The image of another school comes to my mind. A memory of a room full of tiny bodies matching up into smaller groups flashes before me. It was not a game of “Follow the Leader”. It was not a game at all. They really were following clues and commands from another as their socializing had taught them to do, but why had so many transformed at the school to begin with?
“Why wasn’t it pulled? Why did they release it if they knew?” Chapel’s voice shakes with his emotions. He is remembering his two small children who might have been saved.
“It was too late by the time we were aware,” Paula says, looking at Chapel like a drowning sinner. “It was fully tested and ready for use. Something fatal happened when it was mass-produced. Something we didn’t have the time to correct. All we could do was alert the proper people about a possible reaction. Schools all over the country pulled students into localized locations to wait and see after the shots were given. They were told to be prepared for reactions ranging from illness to extreme rage. How do you tell people to watch their kids go through what was really going to happen? How do you warn people of what they were going to become?” She is looking to us as if we could offer her any answers.
We have none. We have not had any for a long time.
“Slowly reports started coming in of whole school’s being wiped out. Elementary seemed to be the first to report symptoms. The shots were part of a school government health wellness program. Parents were asked by the school nurses to keep their kids in school “under the weather” because there was nothing really wrong with them. We have been told as parents to expect certain off behaviors after shots. It didn’t raise any parental alarms. The fever would hit after the shots. School nurses did the best they could, but they were not prepared for this. Whole schools were transformed and disappeared from the grid before we could offer any help. It’s why I am here at this school. This is the school I was sent to,” Paula says. She is silent with her afterthought.
I do not need to wonder what it may have been like. I was there.
I wish I could forget.
“If it was just the kids, then why the others, too?” Shelia asks. I guess this is the first time Paula has shared the story. “Because not only the kids received the vaccines. Every medical
professional, adults, the elderly as is the normal routine.” She is watching me as she talks now. She has finished with Marxx’ arm as best one can do in this facility. I almost squirm under her gaze wondering what it is she is seeing.
“There should be a set number of them then? If we just wait it out, we can make it through this?” Shelia asks with hope radiating through her voice.
“Did I forget to mention the military was also signed up for the first round? Which means the whole government, as we know it, also was going to be included. So yes, if we find a few groups of people willing to go out and fight who knows how many of the transformed roaming around out there, it could happen. That is, if those groups do not become food, chicken out, die of basic injuries, run out of supplies or just stop giving a shit,” Paula explains. Her cold tone pours icy water all over the hope Shelia held.
All we need is a little pixie dust, and flamethrowers. It could happen. I am not volunteering, but it could happen.
“How do you feel Helena?” Paula asks me.
I feel as if I have been caught doing something naughty with the way her eyes are watching me.
“Like I need a flamethrower,” is what I hear come from me. It is not what I told my mouth to say. My confusion must show on my face, making her come over to where I am standing.
Why does every medical person have one of those tiny flash- lights with the retina burning light? And why do they never warn you before waving it in front of your face?
“Let’s lay you down,” she tells me, as I am helped onto my own crinkly paper bench.
With how disobedient my mouth is being, I simply nod. I want to tell her about how cold I am. How I keep missing pieces of time and facts. How tired I am. How I should not be feeling this much confusion and this agitated. How I never meant for Marxx to get hurt. How very sorry I am for everything, but I don’t trust my voice, so I say nothing.
“She didn’t get bit.” Lawless comes into my view. He holds him- self apart from me, but close enough I can see his distress.
“Shock.” J.D. comes over and pushes a stray piece of hair from my face. “She seems to be coming out of it though. Not so bad now. She’s tough, aren’t you, Barbie?” he asks me.
“You promised me a nap.” I close my eyes to refuse the scene before me. His sudden tenderness will undo me.
“You go right ahead,” Paula tells me.
The blanket is warm. It lulls me to the sleep I have been fighting against this whole time. I give in to my tired body and escape the pain. I let myself be a girl and I let them be the men I need. When I wake up, who knows who we will be?
“What was her name?” I ask Paula before I finally slip into the comforting arms of sleep.
“Emily. Who were yours?” She is tucking the blanket around me, sealing in its heat.
“Lilly. Ashley. Conroy.”
I let their names escape from me like a whispered prayer. I let their images from behind my closed eyes from happy memories long gone. I let my tears fall like a river of regrets from which I now bathe.
Chapter 37
How does it feel?” I shyly ask Marxx.
I am cautiously approaching the subject of his arm. My guilt still consumes me long after the need for it. He and I have been making a normal routine of our morning coffee. Some mornings we talk to each other. Other mornings we just enjoy the sunrise in silence. It’s our way of daring the dawn with the fact we are both still here. Even with all that has been thrown our way, and with what is still waiting for us, we are defiantly still here. I wonder if there are other people somewhere gazing at the same sunrise who are also daring the sun with their continued existence.
“Worth it,” Marxx tells me. He doesn’t really answer my question, but his wink does.
His voice is strong again with its deep gravel pitch. Just to see him slowly healing, regaining pieces of himself, makes the dawns easier for me. As bright as his smile is, my guilt still worries at my conscience.
“I don’t know about that,” I say. My voice colors with the hues of my remorse while I stare at the breaking sky.
I feel the knuckles of his hand float along my cheek. I pull my eyes from the various shades gracing the light blue sky. His smile is so unlike Rhett’s mischievous charm or even J.D.’s bold grin. Marxx’ smile is filled with a gentle touch as soft as his fingers now on my flesh. These past few mornings have shown me a side of him I have never noticed before as he slowly pulls further away from the cold, dark shadow from which he has been living within.
“I do. I just wish you would see it again. I miss your smile, Hells,” he whispers such tender words, and I feel nothing with them.
“You and Aimes better?” he asks me, pulling back some with my blatant numbness.
He already knows exactly how she and I are doing. Not a day goes by without every one of them asking me with hopes of a change in my answer. I won’t budge and they won’t yield.
“Haven’t seen her,” I answer him, swinging my eyes back to the window.
There will be no change today. Since recovering from either true shock, or just the shock of that morning, Aimes and I have been tiptoeing around each other. I have finally moved into my own room, unable to take the tension building between us with all the unsaid words. From what I have seen of her, she is receiving plenty of comfort over our fallout. It does nothing to entice me to “make nice” or to forgive her for what has befallen us.
“She needs you, Helena. She is not strong like you. It was always your strength that strengthened her. I don’t know what all was said. I really don’t need to. I know her and Lawless are now ghosts with it. Don’t push them away when they are needing you,” he implores me.
I have started to notice a trend.
The men only use my full name when they want me to do something. It’s almost the same way a parent will call a child’s full name when they are out of line. Apparently, I have been out of line a lot lately.
“There are questions in your eyes,” he continues, using my silence as encouragement. “Questions you need to ask so you can finally nail this coffin shut. You won’t be able to get past it until you hear it all. You can’t forgive what you don’t know.”
“Maybe I don’t want to know. I get the idea. I don’t need the graphic novel of it.” I hope my honesty will end this path of counseling he has decided to travel down today. I am starting to prefer our silent mornings.
“Don’t you?” His eyes meet mine with that simple question of damnation. I cannot hold his stare, and it gives him his answer. Yes, a part of me wants to ask every detail. The truth of why he felt the need to do it. Truth has been so tormenting as of late though, I am too afraid to touch her barbed answers. I may be unable to deny it happened, but I can still hide from the details.
Once truth is invited in, there will be no more hiding. There will be no more white lies to help me sleep at night.
“What do you know?” I ask Marxx, thinking baby steps will be better than a full ambush.
“It’s not my story to tell,” Marxx says, stalling as his eyes glance around the room. He is the one staring at the sky now. Look Marxx, pretty blue lights.
“…but it did happen?” I ease into the sentence with as much grace as a child asking if Santa is real.
“Did what exactly happen?” He is going to make me fight for this.
So much for his whole “I need to know” advice he was pushing down my throat moments ago. I let my silence carry the conversation as I brace for him to answer me.
“Yeah, it happened. That’s all I am telling you. You need to get your answers from Lawless. You two need this conversation. Not you and me,” he says, sealing his statement as the sun reaches past the many bright shades of the sky.
“Was Leslie with anyone else?” I ask, refusing to let him get away so easily. I am pushing my luck. It is one of my many talents it seems as of late.
“She tried,” Marxx replies, and his tone lets me know he was one of her “tries”.
He slips from our conversation with the same gentle kiss on my head as he does every morning since our first morning as the room starts to fill with other voices. Life is stirring in the hall- ways. Residents are starting to fill the tables of the cafeteria with the start of their day. Their timing saves him from my growing bravery or maybe it saves me.
He leaves me with my thoughts and the stares of strangers. The sheep, as J.D. calls them, have noticed the change again in our group. It causes more of their soft whispers and hidden stares when I pass them. It’s not just the alteration to our group that has them scared.
Shelia is now just as shy with hers as I am with mine. Together, our groups have tried to reform a thousand times, a thousand different ways, trying to figure out how the puzzle pieces can work. The ends do not match as well. The corners are too sharp to connect it all. Yet, we keep trying. Like a three-year-old with a peg game and a hammer, we keep trying.
I would be content to sit here all morning in my little corner, watching the many go about their mornings as I avoid mine. I have almost gotten used to the taste of basic black coffee now as it provides the perfect diversion to my morning’s start.
Sip. Watch. Sip. Return a shy smile. Repeat. How simple life could be? Not my life, but how simple it could be. My life just keeps rolling ahead like a roller coaster built by a sadist. Why, is that another hill I hear us climbing? Yes Sir, yes Sir, three times more.
Aimes glides through the double doors with Rhett and J.D. on either side of her. Her eyes are focused straight ahead, but theirs are not. They find me right away with one scan of the room.
Both men share a simple sign of greeting with me. It’s slight and goes unnoticed by the female they appear to be escorting like guards through the room. My bitterness creeps up my throat, leaving a sour taste in my mouth while I watch them.
Part of me wonders how she and I have fallen so far from where we once were. Another part of me is cherishing this. It gives me a new pool of which to swim. Unlike the uncharted river that was pulling me under before, this water is warm and feeds me.
Not to say there are not moments when I turn to share a laugh with her, forgetting she will not be there. Sometimes, when the night is at its darkest, I crave her laughter to chase away my loneliness. To admit any of this out loud, would be more truths I would have to share. The truth of them surrounding her, while I sit alone, is enough sharing for one morning. The truth of Lawless is waiting. Screw Truth, she’s a fickle woman and I have enough drama already.
“Miss them yet?” Simon’s voice clenches my stomach. I had not heard him approach with how deep I have sunk into my dark thoughts. Apparently, life thinks I don’t have enough drama.
“Miss Shelia yet?” I return his question, still staring at the random bodies around us. I will not give him my eyes.
“Every day,” Simon replies, not afraid of my bite or bark.
His words should have held regret, but they are hollow. His voice is not empty. It just comes deep from behind a shelter he will not let me see. Simon and I no longer hold enough trust for the other to allow our true emotions to show. He is standing nervously with two trays of food by my table. I hope he is not planning what his body language is trying to ask for permission. “Paula says you have not eaten breakfast in a few days,” he awkwardly hovers as he says these words as if he is expecting I will help him.
“I’m not a big breakfast person,” I tell him, swirling the remaining coffee like a hint. See, it is the food I am refusing, not you. I smile at him, trying to convince him.
“Or lunch,” he says with his continue stare at me.
“Gee, so much going on, who has time for lunch these days? Things to kill, people to avoid, shit to stir. It gets really exhausting sometimes,” I say with wide eyes. Look, I’m a sweet little girl. Don’t you see my smile?
“Or dinner,” he continues.
I guess I am not very convincing. I ask, “Would you believe me if I said I was on a diet?” I widen my smile at him, even as he drops a tray in front of me. “Guess not?”
“We don’t have to talk,” he says, dropping his tray as well. Simon takes the seat that once held a tender smile for me. There are no smiles before me now.
I sense another plot stirring. For men to believe females are so conniving, I seem to keep falling more and more into the center of male drama proving the theory is wrong. I can’t help wondering what sharp bend my roller coaster is about to take now. I wonder, but I am not going to ask. I plan to ride this denial thing until the end.
Simon and I don’t talk. We sit in silence, rolling the food around our plates more than we are attempting to eat it. His eyes lock on mine for moments as if he wants to say something, but he never does. Which is fine with me. I have had enough conversation and pep talks for one morning. Feeling the eyes of Rhett and J.D. on my back, even if it were painted purple and teal, there is not enough pep in this whole building to inspire any unneeded male conversation today.
Chapter 38
I saw you and Simon this morning,” Shelia tells me, but her voice is more of a question.
“He was worried about my nutritional habits,” I tell her. It’s not a complete lie.
“I’m just glad you two are talking again. If you can forgive him, then maybe the others can too,” she says and she smiles to herself with the thought, as Simon’s plot comes to light.
“…and you? How are you two doing?” I ask, focusing on the many piles of towels and other assorted piles of laundry before us. I am not sure how the keeping of all the laundry has fallen to Shelia and me, but here we are, folding towel after towel and sheet after sheet. It’s a great job demotion from Zombie Barbie to Laundry Barbie in my desperate attempt to hide from those who I used to seek. This one has
a better severance package though. “He is still rooming with Dolph and Richard,” Shelia says, with the forced pep I have been avoiding. “I am sure it is one giant male sleepover for them.”
She still has the strength to hold the positive spin her people cherish her over. I can see how much it hurts her though with the look of her eyes. So much for the Risen keeping marriages together after all.
“It sounds to me like you miss him. It is okay to forgive him,” I tell her, and she turns to look at me with doubt. “You don’t owe me anything, Shelia. Marxx is healing. I’m fine. The rest of them are just waiting for an apology to ease their hurt male egos. I wouldn’t leave them in a room with Ross anytime soon, but then, that was probably true before all of this anyway.” I smile at her, trying to make a joke of the situation.
“It just still seems wrong what they did,” Shelia says, returning to the never-ending pile of laundry. “I don’t know what kind of apology would ever make up for it or for what might have happened.” Her voice is whisper thin with shame. “Look at what has happened between you and Aimes?”
I shrug at the mention of her name. “That actually has nothing to do with them.”
“What does it have to do with then?” She is testing me with her question. She has been hinting at asking this for days, but has never held the courage until now.
“Just something she said,” I offer her curiosity.
“You have to talk about it,” she tells me while placing her hand over mine with her gentle words.
“So, I keep getting told,” I mutter to a very uncooperative sheet. I know I have run into a brick wall, blocking any escape from her. She will not let me evade her now. My suffering is a red cloak to a bull for her. She can’t take her eyes off of it and she is rushing forward to discover it. She stares at me, waiting for me to begin like a child waiting for a bedtime story, and as every parent has thought at least once in their life, I wonder how much I can just bluff to make her leave me alone.
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