  “Sure, just a few more miles of highway before we hit Franklin Woods. We can probably sneak in there and test drive one of those sweet ass houses.”

  “Yeah, Sal and Lucy lived there. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind us staying in their place for the night.”

  “Even better. No more breaking and entering for us today.”

  Clyde laughed at his brother’s remark, “Whoever would have thought a cop would have raided CVS with us?” Juliette smiled for the first time since Ben had met her. He wished she would do it more and maybe then he’d try to make nice with her.

  The group pressed on, it took them the entire day to make it from the city to the other end of the highway with the pace that they kept. Nice and easy, cautious and quiet. Andrew didn’t think there was a reason to waste energy or resources to make such a short trip. As much as it pained him to go so slowly, Ben agreed and remembered his grandma’s favorite saying, haste makes waste.

  “I’m tired of walking.” Juliette spoke softly to Andrew.

  “You’re in the best shape of all of us and you’re tired of walking?” Clyde scoffed. “Gimme a cigarette, will you?” He threw his bags down dramatically and Ben lit two cigarettes, handing one to him.

  Andrew rubbed Juliette’s shoulders and kissed her forehead. “It’s not that much further. You heard Ben, he knows a place where we can stay.”

  “Alright.”

  Clyde and Ben finished their smokes while they walked and the thick trees in the setting sun proved to be eerie for everyone. “I’ll take the city over this shit any day of the week. Imagine bein’ lost out in that.” Clyde flicked his cigarette out into the brush.

  “Dude, what are you a firebug?” Ben craned his neck to try and see where the butt landed.

  “It just rained. Plus don’t these new cigarettes go out by themselves? Annoyin’ as hell.”

  Andrew and Ben shook their heads simultaneously. Ben couldn’t help but look back to check if there was any smoke. Clyde was right though, the new cigarettes were meant to do the opposite of start fires. He didn’t need anything else to worry about.

  Within the next hour, twilight was taking over the sky and they could see the enormous gates that held the community of Franklin Woods within them. The houses rose behind the gates like tombstones in a silent cemetery.

  “I think it’s an electric gate, how are we gonna get it open with the power being out?” Clyde turned to look at Ben.

  “Well, I’m not an electrician but I’m pretty sure those gates are made with fail safes for instances like this. Well, not exactly like this, but we do get a lot of hurricanes.”

  “Yeah, it’s some legality safety measure.” Andrew chimed in as Ben walked past him and Juliette toward the gate. There was no guard in the shed obviously but he had looked out of habit. He gave the gate a simple pull and it barely budged. He noticed someone had put a brass pin in place to keep it from opening and wondered if someone in there didn’t want any visitors. He removed the pin and the gate opened with no problem.

  “See? C’mon it’s getting darker every minute. We don’t know what’s in these woods.”

  Ben ushered everyone through the gate and closed the heavy thing behind him, replacing the pin where it once was. They walked quietly up the street, passing two badly mangled cars that were nearly in the house’s driveway.

  “Man, if I lived there I’d be pissed as hell with this shit in front of my house.” Clyde took a peek inside one of the cars and made a face.

  “I’m pretty sure nobody lives there anymore. Keep moving.” Andrew pushed his brother forward.

  “I just saw a light in that house.” Juliette stopped walking and pointed at the enormous home with the wrecked cars in front of it.

  “C’mon baby doll, there’s nobody there. It’s ok.” Andrew put his arm around her.

  The first street was a huge circle that led back to the front entrance and exit. One way in, one way out of Franklin Woods. Sal’s house was on one of the roads off of the main circle. Ben knew where the key was and retrieved it before the others climbed the steps to the front door. He ran up the steps and unlocked both locks, sticking his head in and calling out, hopefully there were no surprises waiting for them in there. After about ten seconds he was satisfied that the house was empty and the other three joined him inside. They had plenty of food with them but Sal always kept a stocked pantry. Everyone had their own bed to sleep in that night and Ben never prayed, but he did thank Sal and Lucy, wherever they might be, for a place to stay.

  VII

  They all slept in the next morning, embracing the comfort and mild sense of safety of the empty neighborhood. It was after 11am when Ben woke up. He hated to do it but didn’t want to use the toilet. Opening the window and sticking his head out, he took a quick look around to make sure no one from the house had wandered into the yard before enjoying a nice, long morning piss. Sal would have gotten a kick out of it. Lucy, not so much.

  He cleaned himself up and got dressed. Today they would look for Veronica. Ben thought about maybe staying in Sal’s place for a little while. If it proved to be safe then they just needed to get some supplies and board up the windows to make sure no unwanted visitors found them inside. They could go from house to house and see what goodies might be there and they might just have struck gold with deciding to come here. He walked downstairs and Juliette was sitting at the breakfast bar, drinking a warm energy drink.

  “I would have made coffee, but I’m not really sure how to do that without power.”

  “It’s the thought that counts.” Ben looked around the rest of the house now that there was daylight. Sal really had everything a man could need and most of it, other than the food, was useless during a time like this. Too bad he didn’t have a generator. Maybe they could find one and bring it back here. After a while longer Andrew and Clyde joined them downstairs and they discussed the day’s plan.

  “We wasted the whole morning.” Andrew was relaxed on the lush white sofa. “Franklin isn’t very spread out once you get to either town or the bay, it’s just the couple miles between here and there that are pretty irritatin’ without transportation. By the time we’re done with town and head back, I’m sure it’ll be dark already.”

  “This area seems a lot safer than the city, I know there are a lot of woods and cover that things can be hiding in, but that’s also something to take into consideration. If we need to, we can use those woods to our advantage. Plus it was pretty much dark when we got here last night and there was no incident. I can’t wait another day. She could be in trouble, she could be here, she could be gone, we don’t know.”

  “Alright man, I got you. Clyde? Any thoughts?” His brother sat across from him, sprawled out on the matching white loveseat. He shook his head.

  “So let’s get our shit together and head out then. We don’t have to bring much, we’re coming back here so let’s spread it out in case any scavengers show up.”

  Andrew hopped up from the sofa, “Good idea. Juliette? Do you want to help?”

  “Sure, I obviously didn’t have a choice on whether or not I was going so I might as well.” She rolled her eyes and stormed out of the room.

  It took about a half hour to make sure that all of their things were hidden and spread out about the house. It might have been an unnecessary precaution but they didn’t want to take any chances. The sun was high in the sky when they left the house and a soft breeze greeted them on the street. They passed the house with the wreck on
ce more and Ben felt a sense of unease about the place. Juliette might have been a little crazy, but what if she did really see a light? And who put the pin in the gate? The pin he had just been thinking about was in fact still in the gate when they arrived at the entrance/exit. They left Franklin Woods and took a right toward town.

  It didn’t take much longer than an hour to realistically arrive in town at their slow walking pace but Andrew was right, the walk there was full of nothing but trees and made it feel as if though time was standing still. They didn’t want to split up but figured they would cover more ground that way. Andrew and Juliette visited the local pharmacy, gathering what more supplies they could. It was nothing like the CVS in the city, the place had been ransacked but they were able to at least scrounge a few things. Ben had requested more lighter fluid. He wanted to stock up so they would be able to make a fire for cooking or to stay warm if they needed to. Clyde and Ben scoped out the grocery store but that too had been cleared out. Except for a few shambling eaters, they hadn’t run into many of the dead, so their work load was pretty light. After checking a few more small random stores here and there they met up at the police station.

  “There isn’t anything left here, but it’s worth a check to see if your girl’s hiding out.”

  They were in and out within twenty minutes. Andrew and Hank had taken anything useful that was left when they took off for the city and so the only thing left to do was to search it for Veronica. They called out, trying not to be too loud and attract unwanted attention. They did this in several more establishments and finally the sun was getting ready to set. The only places left to search were some small houses, an apartment complex and the high school down the road.

  “There’s too many places left to search today. We’ll come back down here tomorrow and look.”

  Ben was frustrated, but then again she might not have even come here. She may have gone straight to the bay. He silently resented himself for not opting to go to the bay before checking the town. “I really don’t think she’s in any of those houses. We check the high school and then we check the bay. Tonight. We shouldn’t have come here first.”