Lloyd ran a hand across his lips and down over his chin, visibly irritated by my actions and more than likely what I had to say to him in front of his people. I didn’t really care how he felt, as this was my house and I didn’t make it a point to go around to other people’s houses and disrespect them… so no one was going to do that to me.
“You’re right, this is your place and you did make it back alive,” Lloyd said and now looked calm. I nodded to him thinking that things were alright between us and over. I pulled the used mag from the SBR and tried to count the rounds that were left, but Lloyd wasn’t finished with me yet.
“Who would have taken care of her if something happened to you?” he asked.
I looked to see him pointing at Kember.
“You are not going to let this go, are you?” I asked.
He shook his head and crossed his arms. “We aren’t able to care for a child – hell, we can barely provide for ourselves. The plan was simple and you broke protocol and went all crazy, which could have easily gotten you killed. And on top of that we would now be responsible for feeding and protecting your daughter.”
I raised a hand to speak, although everything he had said made more sense than anything I could refute or make up. He was right on so many levels and I had no defense whatsoever. I dropped my hand. “You’re right…”
“This isn’t about one person being right and the other one being wrong. It’s about following orders set forth and in place to protect not just you, but all of us. Your mistake could easily have meant that we all died… think about that next time before you fly by the seat of your pants. You actions affect us all.” He turned and walked away from me.
“There’s people next door,” I stated and he stopped near the couch and looked at me. “I spotted them when I was coming back here, but they won’t come out. The guy said his girl was sick, whatever that means.”
Everyone looked at me as my words faded. Lloyd spoke. “What do you mean she’s sick?”
“I don’t know,” I stated. “That’s all he said with a shotgun pointed at me.”
Ashley piped in. “She could be infected and she’s right next door!”
“Infected or not, they are over there and we are over here,” Lloyd said.
“I told them if they needed help to come over,” I blurted.
Ashley threw her hands in the air and shook her head with a disgusted look upon her face. “Great, now she’ll come over here and turn… just great!”
I looked at her, appalled by her callous words. “If I remember correctly, I never invited your ass into my house, now did I, which means you don’t have any right to be here in the first place where they do!”
She said nothing in return and simply left the room.
“I also think it’s not a good idea to leave so close to dark. I’m thinking we should stay the night here and leave first thing in the morning,” I added.
“No, we have a vehicle and we are leaving as soon as we can gather enough supplies together!” Ashley said coming into the living room with anger blushing her dirty face.
“There’s a lot of open space between us and wherever we are headed. If we get caught out in the open for some unknown reason, we won’t last very long,” I replied.
“No one asked for your opinion,” she blasted.
Lloyd watched the dispute between Ashley and I. I’m sure he found some amusement in it somewhere and allowed it to go on for several more moments until he had had enough and cut in. “Ashley, that’s enough! He’s right. We aren’t going anywhere tonight, it’s too risky.”
Ashley spun her anger toward Lloyd and approached him hoping that there was some way she could change his mind. “Can I talk to you for a minute… alone?”
“No, you may not. If you have something to say then by all means say it. We are a family and families don’t hide things from one another.”
The anger burnt in Ashley’s eyes and she clenched both fists as though she wanted to hit someone. “So it’s not risky to stay here tonight, because those things could come back and the next time there could be double of them.”
“We stay quiet, take turns watching through the night and we’ll be fine,” Lloyd said.
She pointed toward Kember. “We have a loud mouth child now and she could scream if she doesn’t get her way and alert those things that we are in here. We might not be so lucky the next time around.”
I had heard enough and quickly moved toward her. “Then you’re more than welcome to sleep on the front porch, because this is her house, not yours! You are here simply because I haven’t kicked you out yet!” My temper was flaring. “So if you have a problem with my loud mouth daughter, then hit the road and go wherever you want!”
Ashley quickly backed down the second she realized she had no power and no one was going to listen to her. She went back into the kitchen and sat the dinner table, while myself, Lloyd, Devin, Johnny and Kember remained in the living room.
As the sun was slowly slipping away and daylight was fading, we had spent the last few hours making sure that the house was boarded up tight, all door and windows were properly locked and there was no one anyone from the street could see any amount of light from within. Still having power, Ashley had made herself useful and cooked dinner for us all.
She kept to herself and never spoke a single word to anyone – apparently still pissed that she wasn’t going to get her way.
Halfway through the silent meal, a question that had been running around in my head since first meeting these people was begging to get out. I sat my fork down and looked at Lloyd. “So where exactly is it that we are going?”
Everyone at the table looked at me, which wasn’t a good sign. It was as if they were surprised to hear me ask such a question as though I were being invited along and had become one of the gang. The further amount of time it took for Lloyd to answer the question, the more I understood that I wasn’t going with them.
“Well, the trip itself is pretty long and could get quite dangerous along the way. I don’t think it would be the perfect environment for a child, if you know what I mean,” he said and tried to smile to smooth things over.
I pushed back from the table and leaned my chair against the wall. “Ya, I know exactly what you mean.” I got up and took my empty plate to the sink, finished the last of my soda and tossed the can into the trash. They all continued eating. “But just so we are perfectly clear with each other. What do you mean, exactly?”
Lloyd dropped the fork into his plate. He hadn’t wanted it to go any further, in fact he was sure that I had picked up on his hints and would leave it at that.
“Do you mean that you are just going to use me for a safe place and then drive off into the sunset, expecting me to be okay with it?” I added.
“I didn’t plan any of this. I didn’t wake up one morning and be like, ya know, I think a good end of the world would be a great thing,” he said sarcastically, and then turned in his chair to face me. “You know exactly what I’m saying or getting at, but I’m trying to be polite about it as opposed to just being rude and blunt.”
“Kind of like if I told all of you to get the hell out of my house. But instead chose to say something along the lines of, I really don’t have room for all of you,” I said.
“You were on a mission way before our paths ever crossed. You and your daughter were doing your own thing, and still would be had we not picked this house.”
“But you did pick this house,” I said.
“We are continuing the mission we started almost a week ago, like you should continue on with yours,” Lloyd stated.
“Like I should have kicked your asses out when I first saw you?” I asked. “That would have been part of my mission, in fact it was, but I changed my mind and gave you all a chance. You helped me save my Daughter, to which I am grateful for, yet even with all of my hospitality I still haven’t earned the right to better my Daughter’s future?”
“The world isn’t like it used to be anymore.”
“Yeah, it is… the only change is that the people use each other more now, prey on each other like animals and can’t see two inches in front of their own damn noses at those around them. This world is not the same anymore, you’re spot on with that, but the people sure are. It’s a whole hell of a lot easier to justifying you selfish deeds, now!” I crossed the kitchen and entered Kember’s room, but stopped. “Make sure you’re all gone by the morning.” I slammed the door.
“Dammit!” Lloyd said and turned back to his plate. It took him only a few seconds to notice that no one was eating any longer and he raised his eyes to see Johnny and Devin looking at him. Their stares spoke without words.
“Ashley was right, she went about saying it the wrong way, but for the most part she was right,” Lloyd stated. “I don’t like it any more than the rest of you do, but the child would cause unnecessary drama.”
“Drama for whom?” Devin asked. “Because I’m sure we’ve caused him quite a bit of unnecessary drama since we’ve been here. Eating his food, making ourselves at home like we own the place… ya know, shit that normal people wouldn’t do to complete strangers. Especially ones that let us stay without question.”
“That’s not fair. You know as well as I do, it would be a mistake,” Lloyd countered.
Johnny put his two cents in. “Kind of like it was a mistake for him to help us?”
Lloyd leaned back in his chair and shook his head to the comments being shot at him from all angles. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Brandon or that he wasn’t appreciative of the young man’s kindness, because he was. He was very thankful for it. It had more to do with the child than anything else. Since the loss of his son he had kept himself clear of other children and it helped him to heal, and now adding the one thing that would counteract what he had managed to put aside over the last week, could threaten to destroy all of that. He was strong in their eyes and didn’t want to appear weak in any way, as that’s what he had been back when the world was still normal. Here and now, he was someone that had purpose. He was a leader that others would follow and do as they were told without question. A two year old little girl could turn all of that upside down in a fraction of a second.
And that is why he didn’t want Brandon tagging along with them, even though he saw something extraordinary in the young man, he had to repress those feelings and cover his face with the mask he had grown so used to wearing.
I watched Kember lying at the foot of the bed trying to get comfortable. Her belly was full and now she was tired. It would only take her a few minutes to get into the perfect spot before fading out for the night. I took this time to soul search as to why I had deviated from what the Young Woman had told me to do and came back to this small town. There was nothing left for me here anymore. My wife and step-daughter were dead and gone. Family members that I did have, had all but shut me out of their lives years ago. They had no concern for me or my family, so I treated them with the same respects and didn’t care what happened to them, although deep down I really did care. They might be able to be that cruel; I on the hand was not.
Kember was all that I had left to hope for and I would do anything to protect her. I tried for half an hour to look at the bright side of things; however, the more I tried the more my mind switched to the negative. I focused on staying in this house for as long as I could. In the morning the strangers would leave and it would just be her and I left. With the work that we had done to the house earlier, we should be able to stay here unnoticed for quite some time. There was a grocery store in town, a gas station and a hardware store in which I could get ammunition, more guns, if there were any left, and supplies to build things. I’m not sure what things I would build, but if I ever got a wild hair up my ass and decided too … boom, I could.
Faint sounds of thunder rumbled in the distance. Another storm was coming and soon I would be fast asleep under its mesmerizing lull. Kember had stopped moving, apparently finding her comfortable spot, and then passing out. I put a blanket over her and turned the covers down on the bed, getting ready to turn in for the night myself. The SBR lay on the opposite pillow, close enough for me to grab in the event that something happened in the midst of the night. I was about to pull my tennis shoes off when I thought of the strangers still in the kitchen and wondered if I should get them, or at least tell them where they could find spare blankets and pillows of their own.
Why do that? They are just going to leave you and Kember here, so the hell with them! My mind reminded me, to which I totally agreed with, yet at the same time they were still guests in my house and I had never been so cold to someone in the past. Why should I start now?
I moved to the door of my bedroom and slowly opened it. The living room was bathed in a sea of darkness, to which my eyes had to adjust before I could see that they had already found the spare blankets and were camped out on the couch and the floor in front of the couch that had a thick area rug. Another faint rumble of distant thunder spewed from the west and I shut the door.
“Be gone in the morning before I wake up,” I repeated to myself, my voice not traveling any further than the foot of the bed. I felt the need to tell them that. To make them feel the hopelessness I was feeling at that very moment, and had felt when the Young Woman told me. I wanted them to lie awake all night, wondering what would become of them the following day. How they would continue to survive in a world that was no longer bound by any set laws, moral justifications, compassion, or any other forms that humanity had somewhat obeyed since the dawn of time. They needed to know how I felt without me telling them. They needed to live the fear that kept my mouth and actions docile.
Maybe I was just overreacting to all of this?
Maybe things would change in the morning?
Through the dim light, lit by a single candle to lower the chances of any morsel of light penetrating through any unseen defects of my painting skills or holes in the blanket that covered the window above my bed, I thought I saw a flash dance over a corner of the window that had been painted, but I had ran out of paint and chose to cover what remained with a thick blanket. I focused on the single location and intently kept my eyes there waiting for it to come again. It didn’t.
“Must be the lightning reaching us before the storm,” I said with hollow confidence, as something told me it wasn’t lightning at all. The seconds ticked by like grueling hours and I was unable to undress and get into bed, as I had planned. Instead, I moved closer to the window and tried my best to see out into the night. At first glance there was nothing that looked out of the ordinary. No dead ones shuffling about on the far street, none in the backyard next to the house, and none in my backyard. Whatever had made the window light up was secretly screaming to my instincts, which were quickly coming to life. Fear filled my entire body and the harder I tried to shake it off – no doubt the rest of me was still in belief that it was nothing more than harmless lightning, harmless in the sense that as long as it didn’t strike you directly, you were fine – the more it clung to me like falling rain soaking one to the bone. The more you tried to wipe it off, the more it would soak into your skin.
Another flash and out of response for the unknown, I jerked my head back as if I was able to be seen silhouetted by the dimly lit bedroom, making me stand out like a neon sign in the midst of a blackened abyss.
Vehicles!
I blew the candle out from the head of the bed; apparently smoking for fifteen years had done nothing to stop me from killing a single candle ten feet away. In any other circumstance I would have been amazed at the feat; however, the mounting fear was far more concerned with the movement outside.
I grabbed the SBR and retracted the charging handle only a few inches while my eyes darted to the opening dust cover to see a round firmly seated in front of the bolt carrier. I grabbed the chest rig and quickly put it on, slid the one point sling over my head and right shoulder, adjusting it swiftly to ride where the weapon would be most useful in the event that I need to use it quickly and attache
d it to the upper rail of the weapon, inserting a fresh magazine as well. I had too many times in the past been caught with my pants down… that mistake would not find me vulnerable like that again.
None of the strangers budged at first, even though my words had flooded the silent darkness as a ragging tsunami. I spoke them again, but this time with greater intent. “Get up! There are vehicles out front!”
A stir resonated through the sleeping bodies and slowly one of them, Johnny, raised his head and looked at me. “What are you going on about?”
I pointed across the room toward the front door. “There are vehicles out there!”
Lloyd sat straight up, shifting his eyes not at me, but directly toward the front door. He was standing and wielding the shotgun before I could even realize he was awake. He was like a blur. “How many of them?”
“I only saw one, but I’m almost certain there’s more by now,” I replied, feeling for the first time the pain in my left hand from gripping the forward grip of the SBR too tight. My knuckles were white and I quickly released the grip and flicked my hand a few times in hopes of getting the blood back to where it needed to be. The wound started to ache and I was quick to step out of sight and pop a painkiller.
The others had come alive and were grabbing their weapons and scrambling low toward nearby windows in order to get a quick glance at what we all might be up against.
“I got another vehicle turning down this road,” Devin stated.
“There are two out front creeping by. They look like military vehicles to me,” Lloyd stated. “But it’s hard to tell in the falling rain.”
“We’re safe then,” I said almost jubilantly, thinking to myself that our problems were about to come to a screeching halt. They had no idea where we were, no lights exited my house and there were several other houses I had passed on my way into town that had cars parked in their driveways, so why should this place be any different.
“Maybe,” Lloyd replied in a hollow tone.
“Maybe?” I asked. “As long as we keep calm and quiet, we will be.”
Day One (Book 1): Alive Page 16