by Zuko, Joseph
“Yep, you don’t have to worry about it jamming up or ever having to reload it.”
“That’s why I made the spear. There was a beauty of a shotgun at the store where I made it, but I didn’t know how to use it and to carry enough ammo would have weighed a ton. So I went with a knife on a stick.”
“Well, it got you this far.” Cliff said as he began to head down the hallway for his kid’s room.
“Yes, it did.”
Tina could hear their conversation from around the corner in the kitchen. It finally clicked why Cliff wanted to build it. Not just for protection, but to show it off and get some accolades from another man and it worked.
Was this the beginning of a bromance? Tina thought.
Jim limped into the bathroom and shut the door behind himself. His reflection was ghastly. His body was covered in bruises and cuts. He had never seen it so beat up in his life. His elbows, shoulders, chest, back and knees were all black and blue. The falls and car crashes were harder on his frame than he could have imagined.
Jim set the backpack, towel and dolls down on the counter. He unzipped the bag and pulled out a bottle of peroxide. Jim learned this trick to get blood out when Karen had given birth at home and some blood got on the bed. The midwives poured some peroxide on the stain and it came right out. Jim couldn’t believe it. Up until that moment he thought a blood stain was permanent. He held Ernie over the sink and poured a little of the old bubble medicine out onto his orange face.
He executed a perfect Ernie impression, “Gee, Jim how did I get all of this blood on me?”
Back to his normal voice, “An infected human’s brains were smashed all over the floor and you were too close to the carnage, Ernie.”
Ernie, “Boy, I haven’t been this messy since the first night Bert and I hooked up.” Jim did the Ernie laugh.
Jim, “Ernie, I had no idea. You and Bert were a couple this whole time?”
Ernie, “Yep, I’ve been giving it to old Bert for forty years now.”
Jim, “How do you keep your relationship fresh after all this time?”
Ernie, “We role play sometimes. You know bad doctor and the dirty nurse or nasty teacher and his filthy student. In the nineties we discovered ass to mouth and that’s been fun.” Ernie laughs again.
Someone knocked at the bathroom door and it startled Jim. He had gotten lost in a weird world of puppet perversion for a second.
“Jim, are you okay? I heard voices.” Sara asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Jim’s face went flush. “I’m just cleaning my kid’s doll.”
“Are you decent? Can I come in?”
“Yeah, I guess,” he looked himself over in the mirror. His one article of clothing was a pair of skin tight athletic shorts that still had a protective cup tucked into the front. They left nothing to the imagination, but he was a married man. What did he care?
She opened the door slightly and peeked in, “I saw the cuts on your back and thought you might need help to clean them?”
Jim rinsed off Ernie in the sink, swapped him for the towel on the counter and wrapped it around his waist, “Okay, sure. Thank you.”
Sara opened the door. She had a stack of clothes in her hands, “Cliff said you could borrow these until your clothes were done getting cleaned.” She set them down on the counter next to Jim’s backpack. Sara had a chair from the dining table waiting out in the hall. She picked it up and set it down in the center of the bathroom. Jim took a seat with his back to her. She put on a pair of rubber gloves, picked up the bottle of peroxide and a cotton ball. She soaked the ball of cotton and started at the top of his neck. Jim shuddered when she pressed it to his skin.
“It’s cold.” He shook off the shivers.
“Sorry,” she said as she attacked another cut.
“It’s alright.” Jim could smell the beer on her breath and the smoke on her clothes. It smelled incredible in comparison to his B.O. The peroxide bubbled up all over his back as she spread it from one cut and scratch to the next.
“Do we have a plan?” Sara asked only to break the silence. In their new world plans were good ideas that never worked quite as well as they had hoped.
Jim thought it over. All day long he had been reacting to the situation and not given the luxury of long term plotting. He breathed in a lungful of air, “We need to rest up. Get some food. Devon needs a little more time before we move him. What do you think?”
“I don’t know if I will be able to get any sleep, but we need to try.” Sara got a new cotton ball. The old one was solid red.
Jim’s head dropped and he pretended to be back asleep.
“Exactly.” Sara let out a giggle.
Jim raised his head and looked into the mirror to see her face, “In the morning, no matter what, I have to get to my mother-in-law’s. I have to find my family.”
Sara nodded her head, “We will.” She cleaned out the last of his cuts, set down the bloody cotton ball and pulled off her rubber gloves. “That’s as good as it’s going to get.”
“Thanks doc.” Jim said as he got to his feet.
Sara picked up the chair, “Hit the showers, stinky. Oh and Jim, Bert and Ernie are my favorite Muppets so let’s keep the ass to mouth comments to a minimum. Okay?” she joked as she closed the door on him.
Jim was frozen, too embarrassed to say sorry. He looked down at the two dolls on the counter.
Ernie, “Smooth.”
Classic Bert voice, “Yeah, real smooth.”
Jim stripped down out of the rest of his clothes and cranked the water into the red, “I want it just under blistering.” He talked to himself. “Hot enough to take the first layer of skin off. That might get me clean.” He stepped up into the tub. The blast of superhot H2O felt amazing. He wanted to spend an hour under the shower head, soaking in its glory but he also wanted to get out there and scarf down that food. He reached for the bottle of Cliff’s shampoo and realized it was the exact same stuff he used at home.
We have so much in common.
Why didn’t we ever hangout with these people that lived just upstairs? Jim pondered as his hands scrubbed quickly over his body.
Cliff set up a chair next to Morgan in front of the TV. He handed her a fresh beer and opened one for himself, “How are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m great.” She sipped at the cold can. “It feels good to be out of my little old room. It’s exciting here. All these new people and the kid getting stitched up. I get to see my grandbabies. It’s fucking fantastic.” Her words slurred into one long one. Three beers in and now only Cliff’s trained ear could pick up what Morgan was saying.
“It has been exciting here today.” Cliff looked over the room. Tina was checking on Devon. Her fingers were wrapped around his wrist and she counted out the beats of his heart. Frank sat at the kitchen table, a heap of his guns laid out in front of him. He loaded and checked each of them. Sara sat next to him at the table. She was getting a crash course on firearms. Guns and ammo 101. They looked like a team of mercenaries planning their next raid.
Cliff’s attention was pulled back to Morgan when she laughed out loud at a joke on the TV and whacked him on the shoulder with the back of her hand.
Cliff cleared his throat and started again, “It’s good to spend time with you outside your old place. I’m sorry I haven’t been by much in the last few weeks.”
“Don’t worry. You’ve got work, kids and a wife. You are busy. I get it. I was busy once too.” She waved him off.
“You’re right, but I should have made more of an effort.” Cliff leaned in closer so she could hear him without him raising his voice. “I wanted to tell you that I love you Mom.”
She turned away from her show and squinted her face in confusion, “What the hell are you talking about? What’s all this mush about? I told you to call me Morgan, damn it.”
The near death experiences from the day’s earlier events had got Cliff more emotional than normal. Seeing the family torn apart out in the pa
rking lot had put things into perspective. Life was short. Now it seemed even shorter. It could have been his family out there getting ripped to shreds. The two beers helped tip him over his emotional edge.
“Hey, come on. We don’t know what’s going on out there. We don’t know how much time we have together and I wanted it on the record books, Morgan.”
“Well don’t get all sappy on me boy. You know I hate that.”
“Would it kill you to say it one time?” Cliff threw his arm around her shoulders and playfully jiggled her gently back and forth.
“It might. Stop that shit. You know shaking me makes my stomach feel sick.” She shrugged off his arm.
Cliff sat up straight and stared down at his beer. He knew Morgan was never one for affection and there was no changing her now.
She shifted in her seat and then turned to Cliff. A light had gone off in her brain and she just remembered something. The look on her face told Cliff she thought it was hilarious. “What was that silly guy you liked as a kid, Wee Wee Shurman?”
“Pee-wee Herman.”
“That’s right and he had the crazy show.”
“Pee-wee’s Play House.”
“I’ll always remember that day. Here comes little Cliff running up to me in the kitchen and he asks me if I knew that Pee-wee was real. I asked you what you meant by “real” and you said-”
“He’s alive and not a cartoon.” Cliff smirked. It wasn’t the first time she told him this story.
“He was real Mama and not a cartoon you said. It took me a little bit to figure out what the hell you meant by not a cartoon. I sat down and watched the dumb show with you and then I could see what you meant. He acted like a fucking cartoon character. So damn funny.” Morgan giggled to herself. “He’s real!” She laughed a little harder.
“I was five. I thought everything on TV was a cartoon.” Cliff playfully defended himself. Morgan’s laughter calmed down and then she reached over and patted Cliff on his knee.
“I love you too.” She winked at him. “You son of a bitch.”
Cliff chewed on his lower lip. It had been a long time since she had said the “L” word. He leaned over her armrest and pulled Morgan in for a kiss on the cheek.
“Damn it, stop that, that’s why I don’t let this shit get mushy. You turn into a wet noodle and want all this affection bullshit.” Morgan muscled him off of her. He released her from the kiss and sat back in his own chair.
“You love me,” Cliff teased.
Morgan rested her weary head in the palm of her hand, “Please, shut the fuck up.”
Jim exited the bathroom fresh and clean. He had removed the bandage from his forehead and the jagged stiches on his forehead made him look like Frankenstein. He thought it might be a good idea to let it air out before he had Tina wrap it again for the night. He sported Cliff’s old black T-shirt and blue jeans. He felt a million times better with the dried sweat and blood cleaned off his body. Now he was ready to eat. He could smell its amazing aroma from the bathroom. The pit in his stomach begged for a full meal. The cereal he had scarfed down was only an appetizer and now his appetite for meats and vegetables had to be fulfilled. Both Bert and Ernie were cleaned so he placed them in his main backpack for safe keeping.
Everyone else had just fixed themselves a plate of food and found a place to sit at the table or in the living room.
“Help yourself,” Tina pointed to the range and then she took a bite off her fork.
“There’s cold beer in the fridge,” Cliff added.
“Thank you,” Jim found the plate and fork that was left for him. He piled the food high onto his dish and snagged a fresh can out of the fridge.
He entered the dining room and took a seat at the table next to Frank and Sara. Jim popped open the can and took a long swig of Tacate. He dug into his food and the flavor was overwhelming. He tried to pace himself and not just shovel it into his mouth, but it was difficult to hold back. The apartment was quiet, except for the soft sounds of humans chewing. If Jim concentrated he could hear the chaos outside. The sound of gunfire and chaos continued on and Jim thought to himself.
Was this what it was like for the families in wartorn Europe during World War II?
Your life must go on even though someone else’s was coming to an end?
The internal noise his mouth made while chomping the food helped drown out the new war taking place in the background.
Jim finished off a fork full of beef and turned to his hosts, “This is amazing. Thank you guys for everything.”
“It’s our pleasure,” Tina answered.
More silence.
It was tough for the group to conceive an appropriate conversation. They weren’t friends and this wasn’t a party. What could they possibly talk about? What do normal people talk about at gatherings? Movies, TV shows they had recently seen, music, books, online videos, gossip, things you saw on Facebook and the other day to day bullshit people love to retell. All of that seemed pointless.
Who cares if you liked a silly piece of pop culture?
Every one of us had almost died today.
Well that’s something in common. Jim thought.
As he finished his food and beer it dawned on him that who they were in the past didn’t matter anymore. The only thing that mattered was survival.
Did they have what it would take to make it through this?
Jim hoped so, but he wasn’t sure. Could this be stopped? Was there a cure? Or was this the future? Would they soon all be racing around on homemade muscle cars, wearing football pads, mohawks and killing everyone they came across in the barren wasteland that was once Vancouver, Washington? It was a depressing thought.
Finally after nearly fifteen minutes of silence they were all done eating, Frank cleared his throat.
“I got up early this morning to go do some fishing, like I always do.” Frank’s hands were laced together over his empty plate and he kept his head down, almost in prayer as he talked. “I crept out of the house so I wouldn’t disrupt my wife sleeping. My boy had come home for the week. He was on leave and we were supposed to go fishing together, but his old high school friends had taken him out to a bar last night and he had gotten pretty wasted. I found him passed out on the couch. He reeked of booze and I knew it would be more torture than fun for him out on the boat so I let him sleep in.” Frank paused to take a sip of beer.
He had a captive audience and this unprovoked story came from left field. Jim just figured the silence had gotten to Frank and out of the uncomfortable awkwardness he felt compelled to tell his tale.
Frank set down his can, leaned back into his chair and continued, “The waters were calm and the fish were biting. It was a perfect spring morning. By noon I was ready to call it a day so I packed up and headed home.” Frank’s voice took on a slight tremor as he went on. “The second I got home I knew something was wrong. I could smell it in the air. Sick smell to the living room. On the couch where my boy’s head had been laying was a pile of vomit. I got so mad at him. I couldn’t believe that he hadn’t cleaned it up. One of the reasons my boy joined the service was because of his O.C.D. He was the cleanest, most orderly kid I had ever met and the military was right up his alley. When I called out his name I did it in anger. I yelled, Michael! There was no answer. I set down my tackle box and rod on the table then there was a noise upstairs. I went to see what was going on, maybe he had passed out in the bathtub? The closer I got to my bedroom the louder the noise grew. I couldn’t make it out. When-” Frank’s voice cracked and his eyes filled with tears. Sara reached across the table and held his hand. “When I opened the door. I didn’t understand. I couldn’t make out what was happening. I could see my wife’s legs poking out from the comforter, but everything looked red. Like it was all covered in red. Michael’s head rose up from the center of the mattress. His eyes were black. His face was caked in his mother’s blood.” Frank’s tears streamed down his face as he relived the nightmare. “He launched across the room at me. I�
��m no coward, but Michael is two hundred pounds of pure muscle and if he wanted to hurt me there was nothing I could do to stop him. So I ran. I slammed the door in his face and ran. He had choked on his own vomit, died, came back as one of them and killed his own mother.” Frank wiped away his tears and fought to get control, but the day had been too much for him and he needed to get it out. “If I had waked him up. If I had made him come with me. They would both still be alive.”
Jim reached out and took Frank’s other hand. They squeezed each other’s palms, “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine how you are feeling right now, but know this. The three of us,” Jim indicated Sara, Devon and himself, “we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you.”
“We are a new family now,” Sara told him as she wiped away a tear from her own cheek.
Jim nodded his head, “She’s right. We stick together, watch each other’s backs and we will get through this.”
Frank took in a long full breath and let it out, “Okay. I’m okay.”
Tina brushed away a salty drop from her eye, “Oh my God you guys. You’re killing me over here. My heart is going to explode.”
“I think we all need another drink,” Cliff said as he got to his feet and headed for the kitchen. “Anyone else need a new one?” He asked.
“Yes!” Everyone but Devon answered.
Chapter 13
Karen laid in her mother’s bed. The soft glow of a nightlight filled the room. She could just make out the shapes of the furniture in the room. A little girl was tucked under each of her arms. She had just finished reading them a story and now they were snuggling until Robin fell asleep. This had been the routine for the last year and it worked. She had downed the double shot that Leon had mixed for her right before she told the girls to head for the bedroom. It really hit the spot and helped Karen feel a little more relaxed. She wasn’t quite ready for bed herself, but it was late enough to get Valerie and Robin down for the night.
“Mama, why are we sleeping in Ganny’s bed?” Valerie rolled over onto her side to look at Karen’s face.