by David Beers
The words were in Spanish, and in James’s disorientation, it took him a few moments to mentally translate them. He looked back down over the railing; a man stood twenty feet from the building, staring back at him.
James nodded, unsure how to answer.
“You should leave. There’s nothing good in there.”
James nodded again. The man looked on a second longer and then began walking down the street, heading on to his destination.
With the shirt still covering his mouth, James turned to the door again. The cops were called but hadn’t come? So now a dead body lay rotting inside the apartment and that was how life would continue until someone from the government came to clean up? James didn’t want to go in, didn’t have any more thoughts about helping, but knew he was heading inside anyway. He would see what happened to the Munoz woman, and somehow he thought that might put to rest the picture of the dog that seemed to live inside his head now.
He straightened up some, his stomach still trying to seize up even with his hand and shirt covering his face. He stumbled into the door, knocking it open and stepping through at the same time.
The door swung until it hit the wall, revealing the totality of the horror to James.
He doubled over again, heaving, vomiting up stomach acid and other fluids.
Dried and cracked blood everywhere. The walls, the floor—all stained with dark brown patches. Even on the ceiling, James saw blood. He couldn’t make sense out of this room; his body was being assaulted and his mind couldn’t handle it. The heat, the smell, the death collided disastrously with his brain.
James collapsed to the floor, his head landing in a dark stain—the blood cracked as his body came to rest, letting off very faint sounds into the apartment.
Sweat covered James’s body—his system naturally trying to cool itself off; his shirt was soaked and clung to his chest. He opened his eyes, finding the blood splattered ceiling above him. After a second of staring, it came back to him, where he lay. What he had come here for. He sat up slowly, not realizing his hands were pushing into dried blood; he felt lightheaded, and the smell permeating everything didn’t help. The vomiting appeared to be finished, though.
James didn’t remember falling, but he remembered the mess he saw now. He got to his feet, finally seeing his hand was flaked with dried blood. Closing his eyes for a second, James tried to collect himself.
When he opened his eyes, he moved forward looking straight ahead—not wanting to see the massacre on his right or left. Plenty remained in front of him.
Through the tiny living room, he went into the kitchen. More blood, cabinets open, broken glass everywhere. No body, though.
James looked down the hallway; no light filtered in from the windows to the hall—only darkness lived there. He didn’t want to walk down it but he went. He stopped at the first door he came to and looked in. The bathroom, destroyed. The shower curtain strew inside the shower with the rod bent. The glass mirror was cracked in multiple places, like a baseball (or head) had been thrown against it repeatedly. All of that was to the side though, James’s brain registering but not processing it. The body, the source of the smell, lay next to the toilet.
Little more than a torso, chest down, naked.
The head was gone, and as the flesh began rotting away, he could see a white bone protruding from the neck. The right arm had been hacked off at the shoulder, roughly. There were open wounds around the shoulder socket, where someone had cut multiple times before finding a soft enough spot to continue all the way through. A rat, as massive and intimidating as anything James could remember seeing, sat perched on its hind legs gnawing on the shoulder flesh. It stopped feasting for a second and looked at the intruder—regarding James as something it could discard with minimal effort. The rat went back to its meal without another glance over.
The other arm had been removed off at the elbow, apparently a cleaner cut.
James didn’t want to look at the legs, but just as he had made his way to this butcher’s bathroom, he looked.
The skin had been flayed, either before or after the leg removal. Flayed past the buttocks, all the way to the lower back. James stared at rotting, greenish brown flesh. Skin, dry and brittle, flaked around the body in long strips.
James grasped the door frame; his knees weakening again. The rat kept eating.
After a few seconds, James walked from the bathroom and out of the apartment.
He forgot his bag, sitting outside the door where he dropped it when he first smelled the place.
23
Present Day
Brandon
Brandon Allison watched his neighbor park. Mark, that was his name. Early thirties, unmarried, partied a lot from what James said. There weren’t many reasons for Mark to be parking in Brandon’s driveway; James must have asked him to come. Which meant James was worrying, something Brandon didn’t want happening.
Brandon had to make choices though; because he held responsibility now. He had contemplated ways to shirk this responsibility, to go on living as before and ignore what he knew to be true. That would mean more people becoming like him though, like Matt Eldredge. Brandon couldn’t—wouldn’t—be a part of that. Whatever else happened to him, he wouldn’t sentence others to the same.
“What’s he doing here?” Matt asked from Brandon’s bed, on his side with his legs curled up to his stomach. His eyes were closed and his voice tense, hoarse, even though he had not spoken in hours.
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t let him in!” Matt blurted out like a fever patient screaming at phantoms.
“Shhh—he’s going to fucking hear you.” Brandon peered through the slits in the blinds. Mark looked strange, like an animal ready to bolt. He was grasping the car roof now, but that didn’t still his frantic demeanor. “Something’s wrong.”
“Why?” Matt asked, his eyes remaining closed.
“He’s not moving, but he looks...scared.”
“He feels it. Too late,” Matt whispered.
“No, no he doesn’t. It’s not possible.” Panic rose in Brandon. They sat in this room—doors locked, windows closed, phones off—for one reason only: to keep people away. Now this guy stood thirty feet from them with no contact—not even breathing the same air—and yet Matt thought it was happening.
Mark began walking but moving too slow—still trying to keep his fear in check. Brandon watched him disappear under the stoop overhang.
He waited for the doorbell to ring.
“What’s he—”
“The fuck?”
Mark ran, sprinting back to his car. The house remained silent, nothing had changed, but this grown man was fleeing the premises. The car left tire tracks as it pulled out, smoke lifting from the pavement and squealing rubber filling the air.
“He’s gone?” Matt asked.
Brandon watched the smoke evaporate. “Yeah.”
“Hope he got out in time,” Matt said, wrapping his arms around his knees.
“He did. He didn’t even touch anything.”
Matt lay still.
Brandon went to the chair in front of his laptop.
He always liked this room because of the seclusion. James and he lived in a three bedroom house, and he could have had a room on the first floor if he wanted. Up here though, at the edge of the house, it seemed like his own domain—still close enough to his brother, but his own place. Now it felt like an island. An unknown piece of land that no one would find. Not if Matt and he stayed quiet and still.
Except James was on his way home. He would find this island, then face everything Brandon was. The contagion would have him too.
All of them would be carriers.
Brandon had to stop it before that. Whatever else happened, he would make sure it stayed in the room. He wouldn’t infect anyone else.
The first death already came.
Matt saw it on the news that morning.
“Jesus Christ,” he had said. “Jesus-Fucking-Christ.�
�
Brandon turned away from his computer and looked at the television across the room.
“Jeremy Shire took his life late last night. The parents have yet to be contacted, but a school official commented this morning...” A woman on the television spoke with concern.
“Jeremy was here,” Matt said, turning away from the T.V. Jeremy, who had sat downstairs and listened to Brandon’s story, was no longer breathing.
The piece of paper next to Brandon’s computer showed five names. All of the people who heard Brandon speak. Now, only four of those names mattered.
“If he’s not spreading, that could be good. It could be what we want.” Matt sat down on the bed, his back to Brandon. “If none of them are spreading, and they all kill themselves, that only leaves us.”
They hadn’t spoken since then. Not until Mark The neighbor rolled into the driveway. There wasn’t much else to say because they both understood what—only leaves us—meant, even though the—if none of them are spreading—was a giant If. As the hours ticked by those words pressed on Brandon, maybe more so than Matt. Matt could hide out here—his parents could call the police, whatever, to try and find him—but the chances of them looking here were slim. Matt and Brandon weren’t friends before this predicament drove them together; his parents knew literally nothing about Brandon or his house. Matt would be safe here, unable to spread this shit to the people he cared about. James was coming home, was most likely on his way. He would walk up the stairs and into this room to see what was wrong with his brother. Even that could be too far, and it weighed on Brandon.
What could he do? Matt appeared to be sinking into the same non-responsive state he had been in before the car arrived, and Brandon didn’t know how to stop that either.
Brandon closed his eyes. He couldn’t give this to James—he’d give it to the fucking President of the United States, but not his brother.
It always went back to the knives downstairs. That’s what they were there for. He didn’t know if Matt would do what was necessary if the time came, but Brandon would—for both of them.
He looked over at the younger kid. His arms still wrapped around his knees; his eyes shut and his face lax.
“Matt?”
No response.
They only had a few hours to figure this out. If they didn’t, Brandon was going downstairs. To the knives.
Mark Dawkins sat in complete darkness. At nine the sun had drifted under the horizon and he never stood to turn on a light. It didn’t matter to him because he hadn’t seen light in the past hour anyway—hadn’t opened his eyes or unclenched his fists.
His jaw ached, but he couldn’t loosen his muscles or stop grinding his teeth. For an hour Mark sat like this, completely unaware.
He could only concentrate. Concentrate on not running across his lawn and jamming his shoulder into the front door of James’s house. Breaking the deadbolt if necessary, spraying wood across the floor and falling down inside. Scrambling to his feet and running upstairs, running to...
HIM.
Mark had vomited at work. Right at his desk, barely hitting the trashcan next to him. It was nerves—his goddamn inability to stop thinking about that house. He wasn’t going home, not until he absolutely had to; so he sat at work hours after everyone else took off. Then he sat a little longer. When he finally left, he drove the streets, circling his neighborhood but not daring to enter.
Eventually, he had to come home.
He fought something quite simple. Just one want—much like a nicotine craving. The focus it took to keep from caving was all consuming. If he, for a second, considered something else—even getting a glass of water—he would begin his walk over. Would reach his front door, and from there begin a trot, and finally an all-out run.
No, he would piss himself before that happened.
The siege took two hours. Then Mark broke.
Brandon put his hand on Matt’s face. The kid was cold but not shivering, like his blood couldn’t warm his skin.
The clocks said ten; James would be home soon. Brandon thought he was probably on the plane. Another hour landing and debarking, plus another hour getting home. There just wasn’t much time left to figure this out.
Matt still hadn’t spoken, hadn’t moved.
“Matt!” Brandon yelled.
Nothing.
He reached down and shook Matt, hard. The kid rolled onto his back, his arms flopping--but not moving on his own, not opening his eyes.
“You gotta wake up, man. You gotta wake-the-fuck-up.”
He slapped the boy across the face—the skin on skin contact clapping across the room.
Matt’s eyes opened.
“You there?” Brandon asked, still above him.
Matt stared, his eyes not focusing. He didn’t blink.
“Matt?”
He had gone deep. The dreams no longer terrified them; both of them had, somehow, moved past that. Brandon thought of the dreams now as ‘situating’. Their thoughts aligning with whatever caused this; their becoming situated with it, becoming the same as it. This meant they could sleep, that they weren’t frightened in the physical sense anymore—but they both knew, or thought they knew, what would eventually happen. Sleeping long enough would erase them, leave them like shells.
Brandon shouldn’t have let him go under this long.
“Come on, Matt,” he said, whispering now. He couldn’t leave the house without Matt, couldn’t risk him contaminating James even in this state.
Could he kill Matt, lying like this?
Something exploded. Thunder roared up the stairs shaking the floor Brandon stood on.
Brandon reached for the bed, his body flinching, but the sound died just as quickly as it began.
He breathed in and out heavily, looking back down at Matt—who only stared that thousand yard stare, seeing nothing.
Someone was moving, slowly, downstairs.
Brandon went to the bedroom door, putting his hand on the knob. The person downstairs stopped moving. The three people in the house remained completely still, and silence descended. Brandon held his breath, straining to hear anything.
Then feet moved again...to the kitchen? Fast, almost running. Drawers squeaked open and then Brandon understood. Mark was downstairs. Neighbor Mark, the man who partied a little too much but was nice to everyone. The explosion was probably the door and he was inside now. Caught the bug as sure a naked child outside during winter. Now Mark was here, ready to do whatever It told him to.
The movement started up the stairs, creaking as weight shifted from foot to foot. Brandon still held the door, but didn’t shut it. What would be the point? The man had made it through locked doors and windows; a few pieces of ply wood wouldn’t stop him. He watched the shadows in the hall as Mark approached, his face and then his body revealing itself.
Mark stood at the end of the hall, a knife in his right hand. He walked forward, moving out of the shadows. His face looked pained. Confused, even.
“Mark, what are you doing?” Silly, stupid, but the only words that came to his lips.
“That you, Brandon?” Mark responded. He kept coming forward, maybe twelve feet from the door.
“Yeah,” Brandon said, moving backwards. “Why are you here?” The back of his legs hit the bed.
Mark entered the room and stopped. He looked around, taking it in as if this were the end of a religious pilgrimage.
“I...I wanted to be here.” His eyes filled with tears as the words left his mouth.
“What’s the knife for?”
“I don’t know,” Mark said, his eyes still searching the room. “Something wanted me to have it.”
He sounded lost to Brandon, beyond dazed.
“What did?” Brandon asked, trying to match the man’s speaking cadence—feeling it was safer to do so.
“I...” Mark closed his mouth and the tears in his eyes spilled onto his face. “Do you know what’s going on?”
Brandon saw that Mark’s left ear was bleed
ing badly. His left shoulder sagged, too—the whole arm hanging limp.
“It’s not good, Mark. Nothing good is going on over here. Why don’t you go home?”
He shook his head. “I can’t go home anymore.”
“Why don’t you put down the knife then?”
“Because I’ll just pick it up again.”
Brandon stepped forward, trying to gain some power in this situation. “Then what are you going to do?”
“What happened?” Mark asked, his wet eyes making contact with Brandon’s.
“You caught it,” Brandon didn’t hesitate. “Whatever we have, you caught it too.”
“What’s it going to do?”
“Probably kill us.”
Mark nodded, the tears streaming now. “Then I need the knife.”
“No, we can try to figure something out. I don’t know how, but we can’t just give up.” Brandon felt this slipping from him.
“He says you’re a liar. He says there’s only one way out of this and everything will be easier once I’m gone.” Mark’s mouth spoke, but his eyes pleaded, begged, for help.
“You don’t have to listen to Him. We can figure a way out.”
Mark looked on for a second longer, then took the knife and opened his throat. The blood came immediately.
Brandon laughed. The body still sprawled in front of him; the red, open slash across the neck having let loose its last drop of blood a little while ago. Not that it hadn’t pumped plenty out, spreading as far as six feet from where the body dropped. Mark’s face was pale, as white as porcelain.
His brother left him in charge of the place—now James would arrive to blood stained carpets and a dead body, not to mention a kid in a coma. Brandon went to Matt, and rested his head against the boy’s stomach. They holed up here to protect people, to allow themselves time to figure this out. Instead, Brandon had watched a man kill himself and another drift off into some distant world. The others that knew were dying, probably spreading as well.