The Trip

by Tim Morgan

  Dave finished the article and poured himself more Coke. Another article featured the religious point-of-view, and how this virus could be the first strike from almighty God cleansing the Earth of sinners. Dave found it a much, much more emotional piece than the article with the bio-terror hook. He never considered himself particularly religious, but it did make him think. Maybe this year during Lent he would give something up, maybe Coke, and he just might skip eating meat on Fridays.

  The kids in Meghan’s religious ed class had all left and she was putting the books away. She enjoyed working with the grade schoolers; they were still innocent and enjoyed having someone in high school leading them. It was one thing she’d miss when she went away to California, but hey, she’d known the last couple years this was going to end. She walked from the hall to the foyer and saw Chris standing there, hands in his pockets, his eyes red.

  “Hey,” Meghan said. Chris half smiled. She tilted her head as she realized Chris wasn’t himself—he looked…drained?

  “Hi.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I—I need to talk to someone.”

  Meghan straightened up. “Uh, okay. Do you want to go somewhere?”

  “Not you. Is Father John here?’

  “Uh, yeah. He’s in his office.”

  “Thanks.” Chris nodded and walked down the hall. His shoulders were hunched, his head low. Meghan wondered what turned the confident athlete into this.

  “Chris, is everything okay?”

  Chris tried to speak but only an awful sound came with the tears. Instinct brought Meghan to him; she wrapped him in her arms and held him through the sobs. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”

  “I screwed up,” Chris said, “I’ve screwed everything up.”

  “Why are you saying that?”

  “I think I’m in trouble, Meghan. I’m in big trouble and I don’t know what to do.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  The horrible sound came again. Followed by a whisper. “I think I have AIDS.”

  “Oh, God, no!” Meghan whispered as tears filled her eyes. “No, no, no!”

  Father John came out of his office. He was a big guy with a voice for radio and a face to match, but he was the first person everyone in the congregation went to when something was wrong. “Is everything okay?” he asked.

  “Father, this is Chris. He needs someone to talk to.” Meghan guided Chris toward Father John’s office. “Come on Chris. You need to talk to someone. I’ll be right out here when you’re done.”

  Chris nodded, drying his eyes as Father John put an arm around him. “Come in, Chris. Sit down.” As the door closed Meghan stood there a moment, not believing what was happening. She took out her cell phone.

  Tonight was Dave’s turn to get the only shower first. That meant he’d actually get a hot shower instead of a lukewarm one two days this week. A bath and a half for a family of four really wasn’t cutting it. It was even worse before Brian left for college, when five of them fought over one shower.

  Dave got a clean pair of underwear, sweatpants, and razor and was on his way to the bathroom when the phone rang upstairs. He got to the door when he heard Mom’s voice. “Dave! Phone!”

  “I’ll call back!” Dave shouted.

  “It’s Meghan. She says it’s important.”

  “Mom, does that mean I can take a shower first?” Joey asked.

  “Get bent!” Dave shouted.

  “Hurry up, David!” Dad thundered.

  Dave walked upstairs and grabbed the phone. “Hello.”

  Meghan’s voice was quaking. “Dave, it’s me.”

  Dave put on his game face as he walked downstairs. “What’s up?”

  “I’m at church—Chris is in with Father John.”

  “Chris? In church? The end really is near.”

  “It’s not funny, Dave! He thinks he’s got AIDS!”

  Dave almost dropped the phone. “He what?” He sat down on the edge of his bed and ran a hand through his hair. “How do you know that?”

  “He told me.”

  “How does he know?”

  “I don’t know—he couldn’t tell me. He could barely talk. I’ve never seen him so scared.”

  How the hell did Chris get AIDS? It’s not like he shoots heroin or anything like that. Well, Dave didn’t think he did, but maybe Chris was a druggie and he was good at hiding it. He didn’t get it from Traci, did he, because maybe I could hook up with her—why am I thinking like this!?!

  “Do you want me to come there?”

  “No! Stay away! He needs some space. When he’s ready he’ll tell you. But in the meantime you can’t tell anyone!”

  Dave took a deep breath. “Okay. I’ll keep my mouth shut. Make sure he’s okay and call me on my cell when you get home.”

  “Okay. Thanks Dave.”

  “No worries.”

  The call ended. Dave put the phone on his bed and lay back, staring at the ceiling.

  “Are you taking a shower or what?” Joey shouted from the top of the stairs.

  “Go ahead,” Dave shouted back, “but you use all the hot water and I’ll kill you.”

  “Dad!”

  “I’m not stopping him if you use all the hot water.”

  Dave sat back up and leaned forward, hoping the sickness in his stomach would pass.

  SEVEN

  We’re spending the night in a dentist’s office. It’s on the fourth floor, so we’ve got a great view of the city, and it’s got water and electricity. The blinds are thick and we’re going to sleep with the lights on. I don’t remember the last place we could do this—and it feels so good.

  We see signs people were here—the wrecked cars, the looted buildings, blood on the streets, and the scraps of clothing. Sometimes we see bodies—not zombies, but dead people that are really dead. We try to keep away from them since it freaks us out.

  The cell coverage here stinks, so I can’t get a signal. I’ll have to post this when I get more bars.

  Meghan woke as the sun broke over the horizon. Dave and Chris were still asleep when she got up to shut off the lights. She walked to the window and peeked through the blinds. The sky was an angry red, with grey clouds gathering on the horizon. She opened the blinds a little further.

  Street lights changed color. Walk signs blinked. A thermometer on a bank blinked the temperature—70 degrees. If only dead people weren’t getting up and running around, it would be a normal day. I could still wake up, Meghan thought. This could be a dream. The ache in my legs, and the hunger, and the hollow feeling in my gut as we round every blind corner could all be a dream. I could still wake up at home, with Mom and Dad and Karen all in their rooms and Rocket at the foot of my bed and pancakes for breakfast and everything would be right with the world. I could be getting ready to go to California at the end of the summer, which is just beginning, and I could be swimming with all my friends and enjoying life. That’s what I should be doing right now—enjoying life.

  Meghan walked into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. She hardly recognized the face looking back at her. She wasn’t particularly thin when she left home, but she’d lost at least ten pounds during the ride. Her face was slimmer, her hair was crazy, and she could really use a shower. She settled for some soap on a paper towel and washed her face. The water was cold and was coming out in a mostly steady stream punctuated by an occasional puff of air. Meghan couldn’t tell whether that’s how the building’s plumbing worked, or whether the water service was going out.

  Dave woke up as Meghan came out of the bathroom. They nodded a greeting to one another—talking was a moot point this early—as Dave went into the bathroom and closed the door. Meghan went into the cafeteria and checked the cabinets. The office had some instant coffee and some tea bags. Meghan grabbed a bag of Irish Breakfast and looked through the mugs. Did she feel like drinking from Darth Vader’s head, a New York City mug, or a big orange one that looked like glazed clay?

  She dec
ided on the New York mug, filling the cup almost to the top with hot water from the spring water bubbler, and dunking the tea bag a couple times. There were some sugar packets and instant creamer in the cabinet as well. Real milk would have been better, but the creamer would do. She had the sinking feeling once they left this little paradise they would wind up eating much more horrible things . . . things that would make the MREs look great and leave her wishing for the fake cream. Meghan dumped a packet of sugar into her tea—two would have been better, but she wanted to save some for the others—and sprinkled some creamer in. The tea turned the color of the clouds outside, clumps of coagulated creamer spinning about on the surface no matter how much she stirred. This is just not my day, she thought.

  “Hey,” Dave said as he walked into the cafeteria.

  “Hi,” Meghan said. “There’s some coffee and tea in the cabinet. Sugar and creamer too. Help yourself.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Dave picked up a jar of instant coffee and squinted at the instructions. He grabbed Darth Vader’s head and shook the jar, covering the bottom of the mug with coffee.

  “You know what you’re doing?” Meghan asked.

  “I have no idea.” Dave managed to smile. Meghan smiled back.

  “Once we get to Davenport, it’s 20 miles to Orion, Illinois. We should be back on track in a couple days,” Meghan said.

  “It’s going to be a lot longer before we get back on track.” Dave blew on his coffee and took a sip. He winced. “Why do I drink this shit?

  “You think we’ll have to sleep in the tent?” Meghan took a sip of her tea.

  “Unless you want to sleep under the stars.”

  “I’m scared about that. Sleeping in the tent, I mean.”

  “Yeah. Me too. We’ll have to make sure one of us is on watch at night, and ride like hell. Maybe we could sleep in a car or something. Has anyone replied to your blog?”

  Meghan dunked her tea bag a couple times. “Last time I checked, no. The cell service out here sucks.” She tried to kill some of the clumps with the tea bag.

  Dave took a deep breath. “There’s a computer in the office. I bet it’s hard-wired. You try connecting with that?”

  “No. You think it’ll work?”

  “I’ve got no idea. It can’t hurt.” Dave rifled through the cabinets. “Ramen for breakfast, again?”

  Meghan walked into the office as Chris got up, yawning and stretching his arms. Chris said nothing, just got up and walked into the bathroom. Meghan pulled the computer out from under the desk. The network cable was easy to find, being bright yellow with the blinking green light over the port.

  Blinking green light!

  Meghan almost snapped the connector when she unplugged the computer. She plugged the cable into the network port on her laptop and booted up. Oh, pleaseohpleaseohpleaseGodletitwork!

  The computer booted to Meghan’s desktop. She double clicked on FireFox. Oh, please! Please! Meghan crossed her fingers. Site not available. Damn. Her home page timed out. Crap! Meghan’s finger went for the power button when she had an idea. Meghan typed Google’s address in. She waited a few moments. Timeout. Was the internet down? Blocked from this office?

  Darn, Meghan thought. “Hey, Dave.”

  “Yeah?”

  “How do you check if your computer’s got an IP address?”

  “Start, run, IPConfig.”

  Meghan typed in the command. She had an IP address. That means I’m on someone’s network, right? “What do you type at the DOS prompt to hit a site?”

  “Huh?”

  “What’s the command to see if a site’s up?”

  “Ping,” Chris shouted from the bathroom. “Ping, followed by the site address.”

  “If you had to pick one site to be up right now, what would it be?”

  “Microsoft dot com,” Chris and Dave said in unison.

  Meghan typed the PING command. Her breath came in short spurts as she waited, and waited. Result timed out. Result timed out. Request timed out. Request timed out. Meghan pounded her fist on the counter as Chris flushed the toilet. He came out of the bathroom, drying his hands on his pants. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “I can’t get on the internet,” Meghan said. “The light’s on on the network card, but I can’t get outside.”

  “Hmm,” Chris said. He looked at Meghan’s screen, flew through a couple of DOS commands, then turned the computer in the office on. “It looks like you can get the office network in here, but you can’t see outside. When the Army blew up the bridge they may have damaged the phone lines. You try your cell modem?” He walked out to the cafeteria, put four spoons of coffee into a mug along with the rest of the sugar and creamer, and poured water into it. Chris made sure it was just enough to make a paste-like consistency. He didn’t care whether it was hot or cold. It wasn’t tasty—flavor wasn’t the point. His stomach would cramp a bit and he’d feel a bit queasy for a while…but it would take his mind off the hunger.

  “I can’t get a signal in here,” Meghan said. “The reception in this town’s been kind of spotty.”

  “Time to switch carriers,” Dave said.

  “If I could, I would.” Meghan shut the laptop down and unplugged the network cable.

  They packed their gear after filling their water paks with warm spring water. “Let’s see if we can find a sporting goods store,” Chris said. “Maybe we can find a gun or a bow and arrow. I’d settle for a knife that’s bigger than this Leatherman piece of shit.”

  “So you can fight the zombies?” Dave asked.

  “So we can hunt. Once we clear Orion we’re going to be in the sticks for a couple days.”

  “You don’t know how to use a gun,” Dave said.

  “Do the math. We burn close to five thousand calories a day. Before long we won’t be able to ride anymore. We’ve got to eat more than what we scrounge—especially out in the woods.”

  Meghan said, “I think it’s worth looking for a sporting goods store, but we need to get across the river. If there’s one on our way we can stop. Unless you want to call a vote, Dave.”

  “No,” Dave said. “That’s okay. Let’s get out of here. We’re burning daylight.”

  Dave was still bitter about the whole sporting good store thing. The last person he thought should have a gun was Chris—because Dave was afraid he’d be the first person Chris would shoot out here in the new Wild West. He didn’t have much time to think about it. The minute they stepped out onto the street they heard moaning.

  Dozens of them, a cacophony in the morning air. Coarse voices calling to one another. Groups speaking as one. The moans were close, getting closer.

  “What the hell!” Chris shouted. “Did they follow us?”

  Meghan brought her GPS online. “Okay guys, follow me.” She started off down the street, dodging around wrecked cars without thinking. They rounded a corner and ran right into an approaching horde. The zombies broke into a run; Dave and Chris nearly slammed into one another as they skidded to a halt.

  “Whoa!” Chris shouted.

  “Wrong trurn!” Meghan shrieked.

  The zombies closed the gap with a speed none of them expected. A dead hand almost grabbed Dave’s saddlebag. He balanced on one pedal and met the zombie with a kick to the jaw that knocked it off balance.

  The zombies were right on their tail for the first block. Dave pumped his legs mechanically. The fire in his legs, his back, his lungs would be nothing compared to what he’d feel if those things caught him. The second block gave them some running room, and the third block was jammed with cars. Meghan led the way through the rows of glass and steel. The zombie horde clambered over the cars, a dead tsunami covering everything in its path, setting off every car alarm along the way. The obstacle course slowed the zombies down enough for the group to get away.

  Meghan tapped her GPS screen, trying to remember which button zoomed in and which zoomed out.

  “Which way, Meghan?” Chris called. The moans came from every
direction now and were louder, more insistent, angrier.

  “I’m working on it!” Meghan shouted over her shoulder. Does he think it’s easy to run for your life while dodging zombies and oh, if you’ve got time, maybe you could plot a new route?

  “Meghan!”

  “I’m doing the best I can!” She finally got the map to the resolution she wanted and glanced at it. “Route 61! Follow the signs for Route 61! This way!”

  She took a corner real tight. Dave and Chris nearly overshot. They realized it was a highway on-ramp.

  “We can’t ride on the highway!” Chris shouted.

  “Why not?” Dave asked.

  “It’s illegal!”

  “Tell them that,” Dave said, gesturing over his shoulder.

  They shot up the ramp and onto the highway. It wasn’t so much a highway as a main road. There were wrecked cars everywhere. Spatters of blood—Meghan was surprised she noticed it.

  “This won’t get us all the way to the bridge, but it’ll come close,” Meghan said.

  Zombies—thousands of them—filled the streets behind them. Their moans filled the air and when the wind blew the right way, the stench was intolerable. It stung Meghan’s nose and lungs; she pulled her shirt over her nose and mouth trying to filter it.

  “Look at them all!” Chris said.

  “Where’d they come from?” Dave said.

  “Just ride,” Meghan said. “They can’t get up here.”

  They were fighting a headwind, which made pedaling much more difficult than usual. They managed to get away from the zombies, but they couldn’t escape the moans echoing through the town. They picked their way through debris the best they could, riding until the stench and the moans faded and all they could hear was the wind. They stopped under a sign that read Sweetland Center.

  They stared at one another, breathless. Meghan took a sip of her water. Dave put his kickstand down, walked away from his bike and pissed on the side of the road, not even making an effort to hide. Chris leaned off to the side and threw up.