She looks back over her shoulder, at least pausing to consider my request, but she eventually ignores my urgent whispers and keeps going until she’s out of view from my vantage point.
I stand quickly, throw my cigarette away, and stare through the glass. I curse in hushed whispers when I still can’t see her, and run to the next one along to try and find her. Nothing but a very heavy-looking leather armchair and some crowded bookcases fill this room—no Lilly, no monsters, and no danger. I move to the next window, catching a glimpse of her back as she passes the open doorway.
I quickly move along the building to the next window, watching as she peeks around the doorway, her curls catching the sunlight shining through the window. She looks out at me with a shy smile. I smile back and point to the corner where a small wooden chair rests, covered with yellow, aging paperwork. Lilly totters over, pulls everything off it, and attempts to pick up the chair. It’s only a small chair, but she’s so little herself and she can’t wrap her arms around it. She looks to me and then back to the chair, stubbornness etched across her sweet features as she clasps its wooden back in her fingers and begins to tug it behind her.
She drags the chair out of the room and down the long hallway. I cringe at the sound of the wood scraping along the wooden floor, feeling helpless standing outside. I look behind me and then up, seeing that the clouds have begun to gather for a storm, effectively blocking out the sun’s protective rays.
Panic burns my chest. We need to get going soon or we won’t make it back in time. Our light is waiting for us up at the top of the cliff, its safety mocking us from this distance. I look away from the darkening sky and back in the window, the shadow of something passing the doorway a split second later. It’s so quick I’m unsure if I actually saw it or if it was just my imagination. I blink and stare into the house, praying it was just my imagination.
Seconds later, Lilly’s piercing scream cuts the air, breathing life into my nightmare, and I feel my heart freeze in my chest.
Chapter Four.
#4. Remember, you’re stronger than you think.
I run along the side of the building to the stupid little cat flap, peering through it on my hands and knees. Lilly is holding the chair in front of her, its legs pointing at the monster hissing at her. It stays back, away from the light shining in from the window, keeping to the shadows of the doorway.
“Lilly!” I yell. “Open the door, Lilly!”
The monster looks at me, its eyes glowing a deeper red as it bares its mouthful of sharp teeth at me. Its nails click-clack against the wooden floor as it steps forward, but the sun touches its skin and sends it squealing like a pig and scooting backwards into the shadows again.
Lilly continues to cower behind the chair, her body racked with sobs.
“Open the door, Lilly. Use the chair,” I plead.
She never takes her eyes from the monster, her fingers clasped tightly to the wooden slats of the chair as her body shakes and fat tears fall freely down her cherub cheeks.
I clamber to my feet and look to the sky as clouds overhead continue to build, the light dimming. Please, no, I silently beg. The sunlight is our only protection. I look in through the window again. The monster continues to stare at Lilly. Only once do its eyes stray to me, almost as if it can sense that she is the meal and there is nothing I can do about it. I bang my fist on the glass in frustration, making Lilly jump and the thing hiss. I look back to the sky again; clouds continue to fill it, threatening rain and thunder. Panic fills me to the brim, ready to overflow from me at any moment.
“Damn it.” I pull down the sleeve on my sweater, covering the end of my hand as I slam it against the glass. After my first attempt doesn’t break the glass, I hit it again until it finally smashes through, sending splinters raining down to the floor.
I scramble up and begin to climb through the small window, catching myself on several shards of glass and feeling my blood ooze from me, my knife gripped tightly in the palm of my hand all the while. I fall to the floor clumsily, straying into the shadows for a split second before scooting backwards and putting myself between Lilly and the monster.
“You’re okay now. I’m here,” I whisper to her through my ragged breaths.
She continues to sob quietly behind me.
“I’ll protect you, I’ll always protect you,” I say with more conviction than I truly believe.
A shadow falls across the room and the monster sidles closer, a look of almost glee on its distorted face. I want to sob and cry and stamp my foot at the unfairness of it all. There’s food here, I know there is. We’re so close.
The shadows deepen, making the thing almost at touching distance. It stalks backwards and forwards, watching us, waiting, and biding its time. Its fingers and toes curl and uncurl, teeth constantly bared and hungry as it snaps at the air. I glance to the window, seeing the last of the sun finally covered by darkened clouds heavy with rainfall as the monster pounces with a sound almost like a cackle. My knife quickly comes up from my side, catching it off guard, and slashes it deeply in the stomach. I twist and pull, feeling leathery flesh tearing. It continues to snap at me, screeching into my face as it pushes me backwards. It hovers above me, its teeth snapping to find purchase even as its eyes widen in pain when I twist and pull on my blade. I hold it back, one hand gripping tightly to its throat, and plunge my knife deeper into its gut with my other. It can’t have my Lilly. I hear the telltale slop of insides tumbling to the floor and kick out at it. It falls backwards, its legs and arms stilling.
My breath is ragged in my throat, and Lilly is still crying, almost wailing uncontrollably behind me. I turn and scoop her up into my bloodied arms and I squeeze her trembling body close to me as we both gasp for air. This isn’t the first of these that I’ve killed, but it was the easiest kill, and considering that I’m so undernourished and weak, I struggle to work out how that is possible. Is it conceivable that they could be weakening too? That after gorging on the human race and purging us to near extinction, they are now slowly starving? The thought both saddens me and makes me rejoice—to think that they could be weakening—dying, even—just as we too are about to die out.
Both species, wiped out. It all seems so pointless.
I climb over its destroyed body with Lilly clinging to my side, her face buried in the crook of my neck. I don’t look at the monster. I know that it is now dead. I step into the dim hallway, clicking the door firmly shut behind me, fear driving me forward when I should probably be running to my car—but for what? For how long? Sooner or later I’ll be too weak to protect her, too weak to get her anywhere safe, and then my little Lilly will be all alone in the world with no one to look after her. Better I find us food now and stay alive for a little longer.
The house is huge—huge and quiet. Dark shadows play against every wall, our steps echoing all around us. The thunder starts outside, the pitter-patter of heavy raindrops against the windows of the many rooms. Lilly stops crying; only the occasional snivel comes from her still form against my hip. She’s getting heavy, or I’m getting more tired. The adrenaline is wearing off, but fear is still running rampant. The two things collide in my head, making me feel dizzy and unsteady on my feet. I sway into the wall, feeling Lilly stiffen.
“I’m okay, Honeybee, I’m okay.” I kiss the top of her head and push off from the wall with blurring vision, terror filling me. I’m so close. I continue to walk until the narrow hallway opens up to an entrance hall. A large glass window in the circular ceiling makes the space bright and welcoming—more so than the rest of the house, anyway. Lightning flashes, causing our shadows to move and make me jump. Lilly begins to sob again. I can feel her warm tears trickling down my neck. I don’t blame her; I want to cry too.
I head to the front door and look out the windows, seeing our car there, seeing freedom so close. But again, I know I can’t leave here without food. Hell, we probably can’t leave here at all tonight. Not with this storm, and the darkness it brings. The streets wil
l be swarming with the monsters. They love the rain and the darkness.
I move away from the window and head down a different hallway, finding room after empty room. The house is covered in a thick layer of dust and I can’t fathom where the hell the thing had been hiding, or if there are any more. Every room has a huge window in it—no place for a monster hiding from the light to be in. There are no footsteps or claw marks or piles of bones. Nothing. I want to ask Lilly if she saw where it had come from, but I don’t want to frighten her any more than she already is. I somehow, mercifully, stumble upon the kitchen, my heart jittering in my chest as I make my way to one of the large cupboards and look inside. Disappointment rings in my ears at the sight of plates and bowls. I try the next one and find something similar. Despair pummels my body, and I know that I won’t be able to hold it together for much longer; I can feel my emotions breaking away, giving in to the misery.
A sob clogs my airway as I open a third cupboard, and my eyes bulge as I finally see what we so desperately need—can after can of food—and I release the sob with a loud splutter.
“Lilly,” I whisper.
She doesn’t move, and I whisper her name again until she pulls her face free from the space between my neck and my shoulder. I twist her on my hip so she can see the food and I let out a small laugh of manic glee as I let my tears explode and I sag back against the kitchen Island.
We made it.
She blinks away her tears and stares in awe at the food before finally turning to me with a wide smile. She lifts a pointing finger to the food and I nod and step closer for her. She plucks a can free from the shelf with her chubby hands: fruit. She smiles again and bounces on my hip, and I quietly laugh again.
We’re going to be okay. For now, we’re going to be okay.
Chapter Five.
#5. … But we’re not as strong as them…
A new morning has come and gone, and early afternoon welcomed us with a sunny smile—yesterday’s storm has disappeared like a bad dream. We wake almost simultaneously, the glare from the sun a happy sight upon our faces. Lilly hugs me closer and I squeeze an arm around her little body, feeling bones jutting out. But it’s okay now—there’s food here, lots and lots of it. We ate like pigs last night, and today we’ll do the same. And the day after too. We’ll fill our stomachs, put meat on our bones, and live for a little longer. I sigh almost contentedly.
We root through the dusty, overfilled closets and find clean clothes, piling our old, tatty ones into a heap in the corner. I roll the sleeves up for Lilly, and do the same with the pant legs. It makes me sad, when we find a child’s bedroom, to think that once there had been someone only a little older than my Lilly living here. I can’t help but wonder what happened to them. Did they make it out alive? I hope so. God, I hope so.
When the world went to hell, the planet rocked, reeling from the realization that such evil could live among us in plain sight. We were nearly destroyed, but as confusion and fear gave way to anger, we came back. When the second wave attacked, we were prepared and we fought. God, how we fought. But for every monster killed, two more would replace it, until the human race fled and hid. But you can’t hide from what you are.
It has been one year, six months, three weeks, and nineteen days, and Lilly and I have only ever stumbled across a handful of living people. They were not good people. They were desperate and afraid, and with that desperation and fear came violence. There is now more to fear in this world than the monsters. Man is now its own enemy.
They hurt us. My body still holds the scars, and Lilly’s dreams are haunted. But I put an end to both their torment and our own. I freed us, and now we are much more careful.
I shake my head to dislodge those thoughts and memories. I don’t want to think about those people now. We’re here, and they are not, and we have everything we need for now: food, water, some smokes—I even found a coloring book for Lilly. This place won’t be safe forever, but it is for now—for today, at least. And in this world, this cruel life that we lead, you live for today.
My head feels a little better today, but the low throb of starvation still burns in my gut and makes my head and body ache, so I take two of the painkillers that we found in the medicine cabinet and swallow them down with flat orange pop from the pantry in the kitchen. Flat pop never tasted so good, I muse.
Lilly sits happily at the kitchen counter, a bowl of dried cereal on one side of her and a coloring book in front. Some of the pictures are already colored in, and again, it makes me sad, but Lilly says that it makes her happy, that a piece of the child that lived here still goes on in this world. That makes me happy again. She’s so smart.
Lilly feels safe here, in a house with walls and beds and toys to play with. I can’t deny that the feeling of carpet between my toes isn’t something to appreciate. That this home, with all its homey things, doesn’t make my world seem somewhat normal—at least for now.
I finish my breakfast of canned fruit, and leave Lilly in the sunny entrance hall; it seems the safest place for her, given all the windows and the glare coming in from the sun. I’ve checked every inch of this house and found nothing and no one else here. A small, downstairs, windowless bathroom is where I find dried blood and bones—the place where the monster had been sleeping. Like it had gone into some sort of stasis after a while, trapped between the sunlight from one room and the shade of the bathroom—the only room with no windows. Hope blossoms in my heart that maybe the world could come back from this. There must be people somewhere working on a cure, a way to kill these things off, or turn them back to what they used to be.
I step up to the back door, unlatch it, and swing it open wide, letting in sunlight and fresh air. I reach down for the monster’s ankles and begin to drag it outside, wondering why it doesn’t burn up when the sunlight touches it now that it’s dead. I had dragged it in here last night, trapping its body within this room. It was dead, I knew that, but I didn’t want Lilly to have to see its body again—not so soon after it had tried to kill her in this peaceful house.
Its head bumps harshly against the doorframe and leaves a dark black stain. I continue to drag it out onto the lawn, away from the house, before grabbing some of the old newspapers I have brought with me and laying them across the body of the man. I tuck some inside the jacket of his torn suit and stuff some up his sleeves and up his pant legs, being careful not to touch too much of his scaly skin or sharp nails.
I guess this was the father—before he became the monster within. I shake my head sadly and stand back up, pulling the matches from my back pocket. I strike one, and with hesitance I throw it onto the body. I watch him burn, his skin crackling and popping, melting back from his distorted face, his bones altered beyond comparison, his lips stretching back to reveal the tiny pointed teeth caked in black. As his hair fizzes and pops, the smell reminds me to step back, the scent getting too strong. I look toward the back door, seeing Lilly standing there watching. I gesture for her to come over and she does, and I pick her up automatically.
We watch as the monster burns, revealing a more primitive form: that of a man. The man he once was, before all of this happened. Before the infection set in and changed him into something indescribable. A monster. To something more animal than human. It kills me to think that he was once like me, yet somehow he turned into this thing, this monster. From the bones I found, he killed his own family: a wife and two children. The raw, animalistic instinct taking him over must have been agonizing, and I have to believe that he fought against it with everything he had.
“Will I become like that one day?” Lilly asks quietly.
“Not if I can help it,” I reply without hesitation.
“But that’s what happens, isn’t it?”
I don’t reply, but look her in the eye with a soft smile. “You’ll never be one of them. I promise you.” Of course, I can’t promise her. There are no promises in this world anymore.
“But I have the lines.” She points to her tummy, where we
both know the lines of infection have begun. “And you have the lines,” she says innocently.
“I know,” I reply, breathing through the ache in my gut.
“I don’t want to be a monster.” She hugs me, squeezing me tightly, her other arm clutched around Mr. Bear.
“I know. And I won’t let you. We have food and water, and we’ll be okay for a little while now.” I rub the hair back from her face, seeing the dark trail of poisoned black blood, faint in her veins, reaching up like paths on a map from her back. I know I have them too, but mine are darker. Everyone has them, or will get them eventually.
“Everyone is going to die, aren’t they?” she whispers.
“We’ll be okay,” I lie. “You’ll always be my Honeybee. Okay?”
She nods. “Okay.” She looks toward the burning corpse and then back to me. “Can we go color some more?”
I smile. “Of course.”
We walk back toward the house, and I swallow down the tears that threaten to flow. How long do we have left? A week? A month? A year? I have no idea. But at least we have food and water now. For now, there is hope of a tomorrow, and the promise of life.
We’ll be okay for now, me and my Honeybee.
Chapter Six.
#6. Don’t forget the little things.
The days are long, but the nights are always longer. Though the monsters don’t find us, we hear them. Each night, their cries and screams echo into the darkness. Each night we fear that they will discover where we are. But they don’t. We stay inside as much as possible during the day so as not to let our scent get into the air. I don’t even know if they can smell us that way, but it seems feasible—at least as feasible as anything else these days.
Out of the Dark (Light & Dark #1) Page 3