by Ann Christy
“When I left the room to take care of Jon—sometimes he wakes up crying—she opened the door for him. Just like that.”
I can see it now. Sam is there, but not all there. I’ve seen him go from the way he is now, more or less in control, to full-on in-betweener quickly. I’ve also seen him come back from it, banging his head in some terrible grief. He must have been a good man before.
“What do you want me to do about him?” I ask. She has the right to make this decision for herself. She’s the aggrieved party here.
“I don’t want him to hurt anyone anymore. I don’t want him to suffer anymore,” Veronica answers without hesitation.
Her hand is cold in mine when I take it and draw her toward the door again. “He’s secure. I’ll get you past him and then I’ll take care of it.”
When I open the stairwell door, Sam becomes agitated, straining at the end of his leash on the landing and trying to see. His noises are more grunt than speech, but I know what he’s asking. Rather than answer, I lead Veronica and Jon out of the foyer and urge them toward the stairs going down. She almost makes it without looking, but at the last second, she stops and looks up.
I can see her eyes take in his leash, his purple zip-tied hands, the bits of gore that still cover him from his breakfast of birds. Her face crumples and she chokes out a sob. I look at Sam and see his face is almost a mirror of hers, only a cruder and more uncomplicated version of it. That makes it all the more heartbreaking and I feel the sting of sadness behind my cheeks. Tears, I don’t have time for now, but the sting is worse because of it.
He grunts, then hums a sort of concentrated tone as he tries to find his voice. Finally, he forces out two words. “Lub. Zahry.”
I know what those words mean right away.
Love. Sorry.
That does Veronica in and she hugs Jon to her as she sobs. Rather than freezing her in place, that seems to free her and she takes the stairs rapidly downward and away from us.
“Wait on the second floor,” I call in a harsh whisper after her. I hope she’s smart enough not to go outside if she didn’t hear me.
Sam is agitated again, hitting his head and keening softly. I could just leave him there. He’s tied up and that railing is strong. There’s no way he could free himself. Eventually, like my mom, he’d slow down and go deader, then after a time, truly die.
It’s almost as if he hears my thoughts because he stops hitting himself and looks at me, fresh blood leaking from his nose in bright crimson drops. He shakes his head, then raises his chin and slides his hands across his neck in the sign for cutting off a head.
He’s done his job and he is suffering. I can see that. Don’t I owe him a clean death?
I bring up the crossbow and say, “Stand still. I’ll try to be quick.”
He doesn’t try to talk anymore, but he pulls the wire of the dog-catcher’s loop down a little, exposing his neck to me at a better angle, and then lifts his chin. There’s no hesitation in his movements at all. After blinking away the tears blurring my vision, I let the bolt go after an extra careful sighting. It drives home perfectly at the exact center of his neck. His legs loosen under him and he flops to the ground as if all his bones were suddenly gone.
He jerks horribly after a second of unnatural stillness, his nanites going into their expected overdrive and his body in no way under control. I race up the stairs because there’s no time to spare, and decide against using the saw. He doesn’t need to suffer through that. His eyes are wide and rolling, focusing on me in pure confusion when they are drawn to my movement.
I pull out the sledge and set to work.
*****
I take the time to wipe myself off with another towel left in the bathroom. On my way back out, I spot the bookcases. They’re full of hard- and soft-cover books. Hundreds of them. If I hadn’t been so overwhelmed by the condition of the apartment, I would have noticed them before. I told Veronica I have all we need at my complex, but that’s not strictly true. I have a few trashy books and a lot of hours in the day with not much to fill them.
I grab the less bloody of the two pillowcases off the bed, careful to avoid the towel-covered head, and fill it with as many paperback books as it will hold. It’s heavy, but worth it.
I don’t look at Sam as I leave, but I can’t help getting a glimpse of his feet hanging over the edge of the landing, the man inside finally gone to his rest.
“Goodbye, Sam. Thank you,” I say, and take to the stairs.
Six Months Ago - Before I Lay Me Down to Sleep
“Mom, can you hear me?” I ask from my spot on the concrete a few feet from the barrier.
I push away my empty bowl and pull my legs in so I can sit cross-legged. I like to spend time here and it may seem creepy, but I come here to eat my main meal of the day. We always did that together. Today was my splurge day so I had one of the packets of instant miso soup, a pouch of the Indian chickpea stuff—my mom called them Indian MREs—and rice.
This hub must have serviced international grocery stores and a lot of quick-marts. The amount of candy and weird food is staggering.
“Mom, do you remember what the brown sauce in the jars is called? I can’t remember and the label isn’t in English,” I say.
Hardly anything comes back to me, just that shushing sound.
She’s been a lot quieter for the past few weeks. When I look at my chart, the one she outlined on the back of a big piece of cardboard before she got too sick, I see the trend is inexorably downward. Her responses have grown progressively less violent and less vocal.
There’s the tink tink sound of something small moving along the chain link and I know it’s her ring. Her hand. The only vocalization is a sort of raspy noise, like loud breathing that’s also shallow and unfulfilling to the lungs. If she even has much in the way of lungs anymore.
“Mom, I’m so lonely,” I say.
More rasping, more of that same weak agitation.
“I’m thinking that…that I can’t do this much longer. It’s too much alone time.” I laugh as a thought comes to me. “Do you remember when I was so sick the first time, how I just used to beg you to take me home so people would leave me alone?”
More tinking noises and the sliding shuffle of dry flesh against concrete.
“I got my wish, didn’t I?” I ask the corrugated metal in front of me.
I listen for a little while, then get up and stand against the metal, which is as close as I can get to her. I know that she wanted to stay alive for me and I know she tried as hard as she could. And I also know that she asked me to do this, to measure and monitor her like this, so that I could know how long this whole bad episode might last.
She wanted me to be able to make good decisions about when to go and try to find other people, if ever. And she wanted to be a deterrent to whoever might come into this warehouse. My own private in-betweener—then deader—to keep others away.
But it’s so hard.
“Mom,” I say again, my mouth close to the metal so I can be sure my words go through it. “I miss you. I love you.”
I hear the tink tink again of her ring and look at my pinkie where its mate resides. Our birthstones set into the sign for infinity. One in each side of the sign. Her and me, together forever.
Mine only fits on my pinkie now, though when she gave it to me it was too big for any of my fingers. Right before my first brain surgery, she opened the box and told me what they meant. Together forever, our hearts and souls entwined no matter what.
I tap my pinkie against the metal, adding my tink tink to hers, then wait. I hear the rasping and I want to read into it, to imagine some meaning behind her shuffles and noises, but I know there isn’t.
Then I hear it.
Tink tink.
Today - Bumpity-Bump
The trip back is going smoothly except that Jon appears to be getting car-sick and Veronica looks a little green as well. If neither of them has been in a car since this happened then it’s understandabl
e, but the smell of my drive over with Sam in the back is still bad enough without adding puke to the mix.
“If you’re going to hurl, try to do it out the window,” I say, keeping my eyes on the road and the deaders drawn by the disturbance my car creates in their endlessly boring afterlives.
“I’m not hanging Jon out of the window,” she snaps back, then swallows hard and looks forward again. Definitely greenish.
“If you keep your eyes forward it isn’t so bad. Don’t look to the sides.” I risk a glance over and see that Jon’s eyes are darting everywhere. He’s not had this much new visual input in his life, I’d bet. “Jon, can you do that? Just look ahead?”
He seems to understand me because he faces forward, but when I glance back, he’s looking every which way again. I sigh. I can almost feel it coming, and sure enough, he spews a stream of high-powered bile and fruit-gel-colored slime straight at the windshield.
He seems surprised by it, then his face screws up and he starts to cry. It’s quiet, but intense, the way a child who knows sound is the enemy would cry.
“Crap!” I say, and reach under the seat for the little towel I use to wipe off the windows.
When my eyes leave the road, which is entirely clear of other than the normal debris, Veronica shouts, “There’s one coming!”
I look back up and have just enough time to think, How much like a freaking movie is this?
An in-betweener in bad shape is making a beeline for us in the street and there’s no way I’m going to get past him without hitting him. This is a fairly narrow, one-way street and it’s lined with parked cars on both sides. I shout, “Hold on!” and swerve left, then remember the rolled-down window on her side of the car and spin the wheel the other way so we’ll take the hit on my side.
Only, I’ve admitted before that I’m a terrible driver and this is a terrible idea.
I hit him firmly on my half of the bumper, but instead of going under or bouncing off, he slams into the hood hard enough for me to hear the metal buckle under the impact. The airbags pop out and Veronica makes a muffled squeal as Jon is thrust against her face.
Then I make matters very much worse by hitting a parked car and crunching the other half of my front bumper. We jolt to a stop in a squeal of tires and the whoosh of deflating airbags.
“Crap on a stick!” I say and punch at the airbag. My language, however bad it is today, is simply not enough to describe how much this situation sucks. The in-betweener flew off of the car and is somewhere in front of it, banging and making a racket.
I can’t have him making even more noise than my wreck just made. A wreck happens, is loud, and is then over, making it hard to pin down where the noise came from. An in-betweener having a meltdown, on the other hand, is sure to draw a crowd.
“Stay put!” I order the two crying kids in the seat next to me. I spare a single glance and see that both of them are upright and have open eyes, but their faces are both spattered with blood. I can only hope it’s not serious.
Two fast, deep breaths, then I open the door and leap from the car. I slam the door closed as soon as I’m clear and pull out my sledge at the same time. I’ve got no time for this and can only hope he’s down.
When I step around the front of the car—wary and ready for anything—he sort of lunges in my direction from his place under the crumpled front end. He’s half under it and his back is pressed against the car I hit. I came within a foot of squishing him like a bug between the two cars, but the lucky bastard fits nicely in the wedge of space the angle of impact allows.
I don’t hesitate and give him time to work his way out. I swing my sledge like I’m driving home a railroad tie over his reaching hands and toward his head. I’ve got the front of the car between us, so my angle is off and the sledge just sort of swipes down the side of his head and face, bones crunching as it does. Not enough.
Clambering up onto the hood, I get as close as I dare and get ready to bring it down again. His hands are still reaching and he manages to get his ragged nails into my knee and clamp down like a vice. I bring the sledge down on his wrist and it crunches like old twigs. The fingers loosen and he flings the arm, now possessing an extra joint, in my direction harmlessly.
When I swing the sledge this time, my center of balance shifts during the swing—the total amateur move of someone without knowledge of basic physics, which I do have, so it’s unforgivable. I slide right down the hood and into his space, one foot on his shoulder and the other braced against the car I hit. The way we’re positioned is almost pornographic except that the place his face is close to is unarmored and within range of his teeth.
I straighten my legs with a panicked jerk and he clamps his mouth around my shin. The sound of teeth meeting the hard plastic of my shin guards replaces his horrible screeching. I’ve got a better angle now and the sledge does its work, his teeth clamping down hard with the first blow and then falling away from my body. I hit him at least a half a dozen times, his head nothing more than a pulpy bulge of red atop his neck by the time I stop.
The sound of crying reaches my ears over my breathless gasps and my sledge thunks against the hood. My arms are so tired they’re shaking. Sledgehammers aren’t meant for awkward, fast swinging, but rather for careful and steady strikes.
I get down from the hood and realize I’m covered head to toe in blood and bits of in-betweener brain. Through the window, Veronica looks at me in horror as she holds Jon in her lap facing away from me. I notice, fluttering from a lamppost above the car I hit, a ragged banner announcing a forthcoming civic event. I’m pretty sure all events have been cancelled so they won’t miss the banner. I climb up on that car, rip the banner down and use it to wipe off as much gore as I can. I don’t want this on me and I don’t want Jon to see it.
Veronica keeps half an eye on me while she uses Jon’s shirt to clean them both up. I’m still stained red, but the chunks and goop are gone, so I jump down and get back into the car, hoping against reason that it will still start. The front of my car looks like an accordion. This wreck is a lot worse than a fender bender.
I don’t say anything when I get in. I close my eyes for a moment, make a wish, and turn the key. Nothing whatsoever happens. Nothing.
“Dammit,” I say and lean my head on the steering wheel and its deflated air bag. Without looking up, I ask, “How bad are you hurt?”
When Veronica doesn’t answer, I open one eye and look at her. She’s got a goose-egg coming up on her forehead where the airbag knocked their heads together, but the blood doesn’t appear to be coming from her. She dabs at Jon’s forehead and says, “Not bad. Jon’s head is cut, though. I might need to close it somehow.”
“We’re about eight miles from where I live. We’re going to have to hoof it. Can you do that? Can he?”
She blots his forehead again and smiles at him in that fake way parents do when their child is in pain. Finally, she looks at me and answers. “We’ll have to.”
There are a good half-dozen deaders making their way toward us, so there’s more work to do before we can safely leave. On foot, we’ll be able to distance ourselves from this source of noise. We’ll walk quietly and stay out of sight. We’ll watch and avoid. But for now, I’ve got more bolts to loose and more heads to smash.
I just know my shoulders are going to be hurting tonight.
One Month Ago - Forever
It’s summer again and it’s been a year since she died. A full year of first watching and listening, and then just listening. That’s long enough. I can’t take even one more day of it. One more day of not knowing what’s going on behind the wall of metal and wood and I know I’ll go completely insane.
I heft the claw hammer and start pulling nails. I’m so naturally frugal now that, even without thinking too much, I remove the nails carefully, trying to keep them straight in case I need them again. This is more noise than I’ve made near the cage in a long time and I’d expect to hear more agitation, more movement, but all I hear is a soft whis
per of sound between each tug on a nail.
When the last nail is out, I suck in a deep breath and get ready. Then I wiggle the piece of corrugated metal away from its mates. This one is my doorway piece, with no wood behind it. Every other piece of the metal has a messy construction of pallet boards keeping it upright and firmly in place.
I put the metal aside and then stand, not turning around and with my back to the opening in full view of the cage. If she’s still capable of moving, and if she has eyes, she can see me. If she has any of her senses intact, she should react.
There’s only a faint leathery swish and then that fades, too.
I turn around and finally see what has become of my mother. She’s lying pressed against the chain link, as close as she can get to my normal sitting spot. My thought that she was desiccating was spot on, because she looks almost like the mummies I used to see on TV programs about ancient Egypt. Her skeleton is plainly visible, withered skin covering, but not hiding, the bones beneath. It looks like parts of her skin have broken down and rotted away, but for the most part, she is whole.
And wholly horrible.
She has no eyes, only black pits where they should be. Her nose is just a stubby remnant of its once perfect straightness. My mother was beautiful once. The only part of her that is still recognizable is her black hair and even that is dull and dirty. Great dust bunnies of it litter the floor where her shriveled scalp has lost its hold on those once-lustrous locks.
Her hand moves on the floor like a movie prop. It’s stiff and gnarly, all bones, but it moves. Her jaw flexes a little as well. Even after a year, she is still animated to an extent. I don’t need another year of wondering and keeping charts. I can tell from this that it will be a very long time before the world is rid of the deaders. She’s had no food, nothing, yet she still moves.