by M. O. McLeod
“I can hear you ya’ know,” a voice came high and clear through the door.
Inis rolled his eyes at his mother and aunty, they didn’t want her to come in, but he couldn’t just act like they weren’t home forever. Everybody on the south side was home; they for sure weren’t in the streets.
He unlocked the deadbolt and opened the door slightly. “You by yourself?”
“Yes, can I come in?” the voice asked.
“Hell no,” Inis heard his aunty say in a snide voice from the back of the room. He let her in anyway.
Quinn entered the room and looked around. It was just as she remembered – there was the love seat that she had sat on when Santino, her son, had introduced Kurma to her. The kitchen was to the right with the huge glass table in the middle. The hallway leading to the rooms was still littered with pictures. Everything was the same except for the new lady in the room.
“You must be the aunt.” Quinn held up her hand to Prissy, who just stared at it. Quinn quickly recovered and stepped to Fae and smiled. “How have you been?”
“Fine,” Fae said a dull voice.
Inis could tell his family wasn’t exactly team Quinn and Santino. “What’s going on Quinn? How are the kids holding up?”
“I took the kids to my mother’s side of the family. They will be safer there.”
“What about you? What are you going to be doing?” asked Inis.
Quinn wrung her hands as she stood with an invisible spot light on her face. “I’ve been trying to wait for Santino. I’ve got his father looking for him now. I just want my baby back home,” Quinn said, her voice cracking here and there.
“Your son, I hear, isn’t a baby anymore,” Prissy just had to interject. “I heard he was some sort of flesh-eating thing, a monster to be exact.”
“Enough!” Inis yelled, making the three women jump. “Don’t you need to go check on your kids?”
“Um, no,” said Prissy, not taking the hint. “They are where I left them, in the back room asleep.”
Inis was really getting tired of his aunt. He moved his head wildly trying to signal for her to leave.
“Is there something wrong with your neck, nephew?”
“Aunt Prissy, go to the back real quick!”
“Well, okAY, you don’t have to shout, waking up my damn kids,” Prissy said with an attitude. Aunt Prissy walked away, slowly, frowning all the way to the back of the apartment.
Quinn let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you Inis.”
“Don’t thank me just yet.”
“What do you want?” Fae asked from her seat.
Inis gave his mother the ‘don’t be rude look’ and she gave it right back. “Have a seat Quinn.”
Quinn sat on the love seat and smiled nervously. “I know you are all thinking it is my fault.”
“We don’t think that,” Inis spoke for his mother and himself.
“Speak for yourself,” Fae said under her breath, yet, it came out loud enough for the whole room to hear.
Quinn quickly continued. “I just want to say that I am sorry for any part I had in this whole mess.”
“You didn’t do anything,” Inis reassured Quinn.
“But he is my son and I can’t take away from that.”
Fae nodded her head violently and lit another cigarette.
“And I am most sorry for what he did to Kurma, or what he was trying to do to her,” Quinn looked to Fae as she said this. Fae only sat frozen, a cigarette burning in her delicate hand. “I want to put this behind us. I know that it will be hard to do since this is so fresh, but since we know each other, it will be easier for us to work together.”
“Excuse me,” questioned Fae.
Quinn continued, “You guys can’t be thinking about staying on the south side. This place is a dead zone.”
Inis ears perked up. Here was Santino’s mother thinking the same thing he was thinking.
“We should leave as soon as possible. Everyone in these parts are trying to leave and so am I–so should you,” Quinn reasoned with the Rosales family. She knew they were a tight-knit group and only wanted them to stick together and stay alive, something that she couldn’t say for her oldest son.
“It’s not as easy as you think,” Fae said with a cold voice in her tone. “There is the problem of being killed by your son if we go outside!”
“He’s not the only one doing the killing if you haven’t looked outside lately,” Quinn’s voiced riled up, but she checked herself. It was true, Santino had turned into this thing that attacked and mutilated people. She had hoped he was dead in the streets somewhere, that she could deal with, but killing innocent people was hard to stomach. But she loved him nonetheless; she only wanted to see him, maybe talk some sense into him. Quinn hoped her ex-husband, Darius, was still out looking for him. “I still say we try to leave.”
“And go where Quinn, where in the city would you have us go, up north? That’s the only place that hasn’t been overrun by the Phantoms…yet,” Fae added on.
“We could always try the sister city, Saylor Sax,” said Quinn.
From down the hall came Prissy’s voice, “Absolutely as crazy as I thought.”
“Well come out and join the conversation, aunty,” Inis yelled back down the hall. “Since you can’t do simple things like stay out of people’s discussion.”
Prissy huffed and puffed all the way back into the living room. She was clearly in a mood. “That part of the Manor is renowned for its backwards thinking?”
“Do you think I care about how they view their women in Saylor Sax?” asked Inis. “I’m just trying to protect my family.”
“No, Saylor Sax is no place for women and women without money to boot,” Fae rejected Quinn’s idea. “Why would you even suggest such a dumb thing?”
“My ex-husband, he has family who lives there now. They could have helped us.”
“Well, I take it that he is your ex for a reason and would have been no good to us—and probably no good to you either.” Prissy stated boldly.
“Quinn, I had suggested the Bluff,” Inis ignored his aunt’s comment.
Quinn thought about it. She hadn’t heard too much about that side of the Manor. She knew it was the old city, never being able to surpass Saylor Sax and Alexandria, the biggest city of the Manor. Anything was better than the south side though. “I say we go for it. Go down to the airport and get tickets out of the city.”
Inis clapped his hands, he couldn’t control his happiness. “Finally we have someone who is using their head.”
“Well I said I was going with you before she did,” Fae said. “Are you putting in on this trip out of town?” Fae rudely asked Quinn. “Don’t expect a free ride; there are no ex-husbands around to do every little thing for you.”
Quinn put her nose in the air. She could only humble herself for so long. She usually wasn’t this nice, this compliant, but times had changed. She had secured a safe place for her younger kids and now she needed a way for herself. Quinn would be safer in a group and she knew the Rosales family. She would just have to deal with all the personalities of the older women. “I would be more than willing to contribute. I’m taking all my valuables with me. The tickets will be high, but moving to an entire different city will be even more expensive. I’m ready if you are.”
Fae was stung by Quinn’s last words. They seemed to hit her like a ton of bricks to the face. If it hadn’t been for Quinn’s no good son then she wouldn’t have to be ready for anything at all. However, they did have two younger kids to look out for. Another adult, even though Fae questioned Quinn’s parenting abilities, would be needed if they all wanted to make it out of south Alexandria and across the Manor. “I can be ready tomorrow morning at 7:00 am, pack light, be prepared for anything, and most of all–bring the money.”
Fae smashed her cigarette and flicked it into the trash. She crossed over into the living room and opened the door for Quinn to leave. “Is that ready enough for you sweetheart?”
***
Quinn slept horrible that night. Like every other night that followed the attacks, screams in the dark interrupted her sleep. The Phantoms prowled the streets looking for live souls. It wasn’t often that they wildly broke into a house and snatched someone in the night. No, high up in the apartments like Quinn lived in, security was attained. In the daytime, the security level was orange, livable. It was the night that glowed red. No more parties on the town, or late night dinners for two; no movies, no grocery store run, and absolutely no going out into the night. Yet, when the moon rose, the screams came. Sometimes, there was a commotion down below; it seemed that was when another Phantom was created. Quinn had learned that Phantoms were contagious from the news. She had seen her child on the news too. Santino had shown Alexandria how he did it, how he spread Phantasm. Quinn hadn’t slept right ever since. That was a couple of weeks ago and Phantasm had only expanded, like wild fire, it spread. As she lay alone that night in the dark, house empty and still, Quinn wondered where her child was. She didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye, but she couldn’t end up like those things outside her four walls. Feeding on people, attacking people, that was not how she was going to end up. Quinn closed her eyes one last time and tried to wait for the sand man.
A ring went off in her head. Loud and piercing the ring drawled on and on, waking Quinn out of her sleep. Quinn sat up in bed, eyes blinded by the morning’s sun, head spinning. Her land line didn’t work, there was no electricity, where was the ringing coming from?
“My cellphone!” she shouted. Quinn threw the blankets from her body and sprinted from bed. She ran into the kitchen where her cellphone lay ringing on the wooden table. Quickly, Quinn snatched the phone open, out of breath and panting.
“Hello, hello?”
“Quinn, glad you answered. I didn’t think this number would be on,” a clear voice came through the ear piece.
“Darius,” said Quinn, “I’m so glad that you’ve finally called me back.” Quinn pulled a chair from the table and took a seat. “I run over to the convenient store around the block and keep the phone charged. Cost me an arm and a leg, but it is what it is.”
“Quinn, I’ve found him.”
She almost let the phone slip when she heard her ex-husband say this. “Did you really find him?”
“He is alive Quinn, that’s the most important thing.”
“But is he really as they say? Have you talked to him?” she asked
“No, not yet. But I know where he hangs out and I have seen him with my own eyes. I’m going to talk to him as soon as I get off the phone with you. I just want to keep you updated with everything.”
“Thank you,” Quinn breathed heavily into the phone. She was almost on the verge of tears. “Do you think we can get our son back?”
There was a long pause. “Quinn, I have seen him. I don’t think that is ever going to happen.”
Quinn didn’t understand. “He isn’t too far gone Darius. Try for me please. If you don’t ever do anything in your life, please, do me this one favor. I was going to leave the city today. But if you can get my son back, then I won’t have to. We can somehow make this right.”
“You were going to leave without telling me? Where is Lester?”
“Your youngest is with my mother. But don’t worry, now that you have found Santino I don’t think I can leave just yet. Promise me that you will talk some sense into him and try and bring him back home.”
“I will definitely try Quinn.”
“Promise me,” Quinn gripped the phone tight, speaking directly into the mouth piece.
“I promise, bye.”
But Quinn didn’t feel any better. She remained hopeful, but in the back of her mind she knew that her ex-husband had never been good with keeping promises.
Chapter 8:
The ALM Airport
Aunt Prissy didn’t want to leave the city. She felt that in time the situation would rid itself of the problem. Alexandria had always been that kind of city. But staying in an apartment with her two kids in the worst part of the city, while her sister and nephew went out and possibly found shelter, wasn’t fair to her children. “Get up and go wash your little sister’s face. Be ready to leave Che’,” instructed Prissy.
The whole Rosales family had gotten up as soon as the sun hit the mean streets of Alexandria. Everyone was moving about, double checking this and that, preparing food for the kids. They deserved a chance at life too. Aunt Prissy tried to calm her nerves. She didn’t smoke like her older sister did. There was nothing for her to do beside sit and wait and fidget. “Everything is set and good to go.”
“I just want to make sure we have everything,” Inis remarked.
“I just want to get there as early as we can. Stop wasting time.”
“Aunty Prissy, I got this. If you want to do something then go down and get Quinn,” Inis said
“I don’t even know what her apartment number is,” Prissy shot back.
“Did you ask?” Inis retorted.
“Don’t get smart with me. Remember to stay in a child’s place. You hear me?”
“Ok, that’s enough,” said Fae. She was busy running around and settling arguments was not on her to-do list. “Prissy, she stays in apartment A66. Tell her we are ready.”
Prissy slammed the door behind her as she left out. She went downstairs and found apartment A66 without too much trouble. She didn’t know why her nephew wanted to take this Quinn lady with them. If you had asked her, Quinn didn’t deserve to even come along. Her son was the reason that Prissy and her family had to uproot their entire life. Even still, Prissy knocked on the door and waited. She looked up and down the hall, making sure no one was sneaking up on her. She knocked harder the second time. “Hello, Quinn? The guys upstairs are waiting for you.” There was no response. Prissy listened hard for footsteps, sounds of any kind, but heard nothing. “No this little bitch did not try and pull a fast one on us!”
She raced upstairs and blew through the door. “That lady downstairs, Hen, Breen…”
“Quinn!” Inis pronounced the name slowly. “Where is she?” he looked around and didn’t see anyone else with Aunt Prissy.
Prissy folded her arms in front of her. “She didn’t answer the door. Either she got a head start to the airport or little miss girl was pretending the whole time.”
“Swear,” proclaimed Fae.
“Mami, get the stuff. We are out of here,” said Inis.
Prissy watched as her sister and nephew gathered the small duffle bags and a cookie jar.
“Che’ and Lena come on out, we’re leaving,” Prissy yelled to her kids in the back. “So is that where you keep all your money?”
“Damn right,” said Fae. “That freezer trick is old and tired. Thieves not gonna be looking for no damn snack when they robbing the place.”
The family snuck from the building out the back onto the side streets. The roads were littered with junk and trash.
“Quickly, get in the car,” hissed Prissy. Even though there were people out in the morning time there was never any way to tell that everyone who seemed normal were entirely human until you saw their face. Phantoms had dark colored veins lining their arms, neck, and head; sometimes though, the veins weren’t as dark or prominent, so it became much harder to tell. It was the teeth that were a dead giveaway. Phantoms had hideous teeth, all of them, rows and rows of sharp teeth that could not simply be covered by a mustache or beard.
“Aunty, this little thing of a car will not fit us all,” Inis complained.
“Inis just make it work!” Fae hissed.
“So I’m going to have the two kids sitting on each leg while we drive thirty miles out?”
“That’s what it’s looking like,” snickered Aunt Prissy. She started her engine up and peeped out her window. She didn’t want to leave Alexandria. She had grown up here, knew the streets like the back of her hand. Yes, the city was cold, harsh, even dangerous, but it was all that she kn
ew.
“Screw you aunty.”
“Watch your mouth, Inis,” Fae said from the front. “Let’s all pray that we make it to the airport safe and sound and that we all get out of the city unharmed.”
“In your name we pray, Amen,” Che’ said in a little voice.
Aunt Prissy pulled off into the open car lane. She repeated her son’s prayer in her head, over and over.
***
The ALM airport was the busiest and largest airport in the entire Manor. Half of the airport was roofless and open space enclosed in a building. There were several waiting rooms, bathrooms, numerous concourses with jumbo planes coming and going. The restaurants and business flocked to the airport; there was money to be made at the Alexandria Manor Airport.
In the midst of it all were people clamoring over one another trying to leave. Before Phantasm it was the other way around. Alexandria was the land of opportunity, a slice of heaven in a world that was collapsing in on itself. Cities across the globe had been in decline, stocks dwindled, water evaporated, animals died, the systems were in shambles—but not in Alexandria. Now it seemed that everyone was trying to leave Alexandria and they were paying high dollars for the tickets out.
“You, you, yes you. You said you wanted a ticket, the price is thirteen hundred dollars, coach, headed to Manci springs,” yelled a customer rep. “Going once!”
The crowd erupted into an outcry. Hands held high up in the air with green dollars as people tried to show more money. Inis pulled his cousin close as the little boy began to cry. The noise was deafening.
“Sold,” the customer rep shouted over the noise into the overhead communicator. “Our next tickets come as a group. We have three tickets here and the destination is Venuela, Del Con!”
When the customer rep revealed the name of the state the entire room moved. People pushed and pulled, tearing one another apart as they neared the platform where the customer rep stood, outfit pressed and clean. The police pushed the citizens back as the citizens pressed forward.
“The group ticket can now be purchased at five thousand dollars. Three people, that’s hopefully a mother, and father, and their little baby,” the customer rep’s voice came through ever so sweetly over the PA.
“Me!” yelled a voice to Inis right. “I have a small child, please, I have the money!”