Phil chuckled. "Goodnight Jim. I guess it will be daylight soon."
"Okay," Jim said, buttoning his coat and grabbing his flashlight. He walked to the front of the store away from the dim orange glow of the heater. The temperature fell sharply as he neared the front of the store.
He sat down in the chair at the cash register and listened to the wind howl outside. He wondered how many zombies were shuffling across the wastes outside. He also wondered if his dad was still alive. The snow made Jim think of him.
Jim and his siblings had to visit him several times each winter per the terms of his visitation rights. He had bought a house in Saint Clair Shores, a wealthy suburb north of Detroit. His house sat in a cul-de-sac at the end of a street that jutted out on a peninsula into Lake Saint Clair. In the summer they would go swimming in the lake, but in the winter it usually froze over enough to go ice fishing.
His girlfriends always seemed to be terrible cooks. Jim could never understand as a child why they were unable to do something as simple as read the directions on a box of brownie mix.
Jim saw light begin to shine in through the gaps in the plywood. He realized the sun was coming up. He walked back and woke the others and they set out again.
They merged onto westbound I-90 as the sun peeked above the horizon behind them. They drove toward Cleveland. As they approached downtown, with Lake Erie on the right, the freeway suddenly became choked with abandoned cars.
Phil turned the Jeep around and drove back to an exit they had passed earlier: Eddy Road. They exited the highway and drove to Saint Clair Avenue. They continued west on it, passing abandoned homes and businesses. Some buildings were burned out ruins. Others were boarded up. Some had red sheets hanging in broken windows, blowing in the wind. Others were boarded up and spray-painted with warning signs indicating contagion was present within.
They passed dilapidated Victorian houses and crumbling brick structures. Zombies shuffled through the snow all around, so Phil was forced to drive carefully.
"We're about one-hundred-seventy-five miles from Detroit," Jim said, studying the Dist-o-Map.
"Good, we should make it there today," Phil replied.
"Hey, why'd you guys let me sleep all night?" Sherry asked. "I could have kept watch."
"I figured you needed rest," Phil said.
"Okay, thanks!"
As they continued west toward downtown Cleveland, the snow became slushy. The morning sun was causing it to melt. Soon they reached areas where the road was free of snow.
They passed over an interstate that was crowded with abandoned cars. Zombies swarmed around below. Jim wondered if they would encounter a similarly sized horde before they left Cleveland.
The tall office buildings of downtown Cleveland loomed ahead. Soon the Jeep was driving among them. Some showed evidence of fire damage. Some were leaning precariously. Most were missing some or all of their windows. Throughout the downtown area, broken glass glimmered on the pavement and sidewalks.
They approached a plaza to the left. As the Jeep came around the adjacent building, Jim saw two large regal buildings standing one street over. He also saw thousands of zombies swarming around a fountain in the center of the plaza.
"Oh man!" Phil exclaimed, accelerating past the mall. They passed more towers as the road sloped downward toward a river. They passed West 10th Street and Phil slowed to a stop. They were at the riverfront. To the right stood a fallen bridge over the river. To the left stood an intact bridge.
Phil turned left down West 10th Street and they approached the bridge. West 10th Street passed under the bridge's approach.
"Aha!" he exclaimed, seeing a side street they could use to find access to the bridge. As the Jeep came around the corner the road ahead was blocked by hundreds of zombies. Phil slowed to a stop and backed the Jeep up. The zombies saw the survivors and began to stagger toward the Jeep.
Phil turned around and drove down West 10th Street back to Saint Clair Avenue. At that intersection there was a street that ran diagonally toward the bridge. It too was clogged with zombies.
"Go right!" Vik yelled.
The Jeep continued up the hill on Saint Clair and when the group reached West 9th Street, Phil hurriedly turned right as a large crowd of zombies was approaching from the east. He sped down the street and as he turned right on Huron Street, apparently where the bridge’s approach was located, the Jeep slid through the slushy intersection and flattened several zombies.
Phil floored it and the Jeep motored across the bridge, downtown Cleveland and the horde of zombies receded into the distance behind them, the Cuyahoga River below. Everyone let out sighs of relief when the Jeep reached the western terminus of the bridge and they saw the area was devoid of zombies. Phil slowed to a stop and pulled the atlas back out. He flipped through the pages, studying it.
"Okay," he said. "If we go left here, we'll get back to Interstate Ninety."
The Jeep turned left and continued on. Phil ran down several zombies in the street as they sped south. Soon they merged back on to westbound I-90.
"You know that river we drove over used to catch on fire all the time," Sherry said.
"Oh yeah?" Jim asked.
"Yeah. My uncle lived in Cleveland for a while and said that the Cuyahoga used to be one of the most polluted rivers on Earth."
"Wow," Jim said disinterestedly, watching the wintery landscape speed by.
He soon fell asleep.
It was mid-afternoon when he woke up. He saw downtown Detroit in the distance. As he rubbed his eyes he became aware it was snowing again.
"Have a good nap?" Vik asked.
"Yeah," he replied. “How long was I asleep?” He looked to the left and saw the idled smokestacks of the River Rouge complex nearby. Zug Island was to the right with its towering blast furnaces.
“Like four hours,” Phil said. “I just figured we’d let you sleep.”
They followed I-75 as it snaked through the city of Detroit. The skyscrapers of downtown passed by on the right.
"Jim, do you remember when dad had us over for Christmas eight years ago?" Phil asked.
"Yeah, vaguely. Was that when he was dating Deanna?"
"No, he was with Charlene at that point I think."
"Yeah, I remember."
"Man, I remember Charlene just couldn't cook! Remember how she tried to cook a Christmas goose and burned the bird?"
"Yeah," Jim laughed. "Dad had a thing for women who couldn't cook."
Sherry and Vik laughed from the backseat.
They passed Ford Field on the right and continued along I-75. Soon they merged onto northbound I-94. Jim knew they were getting close. The snow had stopped by the time they exited at East 11 Mile Road.
"I wonder how far Jeff and Connor have made it," Jim said.
"If their car held out, they could be in New York City by now," Sherry said.
"Yeah," he said as Phil turned on to Shorewood Street. The Jeep crossed a small bridge and drove past houses that were all, surprisingly, intact. Most had boarded up windows, a few had graffiti spray-painted on them that indicated the presence of Owasa Disease. Phil slowed as they reached the end of the block and pulled into a driveway. The old man’s car was nowhere to be seen. The windows of his house were all boarded up. There wasn't a zombie in sight.
"Alright," Phil said as they pulled into the driveway. He turned toward Sherry and Vik. "Me and Jim are going to go inside to make sure there aren't any zombies. You two stay out here."
"Okay Phil," Vik said.
Jim and Phil got out. A frigid gust of wind swept off the lake blowing snow around them. They walked up the unplowed driveway to the covered porch of the humble one-story L-shaped brick house on the shore.
"Alright," Phil said, inserting his key into the lock. "We don't know what we are going to find in there, so be ready for anything. Dad could be gone. Dad could be alive, holed up in there with a machine gun and an itchy trigger finger. He might be a zombie. If he is, a zombie that is," he
paused, "let me do it."
"Okay," Jim said.
"Alright, let's do this. Get my back."
Jim turned his flashlight on as Phil opened the door. The darkened house was quiet. They walked in and Phil shut the door quickly.
Jim looked around at the interior. The furniture was coated with a thin layer of dust. He looked at the photos on the wall. Baby pictures were prominently displayed alongside Tigers memorabilia.
Phil walked into the kitchen and Jim followed. Bananas sat moldering in a fruit basket on the counter. Jim looked out the small window over the sink and saw the blue waters of Lake Saint Clair rippling in the wind.
They searched the house. All of the bedrooms were empty. So was the bathroom.
"I guess that leaves the basement," Jim said grimly.
"Yeah, I'll go first," Phil said, walking to the basement door in the kitchen. The floor creaked underfoot as they walked across it.
Phil opened the door and the faint scent of death wafted up from the darkened basement. He looked at Jim and shrugged. They started down the stairs, Phil in front.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs Jim swept the beam of his flashlight around the dark basement. He illuminated concrete walls and a washer and dryer with shelving in the corner. And there alongside the shelving, in the corner, their dad hung from a joist in the ceiling, a noose around his neck.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Andy Gibson
Day 34
Andy set a course to the east following the coastline after the horrifying events at Port Fourchon. The others had all been horrified by the radio broadcast and what seemed to be Scott Maniczewski’s last words. By now the sun was coming up, making visual navigation considerably easier.
Royce offered to navigate and steer the boat to give him a chance to sleep. Andy laid down in the back of the lifeboat and tried to fall asleep. Despite the bumpy ride, he sank into slumber very quickly.
He had nightmares about the oil platform. He could hear others around him crying out for help, but he couldn't move. He was frozen in place.
He bolted upright suddenly, wide-awake. He was back on the lifeboat. Bob lay a few feet away, snoring softly. Oscar and Milo were praying together. Royce was still steering the boat. The radio beeped softly.
"What's on the radio?" he asked sleepily.
"Another warning message, warning us to stay away from New Orleans. You can listen to it if you want? I turned the volume down so you and Bob could sleep," Royce replied.
Andy sat up and looked out the porthole in the side of the boat. He saw the coast in the distance. It was cloudy out and the water was a deep stormy blue color. He walked to the front and sat down next to Royce.
The radio was beeping Morse code in what sounded like an S.O.S. The beeping paused for a moment.
"This is Rear Admiral Charles McCann of the United States Coast Guard. By the time you hear this message, I will likely be dead or worse. I am broadcasting from New Orleans, Louisiana. If you receive this message do not come here. I repeat, do not come here. Infection containment protocols have failed and Owasa Disease is rampant. Do not come here. If you come here, you will die or worse."
The beeping continued and then the message repeated.
Royce looked at Andy. "What do you make of that?"
He shrugged. "I guess it's a good thing we aren't going to the Big Easy."
"What do you make of him talking about containment and infection?"
He shrugged. "Who knows?"
"Sounds bad. Did some sort of epidemic happen while we were out at sea?"
"That sounds apocalyptic. But, it also sounds plausible. I mean, why haven't we been able to make contact with anyone on shore? What if civilization was wiped out by some lousy flu virus and then the hurricane just damaged infrastructure even further?"
“Maybe it was Ebola,” Royce said.
Andy shook his head. “Fyodor did suggest nuclear war, back on Thanksgiving.”
"Man that sounds bad. We'd better stop talking like that," Milo said, interrupting them. "That sounds like some kind of disaster movie!"
"Relax," Andy said reassuringly. "I'm sure it's not as bad as it sounds."
"I'm going to go back to praying I think. We'll see how bad it really is once we get to shore," he said. “It looks like it’s much worse than it sounds.”
The next morning Andy awoke after having slept poorly all night. He couldn't stop thinking about Shelly and Isaiah. He had been delightfully surprised when Shelly had learned she was pregnant. The pregnancy had gone smoothly and Andy had been looking forward to taking a month off work from the platform in Brazil.
When Shelly woke him at 3:00 in the morning telling him she was having contractions, at first Andy told her she was just having Braxton-Hicks contractions; Isaiah's due date was still a few weeks away. There was simply no way he would be coming so soon Andy thought. Andy could remember telling her to take a hot shower to see if the contractions went away.
When she began crying out in agony in the shower, he leapt out of bed and realized she was having real contractions. He drove her to the hospital in Bay Saint Louis and at 6:32am, his tiny little boy Isaiah Alexander Gibson was born.
Andy remembered the first time he held Isaiah; he was so tiny and Andy knew in that instant that he would do anything to keep Isaiah safe. All of the late nights after Isaiah came home, all of the sniffly noses, all of the dirty diapers, all of it just made Andy love him more. He was so happy to be a daddy.
Somehow, having Isaiah helped Andy fall even more deeply in love with Shelly. She had been the love of his life since before they had been married. But now he worked to put the phone away when he was home and really be present with her and Isaiah.
So of course Andy was worried when he couldn't reach them via phone after the hurricane. Of course his worry grew as time passed and he still couldn't reach them. And of course it grew further still when he saw the destruction at Port Fourchon and heard the broadcast from New Orleans.
He put on a brave front to the other guys in the lifeboat, but inside he was filled with turmoil. He relieved Bob from steering at 8:00am and took over.
At 9:00am, he cried out. "I see the bridges! We're approaching Bay Saint Louis!"
Royce stood and looked out the front window. "We sure are!"
As they drew near, Andy saw that the rail bridge at the mouth of the bay had large sections missing. The US-90 Bridge also looked badly damaged. Gradually the shore came into better view. Trees had been stripped of their vegetation and uprooted. Houses were missing their roofs and some buildings appeared to have even been washed out into the bay.
Andy grimaced. "This doesn't look good."
"Where are all the people? Where's FEMA?" Royce asked. He patted Andy’s shoulder. "Hey, I'm sure Shelly and Isaiah are alright."
Andy nodded. "Thanks."
As they passed under an intact section of the rail bridge, Andy noticed that the rails had been twisted. The level of destruction astonished him. Even more astonishing was how deserted the city appeared from the bay.
As they approached the US-90 Bridge, Andy saw that it would be impossible to continue north in the inlet; the only portions of the bridge that hadn't collapsed into the water were the concrete columns the spans should have rested atop. The rest of the bridge, every segment, lay in mangled piles between the supports.
"Looks like we'll have to beach the lifeboat," he said, steering the boat toward the sandy expanse. The boat shook a little as it scraped the sand just offshore and then shook violently as they ran aground. Once they had stopped, Milo opened the hatch and all five men exited the lifeboat.
Andy looked around at the desolation. Palm trees had been snapped like twigs. Houses had been knocked off their foundations or had their roofs peeled back like a can of sardines or had been crushed by falling oaks or had burned down. In some places, he could see concrete slabs that had been swept clean of any structure.
They walked up the beach, climbed up the
seawall and walked to North Beach Boulevard. Andy listened carefully; all he could hear was the sound of the surf punctuated occasionally by one bird calling to another. The air smelled strongly of saltwater.
“I’ve heard about what this place looked like after Hurricane Katrina, but this has to be just as bad,” Bob said. “I had an uncle who lived here in Oh-Five. He said it was the worst storm he had ever seen.”
"Man," Milo whistled. "I hope it isn't this bad in Bayou La Batre!"
Andy nodded, his worry growing. They crossed US-90 and saw cars that had been turned upside down; rotting corpses hung from the seats, bound in place by seatbelts.
Once they were north of the highway, the damage became less catastrophic. Here houses only appeared to have water damage. Nevertheless, Andy had a strong feeling he would only find a single stilt remaining of his house.
As they passed a marina on the right, Andy was overcome with anxiety. He started to trot.
"Hey! Wait up!" Royce yelled.
"I'm sorry! I can't wait! One-Oh-Eight Engman! The street's up ahead on the left!" he yelled as he quickened his pace. "One-Oh-Eight Engman! Just catch up!"
He broke into a dash and ran the final mile and a half. As he came around the corner, sweaty and out of breath, he saw his worries about the house had been unfounded! It was still standing! His garage was still standing too! He saw a water line on both buildings about seven feet high. Of course that’s why the house was up on stilts.
He noticed the side door of the garage was open. And he caught a glint of dark blue in the darkness behind it. Shelly's Passat was dark blue! Andy sprinted the final three hundred yards to the garage and ran through the door.
He couldn't see anything in the dim light except the vague outline of the Passat. The garage smelled foul, like mold and something else. He walked to the garage door and pulled it open and flooded the water-damaged garage with light. It was then that he saw the car in detail. The car wasn't water-damaged, so he knew it had arrived after the storm. He saw something in the car and as he approached the driver’s side, his vision grew blurry with tears. He pulled the driver’s door open and cried out.
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