Anthony Puyo's The Compelled

by Anthony Puyo

  The group agrees. They stay low and quiet. Coming up on a garbage bin, they duck behind it. A few cars zip by with infected in them. They’re heading towards the havoc. After they pass, the group runs across the street, passed a diner. They search in a few vehicles, coming up empty. They need the perfect combination of un-wrecked, good tires, fuel, keys in the ignition, or on the body of the poor soul of an owner who died in or near it.

  A block from the diner, and scared to death, they tread. Not too much further, Chet points at an old Chevy truck parked in the middle of the road with its driver door open.

  “Please be the one. This one’s a classic,” Chet begs.

  Everyone else keeps watch, hoping to hear good news from the men. Anxiety sifts through them all.

  Chet searches the ignition. The one place the keys are almost never at. To his surprise, they’re there. He gazes over at Craig with a bingo! grin. “We’re in business, buddy!”

  Craig replies. “Hopefully it has gas.”

  “One thing at time.” Chet whispers a prayer, then turns the ignition. The engine turns slow, turns on, then turns off. “Fuck.” Chet tries again. The same sequence, but this time—it stays on. “Hell yeah, man!”

  White and black smoke exit the tailpipe. Everyone in the group is elated. The kids especially.

  Chet yells out the door to everyone. “The babes got plenty of fuel. Everyone get in. It’s time to find our paradise.”

  A euphoric feeling circles them all. And at last they can breathe. Not another moment goes to waste; they take their seats, and speed off.

  Craig sits in the truck bed with Isabell, Rose, Eva, and Jason. Their vision lies on the fading scenery of the downtown-buildings.

  Many thoughts and memories engulf their minds. The crisp, early morning air gives a surreal picture of the city, allowing for the funneling smokestacks to easily be seen. It’s pleasant to the ears to hear the gunshots fade. It comes as a distinct message; they’re finally leaving.

  Craig glances at the gun in his hands. There was a time he had never thought of using, or even having use in a firearm.

  How things have changed.

  They all stare up to the sound of approaching military helicopters flying overhead towards the city they’re leaving behind. Moments later—as they move further away—several explosions echo from the place they once called home, igniting the backdrop of the buildings.

  They came from lives that were very different from one another. But as the world changed, so did they. All of them shared some form of the same traumatic experiences. Most of them lost family. All of them lost friends. They are the survivors that fate chose. And now, they are free at last to live on their terms. The way they had planned when they were whole, in that dingy, metal and brick garage.

  Nothing is for certain. They discovered that the hard and sad way. Devin, Jack, Charlie, Bodo, Doc—all gone. They will be missed. But the remaining group vowed to make sure Charlie’s and Bodo’s death, would not be vain.

  31

  Paradise

  They arrive at the secluded two-story home at 7:25 a.m. The dwelling sits at the end of a long, dirt road entrance. They found the place far out in the countryside, where the next closest house resides a mile away.

  The home is several decades old and it shows. The outside walls, made of plank wood, white colored, are peeling to their original color of brown. Still, the place stood tough considering its wear and tear.

  The screen door in the front is hanging on one hinge. It sways back and forth in the light wind, banging on the wall every few seconds.

  “Think anyone’s home?” Chet asks while driving up.

  Melissa sits with both kids asleep between her and Chet. She inspects the surroundings.

  It appears deserted. No vehicles in the driveway, fortifies her suspicion.

  “If it belongs to someone, they don’t seem to be here.” She takes notice of the banging screen door. “That door would have drove me nuts by now, if I lived here.”

  “Good point.”

  Chet stops the truck roughly twelve feet from the front entrance. The door rests above a thin three step staircase. The others don’t get off that quickly. Instead, they gaze around as if they’re on a raft in the middle of the ocean. They notice the place sits in the middle of several acres of weeds and dirt mostly. Outside the land; to one side, are groves of orange trees. Grapevines line the other two sides, putting the place in the center of a square. Across the street are endless columns of walnut trees.

  The home has its own little front and back yard, though mostly made up of weed grass. One evergreen and two large eucalyptus trees complete the scene, with the evergreen supporting a homemade swing. It looked to be unused for some time.

  Craig stares up into the sky. It’s changed on a dime since leaving the city. The wind has picked up, and the newly formed clouds are darkening. A gust pushes against his chest heading east to west, and a hefty rain drop hits over his right cheek.

  “It’s about to come down. I think we should knock.” Craig inserts.

  Chet stands inches away from the door. “Here goes nothing.” He knocks fairly hard.

  They wait a few seconds, garnering no result.

  He repeats. This time shouting along, “Is anybody home?”

  Still nothing.

  After a moment of patience, they stare at each other with shrugs.

  Time for the next idea.

  Chet grabs for the knob. It doesn’t even wiggle. “I don’t think someone is locked in there. Maybe they’re out on a supply run. Maybe even dead and not coming back.”

  Craig replies. “Let’s break it.” As if on cue—thunder sounds.

  Side by side, the guys shoulder in the entrance.

  Standing in the doorway of the house with the outside offering little light, it’s near dark inside. The sight makes the eeriness rise up a few notches.

  Craig steps in, searching for a light switch on the closest wall. The flick up doesn’t produce anything. He sighs. “There’s no power out this way.”

  “That’s a shame,” echoes Chet, “Maybe we can find some candles or something.” Melissa hands over a flashlight.

  The place is simple—neat. An odor that most people would describe as old people smell, is imbedded in the homes air. Cigarette and a musky stench accompany it, likely absorbed by the place and the things in it.

  They all go inside, closing the door behind them. The sound of thunder roars heavily. A moment later, raindrops fall fast and hard.

  Chet yells out their presence in the house. There’s no answer.

  “I don’t think anyone’s here . . . for now at least.” Eva says.

  “Looks like home for the night.” Melissa relays softly.

  Craig interjects. “If the owner or claimer comes, will negotiate a stay for the day. Get the word on how it is out here. Hopefully find something of our own if we have to.”

  They take a gander at their surroundings. It’s dim, but they can see up close.

  Chet wastes no time. He jumps, rear first, on the aged blue and white plaid couch. “Comfy for an old rug on cushion, if I do say so myself.”

  Craig about to join him. “Is it?” Before he can, Melissa grabs his arm. Craig turns his head. “What, woman?”

  “Um, the screen door please? Some of us would like to sleep tonight.”

  He asks for a minute with a stare. It gets him nowhere. “Sure, I’m on it . . . But—” he pauses with a smirk.

  Melissa gives a “Let’s hear it” smile, knowing something's coming from that naughty childlike grin of his. “But, what?” she asks.

  “I was just going to say, some of us won’t be sleeping anyway.” He gives a flirty wink.

  She replies playfully. “Are you warning me about your snoring again? Because if that’s the case, most of us, won’t be sleeping tonight.”

  “Ha, Ha, very funny.” Craig shakes his head. The loving husband gives his sweetheart a kiss before doing her bidding.

  A cou
ple of hour pass, and no claimants have arrived.

  Chet, Eva, Jason, and Craig are in the kitchen hashing out their next move. While Chet and Craig talk, Jason opens the fridge. He’s hit hard with a horrid smell. The food inside went bad a few weeks ago. He shuts it with a slam.

  Eva goes through cabinets. finding some candles and matches. She begins lighting them.

  Chet stares out the large kitchen window. The view goes through a side porch laced with old furniture. In the distance, he sees orange trees. “I don’t think anyone’s coming back for this place. The cupboards still got can foods. Water that looks untouched. I’m thinking it might be ours.”

  Craig responds. “I feel the same. If someone was dwelling here, why haven’t they boarded the windows or doors.”

  “Yup. I think we ought to go around back. Search for some wood, maybe aluminum sheets, and do it ourselves.”

  Craig nods in agreement. “Let’s go.” He turns to Jason who’s stuffing his face with cookies. “You ready?”

  “Yes,” he says, accidently shooting crumbs when he answers.

  Eva, placing candles in the living room, comes across the resident’s photos. In one: a young man poses in a sheriff uniform. The picture is an old black and white original. In another, Eva sees the same young man, with a woman and four children—all girls. Eva can’t help but smile at the happiness of everyone in the picture.

  She goes through other ones of the family. They tell a story from different times of their lives. The little girls are grown up in a few, and in others, they’re even older. Eventually, Eva gets to the photos of the women with their husbands.

  Feeling moved, she keeps sifting through frames. She encounters the parents, the owners of the house, now up in age, holding their grandchildren in the hospital. Eva especially enjoys the ones where they hold the kids in other places. One strikes her as exceptionally cute: the grandfather, in his mid-fifties, has his two grandchildren—boys, straddled around his ankles while he stands on the sands of a beach.

  Eva’s face lights up. So lovely.

  Questions forge through her mind. Who are you? What happened? The second being more of a dreadful thought, she quickly lets go. Eva did not want to ruin the normalcy that’s branded in the photos.

  She goes on her way, walking by a mantle, heading towards the skinny staircase that leads to the second floor. She wants to bypass the other photos; in fear they might sadden her. But as her right foot touches the first step, she stops. She knows it won’t leave her mind if she doesn’t continue. Like a good book half read; she has to finish the story.

  Eva puts her candle up close to the cluster of remaining photos. The woman she pegs as the mother of the girls, is in this particular frame. It fascinates her. In this photo, the woman is much older; mid to late sixties, Eva figures. The backdrop is a cemetery, and her face is plastered in grief. The lady is wearing all black and has a bouquet of flowers in her dark gloved hands.

  Another frame—same event—validates Eva’s impression. She whispers, “Ma’am, I’m so sorry for your loss.” A tear slowly rolls down her cheek. The picture shows the woman’s husband, the sheriff, laying peacefully in his casket.

  Eva scolds herself for being so curious. But It’s life. The highs and the lows of it. Sweet sometimes, sour occasionally, and at the end—always bittersweet.

  To see the family’s happiness and sadness through the eye of the lens, is something worth discovering. The mesh of emotions, Eva will keep with her for the rest of her life. However long that will be.

  After a moment of reflection of her own life, Eva gathers herself. She then takes the two candles upstairs.

  On the top floor there’s two rooms. One on each side of the long balcony. A bathroom located in the middle, separated them.

  Walking up, Eva could hear the young girl Violet talking and playing with her mother and Isabell. They reside in the room left of the stairs. Hearing the young innocent laughter, breaks the moment Eva was having a minute ago.

  As she steps closer towards the voices, Eva recounts to herself: How nice it is; to be safe and far away from the madness we’ve come from. It has only been a few hours, but already, things are starting to feel normal again.

  At the doorway, Eva stems. She observes the happy, young Violet plucking her mother’s eyebrows near the window. Violet giggles every time Rose flinches in pain—which seems like every time she’s plucked. Rose has a few unpleasant words in Spanish towards the process of beauty, but Eva could see she’s enjoying her kids delight.

  Eva smiles as she walks in with a candle, putting it on side dresser.

  Isabell, who’s all smiles herself, turns to Eva. “Oh, thank you.”

  Eva makes her way back down the hallway, passed the bathroom, which is occupied by Ryan, to the other room. There, an exhausted Melissa stands, staring out the room’s rather large window. Somethings on her mind. It can be seen on her face as she looks out into the silver clouds.

  The large rain drops hit and roll down the glass over and over. It’s soothing—poetic almost. Melissa’s hard gaze breaks as she notices Eva’s reflection in the window. She turns. The two exchange warm smiles.

  “Hi, I thought you would want one of these.” Eva says, referring to the candle.

  Melissa’s gives a subtle grin. “Yes . . . Thank you.” She walks past the room’s small cot with her hand out to receive the wick.

  Eva, not wanting to intrude, but feels the need to ask. “Are you okay, Melissa?”

  “Yes.” She answers lightly, almost trailing off. It’s apparent she’s holding back strong feelings.

  More concerned now, Eva badgers. “What’s wrong?”

  Melissa puts the candle on the large dresser. “Everything.” Her eyes glossing.

  Eva strolls over and embraces her friend. “There, there.”

  Melissa nestles in her arms for few moments. She doesn’t speak, just whimpers slightly. She breaks out of it, her nose sniveling. “It’s nothing. I’m just being a complainer. It’s nothing, really.”

  “Melissa, you can talk to me about anything, if you need to. Even if it’s just to complain. Sometimes we all need to release. There’s nothing wrong, and I won’t judge you.”

  Melissa sighs. “It’s just, with all the running, hiding, trying to survive, and everything else. I never really had time to let it soak. What we had, what we lost . . . I’m sorry, I know it must sound strange.”

  “Not at all. I understand completely.”

  Melissa grabs a tissue from the dresser and sits on the cot. “I guess. I just wish we knew what we were facing. It seems like we’ll never know. All our lives changed in an instant. We had no control of it . . . We don’t have control now. So much death, so much destruction. And my home, I miss my home. It was small, but it was perfect for our family.”

  “Where did you live?”

  “Downtown on Fulton. We had one of those ‘revitalize the downtown’ condos. We got the condo alright, sadly, the ‘revitalized downtown’ never came.”

  Eva gives a slight snicker. “What a cruel joke.”

  “How about you, where did you call home?”

  “Bullard and Palm.”

  “That’s a nice little area. Any pets or family live with you?”

  “No. It was a pretty lonely place.” Eva says, tongue in cheek.

  “Don’t give up, you’ll find your man and have your family.”

  “That would be different.”

  “What?”

  “To start a family in the new and improved apocalyptic world.” They both share a laugh. “See, you’re feeling better already.”

  “Thank you, Eva. It’s nice having someone around you can talk to. Not that I can’t talk to Craig. But he’s not a woman—”

  “You don’t have to explain, I get it. I saw some coffee earlier in the kitchen. I’ll make some, and we’ll talk about whatever you want. I got plenty of stories, and I’m a good listener.”

  “Sure. I would like that.”

  �
��Okay then,” Eva turns, then stops. “Hey, Melissa?”

  “Yes?”

  “I think things are going to change for the better here . . . I really do.”

  Melissa grins showing no teeth, then nods yes. “Me too.”

  32

  Settling In

  The men go through the shed in the back of the house. The rain isn’t letting up and neither is the thunder. They take whatever tools they can use and go further back to the barn. From the looks of it, the place hadn’t been functioning for some time. It’s probably why it was used as a storage place.

  Many boards of the frame are missing. Broken off in time from the weather. Wood-Rot is another characteristic of the aged barn. A perfect breeding ground for termites. The paint was red, but most of that had come off.

  Regardless of the place’s mishaps, Chet and Craig find it perfect. Whatever wood they can’t get lying around in there, they can easily break it off the structure and nobody will notice.

  It takes till nightfall, but the job gets done. It isn’t as fortified as a bank, but it’s formidable.

  The guys are beat, soaked, and wet. After shop clean up. And for them, drying off and bearing some clean clothes, it was time to relax.

  While the women and the kids go to sleep, the men refresh themselves with some liquor they had found earlier in a cabinet. It’s old, like the rest of the place, but it does fine.

  They sit in the living room, in front of the lit fire furnace. Yellow and orange glows dance all over the room, illuminating onto the guy’s faces. They drink happily and talk comfortably. No one has come to claim the property so their ease grew.

  “What now, what’s going to happen to us now?” A glossy eyed Jason remarks, sitting alone on the love seat. The man-child wasn’t big on starting conversation. But the liquor, which it so often does, installs social attributes and bravery.

  Chet, on the long couch, Craig to one end, pours some more drink of vodka. That makes almost two empty liter bottles for the night.