by Fuchs, A. P.
Des thought he saw hesitancy in the old man’s eyes, as if he didn’t want to give an answer.
“I, uh—I walked. Drove. I’m from here but had gone out of town with . . . with my family.”
“Where are they?” Des asked then Joe shot him a look that said he shouldn’t have asked that question.
August cast his gaze to the ground. When he spoke, his voice was just above a whisper. “Not here.”
The hurt in the old man’s voice was real and Des suddenly felt ashamed about his own selfishness and the sense that Billie was being taken from him. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Me, too,” August replied.
“Will you be all right?” Joe asked the old man.
August put a hand on Joe’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “I’ll be fine. Got some things to work through, but don’t we all, right? There’s more, but I’ll talk about it if and when the conversation allows.”
“I say we make a pledge,” Billie said.
“Pledge?” Des asked.
“Yeah. We need to stick together. Us four. Maybe more, should we come across anybody.” She looked at Des intently. “I know we don’t know each other all too well, but that’s fine. This isn’t about that. Not right now. Look at . . . look at what we’ve been able to manage when we worked together, when we backed each other up. We’d be dead otherwise. Maybe even like them.”
August nodded. Joe did the same.
So I guess there’s no going back to the way things were, Des thought. He supposed it was for the best. Wait, what was he talking about? Of course it was for the best. He just had a hard time accepting it, was all. But this wasn’t about him. Wasn’t about Joe or August or even Billie. It was about trying to get things back on track, about, possibly, even reclaiming a dead world from those who owned the keys of death.
A low groan came from the street below and all four turned their attention toward the window. About seven or eight blocks from the building, a long procession of the undead were making their way toward it.
“They know we’re here,” August said. “Quick, let’s close this window up. They can’t come in.”
* * * *
Billie felt out of place as the men worked. Her main job was to simply hand them tools when they called for them. It was all she could do. She wasn’t that strong so she couldn’t lift and turn table tops once they had been detached from their legs. She couldn’t hold the heavy tops up against the wall as August worked to fasten them into place. Her arms were still fatigued from having to climb the fire hose. But it made her smile inside when August looked her way now and then and gave her a warm grin, when those old eyes bore a little twinkle as he tried to make her feel included. And for a moment, she was able to forget about the blood, the undead, the nearly dying.
Able to forget about her family.
She had a new family now, one that had shown it was willing to give anything and everything to ensure she was taken care of and that she was safe.
It took over an hour before the table tops were secured across the window frames, the men working as fast as they could. The undead they had seen advancing toward the building were down there somewhere, probably right up against the outside wall, searching for a way in. Every so often she could hear their mutterings and groaning below, their hollow banging on the glass lining the lower level.
“We’re okay, right?” she asked August.
“Hm? Yes. For now. But there’s strength in numbers and those things are multiplying. We can’t stay here. We need to get out. There’s also—” The old man cut himself off.
“There’s also?” Des prompted.
“Let’s finish this up then go back downstairs.”
The men quickly finished blocking the large window and examined their work as Billie put the tools away. She slung the pouch over her shoulder and waited for them by the door.
Her heart jumped when a low badoom banged somewhere at the end of the hallway.
“Guys?” she said.
Joe looked back at her from the window. “Yeah?”
Badoom.
Joe’s face hardened. He had heard the sound, too. He quickly snapped out his gun and walked briskly to the door.
“Out there,” Billie said, pointing down the hallway.
Badoom.
“August, rifle. Let’s go,” Joe said.
August brought the rifle forward and marched toward him, grimacing.
“What about me?” Des asked.
“Stay here with Billie. Holler if you see anything.”
Badoom.
“Ready?” Joe asked the old man.
August nodded.
The two went off toward the stairwell at the end of the hallway.
“There’s something I have to tell you . . .” August said to Joe as they walked away. Whatever else he said Billie couldn’t make out, but she didn’t need August to finish his sentence to know what was up. Joe’s momentary stopping in his tracks told her everything.
There was a zombie in the building.
Badoom.
30
When Bad Things Happen to Good People
The front two legs of the wooden chair slammed back down, jolting August out of sleep. After getting his bearings and making sure the chair he sat upon was firm on the floor, he frowned for having dozed off.
The maintenance room was quiet, Joe curled up against the far wall, trench coat still on, its collar bunched up around his neck as a makeshift pillow. Des lay sprawled out on the floor to the side of him, snoring.
The small candle on the workbench was burned down near to nothing and would soon need replacing.
Billie wasn’t there.
You should have been watching, August thought. The plan was to take turns keeping an eye out. He had volunteered to go first in spite of how tired he was. That, and he still didn’t completely trust his new comrades. To just hand over his rifle and say, “Shoot anything that moves and is not alive,” well, might as well just give your life over to a stranger and hope for the best.
Should he go look for her? Earlier, when he and Joe had gone after the zombie that was lurking in the building, they came up empty handed, even after an hour of searching. Wherever the thing was, it was still out there. How it evaded them so easily, especially given how slow the dead were, he didn’t know.
Billie couldn’t have been gone that long. She was still there, lying near the door, when August last surveyed the room before falling asleep. It certainly didn’t feel like he had passed out for long, maybe five or ten minutes. Twenty tops.
She probably just went to the bathroom. He stood. But we’re on the buddy system. She should know better. Besides, she and the others had already gone to clean up. I kept watch for them.
It had, however, been difficult for the others to clean up and use the facilities now that the plumbing no longer worked.
He double checked the room just in case she had decided to switch corners or sleep under the workbench.
Nothing. She was gone. The door to the room was unlocked.
No sound came from the hallway beyond.
“Going to go check,” he told himself and moved toward Joe so he could wake him and tell him what was up.
Just as he was about to give Joe a shake on the shoulder, the maintenance door screeched open. August spun around, rifle aimed at the human-shaped shadow at the door.
“It’s me,” Billie said, her voice quiet.
He lowered the weapon.
She came in, turned to close the door behind her and locked it, then, hands dropped down at her sides, slowly slumped down against the wall adjacent to the door. She didn’t look at him, but instead kept her gaze toward the door. In the faint light, her eyes glistened amidst red cheeks and puffy skin.
She had been crying.
August returned to his chair and eased himself down. Planting the butt of the rifle against the floor, he leaned against it like a walking stick.
He didn’t say anything. Neither did she.
> The minutes ticked by.
“I didn’t want to wake anybody,” she said softly.
“It’s okay. I’m sorry for falling asleep,” he said as gently as he could. It’d been a long time since he had to comfort someone so young. The last had been his son over some trouble he’d been having early on in his marriage. “But next time wake me up, okay? Or Des or Joe.”
She nodded and turned further away so she could wipe her eyes.
“Want to tell me what’s wrong?” he asked.
Billie sniffled and wiped a lock of pink hair away from her eyes. When she spoke, her voice cracked. “I just . . . I just miss my family. That’s all. I spent a lot of time trying not to think about it, but it comes back, y’know? I wanted to . . . . I thought I could be strong, but after today . . .”
He waited for her to finish but the words never came.
An aching warmth filled August’s heart, catching him off guard. For so long now he had tried to suppress what had happened with his own family, tried to hide the pain, but now . . . now he had found someone else who understood what he was going through and someone whom he could understand in return.
“Do you want to share what happened to them?” August asked, hoping he wasn’t pushing to hard.
At first it didn’t look as if Billie was going to reply, but after wiping her eyes again, she told him what happened the day the rain came. Told him how she killed her sister Audrey. Told him that even though she and her folks never got along, she’d give anything to see them again.
To have a normal life again.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” August said. “My family was taken, too.”
“Really?”
He nodded. “The rain came and so my family and I went out of town once we saw what it did to everyone. We thought we escaped it but one night my son went outside and never returned. It wasn’t long before someone went looking for him, then another, then another. When they came back, they were changed. Transformed. In the end I had no choice but to . . .”
Billie’s eyes grew wide.
Tears stole August’s breath and getting the next words out took all he had. “I couldn’t . . . couldn’t let them go on like that.”
“You killed them,” Billie said then shot her palm over her mouth in a futile effort to catch the words before they had escaped.
August sighed, picked up the rifle, laid it over his lap and sat back in the chair. He couldn’t even bring himself to nod let alone answer her directly. “I just thought that, when all was said and done, God’d save us. But instead He didn’t. Or at least didn’t save them.”
She furrowed her brow. “You know . . . I’d never been one for believing in God. I was raised with it but that’s as far as it went.” She wiped her eyes again. “I just don’t see how a loving God could allow this to happen. If He exists, I mean.”
“Well, I know He exists,” August said. “I’m sure of that. But as to what’s going on, I just don’t know. The world wasn’t supposed to end this way.”
“No?”
“No. Other things were supposed to happen. Maybe they still will and this is just a bump in the road?”
“So the, what, Bible doesn’t talk about this? About zombies?”
August couldn’t help himself but smile. “No. Not about zombies and you’d think something as important as this would show up in its pages. This is a pretty big deal.”
“Pretty big?”
“Okay. A very big deal. You know what I mean.” He felt the fatigue setting on again so he shook his head to wake himself up. “I spent some time thinking as I drove here then walked to Portage and Main. I tried to figure this all out. I thought that maybe I’d remember some verse or scripture that would give a clue as to what was going on and how I could survive it.”
She grinned. “I’ll play along. Think of anything?”
“Just one thing, well, two, actually: trusting God and just accepting that I’m not going to figure this out.”
“See, that’s no good. That’s a big problem with you people.” She snapped her mouth shut. “Sorry. I meant you Bible guys. If you don’t mind me saying so, all you guys talk about is faith and trust and whatever, and expect the rest of us thinking people to just accept that.”
“Billie . . .”
“Not good enough, August.” She stood. “People are dying. You three guys are the only living people I’ve seen in ages. There are others out there, but how many, I don’t know. You can’t tell me that some loving God is in control of all this. It makes no sense that He’d allow this to happen. Let so many people die.”
“So you’re going to play that card, eh? Fine. I’ll play one of my own. One time Jesus saw a man who had been blind from birth. His disciples asked Him who sinned to make the guy born blind, the blind man or the blind man’s parents? Jesus said neither the man nor his parents did, but that God allowed it so that, later on in the man’s life, the work of God might be revealed. Same deal, Billie, for you and me. For Joe, for Des. What has happened is being allowed so that, later, God can show Himself. Bad things happen to good people, Billie. That’s just how it is. Tragedy can be turned to God’s glory, if we let it.” August perked up at that old fire rekindling within. It’d been a long time since that flame brewed. “It can turn around, if we’re willing to seek God on the matter. I’m just as upset as you. All I know is that we’re gonna have to ride this out. Your call.”
“Sorry, August, but that’s not good enough.”
“Are you sure?”
31
Out of Options
The incessant banging coming from upstairs forbade anyone from further sleep. Des had jumped from the floor with a shout, only to be met with an “It’s okay, it’s okay,” from August.
Joe sat up, blinked some of the drowsiness from his eyes, then looked to Billie in the corner of the small room. Her eyes met his, concern written all over them. For a moment, the low, distant drumming of activity faded and Joe wished he could offer her some words of comfort.
He had heard her and August’s entire conversation, but hadn’t let on he was awake for fear of launching into his own story about April, Dan and losing everything he loved. He’d been making an effort to just set it aside, put it away for the time being so he could be of better service to his new friends.
Boomboomboomboomboomboom. The bangs were muffled yet loud enough and firm enough to assure that the creatures making them meant business.
August stood and cocked his ear toward the ceiling. “Probably coming from the Richardson building. The windows that line the back are boarded up; the glass in front is coated in blood. You can’t see a thing to the outside.” He put his hands on his hips and clucked his tongue a few times. “They want to come in. They’ve been throwing bodies against the building.”
“How much time do we have?” Des asked.
“I don’t know,” August said. “They haven’t gotten in yet. Either they’re too stupid to figure it out or someone who knows what they’re doing hasn’t yet come along. Either way, I don’t want to be around when they do.”
Joe drew closer to the old man. Des did the same.
August carefully eyed each of them. “If they come in and we’re still here, we’ll be trapped. They’ll siphon in through the Richardson and fill the Square in no time. All other exits are either boarded up or blocked. I checked the Fort Street exit earlier. That I blocked with desks. They’re standing there outside it, as if waiting for us to come out. Unless that’s changed, there’s no way out. There’s probably hundreds outside. Maybe more.”
“Thousands,” Billie said softly.
“And then there’s still that window we closed up upstairs,” Joe said. “It wouldn’t surprise me if they figure out how to get in. They don’t even need to climb to the fifth floor. They just need to know about it and resolve to get inside.”
“We have to leave,” August said. “Now.”
“I’m all for that,” Billie said.
“Me, too,” Des s
aid.
“Where?” Joe asked.
“Out of town,” August said. “There’s nothing left here anymore.”
“To another city?” Des asked.
August tapped the butt of his rifle against the toe of his right foot. “Maybe. There are probably others there. Finding them is another issue altogether. More than likely whoever is still alive is holed up in some makeshift bunker either waiting to die or making some futile effort to wait till this blows over.”
“That ain’t happening,” Billie said.
“It might,” August said though Joe detected a hint of doubt in the old man’s words. He assumed that whatever trust August had in God might be wavering.
“You said you drove in,” Joe told August.
“Yeah, but like I also said, I walked from the TransCanada Highway straight down to here. And it’s gridlock, anyway. Traffic is a mess. Unless we find four motorcycles, we can’t get around the cars. Anyone here even know how to drive one?”
They all shook their heads.
“Bikes?” Des said. “I mean, regular bikes. The ones you pedal?”
“Hey, if you could find them, you might have a chance. But that’s a pretty big ‘might.’” August finally stopped tapping the rifle against his shoe.
Des huffed and Joe knew it was because the idea was shot down. Des meant well. He just didn’t think before he spoke, more often than not.
Don’t be so hard on him, Joe thought. He’s just trying to help.
“So, what, we’re gonna walk out of the city, dodging zombies and hiding in the shadows?” Billie asked.