by David Moody
‘Absolutely no idea.’
‘Those people at the campsite... what was wrong with them?’
‘You heard the radio. They’re sick. Infected.’
‘Something to do with the scratches.’
‘I guess.’
‘You really messed up that old woman.’
‘I know. I didn’t have any choice.’
‘Were they going to eat us?’
She laughed out loud at that, then stopped and checked herself. He wasn’t far off the truth. ‘Something like that.’
‘How did you do it?’
‘Do what? I didn’t do anything.’
‘You beat them up. You drove the car into the woman.’
‘Did I? I don’t remember. It all happened so fast.’
‘It was pretty cool.’
Coming from Ben, that was one heck of a compliment, if misplaced. ‘It definitely wasn’t cool. It was horrific. I’m not proud of myself.’
‘I would be.’
The two toilets flushed within seconds of each other and the girls reappeared. Jody told them to wait where she could see them and left the door open while she did what she had to do. Ben went in the cubicle next door. A minute or so later and the four of them were finished.
‘Ready?’ she asked. Three heads nodded back.
Jody guided the kids out, protective arms around all three of them. Something caught her eye way over to her left. Shit. Standing in the trees a short distance away was a solitary figure. Male. Late forties, maybe early fifties. Overweight. Shabby clothing. Scruffy beard. Clearly infected.
He was watching them.
His head remained still, but his eyes followed their every movement.
She didn’t tell the kids, and she pretended she hadn’t noticed.
‘Are we going back to the holiday now?’ Jenny asked.
‘Shh...’
A twitch of movement from the man in the trees. Ears pricked up.
‘I want my things from the tent.’
Sing-song voice. Everything’s okay.
‘We’ll talk about it in a minute, love. Just get into the car first.’
‘But Mummy, what about my bye-bye blanket?’
Almost there. Key fob pressed. Central locking clunk.
‘I told you, in the car first.’
Jody reached for the handle just as the man in the trees pounced. He came at them with vicious speed and impossible athleticism, launching himself into the air and virtually clearing the length of their car in a single inhuman leap.
She managed to get the girls safely inside and shut the door, but he caught hold of her shoulders and pulled her away. Flat on her back with a sick bastard leering over her. She could hear the girls screaming and she pressed the key fob in her hand involuntarily, locking the kids in.
The man on top of her was a dead weight. Literally. Bizarrely cold and lifeless, yet somehow still volatile. He (it?) tried to raise his hands to get at her face, but his oversized belly and low centre of gravity made it almost impossible for him to move freely. Driven by instinct and repulsion, Jody turned her face away from his then forced her hands under his shoulders and hefted him up and over. She rolled one way and he rolled the other, slapping hard against the tarmac like meat on a butcher’s slab. Their legs were still entangled, but she managed to kick and thrash and free herself.
Jody got up, and so did the dead man.
She was disorientated and had her back to the toilet block. The kids in the car screamed in absolute terror, and when Jenny banged her fists repeatedly against the window, the dead man turned to face her. To Jody’s horror, he began lumbering towards her children.
‘Oi, you,’ she yelled at him. ‘Leave them alone, you greasy fucker.’
But it was too late, and he was up against the car now, scraping at the metal and glass with numb, germ-carrying fingers. Jody ran at him and grabbed his shoulder, spinning him around.
‘I’m here,’ she screamed in his face. ‘Leave them alone.’
And to her surprise, he did. When she was absolutely sure she had his full attention, she slowly backed away and he followed. To her immense relief the kids had shut up, but that relief was short-lived as he launched another attack. She kept backing away and he kept coming towards her, matching her pace almost step-for-step. And then, when she reversed into the wall of the toilet block and could go no further, he came at her with another uncharacteristically athletic leap.
Jody side-stepped, and the infected man hit the wall hard.
And then she was behind him, and he was lost, and she grabbed a fistful of hair and smashed his face repeatedly against the woodwork. Again and again and again. She felt bones crack. Blood began to puddle.
She let him go and he crumbled to the ground. She stood over him for a couple of seconds longer until she was sure she’d done enough.
No keys.
She panicked momentarily, then looked up when she heard Jenny banging on the car window again. ‘Over there,’ she mouthed, and she pointed across the car park to where the skirmish with the dead man had begun. There were the keys. Jody ran and snatched them up, then got into the car and drove like hell, swerving first to miss the infected man (who was, impossibly, getting back up again), then swerving again to avoid a car coming from the opposite direction at even greater speed.
It was quiet inside the car for a while until Ben spoke. ‘That was awesome, the way you smashed that bloke’s face in.’
‘It wasn’t. It was vile.’
‘How did you do it?’
‘I just imagined it was someone else.’
◆◆◆
The origin of the deadly infection, its purpose, its reason for being here and doing what it was doing... all these unanswered questions were unimportant. Jody heard uninformed experts on the radio trying to explain the inexplicable, but their empty, pointless words just made things worse and added to the nauseous fear she felt this morning. Everything that mattered was in this car.
It was the speed of everything that caught her off-guard. In horror books and films you usually had a little warning, but not here, not today. From the moment that first infected had crashed down onto their tent, the morning had been a desperate, non-stop flight to safety.
Problem was, nowhere felt safe anymore.
The light on the fuel gauge had just started blinking. The handbook said there was about thirty miles left in the tank when that happened, but she couldn’t afford to take any chances. She reckoned half that distance was a safe bet, and that left nowhere near enough fuel to get them home.
There was another option.
Trouble was, it was her least preferred option. Her absolute last resort.
‘Okay, kids,’ she said, her throat dry and her legs feeling weak with nerves, ‘we’re going to have to make a detour. We don’t have enough petrol to get home.’
Groans and protests from the girls. ‘Can’t we just get some more?’ Jenny sensibly asked.
‘We’ve only passed one petrol station this morning,’ Ben reminded her, ‘and there was a massive fire there, remember?’
‘That was a petrol station?’
‘Before it exploded, yeah,’ Jody told her daughter, remembering the chaos they’d recently passed. Strange, she thought, how billowing flame, charred wrecks and panicking people had already become par for the course today.
‘There might be another one soon.’
‘And there might not. You’re such a dummy,’ Ben sneered. ‘Mum, what happens if we run out in the middle of nowhere with them zombies running about?’
Jody saw panic on her daughter’s face in the mirror. ‘Thanks, Ben,’ she hissed at him.
‘Are we gonna run out of petrol and get stuck?’ Jenny asked, panicking.
‘No,’ Jody told her.
‘And are they zombies?’
‘No,’ she said again. ‘There’s no such thing.’
‘So what are they?’
Jody couldn’t answer, so she said something else i
nstead. ‘Okay, look, we’re going to call in and see your dad.’
For a few seconds there was a numb, subdued silence. No discernible reaction. Then all hell broke loose. The kids erupted like it was Christmas.
‘Yes!’ shouted Holly, and Jody looked back at her. She had a broad, toothy grin on her face.
‘But Dad hates you,’ Ben said to his mum with his customary lack of tact.
‘I think that’s a bit strong.’
‘No it isn’t. He told me. He said it in a text.’
‘Yeah, well, whatever your dad might think about me, it’s you three I’m concerned about.’
‘I don’t think he’s going to let you into his house,’ Jenny said from the back.
‘As long as he lets you in, that’s all that matters.’
And Jody turned up the radio again in a vain attempt to drown out the kids’ excitement and her own disappointment.
◆◆◆
Nice place, much to her chagrin. Very nice place, actually. In need of some work, but it definitely had potential. The house was bigger than she expected, and far grander. It had an ornate metal veranda right across the front and a double garage with his bloody huge red 4x4 parked outside.
Jody looked up and down the street to check it was clear before releasing the locks. She tried to tell them to wait until she was sure it was okay before getting out of the car but their effervescent excitement was impossible to contain and the three of them bounded up the steps to the front door with an ease and familiarity which saddened her greatly. Until now, this was a place she’d only ever heard them talk about when they got back from spending time with him. To them, though, it was home from home. It was hard to accept that everything she was feeling inside – the nerves and anger, the hate (was that too strong a word?) – was the direct opposite of how her children felt.
One of them rang the bell. She couldn’t see which one, such was the forest of overly enthusiastic hands which reached up to compete to press the buzzer.
Maybe he’s out. Maybe he’s not home. Maybe he’s done a runner. Maybe he’s infected?
A delay. Twitching curtains. Then the door opened inwards and a woman answered. Jody got out, convinced the kids had got the wrong house.
‘Hi, Charlie,’ said Ben, and the woman Jody had never seen before reached out and gave her son a hug. The girls weren’t far behind.
Jody held back at the bottom of the steps and eyed up the woman with caution. Who the hell wears that much makeup at this time in the morning? The rest of the world is falling apart, and this bitch looks incredible... It annoyed her far more than it should have.
The kids were already in the house. Charlie made eye-contact with Jody and smiled awkwardly. ‘Hi,’ she said, ‘you must be...’
‘Jody,’ she answered, and she reached out to shake Charlie’s already extended hand. ‘I’m their mum.’
‘Yeah, I know. Come in.’
‘Are you sure...?’
‘I’m sure of one thing, love, and that’s that you don’t want to be standing around on ceremony outside this morning, not with everything that’s been going on.’
‘That’s why we’re here, actually.’
‘I guessed as much,’ she said, and stood to one side to let Jody through. Jody crossed the threshold and even though she felt impossibly uncomfortable and this truly was the last place on earth she wanted to be (she thought she’d rather be back in her collapsed tent on that grubby campsite at the arse-end of Wales than here), when the door closed behind her it was a relief.
Ben and Holly had disappeared, but Jenny hovered awkwardly in the hallway. ‘Charlie is Dad’s girlfriend,’ she explained.
‘I’d made that connection,’ Jody replied, a little embarrassed.
‘The kids have told me loads about you,’ Charlie said.
‘That’s funny, until just now I didn’t even know your name.’
Charlie shrugged. ‘That’s kids for you, I guess. Must be difficult for them. Anyway, come in. Let me get you a drink or something. How comes you’re here?’
‘Long story. We were camping and all this kicked off. I’m guessing you’ve seen the news? I just shoved the kids in the car and made a run for it. Didn’t have enough fuel to get home.’
‘That’s probably for the best. It’s quieter out here. I’d stay away from city centres for a while if I was you.’
‘I need to get back.’
‘You can stay here as long as you need to.’
‘All due respect, I don’t think that’s going to go down well with certain parties.’
‘You leave him to me.’
‘With pleasure,’ she said.
Jody could hear his voice already, and it made her feel sick to the stomach. She thought about how uncharacteristically, instinctively physical she’d been this morning since the nightmare at the campsite had begun, and she wished she’d had some of that strength and confidence before today. She felt helpless again now, the way being around him always made her feel. She didn’t even know if she’d be able to speak to him.
He was sitting in the corner of a huge lounge in a comfortable-looking leather armchair, all the kids piled on top of him, competing for his attention.
He glanced up. ‘You’re the last person I expected to see this morning,’ he said when he saw her.
‘Hello, Gary. It’s great to see you, too.’
‘We were camping, Dad,’ Ben said excitedly. ‘This manky old woman was trying to get at us.’
‘Your mother was camping?’ he said, incredulous, as if that was harder to believe than the fact they’d been attacked by a rabid infected woman. ‘I didn’t think that was your scene, Jody.’
‘Well the kids needed a break and I didn’t have time to arrange anything else,’ she answered quickly, deciding that was all the explanation he needed.
‘Daddy’s taking us to Disneyland soon,’ Holly said, eyes wide with enthusiasm.
‘Is that right?’
‘Yeah, in America,’ Jenny added, equally excited. ‘We’re going on a plane.’
‘You should see the hotel we’re staying in,’ Ben said. ‘It’s amazing. It’s got at least four pools and there’s this massive slide...’
‘You can show your mum later,’ Gary said.
‘And were you planning on telling me you wanted to take the kids out of the country?’ Jody asked.
‘I’d have got round to it, but only because I have to,’ he quickly replied.
‘Don’t get their hopes up,’ she warned, then she looked directly at Ben who was looking distinctly unimpressed. ‘Your dad has a habit of making promises and not delivering.’
‘I bet you could do with some coffee,’ Charlie said, interrupting at just the right moment. She led Jody out to the kitchen. ‘Probably not a bad thing to let them daydream at the moment. Take their minds off reality.’
Jody sighed. ‘I know. I’m sorry. It’s just they’ve already had enough broken promises to last a lifetime.’
Charlie handed her a mug and Jody held it tight with both hands. The heat was welcome: just on the right side of painful. She hadn’t realised how cold she was. She hadn’t realised she was shaking, either. She hadn’t realised she’d lost a sandal and that she was still in her pyjamas and they were soaked with other people’s blood. She hadn’t realised she was sobbing.
‘Let it all out,’ Charlie said and she sat her down in the nearest chair. ‘I’ll go get you something warm to put on.’
◆◆◆
Washed and showered and fed and watered.
Jody sat in the kitchen-diner and watched the huge TV on the wall in disbelief. It wasn’t even the biggest TV in the house, according to Ben. Apparently Dad had four TVs, which seemed pointless to Jody as there were only two people living here most of the time. And Ben said they were all bigger than the TV they had at home, which made her feel like a failure because they only had thirty-two inches when all of Dad’s TVs were at least forty. Fortunately the kids were currently distracted by ano
ther TV on another wall and Netflix, a Playstation, and Dad.
The news had begun to resemble the trailer for a horror movie. The panic she’d sensed earlier in the day showed no sign of abating, but at least she could now see some kind of authoritarian response to the crisis beginning to emerge. The infection was spreading east, but appeared to be gradually being contained. The military were taking control of the affected areas and isolating (and presumably destroying) the infected. Some cities, as Charlie had said, were like warzones. Hazmat suited soldiers were going door to door in scenes which would have looked hackneyed and clichéd if they hadn’t been so absolutely fucking terrifying. A camera crew followed one group as they entered a remarkably ordinary-looking house and virtually strip-searched its terrified occupants, looking for scratches and other tell-tale signs of infection. Unrelenting shaky-cam images.
Jenny was beside her. She didn’t know how long she’d been there.
‘Is it because of the scratches? Is that how it gets them?’
‘I think so, love,’ Jody replied.
‘Are they dead?’
‘That’s what the man on the TV’s saying.’
‘Gross,’ she said, and she screwed up her face then disappeared back to find Dad.
‘Pretty grim, eh?’ Charlie said, sitting down next to Jody.
‘You can say that again.’
An overlong pause.
‘Look, I just wanted to say that—’
Jody silenced her with a wave of her hand. ‘You don’t have to say anything.’
‘I know that, but I want to say something. It’s important to me. I know more about you and what happened between you and Gary than I probably should, and I want you to know it’s because he’s told me and not because I’ve asked.’
‘Then I hate to think what you’ve been told.’
‘That doesn’t matter. But I also know it must be really hard for you being here, and I don’t want to do anything that makes you feel more uncomfortable than you already do.’
‘Thanks.’
‘I mean it.’
‘I know you do. I’ve got nothing against you. Christ, I didn’t even know your name until this morning.’
‘Yeah. It must be difficult for the kids, though. I remember when my mum and dad split up and I—’