Apokalypsis Book Three

by Kate Morris

  “Oh? Where do you work?” he asked as if he didn’t believe her.

  “Babysitting,” she said with a convincing nod.

  “I’ll just come there then. Doesn’t matter.”

  She ground her teeth together. If she hung around this annoying boy much longer, she’d have no teeth left. He was so frustratingly pushy. “I don’t think she’d like that. Lila’s a really strict…”

  “Lila? Lila Neubeck?”

  Shit. “Um, yeah.”

  “Oh, she’s cool. She won’t care if I come over. I’ve been to her place before. She’s dating my brother.”

  Double shit. This was getting worse by the second. This boy was connected to the one friend she’d made in years. His brother dated her. Pause. Think. Regroup. He didn’t give her enough time to come up with a better lie, though.

  “I’ll come over around five or so,” he said. “I’ll pick up pizza. I know Hope likes pizza.”

  Triple shit. He knew where Lila lived. He apparently knew her little girl. Now, he’d know where she lived, too. This couldn’t get worse. Her brain was on fire with overloaded, frying circuits. She had a pounding headache from his drilling questions and probing behavior. She never had this problem before. People usually left her alone. After all, that was the vibe she’d perfected in giving off.

  “Uh…” she croaked, her voice cracking.

  Instead of stating a firm yes or no, she stormed out. She had two more classes that mostly went off without a hitch. She’d overheard other kids talking about the sick girl in the hospital. It seemed like they were talking about someone new, though. She wasn’t sure. She didn’t know any of their names, so it was confusing.

  Wren didn’t realize until she saw him again in Chem class final period that she’d left her notebook.

  “Here, you forgot this in the library earlier when you got pissed at me and took off,” he said with a knowingness behind his brown eyes. Something else lurked there, too. What was it? Confidence? Smugness? Both?

  And it wasn’t her notebook, although she had labeled it for English class as such. It was her journal. Good God. She hoped he hadn’t looked inside. Quadruple shit. This wasn’t just shit. It was a whole shit storm. A tsunami.

  She was thankful that it wasn’t a lab day. The teacher just lectured while the class took notes. Every once in awhile, she’d risk a glance at him beside her on his stool only to find Golden Boy staring at her. Wren just sent him a glare, hoping he’d look away. He didn’t. His brown-eyed stare was direct, unwavering, and assessing. What was his problem? That tactic always worked. Other people her age cringed with a direct and nasty glare. She’d never had this issue before. Maybe she’d ask Uncle Jamie about it later. No. That wouldn’t work, either. If he even knew that she was talking to Golden Boy, they’d be packing. It was better to keep this a secret.

  Chapter Seven

  After practice, he had to meet with the coaches and explain the bruise on his jawline, the scratches, and the cut on his forehead, which he hadn’t even discovered until Officer Rick had pointed them out. It wasn’t a big deal, but they had to know about every little thing, and they’d noticed the second he set foot on the field.

  “You’ve had a tetanus shot,” the team’s doctor said while they were gathered around in his office as he scanned Elijah’s medical file in his computer. “He should be okay.”

  “I’m fine. I told you guys, I’m cool. No problems. It was just…an incident,” he explained.

  “Try not to get involved in things like that, Elijah,” the head coach said.

  “But she was going to hurt that man. I had to do something.”

  The assistant coach stepped forward and said, “No, leave it to the authorities.”

  “Right,” his trainer concurred. “If she would’ve broken your arm, you’d be out for the season.”

  She was strong, strangely so as he reflected back on it. Still. That didn’t matter.

  “She was hurting people, causing people to need medical attention. I couldn’t just stand by…”

  “Yes,” the head coach said. “You can. And you should.”

  “But…”

  “No, just don’t. We can’t afford to have you benched right now,” he said. “Dan is nowhere near ready to be our starting QB. Think of the team.” Then he went on to lecture him for about ten minutes straight but felt like two hours.

  None of them wanted him to take risks, even if it meant doing the right thing, and that really bothered Elijah. Nobody else did anything to help the pharmacist, either. That crazy woman also injured the man who’d tried to stop her. These people were telling him he shouldn’t have interfered and stopped it. They were saying he should’ve just stood by and let it happen like those other bystanders were doing. That just sat wrong in his gut. He knew if he had to choose again, he’d do what his instincts told him to do. He wasn’t going to sit back and watch someone be murdered. Not if he could do something to stop it.

  He nodded and continued to do so until they believed he was their bot again. Then Elijah hit the showers, left immediately after, avoiding committing to hanging out with his friends, and headed for his car. Someone was leaning on it, he noticed as he approached. As he got close enough to see the person, he found himself frowning.

  “Hi!” Cindy said in her usual, chipper tone that seemed sort of fake. Nobody was that perky.

  “Uh, hi, Cindy,” he said to the head cheerleader. Her pom-poms were splayed on the hood as if she were marking her territory. He looked around. There were still a lot of cars in the parking lot, probably just everyone involved in football or band in one capacity or another.

  “How was practice? Not too sore and tired, I hope?” she asked and boldly squeezed his bicep. She shook her head, causing her blonde ponytail to swing back and forth, a practiced move, no doubt.

  Elijah tried not to cringe. “No, fine.”

  “Hey, a couple of the girls were just saying they thought you were taking Mandy Jenkins to the homecoming dance. Is that true?”

  She was clearly lying. She just wanted to know if he’d asked anyone yet. Mandy ran in the same crowd as Cindy. She would definitely know the answer to that.

  “No.”

  He wanted to leave. He had to pick up a pizza still, which he’d ordered by text a few minutes ago from an awesome mom-and-pop pizza shop nearer to Lila’s community.

  “Oh, hm,” she said, puckering her brightly painted pink lips as if considering something astute. He knew that was definitely not the case with Cindy. “Wellll….”

  That was subtle. “‘Well’ what?”

  “Who are you going to ask, silly?” she teased and squeezed his arm again. She also stepped closer, brushing her right breast against it. She was definitely letting him know that homecoming night had a lot of promise if he wanted it to. Or even now, right here in the parking lot in his car probably. “I know there are quite a few girls waiting for you to. I know this girl is.”

  Really subtle. “Not sure. I was thinking about asking that new girl, Wren.”

  Her eyes widened as if she’d just witnessed what he had this morning. There was true horror there in those vacant blue orbs.

  “Wren. Fucking. Foster?” she asked slowly and with great staccato accentuating her anger. “Are you kidding me? That girl’s a total stoner. God, Elijah. You’re the quarterback for Christ’s sake. You don’t take someone like her to any school dance. Jesus!”

  “I don’t think it’s worth involving the Lord, Cindy,” he pointed out with a smirk, getting another burst of outrage.

  “You can’t be serious. She’s totally emo. She’s a psycho bitch. She just moved here,” she droned. “She’s a loser. Like, a total loser. Melanie said she found out she’s straight from juvie. I mean, c’mon, Elijah. And Damon heard she lives with an older man, like lives with him if you know what I mean. Ew. Like, gross! The girl’s obviously a freak and…”

  At some point, Elijah stopped listening. He didn’t want to hear any of that anyway. She w
as certainly not a reliable source of character judgment or factual information. Obviously.

  “Look, Wren and I have a date tonight, and I’m gonna be late. Excuse me,” he lied and handed her the pom-poms, which the cheerleaders looked at as if they were wielding a thing of precious value like Excalibur’s sword or something. He knew a lot of the guys on his team went out with the cheerleaders, but Elijah just wasn’t into that scene. In his experience, they were partiers and like to drink and smoke pot and snort coke, and he didn’t have time for that. He’d been to a few parties; none that Alex knew of, of course. He’d even gotten drunk at one of them. It wasn’t as fun as it was cracked up to be. The hype behind it made it sound a lot cooler than it actually turned out to be. Ralphing in the toilet the next morning was even less fun. Then having to down one of Alex’s monster breakfasts followed by a protein shake had made him wish he were dead. No more parties for him. Instead, he was high on anticipation for the future. He just wanted to get through senior year and on to college so he could change him and his brother’s lives. Those ambitions and dreams were as good as any drug-induced high he ever experienced so far.

  She huffed, spun on her perfectly white tennis shoes, and left in a fit of righteous temper. He chuckled and fired up the beast, listening to it growl for him for a moment before pulling away.

  After grabbing the pizza and a six-pack of diet iced-teas, Elijah drove to the trailer park and left his car at the curb of Lila’s place. He knocked but didn’t get an answer. A moment later, Wren came out of the trailer behind him.

  “Hey, I’m over here.”

  “Oh, okay,” he said with confusion and walked over to where she was holding the door open for him. “Cool. Thanks.”

  “Jai-jah!” Hope cried out with glee, brushed past Wren, and clung onto his thigh.

  “Hey, Hope,” he said. “What’s up, tiny person?”

  She giggled and ran off into the living room as Wren took the pizza from him and placed it on the counter in the kitchen where they were standing.

  “Thanks,” he repeated and placed the tea there, too. “Sorry, hope you like tea. Wasn’t sure.”

  “Whatever,” she said casually.

  “Do you live here or something?”

  She jammed her hands into the front pockets of her gray jeans and said, “Or something.”

  “Oh,” he answered confusedly. What did that mean? What did anything mean with her? She was strange. Cindy was right about that much. But he was pretty sure she wasn’t into drugs, and she certainly wasn’t stupid or a loser or any of the other insults or accusations the girl had hurled at her character. And he was pretty sure she wasn’t from juvenile lockup. Wren’s eyes caught everything, didn’t miss a single thing. She was very perceptive, not dumb at all. He wasn’t sure about juvie, though.

  Hope bounded back into the kitchen carrying a doll she just had to show him. Instead of squatting, he picked her up and settled her on his hip. He’d watched her a few times this summer when Lila couldn’t get a sitter. He’d also watched her a couple other times when his brother took Lila out on a date. She was a good kid, easy to manage, which was something for which he was thankful because he knew nothing about kids or how to care for one.

  “Pizza!” she yelled loudly, or as loudly as she could manage as soon as she’d finished telling him all about the doll, which apparently Wren bought for her. When he looked at her for confirmation, she’d turned away and began taking plates and glasses out of the cupboards. She got in the fridge and poured milk for Hope.

  They ate at the small kitchenette in the corner, and Wren helped Hope by cutting her food into tiny, appropriate bite-size pieces.

  “So, you’re Lila’s neighbor, huh?” he asked, wanting to know more.

  She wouldn’t look at him. She was staring at her food, which she’d hardly touched. The barely perceptible shake of her head and purse of her lips let him know she was not happy about the question. Why? Why was she so elusive? Why did she always wear a hoodie up or a ballcap? Why did he even care? All he needed was an A in Chemistry class.

  “Yeah, we live here. Me and my uncle. Just us. Nobody else. We live here in this trailer. Any other questions?”

  “Yes, a lot actually,” he answered honestly.

  She rose and went to the small radio on the kitchen counter and turned the music up slightly. It was Credence Clearwater Revival, “Bad Moon Rising.” It was a great song.

  “You like CCR?” he asked, surprising her apparently.

  She nodded and stared at him a second before looking down again.

  “Yeah, me, too,” he said.

  Elijah also wondered if she’d turned that up to drown him out. It must’ve worked because she mostly ignored him the rest of their meal. When they were done, she placed their plates in the sink, and Hope took off for the living room again where it looked like a toy nuke had gone off.

  “Looks like a daycare,” he joked.

  “No, kidding,” she agreed. “Kids have a lot of crap.”

  “I guess so. I wouldn’t know. I don’t have any nieces or nephews. Do you?”

  “We should get to work on that paper,” she said. “It’s due in two days.”

  He nodded, eyeing her up. Then he went out to his car and collected his backpack.

  “Give me ten minutes,” she said. “I’ve just gotta give her a bath and get her winding down. It takes a while sometimes. I’ll let her watch a princess cartoon while we work. That usually does the trick.”

  “Sure,” he said. “I’ll just set us up at the kitchen table if that’s okay.”

  He got a nod. Elijah cleared the rest of the pizza dinner away, placing everything on the counter space. The news came on between old songs, and the reporter sounded distressed.

  “The death toll in South Africa is now up to nearly twenty thousand,” he was saying. “The CDC and WHO are working on a cure, but as of yet, none has been discovered. We’ll keep you updated as we learn more about this dangerous new flu. And now on to your local weather.”

  That sounded ominous. A lot of people had died from some flu. He hadn’t even known about it. All he was doing lately were workouts, running, and homework. He was going to watch the twenty-four-hour news tonight when he got home. Surely, they’d be talking about it, too, if it were truly that bad.

  He took out his notebook, Chem book, and pen. She was obviously going to be more than ten minutes by the sounds of the squealing and giggling coming from Hope in the tub. The glee was usually followed by splashing noises. He decided to wash up their few dishes and did so because he didn’t want her to have to do it after he left. He even had time to dry them and put them away. When he opened the top cupboard nearest the sink, figuring dishes would go in there, he wouldn’t have been more surprised if a rattlesnake shot out at him. What greeted him was a gun, a revolver in a hip holster with two extra loaders next to it. No dishes.

  He heard the bathroom door down the hall open, so he slammed the cupboard shut and stacked the dry plate with the others on the counter instead. A moment later, she walked into the kitchen.

  “Okay, I’m…” she stopped in her tracks. “What are you doing?”

  “Oh, nothing. Just washed up the dishes for you since you were dealing with her. I didn’t know where they went, so I just stacked them here if that’s okay.”

  Her eyes darted to the closed cupboard concealing the pistol and back to him. Elijah knew she was judging whether or not to believe him, so he started talking.

  “I’ve got my work over here,” he said, trying to be cool strolling toward the table. “I wasn’t sure where yours was, though.”

  He glanced over his shoulder as he took his seat again and caught her eyes on that cupboard. Then she snapped out of it and looked at him.

  “Um, I’ll just get it,” she mumbled and left.

  Elijah watched her walk away down the hall through the living room and go into a room on the left. It must’ve been her bedroom. She returned with her messenger bag.


  “Is Hope okay?” he asked.

  “I’ve got her watching her movie, so she’ll be fine until we’re done. She’ll probably fall asleep there.”

  “Does Lila pick her up when she gets off?”

  She shook her head, “No, not always. Tonight, she’s working late, so I’ll take her over in the morning before I go to school.”

  “Where’s she sleep?” In the cupboard with the pistol? he wanted to ask.

  “With me,” she answered and rubbed her right eye as if she were tired. It smeared black makeup a bit, which made her look even more goth.

  He nodded, and they got to work. He checked her work, which pissed her off. And then she double-checked his just to show him that she wasn’t putting up with him scrutinizing her work. About an hour later, she checked on Hope, and they got back to it. After studying and writing for a while, and actually agreeing this time on the correct formulas, Elijah paused to look at her. She was unusual. Her cheekbones were high, probably too high in today’s standards. There was a splattering of brown freckles on her nose and the apples of her cheeks that he hadn’t noticed before. She was very tan like him, obviously a sun lover, too.

  “What?” she asked in her usual, defensive manner and squirmed in her seat.

  “Huh? Oh, you’re just…I don’t know…”

  Wren looked at him like he was an idiot. She was probably right.

  “You’re different from a lot of the girls at our school,” he remarked and swiped a hand through his hair. It was getting too long. He liked it pretty short during the season, cut into a fade. After football season, he’d let it grow a little more. With a helmet, it was hot because it was so thick, so he kept it tight.

  “So?” she asked and yawned behind her hand.

  “Hey, I meant to tell you that I was sorry for the other night at my house. I lost my temper. That was really rude.”

  “It’s fine. I am a bitch. You don’t have to apologize.”

  He laughed and had to admit that it was mostly nervous laughter. She was a strange person. Most girls would’ve freaked out and slapped him for calling them that. He was disappointed in himself for losing his cool, but she’d pushed his buttons. Nobody had ever made him so frustrated before, not enough to get insulting like that.