by Mark Tufo
“Bitch stuck me,” I laughed. Blade couldn’t have been more than a couple of inches long, I don’t know what she’d intended to do with it. I admired her effort, but her arm would have got tired from the repeated stabs long before it did any real damage. I don’t know what was worse, that I’d just killed three people or that I didn’t give a shit about it. I walked out of that clearing without once even thinking about looking back. I’d gone about a half mile, when I could smell the smoke and hear voices in the distance. There were sounds of construction going on. That night, when I could get a better look, I saw that they were fixing up a structure that was already in place.
It looked like a millionaire with an even larger aversion to people than I had, had decided to set up shop here, once upon a time. A fairly large brick home had weathered the unrelenting storm of time fairly well. It was hard to tell, but I think even a few of the windows had survived. My heart nearly froze in my chest when I saw my daughter sitting on a log fashioned into a comfortable chair. She was staring into the fire, a melancholy look on her face. Justin came up and threw a blanket across her shoulders. I reached my hand out, willing it to be long enough to touch them. More people streamed out from the house. Some I knew, most I didn’t. They were carrying a variety of food, it looked like they were about to have a celebratory feast.
Travis came out of the house last; he had a huge smile plastered on his face. He brought out a what I figured to be a roasted turkey. For a split second I thought he looked to the spot where I was hiding; his mouth downturned ever so slightly, and then his hesitation was gone as a small child pulled on his pants leg.
“Come on dad! I’M STARVING!” she said overly dramatically, throwing her head back and pretending to faint.
“You’re a ham,” he told her, heading over to a large, freshly built picnic table decorated with a dozen burning candles. When they all sat, I noticed there was one empty seat at the head of the table. “To dad!” Travis held up his glass.
“To Mike!” Another held up what looked like beer.
It was all I could take, I turned and walked silently away. I’d been called here for a reason and that reason was now lying dead in a clearing a good mile from this very spot. They were safe for now. Maybe it would have been for the best if that was the last time I’d seen them; I could remember their happy, smiling faces. Unfortunately, that was as far from the truth as was possible. There is no truly, “happily ever after” story; it just cannot exist. We are mortal. We die. The end of all those fucking fairy tales should say, “They lived happily ever after, until they died, then everyone was fucking sad.” Why should this story be any different?
Much later, in the deep depths of winter after I’d returned to Ron’s, I realized that day had been Thanksgiving. It was another decade before I felt compelled to head upstate again. The snow had finally given way to early spring. The ground was nearly thawed. In a couple of weeks we’d be in full-on mud season, a phenomenon the rest of the country probably didn’t even know existed. The ground literally just turned into a muddy wet mess for a few weeks as the permafrost released its icy grip. The moisture had nowhere to go and so would stay right where it was. Tracy used to lose her mind when I would drag pounds of the material adhered to my feet inside. I’d had more than one mop handle whacked across my ass.
I DON’T KNOW why I had to go back, although I could guess. With a heavy heart, I set out. Knowing where I had to go and not being riddled with doubt whether I should go, made the trek that much faster. This time, the gaze out upon the lake from the roadway was even more breathtaking, if that was possible. The large meadow where I’d laid out Lilac and her gang had partially been repurposed for crops. Nothing as of yet was popping out of the ground, but it had been recently plowed and, I’d imagine, planted. There were penned up deer, turkeys, and goats. I saw a couple of dogs playing off in the distance. I didn’t see any people in the fields, which didn’t make me feel any better about why I was here.
The original approach to their settlement was out of the question; they’d see me coming for a mile. I decided to go around to the other side of the lake. Couldn’t have made much more of a shitty decision if I tried, at least for the first half. Thorn bushes had decided this was the single best place on the planet to spread their roots and raise their blood inducing barbs. I’d almost given up on that particular avenue of travel when I finally broke through and was able to get to the lake shoreline. I got pretty close to the house from this approach. They’d done a lot of work since the last time. The boarded up windows had been replaced with glass. The mortar had been redone and some of the bricks had been replaced. Anything wooden on the structure had got a facelift as well. A large wraparound deck now adorned the home, overlooking the lake.
Behind and to the side was a large barn, the doors were closed but I thought I heard a horse whinny inside. The one large picnic table now had a smaller brother. A huge fire pit had been built in the center of the yard. Again, it was Nicole I saw first, she was crying. A man I did not know came out and embraced her in a hug that told me all I needed to know about who he was in her life.
“Now or never,” I muttered as I stepped out onto the grass.
There was a loud gasp from Nicole. The man by her side tensed up, he reached to his side for a gun he wasn’t wearing. My daughter ran pretty good for someone in her seventies.
“Daddy!” She may have looked older than me but she was still my little girl.
The man relaxed somewhat but, there was a deep look of confusion on his face, and rightfully so. I met Nicole halfway and picked her up. Fat tears soaked into my jacket where her face buried into my shoulder.
“What happened?” I asked after an intense hug and I’d put her down.
“It’s Justin. He was climbing a tree and fell out.” Nicole could barely make it through her retelling. “He fell out and broke his back.”
Justin had always loved to climb. He’d figured out how to get up on a chair and then the counter a week before he’d figured out how to walk. When he was young and I couldn’t find him, looking up was always the best bet. I wanted to know what the damn fool was doing hefting his old ass up into a tree, but what was the point?
Travis came out of the house next. Deep black bags were housed under red-rimmed eyes. He looked to me; I saw a flash of something there, and then he turned away disgusted. I think having a broad sword break through my chest plate and skewer my heart would have hurt less.
“He thought you’d eventually come to your senses and join us,” Nicole said when she saw the look of sadness I now wore. “I’d hoped the same thing, but I knew why you didn’t. I’ve missed you so much.” She came in again for a hug which I gladly reciprocated.
“Dad, this is my husband, Les,” she said, making introductions.
“Nice to meet you,” he said. I could tell he was hesitant to extend his hand, but he did so after a moment.
“Honey, I love you, but I always thought you were full of shit when you talked about your dad.” He was looking at me as he talked to her, our hands still gripped. “It’s an honor sir,” he said as we let go.
It was strange having a man that could have been old enough to be my father call me sir.
“Trust me, if I stayed around too long you would recant your words. Honey, can you take me to Justin?”
“Sure dad.” Her head was hanging down. As we entered, it was hard to miss the original grandeur of the house they were doing their best to restore. A large, semi-circular stairway dominated the entire left of my field of vision; to the right was an expansive living room. When we entered, Travis sat down hard in an armchair and glared at me. I wanted to wave to him, to say hi, to pick him up and tell him how much I loved him. Instead I pursed my lips and let my daughter lead me up the staircase to where Justin was resting.
Again I thought my heart was just going to seize up and stop all function as I peered down at the frail and broken body of my child. His chest rose and fell as a wispy, wheezy breath tumble
d from his lips. He smacked his mouth a couple of times, his eyes fluttered open.
“Thirsty,” he said hoarsely. Nicole picked up a container of water from a nightstand. I put my hand on her shoulder and took it from her.
I put the rim of the glass to his lips; he tilted his head to take a couple of gulps down. He moved back to say “thank you.”
“You’re welcome, son,” I told him as I stroked the side of his face.
His eyes shot open. It took him a good long moment to fight through the haze of pain and the pain-reducing concoction he’d been given.
“Dad? Dad, is that really you? Or did I die?”
“You’re still very much alive.” Tears poured forth from my eyes unannounced.
“Have you come to shoot me?”
“I...I...” I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about or what to say.
“You should see your face right now.” He coughed out a laugh. “Just remembering back to the day I was scratched by the zombie. You remember that day, dad?”
“Like it was yesterday, Justin.”
“I always wanted to thank you for not shooting me, for giving me a chance to live. I’ve...we’ve had a good life here, dad. The only thing that would have made it better would have been you.” He grabbed my hand. His fingers were warped with arthritis and covered with age spots.
“What the hell were you doing in that tree, son?”
“What I was always doing, dad. Looking at the world.”
“Good an answer as any, I suppose.” I sniffed and wiped a tear away that refused to fall on its own.
“Are you here to take me home?”
“I’m here to say goodbye.” He nodded at that.
“Really screwed up this time.”
“Are you stating the obvious?” I asked him. We both smiled, his nickname growing up had been Captain Obvious; he had me wondering now if that had been a ploy on his part all along.
“The west field—was that your doing?”
“The three?”
He nodded.
“It was.”
“They meant us harm?”
“They did.”
“Thank you for that.”
“I would do anything in my power to keep you guys safe. I’d talked to your mother once about equipping you with a parachute when you were younger; probably should have followed through with that.”
He laughed so hard he began to cough, blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
“He needs to rest, dad.”
“I know, I’m going to stay with him.” She kissed me on the cheek, grabbed a chair for me to sit in and then closed the door as she and her husband left.
I held his hand throughout the night. He called out a couple of times for his mother and once for someone named Meghan. I felt much like the Angel of Death, keeping vigilance on his soul. A few times through the night Nicole and others would come in to see how he was doing. There were young children in the earlier hours running around the legs of the adults, too shy to say hi. By the time the sun began to peek through the windows I knew he wasn’t long for this world; there were others in the room with us now. Others from beyond, I guess. I swear I could feel Tracy’s presence in that room, come to show her boy the way.
I stood and kissed him. “Godspeed, son. Tracy, he’s yours now.” I went to the door to let Nicole know she needed to come quick and say her goodbyes.
I walked outside as a steady stream of people headed to that room, had to be somewhere over twenty, most I did not know nor did I want to. There was a service later that day; it consisted of each of the adults getting up and delivering a funny story about Justin. As far as funerals go, it was one of the most uplifting ones I had ever had the displeasure of attending. Its purpose was obviously to remember the good times they had shared with my boy and not that he was gone. Some things I knew, these from Nicole and Travis, but, for the most part, I was being let in on a large part of my son’s life that I had missed. I was happy to note he had become something of a prankster in his later years.
A large pyre had been set-up and burned that night, not more than ten feet from the lake. For the first couple of hours, the entire small community had stood vigilance. One by one they had said a small prayer then headed off to bed. I stayed the entire night with my son’s body. I could not, I would not move that entire night. The next morning was in the midst of being forged when there were little more than embers. I grabbed the small box I had brought with me for just this occasion, scooped up some ashes, and headed back to the house to tell my daughter goodbye. She was sitting on the porch, a heavy blanket draped around her shoulders and a steaming cup of some sort of herbal tea in her hands.
“You’re not staying.” It was supposed to be a question but she already knew the answer. “So the next time I see you will be on my death bed then?”
I said nothing. She’d known the answer to that question too, even if I wasn’t too sure.
“Do you know when I’m going to die? Forget it.” She held up a free hand. “I don’t want to know. But do you?” She had her eyes on me.
“How would I?” I told her honestly.
“Why won’t you stay?” Tears threatened to fall.
“I’m not the man I once was. I’m barely a man. The father you knew has been broken for so long and the pieces scattered with the wind, I wouldn’t even know how to reassemble them.”
“Those are just words. You’re here now. I see the pain you feel for the loss of Justin. For the loss of time you missed with us all. You can begin the healing process right here, right now. It’s your choice.”
“You sound very much like your mother.”
“She was right. You do change the subject when you’re cornered. When are you leaving?”
Again I said nothing, I was afraid my voice would break if I spoke.
“Go then. I will always love you dad, but you’ve made it hard sometimes.”
“I love you too.” She turned her head when I reached out to caress the side of her face.
Travis came to the door, he saw the tears on his sister’s face and me with my small pack. It didn’t take him more than a second to figure out what was going on.
“Fuck you, dad.” That last word dripped with derision.
There were so many things I wanted to say to him. Instead I turned and headed back to my cold home. I’d made it up onto the roadway when I thought back to how Tracy and I would continually tell our son not to swear. I wondered if we somehow knew that one day he would utter those words to one of us and the pain would be so acute as to be incomprehensible. I should have been more diligent in my attempts.
I hurriedly took my time going back, if that makes sense. What was the rush? I walked to exhaustion each night, in the hopes that I would fall immediately asleep; otherwise, I was racked with deep bouts of guilt and depression that spiraled down into head pounding sobbing sessions. I could not possibly be anymore alone in the world. Even the spirits kept their distance.
Chapter 15
MIKE JOURNAL ENTRY 9 2 Weeks Later
“MICHAEL, ARE YOU in there somewhere?” It was Azile. The column had stopped and it looked like we were calling it a day.
I shook my head violently, centrifugally sending my thoughts as far to the recesses of my mind as I could. They’d invariably creep back up, but for now, I had a break.
“What’s going on?” I don’t know how long I hadn’t shifted in my saddle but I was convinced I’d broken my hip as I swung my left leg over to dismount. “Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck,” were my utterances as my feet planted on the ground. I was bent over, doing my best to breathe through the pain.
“Perhaps I should begin my quest to find a new mate...one less ancient than yourself,” she laughed. “Do you need help, old man?”
“Can you conjure up a walker?”
“Not sure if seeing the world’s greatest warrior shuffling about would be a good visual for the troops.”
“World’s greatest warrior? Do I get
a plaque or something? Screw it. Just put some of those tennis balls on the front legs of the walker so I don’t go down in a heap; I lost my LifeAlert bracelet a few miles back so you’ll have to watch out for me.”
She helped me to a seat, got a fire going, and even got me some food. I was halfway through whatever I was eating when I looked up. “Okay. What the hell is going on?”
“What?”
“Listen, I might be slow on the uptake but if there were a cookie jar, your hand would be firmly entrenched in it. Spill it.”
“Lana and Bailey have agreed to turn around.”
“Dammit.” I took a second to process the new information. “I’m surprised it took them this long.”
“They would have turned back a week ago, Michael, if it wasn’t for you.”
Going off the rails was what I wanted to do. I just didn’t have it in me to do that. We’d been relentlessly following Xavier and hopefully Mathieu for over three weeks and instead of gaining, we were somehow losing ground. Odds that Mathieu still graced this plane were significantly reduced each and every day I did not get him back. By this point there was no reason to think he was still alive, except for that nagging, persistent pain in the ass thing called hope. It dangled glittering prizes always just out of reach, and just when you thought you could grasp what had eluded you for so long, it would vanish into the material it had always been: smoke.
Bailey didn’t have much in the way of tact, which was fine. I actually preferred it that way. She came up a few moments after Azile had left to tend to something, to deliver the news herself.