by Welker, Wick
A few slits of sunlight began to shine through the trees ahead. He remembered the sunlight coming into their master bedroom just the morning before. Just a few beams resting on the bedroom ceiling as he contemplated his workday ahead of him. That was a different world then, a world where he had a little daughter. He had a little girl who wanted to own a Lego shop when she grew up. He was a different person then, maybe even a different animal. The outbreak had transformed him from a small squirrel that scurried around in a warm burrow into a ruthless hyena that fled when threatened or briskly killed when presented with the opportunity. His mind ran only on survival instinct now.
His thigh ached from where it had been stabbed with a pen in the subway from the day before, which now was a moment that seemed weeks ago. The pain reminded him that he had left that man behind down there to be eaten alive. His name was Dean, and he would never forget it. He had also left his best friend behind to die in a skyscraper. He searched for more and realized that he had fled from an elementary school full of teachers with a psychotic janitor, a horde of the infected and military airstrikes. There was also a little girl with them. Lastly, he never found his daughter. It wasn’t as if he deliberately tried to do these things. It was just that it was the most logical next option for him in every situation. Rationality was the cruelest instinct after all.
Turning the suburban around a bend in the river revealed a holocaustic sight. It was full of the sick frantically flailing their arms and thrusting their heads about, trying to understand the sensation of water around them. Amongst the sick were hundreds of bodies floating lifeless as driftwood with them. He marveled for a moment that he and Ellen weren’t one of them. How had they made it out when all these people hadn’t? Was it dumb luck or the cosmos? Whatever it was, Keith hated it for not wanting Jayne to survive with them.
In the silent dawn drive, he finally heard a long, drawn out cough from the back seat. Ellen continued to cough as she emerged from her coma of pain and confusion. Keith briefly glanced back and saw her clumpy hair covering her face.
“Hey Hon,” he said softly.
“Keith…” she coughed again.
“Hey, we’re okay. We’ve been driving for a couple hours now. We’ve cleared New Jersey.”
“What happened?”
“We had to leave that neighborhood.”
“Oh, okay,” she said with a dizzy voice. She went quiet for another ten minutes while Keith drove. He knew that she would wake up again and that he would soon face the wrath of a mother whose child was missing.
Rubbing his thigh, he looked over at all of the pantry food that he had crammed into the passenger side of the car. He realized he hadn’t eaten in at least a day and had no appetite for any of the food.
Ellen coughed again and woke herself up from her daze. Keith could see her gnarled hair slowly rise in the rearview mirror.
“Hey.” He said sweetly.
“Where are we?”
“We’re in Virginia.”
She sat still for a moment and then Keith saw the sudden countenance of realization on her face as her eyebrows furrowed.
“Where is Jayne?” She asked sharply.
“She’s gone. She wasn’t in the house and we had to leave.”
“What!” Her voice rose. “What do you mean that we had to leave?”
“The area was getting out of control and the bombings weren’t stopping. There was nothing else to do.”
“Oh, there was something else to do and there’s still something we’re going to do. We’re going to turn this damn car around right now and go look for her.”
“Ellen, there was no one in that house. She could be… anywhere.” He knew that she could be anywhere, but that she probably wasn’t herself anymore.
“Did you find Miss Stutsen in the house?”
“No, but there was a body in the kitchen with the back door busted wide open, which meant the house had been attacked.”
“Keith! Maybe she got out with Jayne. She could’ve taken her somewhere else.”
“I hope that’s the case,” he said with a defeated tone.
She stopped talking for a moment, considering the options. “I don’t really care where we are going. We need to turn back. I’ve got to find her. I don’t care if we survive, because it will be hell knowing that I didn’t do everything I could to get her back. You shouldn’t have made that decision without me, Keith. You can’t do that. Why are we going to Virginia? What could possibly be there?”
“The government is broadcasting that everyone who isn’t sick should come to the CDC there.”
“As if they’re going to do anything.” She slumped back in the seat, shaking her head.
“Hon, you got bitten and you’re fine. Every other person I saw get bitten got infected almost immediately. You’re probably immune and your blood could help them figure out a vaccine.”
Keith looked back and saw just the top of her head in the mirror. He briefly turned and saw her face. It was stern and fiery and he knew that there was no way he could talk her out of going back to Jersey. Looking back at the grass ahead of him, he pulled the suburban over next to group of trees and waited for Ellen to speak.
She knew that he was ultimately right but a constant maternal gnawing inside of her vehemently rejected the notion of leaving her daughter behind. At the same time, she wanted to give into him. She wanted him to talk her more into keep driving for Virginia.
“Keith, I just--” She stopped. There was a small rustling sound coming from the back of the suburban. It was a jostling beneath canned goods and blankets. Ellen looked at Keith with wide eyes.
“Get out of the car,” he whispered.
They both quietly stepped out, shutting the doors behind them. Keith had an aluminum baseball bat in his hands.
“Didn’t you check the car before you loaded it up?”
“I… I thought I did.” He was replaying the moments he spent packing the car and realized that he had just thrown in a bunch of supplies, and shut the back door. “Well, let’s take care of it.”
Stepping around to the back, he held the silver handle of the back door and abruptly popped it open with blankets and boxed food spilling out. He waited for a moment and saw someone move underneath a blanket. He ducked in and nudged it with his baseball bat prompting a small, girlish cry from the blanket. Ellen put her hand and Keith’s arm and stopped him for a moment.
“Jayne?” Keith dared to say.
A very weak voice replied, “Daddy?”
“Jayne!” They said in unison, drawing the blanket off of their daughter who stared back at them from frizzy hair and a large black eye.
“Jayne, honey, you’re okay!” Ellen reached in and grabbed Jayne by the shoulders, lifting her to her bosom and rocking her intently.
“You’ve been in here the whole time?” Keith reached over for her and kissed her head.
“I don’t know. My head hurts so much.” She began to cry.
Ellen and Keith gave each other a relieved glance that not only had they found Jayne, but that they weren’t going to have a bitter fight about leaving each other.
“Jayne, we were so scared when we thought we lost you. Did Miss Stutsen take care of you?” Ellen cradled Jayne’s head in her neck.
“We went to her house, but those bad people came into her house. They are so bad they wanted to hurt us. Miss Stutsen put me in her car to try to talk to them. Is she okay, Daddy?”
“I don’t know, babe. How did you get that owie on your eye?” He touched her cheek realizing how surreal it was that he was looking at his daughter.
“A boy tried fighting me at school. He was one of the sick ones.”
Keith looked across the river and realized the horrific scene of bodies laid out for his daughter to see and quickly ushered Ellen and Jayne into the suburban.
“Okay, we’re going to try to get to a main freeway,” he said, closing the door behind them. Putting the car in gear, he paused and looked back at his wife and
daughter who looked like they had survived a war. He silently thanked luck or the cosmos for returning their daughter to them. Somehow, he had his family back. It suddenly made sense that she was back, as if he were expecting the universe to turn in their direction during the entire ordeal. He felt as if his life had turned into the narrative of a movie and that it had already been written that he would be reunited with his family. Whatever tragedies had happened in the last day weren’t very significant to him now that he had them back.
He pulled the suburban over a grassy hill and turned into a small town that seemed largely abandoned. After wandering through streets for a few minutes, he finally spotted signs to get to the main interstate freeway.
“Okay, I think we’re on our way now to Richmond.”
“What’s that?” Jayne asked.
“It’s in Virginia. We’re going there to get to a hospital so we can all get better. I’m so glad you’re back with us, Jaynie. We missed you so much. We were so worried about you.” Keith began to cry.
“Are we going to turn into one of the sick people, Dad?” Jayne asked.
“No, no of course not. In fact, Mommy might even be a special person that can help the doctors to figure out how to help all the sick people.”
“But, I want to go home.”
“I know you do, sweetie,” Ellen said, hugging her close. “We can’t yet for a while, okay?”
“Okay,” Jayne resigned. “I’m so hungry.”
“Well, we got plenty of food for you,” Ellen said as she began searching the back seat for something that Jayne might like.
Keith pulled the car up the interstate freeway and saw that Richmond was sixty miles away. The traffic was dense but it flowed easily.
“I wonder if all these people are heading the same way that we are.”
He glanced over to the lane on his left and saw a horse trailer that was hitched to the back of the truck. Instead of horses, it appeared that the truck was transporting infected people. About half a dozen of the sick were sticking their fingers through the metal holes of the carriage, trying to bite at the wind.
“Why would anyone cart them around like that?” Keith asked.
Ellen scooted to the window and look out at them. “They’re loved ones. They’re trying to save them. That’s why they’re taking them to Richmond. It’s that damn radio recording telling everybody and their dog to come. They think there’s going to be a cure.”
“I think you’re right. I’m wondering how easy it’s going to be to get into the facility.”
As they drove further, the traffic became heavier, progressing to a frustrating stop-and-go until it stopped altogether.
“I’m worried about this, Keith.” Ellen opened the car door to peer down the narrow view between traffic lanes. “Both me and Jayne need to get to a hospital and I don’t think we’re going to get anywhere with this traffic.”
“Daddy, do you think the sick people are around here?”
“No, no, we left them behind us a long time ago,” he said, turning and smiling.
“Keith,” Ellen said, grabbing his shoulder from behind his seat.
He turned and saw her looking intently ahead into the traffic in front of them. He slowly unbuckled his seatbelt and sighed deeply, knowing exactly what she was looking at. Opening the door, he looked ahead and saw a frenzy of people down the freeway. Cupping his hand over his eyes to block the sunlight, he finally saw a leading edge of people running in their direction, streaming through the congested traffic.
“We’ve got to get out of here right now,” he shouted.
Scrambling to the back door of the suburban, Keith quickly gathered as many food supplies into the two backpacks that he had brought and hoisted one onto his back. Stopping for a moment, he went to the front seat and slid a baseball bat into the side of one of the bags.
“Carry Jayne, and I can bring these.”
Ellen scooped Jayne up from the back seat and the three began running together past the traffic behind them. Their movement started alerting all of the drivers who also got out of their cars and started running. They soon found themselves at the edge of a human stampede; people panicking and running from only the assumption that there was something to fear but they didn’t yet know what it was.
Keith dropped both the backpacks he was carrying and took out only the aluminum bat. Grabbing Ellen’s hand, he led them both through the crowds, looking for a way off the freeway. They weaved further to the side of traffic and came to a railing that overlooked a steep hill of gravel. Dropping one leg over the side, he assisted Ellen and Jayne over, looking past them towards the invading crowd. They all seemed like healthy, non-infected adults, but he knew that there was a growing tumor of the sick behind them, perpetually biting and infecting the crowd as it moved along.
They slid half way down the bottom of the gravel hill and made it onto the street below. The traffic was less than on the freeway only because people had taken the liberty of using all available shoulders and sidewalks. Keith had no idea where he was taking his family, but he did know that movement was good.
He stood for a moment, deciding which way to go when Ellen nudged him from behind. “It’s okay, Dad, just pick a street. You’ll keep us safe.” She smiled confidently at him.
Taking her hand, he stooped into the street and waved at a car to slow down for them. The car slammed on its brakes and honked its horn at them until they had crossed to the other side. Suddenly, another car pulled right in front of them from the street and mounted up onto the sidewalk making Keith stumble back into Ellen.
“Hey!” He ineptly yelled at the car. The car screeched its wheels trying to accelerate too fast and ran into a streetlight.
Keith kept running, holding Ellen’s hand as they moved. He was searching for something but he didn’t know what; some car to drive off in or a building to hide.
“Keith!” Ellen tugged on his hand.
He turned and saw the gravel hill down the street that they came from. A wave of people was sliding down the hill, frantically stumbling over one another to stay in front what could only be a horde of the infected.
They ran a few more blocks and Keith finally saw what he didn’t know he was looking for: a large military transport truck full of men in fatigues with rifles. The truck was slowly moving through traffic, blaring its horn in an attempt to clear the road in front of them. They ran up to the truck until they were moving briskly along with it.
“Hey!” Keith yelled up to one of the men above who was looking out towards the traffic. He looked down at Keith and dismissively looked away.
“Hey! Uninfected bitten person!” He yelled again. The man either didn’t hear him or chose to ignore him.
“Hey!” Ellen yelled and started pounding on the side of the truck. “You need to take me to the CDC. I got bitten, but I’m not sick!”
“Several more of the men looked down. One of them yelled, “Keep clear of the truck!”
“Can you hear me?” She shouted.
“Keep clear,” he replied.
Keith walked up to the driver’s door, hoisted himself up on a metal step and slammed his palm on the window. “Stop the truck!” He yelled.
The driver jumped with surprise from Keith and angrily shook his head. He cracked the window and yelled at him, “Get off this truck right now or we will shoot you.”
“My wife has been bitten, but she’s not sick. Stop the truck and take her to the CDC!” Suddenly, the driver door opened forcefully, knocking Keith off the step and onto the ground. He winced in pain from landing hard on his tailbone. The driver’s door slammed shut again and the truck began to move slowly.
Keith looked up at Ellen who gave him a surrendering expression. Looking past her, he saw the same wave of people seeping in between the jumbled traffic. Getting to his feet, he grabbed his baseball bat and approached the side of the truck again. This time, he moved to the hood of the truck, which came up to the level of his head. Pacing himself until he was wal
king at the same speed as the truck, he again hoisted himself up onto the bumper and then lifted his body up onto the hood. A few soldiers who were sitting in the open bed of the truck took noticed and aimed their rifles at him.
“You have five seconds to remove yourself or you will be shot!” One of them yelled.
Ignoring them, Keith managed to kneel on the hood while lifting the bat over his head. Without hesitation, he slammed the bat directly into the windshield, fracturing the glass without actually shattering it. A single burst of a rifle shot out at him, hitting him in the thigh.
“Keith!” Ellen yelled from below.
Keith slumped back down onto the hood, trying to grip the edges, but slowly slid down the front and hit the ground in front of the truck. The driver of the truck briskly got out and came around to the front.
“What in the hell are you doing, you idiot!” He grabbed Keith by the armpits and started dragging him into the gutter, out of the path of the truck.
Keith gripped the man’s hands, turned around and started trying to climb up the soldier’s body. He held closely onto his jacket and looked up at him.
“I’m only going to say this once, you stupid son of a bitch. That woman over there was bitten on her shoulder over twenty-four hours ago and has not shown a single symptom of the disease. You get her over to the CDC right now. Have you seen anyone else get bitten and not turn into a monster? Are you actively trying to stop them from making a vaccine?”
The soldier dropped Keith and methodically walked over to Ellen while the street began to fill with the sounds of impatient car horns. Ellen put Jayne down as the soldier moved the top of her T-shirt down, exposing a well demarcated tooth bite that had dried over with blood.
“In the truck, let’s go,” he ordered. “You can bring your daughter, but there’s no room for the man.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you people. You shot my husband!” She yelled, turning to Keith. Before she could reach him, the soldier grabbed her by the arm and began pulling her to the back of the truck while Jayne followed, holding Ellen’s hand.