A small laugh escapes as I walk into the yard, although I can’t find my voice. I want to tell her that she’s a good person, too. That I’m sorry we parted ways, even if it was for the best—even sorrier that we have to part this way.
Soon enough, she won’t understand a word I say. Dread weakens my legs at the thought of those blue eyes turned pale and hungry. I’ll tell her now. We’ll talk until she can’t and then I’ll hold her until she’s gone. I refuse to envision the step after that—I’ll deal with that then.
I’m on my return when a shot echoes out the back door. I freeze in the silence that follows, in the moment before the groans on the street resume in earnest, and then drag my feet to the doorway. Maybe she did it to save me from the chore. Maybe because of my angry words in Grant’s basement. Because of them, I’ll never get to say my final words. The important ones.
The already dim room goes black. I want to jump the fence to the street and tear the heads off the motherfuckers that moan and pace, safety be damned. But revenge only works with humans, and they aren’t human. I kick the doorjamb and scream. The zombies gurgle and choke even louder.
“Fuck you!” I scream, my throat burning. “Fuck you, motherfuckers!”
She died alone while I pissed in a backyard in Philadelphia. It doesn’t make it any better that she wanted it this way. The mess that covers the wall behind her and the thought of her trembling finger on the trigger are infinitely worse than putting her to rest quietly. And, worst of all, I didn’t say goodbye.
I didn’t want to do it, but I would’ve. And now I know that it would’ve been preferable to the crushing guilt that whispers for me to find Rachel’s gun and follow her lead. But I won’t—even surrounded by death, I want to survive. I don’t want to be alone, no matter if it involves people and loss and hard choices. I won’t shrink from this choice again. I won’t let them see my doubt. I’ll say what I want to say before it’s too late.
I try to hold back the sobs that threaten to escape, try to forget Rachel is in there. But the zombies on the street won’t stop; they won’t allow me to forget. Their hisses rebound off the old brick and through the yards until it becomes a cacophony. I sink to the patio with my head on my arms and cry—for Rachel, for Grant, for myself, for everyone else. Maybe the zombies can hear me over their own noises. Maybe they can’t. It doesn’t matter—it’s either cry or turn the gun on myself.
Chapter 22
I’ve sorted all the essentials into my pack without looking Rachel’s way. I want to bury her, but the yards are the hard-packed dirt of the city. Even with my small spade in soft earth, it would take hours to dig a hole large enough. I consider burning the house down. But I don’t know who, if anyone, hides nearby, and smoking them out of their hidey-hole and into the arms of zombies would be a dick move.
In the end, I wrap her in a sheet from upstairs and set her deep in the ivy to let the earth do its job. That’s what she would have wanted, anyway.
I want to say I’m sorry, Rach. I want to thank her. But, if she can see me from wherever she is, she already knows. Tears well up, but I’m done crying. Done with the guilt. She’s given me a gift. I’m sure she knew it was, and I’m going to accept it. I would have done the same to myself to spare her the job, and I would be pissed if she wasted it whining about the fact that she didn’t get to kill me. In her last act, she’s rescued me the way I spent the past days rescuing her.
I clip the buckles of my pack and test its weight. Heavy, but I’ve carried heavier. I find my way to the roof and walk from house to house until I’m down the block, then turn back to where dozens of zombies wander the narrow street near my bike.
I clear my throat. “Hey!” Gray heads swivel. I knock a stick on the side of the building. “I’m going to leave now, on my bicycle, so if you’d all move down here so I can do that, it would be much appreciated.”
Feet shuffle my way. Their eyes lock on me, mouths agape. “Yes, yes, I know, delicious human up here. Come and get it.”
I think of Rachel. She wouldn’t have liked my joke, but now that I know why, I think it’s even more important that I make them. If you live waiting to die you will die—a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I wait until they’ve assembled below and then hightail it back across the roofs to the carriage house. I pad through the quiet rooms and hardly breathe as I click the locks. Once outside, I’ll have to move until I’m out of Philly. I need to cross the Delaware River at some point, so I’ve decided to do it sooner rather than later. Philly’s western bridges still stand, which leads me to believe the ones in North Philly do as well. New Jersey is a crapshoot, so I want to be on the right side of the water. Brooklyn is a known quantity in terms of bridge destruction, but I’ll have to see the extent of the damage before I can make a decision of how, or if, I can get onto the island.
I ease the door open. My bike is where I dropped it on the brick sidewalk. The zombies keep watch on my previous rooftop perch. It won’t be long until they notice movement. Sometimes it seems as though those translucent eyes see just as well as they ever did. Maybe better. Possibly because they’re on the hunt for one thing—they’re not distracted, they don’t fear anything. Movement is where it’s at. Any movement that might mean a meal.
Ten feet across the cracked brick sidewalk, one bend for the handlebars—slippery in my sweaty hands—and then I’m seated and pedaling before they’re on their way.
***
My dad always said I had a good sense of direction. It comes in handy, for sure, but what good is it if the zombies block you from going the way you know you should go? I want to head northeast, that much I can remember from the map in my pack that I can’t stop to peruse at the moment. Northeast means a couple of bridges to get me to the Jersey side of things. But a block over and two blocks up is all zombie. Five blocks north is all zombie.
The day is sunny and warm. Warm enough to heat the layer of rotten air over the city. There must be clear, fresh air up near the clouds, but it doesn’t break through the thick stench that saturates everything. The main avenues are full of roamers shambling in the broken glass amid cars. My backpack is glued to my back. Everything aches. I’m so thirsty. What I need is a good night’s sleep. But, first, I have to get away from the smell, the death, Rachel.
I pedal along streets embedded with metal rails, past discount stores in old buildings that face newer, uglier construction. I don’t know these neighborhoods, but I know north. Eventually, I’ll either be eaten by a zombie or cross the Delaware River. Come hell or high water, respectively.
A laugh sounds over the whir of the bike’s crank. Up ahead are a few dead, who aren’t known for their sense of humor, and a whole lot of ground to cover. I glance back for the source—there’s no one. Me. I’m who laughed. I’ve lost my damn mind.
The stores are upscale now. The cross streets widen. This street becomes a short tunnel under a stone and glass building. You don’t have to be a genius to know that tunnels are a bad idea. My hand brakes squeal at the intersection, and I scan left and right. The bodies that look up with interest are certainly worse than a short tunnel. I can see daylight at the other side. The light at the end of the tunnel has finally appeared—and here I thought things were bad.
At least this time I know the laugh is mine.
Chapter 23
The neighborhood changes to parking lots and chain-link fences, mismatched rowhomes and old industrial buildings that will never be converted to luxury condos. Trash-strewn lots where the trash was strewn before the virus. I can see what’s coming on the next corner, and the answer is not much. It’s time to look at the map and regroup.
I stop on the steps of a church. If only these were vampires, repelled by crosses and holy water. But that would suck, too. Vampires are smart.
“Shut up,” I mutter to myself. Debating the merits of vampires over zombies, even silently, is another sign I’m losing it.
I’ve moved a tad east, a good bit north, and I’ve missed the
first bridge. On the map, the river is a thick blue line that grows progressively thinner until it reaches the next bridge. I’d bet I could swim the river if it’s not too loaded with bodies, as long as I can float my pack on something. The triathlon I did last year involved just over a mile of swimming, and I doubt the Delaware is a mile across in that spot.
I hop on my bike. The neighborhood seems to change street by street, from run-down to well-kept. Finally, after cruising down a street patched with six different shades of aged asphalt, I hit the industrial area. The long access road is clear. The river sits to my right. Shipping containers and fences block my view, but it’s there. The bridge is just ahead. Bridges, really, since there’s also a railroad bridge.
I stop just before the Betsy Ross Bridge, which was supposed to be deliverance but upon closer inspection looks more like certain death. It’s chock-full of stopped vehicles and the roving bodies of the people who drove them. To my right is an inlet. One quick jump and I could be in the river, swimming, but one quick jump and they could be, too. Not to mention the bodies already in the water. I can’t afford wet gear, wet guns or the possibility I’ll lose both in the current. I’m a good swimmer, but those are risks I’ll take when my life depends on it.
Cassie would be proud. For as long as I can remember, my sister has been on me about risk assessment. If she wasn’t an artist, she’d work for an insurance company. Why climb to the roof of the treehouse and then so far above the forest floor that one false move would mean a long fall? Why climb a mountain when you could be safe on the ground? Why trust your life to a rope, an axe, crampons? I’ve never found a good answer, but I always invite her up to see the view, to which she replies she’d accidentally kill us both on the way up. It’s true; if anyone could manage it, she could.
Once again, the train tracks will have to come to my rescue. It’s either that or try my luck with the next bridges. I turn back. A bird in the hand and all that. I carry my bike up the metal stairs set into the grassy incline of the railroad tracks.
I planned to walk the bike rather than jounce across the river on the ties, but as I near the bridge, I see the metal grate that spans the area between the tracks. It’s an empty half mile across the bridge, with no hidden spots for a zombie to lurk. For the first time in hours, maybe a week, I take a deep breath that isn’t strangled and then hop on my bike.
It’s like flying, or as close to it as I’ll get for a long time, maybe the rest of my life. American Airlines won’t be up and running anytime soon. The metal trusses whip by and the wind cools everywhere but under my pack. The Delaware runs below. Philly stands in the distance. The clouds float in a blue sky. I stop mid-river and turn my back on the Betsy Ross Bridge, where I’ve caught the eye of several dozen of them. Their moans are faint, just reaching me on the wind. If I don’t look down at the floaters in the river and concentrate on the trees, the low houses, and the skyline, I could believe this is all a dream.
I like heights. Maybe that’s the answer I could give Cassie if, when, I see her: I like the view it affords, the way it makes big things seem small—whether it’s an actual physical thing or a problem that looms so large you can’t find perspective. After we scattered my parents’ ashes at the cabin, I took off for the mountains. I made my peace with their absence; it was easier to do under a wide-open sky, with no one to hear when I cursed and cried. I don’t know that it lessened my grief, but it made it easier to handle. When I’m close to the stars, when my mind is as clear as the breeze that dries my sweaty clothes, I’m sure there’s a Heaven. And even if Heaven on Earth is as close as anyone ever gets, it’s okay—I’ve already been there.
Chapter 24
Who knew I’d ever be so happy to step foot into Jersey? I’m kidding, really, but I have to uphold the old New York-New Jersey beef. I might be the only person left to do it. It sure seems that way—the streets are quiet in this stretch of 1940’s suburban homes. A few standalone businesses dot what was probably once the main thoroughfare, now supplanted by the highway. The grass isn’t yet overgrown and spring flowers are in evidence. The lack of broken windows makes it look as though everyone just up and disappeared. Only a scrap of leaflet—that holds the handwritten message SAFE ZO—is proof that zombies do exist.
That, and the zombie that’s now moving toward me from a driveway between two houses, his tan t-shirt torn and dirty. He trips off the curb with a grunt and raises an arm. It’s because he wants to eat me, but I wave as I roll past and say, “And a good day to you, sir.”
It’s strange to have left a city teeming with them to arrive here. I don’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but it seems impossible that this can last. A block later, a low sound overrides the rush of wind in my ears. A crowd. The street ahead is still barren, and the side streets I passed were the same. I don’t stop pedaling, but I tighten my grip on the handlebars, ready to swerve.
Once I pass the trees that block my view, all questions are answered. A rusted chain-link fence encloses the giant green lawn of a warehouse and offices. And it also encloses what could be everyone from the surrounding area. This is the SAFE ZO. Was the SAFE ZO.
I reach the intersection. How long have they been waiting for something edible to happen past? I have no idea, but I’ve incited a riot. The fence clangs and metal squeals. The zombies at the rear push against the ones at the fence. The metal bulges. I don’t wait to see what happens next.
The grass turns to a parking lot of tractor trailers with a fence that’s bent to the ground. The entry point for whomever infected these people, possibly, but also the exit point for today. They spill out in front of me at the same time as the fence behind me gives way in a screech of steel. I figure it’s pointless, but I still risk a glance to see if my rear is any better.
The fence is down. Hundreds limp my way. Yup, definitely pointless.
To my right is a factory with an iron fence and a sea of cars in the lot. I don’t see any zombies. That’s about as much as I can ascertain, and it’ll have to be enough—the ones ahead, post-retirement age folks, are closing in. An old lady snatches at air when I pull my bike away just in time.
Up until now, I’ve been calm. But, old folks or not, they’re here to kill me, and every nerve in my body is electrified. I run the bike to the fence and toss it over top. It drops with a clatter that doesn’t sound good. I fit my boot between the slats on a cross rail and yank myself up, and then I’m on the other side.
They hit a second later, but the iron holds. I scurry under their reaching arms for my bike and pedal away. That was close. Too close. The breeze from the bike can’t cool me down. Even my knees and elbows are sweaty. Rachel would’ve freaked. I imagine standing on this side of the fence watching her be eaten. Or her, watching me, because I would’ve sent her over first. It’s a good thing I only have to look out for me, I tell myself, even though me and myself know it’s a blatant lie.
It’s one thing to want to be alone, and an entirely different thing to be cast into a world that’s empty but for you. Part of the fun of a close call is having someone with whom to laugh it off. Alone, it can magnify into something to be feared. Intense fear paralyzes, and I can’t afford paralysis.
I ride through the lot and past the factory building, paralleling the road. I’ll hop the fence again before they get down the street. This lot ends at a chain-link fence, behind which rises a long, high mound of grass. It could be a park, but it doesn’t quite look like one. When it’s time to hit the pavement, I carefully transfer my bike to the road and resume my travels.
That grassy mound runs alongside my route. Fir trees sprout from its top. It stretches on until the road turns up ahead. Not a park, but something familiar that I can’t put my finger on. Finally, I reach a gate with a sign: Sanitary Landfill. Of course. Right in the middle of town.
I laugh and shake my head. Fucking Jersey.
Chapter 25
The bike lasted maybe seven more miles. After an ominous clicking noise began with each rotati
on of the pedals, I knew it was giving up the ghost. But hope springs eternal, and I pushed it until the chain popped. It’s between 50-60 miles to Staten Island, and then I have two bridge crossings. Blown-up bridge crossings. I try not to think about it as I sit under a tree in the park across from an empty yacht club. Hell yes, I checked—not a single boat.
There are a few zombies in the parking lot past the baseball diamond. They weren’t there before I used the port-a-potty set back in the field and I’m lucky that they didn’t see me and come visit while I used it.
A car would be good. A motorcycle would be even better once I get to the traffic in north Jersey. I saw it on TV before it cut out, and there’s no way all those cars found somewhere to go. Cassie might have been in one of them, if she and her friends managed to find a car, as she said she would if it looked bad. But how bad did it look? Probably not that bad until it was too late.
I heave myself up. All the climbing and running Cassie teased me about is serving me well now. Mentally, I’m exhausted. Physically, I’m okay. I’ll find transportation and go as far as is safe before I find somewhere to sleep for the night.
If I stay within the tree line at the edge of the field, my buddies across the way won’t notice, as they’re now chasing a bird. The bird lands to peck at the grass and, when they get close again, it flaps another ten feet and lands. I think it’s fucking with them.
“Nice work, Bird,” I say, and head down the side street.
Except for the few zombies, whom I avoid by walking faster, it’s a pleasant jaunt around the corner. I stop at the first house I see that’s far enough from tagalong zombies and has a vehicle out front. A Jeep Cherokee. Not great on gas, but I may need the 4X4. I can always trade down, or up, depending. There might come a point when I need a bulldozer. You never know.
The keys are likely inside the house, which is a weird 1960’s combination of pale brick and stucco. Like they ran out of brick and figured they’d finish the top half in whatever was laying around. I prop open the screen door and knock with the hand that doesn’t hold my knife. Nothing answers. I try the knob. Locked. It’ll take a lot of noise to open the door. Less noise to break a window. I head around back and find the back door has a window, which is easily cracked with my knife hilt. One twist of the lock and I stand in a sunny, spotless kitchen with a round oak table and a wooden spice rack on the wall.
The City Series (Book 1): Mordacious Page 13