by Cass Kim
They’d been walking again for a little while before he broke the silence. “You know, you can still change your mind. I can just take you home, and you can stay there.” He was leading the way, so she couldn’t see his face as he said it. His voice was soft, and void of emotion. Like he was keeping it neutral with effort.
“I’ve already made up my mind. Besides, I already have… what did Syd say? .05 Milliliters of the manipulated virus in my body now.”
“She also said it likely wasn’t enough to do you any real harm,” he kept walking, picking his way confidently over a maze of roots.
“Yeah, but this whole thing is an experiment anyhow. She doesn’t know that for sure. And I don’t want to be sitting at home like some ticking time bomb that could change any minute. I don’t want to risk accidentally hurting my friends or my mom, just on Syd’s hunch.” She felt her chest tighten at the thought of chickening out now and then having her cowardice directly hurt someone she loved.
He stopped, finally turning to face her, “You realize that the experiment is longer than just if you survive the next few weeks, right?”
“What do you mean?” Her heart squeezed painfully as he yanked off his sunglasses, his copper eyes immediately watering in the midday sunlight filtering through the trees.
“I mean, we still die. The changed. And we don’t know what the virus will do, how long it will stay contained in our bodies. If it’s going to be expressed again.” He paused, flicking his fingers over his thumbs while thinking.
“Like how before they vaccinated for it, the varicella-zoster virus caused chickenpox.” He continued, “And people got all itchy and feverish, but then their bodies had an immune response and they healed up after about a week. People thought that meant it was over. But the virus was still in their bodies. About twenty-five percent of the people who had chickenpox as kids also got this illness called shingles, caused by that exact virus still living in their body from when they were little. Only the second time around, it was worse than the chickenpox. Sometimes it caused permanent nerve damage to people. Even blindness. From everything I read it was really painful. We don’t know if that kind of second life for the virus could happen to us. But knowing how it felt the first time…”
“Are you afraid of that? I mean, do you… do you think that will happen to you? To us?” She wanted to reach out and wipe the tears forming under his eyes, even if they were only a reaction to the sunlight.
“I don’t know. I mean, yeah, I am a little. But mostly I just think you’re jumping into it too fast.”
“Yeah, you’ve said that a few times now.” She struggled to tamp down the frustration in her voice. “Do you think you did? You said before, you didn’t know if you would make that choice again now that you know the consequences. Do you think if you’d taken more time to think, that you would’ve changed your mind back then?”
He shoved his sunglasses back on. “Probably not. I was a stupid kid, though, idolizing my big brother. You have other choices.”
“Yeah,” she answered, her voice low and heavy, “I could always just go home and explain to my mom that her favorite child is in the woods somewhere being held by scientists until his body dies of organ failure from a virus that she’s lived her whole adult life hating. But not to worry, because at least she has her daughter that may or may not turn into a Wilder and kill her in a few days.” She pressed her hands to her forehead, swiping them firmly against her eyebrows, trying to massage away the headache she felt coming.
“Renna, I…” he reached out a hand, resting it gently on her shoulder, “I’m sorry. I guess I just feel like I should have done a better job protecting you from my parents.”
She shook his hand off and straightened up. “It’s not your job to protect me from anyone. Besides, it’s already done. The decision has been made. Can we please talk about something else? Just for a little bit I want to pretend that life is normal.”
They were silent for a long moment, squared off and staring steadily at each other.
“Yeah, okay. We can do that. We’ve got about twenty more minutes before we reach your house. Twenty minutes that will be nothing but fun, light hearted conversation.” He flashed her a grin, and she didn’t need his sunglasses to be off to know that it didn’t reach his eyes. Still, she appreciated that he was trying.
After they’d started walking again he cleared his throat, voice light. “So what do people our age do for fun anyhow?”
She shrugged, “Mostly watch movies, or go to music shows,” which reminded her of her brother, so she hastily added, “I guess really just hang out.”
“Well, Renna, prepare to have a great hang out as we walk through the woods on this beautiful sunny day.”
Renna raised her eyebrows, “That’s a pretty big promise, a great hang out.” She matched her tone to his. If nothing else, they could pretend it was a great day for a great, normal hangout.
He flashed her a real smile then, and asked, “Have you ever played ‘three truths and a lie’?”
“Isn’t that a drinking game?”
“Yeah,” he didn’t lose his smile
“We don’t have any alcohol, and we’re in the middle of the woods.”
“Now it’s a dancing game. If you don’t guess which of the three things is the lie, you have to break out your worst dance move and really show it off. I mean, really go for it. No half-assed disco pointing. I meant like, full on arms whipping back and forth, hips jiving kind of disco moves. And I’ll do the same”
She rolled her eyes but couldn’t fight the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, “Fine, but we keep walking between our awesome dance moves.”
“Deal.”
Chapter Thirteen
By the time they neared her house and had to call the game off, Renna knew that the first girl Emerson had kissed was named Lacie, and that he’d always wanted to be a firefighter, even long after most kids moved on from that dream. She’d learned that he’d broken his left arm when he was seven, riding his bike down a hill and hitting a stick. Then re-broken it the week he got the cast off when his brother dared him to run across the monkeybars in their backyard and he’d fallen just before the last rung. He’d learned that her favorite ice cream flavor was pistachio, and she’d only kissed one boy in her life. They’d also discovered that both of them had impressively bad dancing skills. At one point his ‘running man’ dance had made her laugh so hard she had to sit down on the forest floor to avoid peeing her pants.
Once they’d gotten close enough that the outline of her house was visible between the trees, Emerson called the game to a halt, and suggested they wait and observe for a bit.
“But this is my house. I live here.” She protested as he cleared a patch of ground of sticks and small stones before lowering himself down to sit.
“Yeah, and you’ve been missing for a few days. Unless I’m mistaken, the only thing anybody really knows right now is that your brother’s car was sitting in your driveway, covered in blood, and you are both missing, after what the news called the largest Wilder attack in years.” The beautiful bubble of normalcy he’d helped create burst and she was again weighed down by the recent events.
“Oh my gosh. Diamond. Is his car still here?” She couldn’t quite see around the house to the driveway from where they were sitting. What if nobody had been by yet? Would Diamond’s body still be sitting his car, bloated and starting to decompose? She shuddered, shoving the image out of her mind. That is not how she would remember her friend.
She was about to suggest they work their way through the woods to see the driveway, to see if her mother was home or not, when she heard a snarling growl ripping through the tall ferns that edged their yard.
“Tim Tam!” She rushed forward and scooped the cat up in her arms, carrying him a few feet away from Emerson, who now stood frantically looking around for anybody in the yard or house. Renna didn’t care if somebody could see her. She buried her face in Tim Tam’s long fur, breathing in h
is cat scent. After showering him in kisses she hugged him close and pressed her ear to his ribcage, soothed by the steady rumbling of his purr.
“Oh, I missed you so much my Timmy Tammy!” She pulled away to look him over, seeing a few small sticks tangled in his puffy fur. As she stroked her hand down his body, she felt a few lumps and a small sticky area she feared was blood.
“Buddy, you’ve been outside this whole time?” She set him down and sat cross legged on the ground to start finger combing the sticks out of his fur. The entire time he walked back and forth across her lap, swiping his face and cheeks against her chin and bumping her shoulders, still rumbling his joy at seeing her. He stopped and sniffed interestedly at her sore left shoulder, before rubbing his cheek harder there.
“Emerson, I think it’s safe. If anybody was here they’d have come out by now.” Just as Renna said it the sliding door to the house was whipped back, and Tim Tam trotted toward the house. Renna froze, waiting for the copper door to be opened.
“Rennoodle! Oh my God I thought you were fucking dead!” Alyssa’s voice was thick with tears as she stepped out of Renna’s house. She didn’t even look around before she flung herself across the yard to tackle Renna back onto the grass in a vice like hug.
“Lyss,” Renna found herself crying into her best friend’s shield of blond hair, sniffling back snot and trying to form words. After a few minutes of sobbing, Renna loosened her grip on her best friend.
“Where have you been?” Alyssa pulled back, sitting up abruptly as if realizing they were at the edge of the yard, far from the safety of the house. “We have to get inside. We can’t be out here, not even in the sunlight.”
As Alyssa dragged Renna back toward the house Renna looked back to the woods. She couldn't see Emerson wherever he waited.
Loudly, and for his benefit, she said, “I can’t stay long Alyssa. I’ll explain what I can, but then I have to go again.” And, as an afterthought, “What are you doing at my house?”
“I don’t know who has a longer story at this point,” Alyssa swiped the back of her hand across her nose. “Was Tim Tam with you? I couldn’t find him anywhere. I thought you guys were all…” She trailed off, flapping her hands toward her best friend.
Renna swallowed hard as she latched the copper door and then the slider. She didn’t know how to tell Alyssa about Benjamin and Diamond. She was working up the courage when Alyssa cut in.
“Renna, I… I’m really sorry but…” she swiped at her cheeks as if wiping the tears there would help her stop crying. “Diamond’s dead. She’s outside, in your brother’s car. I don’t want you to see her, so just stay inside, okay? That’s why I thought something had happened to you. I…I found your cellphone on the ground near the car, and it had blood on it.”
Alyssa’s eyes were bloodshot and puffy from days of crying. Renna knew, looking at her best friend who was inexplicably right where she needed her to be, that coming back had been the right thing to do. Leaving her and her mother to wonder forever what happened was unfair. Now she had to be strong to say that good bye. She had to give those explanations.
“Alyssa, I…I know. I know about Diamond.” She didn’t know if she’d be able to keep talking through her tears, but she swallowed hard and forged ahead. “Is my mom here, Lyss?” Renna did not think she could tell the story twice.
Alyssa stared at her, “Girl, you really have been off the grid. Everywhere is locked down. Our whole section of New York has been put into quarantine.” She blew her nose loudly in a tissue and held the box out the Renna. “Your mom is stuck outside the quarantine since she was already at work. The line is actually right at the border of Rutland, so your mom can’t come in. She’s called me, like, a million times. I didn’t know what to say,” she sniffled. “So I told her I didn’t think anything was wrong, but that I was stuck in my house with spotty service. I don’t think she believed me, so I stopped answering her calls.”
Tim Tam was pawing insistently at the cupboard his wet food cans were stored in. Absently, Renna went over and began to open a can for him, wondering if she should use Alyssa’s phone to call her mom or if she should just write her a letter or make a video or something. She wasn’t really sure how to explain this to her.
“Wait a second, Lyss, if everybody is on lock down, how did you end up here?” She set the food dish on the floor and Tim Tam began scarfing the food down so fast she was half sure he’d end up puking it right back up.
Alyssa started sniffling again, and Renna looked up to see her rapidly braiding and unbraiding a small section of her long pale hair, a stress habit she’d picked up a few years back when her parent’s fights started getting really bad.
“Lyss, don’t tell me you actually left your house in the middle of a lock down because your parents were yelling at each other.” Renna wasn’t sure if she wanted to hug her friend or strangle her at the thought.
“He hit her.” She whispered hoarsely. Then, because she was Alyssa and she was mostly fearless, she cleared her throat and said louder, “That bastard hit her. And then I think she might’ve hit him back. They were arguing about money, and then it turned into pointing fingers in any direction they could to shift the blame. And since nobody can go anywhere, they were both just drinking and being the irresponsible selfish assholes they are. So, I got in my car and I came here. I knew that once I got here I’d be safe.” Her fingers were braiding and unbraiding, the tears leaking down her cheeks unheeded. “But then nobody was here except… except Diamond. I didn’t know what to do. So I waited.”
Renna sat down on the couch next to her and grabbed her hands, stilling them. “It’s okay. I’m here now.” She thought of Emerson still waiting in the woods. The timer on Syd’s watch was still ticking down, with only five hours left. That gave her less than two hours to explain this to Alyssa in a way that she’d accept. Renna blew out a long breath and adopted her most “mom” tone.
“Lyss, let’s go to my room while we talk. I need to pack a bag and explain things. And maybe you can tell me what was so different about this attack that the town is being quarantined. They haven’t done that in... what… five years, anywhere in the US?”
Alyssa followed her up the stairs, then plopped down onto Renna’s bed like she had a thousand times before. “That’s the thing, Rennoodle. This attack was… it’s been really bad.” She reached for her hair before clenching her fists and putting them in her lap.
“I heard on the news that forty-five people died in the attack at that bar?” Renna prompted her to continue.
“It’s way worse than that, Noodle. I don’t really get all of the science part of it, but I guess the virus is moving really quickly, and people are changing before they can even report themselves.” She flopped back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling, “Last count was one hundred and thirteen dead either by attack or authorities.”
“What?” Renna’s voice burst out in a shrill bark. She started shoving clothes into her backpack, barely even looking. She had to get back and tell the camp. She had to get this vaccine process going.
“It’s worse than that.” Alyssa sat back up and reached over to raise the blinds. “They’re attacking even in the sunlight. The Wilders aren’t hiding until night anymore.”
“Wait… what?” She darted a glance out the window, wondering if she’d see Emerson from this vantage point, now that she knew he was out there. She saw a little rustle off to the side of the yard, opposite of where she’d left him. He must be scoping out the driveway situation.
“Yeah,” Alyssa’s voice shook for a moment before she shoved the blinds back down and continued, “They’re saying the virus is mutating.”
Renna took a deep breath. Now was the time to explain to her what she was doing and why.
Chapter Fourteen
“I’m not letting you just leave here to be some psycho sacrifice for human kind!” Alyssa stood blocking the open doorway to the backyard, her jaw clenched and her posture firm.
“Alyssa
,” Renna stared at the watch on her wrist, now down to only four hours to return to the camp. “I understand how you feel,” she kept her voice even, words slow, “But I have to. I already explained it to you.”
“Then I’m going with you.” Her chin tipped up into a stance that Renna knew from years of experience meant she was ready to settle in for a long argument.
“You know I don’t have time to get into this with you,” She hated how she heard the irritation in her voice so much louder than the love she had for her fierce friend. This was not how she’d pictured their parting.
Alyssa gave her a small smug smile, “Then don-“
Before Renna could react, a large, grimey hand came from the edge of the step and gripped into Alyssa’s long blond hair, yanking hard. Alyssa’s shout turned into an inarticulate grunt as she was pulled out of the doorway and into the yard, her feet scrabbling for purchase, eyes wide. Tim Tam lunged out after her, hissing and spitting. Renna froze, trying to gasp in air through her clenching throat. What had happened? Why had they left the door open while arguing?
Alyssa made a wordless sound of terror as she was thrown to the side, some of her hair still caught in the hand of the Wilder. Once she hit the ground she was disturbingly quiet. The Wilder was at least six feet tall. With horror Renna realized that this had been the movement she’d seen in the trees earlier. It hadn’t been Emerson at all. Tim Tam stood between Renna and the Wilder, growling, but also not moving to engage.
Her feet remained frozen though she willed them to move, to carry her toward her best friend. The creature wheeled and glared toward the spot Alyssa had landed, just a few feet from the doorway. His head tilted back and forth, studying, looking to see if his prey was dead. Alyssa whimpered, and scrambled to get to her feet. She was fast, but the Wilder was faster as he started toward her. Renna caught her breath, filling her lungs to scream, to do anything to distract the creature.