But that was then and this was now. And the now was a cracked and overgrown street, the earth beneath the pavement reclaiming the land and everything man had built on it. The stores were mere shells of their former selves with broken windows, missing doors, faded and cracked paint, and the ever-present aura of death.
It was a ghost town, a graveyard without headstones, a forgotten and decaying museum of what life used to be. And if life went on this way, if the infection continued to rage, eventually there would be no one left, the human race would soon be gone. In time, so would all of our towns and with them, any last shred of proof that we ever existed at all.
“Looks clear,” Evelyn mused, though her body stayed tense and alert.
Alex let out a small snort. “Looks can be deceiving.”
Her expression pinched with irritation, Evelyn slanted her eyes in my direction, rolling them ever so slightly.
I attempted to give her a smile in return, but didn’t quite manage one. My stomach churned with fear, my head pounded from anxiety, and with every mile we traveled, my fear of the unknown only continued to grow, increasing my discomfort.
“Lei?” she whispered, cocking her head in question. “You okay?”
“F-fine,” I stuttered hoarsely, but I was anything but fine. I tried to envision myself searching out these buildings for food or clothing, things that had once belonged to others—others who hadn’t been as fortunate as me—and my apprehension only grew. I felt like an interloper in this new and foreign world, and worse than that, like a burden on Evelyn and Alex.
What good would I be if we were attacked by an infected, or even by another person? What good was I even if we weren’t?
Closing my eyes, I inhaled slowly and deeply, the stale air of the truck smelling strongly of unwashed bodies. I let out my breath, wishing I could have a private moment alone, somewhere behind closed doors so I could block out the world. Just a minute was all I needed to regain my composure.
I took another breath and let it out, another fruitless attempt at calming my nerves. It was hot in the truck, the three of us pressed up against one another, Alex on my left, his right leg situated firmly up alongside my left, and on my right was Evelyn, her entire left side pressed uncomfortably against me. We were touching from our shoulders to our knees, unable to move even a fraction of an inch without the other being entirely aware.
When I cracked open an eyelid, the truck’s dashboard loomed in front of me, and beyond that abandoned cars blurred in and out of focus as we passed them, Alex swerving every so often to avoid garbage strewn in the road. His elbow would press into my bicep and every time, I cringed and closed my eyes, my breath lodging in my throat.
I needed out of this truck; it was too small and stifling. I needed fresh air and a moment alone. I needed a bath to wash away the blood, the sweat, and the stench of fear. I needed—
“Don’t worry, Lei,” Evelyn said gently, interrupting my panicked thoughts. “It’s going to be fine. I’m going to protect you.”
My eyes flew open just in time to see her reaching for me, more than likely to give me a reassuring pat or a comforting squeeze. The thought of it, of being treated or thought of like a useless child again, sent my emotions into overdrive, and I did something I’d never done before, never thought of doing before.
I slapped Evelyn’s arm away.
“Stop it!” I cried. “I’m not a child. It’s not my fault I don’t know how to use a gun. It’s not my fault I don’t know the first thing about surviving out here. It’s not my fault that I’m not as strong as you, or as brave. And it’s not my fault that I’m weak!”
Evelyn’s mouth fell open, then closed, and then opened again as her eyes widened in shock at my sudden outburst. For the first time, my friend was at a loss for words. There were a lot of firsts happening lately, most of them at the most inopportune times. And all of them were my fault.
“You’re not weak.”
I was so busy glaring at Evelyn, and her gaping at me, that neither of us noticed for several moments that the truck had come to a stop. Blinking with confusion, I turned to find Alex staring straight ahead, his hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly that his tanned knuckles had turned white.
“You’re not weak,” he repeated, this time more forcefully.
Without another word, Alex roughly pulled the key from the ignition and exited the truck, slamming the door loud enough to make me wince. I watched him walk a few feet into the empty street before I looked back at Evelyn, an apology forming on my lips.
“No,” she said, flashing me a wicked smile. “Don’t you dare say you’re sorry. Not for that.”
Flabbergasted, I searched her face, confused by her smile, trying to discern the reason for it.
“Why the hell not?” was all I could say.
“Because,” she said pointedly. “It’s so fucking good to finally see you stand up for yourself again.”
• • •
The first three stores we ventured inside had been picked clean of anything useful quite some time ago. All that remained were fragments of what these buildings had once held, an abundance of cobwebs and dust, and a few scattered human bones.
For the most part I stayed on lookout, remaining at the entrance. My sole job was to alert Alex and Evelyn of any threats, be they infected, animal, or another human, while the two of them searched for provisions.
By our fourth stop, at what looked to have once been a bank, I was more sure of myself than I had been in quite some time. The gun felt good in my grip, solid and heavy, and despite not having yet fired it, I was oddly reassured to have it there.
That wasn’t to say I was no longer scared, because I was. Actually, I was downright terrified. The sun was setting on the horizon, giving the entire town an overall gray and spooky appearance. Without electricity, the interiors of the buildings were already too dim to see clearly, even with the aid of Alex’s flashlight. Added to it was the unnatural silence and stillness in a place that I knew had once been full of footsteps, voices, even the buzz of the streetlamps. It was the perfect setting for a horror movie. And as the sun sank deeper on the horizon, my recently won smidgen of courage began to form into a hard lump of fear in my gut.
“We should get going,” I called out over my shoulder, my voice quivering with my growing anxiety.
“One minute!” Evelyn replied. “There’s something under this…goddamn it, this is heavy!”
“Leisel.”
Alex was suddenly beside me, so close I could feel the heat of his breath against my cheek. Squeaking in surprise, I jumped backward, out of the doorway and onto the sidewalk.
“You scared me,” I breathed out. Placing my hand over my pounding heart, I took in a much-needed gulp of fresh air.
“Sorry,” he said, not looking the least bit sorry. Much like Evelyn had earlier in response to Alex, I found myself wanting to roll my eyes. He was a strange man. Handsome and unreadable, and if the events of the last two days were anything to go on, entirely unpredictable.
“Why did you help me?” I blurted out, suddenly needing to know. “And don’t tell me you wanted out of there. Life was good for you and Jami in Fredericksville. Why would anyone trade that for…” I trailed off and gestured toward the empty, ruined street. “This,” I finished. What I really wanted to ask was, why would anyone trade a comfy and predictable life for what could end up being a very short life, one filled with unfathomable dangers.
As I already presumed, he didn’t answer me readily but instead just stared down at me, his dark eyes appearing black in the waning light.
“You think you’re weak,” he finally said, his voice unusually ragged and thick. “But you’re not. Weak people don’t live through the kind of shit you lived through. Weak people don’t drive a knife into someone’s heart, and weak people don’t just willingly accept the fact that they’ve been sentenced to death.”
Alex took a rather menacing step toward me, and I again found myself fighting to rema
in where I stood. I didn’t want to be the woman who was afraid of all men just because one man had hurt her. I didn’t want to be weak anymore. So I stood my ground and lifted my chin, though my knees began to tremble.
“I was weak,” he continued, twisting his lips into a snarl filled with self-hatred. “I stood outside your home, day after day, year after year, listening to what he did to you, and I never lifted a hand to stop it.” He swallowed hard and shook his head as his nostrils flared, his gaze unfocused. “Weak people do nothing. Weak people let life happen to them, and I was weak. I knew what it was like out here, knew the kind of shit people were doing just to live another day, and I didn’t want to come back to it, to this. So I let him hurt you, didn’t say a word, didn’t try to stop it, because I was goddamn weak.”
My lower lip began to quiver as my eyes filled with tears. One blink and they spilled over, running down my cheeks faster than I could catch the breath I needed to stop them. Who was this man? This wasn’t the Alex I knew, the silent, stone-faced, emotionless Alex who’d been by my side this entire time, and yet the same I’d thought had never really seen me before.
I shouldn’t have been so surprised. Whereas Lawrence had appeared easygoing, always had a smile on his face, was well spoken, and moved in a way that wasn’t at all threatening, he’d actually been the very opposite.
People, I’d come to learn, were rarely congruent to the face they put on. Lawrence certainly hadn’t been, and Alex wasn’t either. Evelyn, however, Evelyn was always herself. The one person I could always count on for honesty, the one person I could always trust. She was my constant, my rock, my heart, and I loved her for that.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” I whispered tearfully. “I don’t blame you for taking care of yourself. You didn’t owe me anything.”
“But I did—I do,” he said, his jaw clenched tight, his eyes flashing fire.
I watched him internally battle his anger, and yet I was strangely not afraid of him. It was the smiles that now worried me, the gentle touches and the softly spoken words that turned into something much more horrifying. Thanks to Lawrence—who had been at his most calm and his happiest when hurting me—Alex’s sharper, much harsher demeanor was almost comforting.
“I owe you my humanity, Leisel. Or what the hell is the point? What are we trying to survive for?”
I opened my mouth, an instinctual response when someone asks you a question, only to realize I didn’t have a ready answer, and more tears fell. Through blurry eyes I saw Alex’s hand rise, and for the first time in three years, I didn’t flinch at the sight of it. But before it could reach me, his hand suddenly stilled a hairbreadth away from my cheek, and hovered for a moment before falling away.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly, all the anger now drained from his expression.
I didn’t want to repeat myself, to tell him again that he had nothing to be sorry for, not after he’d confessed what appeared to be something that had been weighing so heavily on his mind for some time now. To do so would be to dismiss his pain, and I knew better than anyone what that felt like. Never would I wish the same on another person, to ignore the wounds they carried within them.
“Nothing,” Evelyn announced, and we turned to her, finding her expression crestfallen. Kicking at some debris in her path, she made her way toward us. “Not a single thing.”
The three of us stood there for a moment, not looking at one another, not looking at anything in particular. We were all hungry, dirty, and the weather was quickly turning. Soon the days would no longer be warm, and the nights even colder.
“Without gas, we’ll be traveling on foot soon,” Alex said, both sounding and looking grim. “And dead if we don’t find anything to eat.”
“What about other people?” Evelyn asked. “There must be other survivors.”
Alex turned his hard stare on Evelyn. “Trust me, we don’t want to find other survivors. You think Whitney was a ba—”
“Evenin’, friends.”
My head spun left toward the new voice just as Alex grabbed my arm. I barely had time to see who it was that had spoken, only getting a glimpse of a dark figure that looked decidedly male, before Alex yanked me backward and nearly threw me into Evelyn. Quickly, he moved to stand in front of us, shielding us both with his body. Evelyn’s hand immediately sought out mine and we both squeezed each other tightly.
“You look hungry,” the voice continued. “And tired.”
“We’re fine,” Alex snapped. “Just passing through.”
“We’ve got food, friends, and—”
“I’m not your friend,” Alex fired back, sounding more agitated than I’d ever heard him before. I watched, barely breathing, as his shoulders tensed, the muscles in his back bunching under his clothing.
“Are you sure about that?” the voice replied, sounding casual, easygoing, and far too jovial for my liking. “We could all use a friend these days.”
A crash sounded from behind us, just as a bright light temporarily blinded me. Gripping Evelyn’s hand tighter, as well as my gun, I blinked rapidly, aiming my weapon uselessly, trying to see against the blaze of light. All around me I could hear shuffling, muffled curses that sounded like Alex, unfamiliar murmurs, and then all at once Evelyn was ripped away from me.
Momentarily alone, I flailed, fear holding my scream hostage in my throat, until hands suddenly grabbed at me, and pain erupted in my skull. Like from a blow to the gut, breath whooshed from my lungs as my knees gave out. I began to fall, dropping down a seemingly endless hole of nothingness, surrounded by silence and a shade blacker than night.
Chapter Ten
Evelyn
I awoke to the sound of singing.
Groaning, I grabbed my aching head and found something sticky coating my hair, the scalp beneath tender and raw. The trilling sound of several voices singing in harmony only made the ache worse.
I was suddenly reminded of attending church as a child. Every Sunday we’d wear our prettiest dresses, my sister and I, my mother as well, and my father would wear his perfectly pressed suit. The minister had been a grumpy old bastard. Never a smile for anyone, not even for the well-behaved children who’d sat patiently and quietly for fear he’d scold them. In fact, as I’d grown older, it had become a longstanding joke between my father and me as we debated the reason behind that old man’s misery.
When I was finally able to pry my heavy eyes open, it wasn’t only the sound of singing that reminded me of my childhood. I was seated in a church—the front pew, to be precise—and there was a choir standing off to my right singing the last hymn, a benediction I knew by heart.
Similarities aside, the minister standing behind the podium was the exact opposite of my minister. This man was anything but miserable, and instead appeared to be hopped up on happiness. His smile was warm, his eyes shining as they scanned his congregation. A full head of thick brown curls framed his youthful and friendly face, and when he turned that face in my direction, he winked at me, his smile growing even wider.
Blinking, I shook my head as if it would somehow help clear the fuzz from my brain. When that didn’t seem to work, I closed my eyes and counted to ten, because this must be a hallucination or a dream.
That was it! I was dreaming.
Giving myself a good pinch on the arm, I opened my eyes, yet nothing had changed. Confused, I blinked several times, and then a few more for good measure. But nothing had changed. The merry minister was still there, bouncing about happily, clapping while he sang. Out of nowhere, the song suddenly reached a new volume, and my body responded by sending a sharp shooting pain screaming through my head from temple to temple.
When I glanced to my left, I found an older woman with gray hair, her eyes kind as she beamed at me. Scowling, I looked away, only to find the space to my right occupied as well. Another friendly face smiled at me, this one belonging to a middle-aged man who was lovingly cradling a shotgun in his lap.
Startled by the gun, I flinched and inche
d closer to the woman instead. She placed a gentle hand on my shoulder, and I flinched again. My behavior didn’t seem to faze either of them, they continued to smile as they sang, looking expectantly at me as if awaiting me to open my mouth and jump right in.
Shrugging the woman’s hand from my shoulder, I attempted to stand, but was immediately forced back down by both the woman and the man. Once I was seated again, they each took one of my arms, gripping the limb in their grasp. It was then that my mind fully cleared and I realized that Leisel and Alex weren’t here with me, wherever the hell here was.
Twisting around in my seat, I searched through the sparsely filled pews for any sign of my friends, coming up empty. Feeling suddenly sick, panicked, and more than a little afraid, I started to yell.
“Lei!” I screamed, interrupting the third verse of the hymn. “Leisel!”
Despite my cries, the choir sang on with wide, contented smiles on their faces. Not even a glance was spared in my direction, as if this insane scenario was utterly normal for them.
“Get off me!” I screamed, still twisting in my seat, trying to shake free of my captors. “Get the fuck off me!”
The minister chose that moment to finally stop singing, and once he did, the entire church fell silent. His happy expression remained firmly in place, though something had changed. His eyes seemed different now, as if a darkness had crept in.
“You’re awake!” Clapping his hands together, he gave me a toothy grin. “Wonderful. Let me introduce myself, friend!” he continued cheerfully. “I’m Mr. Peter, and the good people seated next to you are Mr. Michael and Mrs. Mary!”
“Friend,” Mr. Michael greeted me, bowing his head.
I gawked at all three of these crazy people, my eyes bugging out of my head, my brain having trouble grasping what was really happening here.
“Friend,” Mrs. Mary said, releasing me in order to offer her hand.
Instead of taking it, I jumped up, catching Mr. Michael by surprise, and wrenched free from his grip on my arm. As I scrambled backward, both Mrs. Mary and Mr. Michael were already on their feet, reaching for me. Suddenly Mr. Peter was there, his white robes swishing around him as he stepped in front of them, blocking them from reaching me.
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