Her dad wasn’t an actual general but with they way he acted at work and at home, he might as well have been. The General was just Drew’s nickname for her dad, though she never used it to anyone but her friends and Kimber. When kids at school complained about their strict parents, Drew couldn’t help but roll her eyes at them. Her fellow students complained about being grounded for a day or two for big offenses like stealing or skipping school. Drew missed curfew coming home from a football game her freshman year by four minutes and was grounded for the rest of the school year. No dances, parties, clubs, or events with her friends were options for her. If it wasn’t for a team she was on or a grade she was receiving, Drew wasn’t able to attend.
The worst part about it all was how silent the house was now. If the General wasn’t yelling at her for doing something wrong, most of the time he just didn’t talk to her at all. In the year since her mom had passed away, Drew and the General had barely had a civil conversation. Even on the day of the funeral they had yelled at each other instead of comforting and loving one another.
It had rained that day, turning the careful curls Kimber had put in her hair into drab, stringy waves. Her skin was clammy and pale, causing her fiery red hair to look even more vibrant. Dark circles hovered around her eyes, the side affect of every sleepless night she had tossed her way through since her mother’s accident.
It was raining that day too, the day her mother died. She had been jogging along the side of the road, something she did every day. Her loop around the edge of town and then through the cemetery was her favorite run. Five miles in all and Drew’s mom ran it everyday, no matter what the weather. An assumed drunk driver hit her on the side of the road. It was assumed that the driver was drunk because they had never found them. No one wanted to think a sober person would hit a woman and leave her to die on the side of the road alone. It was easier to think a drunk person who didn’t know what they were doing was responsible for it.
Holding on to Kimber’s hand, Drew felt like she cried a tear for every rain drop that fell on her mother’s casket before they lowered it into the ground. She wished that Kimber’s fingers intertwined with her own had helped her feel better, but she was nothing but an empty well. Water flowed in and then right back out again, leaving nothing behind, nothing inside. She was a walking shell of who she use to be, the daughter her mother loved.
Nothing had changed since that day. Drew still walked through life, doing the day to day things she was suppose to, but she still felt empty. All of the things she tried to fill the emptiness with were causing her so much trouble. Drinking and partying, lapsing on her responsibilities, all of these things were holding her down.
Drew’s skin felt warm and she could feel the General looking at her. He dribbled the ball on the driveway a few times and waited. There was no getting out of this, no matter how badly she wanted to avoid it all. Her hand slipped down to the handle and she opened her door, knowing that she couldn’t avoid everything anymore.
“Hey, kiddo.”
“Hey, Dad.”
They stood in the driveway in silence for a few minutes. There wasn’t much to say. Well, actually, there was a lot for them to say, but neither one was talking. Stubbornness ran deep through the both of them. Neither wanted to be the first to take a step toward a direction that would change anything. Drew shifted the weight of her backpack on her shoulder. It was full of her school books even though she hadn’t cracked them open for months.
“Do you want to shoot some hoops?” There was a rare tone in his voice, a softness that wasn’t usually found there. Feelings crept up inside of Drew, sadness seeped into her heart and threatening to leak out of her eyes. But that was the one thing she wouldn’t let herself do. She hadn’t shed a tear since her mother’s funeral. Sitting and watching the shiny coffin being lowered into the ground, she felt weak and vulnerable. With a silent vow, she promised herself that she would never feel that way again. The tears, the heartache, the feeling of being weak and useless, it would never have a hold over her life.
“Yeah, I guess.” Drew slid her backpack off her shoulder and sat it on the ground near the edge of the driveway. Her dad bounced the ball to her and she dribbled up to the top of the driveway. The feeling of the ball in her hand felt good and familiar. The small textured bumps helped her grip the ball, a feeling she had almost forgotten. Aggressively, she changed her stance. Dribbling forward, her dad hovered on her back, looming over her. With the ball in both hands, Drew’s elbows went up, trying to keep the ball safe. She couldn’t move. If she took a step she would be double dribbling, but she wasn’t sure she had the shot.
“You going to do something with that ball?” Her dad’s voice in her ear made the decision to make a choice more urgent. With a slight hesitation, Drew took the shot. The ball bounced off the front of the rim, falling to the ground without even touching the net.
“Not quite there. Put some more muscle behind it.” The General took the ball out to the top of the driveway for his turn. For a man of his age, he could handle a basketball. He was in good shape thanks to his job and could keep up with Drew quite well.
Drew hustled up to guard his shot, ignoring the small verbal jabs he made. He wasn’t trying to be mean with his verbal sparring. That was his way of pushing her, to get her head in the game. Usually it would work, as he yelled at her on the sidelines at a game, always sitting in the front row and watching her every move. Even when they practiced in the driveway, he was constantly pushing her to do better, to be better. But they hadn’t done this in a year and now it was just making Drew angry. All the ways he tried to make things better caused rage to flood through her. She wanted to bite back, but she also didn’t want to give in.
The General’s hands were skilled, dribbling the ball around his daughter and between his legs. Each step was calculated quickly before it was made. He moved towards the hoop, going left at first but then quickly moved right. The fake out caused Drew to lose her footing and she fell to the ground. It was his chance and he took the shot and made it. The ball bounced away and the General offered a hand to his daughter.
“You alright there kiddo?” Drew didn’t say anything. Her arms rested on her knees and she looked at the ground. The fall hadn’t caused her any physical injury, it just dented her pride a little bit.
“Drew?”
She looked up at her father. For the first time in a year, her eyes were welled up with tears. Rimmed in red, her blue eyes looked like watery, shallow pools. In the past year, Drew had carefully built a wall around herself. As time passed, cracks had formed, destroying the foundation. Now, with one fall, the wall came tumbling down.
“Dad, I can’t keep doing this.”
The General walked quickly over to his daughter and bent down beside her. “It’s just a pick up game. No big deal.”
“No, not the game.” Drew shook her head, still looking at the ground. She didn’t want to fight anymore. Looking up at her dad, his face close to hers, she said, “I can’t keep pretending that everything is okay anymore.”
“Drew, you don’t have to pretend that things are okay. Though I suppose sometimes it seems like its the easiest thing to do.”
“It was, at first, but it isn’t anymore. I keep thinking that it’s going to change, that something is going to happen and suddenly it will all be okay. But nothing ever helps. Nothing every changes.”
“I know you want time to go by faster, but you can’t rush these things. Only time will help it heal.”
For the first time in a long time, Drew wrapped her arms around her father. The two hugged each other, hard, sitting on the cement. The fall leaves fell around them, red and golds. It felt good, just to sit and hold each other, something they should have done a long time ago. Words had failed them, but the physical touch between a father and his daughter was what would save them.
“No matter what happens, what you’re dealing with, or what kind of trouble you get in, I’m here for you, Drew.” He said into her hai
r quietly. She squeezed her dad harder, not wanting to let go just yet.
“I hope you’re right, Dad. I hope it just takes some time.”
“Oh, kid, you know I always am.” He said with a chuckle.
CHAPTER NINE
Three Days Before the Outbreak
With his back against the brick wall of the hallway, Eli listened to the three faces spew vile words about his baby sister. He knew the faces the words belonged to, but in the moment they were nothing but blurry, indistinct figures. A fist made contact with his cheek, one, twice. Pain surged through every nerve of his face, concentrating around his cheek and eye. His cheekbone or nose were more than likely broken. Blood dripped from a split in his lip, the aftermath of the first punch. Eli couldn’t see well enough to defend himself. He tried to pull his arms up to protect his face, but he couldn’t get them there.
“She really is one feisty latina.”
“I’d like to be in that feisty latina.” The voices jeered from the blurry faces he couldn’t see. His eyes were watering, a side affect of the pain and anger. Tears dropped down his cheeks, mixing with the blood that oozed out of his wounds. Each hit hurt like hell, causing him to grunt and moan, but Eli had to choice but to take it. The physical pain wasn’t anything he couldn’t deal with, but the mental and emotional pain was something different.
“You leave Kimber alone!”
“Oh, he speaks.” The voices were taunting and jeering at him, echoing through the empty hall. The bell rang and Eli relaxed a little. They had to go to class. This would be over soon. But the Mighty Die members ignored the bell. It wasn’t until they gym teacher, Mr. Temple, walked around the corner that the gang members cut and run.
Mr. Temple escorted Eli to the nurse’s office. The gym teacher, who was also the athletics director, didn’t say much. The Mighty Die members were his students and athletes, star players for the varsity football team, and that mattered. Without those players, they would lose games, forfeit championships. Eli knew that this incident would be swept under the rug or if Mr. Temple got really creative, might even be pinned on him.
The nurse patched him up, holding the same silence that Mr. Temple did through the hallways. In a small town like Dyersville, the name that was stitched on the back of your jersey proved how much you mattered. If your family name was one of the greats, spread through town through the town’s legacy for generations, you could get away with almost anything. But if your family name wasn’t important enough or worse, if you didn’t have a jersey to put it on, you didn’t matter. Eli had come to terms with this when he first moved to Dyersville. It wasn’t something that bothered him much, but now that it was being used against him and causing him physical harm, it was an issue he couldn’t tolerate anymore.
“I didn’t start the fight. I didn’t even through a punch.” He told the nurse as she dabbed a cotton swab against a cut on his eyebrow. She nodded, the loose skin under her chin wobbling with her nod, but when her eyes met his, Eli knew she didn’t believe him. Maybe somewhere deep down she believed him, but she wouldn’t admit it. Going against the grain never did anyone good at Die High.
Not long after he was a punching bag for the Mighty Die, Eli found himself sitting in front of the school guidance counselor in her office. A tissue covered ice pack was pressed to his face. Eli knew that this middle aged lady wasn’t going to be able to understand why he had been in a fight. Any school administrator or staff member would have told him to walk away from a fight that was three against one. A new school year had started and the source of Eli’s troubles over the summer, the main five, had gone off to college. He thought that would be the end of it. Unfortunately, the Mighty Die had decided that they weren’t done with him just yet. That was how he ended up in the guidance counselor’s office just after lunch on the first day of school.
“Anger and violence will get you no where in school or life, Eli. A smart boy would have just walked away from the altercation.”
“Guess I’m just dumb then.” Eli slid back into his chair, folding his arms and resting them on his chest.
“That isn’t what I am saying.”
“It’s exactly what you’re saying. A smart man would walk away and I didn’t, therefore I am not a smart man. I’m not twisting what you’re saying at all. It’s simple logic.” This conversation was pointless. No one understood what the Might Die were capable of doing to him. The senior members had tormented him all summer long and when he finally thought he was going to get some relief, the members that were left took over the torture. There was no way he was going to make it through an entire school year with these idiots looming over him. His danger level was always on level red, each turn in the hallway was high risk. The paranoia he felt walking the once safe hallways made Eli’s skin crawl.
“Why do these fights keep happening, Eli? I seem to recall several of these incidents before school ended last year.”
Eli shuffled his feet under his chair. Nothing felt comfortable to him. There was an aching pain across his cheek and around his eye. He was sure it was swollen and changing colors by now. It had been a sucker punch when he wasn’t looking. He had been distracted by the comments they had made about Kimber. Eli was the type of guy who didn’t care what happen to him. He could be beaten, battered, and bruised, and it didn’t matter, as long as Kimber was safe. The things they said about her, the things they said they wanted to do to her, were terrible.
“It’s nothing.”
“This doesn’t seem to be going away. It might be easier just to talk about these things.”
“You don’t get it!” Eli yelled, slamming down a fist on the desk. “You will never get it! This won’t go away, especially if you get involved. Just leave it all alone, everything.”
“You know I can’t do that, Eli.” Her voice was steady and calm. He had to give her credit for not flinching at all. Any other woman her age would have jumped back, maybe even cried.
A beat passed before either spoke.
“I can’t do anything if you don’t tell me what is going on.” Eli didn’t say anything, so she continued. “You were found on the ground with a bloody lip, nose, and a swollen black eye. Mr. Temple suspects he knows who is responsible for the acts of violence, but he wasn’t entirely sure. I need you to tell me who did this and why.”
Eli scoffed, “Of course he knows who it was. I wasn’t found on the ground and he saw them run away. But do you really think he is going to give you the names of his star football players? Do you really think he is going to give them a one way ticket to getting kicked off the football? That means a losing season. He’d rather see me lose an eye.”
“That isn’ the case at all Eli,” her voice was getting on his last nerve, “Please just tell me who did this to you.”
“I’m not going to tell you anything. Why can’t you people just leave this all alone.”
“Because someone is hurting you, Eli. We can’t do anything about it, we can’t stop it, if we don’t know what it is about.”
“You can’t stop it! No one can! Just leave it alone!” Eli’s voice rang out as he got up from the chair with such force he almost knocked it over. He left the office, slamming the heavy metal door behind him. The anger boiling inside needed to escape, some how, some way. If he didn’t do something to relieve it he felt like he would explode.
The blond girl never saw it coming. Eli’s fist pounded into the locker right next to her. She jumped, a completely normal response to someone punching the locker directly next to her out of nowhere.
“Jesus!” She yelled, her eyes looking first at Eli and then to the dented locker, and then back again. “What did it ever do to you?”
“What?” Eli looked at the girl, not understanding what she was saying.
“The locker, it didn’t do anything to you. Maybe you should apologize for taking your anger out on it.” The girl’s accent was southern and wrapped around her words as if they were trying to cuddle them. She was a fellow student Eli assumed, but
he didn’t know her.
Eli cracked an odd small smile. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m sorry.”
“I think it accepts your apology.” The blond said with a smirk, her hand on falling to a round, swollen stomach.
CHAPTER TEN
Two Days Before the Outbreak
Kimber’s dark brown hair flew in playful strands behind her as she pushed off the ground to get her swing moving again. The sand crunched under her feet, sliding and giving her little traction. It was dark and the sky was clear navy blue above the two girls. Drew sat motionless in the swing next to her. The night air was crisp and it felt good against her face as Kimber swung back and forth, her legs stretched out like she was a kid again.
“I don’t understand why she won’t do anything.
When Eli came home with a black eye, Kimber had tried to point out to their mother that it was obvious he couldn’t handle the situation anymore. But she brushed it off as a tussle between teenage boys. It wasn’t exactly rare for teenagers to get into fights, though she did have to admit that she hoped the school was handling it. Maria even told Kimber a long and elaborate story about teenagers back in Mexico, how they would fight in the streets. They would punch, kick, and roll around until they had beaten each other bloody, and the adults would just surround the fighting kids and take bets. Kimber imagined Eli fighting another boy in the dirt roads of their village back in Mexico. She knew there was no way she could have watched him fight like that without trying to kill everyone cheering him on. It made her thankful that her mother had made the necessary sacrifices to get them to America. But even though she was thankful for her mother, she still thought she was dead wrong about Eli’s current circumstances with the Mighty Die.
“Maybe she doesn’t understand how big of a deal it is. It could be a difference in cultures. You said she was use to boys Eli’s age fighting back home.” Drew weighed in, trying to help her girlfriend understand that there was more than just one way to look at the situation. When her mind was set on something, there was no arguing with Kimber. She was fiery and passionate about what she believed in but sometimes that could make her feel like her opinion was the only one thing that mattered. Drew loved her girlfriend and how passionate she was, but sometimes Kimber’s one track mind made their relationship difficult. She wasn’t exactly easy to compromise with and it was hard to get her to see situations from any other angle but her own.
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