by AJ Rose
“Who’s making it easier for you?”
Ash looked at him, warmth blossoming in his chest like a firework, sharp and majestic. “You just make sure you don’t have any more mental earthquakes, and that’ll make it easier for me.”
“You don’t have to take me on, too, Ash. I can take care of myself.”
“Except see, you’re not entirely correct there. You go down for a couple days after these. Hell, just getting clean is kind of wiping you out. Circles around your eyes, unsteady on your feet. You have to rest—and that doesn’t make you weak, before you go arguing with me,” he said when Elliot looked ready to protest. “If we were at home, and you had a couch to lie on and takeout a phone call away, yeah, you’d be just fine. Out here, someone has to help you, make sure you get water and food, and there’s no Maytag refrigerator in the next tent with a pizza and a gallon of milk. It’s okay, Elliot. We have to hunt for ourselves, too. It’s not a big deal making sure we have enough for you, and Riley’s gotten really freakin’ good at snares. But if you were out here alone? You’d be in bad shape, buddy.”
Elliot closed his eyes and breathed through flared nostrils. Ash wasn’t sure if he was angry or fighting for composure over tears. Either one would be understandable. Elliot had told him many nights while they lay side by side and held hands how frustrated and helpless his epilepsy made him feel, how he hated people thinking he was fragile. Ash had only kissed his knuckles and said no, Elliot was stronger than a lot of people, and having a condition didn’t make him weak. He’d repeat it until Elliot believed it, which would probably be never.
“I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Elliot, how well do you think I’d handle leading all these people to safety if I didn’t have someone to talk to at night?”
“Except you don’t talk to me. We talk about stupid shit like Ren and Stimpy marathons and how pissed you are you probably won’t get to see how Game of Thrones ends.”
“You think that stuff doesn’t matter?” Ash asked, tilting Elliot’s face up to shave his neck, taking particular care around his prominent Adam’s apple. “That stuff matters more now, because it’s gone. Sure, when we get to Seattle, I can go buy George R.R. Martin’s books, but he’s not done with the series, and I highly doubt his publisher’s biggest concern is the next print run. Do you know how happy I am they got the Harry Potter movies finished in time for this?”
“See? This is what I mean. I don’t know how you feel about all this, other than your pop culture woes. Are you scared? Are you pissed? Are you going through caffeine withdrawals? What do you think life will be like when we get to Seattle? Will you want…?”
Ash concentrated on getting around the other side of Elliot’s jaw before he answered. “Yes, I’m scared. Riley’s generation is probably going to have to clean up our fucking mess, and that makes me ragey because they didn’t mess it up. I’m also pissed because we’ve had to make some difficult decisions while here, and we wouldn’t have if it weren’t for some dickhead terrorist thinking they could fuck with hundreds of millions of lives. I never got hooked on coffee, so no caffeine problems, but like I said, I miss Coke. And ice. Life in Seattle will be different than we’re used to. Rationing, more difficulty with the food supply than we’ve ever faced, and forget trusting anybody. What is our government doing with all this? But your last question, something tells me that’s the one you want answered most.”
Elliot remained silent until Ash finished, and they rinsed off the leftover bits of shave cream. They’d always looked to Ash like the confetti left over after making paper snowflakes with scissors in grade school.
“Good thing you’re going back to lie down in the tent. The smell of this stuff would scare off any game we wanted to hunt.” Elliot chuckled distantly, and Ash eyed him. “I won’t laugh at whatever you wanted to ask, you know.”
“I know,” Elliot acknowledged. “Just have to decide if I have the guts for the answer.”
“Fair enough.” They moved toward the shore, but before the water dropped below their hips, Ash halted him and threaded his arms around Elliot’s waist. He kissed him, his fingers caressing smooth jaw and cheek, and he stopped before it could get too heated. Elliot needed his rest. “Let’s get you back to camp.”
They were on the bank dressing when Elliot near-whispered, “Will you want me to stay with you when we get to Seattle?”
Ash looked at him, startled. “You have comfortable accommodations with your parents. I would have thought you’d be more inclined to go with them.”
“If they respected me half as much as you do, I would,” Elliot answered, not looking at him as he pulled on his shoes.
“Then I want you to stay.” He could tell that wasn’t quite the answer Elliot wanted, but he wouldn’t keep the man with him if he could get better health care with his folks, who had access to doctors Ash could only dream of. Best Ash could promise was a bumpy-ass boat ride to the mainland from Marvin’s bunker and whichever doctor would see them, probably at some free clinic. Maybe Elliot wanted Ash to say he needed him, but he wasn’t about to put himself over Elliot’s medical requirements.
Without another word, they walked back to camp, Elliot leaning heavily on Ash as his sapped energy became more apparent. They were in sight of the tents when a gunshot rang out. Ash hit the ground and pulled Elliot down with him, half covering him as he yanked his gun from the back of his pants. They were exposed in the middle of a trail, and he couldn’t see anything moving to indicate where the shot had originated.
Aaron and Brian, looking like they’d gone out for some early fishing, scrambled into camp from the other direction. Brian dropped the poles, his pistol pointed skyward. Aaron bore one of the rifles. They scanned the area, and upon seeing nothing, moved to the trees to watch for anyone approaching. Ash patted Elliot’s hip to get him to scoot into some brush along the trail and then tiptoed to the nearest tree.
Charlotte stuck her head out of her tent, but Ash hissed and frantically waved her back in. She didn’t have to be told twice, leaving the tent door flapping in the breeze. That left Jason and Tim unaccounted for.
Ash was reasonably sure Jason hadn’t gotten up and walked away, so he searched for Tim’s tall frame amongst the trees. The sound of a zipper breaking the silence got his attention. Tim crawled from his tent, coughing, his eyes streaming. He had the other Colt. He stood, shoulders slumped, gun hand limp and careless.
“Tim, get down!” Ash whispered, eyes trained on the trees for movement. But there was none, other than a slight breeze.
“He made me.” Tim’s words wavered, and he wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “Fucker made me.” He staggered then and sat as though his legs no longer had the strength to carry him. When his shoulders began to shake, Ash stepped out from his hiding place, keeping an eye on their surroundings and nodding to where Aaron and Brian hid, whirling his finger to indicate they needed to cover him.
He approached Tim with caution. The man was clearly distraught, and an armed man in such turmoil was a danger to any and everything in his view. Ash tucked away his gun and showed his hands to indicate he meant no harm.
“What do you mean, buddy?” he asked when he was close enough to crouch just outside of Tim’s reach. “Who made you do what?”
“Jason,” Tim wailed, his lips twisted in a grimace. “He made me shoot him.” In a display of self-loathing, he lifted his gun hand, limp at the wrist, and waved it as though it was obvious what he’d done, and he wanted to cut off the hand that had dared betray him.
“Jason’s been shot?” Ash demanded.
“He’s dead,” Tim sobbed, lowering his chin to his chest.
Ash waved Aaron out of hiding, pointing frantically to Tim and Jason’s shared tent. Aaron went, leaving the rifle on the picnic table as he passed. Brian stepped out as well, his gun still in hand but pointed down. Elliot stumbled into view and sat at the edge of the clearing. His eyes were hooded, and he breathed heavily, but he looked determined
, as though saying he wasn’t leaving Ash alone with Tim.
“But you said he made you shoot him.”
Tears slid down Tim’s face and snot dripped from the tip of his elfin nose. It was then Ash noticed his eyes were swollen as though he’d been crying for longer than a few minutes.
“He did. He woke up hours ago and was talking crazy. Said he was being chased and a bear had chewed off his foot. That kind of made sense, so I figured he was having a nightmare.” The explanation was given amid stutters and shuddering gasps, but as he talked, Tim seemed to calm. Ash sat patiently, afraid of Tim flying into a rage if he spoke too much. “I tried to wake him up, but he was already awake, babbling about birds dive-bombing his head and people after us we needed to kill.”
“How long did this go on?” Aaron asked, emerging from checking on Jason. He met Ash’s eyes grimly and shook his head, then nodded at Tim’s gun. Jason was dead.
“Hours. I was terrified.”
“Why didn’t you come get me?” Aaron crouched on Tim’s other side.
“I tried!” Tim shouted, face scrunched in so much pain. “He wouldn’t let me leave, and I called your name but you didn’t come, and he wouldn’t let me keep calling. Put his hand over my mouth and wouldn’t let me go until I promised to shut up.”
“Did he say he saw odd things?”
“I think the birds dive-bombing his head were pretty fucking odd. There were no birds in our tent,” Tim snapped viciously.
“Hallucinating,” Aaron mouthed to Ash over Tim’s head.
Who, Tim or Jason? Is it still going on now? Ash pointed to Tim and his watch to ask the question without speaking. Aaron shook his head and pointed to the tent.
“He finally went back to sleep, but he was so hot, and any time I moved, he woke up and grabbed me, keeping me from leaving. I didn’t want to shout again because he needed the sleep, and—” His chin quivered, and his lips morphed into a horrific grimace, the tears coming anew. “He woke up just now and was making sense. Said he knew he was dying, and that he was ready to go. Made me promise not to let him go crazy like that again. He remembered the birds.”
Ash crab-walked to Tim’s side and rubbed his back, trying to soothe him. “Was he still feverish?”
“I guess,” Tim said after composing himself with great difficulty. He lifted his gun hand and rubbed his knuckles across his nose, heedless of where the gun pointed. Ash really needed to get the weapon away from him. “I hoped the drugs were working, but when I looked at his leg around the cuts, it was gross and full of pus. Since before the sun came up, he begged me to just let him go, put him out of his misery. Said if it was the dog, we’d have ended his pain by now. For hours, he told me he wanted to die, and I was an asshole for keeping him here.”
“Is that what you did?” Aaron asked, putting a hand on Tim’s gun arm. “Ended his pain?”
Tim nodded and stared helplessly at his lap as the tears dripped down his blotchy face.
“He was your friend,” Aaron said. “You did what he wanted. You gave him the dignity he asked for. To me, that’s one of the kindest things you could have done.”
“You think so?” Tim asked so hopefully, Ash’s heart shredded.
Would I have the strength to do that for someone? He didn’t know.
“I think so,” Ash answered Tim’s desperate question. “It’s a heavy burden, but you did it to help Jason out of his pain.”
“I wanna die, too,” Tim wailed, his voice going up a register as his anguish poured out.
Awkwardly, Ash put his arms around Tim’s shoulders and made soothing sounds, wanting to get Tim to a place where he was more in control, and they could get his gun away. No way did they want him following through on what he’d just said.
“You’ll miss him,” Ash murmured. “We’ll all miss him. But you did what you thought was best. What he wanted.”
After nearly half an hour, Tim’s grief began to subside, his shoulders going still and his sobs quieting. He laid his head on Ash’s shoulder and stared at nothing. Aaron rubbed up and down his arm, closer and closer to the gun still gripped tightly in his hand.
“Tim, Jason was in septic shock. The infection from his leg went to his bloodstream, and he wasn’t going to make it,” Aaron explained gently. “I thought we had a shot with the IV antibiotics, but he needed a hospital. Clean sheets and proper medical equipment. Powerful drugs in greater supply than we were able to steal. A real bed and a doctor to watch over him. We were going to lose him no matter how hard we tried to save him. The hallucinations were a bad sign. I don’t think he would have lasted the day, and it would have been a very painful last day for him.”
Tim sniffed. “He was my friend.”
“Of course,” Ash said, still rubbing Tim’s back. “He didn’t deserve what happened to him, but he had you by his side at the end. That would make anyone strong enough to face whatever happens after this life.”
There was no response.
Boldly, Aaron covered Tim’s hand and the gun and pulled the weapon from his fingers with some difficulty. “I don’t think you should have this right now, buddy. If anything happens we need to protect you from, we’ll handle it, okay?”
“Okay,” Tim said, voice suddenly dead. “We have to bury him anyway.”
Over Tim’s head, Aaron and Ash’s gazes met. Ash knew there was no taking the body to a hospital like they’d done with Russ. They would have to do this, and he didn’t have a clue how to get supplies quickly enough or if they had enough strength to dig an actual grave for Tim’s friend. Behind him, Brian cleared his throat.
“I think there’s a park’s department maintenance shed near where we were fishing. Maybe it’ll have something we can use to give Jason a proper send-off.”
Ash nodded. “Can you help Elliot lie down first? He was about wiped out already when we heard….” He trailed off, not wanting to say anything about the sound of the gunshot and remind Tim he was the one who’d pulled the trigger.
Brian moved quickly, and Ash breathed in relief when his boyfriend was out of Tim’s sight. At any moment, the man could lash out, and since Elliot had been a target in the past, he didn’t want Tim having any reason to paint that bulls-eye on Elliot’s back again. Especially not in his uneven state.
Aaron stayed with Tim, though they’d passed the gun off behind his back to get it far away from him. Ash went with Brian to the shed he’d found.
“Holy shit,” Ash murmured when they were far enough away not to be overheard.
“Yeah,” Brian agreed. “Not good. That guy is going off the deep end.”
“To be fair, if I had been in his shoes, I’d be just as upset as him.”
“I don’t think you’d have done that. Pulled the trigger.”
Ash considered it fully since the thought first occurred to him. “If Charlotte were dying and said she didn’t want to go slow, demanding I give her a quicker death, I think I might.” Of course, he could say that, but he wouldn’t honestly know how he’d react unless he was in that position. “Could you do it for Elliot?”
Brian frowned. “No. Could you?”
Ash was glad when they reached the shed so he didn’t have to answer. Given his discomfort earlier with how deeply his emotions for Elliot were taking hold, he didn’t want to consider the choice of helping him die or watching him suffer.
They used the butt of Ash’s gun to bust the lock from the shed door and breathed a sigh of relief when they spied a hand tiller and a couple shovels pegged to the walls. They stepped around a pyramid of buckets containing the chemicals used to spray for mosquitoes in the middle of the floor to gather what they thought they could use. Returning to camp with their supplies, including a couple pair of work gloves, they set them aside and converged on Tim to sit with him in the scratchy, weedy grass, waiting for him to give the go ahead to bury his friend.
19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Day 35
Central City, Nebraska
* * *
If you love large, you’ve got to hurt large. If you’ve got a lot of light, you’ve probably got an equal amount of darkness.
—Sarah McLachlan
* * *
“I THINK WE CAN ALL AGREE we need to get out of Nebraska,” Ash said as they gathered around the makeshift fire ring in their camp between the Platte River and Hord Lake.
Elliot nodded along with the others, noting their haggard faces. They were tired, beaten down, and in Tim’s case, glassy eyed and nearly unresponsive. Charlotte bore dark circles under her eyes and even Riley, who sat on his mother’s lap, displayed no real energy. “If we pick up the pace a little, I think we can get close to the border in eight or ten days. That means longer days, fewer breaks, and more importantly, walking faster.”
“Which border?” Tim asked flatly.
Elliot frowned at him. “West.”
“We’re not going back?” Tim said, raising his head.
“No,” Ash answered wearily. “Why would we go back?”
“To kill that fucker that made me kill Jason.”
Elliot closed his eyes against a rising tide of impatience. “Jason adamantly did not want to go back to reach a hospital, so to return now would be kind of stupid and an insult to him, don’t you think?”
Tim’s glare made Elliot squirm. There had been something off about Tim ever since the morning he’d stumbled from his tent in tears and admitted what he’d done. The only thing bigger than his anger and thirst for revenge had been his self-loathing. None of them were experts in psychology, but it was obvious Tim had quickly passed the denial stage and was well entrenched in the anger portion of the five stages of grief. Most of the time, he directed his anger at himself, and despite the group’s best efforts to engage him, he’d spent most of the last two days, after they’d buried Jason’s body, in his tent. He’d come out briefly to allow Jennifer and Aaron to dispose of the bloodied sleeping bag stretcher and attempt to clean up what they could. They’d divvied Jason’s most useful supplies and given Tim anything even remotely personal. But otherwise, Tim kept himself isolated. In the night, when Elliot had taken up his watch, he’d heard murmurs of vicious insults hurled at any and everything under the sun, but most of them were aimed at Tim himself.