We turn, standing back to back. Branches shake. Leaves rustle. The loud cries of the wailers are replaced by smaller, quieter cries. There's modulation. There's inflection. It's coming from one side of us then another. These wailers are talking; they're communicating. They're plotting their attack.
“Get ready,” I whisper to Caroline even though it's no secret where we are. Or that we are trapped. Other than the open gate there's no way out of here that doesn't include climbing the fence.
There's more coordinating from the wailers. It's all animal sounds, like something you'd see in a documentary. Little yips and yawns, then yips and yawns in response. I'm trying to do mental calibrations. Where would I attack from? How would I surprise us of I were them?
“Count of three,” I say. “Follow me.”
I can feel Caroline nod. Her head has been on a swivel the last 30 seconds. She's pressed herself so tightly to me that I can feel every muscle twitch and every joint twist.
“One.” The wailer chatter gets louder.
“Two.” Louder still
A wailer shrieks. There's a thud, and the ground gives a brief shake.
I shout “Three” and whatever has landed meets my cry with one of its own. It’s a deep warble that rattles something inside of me. I grab Caroline’s hand and turn for the gate.
We come face to face with the biggest wailer I’ve seen yet. It towers over me and raises its arms high above its head then smashes them down toward us. I push Caroline aside and dive to my left. The thing’s claws just miss my leg and drive deep into the earth, sending a shower of dirt and grass onto us.
Caroline has rolled away. She springs to her feet and in one fluid motion swipes at the thing’s ankles with her machete. The sound of its thick, rotted skin splitting is followed by cries of pain. I stand and raise my gun.
All of the wailer’s attention is on Caroline now. She’s crouched, prone. Her machete is loose in her hand. She’s turning a slow circle. The wailer takes a limping step closer and swipes an open hand at her, the claws coming just inches from her stomach. She has it occupied. I take aim.
Another wailer cries from over my shoulder. I turn to look. This isn’t a party of three anymore.
“Mac!” Caroline shouts.
My attention is back on her: I fire two quick shots, catching her wailer in the back, but he’s moved. Those shots were meant to kill only make him angry. But he is distracted. Caroline ducks away and runs over to my side. We back ourselves up to the side of the house.
There are four wailers now, and the head of a fifth appears over the fence. If I didn't know better I'd think we crossed some line in a turf war. We'd ventured unknowingly into wailer territory.
The big wailer limps toward us. It opens its mouth wide and we can see deep into its throat. It shrieks and vocal chords deep inside go taut. The three wailers behind it shriek their own response. The fifth wailer clears the fence and joins the chorus line behind this show’s star.
“I don't know that we're fighting our way out of this one. Anything you can do to help?”
She jams the end of her machete blade into the dirt to her side and starts to chant something. Her hands work in slow circles in front of her and begin to glow a dull blow. They are causing everything in this backyard to glow. The main wailer cries short and low and the other start to come up next to it.
Caroline chants louder now, and I’m waiting for something to happen, but it doesn’t. She starts over, and the wailers cry out again. The yard begins to go blue again, but they aren’t going to wait for whatever little show Caroline has planned. They attack.
The main wailer takes two steps forward. There’s a blast and the thing’s chest explodes into a cloud of guts and goo. It takes me a moment to register what’s happened. It takes the remaining wailers half that time, and they are on us fast. Caroline runs one through with her machete before it can extend its arms to attack her. I put three bullets into the middle of the body of one that’s charging me. It stumbles forward and collapses on top of me, pinning me to the wall.
I hear Caroline grunt through another blow with her machete. Then two more blasts from what sounds like my grandfather’s shotgun.
I struggle to push this wailer off of me, until I feel someone help. The dead weight is gone. I role to my feet and come face to face with a guy who could be my grandfather. His hair is gray and long and pulled back behind his head. His beard, also gray, is thick and full. His skin is leathered, and he’s wearing khaki clothes that have been torn and stitched enough times that they look almost patchwork. He wears leather boots that come halfway up his calf, and his pants are tucked into the tops. The shotgun hangs loose in his left hand. He sticks out his right for me to shake and introduces himself.
My savior’s name is Willie.
TWO
Willie wears a vest that’s covered in pockets. He undoes the button on one of them and pulls out a pack of chewing gum. He offers me and Caroline each a stick. We accept, and I tell him thanks.
He nods.
“No,” I say. “Really. Thank you.”
He pulls the knife from his belt. He nods again.
“You’d have done the same.” He steps to one of the wailers. It’s landed face first into the dirt. Willie straddles its back and puts a hand under the thing’s chin. He wrenches it back, bending the head unnaturally high. He draws the knife quickly across the wailer’s neck. A pool of black darkens the grass.
“Gotta be sure they’re dead,” he says.
He moves to the next wailer and repeats the process.
“So,” he says as he rolls one of the wailers over so its back is up, “where are you two from?”
“Here,” Caroline says.
“Haven’t seen you around.” Willie stands. “And I’ve been around a lot.”
I step in. “We’ve come from Fair Park.” Willie pulls a dingy rag from his pocket and wipes his blade clean then tucks it back under his belt.
“That’s where we we had camp,” I continue. “But we’re headed north now. We made a stop here because her apartment was a block or so from here. She had some things she wanted to pick up.”
“You get them?”
“What?” Caroline asks.
“You find what you were looking for? Familiar things are good. Important. I’m wanting to know if you found them.”
“Oh,” Caroline says. She reaches down and pats the top of her pack. “Yeah. I did.”
Willie turns to me. “What are you two doing for shelter now?”
“A little tarp that’s kind of a lean-to. We put it up every night after we find a safe spot.”
“A safe spot? No such thing. And a lean-to ain’t much protection.”
“We do OK,” Caroline says. “We don’t just set up anywhere. And we take turns watching out for each other.”
“Take turns? So you get a couple of hours sleep at a time?”
I pull my pack from the ground. “On a good night.”
“How’d you like to get a good night’s sleep?”
A good night’s sleep sounds better than that steak and pork chop I’d been thinking about earlier. Caroline thinks I sleep. And I do for a few minutes a night. String them all together and they probably add up to an hour or so, but it’s never all at once. We tell Willie that we take turns watching out for one another, and Caroline thinks we do. But I hear her practicing her magic for hours at a time. I hear her get frustrated by consecutive failures. I hear her small celebrations when things finally go right. And at moments I’ll drift off, but I exist in a perpetual state of exhaustion.
I swallow the eagerness that wants to spit out “It’s sounds amazing. Life altering. Perfect.” Instead, I just nod as a way of saying “I’m listening.”
“Come with me.” Willie heads to the still-open gate. I pause and take a look back at the garden. Tomato plants are bent. Peppers lay on the ground, crushed into a pulp. Dirt has been turned over and lays in freshly dug piles, the work of the wailers and the long claw
s that come from what used to be toes. Even the root vegetables are gone, and it’s all such a waste. We could have eaten for days on everything we pulled from this place. Weeks if we’d rationed it all out.
Caroline calls me, and I hurry to catch back up with her and Willie. She’s walking a few steps behind, and leans into me once I’m walking next to her again. She whispers: “What are we doing?”
“Just following for now. Having friends out here isn’t a bad idea.”
“I’m getting a vibe. I don’t know that I like Rambo all that much.”
“We owe him. Kindness at least. Let’s have a meal with …”
Willie interrupts: “You guys want to speak up? I can’t hear you.”
He stops walking and waits. We catch up then make small talk.
He’s asking questions: How Caroline and I connected. How we each got to Fair Park. Where we were the night all of this started. Then where we were the night that the rains came and all the wailers rose.
“The rain was a surprise,” Willie says. “We were lucky out here. Most of us were back at the compound, and we were able to weather the storm mostly. Wailers couldn’t get to us, even though a lot of them tried.”
Willie pauses. He’s lost in a moment we aren’t part of. “But we did lose a couple guys who got caught out in it. Tough night.”
This is the first I’ve heard him use the word compound. He’d mentioned a camp earlier. I had assumed he’d found some kind of house or shelter that provided a bit of safety, and that’s where he was taking us for the night. And he’s saying things like ‘us’ and ‘we’. He’s talking about multiple people, big multiples if he’s referring to a compound. A compound means community, or it could. Hopefully.
We’ve all run out of things to say, so we walk for a couple of minutes in silence until we begin to hear the sounds of life. Voices. Activity.
“Almost there,” Willie says.
We round a corner and can see where Willie is taking us. It’s an apartment complex. Looks old, but it appears to have somehow made it through the last few months mostly unscathed. It’s built in a U-shape with all of the units facing a central courtyard, one of those features that was built with the idea that forced community was better than no community at all.
What should be the open end of the U has been barricaded with a solidly constructed wall that’s nearly two stories tall. From this distance I can see a couple of heads poking over the top. One of them waves toward Willie. Willie waves back, and I hear a voice call out, “Unlock it. Willie’s back.”
There’s the popping of a series of locks as we get near, and a gap in the wall opens up. Willie passes through, and we follow. Just through the wall, we twist and turn through a set of narrow walkways then come out into the courtyard, and all eyes are on us. There are a couple dozen people milling about. They’ve all stopped what they are doing and watch as Willie walks us over to an apartment with a gold 28 painted on the door.
Willie opens it.
“How’s that look?”
I peek in. It’s not much, but it has a roof and a couch. It’s a home, and that’s more than I’ve seen in months.
“Perfect,” I say and shake Willie’s hand in thanks.
Caroline and I step inside, and Willie leans against the door jamb. “You two get settled. I’ll have someone bring a couple plates of food around. We’ll get you fed then you can get some sleep.”
He steps away, and Caroline closes the door behind him.
I sit on the couch and let my body sink deep into the thin cushions. Caroline sits at the other end and lets herself fully relax.
“Oh my god.”
“I know,” I say.
She pulls off her shoes, a pair of leather tennis-style shoes that she’ll need to replace soon. My boots look pristine compared to what Caroline has been wearing. She puts her feet up onto the coffee table that’s in front of us.
“So what do you think?” I ask her. She’s closed her eyes and leaned her head back on the couch cushion.
“I never expected Heaven to look like this.”
I chuckle.
“You OK staying here?”
“On this couch? Forever? Sounds good.”
“You know what I mean,” I say through a smile.
Caroline sits back up. “A few days to rest and recover sounds good.”
She’s right. I don’t know what I’m looking forward to more, a warm meal or sleeping without one eye open.
I turn to say something to Caroline, and she’s out—snoring lightly.
I close my eyes, and even though I’m exhausted, sleep won’t come. I fight it for a moment, wondering if I’ve just gotten used to the hard ground and sweatshirt pillows.
I give up and accept that, at least for now, sleep is avoiding me. I stand and take a better look at our new space. There’s the couch and the table. There’s a TV stand along the wall opposite from the couch and a dead TV sitting on top. Next to that is a lantern and a box of matches, half full.
A hall heads to the back of the apartment with three doors coming from the left side. The first is to a bathroom that’s no longer functional. The next two rooms are bedrooms, both small. They do each have a bed, though, which would be better than a couch. I go back and scoop up Caroline, one arm under her knees and one under her arms. I carry her back to the farthest bedroom and lay her on the bed. She never stirs.
The door to the closet is half open along the wall parallel with the bed. I push it the rest of the way open and half a dozen women’s blouses sway in the artificial breeze. I quickly shuffle through them. They are silk, something that a woman would wear to a job. Something with an office that required a certain appearance. I slide the closet door back closed and head to the next bedroom. The bed in here is smaller. There’s another closet and more clothes. Things that a young boy would wear. Shirts full of faces with cartoon characters I don’t recognize and pants with worn knees.
I move back to the kitchen and start opening drawers. They are mostly empty except for a spare piece of silverware or cooking utensils. Then I get to the skinny drawer that always seems included in apartment cabinets. It’s the drawer that’s too skinny to be of much good, but if it’s not there then it feels like always-valuable storage space is wasted.
I open that drawer and push my hand inside and deep to the back. I pull out a small journal. Something simple bound and about the size of a playing card. I open it. The first pages are just notes. To-do lists. Things to pick up at the store or projects that need to be started or completed.
Then, after a few blank pages, are more notes. I scan the pages quickly. I see descriptions of creatures that are unfortunately familiar.
A knock on the door startles me. Willie calls from the other side: “Got some food for you all if you’re hungry.”
I pocket the notebook and open the door. Willie comes in and sets two plates on the coffee table. It’s some kind of roasted meat and some wilted greens that I don’t recognize.
He scans the room for Caroline then asks: “She already asleep?”
I sit on the couch and pull a plate of food over to me. I pluck a large chunk of meat off the plate. The grease cuts warm streaks down my fingers and across my palm. I pop the meat into my mouth and suck the leavings off my hand.
“Don’t think she made it five minutes,” I say and pinch a second bite of meat.
Willie chuckles. “I’m surprised you’re still upright.”
“Me too. Disappointed, really.”
“Mind racing?”
“A little. I didn’t get up this morning thinking I’d be here.”
Willie pulls a match from the box on the cabinet holding the TV and lights it then the lantern.
“I’m biased.” He shakes the match and the flame goes out. “But I like it.”
“We really do appreciate you all taking us in.”
“It’s nothing.” Willie heads back to the door. He stops halfway out. “Breakfast is served early. If you’re up you can get som
e but I can’t promise anything will be left if you don’t join the rest of us out here.” He gestures to the courtyard with his head.
I suck grease off my fingers and nod my head. “Sounds good.”
He waves his goodbye, and I stand. I lock the door then go back to my plate of food. I make quick work of what’s left then lay on the couch, stretching my legs out in front of me. The muscles all go to jelly, and I know that I’m not making it to the bed tonight.
I pull the notebook out of my pocket and flip past the notes and lists and find the descriptions of the last few months. I read about the night when rocks and boulders crashed through everything and destroyed life as we knew it. I read about attempts to survive and find normalcy, if only for the writer’s son. And then I read about the wailers. About the first time the writer heard them and how she thought that maybe it was just a pack of wild dogs, how that’s all she hoped it was. Then there were the disappearances of everyone in the complex, one by one. How the wailers’ cries were getting louder and how she’d finally seen one. The sentences getting longer and more rambling. The words getting more desperate. She wrote of making plans to leave, but how she didn’t want to travel alone. Still, she was going out and scouting routes, finding the ways that were still passable and seemed safest.
Then the entries stopped.
I shut the notebook and toss it onto the coffee table. I close my eyes and drift off quickly this time, thinking about a woman and her boy and praying that just because the entries had stopped their story hadn’t.
THREE
There’s noise outside the front door. That’s what wakes me. I sit up and it takes a moment for me to recognize where I am, the sleep was that deep. Then I see the empty plate of food and the notebook and it all comes rushing back.
The Road North Page 3