Patrick ducked beneath me to blade through the gap, but he was too wide. His chest jammed in the opening. The Hosts were almost on us. I wrenched the hook as hard as I could, prying the doors apart another inch, and Patrick tumbled through. I fell in behind him, feeling dozens of hands brushing my back. The doors banged shut around my ankle. I turned, looking back into the press of flesh filling the giant glass door. At the bottom, Coach’s breaths fogged the pane, her hands cradling my boot at the heel and toe, like a mom helping a child slip off a sneaker.
Cassius stood protectively over me, the fur raised along his scruff, barking at the glass. I ripped my foot back as hard as I could, and the doors slammed shut. Faces and hands smeared the panes, blotting out the light.
My chest jerked up and down. For a minute it seemed I wasn’t going to catch my breath ever again.
“They can use tools,” Patrick said. “Let’s move before they figure it out.”
I rolled out from beneath Cassius. He was upset now, his tail tucked between his legs. We ran through the dark aisles, heading for the rear of the building. Rocky clipped a grapefruit pyramid, sending the fruit rolling across the tiles. Being in here now was surreal, the aisles dark and empty.
We rushed through the swinging doors behind the butcher’s counter and through the car-wash curtain that never made any sense to me. The rear room, a concrete box rimmed with freezers, was cold enough that I could feel the chill coming up through my boots. Boxes and pallets and a broken meat grinder.
We doubled over, hands on our knees, breathing hard. It felt like when Coach Hanson made us run the mile during PE, screaming at us over her stopwatch, her face nearly as red as her Cardinals hat. I thought about her back there at the sliding doors, her broken leg stuck out to one side, not feeling the pain. Driven by a single focus: getting at us.
I shuddered, and it wasn’t from the cold.
Patrick put his hand on the dead bolt leading to the loading bay in back. Alex set her hand gently on his and said, “Don’t.”
He paused.
“The kids are too tired.” She gestured vaguely toward Rocky and JoJo. I realized I was standing behind them and hoped she wasn’t including me among “the kids.” She looked back at Patrick. “Give them a sec to catch their breath.”
A shattering sound carried across the aisles, followed with what sounded like bodies slapping the floor.
Patrick threw the dead bolt.
The loading bay was empty—whatever Hosts had been back here must have been drawn to the front. We jumped off the dock, landing on the asphalt. Patrick headed into the row of Dumpsters. We single-filed behind him, squeezing through the narrow space. Cassius scrambled to press into the side of my leg.
Patrick halted and held up his hand.
Ahead of him a shadow fell across the mouth of the makeshift alley between Dumpsters. I put my hand on Cassius’s back, willing him not to whine. The shadow tick-tocked back and forth, and a moment later a body crossed into the narrow view ahead.
Eddie Lu, one of the baggers, headed across the row of Dumpsters, his head angled toward the ground. Eddie graduated Creek’s Cause High last year. He still wore his hipster beanie and Piggly Wiggly apron. In front of me, JoJo opened her mouth, and I clamped my hand over it.
Eddie walked directly in front of us, never glancing over. He passed so close to Patrick that Patrick could’ve reached out and poked his shoulder. Eddie moved across our brief field of vision and disappeared. We heard his shoes scuff the ground as he made a sharp right angle at the corner of the Dumpster, and then his footsteps continued along the far side. We held our breath.
We listened to his shoes moving on the other side of the Dumpster. The scuffing sound came again as he pivoted to head back behind us.
Patrick gestured us forward, Alex right on his heels, me bringing up the rear behind the kids. We eased through the thin corridor between metal bins. Just past the trash area rose the chain-link that let onto our high school’s baseball field. At the bottom of the fence, the Braaten boys had cut a slit for sneaking through to play hooky during fishing season. Patrick pried up the flap of chain-link, ducked under, and held it for us.
We tiptoed forward.
Behind us we heard that scuffing noise once again as Eddie reached the lane between the Dumpsters. I turned and looked over my shoulder. Less than ten feet away, his dark silhouette faced up the corridor in which we were neatly lined. He started after us.
The eyeholes and vacant expression were made more awful by Eddie’s casual cap, the familiar ankh tattoo on his inner wrist, his yin-yang necklace. We’d seen a lot of Hosts, but none even close to our age. He was one of us.
I’d just tensed to sprint when I realized that Eddie hadn’t noticed us. His head was still oriented toward the ground. With a series of furious hand gestures, I conveyed as much to Alex, and she nodded and crept forward as silently as possible.
We kept on that way, a train of bodies filtering through the space between Dumpsters, Eddie bringing up the rear on a slight delay. Without slowing, Alex dropped to her hands and knees and slithered through the gap in the fence. Rocky crawled through next. I could feel Eddie gaining on me from behind. I didn’t know how much longer I had before my heel would catch his field of vision and he’d spring onto my back, taking me down. I didn’t dare turn around. I just moved toward that slit in the fence, trying not to let my shoulders scrape the metal sides of the Dumpsters.
I ushered JoJo before me, struggling somehow to rush her and not rush her at the same time. She barely had to crouch to get through the fence, Bunny dragging in the dirt. Cassius followed her, and then it was just me with Eddie in the tight corridor.
I could hear his shallow breaths, practically feel them against my back. My hands cramped around the handles of the baling hooks. I forced myself to release them, letting them dangle from my wrists by their loops. Fighting down my panic, I bent over, stretched my arms into the gap, and slid through. Patrick caught my hands as I knew he would and whisked me through the gap. Alex lowered the chain-link section as gently as she could, closing it like a curtain. It made the faintest click.
Eddie reached the fence, his eye tunnels aimed just in front of his toes. We stood right on the far side of the chain-link. All he had to do was tilt his head up an inch and he’d see us.
But instead he turned on his heel—a neat pivot like you see in the army when some junior officer is dismissed—and continued his course along the fence line. I exhaled.
We moved backward, keeping our eyes on him even as he continued his right-angle swivels through the trash zone. The dew-wet grass of right field shot up beneath the cuffs of my jeans, tickling my ankles. At last I felt the dirt of the infield beneath my boots and turned to face Creek’s Cause High. I realized now why Patrick had pointed us here. After a few school shootings swept through the heartland, the town council had voted to make the grounds as secure and contained as possible.
It was the only place in town that was completely fenced off.
Who’d have ever thought high school would be our last safe haven?
We spread out, breathing easier as we headed toward the dark, sprawling building. The football stadium loomed to the left. We reached the math-and-science wing first, Mrs. Wolfgram’s classroom at the near end. Cupping my hands like a scuba mask, I put my face to the window. The rows of empty desks inside looked emptier now. Proofs scribbled on the dry-erase board. Faded charts breaking down geometric 3-D shapes and surface areas. A dangling wooden octahedron made from eight equilateral triangles, an extra-credit project built by Janie Woodrow or, more likely, her overly involved mother. I thought about how competitive Janie always was, wearing down the teachers to turn her A-minuses into straight A’s, and how much I resented and envied that at the same time. A memory flashed at me, Don Braaten pinning Janie down in the middle of the road, his grown-man knee crushing into her back, her cheek smashed to the asphalt. Had there been tears? We were too far away to see, but Janie tended to cry easi
ly.
I used to make fun of her for her color-coded Post-its, her collection of mechanical pencils, her flawless handwriting, and now I regretted every unkind word.
To my side, Patrick jiggled the handle of a service door. Locked.
“Should we break a window?” he asked.
“Too much noise,” Alex said. “What if they’re in there?”
Morning was coming on, leaving us visible here outside the building. Inside, everything was connected—classrooms, gym, cafeteria. A necessity for our harsh winters. If we could only get in there.
“Wait,” I said. “The back door by Dr. Chatterjee’s room might be unlocked. He has trouble with the key and dead bolt because of, you know, his hands.”
Dr. Chatterjee often stayed late to grade papers. Rather than make his way through the school’s warren of corridors and doors to the front exit, he sometimes left out a back door so he could circle easily to the parking lot. Because of his weakened grip, he couldn’t use a key, so he tended to leave the door unlocked behind him. It was worth a shot.
JoJo’s tiny hand rose, pointing. “Look,” she said.
A few Piggly Wiggly stockers had appeared along with Eddie Lu at the edge of the baseball field. It was only a matter of time before one of them noticed us standing here in the open and breached the fence.
I rushed along the building, put my hand on the doorknob, and took a deep breath. The others crowded at my shoulders. I clenched and turned.
The door creaked open.
We piled in and closed the door. Alex reached over and locked it behind us. We slipped through the open hallway, ducking into Chatterjee’s room to take cover. The familiar scent of formaldehyde washed over us. Never before had I been so relieved to be in a classroom.
Patrick clicked the light switch quickly to check the electricity, but nothing happened. He shrugged. “Worth a shot.”
Cassius stuck his head in the trash can and came up with an apple core. No matter what else is going on, dogs will be dogs.
“Drop it,” I said.
He opened his jaw and let the core drop back into the trash with a thunk. From the look in his brown eyes, you’d have thought I’d kicked him in the ribs.
Patrick peeked around the jamb into the hall for a while, then signaled us to come. We moved out into the dark corridor, the swinging door blowing a Ziploc bag across the floor, chased by a trampled brown paper lunch sack. The rows of battered lockers, that dirty-sneaker smell, the dented recycle bins. Flyers curling from bulletin boards announced various events in bubble letters: Blood Drive Week! Buy Your Tickets for the Harvest Dance! Auditions for Sartre’s No Exit! A varsity jacket was stuffed above the lockers where someone had forgotten it. For some reason the sight of that stupid jacket without its owner tore open something inside me, and I had to fight to keep my composure. How many kids were missing? How many adults were missing as well, even inside their own bodies? It felt too huge to contemplate. Here in the safety of the school where I’d spent so much of my life, it all seemed unreal and impossibly close at the same time.
Patrick’s voice cut in on my thoughts. “Let’s make sure all the other doors and windows are locked,” he said. “Secure the school as a base.”
That was Patrick, grace under pressure, burying the horrific present beneath What Had to Be Done. I thought about his reassuring hand on my shoulder when he’d found me downstairs, crying over the bloody spill of windshield glass from Mom’s purse. I remember wondering if I’d ever be that grown up.
I wondered it again now. I bit down on my lower lip and put my hand on JoJo’s shoulder, as Patrick had put his on mine. If I couldn’t be as brave as him, at least I could fake it.
We moved as a group, going corridor by corridor, floor by floor, checking that everything was secure. We spread out to get the job done faster but stayed within eyeshot—or at least within shouting distance. Everything looked to be empty. We moved as quietly as we could. We reached the humanities wing and disappeared through different doorways. In Mr. Tomasi’s English classroom, alone, I paused by my desk. I ran my fingers across the graffiti scratched into the wood, some bad joke by a student who’d sat there before me—LURNING SUKS. I wondered where that kid was now. Trapped in one of our dog crates in the bowels of the church?
I crossed to the windows and made sure all the latches were thrown. They were. Through the tall chain-link fence hemming in the school’s front lawn, I could see a few men in the neighborhood walking their bizarre spirals. I stood watching them, pins and needles pricking my skin. It felt as though I’d landed on Mars and was staring out at an exotic landscape populated with alien beings.
Turning for the door, I weaved between the empty chairs, giving my desk a little tap with my knuckles as I passed. I suppose it was a good-bye to all the learning I’d done in that plastic chair, all the great books we’d talked about, the homework I’d read aloud from nervously but with bits of pride shining through whenever Mr. Tomasi nodded his shaggy head.
I stepped out into the hall at the same time Patrick and Alex emerged from their respective classrooms. We waited for Rocky and JoJo to come out from their room with Cassius, the delay making us nervous. I was just about to head after them when Cassius padded out, his tail wagging, the kids behind him. We all flashed one another thumbs-ups and gestured at the next set of rooms we would tackle.
I headed through the open door into shop class, the biggest of the rooms, filled with slumbering machines. It was creepy, the air thick with the scent of grease and sawdust. Half-finished projects lay on shelves to the side. Pig-shaped cutting boards, the hind legs still trapped in wood. An unsanded back scratcher. A model of a jalopy missing a roof and two wheels. They’d never be finished. They’d just lie there, incomplete, collecting dust. Heading for the windows, I passed between the belt sander and the band saw. That’s when I heard it.
The faintest clank.
Inside the room with me.
I froze, one boot inches above the dusty floor.
It came again. Clank-clank.
I bit my lip, lowered my weight. Was it one of the machines, shuddering with a dying jolt of electricity?
I leaned around the band saw. The vertical blade cut my view in half, but I could still make out a man hunched over the workbench across the room. Though his back was turned, I could see his hand to the side, hovering over various tools, deciding which one to grab. Wrench … Phillips head … clawhammer.
The hand closed around the clawhammer.
The man straightened up and started to turn, his legs swinging stiffly. I dropped behind the base of the band saw, my knees rising to touch my chin. I heard another clank and realized that the sound came from leg braces.
Dr. Chatterjee.
The footsteps neared. Clank-clank. Clank-clank.
I debated shouting for Patrick, but if there were other Hosts all around us, that would only alert them. I braced myself, hoping Chatterjee would change course. My baling hooks were at the ready, but I hadn’t killed anyone yet and prayed that I wouldn’t have to now. Sweat stung my eyes. My heartbeat came so loud I thought he might hear it.
Clank-clank. Clank-clank.
A worn loafer set down in view—clank—and I knew his next step would bring me into full sight. I set my feet and sprang.
But my boot skidded on a slick of sawdust, and I fell forward, dropping the baling hooks, my palms jarring the floor. I rolled over onto my back, arms raised over my face. Dr. Chatterjee stood nearly on top of me, the hammer swaying at his side.
With my wrists I jerked at the baling hooks’ nylon loops, trying to tug the handles into my palms. They bounced off my fingers. I couldn’t look away, not even as Dr. Chatterjee leaned over me. For an instant the faint light from outside hit his wire-rimmed eyeglasses at the perfect angle, turning the lenses to mirrored circles. I knew that once he moved another inch, the glint would vanish and I would see what lay beneath.
I steeled myself for those tunnels, two circular views through to the
ceiling above, and I wondered if this would be the last thing I’d ever see.
Dr. Chatterjee looked down at me.
With real eyes.
I let out a garbled sound, choking on a gasp.
His gentle voice descended on me with that great lilting accent. “Chance? Is that you?”
It took two tries before I could find any words. “Dr. Chatterjee,” I said. “Wait—you’re a grown-up. Why aren’t you infected?”
He held out a trembling hand to pull me up to my feet. “That isn’t the question,” he said. “It’s the answer.”
ENTRY 12
We all headed down the long school hallway clustered together, Dr. Chatterjee moving at a decent pace despite his leg orthotics. I was still breathing hard, relieved that I hadn’t had my skull caved in by my favorite teacher.
“White matter!” Dr. Chatterjee announced excitedly. “It’s the key.”
“Like brain white matter?” I asked.
“Shouldn’t we keep our voices down?” Patrick said.
Dr. Chatterjee waved him off. “It’s safe in here. Now, look.” He unclipped an electronic unit swaying from his belt like a holstered gun. We all crowded around to see it in the dim hall.
“Wait,” Rocky said. “That’s the carbon monoxide detector thing, right?”
We looked at him, surprised.
“What?” he said. “I was emergency room captain in Mrs. Rauch’s class last year.”
“That’s right,” Dr. Chatterjee said. “It detects carbon monoxide, natural gas, other hazardous leaks. But check this out.” He clicked a button, backlighting the screen, which blinked code red. Beneath it two words flashed: UNIDENTIFIED PARTICULATE.
His face, shiny with sweat, held equal parts worry and excitement. “So my hypothesis is that this airborne particulate enters the human body—”
“Tell him about the spores,” Patrick said to me.
Dr. Chatterjee stiffened. “What spores?”
The Rains Page 7