Zombies Don't Ride Motorcycles

by Melissa Leo-Pahl

  “Boyfriend?” She noticed the fear and love in the little girl’s eyes.

  Ellie shook her head from side to side. “My older brother” she sobbed.

  Charlie spread her hands out to show she was yielding her aggressive nature. “What does he need?”

  A mumbling grunt from under the trench interrupted before Ellie could barely mouth an answer. “Chlordiazep—or –azepam” he stuttered. His voice was raspy, hollow, and cold.

  Charlie looked back to Ellie quizzically. “He needs something called Chlordiazepoxide or diazepam. They are supposed to help ease his withdrawals; they refused to give him anything after the first week he was there.” Ellie gasped out the last words out of her mouth spastically. She was shaking hard herself now, on the verge of a full on panic attack.

  What was this guy on? Charlie watched as even his hands shook with such ferocity, even as he massaged his own scalp. She had never seen anything so uncontrollable and pitiable. I wonder if it was HAVOC.

  Ellie turned back to the front shelves behind the counter. Charlie starting to work at Ellie’s shoulder and worked the counter down in the opposite direction. All along the extended kiosk lined up in alphabetical order by customer name, were bags of varying sized with the prescription receipts stapled. Charlie started on the opposite side, occasionally looking over her shoulder at the man writhing in what had to be unbearable agony. She ripped the bags open one by one, ensnaring each bottle, rolling them between her fingers, scanning for the drug name. Bottles skittered across the floor again. When she came upon a drug she recognized, she quickly made it disappear into her side bag. Anything with Codeine or an antibiotic could be helpful. Never know when one of them might end up cutting themselves severely or break a limb. This world wasn’t nearly as protected as it once was. Its systems were broken. No firefighting heroes, No Officer McGruff. No Doctor Grey. No one would be there to protect them from themselves.

  Charlie’s paper bag rampage screeched to a halt as the word Chlordiazepoxide was found circling the bottle at its equator.

  “Found it!” she screamed.

  Ellie came running and slid to a stop as she snatched right it out of Charlie’s hands, fumbling with the bottle hysterically. Knowing she wasn’t going to get that bottle open in her hysterical state, Charlie reached down and gently laid both hands over the struggling elfin-like hand of the young girl to take the bottle from her. In a moment, the top was removed with a triumphant pop. Charlie shook the contents into her own waiting palm.

  “How many does he need?” she asked the girl.

  “Gimme t-two!” The man on the chair pulled himself up unsteadily against its back. Ellie reflexively put her hands on his shoulder and anchored him. Charlie sat the amber bottle down, picked two pills out of her palm, and scooped them into Ellie’s waiting hand. Charlie steadied him at his shoulder while the sister tore open her fanny pack and produced a half-bottle of water. She deftly pushed the two pills into his mouth and lifted the open bottle to his lips. He rasped raucously, and even managed to choke a bit while trying to swallow them. After a tense moment, they went down, and they both eased him back down on the chair.

  Charlie remarked on the man’s face in her inner voice. Well, he was hardly a man. He appeared to be late in his teens, maybe nineteen years old. Perhaps he was twenty. The unkempt scruff on his face aged him a bit; however, he barely looked older than she did. His hair was jet black and disheveled. The cut was a tell-tale sign that he may have once spiked the middle up, Regardless, she could tell that it hadn’t been seen a comb or brush in weeks. His face was clear but pale. Most remarkable were his eyes. The dark circles around them seem to suck in the shadows from the room itself. They were dark all the way around, yet they still drew her in regardless. The whites of his eyes were mapped in red highways all over.

  He was not altogether unhandsome. In fact, she rather liked the scruffy look about his unshaven face, although she would never admit out aloud to anyone else. She fancied a full beard on him would not do the man justice. Perhaps a goatee would work for him. Either way, he looked a tad emaciated, like he had not eaten in about a week. She found herself pulled back into his eyes again. At their centers, a perfect shade of reflecting blue.

  Byron broke the silence, poking his head through the empty window space.

  “You okay in here, Charlie?” he asked meekly.

  Charlie nodded. “Yeah. Just wait in the car with Fayte. Keep her safe. We’ve got company. I’ll be out soon.”

  Byron nodded uncertainly and shot a nervous glance at these new faces he saw in the window, but obliged. He did not like leaving Charlie alone, but knew that she could probably take care of herself. Only if neither one were armed with pressure washer wands, he smirked to himself. He had surprised her then, and he suspected she was not the type of person to make the same mistake twice. He eased himself carefully back outside and hurried back to Fayte, who stood standing at the front of Lady, her dingy white teddy bear still clutched against her chest. Penny was safely tucked away in her backpack.

  Charlie’s eyes followed him out the window, and only when he was back at the car with little Fayte, did she turn her attention back to Ellie.

  “What does he need now? She asked.

  Ellie grimaced. “It will take at least twenty minutes for the drugs to kick in. All we can do now is try to keep him warm. The Dee Tees are giving him horrible cold flashes. The coat he is wearing won’t be enough.”

  Charlie nodded and rose to her feet. She surveyed the rows of shelves and started to explore them. In a cardboard kiosk, she eyed a stack of Baja ponchos, and next to them on the metal shelves were unopened packages of electric blankets. Perfect. At least someone left these!

  She scored them up into a pile in her arms and sprinted back to the seat where Jace remained shivering. She popped the little plastic buttons on each package and in a few minutes, Jace was buried in an avalanche of blankets, their cords still tied up in bread ties.

  “I just wish we had power to run these blankets.” Charlie huffed. That scruffy face pushed its way back to the forefront of her thoughts.

  “What’s his name?” she whispered again.

  “Jason, but I’ve always called him Jace.”

  Jace, Charlie thought. It suits him. He looks like a Jace. Short and simple, Jace. Rolls off the tongue.

  Ten minutes later, he was sleeping soundly; all of his tremors had abated. He was sleeping so soundly, Charlie had to check his pulse to make sure he had not died.

  “So…that worked pretty quick.” Charlie broke the uncomfortable silence that filled the void between Jace’s softly muted snores.

  “Where’re you heading?”

  Ellie looked up from the man that was once her hero to the woman who was now glowing from the fading light from the window. She simply replied.

  “Anywhere but here.”

  ***

  “Memphis. I figured maybe there would be a better chance of meeting up with any other survivors in a big city.”

  Charlie nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I thought too. I was in base housing when everything happened. The few that stayed behind on base were overrun or already turned.” She started to tear up. She sliced her forearm across her eyes to wrangle off the one that escaped, but it only served to wet the rest of her face.

  Ellie dropped her chin to her chest, her lips trembled. “You lost somebody, huh?”

  Charlie screwed her eyes shut and squeezed her hands shut. “My parents.”

  “Yeah. Us too.”

  Charlie pointed her nose to the ground, composing herself. No weakness.

  “It’s getting dark. The walkers will be more active soon, in greater numbers. We should hole up here for the night.”

  Ellie nodded in acquiesce. “I don’t think we should move Jace anymore today anyway. He is still too weak.”

  Outside Fayte had taken to walking on Byron’s feet while he took giant knee-raises to lift her up off the ground, while she giggled playfully. A sharp finge
r to Charlie’s lips brought the pair to a sudden stop as she approached them.

  “Let’s not draw any unwanted attention you two,” she whispered. Fayte made an exaggerated attempt at gumming her lips inside her mouth to keep it from opening. Charlie broke out in a smirk and shook her head. Charlie grabbed the back of her own hair and with a twist and a tuck, expertly had it in a makeshift bob. She tied a loose knot in it and rubbed her hands in preparation. She knew she was going to have to do something about her hair soon. She had lost a good hunk of it in her battle with the behemoth walker. She was sure she looked foolish now, but she was not worried about how her hair looked. Her hair was just another victim of this disease that was erasing everyone off the planet. It almost caused her to become a victim as well. She was damn well sure that was not ever going to happen again.

  “We’re bunkering here for the night. The guy you saw is in pretty rough shape, and can’t be moved yet.”

  Byron made a doubtful look. “Are you sure we can trust them?” he asked.

  Charlie looked back over her shoulder and peered into the open space that had been once a bay window.

  “Yeah”, she breathed. “Neither one are in any kind of shape to hurt any of us. And they seem harmless enough. I don’t think either one of them are going to be good in any kind of fight though,” she finished with a sad smile.

  “Let’s unload the car and bring everything in. We are especially going to need a few candles. We will barricade ourselves in so there not gonna be any light in there. I don’t want us trampling over anybody in the dark.”

  Byron nodded the affirmative, and started grabbing what little supplies they had brought out of the car. He handed several of the smaller items to Fayte, who tucked them neatly away into her dad’s old green backpack and immediately felt helpful.

  Byron hefted the rest of the gear in both hands and carried them without so much as a sway in his step. Charlie watched him. It brought bitter sweet memories of her father to come bubbling to the surface. She remembered how her dad used to try and bring all of the grocery bags in all at the same time. He would hook each bag, sometimes two, on each of his fingers and he would carry them in like some muscle-bound show-off Superman. He would never fail in getting all of the bags in at one time, leaving the separate containers like cases of bottled water or laundry detergent for her or her mom to bring in. He paid for it dearly though each and every time. Once he dropped them on the kitchen floor with a flourish, he would have to sit for a bit and try to rub out the indention marks in his fingers where the plastic pinched his skin.

  Bryon did not seem to have that issue at all. He lowered the bags lovingly to the floor and then walked over to survey the predicament of covering the window entry for the night. Charlie leaned in close towards Ellie.

  “You see this?” She pulled her hair out of her bun and showed Ellie the results of her most recent ‘hair cut’.

  “Dear God!” Ellie whispered.

  “Yeah, it’s a mess ain’t it?”

  “But how…?”

  Charlie nodded. “Walker. Caught me up by the hair. Big mother too. Had to cut my hair to escape.”

  Ellie just sat their slack-jawed, her hands covering her mouth in her own dainty way.

  “You been kinda sheltered your whole life, huh?”

  Ellie nodded. “Yes. Kinda so, I guess.”

  Charlie by the hands. “My dad used to have a saying.” She faltered as thoughts of her father bubbled back up to the surface. She stifled her tears and cleared her throat. “You see Charlie,’ he would say. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do. You have to try and not think about it, and just do it. Do what must be done.” She smiled as her eyes watered. She looked back up into Ellie’s eyes to drive in her sincerity.

  “Now. We gotta do what we gotta do.” She slipped out her K-bar and placed it in Ellie’s hands. Ellie looked back at Charlie, confused.

  “I only make a mistake one time. I don’t want to make it again.”

  Ellie nodded. “You can trust me.”

  “I hope so,” Charlie said as she turned around, and locks of hair fell to the floor throughout the night.

  Morning came, although the only signs of it came from the few streams of light that pierced through from around the boarded up windows where they did not butt up quite so uniformly. It chased and sent dust specks spiraling down to their final resting place on the cold tile. Jace was the first to emerge face first from within the blankets he was trapped in. He grunted and moaned against the sheet weight of it all and finally shouldered his way free, like a madman in his straight jacket. Charlie jerked her head and awake at the sound of twenty or so electric blankets hitting the floor.

  “You’re up,” she whispered.

  “Yeah. I am,” he groaned and twisted his neck in a wide circle. He stretched it for a few moments and stood slowly up. Charlie was quick to notice the obvious difference between now and a few hours ago.

  “You’re not shaking,” she said surprised. She tried hard to quell the volume in her voice. Noises carried in this boarded up store and she didn’t want to wake up Fayte just yet. She wanted to let her sleep the sleep that innocent princesses do. A fearless sleep. The sleep of the safe and protected.

  “And your hair is gone. Big whoop,” he groaned. “I don’t shake much when I first get up not for a couple of hours.

  “Oh? I thought all druggies shook all the time unless they had their drugs in their system,” Charlie spat, and immediately regretted it. She just knew she was baiting him in for a fight.

  “Well, HAVOC isn’t your usual drug, sister” Jace cannoned back.

  “Havoc?”

  “Yeah, take my advice and stay away from it. Nasty shit,” he shuddered in a mini seizure, like a dog shaking off the last bits of a bath. He turned away, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

  “I wouldn’t know. I tried smoking once. Managed only to puke my lungs up. I can barely keep down Ibuprofen for a headache. I guess I’m just not built for it.”

  “I’ve only taken it twice myself. But once is all you need to get hooked.”

  “What? The Havoc?”

  “Yeah.” He started touching his face, feeling around on the half-thick beard he just realized he had been growing. It felt so oddly unfamiliar to him, like his fingertips had not felt anything in weeks.

  “I just can’t believe a drug can be that powerful,” she said aloud. Only taken it twice, huh? This knowledge rather redeemed him just a bit in her eyes.

  Jace spun on his heel, in an instant, he had cleared the space between the two of them, and he was upon her, invading her personal space. He slapped both of his hands against the wall on each side of her head and leaned in hard and quick. He had rushed in was hovered and stood nose to nose with her. She cringed backward into the deepest part of seat, even though she could retreat no further.

  He cocked his head to the side, and stared down deep into her eyes.

  “You know - what I can’t believe - is you.” His breath was heavy now, almost panting. “For all I know you’re not real. You’re not here. You are just a figment of my imagination caused by the lows of coming off of this drug.”

  Her eyes were wide, taking him all in. His whole visage. His face. His smell. The pain he was feeling was in the air around him and she could feel it, almost see it on the edge of her periphery. For an instant she was lost. Instinct allowed her to find herself, took over and she flipped the dagger up and caught it by the handle. Before he could blink, he felt the pinch of the dagger’s tip pushing upward just under his chin. With only the minutest pressure, he was forced to push himself off the wall and stumble back a few paces.

  “So, they call you Charlie. Is that short for…?” His hands took the air in defeat.

  “…A reason.” Charlie finished for him. Her emotionless stare silenced him and he rolled his head away, flicking his chin off the tip of her blade.

  “Okay, sorry I asked.” He mumbled and pursed his lips into a mock silent whistle. Thi
s imaginary cat has claws, he thought.

  She kept her eyes on him. Some of the darker features of his skin tone seemed to have lightened up. Shadows did not creep into the folds of his skin any more. He seemed more filled out that she remembered when they had first met. He certainly was not as emaciated as he had seemed at first. A withering boy seemingly collapsed on himself. Obviously there was more substance there than what she had originally perceived. All of those blankets they had him cocooned up left everything up to her imagination. She had pegged him as a skinny drug-addict. Stereotyped him to a “T”. His abs stretched out across the peeking folds of his T-shirt blew that away.

  He walked over and knelt beside Ellie, who was already sitting up from her pallet and rubbing her eyes.

  “Where’d you dig this chick up?”

  Ellie yawned. “She found us while I was looking for some medicine to help you. Don’t you remember?”

  “I can’t say that I do.” It was only in that moment he realized that his sister was also less than she was before he saw her last.

  “Not you too, sis.” His hands ran through what was left of Ellie’s hair. The two French braids that he had come to know her for were long gone. He looked over across the way and that is when he saw the pile. Two long braids laid underneath sticking out somewhere in the middle. He winced at it painfully. “Ellie…”

  “It’s something she had to learn the hard way.”

  “Having long hair these days can get me killed. You saw those things.” She reached up and patted her own head still uncomfortable with her loss. Jace rubbed the top of her head playfully.

  “Yeah. I saw. I still can hardly believe it. It’s like the whole world has gone tits-up. Is it like this everywhere?”

  “I think so. You should have seen it on the news, Jace. Remember how bad it was on 9/11. Everyone was glued to their TV’s. The sickness was on every station 24/7. The hospitals got all filled up. Then there were riots. Well, we thought they were riots. It was really when everyone started attacking everyone else. Cars piled up on the roads with everyone freaking out. The very last thing I saw were reports of planes falling out of the sky. But it wasn’t terrorism.” Jace remained silent as Ellie continued.