The young girl wrapped in the blanket looked petrified as she watched the scene unfold.
Please, Tom, put the knife down,” she managed to say as she approached her boyfriend. “If we do like we’re told they might let us stay.”
“We don't need them,” Tom told her. “These old kooks can go to hell. We were minding our own business and now they’re jumping down our throats. We can find a better place to stay than this.”
Reverend McMann saw an opening when the boy, distracted, glanced at his girlfriend. He rushed in and grabbed the boy's wrist with one hand and grasped his neck in the other. The young girl screamed as the two began to wrestle with each other. He was physically larger than the youth, but was not able to overpower him. The knife waved back and forth as they continued to struggle against each other. Suddenly, the boy head-butted the pastor in the face. Stunned, and now with a bloody nose, Reverend McMann released the boy.
The larger of the two men by the door attempted to rush the boy. But as the boy continued swinging the knife wildly, the razor sharp edge slashed a deep trough into the man's cheek. With blood pouring down the side of his face, he let out an enraged roar and lunged forwards. Upon impact, the boy and the man both fell to the ground. As the two entangled the man let out a load moan.
The boy pulled away to reveal the man lying on the floor with the knife was now deeply embedded in his chest. A red spot was growing on his white dress shirt.
“Benjamin!”
A woman broke out from the crowd and fell to her knees beside the man, screaming at the sight of the man who had begun to shake and tremble.
“Someone, go get Beth Simpson,” Reverend McMann called out, now somewhat recovered from the head-butt he’d received. “We’re going to need help! Go! Hurry!”
A couple women obeyed and ran off towards the social hall.
When I looked back up at the boy, he was looking at the man he’d stabbed. Behind him, I saw Sam approaching with his pistol in hand. With the handle of the firearm, he hit the boy across the top of the head, and the boy collapsed onto the ground.
While a few people worked to apply pressure to Benjamin's wound to slow the bleeding, a few others began to tie up the subdued attacker with a length of electrical cord.
“Should we take the knife out?” a woman asked.
“No, it might make the bleeding worse,” a man responded.
“Keep applying pressure around the knife,” Sam said.
A moment later, the woman Reverend McMann had called for arrived, along with Oscar.
I watched from beside the doorway as a look of horror covered Oscar's face after getting an eye full of the scene.
“My God,” he exclaimed. “Tommy? Oh Tommy!”
In his overalls, Oscar knelt down beside Tommy.
“Wake up, son. Wake up... What happened here?” he asked the disoriented youth.
“Papa?” Tommy mumbled.
“It's me. I'm here,” Oscar stated. “Please try to focus and talk to me.”
I then realized Tom, the boy who stabbed Benjamin, was Oscar's grandson. I watched as the boy slowly started to gain awareness. While Tom began to speak more and more coherently to his grandfather, Beth took Benjamin's pulse and blood pressure. I then saw a frown on her face as she stood up over the motionless man.
“His heart has stopped,” she said. “He's dead.”
“Oh God, no! No!” the man's wife exclaimed as she clutched onto his lifeless body. Tears filled the woman's face as her long hair draped the man's body.
Beth put a hand on the woman's shoulder for a moment, whispered something to her, and then walked up to Reverend McMann.
“I need to take a look at your nose,” Beth said.
“Not now. Just tell everyone to go. There’s no reason for anyone to be here now,” he responded.
“It's still bleeding,” she said. “We need to get that stopped. You don't want to lose too much blood and pass out.”
“It's almost stopped,” he said. “Just please do what I asked.”
“Alright, but I'll have to look at it soon” she said.
As she began urging the onlookers outside of the room to go about their business, Reverend McMann knelt down next to the distraught woman and her husband's body. He put his hand on her shoulder as he started to quietly talk to her. I could hear him reciting a prayer while the woman continued to cry.
Noticing the traumatized, dark haired girl was still balled up in the corner of the room, I called for Beth.
“I think this girl needs help. Can you check on her?” I asked.
Without saying a word, Beth and a woman she was talking to walked over and started attending to the girl.
Sam and a couple of men were watching over Oscar and his grandson. One of the men looked particularly angry. He looked at Tom with disdain before kicking him in the ribcage.
“Lay off him!” Oscar said to the man standing up pushing him away. “Get out of here – quit stirring things up even more! “
Sam pulled his companions back, and Oscar turned again towards Tom who was now sitting up looking confused.
“Tom, tell me. Did you stab that man?” Oscar asked insistently.
“Papa, he came at me first,” Tom responded.
“Listen to me, did you stab him?” Oscar repeated.
“It just happened,” Tom blurted out. “I don't know how. He came at me, we were on the ground, and then I saw him . . . with the knife . . .”
“Why did he come at you?” Oscar asked with his face turning red.
“I don’t know!” shouted Tom putting his arms around his head with his chin tucked into his chest. “Leave me alone!”
Sam stepped forward. “I’ll tell you what happened.”
“Your grandson was found in here shacked up with his woman,” Sam continued. ”Reverend McMann didn't fancy the idea of them two getting it on like a pair of rabbits in the house of God, especially near Reverend Sikes's secret parlor room. The dope in the corner over there didn't help things either, obviously. The good Reverend ordered him to leave the church, but before he could be evicted the hot head pulled a knife. He was asked to put it away, but ended up breaking the Reverend's nose and slashing Benjamin's face before stabbing him in the chest. That's how it went down.”
“Is what he said true?” Oscar asked Tom.
Tom remained silent.
“Speak up boy,” Oscar ordered.
In the corner, I started to see one of the other boys waking up. Whatever they had been smoking was wearing off, and they would probably all be awake soon.
“Tie those two up before they wake up,” Reverend McMann insisted after ending his prayer session with the newly widowed woman. Holding his still bleeding nose, he directed the men standing by Sam to restrain the two boys.
Tom continued to remain silent as two of his friends, still half asleep in a drug induced haze, were dragged out of the room. By this time Beth and the other woman had managed to get Tom's girlfriend to sit up, and were trying to convince her to go with them. However, she was still in shock and not very cooperative.
“Is what he said true? Yes or no!” Oscar was shouting at his grandson now.
Tom continued to stay silent, until Oscar grabbed him and thrust his face towards Benjamin's body and his grieving wife.
“Let me go!” Tom said.
“Not until you tell me if it went down like he said or not,” Oscar responded. “If it didn't, you better, for God's sake, tell me now!”
“You already know the answer, so leave me alone,” Tom said.
“So you did it?” Oscar asked.
“Yes, I did,” Tom responded defiantly. “And I'd do it again.”
“You sorry punk,” Oscar said as he stood to his feet.
“I wish you had never called and convinced me to come here. Lana and I would’ve been just fine at Uncle's house. He’s armed to the teeth at his place, and we would’ve been safe there. But noooo! You had to convince me to mope around here with these hypoc
rites who think it's fine to stuff their gullet until they have a heart attack, but seem terrified at the idea of two people having fun or smoking a little herb,” Tom said. “All of this is your fault, not mine!”
Oscar turned around, glanced at his grandson, and looked up at Sam and then me. He was quiet for a few moments, closing his eyes and rubbing his forehead.
“This is my fault,” he said quietly. “I knew this brat was trouble, but he was my kin. When my son was diagnosed with prostate cancer, I promised him that I would take care of his boy. I've done my best since my son's passing, but I now realize it was not enough. Tom is my problem and I'll take care of him.”
“We need to all clear out of here,” said Pastor McMann.
While Tom sneered at his grandfather, I noticed that the red headed girl on the floor was still unconscious. I walked towards her, got on my knees, and put my ear to her mouth. I could hear that she was still breathing, so with one massive heave I scooped the girl into my arms. Although she probably only weighed a hundred pounds or a little more, I was not used to carrying a person's limp body around. It was awkward and unwieldy. Struggling a bit, I managed to awkwardly carry her out of out the room.
Sam assisted Beth in walking Lana, Tom's girlfriend, out into the hallway. As I carried the young woman in my arms I scanned the hall for a cot. Thankfully, there was one not too far away. I placed the girl on the cot and turned around to hear Reverend McMann speaking to Oscar.
“You have ten minutes to talk with him,” he said. “Then he has to leave. I want him gone. I haven't decided what to do about his friends yet, but your grandson is trouble – too much trouble for this church. Put him in his vehicle and tell him not to come back.”
The Reverend left the room, shut the door, and walked towards the church office.
I noticed that Sam was walking towards the social hall social hall and I followed after him.
On entering the social hall I saw Jennifer sitting at a table with Roy and Kay Bridges. The room was abuzz with talk and gossip about what had transpired in the other room, but I wanted no part in it. I went and sat down next to Jennifer.
“What exactly happened in there, Hank?” she asked.
“Nothing good,” I said.
“Are you alright?” she asked.
“I'm fine, but some serious stuff went down,” I said. “Let’s just eat something and try to go get our tire fixed.”
“Okay, alright,” Jennifer said. “You can tell me about it later.”
I stood up and proceeded to once again go and stand in line. Picking up a Styrofoam plate, I realized my appetite was gone, but I knew that going outside without some blood sugar in my veins was a bad idea. If we encountered any freaks during the excursion, I would need all the strength I could gather.
After scooping small portions of scrambled eggs, grits, and a couple pieces of toast on my plate, I sat back down. As I slowly picked at my food, I listened to Roy and Kay talk about the man who had been murdered. Benjamin Witherington was a friend of theirs and a long time church member. He’d given guitar lessons to Roy a few years back, and was considered to be very musically gifted. I heard Roy say something that sparked my curiosity. He wondered if finding the teenagers in that particular room was what infuriated Reverend McMann and not so much what he caught them doing.
“What's so special about that room?” I asked them.
“No one knows, but Reverend Sikes has been seen coming and going from it a lot,” Roy said.
“He spends a good bit of time there, at least when he isn’t in his office,” Kay added.
“Well, just last night Reverend McMann took me in there,” I said. “Reverend Sikes wanted to speak with me.”
Their eyes widened as I told them about my encounter. I omitted some of the details about what Reverend Sikes had told me about the Holy Ghost, but I mentioned the noise I had heard coming, I thought, from beneath the floorboards. Roy and Kay looked at me with intense curiosity as I explained how creepy the room had seemed. Looking beside me, I actually saw the Bible he’d given me in our bag of stuff. I lifted it up and showed it to them.
“That is his wife's Bible,” Kay stated. “She taught the young married couples Sunday School class for several months last year. I'm sure that is hers.”
Opening the cover of the Bible I saw a hand written note on a dedication page.
This Bible, a copy of the divinely inspired, Holy word of God, is dedicated to Mrs. Martha Sikes by her loving husband. May it comfort you in hard times and bring you hope in times of doubt. In Christ’s love, Rev. Sikes.”
When I showed them the Bible, Kay and a few others church members who had been listening seemed perplexed.
“I'm surprised he’d give that to anyone,” said Kay.
“Why?” I asked.
“Other than his sister Ms. Teresa, his family is dead.”
Before I could ask her to clarify her last comment, I heard a single gunshot.
A few moments later there was another.
Chapter Five
The two gunshots were enough to silence the chatter that filled the social hall. It sounded to me like the noise could have come from inside, but some people rushed to the window to see if there were any freak attacks going on outside. A couple of men stood up and exited the social hall and headed down the hallway that led to the sanctuary.
I had been sickened by what I had just seen, and I had no desire to get involved any more in this community. I just wanted to get on the road again with Jennifer. Maybe I was being selfish, but there was an apocalypse going on and at some point I felt I just had to take care of my own needs.
“I want to get out of this place,” I said to Roy. “A group of us were going to make a run to Robert's shop to get a tire for my van. Want to come along?”
“No,” his wife said quickly.
I then looked at Roy directly and asked him the same question.
“Do you want to come with us?” I asked.
He looked at his wife, looked back at me, and declined the invitation.
“I'm sorry,” he said. “But I've got my family here to protect.”
“It's alright. I understand your situation,” I answered.
“Let’s go Jennifer,” I said. “Let’s get the group together.”
Looking around I saw Sam at one table, and Robert Gardner standing near the outside door.
They were still willing to go with me to help me with my tire, so we all left the church together.
Thankfully, the rain had become little more than a drizzle by the time we exited the gate of the fenced off perimeter. Oscar's empty golf cart was parked only several feet from the gate and Meredith was standing next to it; she continued her patrol duties despite her scratched arm and didn’t seem to have any obvious signs of infection as we passed her.
Sunlight was starting to break through the cloudy sky as we walked towards the van. Despite the sudden, unexpected attack the night before, I felt fairly safe in the church yard. In every direction I looked, patrols were walking across the soggy grass surrounding the church.
I was the first of our group to reach the van. I unlocked the side door and climbed inside to get the items we needed. The ammo for my revolver was easy to find; the box of cartridges for the .357 magnum were exactly where I had left them. A moment later I came across the set of large butcher knives I had acquired from the meat manager's secret stash.
“Would anyone like one of these?” I asked as I turned around and displayed one of the fourteen inch long blades.
“Sure, I'll take one,” said Robert.
“Be carefully with it,” I warned as I passed him the knife. “It’s razor sharp.”
I handed another knife to Jennifer.
Although the knife I had used in our escape from Sandy Hills was beside the driver’s seat, I wanted a brand new one. Cutting through bone can dull a knife fast, and I wanted a blade that would be as effective as possible if we had an encounter. In the corner of the van, under a shoppin
g basket of medical supplies, I saw a large, sheathed butcher knife. I quickly attached the beige, leather sheath to my belt. Taking a second look at the sheath hanging from my waist, I noticed it also held a smaller fillet knife. It might come in useful.
Before locking up the van, I grabbed a ball cap and put it on. In red letters it read, “Grocery World Meats: Dinner's Calling.”
After I got out of the van I saw Robert kneeling and taking a look at the flat tire.
Don't Dare Call Them Zombies : Books 1-4 Page 13