An hour later and Michael started to feel an overwhelming sense of anxiety. Why wasn’t his father back? Was his mother really just outside, wandering the streets? He kneeled before the woman, who still sat on the toilet that they had left her on.
The towel was fully soaked in blood now. It hadn’t stopped the wound like Michael thought it would.
“How do you feel?” Michael said.
“Angry.”
The woman just looked down at the floor, and a finger on her right hand twitched for a moment.
“What did you say?”
“I could kill the bastard,” she said. “If I could just get out of this chair.”
Michael didn’t think there was anything else that he could do for the woman but wait and hope that help would arrive soon.
“What’s your name?”
“Bitch.”
“What?”
“B-b-b-bitch.”
“Okay, why don’t you stay here for a bit. It probably won’t be comfortable, but I’m just going to close the bathroom door so you can get some rest.”
Dustin started to whimper as though he was going to cry. He didn’t want to be stuck in this dark room with the crazy woman any longer.
There was a sudden banging against the bathroom door. Michael figured the woman probably woke up from her sleep. He walked over to the door and tried to open it but found that the woman was pushing against it from the other side.
“What’s going on, are you okay?”
The banging stopped. There was shuffling behind the door. Jess tried pushing until he forced it open. The woman was standing about five feet away from the door opening, her toque missing and her head hanging down so that her grey hair covered her face.
“What’s going on?”
“I don’t feel, right.”
“What do you mean; can you explain? Is it your injury?”
“I think my heart is about to stop, like I’m having a slow heart attack or something, and I’m scared, and angry. So angry.”
Michael put a hand around the woman’s waist and tried guiding her over to the chair. She grabbed his wrist tightly as she sat down.
“You’re still strong, aren’t you? Full of life and muscle, and flowing blood.”
Michael laughed nervously. “I guess so,” she said.
She sat in the chair motionless, save for the long, deep breaths that entered and exited her open mouth.
A moment later, the heavy breathing seemed to stop. Michael leaned in close but couldn’t hear anything. He checked her wound quickly by lifting up her shirt a little and saw that it had turned black, like rotted, dead flesh.
He wondered what he was supposed to do and she opened her eyes and exhaled. Not a normal breath like someone would take after emerging from a long swim, but an exhalation of breath and sound, like someone who in relief was letting go of the last grips on something. Like Jesus dropping the cross.
Michael was certain it was the first stages of the body slackening; letting go. But then her hand came up for his wrist again and Michael let her take it, surprised by the movement.
Her grip was strong, like that of someone scared and trying to hang on for dear life.
She struggled to get to her feet, and her lips recoiled to show her teeth. She practically fell upon Michael, lashing out at him like a drugged animal.
Michael pushed her off and backed up in the doorway.
“What’s wrong? What’s going on?”
But there was no answer, just the awkward attempt of the woman trying to get to her feet. The same horribly slow expulsion of sound coming from her throat as she tried to steady herself on her feet. And there was something wrong with her eyes, like they had glossed over – almost exactly like a cadaver’s did in the movies, Michael thought.
Chapter 19
It was difficult to believe that Toni was sick. Infected was a world that kept entering Jess’s head.
Jess had half the hair on his head go grey and his back hurt; his stomach protruded and his face was beginning to show permanent creases. Toni seemed to suffer from none of this - even after all these years she still stood up straight and tall, like a proud flower. Her head arched a little more, confused by the ringing sounds. The wind was hurling ash all around them, like a furious grey tunnel that they stood inside.
Jess was transfixed. He wanted to help her but wasn’t sure what to do.
The ringtone sounded like distant wind chimes. Toni looked down at her body and slowly turned in a semi-circle as if searching for the source of the sound.
She didn’t have a purse on her - so it must have been in a pocket but she seemed oblivious to the concept. With her back now towards him, Jess decided to act quickly. He took his belt off, wrapped it around Toni’s neck and pulled her around to the back of the van. She struggled a little but because she couldn’t see him since he was leading her from behind, she seemed disoriented and unable to fend him off.
He pushed her in the van and closed the doors.
She was having a fit in the back. So loud was the banging that he wondered if she could actually break through. He walked around the van and determined that it must have sounded worse than it really was. The walls were metal of some sort – no thick perhaps, but thick enough that no human hand could break through it very easily.
The store was close by. The commotion hadn’t seemed to attract any other attention, so he moved slowly across the street. He had to pry the front doors open and as he slid in he thought he heard the sound of an engine in the distance.
Must be the wind.
He checked the time – 15 minutes had passed already.
There were a few spotlights lit around the store, likely from a backup generator. It didn’t provide much light however, but just enough to keep the place from being pitch black. Others had obviously rummaged the store earlier, as there was rotting fruit and vegetables all over the ground. Almost every aisle was in the same state. Jess went quickly, looking for canned goods and filled up his plastic basket as he found tins that didn’t look damaged.
It only took him a few minutes and then he was heading across the street again. He had to put the items up front in the van. It was going to be a tight fit with the food and two teenage boys but it was like one big sofa cushion across the front. When he dropped the cans on the floor, a banging could be heard in the back again. Toni was growling and hitting the wall. There was no way he was going to be able to pretend that nothing was back there.
He started the engine, which unfortunately caught the attention of some shuffling bodies. He drove down the ramp, stopping the van just in front of the entrance that led to the laundry room.
When he approached the door, he could hear banging inside. He quickly threw open the door and saw his boys standing against the far wall as two bodies struggled on the floor. It was an old woman with long grey hair and a man by the looks of it.
“Boys! Come, now!”
He motioned for them to exit the room and they did - Michael pushed Dustin forward first and then followed him. The door was starting to close when the man in the fracas looked up and saw Jess.
“You!”
It was Roscoe - seemingly in a struggle with this contaminated senior woman, and it looked like he had lost most of his right ear in the struggle. Blood trailed down the one side of his face. He was holding her by the throat, likely to keep her teeth away from him.
The door closed and Jess ushered the boys down the hall towards the van. He heard Roscoe shouting from within the room - angry, violent shouts.
A loud bang finally drowned him out.
“In the front seat, now.”
Both boys got in and Jess started the van and put it in gear. Banging continued in the back of the vehicle.
They all had to squint their eyes against the light before them. It was not the sun that caused them to shield their eyes. The building across the street had now caught on fire.
“That’s probably the noise we heard,” Jess said.
/> All of it was going up in a massive pyre. Jess pushed down on the accelerator pedal and moved them past the blaze, yet they were close enough to feel the heat, even through closed doors and windows.
Jess kept checking the rear-view mirror for signs of Roscoe.
“You still have the smartcard?” he said to Michael.
The boy nodded.
“Make sure the GPS and anything else that can track us is off.”
“Oh, I can do better than that,” Michael said. “I can get Orson to manually change our coordinates and make him think we’re on the opposite side of town.”
Jess looked down at his son.
“Really?”
It was so dark on the streets that the headlights of the van seemed to scan to the distant horizon where they were clear of other vehicles. They were not able to travel very fast, as cars were scattered across the street, and were not always visible until they were almost upon them. Most were deserted by their occupants. At least, that’s what it seemed like at first glance. But they had not all deserted their cars – many had died in them.
He hoped that his boys hadn’t noticed that there were lifeless forms in the windows. The state of the roads made it so that he had to get out of the vehicle a few times, just to see if there was a way around the blockage in front of them. Some of the dead had their heads slumped against the windows but most, thankfully, had fallen down in their seats and were out of view; others were slumped over their steering wheels, red blood lines trailing away from their ears and noses.
The boys were sitting together on the other side of the stick shift, quiet for a good hour, presumably shocked into silence by the devastation. Then Michael made a grunting sound as he shuffled in his seat.
“What happened to them?”
“Don’t look,” Jess said.
They went back to not talking for a bit. Jess felt uncertain about how to calm them, if that was even possible. Toni would have handled this part of it so much better. Dustin’s hands were slapping the top of his thighs in what, to him, must have had some rhythmic logic.
Michael looked out the window, rubbing the stubble on his chin.
“Holy crap, the mall is burning!”
Jess and Dustin looked over and saw smoke coming from the far end of the mall and a glow that could only be fire.
“I wish we could stop and get some video games,” Dustin said.
“”Or a new PAL,” Michael added. “The latest version has nano-integration out of the box!”
Michael looked over at his eldest son.
“What does that even mean?”
“Implants, dad,” Dustin said. “The PAL starts feeding your brain directly.”
“Why would you want to do that?”
“Because there’s no need for devices anymore. You don’t need to worry about forgetting your smartcard – it’s always with you.”
“Michael wants to be a cyborg.”
“Shut up!”
Michael shook his head.
They went over something on the road that made the van jump and jostled them all back onto the road before them. Jess heard things bounce around in the back and now banging could be heard on the wall directly behind their backs.
“What is that noise?” Michael said.
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Can’t you answer anything?”
Jess stomped on the brakes and put the car in park.
“Fine, you want to know? I’ll tell you, but we’re all going to regret this. Those noises coming from the back of the van? That’s your mother. Remember that old woman in the laundry room? How she turned into some kind of a monster? Your mother’s the exact same way. I found her when I was walking over to the grocery store. She tried to attack me but I was able to get her in the back of the van. I’m hoping we can help her. Find a doctor or a government base where they can give her an antidote or something - but I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
More bangs came from the rear of the vehicle.
“Do not even think about going back there to see her. She’s not herself and we can’t see her or talk to her until we get her help. Just be thankful that we found her.”
Jess reached down by their feet and pulled out the basket of cans. He handed three cans of Chef-Boyardee pasta and a can opener he swiped to Michael. Slowly Michael turned the handle on each can and they ate in the silence of the upward glow of the pointed flashlight.
The boys were circling their fingers around the inside of the can to scoop up as much of the sauce as they could. Dustin began tapping on the bottom of the empty metal cylinder, creating a repetitive drum beat that echoed in the cabin.
“Where’s Orson?” Jess said.
Michael pulled it out of the bag and showed him. The screen came on and his fingers did a few motions on the glass. He raised his gaze for only a moment; a frustrated look flashed on his face as if he didn’t get the answer he wanted and then he continued on for five more minutes, pushing buttons and looking increasingly agitated.
“Fuck!”
“What did you say?” Jess grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to look at him. “I don’t want to hear you say that word again. It’s completely inappropriate and your mother would not be happy to hear it.”
The look on his face did not change. Smug and young - it made him seethe with anger until one of his hands lashed out and slapped the boy across the face.
Before he realized that he was winding up for another blow, Dustin cried out.
“Stop dad!”
Michael just stared at him, more shocked than hurt. Probably what he looked like many years ago, he thought.
“I’m sorry. I don’t want to hear you use that word again.”
He shrugged his shoulders and turned the smartcard off, slipping it into his jacket pocket.
“Well, what did it say?”
“I can’t get a signal to make a phone call. I can’t get anything to work. Data usually works everywhere nowadays – not in the subway, but everywhere else. Where are we going?”
His eyes were pleading in the light of the flashlight.
“We’re going to grandma and grandpa’s place. I’ve got us clothes and food. They were prepared for these kinds of emergencies there.”
“What about my stuff?” Dustin said.
Jess knew that he was thinking about his video games and his collection of mint anime comic books that were worth a small fortune.
“We’ll come back for it if we can,” Jess said, urging them toward to the minivan. “It’s not going anywhere.”
The response didn’t really put Dustin at ease. He didn’t care that the gadgets were useless without power. Obtaining them took years of lobbying prior to holidays and birthdays. They were valuable because of the difficulty in obtaining them.
Chapter 20
He looked at his older son now through the rear-view mirror. He looked so much like he used to, the wide-set jaw and the way his nose wrinkled at the bridge when he was tense or laughing – any reaction apart from being still. Michael though, had one thing that his father hadn’t for many years: a sense of ownership; of entitlement. Michael felt that his appreciated physical abilities, his adult-like physique, granted him entry into adult decisions and events. His father had given up competing for all that was available to him. He had that drive at Michael’s age – that desire to be the best; a leader and go-getter. But that was before everything changed.
Now Jesse worked because he had to. He was tired and broken.
“Where are we going?” Michael repeated.
“I told you: to your grandparent’s,” he said.
“Why does Mommy keep hitting the walls?” Dustin said. It was a title he hadn’t used in many years. Mommies were protective. Dustin wanted his mommy.
“I don’t know,” Jess said. “All of these infected people seem angry for some reason.”
“Maybe she’s hungry,” Dustin said.
Jess thought about the various infected people
he’d seen over the last few days and shuddered as he pondered what they seemed most interested in eating.
“Maybe she is.”
“Can we give her some food? There’s another can of pasta in here.”
“Not right now, but I’ll tell you what. The next time we find a place to settle down for a bit I’ll try going back there to see if I can offer her something. For now, you two have to stay away from her.”
They passed by a bus that had slammed into the side of a house. As Jess drove around it the headlights showed that the vehicle sported the same insignia as the one emblazoned on Jesse’s work shirts and maroon jacket: the city’s public transportation authority.
They still hadn’t made it out of the city yet.
The carnage was everywhere and every few minutes Jess came across a street that he was unable to continue on. Cars would be piled up in accidents that blocked the way. He’d have to turn around and go back to find some other route to get through. Occasionally, cars would be burning in the street. They’d roll their windows up against the black smoke as they passed by and then roll them back down once they were clear.
There wasn’t a living person to be seen. Bodies were also strewn on the sidewalks, pedestrians perhaps, out walking the dog or taking the trash to the curb. Others had survived, Jess was certain, like the others in the building, but they all seemed long removed from the city.
It took twice as long to get anywhere as it would have normally, even with the gridlock. The boys marvelled at the ash, looking so much like snow, was still falling from the sky.
When he turned his wipers on the boys realized that it wasn’t snow. The flakes were smudged across the windshield, leaving a dirty trail. This was dust, or soot, perhaps from the earth or from things burning, blowing up into the air and descending back to the ground again. It soon formed a thin layer on the van. He had his boys roll up their windows.
“Don’t touch or taste that stuff if you can help it,” Jess said. “It’s not what it looks like.”
An hour later the falling ashes had become thicker. The distant horizon was blotched out by them. The sky almost seemed to darken continuously as they drove.
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