by Joseph Zuko
“Goddamn it! Hold on,” Rich shut and locked the office door and disappeared into the building. Two bay doors began to rise and Cliff and Jim were back into their cars. They quickly pulled into the garage. Frank zapped a few more zombie stragglers as the metal doors descended. He ducked under the closing door at the last second and entered the garage.
They killed the engines as Rich flipped on four rows of florescent lighting.
Rich still had on a gray work shirt with a patch above the left breast pocket that spelled out “Rich” in cursive. His thick silver hair had black streaks in it. Reminiscent of the color it once was. He wore it slicked back into a pompadour. They could tell he had been sleeping because the back of his hair was a mess. As soon as the lights came on fully he had whipped out a comb from his back pocket and fixed the disaster. He replaced his comb and walked over to Cliff as he was stepping out of the van.
Rich reached for a hug, “Jesus Christ you’re alive and kicking!” The two men embraced.
“What are you still doing here?” Cliff asked as he patted Rich on the back as they finished their hug.
“I was working on Mrs. Elis’s radiator over there,” Rich pointed to an old Buick in the first bay. “And out of nowhere those things started showing up. So I locked down the place and was waiting for the goddamn army to show up and take care of these…things. Sick people whatever. Fuck me in the ass, it looks like it is total anarchy out there, you know what I mean?” Rich noticed the kids in the back of the van. “Ah shit. I’m sorry. Pardon my French kids. You got the whole family safe, good. Tina, you’re looking beautiful as always.”
“Thank you, Rich,” Tina said as she climbed out of the van.
“When are you going to leave this bum and run away with me?” Rich took off into his normal routine with Tina.
“Any day now.” Was always her answer.
“We need your help,” Cliff pointed to the flat.
Rich spoke with a jesting tone as he teased Cliff, “You always want something from me. You cheap bastard.” Rich quickly scanned the bloody PT Cruiser and then he looked over its heavily armed driver and crew.
“You guys look like a pack of fucking mercenaries. Pardon my French kids.” Rich stepped over to Sara first and reached out for her hand. “Hello Red, my God you’re beautiful. What are you doing with these killers?” Sara shook his hand and before she could answer he started up again. “What am I saying? You’re probably the leader of this killer crew. You got a boyfriend? You want one? I’m kidding, of course.” Rich let go of her hand and then proceeded to shake Frank and Jim’s hands. “Hey fellas I’m Rich. This is my place. I see you got a problem there. You’re driving a fucking Chrysler.” Rich laughed hard at that one. Then he noticed how serious everyone was. “Goddamn, tough crowd. You guys must have been through some heavy shit today. I’m sorry.”
“You think you might have a tire in stock that will fit?” Cliff asked as he opened the van’s side door to let the kids out.
“Yeah, I should have one, but you need more than just a tire,” Rich said as he circled the Cruiser.
“What do you mean?” Jim stepped back to look at the wheel and check it for damage.
“Where are you all heading to, Clifford?” Rich popped open a back door of the Cruiser to examine it. Devon was pale white and still in the backseat. “You look like shit, kid.”
“Thanks,” Devon grunted.
“We’re heading across town to get to his family.” Cliff pointed at Jim.
“Across town? You didn’t even make it half a mile before you broke down and you want to go across town in these fucking things?” Rich pointed at the family style cars. “Pardon my French. I’m not leaving in these deathtraps.”
“Leaving?” Cliff raised his eyebrow at Rich.
“Yes, Your highness. I’m coming with you. I got half a roast beef sandwich in the fridge. How long do you think that little snack will last me? There ain’t no one coming to save sweet old Rich so I’m coming with you, but not until we crank up the security here.”
“What are you thinking?” Cliff looked over his van.
“Steel bars on the windows, cow catcher on the front and maybe a few spikes to keep those things off of us. It would only take a couple hours and then we could smash our fucking way across town. Pardon my French. Alright, Cliff roll up them sleeves and let’s get started. Let’s use whatever we can find here in the shop and help me bolt them to the vehicles.”
It sounded like a waste of time to Jim, but the look on everyone else’s face told him that was what they all wanted. A more secure ride. If Rich could do it and it only took a few hours then it might be worth it.
“I’m going to go reload everything,” Frank picked up his duffle bag.
“His stitches might have popped.” Sara nodded at Tina.
“Let’s have a look.” Tina led the way to Devon’s open door.
“You waiting for an invitation sweetheart? Get your ass over here and help us move this shit.” Rich waved Jim over.
CHAPTER 17
Troy wasted no time and began digging at the earth right away. Karen jabbed at the dirt, but digging a hole was not her forte and her wrist was still killing her. This was about solidarity. It didn’t matter how much dirt she moved. This was about gutting out this horrible task together with her brother. They worked in silence. Troy chugged away at the hole like a backhoe. He had to chop through thick roots and dig out football sized rocks. It was dreadful. Digging any size hole into the Vancouver landscape was always a tedious job. It was a river bed thousands of years ago and now it was littered with round stones. They would bring your digging to a complete stop until you cleared the rock from its earthly tomb.
Troy worked and worked until the hole was hip deep. They didn’t have the time or energy to go a full six feet. Besides they weren’t worried about a zoning code violation or scavengers looking to rob the grave. It would work and be a good final resting spot for their Mama.
Karen helped Troy up out of the hole. “I’m going to get a spare sheet and we can wrap her in it.” Karen said as she smacked the dirt off her jeans.
“Okay, I’m gonna drag that asshole out of here,” Troy nodded over to the dead body of the Salesman that attacked Penny.
Karen headed back into the house and searched the hallway closet. She found an old white sheet that would work. As she passed the clock in the kitchen it read four fifty in the morning.
Another awful night of no sleep. Karen hoped that she would get a chance to sleep in, but the odds of that were doubtful. They still had to fill in the grave and it was going to take at least another hour. The sun would be cresting the horizon by then and a new day would start.
“Karen!” Troy called for help.
She raced out into the backyard. Troy was on the ground, wrestling with an infected man. He had dragged the salesman’s body halfway through the gate before he was attacked.
Karen first reached for her gun, but stopped herself. She was afraid she might shoot Troy instead of the monster. It was dark out, she could barely see the two of them and her nerves were frayed. A shovel laid on the ground in front of her. As she sprinted forward she picked up the garden tool and raised it high in the air. Troy was pinned under the thing and he had his hands wrapped around its neck. Its ferocious mouth snapped over and over again like one of those windup plastic chattering teeth toys. The shovel’s metal head came careening down onto the back of its skull. The blunt force sent its hungry mouth closer to Troy’s face. Its outstretched tongue touched the tip his nose.
“Fuck! Shit!” Karen recoiled and then put her boot into the side of its face. Troy rolled with its momentum and was able to get himself out from under it. Now he was on top and holding it down by its throat.
“Get it!” He begged. Karen was already planning a strike. She maneuvered close to its head and drove the blade of the shovel into the bridge of its nose. It crunched on impact, but it wasn’t enough to finish it. She tried again. This time she hit the
beast in its open mouth. The shovel slit its cheeks open all the way to the back of its jaw. While the infected was pinned down Troy let go of its neck and grabbed the shovel’s handle. He pulled himself up off of the monster and took Karen’s position at its head. She let go and stepped aside. Troy hopped up and landed both of his feet onto the shoulders of the shovel. His weight drove the dull metal blade through the back of its spine. The top of its head severed and tumbled away from the rest of its body.
Troy took a deep breath, “The thing came out of nowhere.” He puffed and tried to regain his composure.
“Let’s get this done and get back inside before-” Karen’s words were cut off. Two more infected were on their way from across the street. The city street lamps that hung above the neighborhood cast an eerie glow over their fast moving infected bodies. Karen whipped out her gun, but it was too dark. She couldn’t see well enough to get a clear headshot.
“Come on!” Troy pulled her into the backyard. They skipped over the dead salesman’s body that was blocking the gate from closing. The backyard had a set of floodlights above the sliding glass door. They lit up the chicken coop, the flower bed and the concrete patio. This circle of light was about to become a battle arena. Troy and Karen stood in the center of the arena and waited for their death match.
“Don’t shoot, it will only draw more of them!” Troy picked up the second shovel from the ground and handed it to Karen. She knew he was right, but damn, it was so much easier to put a round between their eyes. Karen holstered her gun and took the shovel just as the two monsters jumped over the dead Salesman’s body.
The two challengers had entered the arena. Troy charged at the first one and nailed it with a perfect swing. The bottom of the shovel’s blade CHONGED when it collided with its face. Karen swung her weapon and it only caught the edge of the infected’s skull, but it was enough to get it to change course and it ran headlong into the side of the house.
Troy swung again and this time he pinned its head up against the wall of the garage. A two-foot geyser of black blood erupted between the shovel and the wall. It spattered the siding with gore. Troy had performed an excellent finishing move. Karen’s infected stumbled against the wall and tripped on a coiled up garden hose on the ground. The creep crashed to its face and Karen launched her shovel at the base of its spine. She hammered down onto the shoulder of the shovel with her foot. The spine cracked and the infected stopped flailing on the ground.
“You all right?” Troy was already moving the body towards the front yard.
“Yeah.” She muscled the tool out from its spine and went to help Troy get all of the dead bodies out of the backyard. They quickly pulled the corpses into the front yard and stacked them up.
“We’ll need to burn these tomorrow,” Troy said as he closed the gate behind them.
“Don’t you mean today?” Karen jested about the late hour.
“Shit, you’re right.” Troy rubbed at his eye lids. Karen picked up the sheet she had dropped when she came to Troy’s rescue and handed him an edge. They unfolded the fabric and pulled it tight as they laid it on the ground next to Penny’s body. Rigor mortis had set in and they had to roll Penny’s stiff cadaver onto the sheet. Touching a dead body was repulsive. Touching their Mama’s dead body was agony.
They slowly and carefully rolled Penny’s body into the sheet. Then they hoisted her up and carried her over to the grave. They laid her down next to the opening in the earth and Troy jumped in. Karen joined him in the dirt hole and they gently laid Penny’s wrapped body onto the cold soft dirt. They dragged their tired bodies out of the grave and stood at the foot of her burial plot. The siblings looked down at the stained white sheet. Some of the coagulated black blood had bled through the cotton fibers.
This was not how Karen ever imagined her Mama’s funeral. She had actually never really thought about her mother passing away. That dark day seemed like it should have been decades away, but here it was. There they stood, exhausted, filthy and emotionally drained in front of their Mama’s final resting place.
“Remember when she took us to see Tool live?” Troy bent down to pick up his shovel.
That day had slipped Karen’s mind until Troy mentioned it. It was the fall of 1996 and they were on tour for their new album, Aenima. Karen and Troy were obsessed with the band, but they were under eighteen and couldn’t go without a legal guardian present. Penny saw just how badly they wanted to go see the silly rock show, so she volunteered to take them. All of Penny’s friends thought she was nuts for taking her seventeen and fifteen year old kids to see a band like Tool, but she did it. That was the kind of woman Penny was. She sat through two hours of ear shattering racket just to see her two children smile. Penny’s ears rang for a full week, but she was a hero to her children and that made the pain worth it.
“She was so miserable. Napkins jammed into her ears and people trying to mosh with her.” Karen’s somber voice rose for a moment as she recalled that night.
“That guy offered the three of us weed and she said, ‘Thank you sir, but we don’t need any marijuana.’ The look on that guy’s face.” Troy leaned on the shovel’s handle.
“And afterwards she took us to get pancakes and waffles at IHOP at one in the morning. She yelled her order to the waitress, because her ears were ringing so badly.” Karen picked up her shovel.
Troy bowed his head, “She was an amazing Mama and all she ever wanted was for us to be happy. No matter what it took she always did her best to show us how much she loved us.”
Karen reached out and took Troy’s hand. She squeezed it and said, “She was a better Mother than we deserved and she always said we deserved the best. We should get back inside soon.” Karen gave her brother’s hand one last tight squeeze and then she forced her shovel into the soft mound of dirt that sat next to the grave. They both swelled with tears as they slowly dropped shovels full of dirt down onto their Mama’s corpse.
Amber sunlight began trickling over the fence as they placed the last scoops of earth onto the newly filled plot. As they finished, the sun began to peep over the horizon, just like Karen thought it would. They had not spoken a word to each other as they worked. They staggered back into the garage, placed the shovels and lantern back on the wall and headed inside.
Karen needed a shower and a strong cup of coffee. She was covered in dirt and sweat. She felt grimy everywhere. She drifted like a dust cloud into the kitchen and headed straight for the coffee maker. She moved like she was on autopilot. She wasn’t thinking, just moving. Coffee grounds into the paper filter, she added a little extra just to be on the safe side. This wasn’t the same kind of espresso machine she was used to at home. She poured in the water and made sure it was a cup or two light on water. She wanted that coffee to be strong. She hit the delay start button on the machine. She set it to start brewing in about three hours. Karen needed to get cleaned up first but she absolutely needed more sleep.
Before parting to hit separate showers Troy gave his sister a hug. They were too tired for anymore tears, but she knew it was his way of saying thank you for the help.
Karen headed for the master bathroom and Troy crept towards the guest bathroom. Penny’s water heater was a little undersized and now it was a race to see who would get the hot shower first.
As Karen passed the spare bedroom. Leon was in there snoring like a yeti.
Lucky bastard! He slept through all that bullshit! Karen wasn’t mad. She was jealous. Jealous of anyone that got a good night of sleep. She felt the same way when she entered the bedroom and saw her two babies sleeping. She fumed with jealous rage, but she reeked and was filthy. She didn’t want to climb into bed that way. She kept moving and headed for the next best thing. A hot, long, steamy shower.
CHAPTER 18
It had been two hours since they had hit the garage and their projects were taking shape. Rich was a fantastic mechanic and worked wonders as he fabricated a protective shield for the PT Cruiser and Cliff’s van out of scraps of metal.
Jim learned more about welding and turning a wrench in those two hours than he had his whole life.
Rich’s first order of business after he switched out the tire for a fresh one was to build a cow catcher for both rides. They needed two large chunks of metal to attach to the front of both cars. So they improvised and took the heavy metal doors from the two public bathrooms stalls. Rich wanted to give the cow catchers an angle so that the infected bodies would slide off and out of the way. They propped up the bathroom doors against Rich’s work bench and Cliff swung a sledgehammer into the center of them. It took three dozen swings of the hammer to get the doors to bend slightly in the middle. When Cliff was finished, he laid them on their side horizontally. The two solid hunks of metal had about a twenty-degree bend down the middle that fit perfectly up against the front of the two cars.
Tina had bandaged the wound of Devon’s leg and had gotten the bleeding to stop. Devon rested on the couch in the waiting room of the office. Rich had an old fashioned popcorn machine in the corner for his customers to eat as they waited and he had fired it up to get the kids some food. Nickelodeon was still running its normal programs, so Morgan, Devon and the three girls sat and watched SpongeBob SquarePants as the others worked on the cars.
Rich had Sara and Tina working to cover the side and back windows of Jim’s car. Rich told them to take apart a rack that held air and oil filters. Then they used the metal shelves to cover up the rear windows on the PT Cruiser. An air compressor chugged away in the corner of the shop as the two ladies drilled out holes in the shelves with a set of air powered impact drills and bolted them to the Cruiser.
Rich used angle iron to attach support anchors to the frame and bumper. Cliff and Jim held up the makeshift cow catcher as Rich bolted the stall door to the support anchors.
“There we go, baby! It’s solid as a fucking rock and will still let the air flow into the engine compartment to keep it cooled.” Rich pulled at the van’s new cow catcher and it didn’t move. They continued to fortify it with more bolts and welding on lengths of steel. Since they had worked out the system, they attached the other cow catcher to the PT Cruiser much faster.