Dead in Bed by Bailey Simms, The Complete First Book

by Adrian Birch

  I felt tears drop down my cheeks. I turned away and covered my face. I couldn’t bear to look at Ian. I was so ashamed, and at the same time I couldn’t believe that he wouldn’t even acknowledge that I’d just lost Morgan; that I had to be the one to snuff her out with my own hands.

  I could hear my mom on the phone in the living room. Whether or not Danielle had called the Home Guard directly to the house, my mom was doing it now. I could hear her reporting that there was an infected body to pick up.

  “I have to go,” I whispered.

  Not only had I lost Morgan, and Bryce, too, but it looked like I was losing Ian.

  “What about you?” I asked him, struggling to speak through my tears. “What will you do?”

  “I have to stay here,” he said quietly, “at the house. I can’t leave my family vulnerable again. I just can’t. I’ll stay in the attic for now. It’s what I have to do. The Home Guard won’t find me up there, even if they come with a search warrant. There’s a panel in the wall I can hide behind if anyone comes up there. I can take care of myself.”

  “And Morgan?” I asked. “Her body?”

  “The Home Guard will take it,” he said. “There’s nothing we can do about that.”

  Danielle called out softly to Ian from inside the bedroom. He touched my shoulder in a heartbreakingly cold way.

  “You’re on your own, Ashley,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. If there was any other way—” But he cut himself off. For a moment he looked like he was going to hug me, but he stopped and said nothing more.

  I had to leave.

  As I stepped away, Ian said, “Ashley, wait,” but I ignored him. I hurried down the stairs. Before going back out into the night, there was one thing I had to do.

  My dad was at the dining table, sitting alone. His face was buried in his hands. I sat beside him and put my hand on his back.

  “Dad?”

  He startled a little, as if waking from a dream. He patted my hand, then looked away.

  “I need to ask you to do something for me,” I whispered. “I told you if I went to the ruins, Ian would go with me. But that’s not going to happen. Not anymore. He doesn’t know about them yet, and now he can’t know about them. Not ever. Don’t say anything about the ruins at all. Not to anyone. Not even to Ian. Okay?”

  My dad nodded. He was in a daze after everything that had happened in his house that day, but I knew he wouldn’t tell a soul.

  “You be careful,” he whispered. He turned and hugged me. “Love you, kid.”

  It was all I could do not to break down crying in his arms.

  “I love you, too, Dad.”

  I pulled away from my father’s embrace and hurried out the back door into a dark, moonless night.

  Moments later, I was running as fast as I could toward the granary. Before anything else, I had to warn Chris that the Home Guard was on its way.

  I could barely see where I was going, but I found the riverbank in the darkness. I didn’t stop running until I reached the empty grain yard and felt for the granary’s rickety door.

  I found the loose knob, and I pushed. Inside, it was completely dark.

  “Chris?” I called out softly.

  There was no answer. The granary was totally silent.

  I felt my way toward Chris’s desk. My hand bumped into his soda-can ashtray. I faintly smelled the scent of stale, burnt weed. Next to the ashtray, I felt a cigarette lighter.

  I flicked its flint wheel.

  A weak flame leapt up and went out. The lighter was almost out of fluid. I shook it and tried again. A tiny flame appeared and wavered, but this time it stayed lit. I cupped my hand around the meager light source.

  Everything in the granary was gone.

  Except for the ash tray and a few empty antibiotics boxes strewn across the dusty desk, all of Chris’s supplies had disappeared. Even his worn-out swivel chair was gone.

  The lighter went out.

  I lit it again as I stepped around the elevator engines toward the back of the granary, doing my best to protect the flame as I moved.

  Three bodies, each covered in the same grease-stained sheets, lay atop Chris’s makeshift examination tables. I knew the first two were Mr. Hershel and the man from the locker room. The other body must have been Bryce.

  Again, I called out for Chris.

  Only silence.

  I hurried outside and checked each of the silos. All of them were empty. The refugees were gone.

  I had no idea how Chris got word that the resistance was in danger of being discovered, but someone had obviously tipped him off. Everyone had fled, but to where, I had no idea. I didn’t even have Chris’s cellphone number, so there was no way of finding out.

  I was totally on my own.

  And I couldn’t stay here. After my sister’s call, the Home Guard would raid the place as fast as they could get a squad ready.

  After what had happened with Morgan, I’d almost completely forgotten about the date I’d set up with Jason Gibbs that night. Now, it looked like I only had one chance I left to do a little good: I had to go wait at the bend in the highway where Jason and I had agreed to meet and hope he’d show up. What else was I going to do? Morgan was gone, but there were other refugee positives who still needed Chris’s antibiotic cocktail. If I managed to steal Jason’s pharmacy access card, then maybe somehow I could track Chris down and give it to him. I just hoped the raid on the granary wouldn’t make it impossible for Jason to meet me tonight.

  Just as I was turning to hurry away, I caught a glimpse of something on the granary door—something white standing out against the darkness. When I’d rushed through the first time, I’d missed it hanging there.

  As I approached the door, I could make out a piece of notebook paper. It was tacked up with a nail.

  I tore down the paper and lit the lighter. It was a note:

  Refuse Morgan

  That’s all it said. Just two words.

  What the fuck? What did that mean?

  At first, it seemed like this was some strange, mean-spirited comment about Morgan. I almost started to cry again. Why would someone write something like that? The Home Guard hadn’t been there yet, so the note had to have been written by someone in the Underground.

  But after I cleared the cobwebs of grief from my rational thought process, I saw that the note couldn’t have been just some random disparaging comment about Morgan. I didn’t recognize the handwriting, but I could tell it wasn’t Ian’s. I wondered if maybe Chris had written the note as some kind of code, warning Ian that Morgan had progressed to stage three.

  But even that didn’t make sense. As far as I knew, Ian had been with Chris at the granary all day. Why would Chris need to leave Ian a note?

  Was the note for me?

  I turned the paper over. Nothing was on the back. I read the two words on the front again.

  Refuse Morgan

  I had no clue what the message meant. It had to mean something, but I couldn’t afford to hang around at the granary trying to figure it out.

  I folded the paper, stuffed it into my pocket, and started making my way through my dad’s alfalfa fields toward the bend in the highway and my date with Jason.

  * * *

  When I reached the road, I had no idea what time it was.

  I’d been keeping my cellphone off, knowing that the Home Guard could track my GPS position, and I didn’t want to risk turning it on even to check the time.

  I climbed up the gully to look for a hiding spot behind the cottonwood grove. This was next to impossible in the dark, but eventually I managed to feel out a flattish place between some boulders. I was well hidden, but if Jason decided to ambush me here with his squad, I’d be shit out of luck. The gully above was steep, and there was no place to run.

  I waited.

  Not a single car drove by. The night grew colder. I was still only wearing a T-shirt with mid-length sleeves, and I started to shiver. Soon I was chilled to the bone. I curled up in a tiny
ball between the rocks, trying to capture as much of my body heat as possible. But I couldn’t stop shivering.

  A sliver of moon rose between the branches of the cottonwoods, offering practically no extra light.

  By now, I had to accept that eleven o’clock must have come and gone. It was probably well past midnight, maybe two or three in the morning.

  Jason wasn’t coming.

  Maybe he’d figured out I was setting him up. Or maybe the Home Guard was tracking the fugitives from the granary, and he couldn’t get away. One way or another, it was clear that he wasn’t going to meet me tonight.

  I tried to sleep, but I was miserable. Until now, I’d focused all of my concentration on the prospect of stealing Jason’s access card. But now that he hadn’t shown up, my thoughts had nowhere to go and nothing to do but fall into a downward spiral of loneliness and regret. I don’t think I’d ever felt more hopeless or alone than I did that night, shivering in the brush.

  When dawn finally came and I saw the girl approaching on the highway, I felt a moment of manic elation just at the chance to be in contact with another human being.

  But when I stepped onto the road and couldn’t break her from her innocently vacant stare, it was all I could do not to throw a rock at her back and scream, “Talk to me!”

  Even after the girl was out of sight, I couldn’t stop thinking about her empty green eyes and her gruesomely broken foot, trailing that chain.

  And it was only then that I let myself really think about Morgan—I mean, really think about the fact that she’d been sick, just like this girl. I let myself acknowledge that she was really gone, and what I’d done to her. Right after her death, I’d slipped the knitting needle covered in her blood into my back pocket. I took it out and looked at it. I don’t know why I couldn’t get rid of it, but for some reason I didn’t want to let go of this reminder of what I’d done. I thought about the last calm moment I’d shared with her in the silo. I wished I could have had just a few more minutes with her, even if it was just to sit there beside her while she slept among her filth and discarded wrappers.

  And that’s when I remembered Chris’s weird note.

  I tried to pull myself together. I dried my tears with my sleeve. I took out the note, unfolded it, and read it again: Refuse Morgan.

  Was Chris trying to leave a message which he hoped I would understand, but which would be meaningless to any Home Guard ranger who found it? None of the rangers knew, after all, which silo Morgan had been staying in. Maybe there was something there. Maybe Chris had left something else he wanted me to find. It was a long shot, but it was possible.

  I had to get back to the granary.

  * * *

  Now that it was daylight, I took the long way around my parents’ property. I couldn’t just walk straight through the fields again. Instead, I followed the irrigation channels—the tall weeds would keep me hidden from view. Once I made it to the river, I kept close to the bank. For all I knew, the Home Guard was searching the entire area.

  But I didn’t see anyone.

  The granary was completely empty.

  The Home Guard had obviously been there, though. Boot prints were everywhere, and all of the weeds in the grain yard had been flattened by heavy vehicles. The three bodies in the granary were gone.

  Morgan’s silo had been mostly untouched. Someone had obviously searched it because the food wrappers left on the floor had been trampled by booted feet.

  That’s when I realized what Chris’s message meant.

  “Refuse” was another word for “trash”! Chris must have hidden something among Morgan’s trash! He’d known that none of the Home Guard would have paid any attention to trash strewn around the silos in the middle of a night raid for fleeing refugees. None of them even know which of silos Morgan had been kept in. But he knew I did!

  I started to search through every empty meal-ration packet and discarded candy bar wrapper that Morgan had left on the silo floor.

  And finally, I found what I was looking for.

  Inside a Hershey’s wrapper, stained with streaks of leftover chocolate crumbs, was a much longer note from Chris:

  Ashley,

  If you’ve found this, you figured out what the fuck I meant by the note I left on the door, and you fucking kick ass. Sorry to get so cryptic, but it was the only way I could think of to get a message to you while keeping it from the HG’s eyes. But you’ll probably never find this message anyway, which means I’m writing to nobody, and none of this matters…

  But, fuck it. Just in case you do actually find this, listen up. I have a confession to make.

  I haven’t always been the most “ethical” of doctors. Before this whole quarantine thing happened, I used to sell prescription drugs illegally on the side. And it just so happens that Jason Gibbs used to be one of my frequent-flier clients. He used to buy all kinds of pills from me. You name the drug, he’d buy it. The more powerful, the better.

  Before Ian tipped me off that the HG was going to raid the granary, he told me about your plan to steal Jason’s pharmacy access card. I just want to say that I think you’re brave as shit for wanting to do that. You’re a superstar. I hope you’re still planning on doing it, too, because the Underground really, really needs antibiotics. Some of the refugees are in bad shape and progressing fast.

  At the bottom of the same candy wrapper you found this note in are two capsule pills. One is tied up in the finger of a BLUE latex glove. That one’s a powerful sedative. Anyone who takes it will fall unconscious in about twenty minutes.

  The other pill is tied up in the finger of a WHITE latex glove. That one’s just a sugar pill. It won’t have any effect at all.

  I figure if you can slip Jason the sedative while you take the sugar pill, then in twenty minutes he’d be out like a light, and you can take whatever you want from his wallet.

  Tell him the pills are “grasshoppers.” It’s the street name of his favorite drug. Jason fucking loves them. I’ve used the same kind of capsules I used whenever I sold him grasshoppers. He won’t know the difference.

  Just remember: give Jason the pill tied in the finger of the BLUE latex glove. You take the sugar pill tied in the finger of the WHITE latex glove. Don’t mix them up! The pills look identical!

  My cell number is 555-436-7260. But don’t call me from your cell! The HG will trace your position. Call me from a pay phone. Got it?

  Good luck! If you can get that access card, you’ll be doing a lot of good for a lot of people who really need help.

  Later,

  Chris

  I shook the Hershey’s wrapper. Two knotted pieces of latex, like little un-inflated balloons, fell into my palm. One was blue, the other white. I could feel a pill tied inside each of them.

  I looked around the silo. Morgan’s flannel shirt was lying against the wall near where she used to sleep. I remembered pulling it from her dresser the night Ian shot Mr. Hershel and we’d taken Morgan to my parents’ house. It seemed like months ago. I put the shirt on and buttoned it up. If I had to sleep outside again, it would be useful. It felt good to wear a piece of Morgan’s clothing, too. It made me feel close to her. It gave me confidence…and maybe even a little hope.

  The shirt had a tiny breast pocket. I slipped the pills inside and snapped the button.

  I thought again about the ghostly stage-three girl who’d passed me on the road that morning. I thought about the new refugees, who I hoped escaped the Home Guard last night. I thought about everyone else who contracted the pathogen, and everyone who would contract it in the future.

  Tracking down Jason might be impossible, and however certain I’d been earlier that he’d sleep with me given the chance, I wasn’t so sure now that he’d stood me up. Trying to drug him and steal his access card would definitely be the most hopelessly dangerous thing I’d ever done, but I had nothing else to live for. And if I died trying, maybe at least it would make up for some of the ways I’d let my family down.

  I had to find
Jason.

  * * *

  A couple of miles from my parents’ property was a gas station with a mini-mart. It was just on the outskirts of town. By avoiding roads and walking under cover of the trees along the river, I was able to make it there by midday.

  I approached the gas station cautiously from the riverbank, but as I got closer to the road, it was obvious that the place was totally abandoned.

  On my side of the road, a sign marked the border of Muldoon township. MULDOON, POPULATION 647, it read. I’d passed it a million times. That’s probably why I didn’t notice at first that something was hanging from it.

  It was a body.

  It was the body of a Home Guard ranger. He was still in uniform, hanging by a rope from one of the sign’s wooden posts.

  There was a bullet hole in his head. I didn’t recognize the face. Around his neck hung a cardboard sign that read: SICKO FUCKER.

  The Home Guard must have started executing members who were caught having sex with positives. This was obviously a warning from the higher command that if any of the rangers slept with anyone suspected of being infected, the punishment would be swift and harsh.

  No wonder Jason didn’t show up last night. He was a sergeant, but he still had to answer to a higher chain of command. There was obviously a crackdown on wayward rangers, and he’d probably been afraid of getting caught and ending up hanged by the road.

  It was going to be even harder than I’d thought to get him to meet me for sex.

  Still, I wasn’t about to give up.

  I actually found Jason’s home number listed in the pay phone directory. The only problem was that I didn’t have my wallet, and I didn’t have any change to place a call.