The Rabid

by Ami Urban

  "Kay, well, your battery"s corroded, here. See the buildup around the wires?"

  "Okay."

  "You need a new one."

  "Well, there isn't a way for me to get a new battery now."

  I shrugged, wiping my hands on my jeans. "Five finger discount?"

  She looked at me like I was crazy. "I've never stolen anything in my life, and I'm not about to start now."

  I put my hands up in defense mode. "Got it. Sorry. Where you headed? I can let you borrow my buddy's car... He won't be using it."

  She hesitated, avoiding my gaze for a moment. "we're going to Colorado."

  We? "Land of legal dope, huh?" I kicked a loose pebble into the road. It skittered halfway across and stopped. She watched it with brows knitted together. I had that effect on a lot of women.

  "There may be a sanctuary there."

  "Sanctu-wha?"

  "A safe place to stay. What about you?"

  I looked up. "Huh?"

  "don't you have someone you need to protect? it's not a good idea to stay here." There was a mother"s care in her voice.

  "I don't have anyone," I said. "My boss was the only one and he... I trailed off, but she seemed to understand right away.

  "he's infected." Her monotone statement caught me off guard. She must have had a killer intuition. I stayed silent.

  "You should use your friend"s car to get to Colorado," she said.

  "Nah... You need it more than I do. Besides, I can fix yours and use it if need be. I'll just go grab the keys and be back in a sec."

  "Okay."

  I ran back into Silas's house, thinking about how much of an idiot I looked in front of a pretty girl. Of course, she'd never go for a guy like me, anyway. Aside from that, she seemed way serious. "

  I stepped over Silas's corpse. A line of sticky red stood out behind him on the wall where he'd fallen. I felt a hiccup in my chest, but I had to keep going. Silas was gone now, and it wasn't my fault! I grabbed the keys to his SUV off the counter. And when I turned to go back out the door, I heard a woman scream.

  I rushed out into the street just in time to see one of those things trying to bite the girl across the way. It was backing her up against the door to the house. She kept crying out someone's name and slamming her first against the jamb, but no one was coming to her rescue.

  I sprinted across the street, trying not to listen to the thing howl and snarl. It was a terrible sound. The girl spotted me and her eyes widened.

  "Help!"

  It lunged for her.

  But I was faster. "Bad touch!" I hit it with the butt of my rifle right in the temple. There was a loud crack, and it went down, writhing on the concrete porch. We watched the thing squirm and cry for a while. Finally, it went still.

  The front door of the house flew open and a tall, dark woman looked at us in surprise.

  "Lisa?!" she cried.

  "Sylvia!" She went to her friend. "Where were you? didn't you hear me?"

  Sylvia looked down at the dead thing and yelped. She pulled her friend into the house, but didn't shut the door. "I was upstairs with the kids. I...I'm sorry..." She looked at me. "Did you save her?"

  "Yes." Lisa answered before I could. "He saved my life."

  "I was just in the right place at the right time." I ran a hand through my hair.

  "No." She shook her head. "You saved me." Carefully avoiding the bleeding thing on the porch, she took a step toward me. Then, she looked into my eyes and asked the question. "what's your name?"

  "Jack. Jack Reynolds."

  "I'm Lisa James and this is Sylvia Hargrave. Why don't you come inside?"

  I hesitated, clearing my throat. "I don't think"

  "Listen, Mr. Reynolds"

  "Whoa, there. Mr. Reynolds is an actor. You can call me Jack. I haven't done anything in my life to get the mister title."

  There was a brief pause where they both looked at me blankly. "Okay. Jack." It was as if she tasted my name. I kind of liked the way it sounded coming from her. "Neither of us would be able to fight something like that off." She gestured toward the thing on the porch. "And neither of us know anything about cars. But you seem to. If you'd be willing to accompany us to Colorado, we'd be grateful to have your skills."

  Sylvia snorted behind her. "Way to lay it on thick, Lisa."

  Lisa put her hands out. "it's better to be up front and honest than dancing around the issue."

  "No." I stopped them. "I appreciate it, Lisa. Can I call you Lisa?"

  "May" you call me Lisa. And yes."

  "I'll go with you."

  From the Desk of Dr. Lisa James

  "Should we get going, then?" I followed Jack and Sylvia into the kitchen. I could already tell she was trying to make him more than her friend.

  Sylvia waved a hand at me. "That was the only one of those things for miles. Quit worrying." Turning back to Jack, she put on one of her seductive smiles while batting her eyelashes. "I'm sure our new friend would like some coffee before the world runs out of it. How do you like it?"

  "Like prisoners."

  "What?"

  He shook his head. "Never mind. Bad joke. However you're taking it."

  I noticed he seemed a bit preoccupied, but I put it off as we were all preoccupied. Specifically Sylvia, but her preoccupation was with something else. When we got to the kitchen, Alex and Rex were packing a few snacks into a bag. Except Rex had gotten a hold of one of his toy cars and was driving it around the floor. Its wheels scraped the tiles.

  "Who are you?" Alex was the first to speak.

  "Lexi!" Sylvia scolded her daughter.

  Jack bent down. "I'm Jack. I hear your name is...Lexi? Is that right?"

  "Alex." She still seemed a bit guarded.

  "Ah. You know what that name means?"

  "No..."

  "Means you're the defender of all mankind."

  Alex tilted her head to one side. "that's a lot of pressure."

  A smile spread across Jack's face. "You know what Lexi means?"

  Sylvia's daughter perked a bit more. "What?"

  "It means you have to protect all of Greece."

  Alex's nose crinkled. "that's not a very good job."

  "Ooh." Jack took a quick look around. "don't tell a Greek person that."

  She giggled.

  "And who's this?" He turned toward Rex, but all my son did was chomp at the air as if he were vicious. "Let me guess... Jaws?"

  Alex giggled again. "that's Rex. Aunt Lisa's son."

  "Rex." Jack mused for a moment. "Good name. Nice to meet you, Rex."

  "Rex." My son repeated his name. Sylvia turned to make coffee.

  "Rex suffers from autism." I moved closer to my son as Jack stood.

  "I noticed." He shrugged. "I just wasn't sure how sensitive of an issue it was."

  "You noticed?"

  "Yeah." He looked at me. "I had a cousin who had Asperger"s. Where is he on the spectrum?"

  The question put me back for a moment. No one had ever asked except doctors. "Well, he sees patterns in everything, but has trouble learning. We think he's somewhere in the middle with a mild learning disorder."

  Jack nodded. "Has it been difficult?"

  "Oh, hell yeah." Sylvia handed Jack a cup of coffee, but offered none to me. "That kid gives Lisa a run for her money all the time. Sometimes she can handle it, but most of the time it's a struggle."

  Jack glanced at me. Presumably because he thought I'd want to start a fight, but I was accustomed to Sylvia's odd need to compete with me. I paid no mind to it any longer.

  A thump on the sliding glass door caused Sylvia to yelp. She let go of her coffee mug where it shattered to pieces on the floor. Startled, Rex began to sniffle. I bent forward to pick him up. He struggled with me at first.

  "Get the bags." We all looked at Jack whose focus was on the door. When we all switched our gazes, understanding flooded through everyone.

  A woman with a large bite out of her shoulder was shuffling along outside. We knew sh
e'd seen us as she'd turned and banged on the glass again. Rex whimpered. After the second attempt to break the glass, the woman began clawing at it, chomping at the air as Rex had done a few moments earlier. Foam collected at the sides of her mouth.

  "Get the bags." Jack's voice once again destroyed the haze of stunned silence and booted us into action. I lurched forward with my son still in my arms and grabbed his bag. The woman pounded on the glass, causing me to jump. When Alex went to snatch her duffle, the woman threw her entire body into the door, causing it to shudder in its frame. Alex squealed.

  "let's go, guys." Jack's voice was low and calm. We turned to follow him out the front door. But as soon as we got there, an infected male popped up in the side window, howling at us. Sylvia screamed as a few more victims began rapping on the door.

  "You got a fire extinguisher?" Jack asked Sylvia. When she didn't answer, he shook her shoulder gently. "Hey! You got a fire extinguisher?"

  Sylvia shook her head. "Y-yeah. In the garage."

  He squinted at her. "Why in the...? Forget it. let's go."

  We followed him down the hall and through the doorway to the garage. Jack began to sorting through piles of junk my friend had collected because she was too petrified to remember where the thing was. I set Rex down and joined in.

  "Thanks." Jack tossed some old clothes away. They still had tags.

  "We need to get out of here."

  "Yeah, no shit."

  We tossed boxes of crap aside until those things started running into the garage door, causing the metal bangs to reverberate off the dry wall. That only made us search faster. I was the one who found the fire extinguisher beneath a pile of discarded perfume bottles. I tossed it to Jack then ran to grab Rex.

  Jack positioned himself by the door opener. "Okay, on my signal, you run across the street to my buddy"s car."

  I nodded. After a deep breath, Jack hit the button and the door to the garage began to slowly open. Before the damn thing was even halfway open, infected people began clawing their way underneath. Jack sprayed each one right in the face with CO2 until they howled, clawing at their faces while running backward.

  "Go!" He shouted when the door was open. We all took off running. Occasionally, he'd turn around and fire the extinguisher at them, laying them out as if he had a flamethrower. And when the thing was spent, we were only halfway there. Jack looked at it for a second, then flung the empty container into the mob of infected victims. Then, he turned and ran after us, keys in hand.

  We piled into the car and immediately buckled our seatbelts. A few diseased pounded their flat palms against the windows, but Jack had already started the car and was backing out. Rex squealed as we ran over one of them. I think I heard the crack of a skull, but it happened too fast to even give it a thought.

  From the Desk of Dr. Lisa James

  October 17

  "I just want to know how you knew there were none of the infected people here." Sylvia eyed Jack over the light of our fire while taking another swig of her beer.

  Jack shrugged. "I know it doesn't look like I listen to the news, but I do." He gave her a crooked smile. She returned the gesture. I could already see the lust blossoming inside her. "They say the Biters are scared of water."

  I looked behind him to the subtle waves crashing on the shore of a random beach we'd driven to.

  "Hydrophobia is one of the most common symptoms in rabies," I said.

  "So what did you do before this?" Sylvia ignored me. All of her attention was on him. I resisted shaking my head.

  "I was a mechanic."

  Sylvia sat up straight, pretending to be flabbergasted. I knew her too well. "A mechanic? With a face like that?"

  Jack grinned. "Yeah, I know. People tell me that all the time. But it's another story when I'm covered in grease and you ask me who's running for president next year or what political party I belong to."

  "Why would I ask you any of that?" Sylvia's tone bordered on airy ignorance.

  "You got that right." Jack held out his beer and Sylvia clinked it with the neck of hers.

  "What about you, Lisa?" Jack took a drink. "You said you were a doctor, right?"

  "Yes. I'm a doctor."

  Even in the dim firelight I could see Jack's eyes widen. "Is...there more to it than that?"

  "Just don't ask her about that rash on your ass. She's not that kind of doctor." Sylvia giggled.

  "I take it there's an inside joke in there." Jack took turns looking between us.

  "Most everyone wants to know about a rash they have in some inadvertent part of their body I don't want to see whenever it's mentioned that I'm a medical professional. Where are the kids?"

  "Relax. Lexi is watching over Rex in the SUV. they're a holler away." Sylvia brought the attention back to her. "Maybe you can show me your ass."

  A chuckled escaped our companion. "Are you the ass doctor here?"

  "Nope. I'm just the one who's focused on the right things."

  "Sylvia." My tone was warning. "Please."

  "Hey, you had your chance. it's mine now."

  "And...exactly what have I stumbled into the middle of?" Jack's voice began at a normal tone, but collected in a crescendo at the end of his sentence.

  "Sylvia is a serial dater." I glared at her, but she ignored me.

  Jack raised an eyebrow directed at her. Her face remained smug.

  "Oh, yeah. See, I just like to have sex. Sex is great and everyone involved benefits from it. it's not my fault you didn't marry Chase when you had the chance."

  "Can we please stay off that topic?" I wasn't in the mood to discuss Rex's father.

  "Okay, now I really need to know what's going on." Jack had placed his beer in the sand to lean back on his hands.

  "No, you don't."

  "Yes! He does." Sylvia was beginning to act air-headed " a sure sign she was smitten. "See...Rex's dad, Chase, had asked Lisa to marry him when she got pregnant."

  "Sylvia."

  Jack held up a hand. "No, it's ok. I'm intrigued."

  "Yes, but I'm not. I've heard this story a thousand times. I've lived it."

  "Then you can hear it one more time!" Sylvia laughed and leaned forward to put a hand on Jack's knee. Then, she scooted closer to him. "So, they were engaged, right? And everything seemed okay until Lisa did this ultrasonic test or something"

  "Prenatal test." If I was going to hear the story again, I was going to hear it correctly.

  "Whatever. Prenatal test. And it turned out the baby had a seventy-five percent chance of having some sort of defect. Which...well...you can see... Anyway, Chase up and bailed. couldn't deal with it. I told Lisa she should try and go after him, but she's too damn stubborn. Has too much pride."

  "Yikes." Jack said the word as if he'd been holding his breath the entire time. "Chivalry really is dead, isn't it?"

  "Not entirely, right Jack?" Sylvia's hand lingered too long on Jack's thigh. When he didn't respond within her time table, she pretended to lose balance and flop into his lap laughing.

  "Okay, sweetheart, I think you've had enough." There was reluctant laughter in his voice as he sat her back up.

  "Momma, momma!"

  We all turned as Alex sauntered into the firelight.

  "What is it, kiddo?" Sylvia's voice sounded bored.

  "I found this, see? What is it?" She held out a gold object with what looked like a button on the end. Sylvia studied it for about half a second.

  "I don't know. Go back to bed."

  "Let me see." Jack held out his hand. Alex turned and gave him her new toy. He looked it over carefully, inspecting every angle. "Where did you get it?"

  "In the glove compartment."

  "Huh...wonder why Silas put it there. it's a straight key."

  "Does it unlock a door?"

  He laughed. Sylvia announced she was getting another drink and stood to leave. "Nope. This was used to communicate across big distances way back when. it's used for Morse code."

  "Oh, cool! I learned a
bout that in school. Do you know Morse code?"

  "Sure do."

  "Can you teach me?"

  "Maybe one night I'll show you, ok, honey?" He handed it back to her.

  "Okay! Goodnight, Auntie Lisa."

  "Goodnight, sweetie."

  "Goodnight, Jack."

  Jack smiled. "Night, honey."

  She took a moment to study him before running back to the SUV to sleep. Jack and I were alone. The story Sylvia always told to male guests about my relationship with Chase was inappropriate. Every time, I would tell her to stop, but she'd keep going. It was almost as if she wanted men to steer clear of me. It didn't faze me too badly, however. I had Rex to look after. There wasn't much time for dating.

  "So what did you specialize in?"

  Jack's voice tore me out of my thoughts. "Oh. When I started the program, I wasn't sure what I wanted out of it. All I knew is that I wanted to be in medicine. I spent a semester attending a surgeon, but it didn't quite challenge me enough. I followed a podiatrist, but I didn't learn anything. Then there was private practice. That was where I met Chase."

  "Oh, was he a doctor, too?"

  "No, he was a patient. he'd come in for a domestic abuse case." I paused, lost in my own thoughts. "But it was her who'd hit him."

  Jack nodded while watching the fire.

  "I actually ended up attending at a hospital. I liked that work much better. Several new cases daily and I had to learn a blanket of things. I was able to assess and recommend treatments. I worked right up my delivery day."

  "Wow. Tough gal."

  I shrugged. "It was what I felt I was meant to do. I'd still be at that hospital if the doctors hand't all been infected."

  "How did you get away?" Jack asked.

  I looked at him. His attention seemed genuine. "I ran." It was a simple answer, but the truth.

  He nodded again. "So, you didn't study rashes, huh?"

  "I studied dermatology for a semester, yes, but that morphed into oncology due to so many skin cancer patients."

  He paused. "That...was a joke."

  I cleared my throat. He was decent at making humorous comments. One could hardly tell when he was serious. He reminded me of my father.

  "California and their skin cancer..." Jack mused.