Stronghold

by Ron Tufo

  “You know, son, you really should try to tone down your swearing. Try some alternatives like ‘feckin’ or ‘Holy Guacamole.’ Maybe even ‘Fudge Ripple Ice Cream’ when you’re spitting mad.” I smiled like I was paying attention and sucking up some great fatherly advice, like I did as a teenager when he delivered the same lecture, and I was truly listening as well as I did back then, which means not at all. Meanwhile, back inside my brain, I knew Fudge Ripple Ice Cream was just not going to cut it!

  It was only seconds later that my finger swelled to the point where the trigger dry clicked and the hammer released. If that round had still been in the chamber, who knows where it would have hit. Thanks dad. That was one possibly disastrous mistake avoided.

  The battle was over for the moment, or so we thought. We could still hear the occasional report of a rifle from Wink’s home. No sounds were coming from Squeak’s. We all hoped that was good news; we would have to wait to find out.

  Melissa and dad helped me into the house. Gary and Mark stayed on watch outside. Once inside, I placed my rifle with my swollen hand still attached to it on the kitchen table. Taking the weight off provided a little bit of relief, anyway. Melissa went to the fridge and came back with some vegetable oil. Good thought. Didn’t work. Just too swollen. Just like the pain of a tooth gone bad, I was at the point of “cut the damn thing off and be done with it.” This was killing me! (Yeah, so I am a big wuss. Wanna trade places?)

  Dad asked me if I trusted him to try something. How did I know this was going to hurt even before I knew what he was going to do?

  He quickly told me this was a two-part process while he broke into his tackle box and came out with a spool of forty-pound fishing line, the thickest line he had. I closed my eyes in silent agreement and just asked him to promise that if it didn’t work, that someone would knock me out with a Mickey Finn, which we also kept on hand at Talmart, to give me some relief. He nodded in the affirmative and began to thread the line through the trigger housing and then around my swollen finger.

  It would do a couple of things, he said, trying to keep the chatter up and keep my mind off the fact that he was scrunching up a finger that was already twice the size of the housing into one that would be able to be drawn back out one line wrap at a time. Took him a couple of minutes to complete the wrapping and by then, my whole body was throbbing like a metronome in time with the pounding attempt at pushing blood flow into my tightly encapsulated digit.

  “Not only will this help to withdraw your finger, but the wrap will help to reset the broken bones. Maybe they won’t be perfect, but your finger won’t look like a corkscrew when it heals.”

  “Gee, thanks dad. I know I can always count on you for encouragement.” Maybe the dripping sarcasm was a bit too much, as he made the last wrap just a little tighter than it needed to be. Yeah, yeah, I know, I deserved it.

  Fudge Ripple Ice Cream if his method didn’t work. Nah that still isn’t getting it done. Let’s try it the old-fashioned way. Fuck if his method didn’t work. Ah, much better. The last circle of fishing line was blissfully off and circulation was being restored to my still-pulsating extremity. Felt like it was coming out of frostbite while someone was still whacking it with a steel pipe.

  Melissa had a splint ready and, yup, you guessed it, popsicle sticks. It really helped to have the thing protected and immobilized. The haze began to lift from poor Ron’s pain sensors. I do not ever wish to repeat that particular injury. Having my knee blown out in college rugby scrums didn’t even come close.

  Melissa realized the kids were still upstairs at their posts. She hustled up and told them in her most military voice that the battle had been won. The kids let her know they hadn’t even seen one zombie; thank goodness for small blessings. They had, however, seen the great fireworks from over on the other side of the house. They asked Melissa if that would happen every night and she answered very truthfully, “Maybe, until my father runs out of trucks for Mark to blow up.”

  She announced that they were relieved from their posts and should go downstairs and report to the General, better known as Grandpa Tony. Both Louis and Jerome gave their best salutes while Iza just rolled her baby blues with the same expression women have been using about men for millennia. The kids all ran downstairs and gave Grandpa a big simultaneous group hug. I would have started to cry if I hadn’t been crying already. Jerome had bounced off my finger as he came flying around the corner at the bottom of the stairs. Aren’t kids wonderful.

  At the very least I could count to three. All bad things came in threes, right? A truck, a pipe, and a ten-year-old boy. Thank goodness. It is over. I’m done.

  Gary came into the house with Mark, having determined that the fight was indeed over and his first comment was, of course, directed at his older and braver brother.

  “C,mon ya big wussy. We have some things we need to talk about outside.”

  Feeling like it was probably safer outside than inside, I followed him out the front door.

  “Brother, we may have a real problem on our hands.”

  I knew that on the off chance Gary was being serious, the words “real problem” were most likely an understatement. “When I took out Abner….”

  “Yeah, great shot and thanks, man. We were in real trouble.”

  I immediately got the “Shut up and let me finish” look. “When I took out Abner, I don’t think it was soon enough.”

  “What do you mean? You saved our asses, man.”

  “Ron, I may have saved yours, but I don’t think I was quick enough to save Andrew’s.”

  “What? How do you figure that?”

  “Did you see the back of his neck? No, you probably didn’t. Abner got him good. He may not even know it with all the crap that was going on, but he is all scratched up. We are going to have to put a watch on him. This sucks bad.”

  The rest of our dysfunctional extended family came over the hill to the main house. Some quick exchanges confirmed that we had, by far, seen the worst of the engagement, and that we had hundreds of things to improve upon in our defensive scheme, and quickly.

  Gary related to Wink and Squeak what had happened with Andrew. That would not be part of the general debriefing we would do with everyone in the morning. For now, it was determined that a diversion was needed for Melissa and that we would keep a watch on Andrew for the rest of the night.

  I asked Melissa if she wouldn’t mind staying with the kids this night after what they had been a part of. She readily agreed, understanding the need for it. I felt bad about deceiving her, but happy that Andrew would be under our watch and care for the evening.

  Squeak stayed with us and we took short shifts, locking Andrew’s bedroom door once he fell asleep, for the duration.

  Morning came with a blessing. The wonderful aromas of a big home cooked breakfast wafted up through the house. Long tables had been set up in the farm style living room and it would be a special morning.

  Gary unlocked Andrew’s door before he awoke and peeked in under the guise of waking Andrew for breakfast. Andrew did not respond. Worriedly, Gary snuck up to the bed quietly and cautiously, expecting the worst.

  He poked. No response. He poked again, wished hard, and softly whispered, “Andrew? Please get up, man.”

  With still closed eyes and dreams of Melissa, Andrew murmured, “Aw, I love you too, sweetcheeks, but let me sleep a little while longer.”

  Gary clutched his man card with a death grip. “I love you too, snookums, but get out of bed. Breakfast is ready!”

  Andrews eyes now snapped open and an awkward grin passed between them. “I am so telling my niece you are cheating on her,” smiled Gary, making a kissy face at Andrew. He was so relieved that Andrew had not joined the other side over the course of the evening.

  Tony commented at the table, “Where’s Ron?”

  It was Nancy who answered him. “He is out in the back corner of the property playing with his backhoe. He said he was digging a grave.”

  “Go
od idea,” responded Tony. “We will need to move all the re-dead into it sooner rather than later.”

  “Um, I don’t think he is digging it for the zombies. He mentioned something about giving his F450 a decent burial. I don’t think he could stand to keep looking at the burnt-out hulk of a ‘once proud and beautiful truck,’ everyday. His words, not mine!”

  Mark just hung his head a little lower. Tony groaned. The rest of the table chuckled.

  Tony sympathetically turned to his grandson and tactfully told him, “Mark, I know your dad. This too shall pass. In the meantime, it would probably be a good idea for you to clean and store your weapon and find some things to do to keep out of his face until he puts last night behind him. In truth, we all need some alone time to place last night in perspective.”

  Mark smiled at his grandpa and softly whispered back, “Thank you.” The whole table was kind of subdued for a few moments until Melissa came in from the kitchen carrying some of the morning goodies. Gary and Squeak both sucked in their breaths when she leaned over to give Andrew a morning love peck, and let them go when Andrew looked up at her and grinned. No one noticed. Point to the good guys.

  Morning chores were doled out after a great breakfast. What Nancy could do with bacon and eggs was worthy of a gourmet restaurant. Lyn had been allowed to make toast and no one broke a tooth. It was declared a victory! A good start to the day.

  Everyone pitched in to police the area of brass and dead stuff, but not before a few of the guys broke off into pairs and did the gory detail of putting all the still-animated zombie parts out of everyone’s misery.

  Very thankfully, there were not as many still undead as we thought there might be. I came back in from my own burial detail and used the front bucket of the backhoe to scoop and drop bodies into a hollow I had dug out for the purpose. Took most of the morning and was not the favorite part of my day, but was a more than necessary piece of scutwork to maintain everyone’s health and sanity. Think of it as preventative maintenance. Who the hell wants to smell and step into month-old ex-undead gooky stuff?

  The day was going on as planned until Melissa yelled for some help. Andrew had just fallen down in a heap and couldn’t get back up. Squeak was first one the scene; it had been his turn to keep an eye on Andrew and without thinking about it–or if he had thought about it, he was either the bravest man I knew or the stupidest one–he scooped up the unconscious young man and headed back to the house. Predictably, everyone followed.

  Once inside, Squeak gingerly laid Andrew on the couch. Melissa came over to him quickly and gasped when she felt how hot he was. “Mom, he must have an awful fever. He just crumpled out in the woods. No warning from him at all. If I hadn’t seen him go down, I wouldn’t have even known.” Nancy looked at her sympathetically and turned to Andrew. “He is so hot,” Melissa continued, “I can barely keep my hand on his forehead.” Nancy had some cool, damp cloths all ready and Melissa began to place them where she felt they would do the most good. Gary, Squeak, and I pulled dad aside and told him what we knew from the night before.

  “Mr. Talbot, we figured if he made it through the night he would be alright,” this from Squeak

  Looking at me he said with disdain,“Well, I think you guys figured wrong and put all of us at risk, especially your daughter, Ron.” As always, dad’s first thoughts went to the welfare of his grandchildren. I couldn’t blame him.

  “Dad, we watched him all last night and have been keeping a covert eye on him this morning. What would you have us do differently?”

  Tony just grunted. An acknowledgement of sorts that he probably would have done the same thing, given the situation, which was a small gift to myself. I already felt like dog poo.

  With impeccable timing, Boo, dad’s Old English Bulldog, made an appearance near the couch. She hadn’t come out of her kennel since this whole business started. She sniffed a bit around Andrew, started a low, bulldog rolling growl and began to back away. We have had dogs in our family our entire life. You do learn that almost always, a warning from a dog should not be ignored.

  I suggested we take Andrew upstairs to a bed. He was really out of it and just lay there making soft moaning sounds like his body hurt him more than he could endure. Squeak carried him up the narrow farmhouse stairway like he was holding his favorite sandwich in both hands and laid him down on the nearest bed. Gary and I were already formulating a watch plan.

  It was pretty much a given that Andrew was beginning to go bad. None of us had seen how turning happened close up, so we really didn’t know what to predict. Nonetheless, I was not going to put my daughter at any further risk. We decided to tell her what we thought was going to happen and that there would always be two of us in the room with her until we saw how this played out. We all hoped for the best outcome, but we all expected the worst.

  Melissa Marilyn Talbot did not handle the news well. None of us anticipated that she would, but we didn’t think that her reaction would be quite so energetically profane. Shows what we know. Squeak and Gary were competing with each other to see who could blush the deepest shade of scarlet. I was looking for a pen and paper to take some notes. I hadn’t even heard of some of the more inventive terms she used to describe her male side of the family.

  Melissa eventually wound down and searched the faces of each of us for an ally to tell her what was happening was not true. When no one was able to give her that affirmation, she just about fell into me and pushed her face into my shoulder. She began to sob so violently I would have gladly traded places with the young hero on the bed.

  The next hours were a blur. Meredith and Lyn kept coming upstairs with cool, wet cloths to help Melissa care for and hover over Andrew, providing what comfort she could. We had tried to give him a light soporific, but nothing was getting past his rigidly clamped jaw. Our hearts went out to the poor kid, but short of trying what palliative care we could, there were no other ministrations that were available to us.

  Melissa would not leave his side. We would not leave Melissa alone. Early evening came and as the sun retreated, it seemed that Andrew’s life went with it. His breathing became shallower, his skin mottled from lack of oxygen, and his jaw, which had been grinding for hours, began to go slack. I watched the young gentleman I had come to love and think of as another son slowly, inexorably fade from existence. I tearfully motioned to Squeak to stay alert and be ready to get Melissa out of the room. He knew his role, and, thank god, he was willing to do it. I don’t believe I could have.

  Andrew quietly passed.

  Melissa knew before we did. She began great gulping sobs, a heartbreaking sound I don’t ever want to hear again, for this was no tender soft crying. This was the lament of losing someone whose life you would put above your own. We all stayed in that limbo of emotion for what seemed like endless minutes.

  I saw the twitch of a foot first. I jolted from my chair. Squeak needed no instruction. He grabbed Melissa by the shoulders and before she could grab Andrew he had pulled her upright and away. I threw open the door and Squeak forcefully backed out with Melissa in tow. I had to yell at him to move even faster. What Andrew had become was animating at a rate I hadn’t thought possible. Its eyes were open, not that they actually saw anything, but they had flown open with such intensity it was fucking terrifying. Squeak had his hands full with a completely out of control Melissa. I turned my back on the devil’s latest creation and pushed on her as he pulled her backward. The very nano-second I could, I closed the door.

  Turning my back on the zombie was a bad tactical move. A really bad tactical move. Where was Gary when I needed him? He would have never made that mistake. It, well, ex-Andrew, was already up out of the bed and closing on me. I could feel the fetid breath on my neck as it leaned in. I let my knees go limp and fell to the floor and crawled, yes crawled, to some relative safety. The zombie was still between me and my rifle and showed no sign of giving up its unconscious advantage. For some absurd reason, my thoughts went to a passage from a Spanish author b
y the name of Valgame whose book, Zori Parte, I had read twenty years earlier. It had nothing to do with war, but had a most memorable quote. “If you suffer an attack, your best ally is to keep calm.”

  Fat lot of shit he knew. Try keeping calm with your youngest daughter screaming in the hallway while being held by your best friend, the entire Talbot clan et al flying up the stairs to see what the hell was going on, and a fucking zombie trying to make a late night nibble out of your exposed throat. I lost it. Keeping calm was just not in the cards. I pushed the zombie back over a chair and into the far wall using my closest hand to it, the one with the awesome finger. (Yeah, fucking brilliant Ron. Let’s just add a little brain-fogging pain to the equation!) I lunged for my gun and before the newly created atrocity could regain any balance and stature, I double tapped it right through the nose. Cream of Andrew was all over the damn room and I could not catch a breath. I wanted to be outside with everyone else, but not until I could open the door without retching all over myself. Thank the stars that Squeak was holding position directly in front of the door, fighting with himself to not rush in and help me and to keep anyone else from opening the door and getting into the room.

  I don’t believe my daughter will ever completely forgive me. I know she realizes that what was done was done because it needed to be, but it makes no difference. I will always be the traitor that shot Andrew. I had known, even before all of this came to pass, that I would have to be the one who took the responsibility, and I knew that the fallout from it would be soul-devouring devastation. There was just not time for any other options, and I don’t think I would have placed this awful chore on anyone else anyway.

  Dad brought me up a tarp to wrap the body in and Nancy left me with all the old towels she could find and a couple of tubs of soap and hot water. I wanted to give Andrew the final respect he deserved. Yes, it was a most ghoulish task. Yes, I will never put myself in a position where it will need to be done again. But be done it must. Gary helped me move the body from the room and outside onto the top of a hill overlooking the house where he had dug a proper grave. Andrew would always occupy a place of highest honor and presence in the Talbot family. The young hero who had brought my daughter back to me was gone.