"Is it that bad in there?" John asked.
"It's bad enough."
They went in through the shattered window.
Chapter 4
At one of the rooms, Scooter handed John a key card.
"This works?" John asked.
"I think the locks are battery powered," Scooter offered in way of an explanation.
The old man put the key into the slot and heard a beep followed by a click. He pushed the door open. "At least it doesn't smell as much in here," he said, walking into the room.
Everyone followed him into it.
The room was clean. The sheets fresh. Two towels were neatly folded at the bottom of the bed. There were a couple of chocolates on the pillows.
John sat on the bed. It felt nice to be able to take a break like this.Safe. "The doors look strong too," he added.Maybe not as strong as his door at home, but good enough.
"Yeah," Scooter agreed. "Nothing's getting through them."
"What about through here?" Alice asked. She was standing in front of a window.
"It's pretty strong too. Just make sure to keep it closed."
"It'd be nice to air out the room for a bit," John argued.
"You want me to open it?" Alice turned to her husband.
"Just for a bit," he said.
"For a bit," Alice reiterated. A slight breeze pushed the curtain as she opened it. Then she sat on the bed as well. "Now what?"
"We look for food," Scooter replied.
Julie turned to him, worry across her face once more. "We will? Why don't we just stay here? We can find food tomorrow. When we leave."
Scooter shook his head. "No, we've gotta get something now."
John moved to get up, but Scooter motioned for him not to bother. "I should help," the old man said.
"You can help by staying here and taking care of Alice, Emily and Buster."
"Andme," Julie added. "I don't think that I can see any more of these bodies."
"That's fine. All of you can rest here. I'll go look on my own."
"No," Marianne said. "I'll go with you."
Scooter turned to look at the woman. He was still surprised by the courage she had shown. Not once had she been frightened by the bodies they had come across. The knife was still in her hand.
"All right, come with me." He turned back to the others. "We won't be long."
"Be careful," Julie warned him.
"We will."
Scooter and Marianne left the room, quietly closing the door behind them.
Chapter 5
As soon as Scooter closed the door, he turned to Marianne.
"Everything okay?" she asked.
No, it wasn't,he thought. He was starting to have second thoughts.
He kept his eyes on Marianne's, but he continued to think of her bright yellow shirt, the purse that she usually had strapped over her shoulder, the big sunglasses she wore outside. And though she wasn't old enough to be his mother, he figured that she was close enough.
What was he doing?
"It's fine," he decided. "Where should we start?"
"There might be a restaurant around here somewhere."
"Did you see one?" Aside from the lobby and reception desk - and the bodies that were scattered around it - he couldn't remember seeing anything that looked like it held any food.
"No," she admitted.
They walked back toward the lobby. They both figured that there might be a sign pointing to where the restaurant would be.If there was one.Maybe even be a map of some kind.
Once there, Marianne stopped and pointed. On the wall, it read:Restaurant, Pool, Exercise Room. An arrow pointed down another hallway.
"Looks like you were right," he said. He had a brief thought of what the pool must look like - bodies floating in bloodied water - and told himself not to check if they came across it first.
Side by side, they made their way toward the restaurant.
This part of the hotel wasn't much different than the other. Dead bodies. A couple of them in hotel uniforms. Holes in the walls. Over-turned tables. Blood.
"At least there are no creatures," Marianne said.
Scooter was thinking the same thing.
When they got to the restaurant, they saw that its doors were shut. There were also no windows to look through, so they had no idea of what waited for them on the other side.
Scooter raised his finger to his mouth, telling Marianne to be quiet. He placed his ear to the door and listened.
"Anything?" Marianne whispered.
"No." He kept his ear pressed to the wood for a little longer. "I think it's clear."
Marianne squeezed the handle of her knife and held it out in front of her. "I'm ready when you are."
Scooter readied his axe. "Let's do this." He pulled at the door.
As it swung open, a stench worse than they any other he had smelled before greeted them. Scooter winced. Marianne pulled back. The door closed shut.
"Fuck," Scooter said. "That's not good."
"So what should we do?"
"Fuck," he said again.They had come this far. Why not go the whole way? "I guess we've gotta try it again."
"Okay."
"You can wait out here, if you want."
"Why?"
"Do you really want to see what's in there?"
Marianne gave him a look from the corner of her eyes. "Doyou?"
Of course, he didn't want to. "All right," he said. "I get it."
He placed his hand back on the door knob and took a deep breath. He nodded to Marianne, then pulled. The smell hit them again as they rushed inside.
Luckily, the restaurant was brightly lit. It meant they wouldn't have to strain to see anything. They could easily find what they were looking for and get out. Of course, it also meant that they could see all of the horrible things that had happened in there, but there was nothing they could do about that.
Scooter and Marianne searched.
They came upon several dead bodies. Blood spread across the walls, covered the tablecloths. People had forks and knives sticking out of faces and chests. Plates had been smashed. Food scattered.
Scooter only paused when he came upon a young girl. She was lying spread across the floor, her long blonde hair fanned out beneath her. A bottle had been jammed into the side of her neck and her blood had poured out of it like a funnel. It had pooled around her.
Fuck.
He turned away from the young girl and continued his search.
Chapter 6
Marianne had her hand over her mouth and nose. She didn't know how much more of the smell she could take. She did her best to search around for any sign of food that they could take, but stench of death made that hard. Her eyes were squinted together. She could barely breathe.
She saw Scooter standing over on the other side of the restaurant. He was looking down at a small child. A girl. It reminded her of the one she had seen at the park, beside the playhouse, all those…months?…days ago.
Scooter looked up and marched away from where he was standing. Marianne did the same. Though she didn't make it very far.
She motioned to Scooter.This was too much. He agreed.
They both charged for the door.
Chapter 7
Outside the restaurant, they began panting, sucking in all of the somewhat fresher air.
"Shit," Scooter said in between gasps. "That was fuckin' horrible!"
Marianne looked at him. Instead of saying anything, she simply started to laugh.
It took Scooter by surprise.After all they had just seen, how could she laugh?He thought that maybe Marianne had lost it. Seeing all of that blood, smelling all of that decay.Had it pushed her over the edge?
Finally, she spoke. "Yeah, thatwas fuckin' horrible!"
Scooter started laughing too. He couldn't help himself. The words had a strange sound coming out of the mouth of this middle-aged woman in her bright yellow shirt.
"So what do we do now?" he asked once he gathered himself
.
Marianne laughed a little longer before she answered. "I don't know."
It wasn't much of an answer, but it was along the same lines that Scooter had been thinking. They had come so far. Yet they didn't know if they wanted to go any further.
"It really wasfuckin'horrible," Marianne repeated.
"Should we forget about it? Head back to the room and tell them we couldn't find anything?" Scooter didn't like that idea, but he wasn't sure what else they could do.
Marianne didn't answer. She had her own question to ask first. "Did you see anything in there we could take?"
"No."
"Me neither." She looked back at the door. "But I think I saw where the kitchen was. Maybe we should try to check that out first."
"You mean go back in?"
Marianne's head bobbed up and down slightly. She didn't really want to go through all of that again. "The least we can do it try."
Scooter glanced from the door to the hallway that led to their rooms. People were relying on him to get this done. He had to try. "Okay," he said. "We'll give it a shot."
Fuck.
He grabbed the door knob again, then turned to Marianne. "Ready?"
"Ready."
"On the count of three."
He began to count. At 'three', they took a deep breath and he pulled the door back open.
They hurried inside.
Chapter 8
Julie opened the hotel room door to let them in. Scooter and Marianne both had their hands full with cans of food they had found in the kitchen.
"You found so much," Julie said.
They placed the food onto the table and sat down. Their adventure had taken a lot out of them.
"Was it bad?" John asked from his spot on the bed.
"Worse than bad," Scooter replied. He shot a quick look to Marianne.Fuckin' horrible."But we found a few things."
It was then that Scooter noticed John had something of his own. A can of pop and a bag of something. Alice and Emily were sharing something too.
"Where did you get those?" Scooter asked.
John held up his hand. A bag of peanuts. "These?"
"Yeah, those."
"The mini-bar." John pointed to the small refrigerator underneath the television. "We thought about it after you left."
The mini-bar. Scooter didn't know why he hadn't thought of that earlier. There wouldn't be the best food in it, but it would've helped. They might've even been able to avoid going to the restaurant and seeing what they had.
Nothing they could do about that now…
Scooter leaned over and opened the fridge. There were a few more things left in there. He pulled out an orange juice and offered another one to Marianne. They drank it quickly.
"Was it that bad?" Julie asked. She had made her way to the bed and was sitting on the edge of it. She wrung her hands together as she spoke.
"Yeah," Scooter said. "It was."
"You still think we should leave tomorrow?"
"Yeah, I do." Scooter didn't want to keep wandering around outside, but he knew that there was too much death in the hotel. They'd have to stay in their rooms. They couldn't have much of a life here. Besides, he still wanted to find more survivors. "I mean, we might be able to stay two or three days, but I don't know if that's a good idea."
John came to his defence once more. "No," he said. "It's not a good idea. We should keep moving on. Don't get me wrong, I like this bed we've found. But opening the window hasn't done much to air out the room. It still smells in here. And I might not know much about these types of things, but I don't think it can be good for our health."
"But…" This time it was his wife who spoke. From the look on her face, they all knew that she was worried about John being outside. It had been hard enough for him to get to the hotel. She didn't want to keep taking unnecessary risks.But was this unnecessary? "I guess you're right," she admitted.
"On the bright side," John continued, "by the looks of it, there's lots of food now."
"There is," Scooter said. He grabbed a can and turned it around in his hand. "Soup. Sauce. Some vegetables. Fruit salad."
Emily's eyes lit up at that. "Fruit salad? With cherries?"
Scooter smiled. The little girl really was beginning to talk more. "Yeah, with cherries. Anyone have a can opener?"
Marianne searched through her purse and pulled one out that she had taken from John's house. She gave it to him.
"Who's hungry?" Scooter asked.
Emily raised her hand.
He poured some of the fruit salad into a cup and passed it to her. "Here you go."
"Thanks." She dug her fingers into it straight away.
"Anyone else?"
They were all hungry and wanted to eat. He opened up a few more cans and handed it all out. The could talk about leaving later. For now, they were happy with their food and decided to leave it at that.
Chapter 9
Something startled Scooter awake. He was alone in his room and had no idea what had made the noise. He looked around and tried to see what it was. The moon shone enough to dimly light his room.
When that failed, he listen for the sound again.
Nothing.
He was sure that he had heard something.
He reached over and made sure that his axe was beside him. It was.
He waited a moment. Then the sound came again.
Knock, knock, knock. Someone was at his door.
He knew it wasn't one of thosethings, but he also couldn't see any reason why anyone would come calling at this hour. He grabbed his axe, got out of bed and quietly walked to the front door.
Knock, knock, knock.
"Who's there?" he asked. His voice wasn't more than a whisper.
He waited for an answer. When it didn't come, he started to question whether or not anyone was even there. The knocking had stopped. It could have been his imagination.A dream. He didn't really think so, but he wasn't sure what to make of it.
"Hello? he raised his voice this time.
Nothing.
He thought about opening the door. Though he wasn't quite ready.Had it been in his head?
Knock, knock, knock.
He jumped at the sound and readied his axe. "Who's out there?" he called even louder.
A reply never came.
He stared at the door, knowing he'd have to make a decision. He could either go back to bed and hope that whoever was out there would stop knocking on the door. Or he could open it. Calling out wasn't working.
He turned to look at his bed. There was no way that he was going to be able to sleep without knowing who was outside.
"Hello?"
Still nothing.
He grabbed the door knob and turned it slowly. The door clicked open. He pulled it toward him. Though it was dark, he could easily make out the bright yellow shirt.
"Marianne," he said. "What are you doing?"
"Can I come in?" she asked.
"Is everything okay? Is everyone all right?"
"Everyone's all right. Can I come in?"
Scooter looked up and down the hallway. There was no one else out there. Everything seemed fine.
"Sure," he said, moving back for her to step past him. He closed the door as soon as she was inside. "Why didn't you answer me?"
She walked further into his room, her back to him. "Idid answer you. I told you that everyone was all right."
"No, not that. When you were outside just now. I called to you. You didn't say anything."
"I guess didn't hear you." She turned to face him.
He could see her better now that they were closer to the moonlight coming in through his window. She had a slight smile on her face, though a sadness in her eyes.
"Marianne," he said again. "What is it? What's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong."
"Really?"
She sat on the bed. "I don't know. Not really, I guess."
He placed his axe against the bedside table and sat down on the bed beside
her. "You okay?"
She took a moment before answering. "I was just thinking," she said.
"About what?"
"About the past few days. And about today.The restaurant. It was pretty bad in there."
"Yeah," Scooter said. "It was." He thought about the little girl with the bottle in her neck.Fuckin' horrible.
Marianne wrung her fingers together. "I was also thinking aboutyou."
"Me?" Scooter didn't know where this was going, but something about it felt strange. "Why?"
"Oh, I don't know." Her fingers continued to press together. "I guess I was thinking about you…and Julie."
"Me and Julie? What do you mean?"
Marianne's fingers stopped moving. Her eyes focused on his. "You'll never be happy with her." The words came out of her mouth bluntly, as though they had been friends for years and she needed to tell him something that he couldn't see for himself.
"What?"
"You'll never love her."
"Never love her?"
"Not the way that you want. Not the way that you deserve." Marianne reached out and placed her hand on his knee. She squeezed it gently. "I see the way you look at her. I know what you want. And I know that you won't get it from her.You know that too."
Did he?
He moved his knee from under her grasp. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Marianne laughed. Well, actually, it was more of a chuckle. A sweet, girlish one, at that. "You know that I mean," she said. "Deep down, I know that you do."
Deep down? Was it true?
"I…I…" He didn't want to be having this conversation. Not with Marianne. Not at this hour. "I think you should leave."
Marianne's expression dropped. "I didn't come here to upset you. It's just that I knew that you were having some trouble with her. I could see it in your eyes. The way you look at her."
In his eyes? The way he looks at her?
"I don't want to talk about it anymore," he said.
"I know you don't," Marianne continued. She reached out and touched his face. She ran her fingers down his cheek and underneath his chin. "But, remember, I just wanted to help. You're a good young man and you deserve someone strong. Someone you can rely on. Like me."
Glory (Book 4) Page 7