by Tony Urban
“I still miss that truck,” Wim said and everyone chuckled.
“As do I,” Emory said and continued. “That very first day, Wim told me about Ramey. How she was the person who made him leave his farm and venture out into the world with the rest of us. As we traveled south, I felt the odds of locating her were slim, but he kept going on and on about her and I sensed there was something very special about her. I could tell how important she was to Wim and I was more than willing to go along for the ride. In the end, it was Ramey that found us. And as soon as I saw them together, I had a feeling it would be permanent.”
“This is the part where I’d usually talk about the future and ups and downs, trials and tribulations, and leaning on each other rather than letting the hardships in life tear you apart, but I suspect that, for the most part, those missives are not necessary. The two of you have been through enough challenges for several marriages and even though there are bound to be more, I believe you’ll be even stronger together.”
Emory pulled out a crimson, silk handkerchief and held it up. Wim thought it looked vaguely familiar and he seemed to recall Emory holding it once or twice in the past.
“Grant gave me this many decades ago.” Emory unfolded it and reveled white embroidery at the bottom. It read, ‘And now two become one.’
“I’ve had this in my pocket every day since. It’s been on every continent on the planet and more countries than my tired old brain can quite remember. When Grant gave it to me he said, ‘I chose red, because red is the symbolic color of love. But I decided on a handkerchief because I know life is never as perfect as we’d hope and sometimes the need to wipe away our tears arises. When that happens, even if you’re in pain or lonesome or angry, remember that you have my heart.”
Emory’s eyes glistened. Wim saw him swallow hard and then he continued. “Ramey, Wim is my very best friend. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit a part of me is reluctant to hand him over to you, but I know you’ll take good care of him.”
“I will.” She looked at Wim as she said it.
“And Wim, I know you frequently lament the age difference between the two of you. But as an octogenarian I can assure you that age is only a number. One thing I learned through my life is that it is meant to be shared. Both in the good times and the bad. Having someone at your side with whom you can experience the highs and lows is God’s greatest gift. I suspect that is even more true now. And the fact that you two managed to find each other not once, but twice, like you each held magnets pulling you toward the other, well that my friends is the very definition of kismet. So, I’m giving you this handkerchief to remind you to always share not only your hearts, but your tears.”
He extended the cloth to Wim. Wim took his hand, the old dark skin feeling as soft and fragile as velvet, and gave it a light squeeze.
“Thank you.”
Emory nodded but Wim thought he seemed ready to change the subject.
And that’s what he did. “Ramey, would you like to say anything?”
Ramey nodded. She pulled an index card from her pocket but rarely needed to look at it while she spoke. “Wim, I was a total shit to you the last few months. I’m using the excuse that I’m young and dumb but that doesn’t make it alright. Because you’ve been nothing but good to me since the day we met. You saved me then. In more ways than one. And you keep saving me. I hope you never get tired of me being me, because I don’t know how to stop.”
“And I don’t want you too.”
“That’s good. Because you’re stuck with me now. At least, you will be in a few minutes. And when we can get out of this place and really start our lives together, I have a feeling that I’m going to be happier than I ever thought possible. I want to be your wife because you’re the best man I’ve ever known. A better man than I might deserve, but I’m glad you’re mine.”
She grabbed his belt buckle and pulled him in close. He shivered as she looked up at him, smiling big and looking like the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in his life.
“Wim, do you have a few words to say?” Emory said.
“Only a couple. I’m not as good with them as you,” Wim said to Ramey as he took her hands. He thought they felt so soft and warm and perfect in his own. “I spent the last ten or so years of my life all alone. It never bothered me all that much, and I grew accustomed to it. But now that I know what it’s like to love you, I can’t imagine my life without you. And I promise you, Ramey, that I’ll love you every day for the rest of my life.”
He saw a tear slide down Ramey’s cheek and wiped it away with the back of his hand. Then he looked to Emory. “That’s all I got.”
Emory was crying too, more than Ramey even. “That’s more than enough, Wim.” He took a moment to compose himself.
“With that, I think it’s time to wrap up this ceremony so these two amazing people can begin their lives together. I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
Wim watched him. A second passed. Then two. Then three.
Emory leaned in to him. “Now is when you kiss her.”
“Oh.” Wim grinned, a little embarrassed. He put one hand on Ramey’s waist and the other on her neck and pulled her in to him. He thought her mouth tasted sweeter than honey and he felt her hands in his hair as she held on to him. He half hoped the moment would never end and, for once, didn’t even mind being the center of attention.
When they separated, he whispered in her ear. “Promise me you’ll never leave me. That we’ll always be together.”
“There’s nothing I want more.”
That wasn’t really a promise. He realized that later on, but in the moment, it was what he needed to hear.
They laid in bed, pressed together, almost melded into one form. Ramey could feel Wim’s heart beating as his chest pressed against her. It was fast. Strong. He held on to her so tight that she thought she might break but she’d never imagined anything could feel that good.
Their bodies were drenched in sweat from the recent consummation of their marriage and now the cool night air felt even colder. Ramey shivered.
“Are you all right?” Wim asked, his voice full of concern.
Ramey turned her face up toward his, smiling. More than smiling. Glowing. “I’m not alright, Wim. I’m wonderful.”
“You still want to leave here in the spring, right?”
There was almost nothing she wanted more. “Of course.”
“Is there somewhere you want to go? Because I’ll follow you anywhere.”
She hadn’t given it much thought. “Not really. Just far away from here.”
“I was thinking about finding us a little cabin somewhere. Maybe in North Carolina or Tennessee. Where the winters aren’t so long, but you still get the change of seasons.”
“That sounds nice.”
“It won’t always be easy. But I have faith we can get through anything that gets tossed our way as long as we’ve got each other.”
She felt him give her another squeeze, and wasn’t sure if he’d realized he’d done it or if it was his subconscious way of saying he’d never let her go.
“We could clear off a section of land for a garden. Take in any livestock we come across and raise them up. Not for eating, just for the noise and company”
She thought that sounded good. She’d grown skeptical of people after her time here and had no great desire to live amongst them again. Animals would be nice though.
“I can picture it in my head already. You’ll be running around, chasing the chickens back into their pens when they get out, because they always do. Gathering eggs for a late breakfast because I got distracted talking to the cows while I milked them. You’re wearing a pretty little dress— “
“I’m not really the dress type, Wim,” she said with a lazy, contented grin.
“That’s all right. You’d be beautiful in anything. Even one of those old flour sacks. But I can see you sitting on the porch of our very own home and me sitting beside you. Maybe I’ll make us some of those
tilted back chairs, Adirondack’s, I think they’re called. Or maybe a swing. Yep, it’ll be a swing so we can sit side by side. And because it’ll be up in the mountains we’ll get to see the prettiest sunsets ever.”
Ramey could picture it too. It sounded perfect.
“And afterward, we’ll look up at the stars and there’ll be so many and they’ll be so bright, that it won’t even feel like we’re on the same planet anymore. It’ll be like we found ourselves a whole new world. A better one.”
Until that day, Ramey never thought it was possible to love someone so much. She laid her head against Wim’s chest, her ear over his thudding heart, and thought they should leave the Ark at that very moment. That the two of them could disappear into the night. Run away and find a new place where they could be happy together forever. And later, when she looked back, she realized that maybe they should have done just that and avoided the carnage that was to come, but instead they made love again and dreamed about a future.
Part Four
Chapter Thirty-Four
Saw loved watching Yukie dress after they fucked. She wasn’t much to look at, a right munter really, but the bird had a way about her that he found almost irresistible. And she was fun in the sack too. He hadn’t had his balls drained so often since he was a lad.
“What are you staring at?” She asked.
“I like the way you jiggle.”
A lesser woman might have been offended, but Yukie grinned. She held her arms out at her sides and shook her body, sending her flesh shaking like a mild earthquake was taking place.
Saw went to her and grabbed her flabby belly in his hands. Then he kissed her.
Yukie’s hand squeezed his crotch which was swollen, eager. “Again already, big man?”
Saw pushed himself against her. “Saves you the trouble of getting dressed.”
“That’s true.”
Yukie rolled his balls in her hand like they were two big marbles and kissed him back.
Yeah, he liked this one. He liked her a lot.
About the only thing of interest Saw could find in London, Kentucky was a huge banner spanning Main Street which read “World Chicken Festival.” Nonetheless, he found it far preferable to London, England and all its toffee-nosed wankers.
Paramount on his mind now was finding a hospital. It wasn’t a life and death situation, but for the last few days, every time he pissed he felt like his cock had been doused in petrol and set aflame. In between pisses, oily white goo seeped out his dick hole almost constantly. He was no doctor but he knew a dose of the clap when he saw it. And even though they’d assembled a small arsenal of firearms and enough food to last for weeks, they were woefully unprepared for medical issues that didn’t involve slapping a bandage on it. It was time to fix that.
He sent the men off to search the town for anything of interest. He didn’t want them to be aware of his plumbing issues so he didn’t tell them why he and Yukie were headed to the hospital.
Getting inside was easy enough. The sliding double-doors were wide open. In the lobby, a zombie with a cast extending from its foot to above its knee flopped on the floor. When it saw them, he grabbed at the tile, trying to crawl toward them. Its bloody fingers were worn down, allowing the glistening, white bone to poke free of the destroyed skin. The bones could gain no traction on the floor, clawing across the tile with a sickening screech. Unable to make any forward progress, it gasped at them.
“Look like you need someone to put you out of your misery, mate,” Saw said as he stepped forward raising his sledgehammer overhead. The zombie reached for him and Saw responded by beating its skull in.
They didn’t encounter any more zombies as they traveled down the halls. After a few turns and detours they came to a door with a sign reading. “RX - Authorized personnel only.”
Saw glanced at Yukie. “Uh oh, love. Looks like they’re trying to keep the likes of us out.”
“I won’t tell if you won’t.”
He tried the door. It was locked. A blow with the sledge did little to change that situation. Saw tried again. And again. And again. After a dozen or so hits the handle and lock tumbled free. Saw struggled to catch his breath and sweat had soaked through his shirt. That was more of a workout than he’d expected. He pushed the door open and extended his hand. “After you.”
Yukie stepped into the room and he followed behind. “What are we looking for again?”
“Start with anything ending in ‘cilin,” Saw said as he scanned the almost endless rows of shelves. “Or ‘mycin.'”
Their search proved quite productive and yielded two plastic bags full of antibiotics of various varieties. Saw was pleased with the haul and popped a handful of the pills into his mouth, then dry swallowed them. He tilted a bottle toward Yukie. “Your turn.”
“How do you know I need them? I don’t have any symptoms?”
“Well, I sure as shit didn’t catch this sitting on the loo.”
Yukie took a few pills and swallowed them with a grimace. Saw noticed that she’d pilfered a bottle of pills from the narcotics section, but he decided to let that slide for the time being.
“Time to move on, don’t you think?”
She nodded and they headed toward the doorway. Saw got there first and what he found in the hallway hit him like a punch in the gut. “Bugger me.”
Yukie pushed in beside him and together they looked out upon a hallway filled with zombies. They rolled in from both sides, dozens of them. Yukie barked out a short, piercing scream which seemed to fire up the monsters even more. They moved in faster, their hungry groans echoing off the walls and ceiling. The stench of their death was almost overwhelming in the small space.
“Where’d they all come from?”
“Must’ve heard me breaking down the door. Christ, we should have checked this place out first.”
Yukie tried to pull him back into the room. He resisted. “Come on.”
“I beat the fookin knob off. They’ll push the door straight open.”
“We can block it.”
“With what? A bunch of shelves? That wouldn’t buy us two minutes.”
“Then what?”
Yukie clutched his arm, her fingernails digging into his skin. He felt it pop and warm blood trickled down his flesh. Saw realized they only had one chance. They needed a distraction. He pointed to their right. “There are less that way. See?”
Yukie looked. There were less, but the numbers were still overwhelming. Saw knew he had a full magazine in his pistol. Eighteen rounds plus one in the chamber. He didn’t know for certain what Yukie’s gun held but imagined it was in the same vicinity. That gave them less than 40 bullets for at least that many zombies.
“We have to shoot our way out,” he said.
“It’s too many.” Yukie chewed on her lip but she was already pulling her pistol from its holster.
“All’s we need’s a clear path, love. Shoot up the middle and we make a mad dash the hell out of here.”
Her big, brown eyes met his. He saw worry in them. Fear. He lifted his hand and took her chin between his thumb and index finger, then gave her a quick kiss. “We’ll be just fine. We’ve got out of stickier spots than this.” That was a lie but in the moment, it sounded good and she didn’t correct him. Saw didn’t wait. He stepped into the hall and started blasting.
Solomon Baldwin was a lot of things, but a marksman was not one of them. Most of his shots hit, but landed in the zombies’ chests, arms, stomachs. He got in a few headshots but by the time he’d fired fifteen rounds he hadn’t dropped more than three.
Yukie, on the flip side of the coin, was damned near a pro. She only missed two headshots and a narrow but almost clear escape route had started to form.
Saw shot again and the head of a zombie nurse in Hello Kitty scrubs blew into pieces. Yukie took out an orderly who had his long, gray hair pulled up in a man bun. Saw’s next shot went wide, sending bits of white tile flying as it ricocheted off the wall. He shot again and sent a bu
llet into the chin of a Japanese woman in a doctor’s coat. Her jaw split in half but she kept coming. Yukie finished her off.
“I’m out,” Yukie said, holding the pistol up as if to show him it was empty.
Saw was almost certain he had one round left but there were still two dozen or more zombies bearing down on them and that slim path to freedom was shrinking by the second.
“Run!” He said and she did. She dashed up the channel their shooting had created. But Saw knew it wasn’t enough. The horde was closing in. He’d never make it through. One look behind him revealed even more zombies following.
He wasn’t getting out of this one alive. That was plain as day and the thought infuriated him. He’d been built for a scenario like this. The world in chaos. No arbitrary rules to follow. This was his destiny. A world where only the strongest would survive. It couldn’t end like this. Chomped to death in a hospital hallway all because some slag had given him a dose. Solomon Baldwin’s fate wasn’t to end up as zombie chow.
Yukie glanced back to check his progress. She was five or so yards ahead of him now.
“Keep going!”
She did. He followed. Yukie was a better shooter, but Saw was a far quicker runner. He’d closed the gap to a few feet when he put his last bullet to use.
He shot Yukie in the back of her chunky thigh. He’d been aiming for her knee, but this did the trick just as well. She collapsed on the floor, skidding across the tile and into the oncoming zombies.
As they began to tear her apart, Saw caught her staring at him, her eyes wide and confused. He thought about apologizing, but he’d been quite fond of her and didn’t want his last words to her to be lies. He wasn’t sorry. He’d done what was necessary.
Yukie’s agonized shrieks filled the halls and drew even more zombies toward her, making it easy for Saw to maneuver past the few remainders. He used the sledge to crush the head of an elderly man in a hospital gown, hitting him so hard the man’s scrawny neck opened and his skull almost came clear off. After that he had smooth sailing. He’d even managed to keep all the antibiotics. All things considered, it wasn’t a bad afternoon. Not bad at all.