Autumn

by David Moody

  In every aspect of his life before this disaster, John had been taught (and had taught others) to always look for the good in people. But trapped up here on the top floor of this hotel, waiting to either starve to death or be flushed out by an army of dead bodies, he couldn’t help but concentrate on the irritating personality traits which made the five other survivors trapped here with him the worst cell-mates imaginable.

  Barry Bushell. Now there was an interesting character. John still wasn’t sure what the dress-wearing man was about. Barry had been understandably annoyed when the other survivors had arrived and compromised the safety of his precious hotel hideout. Even now he continued to maintain a distance from the others, spending much of his time alone in the master bedroom. John had initially admired his confidence in wearing women’s clothing in public, but he still couldn’t understand why he did it. There must have been some underlying sexual confusion, he thought. Whatever the reason, he’d been equally surprised when, a couple of days ago, Barry had reverted to wearing ‘normal’ clothes. He’d asked him why he’d made the change, and Barry had explained it was just to shut the others up. He’d said he’d had enough of the constant jibes from Nick and Elizabeth, and the endless pointless questions and sideways glances from that bloody woman Doreen. Why couldn’t they just leave him alone, he’d asked? What difference did it make to any of them what he was wearing? That said, John found it far easier to relate to Barry when he was wearing jeans and a T-shirt rather than full drag. It really shouldn’t have made any difference, but it did. Barry now sat on his own in the doorway of his bedroom, quietly reading a book he’d already finished once this week.

  Elizabeth and Nick had a strange relationship. One minute they were fighting, the next laughing. They were of a similar age and background, and maybe that was the connection? John sensed that the decision to fight or laugh was usually down to Elizabeth. She used her femininity to twist Nick around her little finger, dangling him on a string. Then again, maybe he was doing her a disservice? Perhaps he was jealous?

  Now Doreen Phillips he couldn’t stand. There were no ifs, buts or maybes when it came to Doreen, he simply couldn’t abide the woman. He hated her grating voice and her witch’s cackle of a laugh. He hated her smell and the cloud of cigarette smoke which followed her around the room. He hated her wizened, wrinkled skin and her yellow teeth. Most of all he hated the fact she moaned constantly about everything to anyone who’d listen. She had more aches, pains and problems each day than the rest of them combined. No matter how low or desperate you might be feeling, Doreen always had it worse. John tried to avoid all contact with her, which wasn’t easy being trapped together in such a confined space.

  It was interesting how little everyone seemed to have to do with Paul Jones. Nick in particular hardly spoke to him. Perhaps there was an element of competition, both of them considering themselves the all important alpha male? Whatever the reason they kept their distance from each other, although Paul tended to keep his distance from everyone. He both infuriated and fascinated John. Such an isolated and solitary person and yet, when he could be persuaded, he brought so much to the group. He was obviously intelligent, but his distance from the rest of them came across as an unpleasant arrogance. Maybe he just wasn’t very good at relating to other people? Or did he think he was better than the rest of them?

  Funny, John thought, that we should easily overlook the good and find so many faults with each other. There they were, all living through the same nightmare, and yet they couldn’t put aside their differences and work together for love nor money. They focused on trivialities rather than trying to work together for the common good. It spoke volumes about the human condition.

  Doreen and Nick were at the dining table playing cards, their poker faces emotionless. Close by, Elizabeth dozed on a couch. Like Barry, Paul also had also marked out a small area as his own: sitting on a chair, looking out of the wide floor-to-ceiling windows at the front of the hotel. From there he could see the rear-end of the bus sticking out of the gaping hole where the main entrance to the building had been. Ten days on and the dead were still fighting through the rubble to get inside.

  Boredom and curiosity caused John to get up and wander over to Paul. Paul didn’t react, hoping he’d go away again. He didn’t.

  ‘Any change?’

  ‘Yeah, they’ve all gone. What do you think?’

  ‘Still more of them coming?’

  ‘Obviously.’

  ‘You’d think they’d have given up by now, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Fuck all else left to distract them, isn’t there? Just the noise up here.’

  John knew he was annoying Paul, but he couldn’t help incessantly asking questions. It was a coping mechanism, he’d long-since decided. ‘You think they’ll ever stop?’

  ‘What, stop moving or stop trying to get in here?’

  ‘Both. Either.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Yes what?’

  ‘Yes they’ll eventually stop moving and yes, they’ll eventually stop trying to get in here.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Quarter past six tomorrow night. Christ, how the hell should I know?’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘They’ll stop moving when they’ve rotted so much they just can’t do it anymore, and they’ll stop trying to get in here when there’s so many of them crammed into this fucking building that there’s no more room. And please don’t ask me which is going to happen first because I don’t have a fucking clue.’

  John took that as his cue to go. A sudden tirade like that from Paul usually meant you should go before he told you to. Dejected, he ambled slowly back into the middle of the huge penthouse apartment. It had been an impressive sight when they’d first arrived there, palatial and immense. Now the Presidential Suite looked as dilapidated and rundown as the rest of the world; a millionaire’s home taken over by squatters.

  John wandered into the kitchen area to look for scraps of food he knew he wouldn’t find. They were rapidly running out of everything, but he kept looking regardless. Maybe he’d find something in the rubbish that one of the others had missed…

  As he waded through the discarded boxes, bags, wrappers and other litter that covered the floor, he thought about what Paul had just said. He was absolutely right, the bodies would keep trying to force their way into the building until there was no more room. That was a terrifying prospect which had generated a lot of very animated discussion but little action over the last ten days. If things kept progressing as they had (and there was no reason to suggest they wouldn’t) then a time would inevitably come when the building in which they were sheltering would be filled to capacity with dead flesh, leaving them stranded and starving. But what could they do? They’d talked and talked about it without reaching any conclusions or workable solutions. There had always been enough food in the kitchen and enough space between them and the dead to enable them to put off making difficult decisions until tomorrow, and then the day after that, and the day after that. John sensed that very soon, one way or another, they’d have no choice but to act.

  He had, for his part, tried to do something constructive. Granted it wasn’t much, but (as he frequently reminded them), it was more than anyone else had done. A keen photographer, five days ago he’d found a camera and batteries lying around the suite which Barry had brought back with him from an early trip into town. In a moment of inspiration, he’d crept out onto the landing, attached the camera to the end of a fire-hose, and lowered it down the middle of the staircase. Through trial and error he’d managed to work out what length of hose was necessary to lower the camera between floors and, at the same time, he set the timer to take a single picture once the required level had been reached. With a surprising degree of accuracy he had soon developed a means of taking photographs of each level down as far as the hose would reach. He had, therefore, found a way of measuring the progress of the dead when they finally appeared. Their incalculably vast numbers meant that those bodi
es at the front of the crowd were continually being pushed forwards, inevitably beginning to climb the stairs. With corpses continuing to pour through the bus-shaped hole in the hotel’s outside wall, once the ground floor reception had been completely filled there was nowhere else for them to go but up. Moving almost as one huge dripping mass, the enormous crowd was slowly being funnelled deeper and deeper into the building, climbing higher and higher.

  Each time John hauled the camera back up to the top floor, the group crowded around to check the progress of the slowly advancing cadavers. There had been no sign of them initially, but John continued to take his photographs every morning regardless. And then, yesterday, the dead had been photographed on the twenty-second floor. It was a simple enough calculation to make – they’d covered twenty-two floors in about nine days, so they were climbing at the rate of just over two floors a day. The second simple calculation made was altogether more disturbing. It was Thursday today. If their rate of climb continued at the same speed (and there seemed no immediate reason why it shouldn’t) then the bodies would reach the twenty-eighth floor sometime on Saturday, Sunday morning at the very latest.

  Bizarrely, John enjoyed his role of chief cameraman and body-watcher. It gave him a purpose. Perhaps even more importantly, it became something he could hide behind and use as an excuse for not doing anything else.

  #

  Three forty-five. The afternoon sun was dropping down towards the horizon, filling the Presidential Suite with orange light and long, dragging shadows. Rather than spreading themselves around the edges of the apartment, on this rare occasion the six survivors sat together around the dining table. They needed to talk. No food, very little time.

  ‘So exactly how much stuff have we got left?’ Doreen asked.

  ‘Enough for a day,’ Barry replied, ‘maybe two at the very most. After that there’s nothing.’

  ‘We must have something?’

  ‘No,’ he said again, shaking his head. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘It can’t have all gone, can it?’

  Nick had reached breaking point. How were they supposed to get through to this bloody woman? ‘Listen, Doreen, the cupboards are empty. We’re down to our last crumbs. There isn’t an extra little stash of food tucked away for emergencies. After this we’ll have absolutely nothing. Zip. Fuck all.’

  Doreen slumped back in her chair. ‘So what are we going to do?’ More sighs came from around the table.

  ‘That’s what we’re trying to work out, you stupid cow,’ Nick said, sitting on his hands so he didn’t throttle her. ‘Bloody hell, are you on the same planet as the rest of us?’

  ‘Wish I wasn’t.’

  ‘So we’ve got two problems,’ John summarised, trying his best to control the conversation. ‘We need to try and get out and get supplies but—’

  ‘—but this building is full of bodies,’ said Barry, before adding, ‘thanks to the hole you lot made in the front door.’

  ‘So what do we do?’ Doreen asked again.

  ‘Is there any way of getting out of here and back up again?’ Elizabeth wondered.

  ‘Don’t think so,’ Barry answered quickly. ‘Getting down’s no problem, we can use the fire escape.’ He nodded over at an inconspicuous looking door in the far corner of the room. ‘The problem is what to do once you’re down there. Open the fire escape door on the ground floor, and you’ll find yourself right in the middle of a few thousand bodies. And if you manage to get outside, you’re not going to get back in again afterwards. It’d be impossible empty-handed, no chance if you’re carrying supplies.’

  ‘But there must be a way?’

  ‘Get a sheet, hold it like a parachute, climb up to the roof and jump off,’ Nick suggested.

  ‘You think that’ll work?’ Doreen said, her bewilderingly stupid response meeting with groans of disbelief.

  ‘Try it and let us know, Doreen,’ he said.

  ‘But how would I get back up again?’

  ‘Flap your arms,’ Nick said. ‘You know what I think? I think we should just get out of here. This place is fucked. We should go downstairs and torch the place on our way out. Set light to the building and watch the whole fucking place go up in flames.’

  ‘What good’s that going to do?’ Barry said.

  ‘Well it would distract them for a start. Christ, the heat and light this place burning would generate would be more than enough of a distraction to let us get away. They’re not going to be interested in a handful of people sneaking out the back door with all that going on, are they?’

  Nick’s suggestion was met with an awkward, muted silence. They each thought long and hard about it, but none of them were sure. It wasn’t the wanton destruction that put them off, rather it was the thought of being out on the run again, searching for places to hide…

  ‘What about the cradle?’ John said. ‘We’ve talked about it before, haven’t we? Barry said there’s a window-cleaner’s cradle half way up the side of the building. We could use that to get us down, couldn’t we? We might even be able to use it to get back up as well…’

  ‘What about power?’ Paul said. ‘How do you think you winch it? You think the window-cleaners used to pull themselves up thirty floors by hand? No power, no cradle.’

  Another idea quashed.

  ‘Seems to me that if we can get out of here in one piece, then maybe that’s what we should do,’ Elizabeth said dejectedly.

  Barry shook his head. ‘I don’t want to leave here. I can’t see any point running.’

  ‘Of course there’s a point,’ Doreen said.

  ‘Is there?’

  ‘Yes,’ she answered, sounding far from convinced. ‘There must be…’

  ‘Well let me know when you find it.’

  ‘So what are we actually saying?’ Nick asked. He pointed at Barry. ‘Does she just want to sit here and starve? Good plan, well done!’

  Barry was unfazed. ‘But why run?’

  ‘Because I don’t want to die.’

  ‘Good answer. Why don’t you want to die?’

  ‘Stupid question. No one wants to die, do they?’

  ‘But is it the end of your life you’re worried about, or is it death itself that scares you?’ Barry said.

  ‘What? You’re just talking bollocks now.’

  ‘No, I’m not. Are you worried that you’re not going to achieve everything you’ve always wanted to achieve, or is it the prospect of being torn apart by hundreds of bodies that bothers you most?’

  ‘What point are you making, Barry?’ John wondered.

  ‘Sorry, I’m just thinking out loud. I’m not trying to wind anyone up. I think what I’m saying is that I genuinely can’t see an easy way out of this. If we run we’ll find somewhere else to hide for a while, then something will happen and before you know it we’ll be moving on again, then again, and again, and again…’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Elizabeth said.

  ‘No, but that’s probably what will happen, and we have to accept that. We’re not in control here. Christ, I thought I’d hit the jackpot finding this place until someone drove a bloody bus into the building.’

  ‘But running’s got to be better than just rolling over and waiting to die, hasn’t it?’

  ‘I’m not so sure,’ Barry said. ‘That’s what I used to believe, but I just don’t know anymore. Every morning when I wake up, it’s getting clearer and clearer that my life is just about over. We’re massively outnumbered and society is finished. Christ, we’re sitting here talking about risking our necks just to get food. What kind of a life are any of us going to have if getting the basics like food and shelter are so difficult?’

  His words were greeted by almost total silence. ‘Still don’t understand you,’ Doreen said. ‘What were you saying about death and dying?’

  Barry rubbed his tired eyes and explained further. ‘I don’t want to keep struggling and fighting forever,’ he said sadly, ‘and I don’t think any of you do either. If I’m completely honest, I just wan
t to relax and let things happen naturally. We’re in the minority now, and I don’t think we were supposed to survive. So, while I don’t relish the idea of letting those things out there tear me limb from limb, I guess I’m not bothered if I die.’

  ‘But that’s—’ John started to say.

  ‘Not normal? I accept that. It’s not what any of you were expecting me to say, I know. We’ve been pre-programmed all of our lives to keep fighting and keep struggling. All I’m saying is I’ve realised there’s no point anymore. Just sit back and relax. Let nature take its course.’

  More silence.

  ‘No,’ Nick said. ‘There’s no fucking way I’m just going to sit here and wait to die. Absolutely no way…’

  ‘I’m with you,’ Paul said, similarly unimpressed. John looked up in surprise. He couldn’t remember when the two men had last agreed on anything. Strange how their dislike of each other could be put to one side when their backs were against the wall.

  ‘So what do we do?’ asked Elizabeth.

  That was the million dollar question which no one could answer. The ominous silence continued for several minutes until Paul spoke again. ‘Exactly how full of bodies is this place?’

  ‘They’re almost up to the twenty-fourth floor,’ John said. ‘I told you that a few minutes ago. You don’t listen to a word I say.’

  ‘No, you told us how far up the staircase they’d managed to get, you didn’t tell us how full of bodies the building is.’

  John struggled to see the difference and he wasn’t alone in his confusion. ‘What do you mean?’ Elizabeth asked.

  Paul shook his head. Christ, these people were infuriating. More to the point he was annoyed with himself. Why hadn’t he thought of this before? ‘A couple of minutes ago we were talking about getting out of here, weren’t we?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So how were we going to get out?’

  ‘Do you always answer questions with questions?’ she snapped.

  ‘Do you?’ he replied, before re-phrasing and asking his previous question again. ‘There’s another way out of here, isn’t there?’