by Lowry, Chris
Steve took a coffee mug from the drying rack and topped it off from the cold pot. He poured the remnants into a second cup and set it in front of Emma at the table.
Bob joined them as they listened to the moaning struggle of the Z against the door.
“What now?” Emma looked at Steve.
“I was hoping you would know.”
She shrugged, took a sip and grimaced.
“It was my idea to come here. I did this.”
She glanced at the door.
“No,” said Steve. “You didn't start this thing, whatever it is.”
“I brought us here. I did that,” she pointed to the door.
“Could you?” Bob asked.
“Could I what?”
“Stop him? Could you have kept your grandfather from going to town?”
“I should have tried.”
Bob shook his mane of curly hair.
“I'm not saying you couldn't, but he's old and you're just a kid.”
“So?”
“So, old people don't listen to kids. Especially if they think we're full of bullshit.”
Steve snickered.
“He did think we were high.”
“Really?” Bob tilted his head to one side.
“I would too,” said Emma. “If I hadn't seen all of it with my own eyes.”
“I have never even tried it,” Bob said.
“Then we're back to what now,” said Steve.
“I don't want to try it,” Bob said in a raised voice.
The zombies hit the door again, scratching, moaning.
“I can't stay here,” Emma shuddered.
“Then the plan is we leave,” said Steve.
“Great. Where do we go?” Bob asked.
“We need to find somebody who knows what's going on,” said Emma.
“We know what's going on. Zombies. That's what's going on.”
“I mean someone in charge.”
“We tried that with the cops, remember? It didn't turn out so well.”
“Maybe the Army?”
“Seriously?” asked Bob.
“I don't know. No one is making a decision and we need to do something.”
She glanced over her shoulder at the master bedroom door.
“We need to get out of here.”
“That's decided then. We're leaving,” said Bob. “Where?”
“Army base?” Steve studied Emma's tear swollen face. “Why army?”
“No duh!” Bob sneered. “They have guns.”
Steve shrugged.
“A lot of people have guns,” said Steve.
“But the Army has training,” Bob said in defense.
“Do you think they trained for this?”
“Not for this exactly,” said Emma. “But they might have plans for a National Emergency.”
Steve grunted.
“What?” said Emma.
“Do you think this has gone National?” Bob asked.
Her eyes moved from Steve to Bob and back again.
“Yes.”
“Shit,” Bob let out a long slow breath.
“Yeah, well we don't know do we?” Steve stammered. “Do we?”
“It could be confined to Delano,” Bob said. “But come on, you know nothing ever happens there.”
“Until now,” Steve laughed under his breath.
“Which is why I think it's National.”
“Okay, then we need to prepare.”
Steve pushed back from the table.
“Knob, get all the food we can carry.”
Bob stood with him and started grabbing cans from the pantry.
“Be honest. You put me in charge of food because of my weight,” he grinned.
“You shouldn't joke about that,” Emma said.
“Why not?” said Bob. “I'm husky. He knows it. I know it. You know it.”
“It just feels wrong.”
“It's okay Emma. I like me. Hell, my mom would tell you I love me. Besides I beat him to the punch.”
Steve shrugged.
“I know where the food is,” Steve said. “I just need her to help find any camping gear.”
“Oh.”
Steve and Emma left Bob to collect all the food while they began to search the house.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Not bad,” Knob grinned as they stood over a stack of gear and food spread out on the table.
“Grandparents,” Emma sobbed and wiped her leaking nose with the back of her hand. “They always had so much.”
The table had thirty four cans of different food, plus boxed pasta, peanut butter and anything that didn’t have to stay refrigerated.
Steve added a tent, three sleeping bags plus pillows and comforters from the guest bedroom, which Bob eyed dubiously, as if that’s what they were going to make him sleep on.
There was a simple metal stove with a cast iron skillet Emma put on top, plus a lantern.
“Is that it?” Bob asked.
“It’s enough to get us started,” said Steve.
“Look, we don’t know what’s out there,” said Bob.
“But we know what’s in here,” Steve said in a soft voice. He nodded his head toward the bedroom door. They could hear the duo behind it, scratching, mumbling, shuffling.
Emma followed his look, sniffed and wiped her nose with the back of her hand.
“I can’t stay here,” she said.
“Besides,” said Steve. “The government has to be doing something. They have a plan for things like this, don’t they?”
“Are you asking me or telling me?”
Steve shrugged.
“I think they plan for things like Russian invasions or Korean nukes or EMP’s,” Bob picked through the food on the table.
Emma noticed he was dividing it into tiny meals.
“But a zombie apocalypse? No one expects a zombie apocalypse.”
“That’s because they aren’t real,” Emma said quickly. “Weren’t real, I mean.”
“Yeah,” said Steve. “What made this happen? Why is this happening?”
“I don’t know,” Bob sighed.
They stared in silence at the supplies spread on the table for a few moments.
Outside, the world was mostly silent. Which is to say the world had noise in it, the noise of nature, birds and insects and the wind in the trees.
But they couldn’t hear the distant buzz of engines, which had been a part of the background so long, it seemed a piece of nature.
“We’re doing this,” Steve said, though it came out more like a question than a declaration.
He ran his hand along the canvas bag that held the tent.
“The State Park is north of here,” he said. “We can get in there, get one of the camping spaces and we should be okay.”
“Out there?” Bob scoffed. “With nothing but the tent walls to keep them out.”
“That’s the beauty of it Knob. The park is going to be empty this time of the year. It’s a weekday for one thing, and the other is no one is thinking about hiding in a campground.”
“You hope.”
Steve shrugged.
“Do you have a better idea?”
Bob thought about it for a moment, the skin between his bushy eyebrows creased in concentration.
Then he shook his mane of hair.
“Not any good ones. I still think the Army base is a good idea.”
Steve nodded.
“I’m not disagreeing with you. We should go there. But later, after this has settled down some.”
He turned to Emma.
“What do you think?”
She shrugged.
“Any plan is a good plan,” she said. “We just need to get out of here.”
CHAPTER SIX
It took a half hour to load the SUV. Steve stowed the camping gear in one side of the rear compartment and the food on the other.
Bob watched him divide the food into small sections.
“What are you doing?”
Steve held up a can and moved it to one of the small piles.
“Dividing by expiration date,” Steve explained. “We’ll eat the stuff that’s closest to the date first.”
“Huh,” Bob said.
Steve stopped, a can in his hand.
“What?”
Bob shrugged.
“Nothing.”
“What is it, Knob?”
“It’s just, that’s a smart thing to do.”
“And you don’t think I’m smart.”
“Not even close,” Bob grinned.
“Maybe not,” said Steve. “But your stomach is going to think I’m a genius if I keep us from getting poisoned.”
Bob patted his gut.
“Yeah, I’ve got a lot to thank here.”
Steve looked at him and shook his head. Then he stared around to make sure Emma was still in the house.
“Listen Knob, this isn’t going to be easy.”
“I know.”
“So you need to take it seriously.”
“I am,” Bob snarled.
“I don’t think you are,” Steve said in a slow patient voice. “I think you’re acting like you’re in one of those stupid role playing games you and the nerds like to play in the park.”
“Live action role playing is not stupid,” Bob snapped. “I bet we were better prepared for something like this than the Lacrosse team. Or anyone else for that matter.”
Steve shook his head.
“I don’t think any of us was ready for this Knob.”
But the curly haired boy wouldn’t give up so easily.
“You’re wrong, Steve,” he said. “You and the rest of the jocks may not have thought about something like this, but trust me, the geeks and nerds sure as hell have. Thought about it, planned for it, played at it. I mean, we didn’t go full on prepper mode, but all that stuff we did in the park, that was battle. I’m prepared for battle.”
Steve studied him as he divided up the last of the cans and stowed them. He double checked the back of the truck and closed the door.
“I think you think you’re prepared,” he said.
“I’m ready,” Knob tried to keep his voice from squeaking as he said it.
“Me too,” Emma stepped out of the house and pulled the door closed behind her.
The keys dangling from her finger jingled.
“I’ll drive,” she said.
“Shotgun!” Bob shouted.
Steve ignored him and climbed into the front passenger seat.
“Hey,” Bob whined. “I called shotgun.”
“I heard you Knob,” said Steve. “Here you go.”
Steve passed him the shotgun from inside the house and a box of shells.
Bob turned it over in his hands.
“How do you load it?”
“Yeah, we’re ready,” Steve muttered.
Emma started the car and dropped it in gear. She drove out of the drive and let the tears drip from the corner of her eyes as she stared in the rear view mirror at a place she would never see again.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The entrance to the State Park was blocked with a ranger’s pickup truck pulled across the road.
“I think that means no entry,” Bob said as he leaned between the seats to look through the windshield.
“The gate’s still open,” Steve pointed. “This is just to scare people off.”
“It’s working,” said Emma.
“We can drive around,” said Steve.
He motioned her to the strip of muddy grass along the side of the road where there was room enough to pass behind the stalled pickup truck.
“Whoever put that there left it for a reason,” Bob said.
“Yeah, and if it’s making us second guess going in, then it’s making other people do the same,” said Steve. “We’ll be safe in there.”
“We’ll leave tire tracks,” Bob pointed out.
Steve turned in his seat to both of them.
“I don’t know why they put a truck across the road. Maybe it was to keep people out. Maybe it was because they were in a hurry and just left it.”
“Door’s shut,” Emma said.
“Whatever. I think we should just go in.”
Bob glanced up and down the deserted road. So far, they hadn’t seen anyone else, which was spooky.
No other cars, no other people. Nothing. The road looked abandoned, lost and forgotten.
Emma considered the patch of grass beside the truck and dropped the SUV into the lowest gear.
She pressed the gas and slithered around the edge. The back end threatened to fishtail once, but she turned into the slide and they bounced back on to the black top leading into the pine forest.
“Be ready,” she said in a low voice laced with fear.
Bob gripped their seats so tight, his knuckles popped white against his skin as he peered up the road, searching the shadows for threats.
“Do you know where we’re going?” he whispered.
“You don’t have to whisper Knob,” Steve said, his voice almost as low.
“Then why are you?”
Steve didn’t answer. He pointed to a wooden sign the size of large table bolted between two posts. It showed a painted map of the campgrounds and state park where it brushed against the side of a lake.
Steve directed Emma along the left path which swung them closer to the body of water.
“I think that would be better, don’t you?”
Emma shrugged.
“If it’s not, we’re blaming you,” said Bob.
She drove slow, tires crunching over pine needles.
The road opened up to a cleared campground on the shore of the lake.
“Guess we’re not the only ones,” said Emma.
Two dozen tents, RV’s and trailers lined the designated camping spots, with tents and tarps thrown up in bare spaces between them.
People stopped and watched the SUV as it pulled to the edge of the campsites. The lake shimmered in the background under the mid-morning sun.
A park ranger stepped out of the group holding a shotgun. He didn’t aim it at the SUV, but his finger was on the trigger.
“Shit,” said Bob. “You got us busted.”
“Just be cool,” said Steve. “Roll down your window.”
A second man joined the ranger, then a third. They advanced on the SUV, spreading out as they walked.
“Kill the engine,” the ranger called out.
Emma cut the motor and they sat there listening to the tick of the metal as it started to cool.
The ranger kept the shotgun ready as he came up to her window and looked inside.
“You’re just a bunch of kids,” he said in wonder. “How did you get in?”
“Drove around the truck,” Emma squeaked as she stared at the weapon not quite pointed at them, but in their general direction.
The ranger glanced up the road.
“Well that was stupid,” he drawled.
“Told you,” said Bob, more of a whimper than a matter of fact tone.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“You can set up over there,” the Ranger pointed to a bare spot in the packed dirt between a larger newer looking RV and an ancient rusty camper.
Emma didn’t argue with him, just pulled the SUV into the narrow space between the two campers and put it in park.
“What now?” she whispered as she stared through the windshield.
The large RV was blocking the rest of the people. Most had gone back to what they were doing when the SUV arrived, but a few were staring.