by Red Lagoe
A deep creaking sound of metal overpowered the noises of the infected. The chain link fence bowed and snapped under the weight, and the mass of bodies plummeted to the ground with the falling fence. Infected bodies spilled onto the pavement into a pile, while Marcus kept running.
Kayla kept holding off the infected man with the chair leg pressed against his chest. She was pinned to the brick wall, as the mass of fallen bodies began to rise to their feet.
She released him long enough to jam the chair leg into the man's mouth. She plowed forward, sending him back, but she was already swarmed by the mass of others that had poured out from the fallen fence.
Marcus turned around as the crowd of bodies fought with each other and closed in on her, trapping her against the wall, as she sank below their sea of bodies. Her ungodly screams echoed off the walls of the buildings as Marcus took off in a sprint.
At least five of the infected followed him. He didn't try to count. He just ran.
He ran without thinking anything other than survival. He focused on his loafers hitting the ground as his body plowed through the rays of sunlight beaming through the trees. He outran them.
He made it farther down the fence to where it was still intact, scaled it, and kept running. Tripping over branches, and sprinting through the woods as fast as his legs would carry him, he ran until he couldn't breathe any more.
Marcus stopped, panicked, whipping his head from side to side in search of incoming infected, but there was no one, other than scattered dead bodies, lying lifeless in the woods.
Panting, Marcus sat for a moment on a fallen log as he pulled in enormous gasps of air. His feet were heavy upon the wet mossy earth. Sweat ran down his back as he hung his head between his knees and tugged at his own hair.
He wondered what kind of man he had become and could still hear the snarling and screaming in his head. Covering his ears didn't help. Marcus smacked himself against his skull repeatedly, trying not to fret over what he had done.
"Damn it!" He whacked himself against the temple. He had left her to die. Her screams played back in his mind on repeat, and Dr. Carter's screams joined in.
He had left them both to die. He could have saved Dr. Carter when he had banged on the lab door to get back in, but he didn't. Dr. Carter made his choice to leave, and Marcus couldn't risk opening the door to let him back in.
He let them die to save himself, because he had to. It was necessary. Marcus stood up with a twitch in his eye, trying to catch his breath—and to keep his sanity—before he moved on.
This was how it had to be now. This was how a person would survive. It was nothing more than survival of the fittest. Anyone that slowed him down or kept him from living would have to go.
He stayed close to the trees, following the tracks toward the school, gripping the metal rod in his sweaty palm, and ready to kill anyone that got in his way.
It was more peaceful now that he was alone. He didn't have to worry about whether or not she could keep up. He would make his way to the quarantine zone and finally get some food and rest, then he could move on.
Melody crept into his thoughts. He wondered if there was any possibility that she was there at the quarantine zone. He hoped not. He hoped that she got out of town or at least died quickly. His head spun, wondering how he could be so heartless, but he silenced his conscience. A girl like Melody didn’t have what it took to handle this life—he thought. She would slow him down, just like Kayla did. He toughened up his heart and headed down the tracks toward the school, wondering if his wife had suffered the same demise as Kayla.
32
The Lake House
The lake cottage was not far. Melody and John stepped out the front door and began cutting across yards with Harkness trotting alongside them. A cold front had moved in the day before, and brought relief to the sweltering heat. It felt more like October again.
Bodies lay dead on the sidewalks, and no signs of living people were in any direction—it made the world feel bigger. Like they were the only people remaining on the planet, until John saw the curtains move on the second floor of a house at the end of Carlisle.
"Did you see that?" Melody asked.
"Yeah," John kept an eye on the curtain and spotted the faint movement of a shadow back away. "Let's keep moving. We don't want any trouble."
John scanned the other houses, wondering how many others could be alive, finding haven in the safety of their homes, and that thought brought a newfound sense of optimism.
"We can beat this," Melody said, passing another body with no more than a couple of small wounds. "Look. This person doesn't have life-threatening injuries."
She knelt down over the body of a short round woman, curled in the fetal position. "There are some minor lacerations—just the bite wound to her arm and some scratches. She got infected, and died from the infection. Five to seven days."
"They're dying."
"If people can stay inside, they can ride this out."
"If..." John said. "Look at us. We had to move. Keeping frightened people to stay put is hard."
"But if there's a place like Fort Drummond-"
John interrupted, "If..."
"Then they're studying the disease. They're working on a vaccination. We can beat this."
They didn't encounter many of the infected on their way to the lake house, but they did see plenty of corpses, many being swarmed by flies.
They hiked across the open fields through the Gilmore Farm on the outskirts of town, passing by more bodies decomposing in the field with crows pecking at their flesh. Occasionally they'd see a person lumbering along in the distance, but they were far enough away to avoid a fight.
John's leg was still sore and Melody was still exhausted, so they were relieved to have a break from the continuous onslaught of infected.
As they marched through a field of tall golden grass, the low rising sun skimmed across the surface of the blades.
"Hey Chuck, about last night..."
"Nope," said Melody, picking up her pace to move ahead of him.
"What do you mean, 'no'? I thought that you and I..."
"Oh, you thought there was something between us? Don't flatter yourself, sweetheart,” Melody said, mocking John’s hurtful words from the other night.
John smiled and tried to speed up behind her, but his swollen leg kept him back. Her stubbornness aroused him even more. He considered reaching for her hand, pulling her against himself, and lying her down right there in the field, but maybe she couldn't handle such a bold move right now. She would probably whack him upside the head with that bat of hers if he tried anything stupid again.
"I want to apologize for-"
"Don't apologize," she turned around to face him and smirked. "It was nice."
"It was nice?" John was insulted.
"Yeah. It was a nice kiss."
"Oh you thought I meant the kiss? No. I'm apologizing that you had to wear that awful kitten shirt."
Melody stormed forward, but he could tell she held back a laugh.
Ahead, they could spot the lake in a clearing between the trees. Thick dark clouds hung low on the horizon—a stark contrast of the bright, orange sunrise to their east.
Melody guided John to the gravel road along the lake that led to her mother-in-law's cottage and approached a Ford pickup with its front end crashed into the wall of one of the lake homes. Hitched behind it was the boat with the red lightning bolt detail that sped out of their neighborhood two days ago.
"They didn't make it," Melody sighed.
"That's what they get for ditching that woman while she was bleeding out," John said. "Good news is, we’ve got a boat if we can get the truck out of the side of that house."
Harkness lowered his head to growl as an infected man staggered out from behind a small grey lake home. John stepped in front of Melody. His shoulders dropped, and he held his hand over the knife at his hip. He was not up for the challenge today. Melody readied her bat and moved in front of John
to approach the elderly infected man snarling at them.
"I got it," she said.
"That's alright, Chuck," he argued, and stepped in front of her.
As the infected man rushed forward, John realized he shouldn't risk the fight. Neither he nor Melody had the strength for combat, despite a good night's rest. He pulled his rifle from his back and fired a shot into the man's head, taking the risk of luring more infected.
John slung his rifle on his back and tried to speed up.
"We'll go to your place. If your boat isn't already in the water, we'll come back for this one."
He could barely walk. The prosthetic ground into the raw end of his leg.
"We're almost there," she assured him and placed her hand on his back.
The sunlight to the east had disappeared behind the fast-moving clouds, and a rumble of thunder rolled across the late morning air.
They arrived in front of a tiny pink house with weeds already invading the landscaped front yard. The little cottage was no more than 500 square feet. Out back, the land sloped down into a steep hill that led to a dock with the pontoon boat tied to it. The sight brought instant relief.
A sprinkling of rain began to pepper the dock, and the sky sparked over the lake with lightning. Melody tilted a canoe that leaned against a tall oak tree behind the cottage and pulled out the hidden house key.
She unlocked the back door, and they walked onto the furnished screened porch that overlooked the lake. Beyond the porch was an inside door that led to a musty, dark living room. The stale odor inside indicated that her in-laws had not been there in a while. The cottage was no more than a kitchenette, tiny bath, and living room, with an open loft bedroom up above.
John sat down on the green tweed couch on the screened porch, and lifted his prosthetic leg onto the coffee table. A spectacular view of the lake sprawled out before him, with nickel grey clouds creeping above it. He removed the prosthetic to expose his swollen, infected stump. This skin around the wound was discolored.
"Holy crap," Melody said.
"It's alright." John leaned back on the couch and winced from the pain. "I have that balm."
"Balm, my ass!"
"Well, if you say so..." He shot her a playful sneer.
"You're going to need more than just a balm for that. That's going to need antibiotics. It's already looking angry." Melody hurried to the cabinets in search of meds.
"My mother-in-law is always on drugs for something."
John could hear her rummaging through cabinets in the kitchen area.
"Tylenol...anti-diarrhea meds,” she said.
She shook a couple of Tylenol into her hand and brought them to John. "The vet clinic is right down the road," she said. "I can get you some antibiotics."
"Dog drugs?"
Melody smiled. "Amoxicillin. Cephalexin. It's the same as human drugs. I had them in my pack, but that's gone now."
She tried to get John a glass of water from the kitchen, but a grinding sound came from the faucet, then nothing.
John called to her from the porch, "I take it the water tower doesn't supply these old lake houses?"
"I guess not," she said. "I'll get some water from the lake."
"That's OK," he said, and popped the pills in his mouth and swallowed. "Let's wait out this storm-"
Melody ran outside with an empty glass jug in her hand. John jumped up to stop her, but she was already halfway down the stairway to the dock by the time he made it to the door. John's heart pounded within his throat. He worried he would not be able to act quickly enough if she needed help. He readied his rifle.
"Chuck, you moron," he whispered, while he propped himself in the door frame on one leg and kept an eye out for the infected.
She lay down on the dock and scooped up water from the rough waves, then hurried back to him without incident. He peered in all directions outside as she came back inside. There was nobody in sight.
"Don't do that again," he insisted.
His concern shocked himself. He didn't realize how important she was to him until in that brief moment that she ran down those steps. He imagined what would happen if he lost her. She kept him sane, and she kept him laughing, but she also kept him safe. He would have been dead under a pile of infected if she didn't step out her front door the other day, but he couldn't admit that. She was exactly what he needed in his life, and he was certain that she needed him too.
Melody raised an eyebrow. "Don't do that again?" she mocked him.
She knelt down on the floor beside the couch and held up a brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide that she had found in the bathroom.
He sat down beside her and held out his leg, while Harkness curled up beside him. She poured it onto his irritated raw skin and watched as John clenched his jaw and gripped at his own legs. A white foam bubbled up as the peroxide invaded the wound. Melody rinsed it off with lake water. She didn't have much gauze left to wrap his leg, so she’d let it air out until they needed to get moving. She would have to get to the veterinary clinic for more supplies, but first she sat down beside John on the couch to look out over the lake.
"You shouldn't wear your prosthetic until your leg heals."
"I have to wear it. I don't exactly have a lot of options."
Melody's eyes lit up and she ran to the small bathroom and pulled open the shower stall curtain. It was there. Henry's walker. They always kept one in the shower. Melody carried it out to the screened porch and set it down. A gray, shiny walker with three tennis balls poked onto the feet. The fourth ball was missing.
"Tada!"
John looked at it and shook his head, "Nope."
She rolled her eyes and picked it up. "Look, it can be a weapon too." She jabbed it at the air. "It's here in case you need it."
"I'm not using that thing."
The rain fell heavier, and the landscape turned gray as the thunder cracked. Waves on the lake crashed against the dock, rocking the boat back and forth, and a tall thin infected man crossed into the backyard. He dragged his feet through the grass, kicking up mud as he stumbled along. The rain poured upon him and he dredged on, unaware that John and Melody were sitting exposed in a screen porch, close enough to see the detail of his pineapple-printed necktie.
They sat still as he moved by. Lightning streaked across the lake, followed by a piercing crack of thunder. The man turned toward the sound and lunged at the air. He reached the edge of the slope and tumbled down to the bottom of the hill to the bank, then got back to his feet and he moved toward the sound of the storm. The lanky man dropped off the edge of the bank and into the waist-deep water, where the waves knocked him around until he was swept under and out of sight.
Melody's mouth hung open. She turned to John who had an equally shocked look on his face, and they both started laughing. Melody covered her mouth trying not to, but couldn't help herself. She felt insane laughing over such a thing.
"We shouldn't be laughing." She whacked John in the chest with the back of her hand, while they both tried to contain their insane snickering.
That brief touch of her hand against John's chest lingered on her skin. She wanted to touch him again. John leaned back into the arm of the couch, resting his head in the crook. His posture practically invited her to touch him, so she let herself in. She invaded his space, crawling closer to him, until her head came to rest against the cotton fabric that clung to his pecs. Her arms rested around his waist, and she closed her eyes. As she inhaled, her breasts pressed against his abs.
John raked her tangled hair back from her face and let it fall behind her back, then rested his arms around her.
She lay against him, enjoying the pleasure of his embrace. This felt easy. That brief moment of comfort and solitude with a friend was worth all the fighting it took to get there. Melody wanted to stay with John every step of their journey, but she couldn't let him risk the trip to the vet hospital on that leg. Once he was asleep, she would sneak away to get the supplies he needed. However, her body had other
plans. She drifted to sleep instead.
They both slept for a couple of hours on that couch as the storm moved through. A cool wind blew through the screened porch, bringing in splatters of rainfall onto the cement floor as they napped.
33
Honey I’m Home
John woke to the sound of gravel crunching beneath tires on the road out front; it approached fast. He slid out from under Melody while she slept and heard the vehicle rolling to a stop. There was no time to remove the bandages and put on his prosthetic, so he reluctantly used the walker.
The sudden jump from a nap to an upright position on minimum calories made him dizzy for a moment. Pressure and pain rushed to the stump of his leg. Melody was right—his leg sores were beyond the help of his balm.
He looked through the small kitchen window to see a blue Toyota screeching to a stop out front. At least eight infected were following the car.
He rushed out the front door, shifting the tennis-balled walker beneath him, with his pistol in hand. A tall lean man exited the vehicle in front of the cottage—a familiar looking man.
"Keep it running!" John shouted as he pointed toward the incoming infected.
"Who the hell are you?" he asked, putting his hands in the air at the sight of the gun.
John recognized him and couldn't believe it.
"They'll follow the car. Move," John said.
He took a few enormous, one-legged leaps with the walker—as fast as his body could go.
Marcus was already backing away from the Toyota toward the cottage.
John leaned in the car, put it in drive, and pressed on the gas pedal with his hand. He pulled his body out of the vehicle as it jolted forward, but not without the door frame whacking him in the right shoulder as he backed out. The blue vehicle crept down the gravel road and veered slowly into the small open field.
John signaled for the man to follow him behind the house.