Broken Dreams

by Rissa Blakeley

  “We’re going to go back the way we came.” Sophie leaned up against the table next to him. “The highway was mostly clear going back into the city. I have a feeling most people were fleeing the city, and not wanting to go back.”

  “Right.” He began to sip on his mug of blood. “Make sure you take the full magazine.”

  “No, you need that,” Sophie insisted.

  “Listen, you might run into some serious shit out there. Nick and I have got it covered here. We have a wide variety of cutlery to work with.” He grinned.

  “Not funny.”

  “I’m not trying to be funny. I’m just saying.” He smirked again, tipping back his mug to get every last drop. I shuddered again.

  “I will have you know that when Thomas and I went to the medical facility, we did a pretty good job taking off some undead’s heads with the handle of a shotgun. We didn't use a single bullet.” Claire stood with her hands on her hips, proud of herself.

  “Yes, quite impressive for a proper girl such as yourself.”

  “Feisty this morning, aren’t you, Henry?” I said with a smile. We all laughed.

  It died down when Sophie, the buzz kill, said, “Anyway, once we get back to the apartment, we will load up as much as we can. Depending on when we get there, we may spend the night.”

  Henry said, “Well, I want you to make sure you take some proper provisions with you. Food, blankets, water, et cetera.”

  I began to feel even more nervous than I was before. I didn’t want to think about the danger they could be facing the moment they walked out that door.

  “What’s the time limit before we go and look for them?” Everyone looked at me. “What?” I shrugged. “I’m just concerned, that’s all.”

  “You have such little faith in me, do you?” Sophie stood before me with her hands on her hips, waiting for a response.

  I sighed. “No, Sophie, it’s not that. I just want to make sure we have a plan in place, just in case.”

  “Right…” It was long and drawn out. “Give us five days.”

  “Alright,” Henry said, easily agreeing.

  “Fantastic. Let’s load up, shall we?” On Sophie’s cue, everyone hustled around the house, gathering items we all felt were necessary for the trip back to the apartment. The supplies we were collecting may have been a little excessive. There was no way they needed so many blankets for just the three of them.

  The closer it got to the time for them to take off, the more my stomach was doing flip flops.

  Once the truck was loaded up, Henry had a last few details for Sophie. “You know those vehicles that were pushed off on the side of the road on the main road here?” She nodded. “Check to see if you can siphon from them, and see if they have any extra supplies.” He handed her all the tracking devices. “Leave these somewhere.”

  “Okay,” Sophie said. They stood and looked at one another for a few minutes. Henry grabbed her hands. I couldn’t help but feel a small spark of jealousy when I saw the way they looked at each other.

  “Listen, I just want to say thank you for everything you have done for us…for me. I promise that we’ll find your kids and get them away from that fucker.” Sophie’s eyes filled with tears. “Take care of yourself. I know you’ve got this.” She nodded. Henry pulled her close and hugged her.

  “Thank you.” She smiled back at him.

  “Oh, grab my iPod off of the counter. I have the car charger in my truck already. It would be nice to ride with some music, instead of the quiet.”

  “Can do.” She smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek.

  A little more than a flicker of jealous rage ran through my body, but I was trying to remind myself of her words to me: He loves you so much, Elaina. Do not take him for granted. He never loved me the way he does you. They had a tight bond because of their history together, not because they were once lovers.

  I tapped Henry on the shoulder, as if we were at a dance. “May I cut in?” Henry turned around and smiled. Sophie had a frightened look on her face. “Umm…shit.” I wrapped my arms around her. She was surprised by my action. We hugged for a minute, and then I pulled away. “As we have already established numerous times, we started off on the wrong foot. So, umm…I just want to say thank you.”

  She gave me that grin that I hated so much at one time. “That means a lot to me.” She leaned in to whisper in my ear. “Take good care of him.”

  “I will. I promise.” We pulled away from one another. I turned around, only to see that Henry was thrilled that I had finally accepted Sophie. I walked past him and went to Thomas.

  “Thomas, you scrawny little pissant.” I winked at him. He smiled and looked down. “Take care of yourself. I’m glad we met. The circumstances were a little on the shady side, but you saved my Henry when you shot that fucker. For me, that made up for holding Henry hostage.”

  Thomas smiled. “Thank you,” he whispered. I gave the boney little twerp a hug.

  I walked over to Claire. I started to get a lump in my throat. I would be devastated if anything happened to her. She was like the sister that I never had. She grabbed me, and we hugged one another. We both wept uncontrollably. Then we looked at each other and laughed.

  “Don’t worry. We’ll be back before you know it.”

  “I hope so. I love you, Claire.”

  “I love you, too.” She gave me another quick hug, and they headed out to the truck.

  “I’m going to walk them out,” Nick ran out after them. I watched from the front porch. He went to the passenger side and opened the door for Claire. They stood and spoke for a few minutes, and then they embraced. He kissed her on the cheek. She smiled, and looked to be somewhat embarrassed. He helped her in and closed the door for her. Sophie started the truck, and they drove off.

  When Nick came back to the porch, I met him at the top of the stairs. “What?” he said with an innocent smile.

  “Unbelievable.” I had my hands on my hips.

  “What?”

  “You!”

  “What did I do?” He had a ridiculous smirk on his face.

  “You have the hots for Claire, don’t you?”

  He brushed past me and into the house. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “Nicholis Cooper! You better tell me what’s going on!”

  “Nothing. Nothing at all.” He plucked a book off our dad’s bookshelf, sat down on the couch, and began to sift through it.

  “Nick! You two had sex, didn’t you?”

  “Shh, baby sis. I’m reading.” He smiled and chuckled, knowing he had information that I wanted.

  “Ugh!”

  I stomped off through the kitchen, only to find Henry standing in front of the fireplace, looking at our family pictures. I lingered in the doorway between the kitchen and the family room, enjoying the view of the beautiful man in front of me. When he realized I was there, he said, “You had a beautiful family, Elaina.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “It pains me, knowing what has happened to them.”

  “Me, too.”

  “I hope we can have a family someday.”

  I smiled. “That would be amazing. I think you would make a fantastic father.”

  “Really?”

  I walked over to him and wrapped my arms around his waist. “Yes. But we need to talk about this a bit more.”

  He frowned. “Right.” He turned around, sounding disappointed.

  “We can’t have a baby any time soon.” I tried to keep my voice down so Nick didn’t hear our conversation.

  “I agree.”

  “So, we’ll have to be careful.”

  “Ahh, yes. That.” Realizing where the conversation was going, he said, “Right. Of course.”

  “Good, I’m glad we’re on the same page.” I nestled my nose into his neck. Even his funk smelled good to me. He kissed the side of my neck and moved up to my ear, licking and nipping. My nerves were dancing all over my body. I started touching him, caressing his coo
l, battered body. Then I pulled away with a gasp.

  “What? What’s wrong?”

  “We can’t.” He looked annoyed. “Did you forget the conversation we just had a few moments ago?”

  “Hmm…yes. I must have some sort of short-term memory loss. Too many concussions, you know.” I rolled my eyes at him, and he winked at me.

  “Plus…I have some questions.”

  “About?”

  “You, and what you are.”

  “Alright.” He guided me over to the sofa. “Ask away.”

  “Sophie’s kids... They aren’t like you?”

  “I don’t know exactly. I can’t imagine he would have lied about that.” What he said made absolute sense, but I had more questions.

  “If you’re infected, wouldn’t you infect me?”

  “Like I said before, there has to be a blood/saliva mix in order to contaminate you.”

  “So the injection that they forced into you was made with saliva?”

  “A small amount of the virus was mixed with saliva, then injected into my blood stream.”

  “So the full blown injection was made with saliva, as well?” I was disgusted.

  “Yes, but it was highly concentrated.”

  I chewed my cheek for a second. “Right.” I paused again. “I’m just worried, you know, if I get pregnant…”

  “I’m sorry. I wish I knew how it all worked, but that was never explained to me. But, like I said, that fluid is clean.” He looked at me in a bit of a sinister sort of way. Then he wiggled his eyebrows up and down. I had to ignore his advances. He sighed when he realized it wasn’t working.

  “Is it safe to assume Roger is not infected?”

  “Correct. He is not infected. He would never allow it. We were his guinea pigs for this virus.” He tucked my hair behind my ears, and sat there smiling at me. “You do know that no matter what, I will love you always.”

  “Even if I kick you in the tomatoes?”

  “Hmm... That might be the deal breaker.” We laughed a little, and held one another while leaning back on the sofa.

  “How did I manage life before all of this craziness?”

  “That’s simple, my love…” He tapped me gently on the nose with his index finger. “You’re mental but, now, so is everybody else and no one notices it as much.”

  “Henry!” I punched him in the shoulder. He jerked away and hissed. I had forgotten about his ribs. “Oh no! I’m so sorry!”

  “No biggie. Just a bit of pain. Nothing I’m not used to,” he grumbled.

  Chapter 26

  S

  ophie pulled out of the driveway as Claire was staring out the window at Nick waving goodbye. “Looks like Nick has a new crush.” Claire’s icy glare could have cooled a volcano.

  “That’s none of your concern.” She wasn’t ready to give up any information about her and Nick yet.

  “Right.” Sophie chuckled as she turned onto the main road, suddenly noticing something interesting. “Well, would you look at that?” She seemed excited. Thomas and Claire looked and saw a black Tahoe, identical to hers and Henry’s, parked at the takeout window of a fast food restaurant.

  “Is that…?” Thomas started to speak, but Sophie interrupted.

  “Yes, yes, I do believe that is…I mean, was…Kellan’s truck. Let’s go and investigate, shall we?” She pulled up beside it.

  “Why wouldn’t he bring it to the house?”

  “I have two suspicions. Number one, he was trying to lay low. Or number two, he ran out of gas.” Sophie opened her door and said, “Let’s be aware, please.” She hopped out, Thomas and Claire following. Sophie tried the handle, but it was locked. Claire looked in the back window.

  “There’s a trunk back here!” She was feverishly pulling on the handle. She hoped that they would find everything they needed in Kellan’s trunk, and they could get back to the house sooner rather than later. It took her a couple of seconds to realize it was locked.

  Sophie and Thomas came around to the back. Claire was looking around for a rock or something with which she could break the window. She heard the glass smash and turned around. Sophie was pounding out the driver’s side window with the butt end of her Sig. She reached in and unlocked the truck, Thomas pulling open the liftgate.

  “How are you gonna open this? You don’t have the code, do you?” Thomas asked.

  “There is an override keypad underneath. Tip it back.” He did, as Claire stood and watched for undeads. Sophie pushed a series of buttons, putting in the code. “I’m not supposed to know this. I discovered the code when I was snooping in Roger’s office one night.”

  “Snoopin’?” Thomas looked a bit shocked that Sophie would even take that risk. “Weren’t you afraid of what would happen if he caught you?”

  “What did I have to lose?”

  Thomas shrugged. “Nothin’, I guess.”

  “Exactly. In the middle of one of his special ‘training’ sessions with me, there was an emergency in the complex that he had to respond to so he left me alone in his office for a bit. I used it as an opportunity to snoop.” Sophie pressed one more button on the keypad and the trunk unlocked.

  “Yes! Get down. Just in case it is rigged.” Thomas jumped out of the back of the truck. Sophie carefully opened the lid of the trunk. She didn’t seem all too worried about her own welfare. “Motherfucker…” quietly rolled off her lips.

  “What?” Claire was standing on her tiptoes, trying to see what was in the trunk.

  “Empty,” Sophie muttered. She got out and leaned over to the gas tank, tapping on it. Empty. “That arse! He left us with nothing! Where did he hide all the weapons? Fucker!” Sophie spent the next several minutes tearing apart the truck, looking for anything they could use for supplies.

  Claire spotted a small herd of undeads staggering toward them. “Sophie. We have company.”

  “Shit. Come on. Let’s get out of here.” Sophie jumped out of Kellan’s truck and got into theirs. She started it up and threw it in gear just as Thomas and Claire closed their doors. She took off back to the main road.

  “Shouldn’t we take care of them? What if they wander toward the others?”

  “I don’t think they will make it that far. They’ll get sidetracked before they make it down that way.” Claire was uneasy about leaving them wandering, but Sophie was the boss when Henry was not around. She didn’t want to cause any waves so soon in their trip back to his apartment.

  Sophie drove like a maniac back to the highway. It was the proverbial white knuckle ride. Everything looked the same as it did when they had passed through there the first time not all that long ago. Across from the convenience store, where they found Thomas holding Henry hostage after he bit Nick, was the off-ramp. Sophie decided to get on the highway by going up the ramp.

  “What are you doing? This is the off-ramp!” Good ol’ Claire. Always trying to walk the straight and narrow.

  “Do you think that I don’t know that?”

  “You can’t go up this! It’s against the law!”

  Sophie cackled. “Against the law!” She howled. “Who is going to stop me?” Claire just let out a noise of frustration. “I’m going to get on the highway, and cut across the median between the north and south lanes.”

  “Great.”

  “What are you worried about?”

  “Getting hit by another car!”

  Sophie rolled her eyes. “I don’t think we’re going to see anyone, Claire.” Then she pulled up onto the highway and drove a little ways down until she found a division. She drove the truck onto the opposite side of the highway and began to head back toward the city.

  ***

  It took most of the night, but they finally made it to the exit to get to Henry’s apartment. There were a few traffic jams that they had to push through. There were some moments scarier than others, but for the most part, things went well, considering the circumstances.

  The nighttime was always eerie. With nothing but the moon and the
ir gore-covered headlights lighting their way, it was difficult to see. Thomas and Claire hung out the windows of the truck, looking for any signs of life…or unlife. The chilly autumn air was cutting through them.

  Slowly, Sophie navigated through the city streets, dodging several herds of staggering undeads. Finally, they made it to the street Henry’s apartment was on. It looked just as they left it…corpses rotting in the streets, cars pushed aside, and that limo parked right in front of the building.

  When Claire saw that the limo was still there, she flashed back to Marc getting bit at Elaina’s wedding. She went into a zone. Her mind was flashing through all their moments together. Everything from the day they met, until his very end, until the end of them.

  She felt guilty giving herself to Nick, wondering if she had properly mourned Marc. It had been only a few weeks since his true death, but it seemed like an eternity.

  After she met Marc, Claire had envisioned a life with him. She had given up on her fantasy about Nick and her…for the most part. It was always alive in the deepest parts of her heart. She wanted to marry Marc, she wanted to have his children, she wanted to have a happy life doting on the very man who saved her from falling into a deep depression when her parents died. If it hadn’t been for him, she would never have gotten out of bed again.

  Then, suddenly, she flashed forward to the moment that Nick first kissed her. It made that flicker of life stir deep in the pit of her stomach. She always had a crush on him.

  Claire and Elaina became friends in middle school. The first time she went over to the Cooper’s, Nick was lounging on the couch, playing his guitar. She remembered being lost in his rhythmic movements. He was singing with his eyes closed, not knowing he had drawn in the audience of one girl, who quickly became smitten with her friend’s older brother.

  She would never forget the song: Going to California by Led Zeppelin. Nick played it with such ease, such talent, and such grace. When the song ended, Claire softly applauded and he was jolted out of his somber trance. He looked at her with a soft smile. Then Elaina grabbed her arm and pulled her upstairs to her room so they could do what fourteen-year-old girls do best…gossip.