Laying in bed Serafina pulled her husband close to her, snuggling against him. In minutes, she was asleep.
Daniel stared at the ceiling, waiting for sleep to come.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Oceanside, California
“Get the kids and go, Sarah.”
The words hit Sarah Ferguson in the gut like a punch from a heavyweight, stopping her heart and making her stomach feel hollow.
“What? What are you talking about, John?”
Her husband’s hushed voice hissed through the phone. “Something’s gone wrong, Sarah. People are killing each other in the street, it’s like they’ve turned into animals or something.”
“Oh my god…” Sarah stared at the ceiling of their small condo in Oceanside, California, wondering if there was any way what her husband was telling her could be true. She couldn’t see it. “Are you sure?”
“What?! Yes, I’m sure, Sarah. We responded to a nine one one call of an assault with multiple victims, and we assumed it was another mass shooting.” He took a deep breath before continuing. “It was so much worse. Bodies were everywhere, torn apart like rag dolls.” She heard him swallow before his voice caught in the back of his throat. When he went on, it was obvious he was barely keeping it together. “I saw a woman tear apart her little girl, Sarah.” He paused again, choking on his emotions. “You have to go.”
“But what about you?”
There was a long pause. Sarah could hear her husband on the other end of the line, but he remained silent.
“John?”
Finally, he spoke. “Just go, Sarah.”
“What? We can wait for you…”
“I can’t come back.”
His words hit her like a punch in the gut. Feeling tears well up in her eyes, she choked them back. “Why? What do you mean?”
“They got me.”
Sarah’s heart was racing in her chest as she tried to process the meaning of his words. Her voice was barely audible as she spoke into the phone. “They... they what?”
“One of them bit a chunk out of my forearm.”
More silence.
He spoke again.
“I’m infected, Sarah.”
Fighting through her tears, Sarah Ferguson pleaded with her husband. “Come home, baby, please. We can give you medicine or something. We can fix it.”
“I can’t, sweetie, and you can’t fix it. No one can.”
“John…”
“I love you, Sarah. I always have. I’ve loved you since the day we met…” He paused, choking up as he spoke to her for the last time. “Tell Jason and Olivia that I love them, okay? Daddy loves them.”
The line went dead.
Sarah sank to the floor, clutching the phone in her hand as she cried. She dialed her husband’s number over and over, praying he would pick up as she did. He never answered.
What was happening? This was America. This kind of thing didn’t happen here. They were supposed to be safe.
Leaning against the wall, she wrapped her arms around her knees and pulled them close to her. She lowered her head and rested it on her knees as she continued to weep. She wanted to fall over, onto the ground, and go to sleep. Sleep until this nightmare was over. If she could just sleep -
“What’s wrong, Mommy?”
Looking up through tear filled eyes, she saw Olivia standing in front of her. The little girl was dressed in her favorite Disney princess outfit and was holding an Ariel doll in her hand as she looked at Sarah. The young girl’s light brown hair, which Sarah had put into a braided ponytail, hung down the left side of the girl’s chest. Watching her mother cry had upset the girl, bringing tears to her big brown eyes.
Keep it together, Sarah.
Reaching out, she rubbed her daughter’s arm while bringing her sleeve up to wipe away her tears. “It’s nothing, dear. Mommy’s just feeling emotional.”
Olivia came over to her mother’s side, reached down, and stroked her hair, playing the adult. “It’s okay, mommy. No need to be ‘motional. Everything is going to be just fine.” The girl nodded for emphasis as she finished, indicating her confidence that things would, in fact, be fine. The girl smiled widely as she saw her mother smile, then asked, “Is it time to go pick up Jason yet?”
Sarah Ferguson's heart stopped in her chest.
Her son was out there.
She was on her feet instantly, moving quickly through their condo as she found the keys to their Nissan Pathfinder, stuck shoes on Olivia’s little feet, and donned her own sneakers. In less than three minutes, she was rushing down the stairs, carrying her five-year-old daughter in her arms. She stuffed the girl into her car seat in the backseat of the SUV she and her husband had bought just six months ago, after his recent promotion to Lieutenant in the Fire Department. Rushing to the other side of the vehicle, she opened the door and jumped in.
Sarah Ferguson practically flew the two and a half miles to the elementary school where Jason was enrolled. The tires on her SUV squealed as she sped into the parking lot, weaving around the speed bumps, not caring about the normal safety rules that governed areas with small children.
Nothing was normal anymore.
Screeching to a stop in the red zone directly in front of the main entrance to the school, she leapt out of the car, pocketing her keys before moving to the passenger side of the vehicle. Opening the door, she reached inside to release the harness that kept Olivia in her car seat.
A scream came from inside the school, freezing her.
With one hand on the strap of the harness, she slowly turned and looked towards the school.
Another scream, this time closer.
“Shit!”
“Mommy?”
Looking back at Olivia, Sarah glanced at the windows of the vehicle. The driver’s and passenger’s windows were cracked open, leaving a one-inch gap.
It would have to do.
“Mommy will be right back, sweetie.”
“Mommy…..!!” The girl’s face was full of fear as tears burst forth from her eyes.
“I promise, sweetie, I’m just gonna get your brother.”
“Mommy!!!”
She shut the door and turned away, pressing the button on the FOB to lock the doors of the SUV.
None of those warnings about leaving children in your car accounted for this situation.
Heart pounding in her chest, she rushed to the front door of the school, grabbed the handle, and threw it open.
Inside was nothing short of pandemonium.
Screams were coming from every direction. Glass was breaking. Children were running down the hallways, rushing towards her as they tried to escape.
Sarah moved to the side of the hallway, forging her way ahead against the flow of children. One of the teachers, a woman Sarah had only seen once or twice, came around the corner, her flats sliding on the tiled floor. The woman’s arms windmilled as she tried to regain her balance, but it was no use. Her feet came out from under her and she fell, taking the brunt of the impact on her elbow and hip.
Sarah’s feet started to move her in the direction of the woman, but the woman was up in an instant, clutching her arm as she broke into a run again. She looked over at Sarah.
“Get out! Get away!”
“I - ”
The woman was gone.
Sarah turned and ran, heading for Jason’s classroom. She turned the corner and rushed to the third room. The door was closed. Reaching for the knob, she grabbed it and threw the door open.
A chorus of screams came from the room as frightened children shrunk away from her sudden entrance. Jason’s teacher, a young, twenty-something woman named Danielle Nielsen, held as many of the children as she could close to her as she stared in fear at the doorway. The others hid behind her, doing their best to shrink in size.
In the middle of the group of children was Jason, his dark eyes wide with fear and worry. Tear stains covered his face, his clothes were dirty, likely from their time in the play area during r
ecess, and his hair was a mess, but he was there.
Still alive.
‘Thank God.’
“Jason! Come here, sweetie.”
The boy surged forward, anxious to get to his mother, only to have his efforts stopped by the teacher, who reached out and grabbed him, holding his arm tightly.
Stepping forward, Sarah stared at the younger woman, feeling anger rise up inside her. “Let. Him. Go.”
The woman’s face was a mixture of sadness and fear as she stared back at Sarah. “Are you one of them?”
Sarah stiffened. “Them? Who’s ‘them?’
Nielsen shrunk under Sarah’s withering stare. “The...crazy people. The ones who are attacking everyone. Like Mister Rudolph.”
James Rudolph was the school principal.
Sarah shook her head. “I’m not crazy. I just want to take my son home. I’m here to protect him.”
Danielle’s hand released Jason, who immediately rushed to his mother’s side, wrapping his arms around the woman’s waist. In response, Sarah wrapped her arm around the young boy, holding him close as she looked back at the teacher.
“You need to get out of here.”
“But...What...how?”
Looking at the teacher, a woman who’d likely been in college less than three years ago, Sarah saw what she assumed was shock on her face. It had taken all of the woman’s wits to gather the children in the corner of the room. Anything beyond that was asking too much.
Like locking the door.
Dammit.
Taking a breath, Sarah motioned with her hand at the woman. “Come on. I’ll lead you outside, then after that, I have to get my son home.”
“I…”
Her patience gone, Sarah shouted, “Get up! Let’s go!”
The loudness of her voice broke the woman’s paralysis. She rose to her feet, looking down at the grouping of children. “Okay, class, we’re going to follow Miss Ferguson outside. Everyone stay close.”
At that moment, the title ‘Miss’ struck Sarah like a shot to the temple.
She was a Miss; no longer a Missus.
Even worse, she was most likely a widow.
‘No time for that,’ she thought, as she watched Danielle bring the children over. The woman looked at her, eyes wide with fear.
Sarah crouched down quickly, grabbing Jason by the shoulders to hold his attention. She stared into her son’s eyes, trying to convey the seriousness of the situation as she spoke to him. “Honey, listen to me. We’re going to get out of here, and we have to hurry. Stay next to Mommy, okay?”
The young boy nodded, reaching out and taking his mother’s hand. “Okay, Mommy.”
Sarah stood and looked around the room for something to use as a weapon. There was nothing, which made sense. They were, after all, in an elementary school.
Moving to the door, she leaned against and listened for a moment. The screams of terrified adults and children came to her through the door, but most of them seemed to be coming from a different hallway, somewhere off to her left.
‘Here we go,’ she thought, softly pulling the door open. The hallway was a mess, with loose papers, lunch boxes, backpacks, and ball caps strewn about the floor. As bad as it appeared, when she glanced in either direction, she saw no one. Screams echoed through hallways as she stepped out of the classroom, motioning for the young teacher to quickly move the children out into the hallway.
Sarah pointed towards the front of the school. “Go! Get them out of here!”
Nodding, Danielle looked down at the children. “Okay, boys and girls, we’re going to hold hands and run to the front of the school.” She grabbed the hands of two children and started moving. One by one, the children grasped the hands of their classmates. Shuffling forward, the woman led the children towards the front of the building, running in short steps to ensure she wouldn’t leave any of them behind.
A bloodcurdling roar came from behind them as the man who’d once been James Rudolph rounded the corner. Tall and thickly built, the man’s sudden appearance was terrifying. His graying hair, which was usually perfectly combed with a part down the right side, was a tousled mess, hanging down around his face, which was streaked with blood. His shirt was stained and ripped, hanging out of his normally pressed slacks, which were torn and covered in blood stains as well. His eyes were filled with unfiltered rage as they locked onto the two women guiding the group of children down the hallway.
At the sound of the man’s primal scream, the children responded in kind, shrieking in fear as they looked back towards their principal. Some of them froze in place, only to be yanked forward by the chain of clasped hands, which remarkably had remained strong. Perhaps holding a classmate’s hand was all the security they had in that moment. Perhaps they were just following their teacher’s directions, the only person they trusted in that moment.
Either way, it was helping.
Nielsen dragged the children forward as they rounded the corner. Sarah followed closely behind them, keeping her son next to her as she moved in short, quick steps, desperately trying not to trip the children in front of her.
Fifty yards away, at the end of the hallway, Rudolph broke into a run, charging towards them at full speed. Spit flew from his mouth and he surged, snarling and grunting as the leather soles of his shoes slapped on the tiled floor.
Looking ahead, Sarah saw the corner of the hallway less than twenty feet ahead. The first children in their group were rounding the corner, heading towards the building’s administration offices and ultimately the front entrance to the school.
Glancing back over her shoulder, she was dismayed to see the big man had closed to within fifteen feet.
‘How can he be so fast?’ She asked herself as she pushed herself harder. Mister Randolph was tall, with long legs and arms, but he was far from young (at least in his mid-fifties, she estimated) and carried a lot of extra weight in his midsection.
Nevertheless, he was there, closing in, his long arms stretched out in front of him as his hands reached for both her and Jason. She could hear his heavy breathing and rabid snarling loudly in her ears now as the man closed in, making it clear they wouldn’t escape.
Out of desperation, she grabbed the loose end of a colored poster that hung from the wall and tossed it behind her, knowing it was a ridiculously pathetic attempt to stop a man of that size.
James Rudolph’s growl was thundering in her ears when it changed pitch suddenly before being cut off.
Surging forward, arms outstretched, the man’s left foot came down on the poster, which slipped out from under him on the polished surface of the tiled floor. Running full speed, the man landed hard on his hip, sliding sideways as his momentum carried him into a glass display case on the opposite wall. Glass exploded in a massive shower, sending fragments flying in all directions as the big man’s right leg and the right side of his torso slid along the razor sharp edges of the broken glass, ripping his clothing and cutting deep into his skin.
The man roared in anger as Sarah raced away. At this point she was essentially dragging her son, the boy’s feet barely touching the ground as he was pulled forward.
Up ahead at the end of the hall she saw the front doors to the school fly open as Nielsen and the children made their way outside. Within seconds, Sarah and Jason rushed through the doors out into the open air, squinting in the bright, midday sun.
The crazed rush of bodies that had been inside when she’d arrive was now outside, with hundreds of adults and children racing one way or another as they tried to get away from the school. Car horns blared as frustrated drivers struggled to work their way out of the parking lot, some of them leaning out of the window of their vehicles to shout at other drivers, demanding movement, regardless of the impossibility or difficulty associated with it.
Rushing to her SUV, Sarah pulled the FOB from her pocket and hit the button, unlocking the doors. Wasting no time, she threw open the door and literally tossed Jason inside, telling him to put on his seatbe
lt ‘like a big boy.’ Ignoring Olivia’s wailing, she slammed the door and moved to the driver’s side. Opening the door, she jumped in the driver’s seat and quickly pulled the door closed behind her before sliding the key into the ignition. Starting the vehicle, she hit the button to lock the doors before putting the SUV in Drive.
‘Now what?’ She wondered, looking around the traffic jammed parking lot.
There was nowhere to go.
She moved forward anyway, hoping the other vehicles in the lot would start moving, but when she glanced towards the exit, she saw a crazed person half-in, half-out of the lead vehicle, attacking the driver within.
The line wouldn’t be moving any time soon.
“Fuck this,” she muttered, reaching down and sliding the SUV into four wheel drive.
“Mommy…”
Focused on her efforts, she leaned forward to look over the front end of the vehicle as she spoke to her son. “I know, Jason, I’m sorry, I said a bad word.”
“No, Mommy, that’s not it,” the boy protested. “You need to put on your seatbelt.”
Realizing her son was right, and that it would indeed be needed, since things were about to get really bumpy, she reached up and grabbed the buckle and pulled it down, sliding the metal end into the socket. “Thank you, Honey.”
Taking a deep breath, she added, “Hold on, kids.” Pressing down on the gas, she drove the SUV forward and up onto the sidewalk in front of the main school building. The engine revved loudly in response, but handled the small climb without trouble. Honking, she shooed people out of her way as she travelled across the section of sidewalk between her and the sloped grass area that led down towards the street. She drove onto the grass, then down the small hill until she reached the hedges at the edge of the sidewalk.
“I’ll pay the bill,” she said under her breath as she guided the Pathfinder into the hedge, wincing as she heard the branches dig deep gouges in the silver paint of the vehicle. Her left front tire caught on something, forcing them to stop momentarily, but she pushed the gas pedal down harder, causing the hybrid all-terrain tires to climb up and over the hedge, flattening it in the process as she reached the sidewalk along the street. A second later, the front end dropped down off the curb of the sidewalk, reaching the street. The rear end dropped down immediately afterward, rocking the vehicle as it did. Not bothering to return the gear to two-wheel drive, Sarah sped away, heading for home.
Surviving Rage | Book 3 Page 13