by Jeff Olah
26
Cora was now hysterical. Her voice cracking as she screamed for Ethan to do something. He wanted to help, but for now, the others would have to figure it out. He had other more pressing matters to attend to. First and foremost, he had backed the armored truck into a dead-end alley with only one way out. And at the moment, that exit was being filled by walking corpses.
“Cora!” he shouted.
Her words came through slowly as she began to sob. “Ethan… please…”
Throwing the truck back into drive, Ethan focused on a spot at the end of the alley. “You and Carly are going to have to handle this. Get Frank to help.”
Over to Ben, Ethan motioned back toward the growing crowd. “You good?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Okay,” Ethan said. “Hold on.”
As Ethan shoved the gas pedal to the floor and the truck lunged forward, Ben turned in his seat. Griffin was laid out flat on his back, motionless. Cora and Carly leaned over him, attempting to remain upright. Shannon held tight to the rear door and Frank braced himself along the corner, gripping tight to the two black duffel bags.
Ben shouted over the thundering engine. “Thirty seconds, just hold on. Ethan’s going to go right through them.”
They only had a fifty foot run up, which was not nearly enough. The truck plowed into the first half dozen bodies and its speed was instantly cut in half. Ethan leaned into the pedal with his right foot, keeping it pushed into the floorboard and then cut the wheel hard to the left to avoid a particularly thick grouping.
“Ben, have that pistol ready to go.”
His eyes still transfixed through the windshield, Ben only partially turned to Ethan. He sat forward and pushed up on the dash, looking out over the horde and into the street beyond. “Uh… Ethan, I don’t really think… wait, what?”
“Be ready, I may need you to—” Ethan paused. He finally saw what Ben was seeing. He wasn’t sure how he missed it before. When backing into the alley, he assumed that he’d shake free those gripping to the armored truck. He’d then drive right through the remaining crowd and out into the street, giving them some room to breathe.
Slamming into the next grouping of Feeders, he realized he was only half correct in his assumptions. They’d freed themselves from a large portion of the crowd, although in doing so he inadvertently pushed back behind the larger section and beyond that, a second horde gathering in the street beyond. One step forward, three steps back.
Still shouting from the rear cabin, Cora begged for Ethan to hurry. Momentarily allowing his attention to drift back, he could hear Carly trying to calm her and at the same time speaking quietly to Griffin.
“Can you hear me,” she asked. “Griffin, we need you to fight, we need you to try to—”
As her words trailed off, the rear cabin went quiet. Five full seconds of silence and then Carly’s voice returned. Now more directed and abrupt, she spoke with authority.
“Cora, I need you to pull yourself together. If you can’t, then move aside and cry somewhere else. Shannon, get me something to put under his head. A blanket or a pillow. Frank, I need you to get over here and help me hold him down.”
Swerving sharply back to the right, his speed was again cut by half as Ethan drove straight into the massive group lining the sidewalk before the street. In much the same position he was in five minutes before, the density of the horde and the bodies piling up around and under the weighty vehicle brought it to a stop.
“Ethan,” Carly said. “Why’d we stop?”
He didn’t answer her. Instead, he gripped the wheel and shifted back into reverse. The group outside had again begun to push themselves up against his door and now started to move toward the passenger side. Ethan rolled the truck backward a few feet and then dropping it back into drive, revved the engine with his other foot over the brake.
To his right, Ben readied the nine millimeter and shouted to Ethan while staring straight ahead. “I’ve got like five seconds. Do you want me to get out?”
“No.” Ethan said. “Stay put. We’re gonna push through… right now.”
Carly came again, this time with more of a command than a question. “Ethan what the hell are we doing? Griffin is starting to convulse, so I need you to either get us the hell out of here or get back here and help. But I’m not going to be able to help him with this thing rocking back and forth.”
Pulling his left foot off the brake, the armored truck leapt forward and bulldozed its way through a lineup of Feeders three rows deep. The cabin shook violently as Ethan pointed the truck away from the alley and out into the street. Cutting the wheel to the right, Ethan drove through the last of the horde, tossing multiple bodies aside and driving directly over those who weren’t as fortunate.
Ben sat in disbelief, his jaw hanging open as he stared back into the passenger side mirror. “Are you kidding,” he said, still looking back at what they’d driven through. “How’s that even possible, I mean really?”
Two blocks ahead, the bodies still poured out from the old Taylor farm. Ethan maneuvered through the intermittent crowds and turned left onto Mineral Street. With nothing between them and end of the long block, Ethan pushed the truck up to sixty.
Moving quickly through the once happy town, he tried to forget what used to be and only focus on where they were headed. Glancing out the side window as they drifted past where he laid David to rest, Ethan gradually let off the gas.
Turning left onto Second, he slowed the truck as they moved past the Summer Mill City Limit sign. Cringing as he pulled to a stop, Ethan read the last line.
Population 2,699
As he pulled the keys from the ignition, Frank had already moved in behind his seat. “Ethan, Griffin’s not—”
“I’m coming.” Checking his mirrors, Ethan stepped out of the seat and followed Frank into the back. Cora sat near the rear door with Shannon and watched as Carly tended to their injured friend.
The rear cabin was quiet as Griffin lay on his side. He wasn’t moving, but he was also no longer convulsing. His eyes were closed and being cradled by Carly, he appeared to be breathing normally.
“So?” Ethan said.
Carly brushed Griffin’s thick dark hair away from his face. “I’m not even going to address what happened back there. You may have just saved us—and I’ll remember to thank you for that later—but right now Griffin needs a break. Two concussions in a lifetime are enough to induce permanent damage and he’s lost consciousness twice in only the last six days.”
Ethan slowly nodded. “I get it but—”
“No Ethan, we can’t keep doing this. We need to get away from here and just rest for a few days.” She looked down at Griffin. “Especially him—he’s not going to be able to take much more.”
27
Flat on his back, Tom opened his eyes and just stared up at the woman. He didn’t speak and she hadn’t yet noticed that he was looking at her. He didn’t know where he was and couldn’t remember how he got there, but he was breathing on his own and appeared to still have full use of all of his extremities. Although the day hadn’t gone how he expected, he was at least still alive.
Sitting up against the wall of what looked like the interior of a doctor’s office, the woman had her knees pulled up into her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them. She stared off in the opposite direction and closed her eyes. But as Tom attempted to roll onto his side, she slowly lifted her head and turned to him.
“Hello,” she said.
Sliding his tender right leg up under him, the excruciating pain had faded considerably. The debilitating cramp that literally brought him to his knees had somewhat relaxed. Placing his hand against the back of his leg, the area still ached. However, other than the pounding behind his temples, he now almost felt human.
The room was warm and only partially lit. Splintered sunlight breached the vertical blinds in sharp strands and then filtered throughout the oversized office. The walls looked as though they
were freshly painted and were without a single adornment. Scoping the floor below his outstretch body, the commercial grade carpeting was littered with vending machine snack wrappers and empty bottles of water. And as his eyes fully adjusted to the room, he turned to her.
“Where are we?”
She was different now, less comatose. Her bloodshot eyes told him she was tired, but that she was a fighter. Hell, he wouldn’t be here if she wasn’t.
“I don’t really know what this place was,” she said. “I came here two days ago after waking up out there on the sidewalk. It’s safe… at least for tonight it should be. If we stay quiet, we should be okay until tomorrow.”
Pushing up into a sitting position, Tom also leaned into the wall and flinched as he attempted to mirror her position. “We can’t stay here. I need to get back.”
The woman smiled and looked toward the door. “It’s going to be dark in the next hour or so.”
Tom also looked to the door. “Is that the door we came through?”
“No,” she said. “We’re still on the first floor, but just on the other side of the lobby. I think they were remodeling this place when it all happened. I tried a few other spots, but no luck.”
Attempting to stand, he felt light-headed and a bit nauseous. “What’s the rest of the building look like? Are there any other exits?”
“I don’t know. I only made it to the second floor. Yesterday, before I left here, I made it to the stairs and then to the second floor.”
“Yeah?”
“I was very hungry and almost out of food. I decided to go out and try some of the other floors. But up there, I opened the door and there were just too many of them. I don’t have a gun and probably wouldn’t know how to use one anyway.”
Slowly moving toward the window, Tom favored his right leg and leaned along the wall. “So that’s why you were out there, in that parking garage?”
The woman slid her backpack in close and unzipped it. “I left through the front and only made it three or four blocks. You’re the only person I’ve seen in four days. I was beginning to think that there was no one left.”
“My friends and I have a place.” Tom stopped at the window and paused. “It’s fenced in and has been abandoned for some time, so there aren’t any of those things to worry about. It’ll be safe, we just need to get there.”
Stretching out her legs, she placed her pack on her lap and reached inside. “Tomorrow?”
Turning toward the window, Tom slid his index and middle finger between the blinds near the edge and parted them only an inch. “I’ll tell you what, how about we agree that we don’t go out until it’s safe, and we don’t even attempt to make it back to the car unless we know for sure that it is clear?”
Hunched over her bag, the woman began slowly emptying its contents onto the ground beside her. “Okay, but I—”
She pulled out a long sleeved t-shirt and a pair of sunglasses. Neither of which looked like they belonged to her, but then she stopped. Looking deep into the pack, she shook her head. She looked up at Tom and then pushed her arm into the bag up to her elbow.
Stepping away from the window, Tom limped slowly to her side. “What? What is it?”
The woman appeared much like she did when he first saw her sitting in the rear of the SUV. She again looked frightened. Her eyes darting from his face to her pack and then back again, she didn’t speak—couldn’t.
He took a step toward her, figuring that may help. He leaned into the wall and used it to hold himself steady as he slid down into a seated position. Attempting to catch her gaze, his right hamstring began to tighten, although stretching it out flat seemed to pacify the challenged body part for the moment.
“Is there anything—?”
She looked up quickly and turned to him, almost as if she remembered. Remembered something she should have already known. Withdrawing her hand, she held a phone. It was covered in dried speckled blood and its case was only partially hanging on. She held it out at arm’s length showing it to him. “This…”
He waited.
She pulled it back and cradled it between her hands. Staring down at the screen, she smiled. “This is me.”
“Uh…” He thought he knew what she was attempting to say, but he wanted her to say it. “Your phone… is there something on there that can help you remember?”
She nodded.
“Is it dead?”
Again she nodded.
“I’m sorry.”
Tom was beginning to understand how she may have lived for six days all on her own. She hid from everything and everyone—that was until he drove into the city. She was fast and stayed to herself. She ate sparingly and watched and learned. Didn’t take chances and only emerged when she thought she had no other choice. She was alive, but she was in pain. Not the same type of physical pain his right leg produced—this was different; it was worse.
Gazing at the dusty screen, the woman began to tear up. She rubbed her sleeve over her face and winced as she swiped over the knot above her right eye. Pulling away her arm, the tears running down her cheek had mixed with the dried blood and although she couldn’t see what she looked like, he could.
Tom sat quietly, watching her struggle for her next words. She started and stopped three separate times. As she gave up and finally turned to him, he slid in beside her and reached for her hand. “I’m going to get you out of here, I promise.”
She squeezed his hand. “I’m scared.”
Tom returned her gesture. “I am too, I think we all are.”
“No,” she said. “I don’t remember anything before waking up out on that sidewalk and that scares me. But what scares me even more is that I never will.”
28
With the Walter Hamilton Bridge and the devastated town of Summer Mill fading in his mirror, Ethan drove away from the only place he’d ever called home. In his thirty-eight years, it was all he’d ever known. His first day of school, his first love, his first kiss, his first job, his first everything. He’d told himself he was going to leave one day and make something of himself, that Summer Mill was just too small of a town to contain him. He even tried to convince himself that it was the truth, but it wasn’t.
The truth was that he loved that town. He loved the people, the weather, the food, the way it felt to be secluded from most everyone else in the world. His own private retreat from the accelerated lifestyle most every other city seemed to adopt. He’d traveled to other places, mostly within a few hours of Summer Mill, but a few times he’d ventured to the opposite end of the state. He was always glad to end up back in this familiar place, even though he’d never admit it.
Watching the snow begin to take up more of the landscape as they progressed up the two-lane mountain road, Ethan stared out through the windshield. He was watching the world beyond, but also gazed at her reflection. Shannon had taken up residence in the passenger seat and although she concentrated on the box in her lap, he figured she was there for more than just idle chit chat.
“So,” Ethan said, “Griffin… is he okay?”
“Yes, but hold on. I’m trying to decide which thing I want to show you first.”
He didn’t know whether he needed to apologize to the group or if he simply needed to explain himself. “I guess what I did back there in the alley—you know, slamming us into that dumpster and all, you guys must think that I’m an idiot?”
She stopped digging through the box and turned toward him. “No one’s upset, I don’t think. Maybe a little confused. I know Ben is still trying to convince them that you made the right choice by thinning the crowd and then driving out. We couldn’t see what you were seeing and so I guess, I mean, I don’t know.”
She sat quietly for a few seconds and then tried to smile. “We’re all alive and that’s what really matters, right?”
That wasn’t exactly what he was expecting to hear. He hoped that the group would say that they trusted him and that they understood why he did what he did, but for now, their
indifference would have to do.
“Yeah, I guess.”
Peering into the distance, Ethan slowly accelerated out of a long sweeping curve. The road ahead was clear of any weather and for the first time in six days, the world didn’t appear to be falling in around him. Turning again to Shannon, she looked up and he smiled. He motioned toward the dash and then turned on the radio. Nothing but static, one channel after the next.
Lowering the volume, he quickly scanned the display and pressed the Seek button. They listened intently as the radio slowly worked its way from one station to the next. Static and then dead air and more static and dead air. This rotation continued as Shannon lost interest and turned her attention back out the passenger window.
After more than three trips around the dial, she leaned in and lowered the volume herself.
“Aren’t you curious?”
“Curious about what?”
Shannon shook the cardboard box in her lap. “About what I brought from the station. I told you that I would end up being your favorite person ever, and I really wasn’t kidding.”
He wondered if she knew. He was sure that after their kiss, she had some idea, but he doubted that she really knew the extent of his feelings for her. He wanted to tell her, to get it off his chest, but now wasn’t the right time. He hoped that one day soon it would be.
“Okay,” he said, “tell me why you’re about to become my favorite person and what that beat-up old cardboard box has to do with it.”
She was ready before he finished speaking. “Item number one.” She slipped her hand under the jacket covering the box and pulled out three folded roadmaps. Holding them up, she said, “I took only the ones we’d need.”
“Okay?”
“No cell service, no GPS. We’re going to need these.”
He nodded. She was right. “Yeah, good call.”
“You ready for the second most spectacular item left in this world?”