When Connor described the chaos that fractured Europe and Asia, the severity of it all crashed down on me. I couldn’t process it. The whole world - the entire globe…infected?
Connor was right, his son probably was dead.
“I’m so sorry Connor.” I whispered.
“I should have been there. I should’ve at least been there, in case…what if he had no one in the end?” He covered his face with his hands and stayed that way for a long time.
I sat next to him, not sure how to comfort him. I decided not to lie. “Being there, as a parent, would have only made it harder for you.” My voice wavered.
He sat up and looked at me. His eyes were moist. It made the blue color of his irises brighter, almost turquoise in color. He stared at me intently.
“As a parent…?”
I cleared my throat and braced my arms against my legs. “My daughter’s eight…my son is four. Was, was eight and four.” My body trembled and Connor reached out to me. I couldn’t say anymore.
“Oh my god, Riley.” He hugged me to him. When I began to softly weep he pulled me under the covers with him and we stayed in bed that way, in our clothes, holding and crying into each other until we ran dry.
Zoey slept fitfully at our feet, lost in her own dark dreams.
***
The next morning we woke at dawn. We left the window curtains wide open the day before and as the sun broke the surface along the eastern side of town it lit up the room with radiant streaks of oranges, ambers, and golden yellows. The room was absolutely ablaze with sunshine. With the light came warmth, and as the shadows were forced under the bed and into the corners, the ability to stay under the covers fully dressed became unbearable and we begrudgingly rolled out of bed.
Connor delegated himself to coffee brewing duty while I sifted through the food on the counter until I found a bag of granola and set out the last of the fresh apples. We hadn’t spoken much since rising. We were both mentally and physically drained.
After breakfast we took turns showering and dressed in clean clothes. We threw the little laundry we had into the washer and sat down to write a list for what we wanted to take east. Both of us needed warmer jackets and snow gear. Connor needed boots that were designed with the weather in mind, and his designer footwear, though expensive, wouldn’t survive many hikes in the mountains.
We also wanted to find another vehicle, one that would get our gear and us back to my Jeep. This meant a truck and Connor thought he knew just the one to take. In the parking lot there was a brand new F250, and since it was in the lot for the hotel, with only a handful of other cars, it shouldn’t be too hard to find the owner. This meant though, that he had to rifle through the dead bodies he had moved into the conference room until he found the right set of keys.
It was just before 7:00 when we planned to head out for the morning, and walk over to the mall where we could get the rest of our supplies. Connor was the first to open the suite door as I searched my room for Zoey’s leash.
“Riley, there’s a note on the door,” Connor said.
I met him at the entrance as he pulled the paper off the door where it had been suspended by a piece of tape. He handed it to me and I read it out loud.
Riley and Connor,
It was early when we left this morning, otherwise we would have said goodbye. Thank you for the room and the company. We are on our way to Las Vegas to hopefully find our family, please wish us luck. I wish, wherever the two of you go, you will find what you are looking for, and I hope to see you again. Who knows, we may end up coming back this way.
Love, Mariah
p.s. Please hug Zoey goodbye for me!
“So…they left,” I said quietly to myself. I regretted parting with Mariah this way, although I was happy Matt was gone.
I glanced at Connor and he said, “I hope they make it there.” It sounded like he meant it, though I was sure it was only because he hoped they found someone in their family alive, so they would stay in Nevada. I doubted he ever wanted to see Matt’s face again either.
***
It took us a few hours and two different stores to find everything on our list. We pushed it all back to the hotel in a drugstore shopping cart. The roads had a different feeling than they did the last time I walked through them. The rain had washed away the dirt and most of the debris, and the dead smell that had been festering from within the buildings was barely noticeable. I still had the feeling I was being watched, though the streets were completely silent, so I continuously scanned the road around us.
We were two blocks from the hotel when Zoey started barking. Connor was pushing the cart and he stopped to glance behind us.
“Riley, look,” he said quietly.
I searched the street around us and down the sidewalk, not seeing anything other than parked cars, buildings and a handful of military vehicles. Zoey had stopped barking, and was cowering behind my legs, between me and Connor. I started to turn back towards Connor when I saw her. A girl. She was standing alone, in the middle of the road, a few blocks away. I could see her red overcoat and a red hat sitting atop her long black hair, but she was too far away to make out much more. She was standing in the street, facing our direction, not moving.
“Oh my god,” I breathed. I began jogging toward her, straight down the street.
Several seconds later I heard Connor yell, “Wait, Riley, wait!” But I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. I registered the sound of Connor’s feet lightly slapping the ground almost a full block behind me but I didn’t turn to look at him.
I pumped my legs harder and when I was close enough to see her clearly I realized she was young…five, maybe six years old. In addition to her coat and hat she was wearing a pair of white tights, with the knees stained a dark color, like she had kneeled in dirt. Blood pounded through my temples and again Connor yelled at me to stop but I couldn’t, I was less than a block away from the child.
I ran right up to her and skidded to a stop within arm’s reach. My chest was heaving, and I sucked the air in at the same time I reached out and touched her arm. The twill fabric of her coat was rough beneath my fingers. The sunshine broke through the patchy cloud cover and sprayed across her, causing sparkles to bounce through her dark hair.
“Sweetie, are you okay?” The words came out in pants and my breath trailed out before me in puffs. It was cold. I left my hand near her shoulder and shook her gently when she didn’t answer me. She was pale, and a familiar red blotchy pattern bloomed out from her nose and mouth. The blood capillaries had burst in different places all around her face and neck like little fireworks had gone off below her skin. Her eyes were so dark I couldn’t see the pupils, and her vision was frozen straight ahead, as if she was looking right through me.
“Honey, can you hear me?” I pleaded, but still she didn’t answer.
My hand dropped from her shoulder and Connor shouted my name from the curb a hundred feet away. In my peripheral vision I saw movement on my right and left. I looked over my shoulder and dozens of people were walking towards me, their faces all fixed on mine. It was the same from the other side of the street. I jumped to my feet; my breath still ragged from the run, and turned in circles. Men, women and children approached me from all four sides of the street, moving quickly, and filing in next to each other so close that their shoulders bumped together.
Terrified, I yelled for Connor and thought I heard him respond but he sounded muffled and impossibly far away. Every face I saw was either streaked with blood or covered with blotchy skin abrasions like the young girl standing near me. The mass of bodies surrounded us, and the noise from all the cries of anguish and pain was deafening. I squeezed my hands against my ears as I turned around and around, screaming in fear.
The first one to reach me was a man wearing only a sagging pair of pants, with dark, sickly colored blood flowing freely from his nose. His eyes were clouded over with a white mucous substance that oozed down his cheeks and his flesh hung from him like a poorly fitted
suit. When he reached for me, grabbing forcefully at my shirt, I shrieked at him in horror. Behind me hands tugged at my hair, pushed against my back, shoved at me, groped me. I tried to smack the hands away but there were too many, hundreds of bodies slammed into me. The smell of death filled my nostrils, and I choked on the rancid odor. An elderly woman clothed in a nightgown snagged my right arm and when I struggled to push her off, some of her long frizzy grey hair tangled in my fingers and came out in fleshy clumps. These people weren’t alive, they were rotting. Repulsed, I screeched so high pitched my ears rang.
The mob swayed and pushed and swelled around me until I was sure I would suffocate. Even though my voice was hoarse I screamed over and over for Connor. Someone pulled on my legs and I tumbled to the hot asphalt in a trembling, blubbering mess. I curled into the fetal position as darkness closed in around me. The swarm of dead bodies began to still and move together in a slow sway as a small pair of black dress shoes came to a stop by my head. I looked up and saw the little girl with the red overcoat standing above me, her hand reaching for me. She was looking at me with a pleading expression and when she moved her lips to speak, congealed blood bubbled out of her mouth.
I dropped my head to the street and let the darkness take me.
CHAPTER NINE
When Riley saw the little girl, her first instinct was to run to her but Connor froze. He let Riley get more than half a block away before he snapped out of it and pursued her. He noticed the materializing crowd of people before she did and he yelled, screamed at her to stop and come back to him, but before he could reach her, the mob closed tightly around her and he panicked at the sound of Riley’s shouts. He ran straight into the legion of crying bodies but only got five feet in before they surrounded him. Arms yanked him back and forth, hands grabbed at his clothing. The smell of rot was so strong he couldn’t breathe the air. Even though his eyes saw it happen, his brain refused to believe it. One second the street was empty, and the next the horizon shimmered, as if cooking under a hot desert sun, and they were just…there.
He tried to choke out Riley’s name into the pulsating crowd but only heard her screaming in response. A teenage boy reached out at his face and he pushed the arm away, sliding a huge chunk of skin off the young boys arm from the elbow to the wrist. He gagged as the bloody flesh hit the pavement with a wet sound. He kept screaming for Riley, lost in a panic that threatened to drive him mad and until the shoving from the bodies around him halted so suddenly he lost his balance and stumbled to his knees. His hands were covered in dark, lumpy blood and he held them away from him in disgust.
“What the fuck’s going on?” He screamed into the sky.
The pack of people began to move backwards, away from him, and gradually dissipated the same way they had appeared until he could only see a few dozen or so bodies moving away from him. He blinked, baffled, as they shimmered, like a mirage…and were gone. They disappeared, right before his eyes.
“This isn’t happening.” He muttered to himself, as movie scenes from every ghost flick he had ever seen flashed through his mind.
The frenzied barking from Zoey in the distance snapped his head back up the street. He struggled to his feet and saw Riley lying motionless in the middle of the intersection, curled into a fetal ball. He ran for her, screaming her name.
“Oh my god! Riley, please be okay!” He slid to a stop beside her.
The clicking of Zoey’s nails grew louder as she scurried down the sidewalk behind him. His whole body shook with tremors as he lifted Riley’s head off the ground and placed it in his lap. He paused to look at his hands, which were clean, each nail neatly groomed, no traces left of the bloody mess he had just scrambled through and a shiver of anxiety ran through his body. He couldn’t have imagined it all, could he?
Riley was unresponsive but breathing. He checked her head for bumps and scrapes and found none. He hoped she simply passed out and that nothing else was wrong with her. Zoey rushed him from behind, whining and nudging Riley’s arm as he stood and lifted her carefully into his arms, and began walking the several blocks back to the hotel. His eyes continually scanned the streets, the doorways, the cars, for any sign of movement. He had never been more terrified in his life. There was nothing logical in his mind that could explain what happened, at that moment he didn’t want explanations, he wanted Riley safe inside the hotel, away from this street.
He was perspiring heavily by the time they reached the hotel lobby. He grunted as he struggled with the door and cursed when his grip slipped from around Riley’s legs, nearly dropping her. When he reached the elevator he pounded the call button but kept his eyes locked on the lobby doors. Zoey brushed against his legs, shaking and whining. When the elevator opened, they rushed inside and he leaned against the wall, holding Riley close to his chest. Even though his arms felt like Jell-O, he refused to set her down, not until he was behind a locked door. His feet stumbled into the twentieth floor hall and he weaved down the walkway to the end and cursed at his keycard after realizing it was in his back pocket. Squatting, he rested Riley’s legs against his own and yanked the keycard out, slipping it into the lock. The second he entered the suite he slammed the door shut, engaging the bolt. He laid Riley on the sofa and stumbled into the kitchen. When he returned, he draped a wet towel across her sweaty forehead and collapsed onto the carpet next to her. No matter how many times he replayed what happened through his mind, it didn’t make sense. His temples pounded with a stress headache unlike one he had ever had before, and he thought for sure if his head went on hurting this way it would split in half.
Riley woke fifteen minutes later, thrashing and screaming. When he tried to hug her she threw his arms off and punched at the air around her. He had to grip her wrists and yell into her face, “Riley! Riley, it’s Connor! It’s me!” before her eyes focused on him and she sunk into the sofa in sobs. She was trying to talk but the words were swallowed up by convulsive cries. He pulled her heaving body into his and held her while he cried into her neck. He kept telling her it was okay, they were okay, they were safe.
Several minutes passed and gradually her weeping turned to sniveling. Her ragged gulps for air became a steady inhale and exhale and he pushed her away from him just far enough to see her face. Puffy bags protruded from beneath her bloodshot eyes, and she licked at her swollen and chapped lips.
“Can you drink some water?” He asked her, picking up a glass from the coffee table.
She nodded yes, and took a sip before abruptly turning away from him and throwing up onto the carpet.
Once inside his bathroom, he stripped all her clothing off except for her bra and underwear. She let him help her into the massive tub and began filling it with hot water. As the steam curled up around them, fogging up the mirrors and flattening his hair to his head, he used his hand to scoop up the water and pour it over her back. He dribbled the warm water across her neck and shoulders, and watched it trail down her arms in little rivers. She sat in the tub silently with her knees drawn to her chest, and her eyes closed tightly as he washed her, as best he could.
After he drained the tub, she was more alert and aware of his movements. He left her huddled in one of his large bathrobes to retrieve dry clothes from her room, but she called for him to stay with her, so he held a towel out in front of him as she slithered from his robe and out of her wet undergarments, stepping into a pair of his boxers. He stood behind her and pulled one of his shirts over her head and down her bare back while she wiggled her arms into the long sleeves. Wind shook against the side of the building, whistling along the bedroom windows as he guided her to the bed and pulled the covers back for her to climb in. She grabbed onto his arm, and pleaded with him not to leave her.
Zoey had followed them both from the sofa to the bathroom, to the bedroom, and once Riley was in bed, the dog jumped onto the mattress and cuddled up to Riley’s back. They were all traumatized, the three of them, clinging to each other.
When he knew that Riley was asleep he whispe
red over her head at the dog, “Go pee in the bathroom, because I’m not taking you outside.” Zoey’s dark round eyes darted from him to the door, as if she agreed it was safer where they were.
He told himself they were leaving the next day. He had to get them out of the city. Whatever it was that happened, he sure as hell wasn’t going to stick around to see if it would happen again. And that’s when he realized the cart they had filled with supplies was still on the sidewalk, at least two blocks from the hotel. The truck, we’ll pick it up with the truck…that’s if it’s still there in the morning, he thought to himself.
He passed out with his arms safely wrapped around Riley and sank into a deep, frightful sleep. He was on an Irish hill, overlooking a valley, holding Roan’s hand. When he turned to smile at his son, the boy pulled away from him and the flesh from his hand slid off into his in a bloody and pulpy mess. Terror spread through him as he stared at the chunk of skin smeared between his fingers. When he looked up, Roan was gone, so he ran down the hillside screaming for his son. All he found at the bottom was a puddle of blood surrounded by the grass of the meadow that stretched before him like waves on the sea.
I Hope You Find Me Page 11