Race to Refuge

by Craig, Liz

  The camping section had MRE type foods in pouches. I stuffed my bag with as many as I could. They were light to carry and I wouldn’t have to worry about cooking them. And the meals were good for forever. I wasn’t sure if they ever really went bad.

  Finally, I headed for the fishing section of the store and got one of those really tacky looking fisherman vests with all the pockets and put it on. I figured I could use as many pockets as possible and being a fashion plate wasn’t going to help me survive. I took some of the smaller things out of the duffel and stuck them in the pockets.

  I whistled to Mojo and we jogged for the door. Like I said, I had every intention of returning for round two of looting the outdoors store, but as Mojo and I were trying to get out, a crowd of people forced their way in, pushing each other, eyes wide. They weren’t going to be happy to discover there wasn’t much stuff left on the shelves and I didn’t want to be one of the people holding supplies when they figured it out.

  Since the two huge front doors were jammed with people trying to force themselves in, I headed for a smaller, emergency exit on the side of the building and Mojo and I slipped right out. But now that we were in the parking lot there was another problem. Some guy was hovering over my bike, messing with the engine. Trying to hotwire it and take it for himself.

  I wasn’t going to moralize. I just looted a store, right? But I wasn’t going to meekly give up that bike to some middle-aged guy trying to hotwire the thing, either. “Mojo,” I said softly. “Get him.”

  Mojo was a sweet dog. He was the kind of dog that would lie on his back for a tummy-rub from strangers in the street … at least, strangers that I was speaking kindly to. But let’s face it—he’d had a stressful day. Mojo was only too happy to hear a command to rough someone up a little. He launched himself, snarling and snapping and looking like a holy terror, at the middle-aged guy with the bald head and the full beard. The guy, of course, had no idea that snarling and snapping was as far as Mojo was likely prepared to go in terms of an attack. He jumped away from that bike as if he’d been shocked, hands up in the air like he was trying to persuade the cops not to shoot.

  Not much in the mood for conversation, I just got on the bike with Mojo, balancing the huge duffel on my back. Then we took off to find a quiet place to bed down. Because, as of that moment, I was officially exhausted.

  Chapter Ten

  Mallory

  The funny thing is that, back at the apartment I never really was a great sleeper. I’d try different things, like going to bed earlier and setting my alarm to wake up early. And going to bed late and sleeping later in the morning. Exercise in the morning. Exercise at night. Fast at night. Eat at night. No matter what, I spent restless nights staring at the clock and feeling like the only person in the city who was still awake.

  But at that makeshift campsite that Joshua set up, I slept like the dead. Maybe it was because the dead had been chasing me all day long, but I slept harder than I remember having slept for ages. You’d think I’d have had horrible nightmares. But, despite the situation and what really was a pretty grim outlook, I felt safe.

  When I woke up, Joshua had already gotten up. His white hair stood around his head like a halo in the gentle breeze. He’d even made a small fire, waving the smoke away with a book as it burned—I guess so that it wouldn’t alert anyone, living or dead, to our presence. Over the fire he’d taken some of the bread from the car and the ready-to-eat bacon I’d thrown in and made toast and bacon.

  He spotted me coming out of the tent and gave me an apologetic smile. “I would have trapped something, but it sounded like you weren’t really at the point where you were ready to eat fresh meat yet.”

  I nodded wryly at him. “That day will, unfortunately, probably come. But for right now, eating out of the car is all right with me. Thanks, Joshua.”

  We ate in a companionable silence, the sounds of the woods making a peaceful background noise for us. Finally, I said, “Joshua, this is none of my business and you can remind me of that.” I hesitated. “It’s just that—well, I was wondering—it’s just that you seem so organized and knowledgeable.”

  Joshua gave me an understanding smile. “You mean, how did I end up being homeless? It’s okay, don’t worry. Your question is only natural. And it’s one that I’ve asked myself many times. If I’m knowledgeable, as you say, it’s because I’ve really honed my survival skills as a homeless person. But how did I end up this way? It all really comes down to one single thing: bad decisions. That must be hard for you to understand, since you seem to be a very professional person who probably doesn’t have much experience with poor decisions.”

  I shook my head. “On the contrary, I made a really bad decision less than a year ago. I got in a toxic relationship with someone—a relationship that was bad for me in every way. Everyone could see it but me. Somehow I either couldn’t see it, or just couldn’t own up to the fact that I’d made a mistake.”

  “Stubborn?” asked Joshua.

  “And how.”

  “That’s something we both have in common, then,” said Joshua, carefully cleaning up the napkins and the paper plates that we’d used and putting them in a makeshift trash bag. “I’m exactly the same way. And, like you, I made bad relationship decisions. I also made bad decisions in every other aspect of my life, too. I wasn’t a good father. I couldn’t stop drinking, even though it kept me from holding down a job or being a good husband or parent. Plus, I stubbornly refused to seek help or even acknowledge there was a problem to begin with.”

  I sighed. “If I’d only paid attention sooner and realized that I wasn’t in a healthy relationship.”

  Joshua said kindly, “But the big difference between us is that you didn’t allow your bad decision to continue impacting your life. You said that it was less than a year ago. In my case, my bad decisions compounded and impacted my life and my family’s lives for decades.”

  “But you seem well now,” I probed.

  “Lack of funds can definitely help contribute to sobriety,” he said, his eyes twinkling. “I think you need to pat yourself on the back for having the strength to get out of your situation instead of beating yourself up about it.”

  He finished putting the small fire out as I enjoyed its remaining warmth. Suddenly I was reluctant to leave this basic campsite. The unknown out there seemed very … unknown. “I don’t suppose we could just stay here for a while?” I asked. I reddened after I asked, feeling a little silly. “I mean, it seems really quiet here and peaceful. Safe somehow.”

  Joshua said softly, “But your friends are waiting for you, aren’t they? Won’t they worry if you don’t show up soon?”

  They would. They definitely would. But after the terror of yesterday, seeing people who had started out as innocent victims themselves turn into vicious killers, I hung back.

  “I understand why you’d want to stay here. There is water nearby. And there are animals we could trap. Plus, it’s very quiet,” said Joshua.

  I nodded. So where was the downside?

  “The only problem here is that we’re totally exposed,” he continued. “There isn’t any type of shed or abandoned building that we can stay in for protection. And the water supply, although it’s decent, may not always last if we don’t get regular rainfall.”

  “It’s just a temporary solution, then,” I said, disappointed.

  “It would be better if we had land we could farm, too. Eating a diet of game meat would probably get old after a while,” he said, eyes twinkling. “It’s very shady here and the soil is rocky. It’s not a great place to farm.”

  I took a deep breath. “I guess we should head for Annie’s and Jim’s place. That was probably the best plan all along. I know they keep a garden there. And it’s still very remote. I think they even have a well or something.”

  Joshua’s face grew serious. “One thing that we do need to take care of is getting gasoline. I noticed that you weren’t exactly sitting at a full tank.”

  I sudde
nly wished I could just go lie back down again. My head was throbbing. “Right, it’s only got about a quarter of a tank. And the car drinks gas down pretty fast. There’s no way that’s going to last until we get to their house.” Then I remembered something else. “I don’t even exactly know where I’m going. I know the general direction, but we’re probably going to have to hunt around for the house a little while, since it’s been about a year since I’ve been there. I meant to use my GPS to get an exact location, but I got distracted.”

  I got distracted by helping Joshua, actually. Although I was glad I did. I’d have been completely nerve-wracked if I’d been out here in the woods by myself. I’d have been sleeping in my car with the doors locked and jolting awake at every sound.

  “Have you tried it? Just to see?” he asked.

  I doubted I would be able to pick up a signal, but I pulled my phone out. And sighed. “Battery is dead. I’ve got a car charger, so we’ll put it on the charger and maybe we can try again when we’re getting gas for the car. I do know how to get there most of the way It’s just when we get to the final leg that I’m not sure about the turns we need to make.”

  I was still weirdly reluctant to leave. I say it’s weird because at work I’m always a take-charge person. All day long I say, “I’m on it,” when the senator asks me to do something. I’m an action-oriented person. It’s not like me to linger or procrastinate. But I had this tremendous reluctance to face the world again after escaping it so thoroughly.

  Joshua somehow seemed to understand. “I’ll help you scout out a place to stop for gas,” he said. “I know I wasn’t much help yesterday with the nap I took.” His expression was chagrined.

  “I just admired you for being able to nap, under the circumstances,” I said with a grin.

  He returned the smile. “Today will be different. I’ll be a real copilot. We’ll get you to your friends’ house.”

  “We’ll get us to my friends’ house,” I corrected. And he smiled again at me.

  Fortunately, we were still in a rural area for the next thirty minutes we drove. At that point, I don’t think I could have handled another city and another crowd of soulless eyes gazing hungrily at me. The rural areas seemed naturally safer, less-populated, less-likely to have huge numbers of used-to-be-humans around.

  But thirty minutes later, we were in dire need of gas. And the rural route highway wasn’t offering any places to stop. I got the feeling that Joshua was biting his tongue, wanting me to reach a particular conclusion myself. Eventually, I did. “I guess we’re going to have to get onto the interstate and then exit off.” The words slouched reluctantly from my mouth.

  Joshua’s expression was relieved. “Unless you know for sure that there’s a small town or a gas station up ahead on this road.”

  I shook my head.

  “We don’t want to run out of gas here. This area is more exposed and it might take us a while to get into a heavily wooded section again. Let’s connect to the interstate the next time we see a sign for it and then we can fill up and get back on this road again,” said Joshua.

  A couple of miles up the road there was a sign pointing to the interstate. I couldn’t shake this feeling of dread that I’d had since that morning. Still, I took the exit. There were a few cars there, whizzing by at tremendous speed. Fleeing for their lives, I supposed. I had no intention of pushing the accelerator that hard and burning through the small amount of gas we had left.

  “I suppose no one’s worried about being stopped for speeding,” I muttered. “At least the interstate isn’t completely backed up. Which is sort of odd, actually. The roads were already jammed back in Raleigh.”

  Joshua said softly, “Maybe that’s as far as the cars could go…Raleigh. Maybe the only cars we’re seeing here on the interstate are people escaping from small communities.”

  It made sense. With everyone fleeing the city at once, there were wrecks and complete stops. Those vehicles blocked the exit routes. No wonder they hadn’t made it this far. I’d never seen the interstate this quiet. It lent a very eerie feeling to the road. As if it were the middle of the night … but it was broad daylight.

  A few minutes later, Joshua spotted a sign for gas stations at the next exit. “We should probably take it, don’t you think?”

  I did, since we were probably running the car on fumes. But I didn’t feel good about it. I squeezed my hands tightly around the steering wheel.

  The station was old, but it at least had digital pumps. I pulled into the station and we peered around cautiously from our locked car. Finally, I figured the coast must be clear and pulled up to a pump, popping my gas door, muttering while fishing around, “I guess it won’t let me gas up without swiping a debit card first.”

  Joshua stopped me. “Let me fill it up.”

  I hesitated. “Do you think this is a safe station? Should we keep driving?”

  “I don’t think we really have a choice,” he said. “We probably won’t know how safe it is until we take a look around the property. Besides, I think it would be a good idea to go inside the station and see if they have a gas can or two. It would be nice to have some extra gas on hand in case there isn’t a gas station the next time we need to fill up.”

  “Okay. But are you sure that you want to go inside?” I still couldn’t shake that underlying fear.

  “It’s all right,” he said firmly. “This is something I want to do.”

  Chicken that I was, I was relieved. I was worried Joshua was in danger, but I couldn’t be more relieved that I wasn’t getting out of the Subaru.

  He opened the door and paused for a second. “Mallory, if I tell you to drive on, I need you to drive on.”

  I started shaking my head immediately. That wasn’t part of the deal.

  “No, please. If I tell you to leave, or if I’m getting attacked in any way, I need to know that you’re going to keep going. Keep moving ahead with your plan,” he said in an anxious voice.

  I reluctantly nodded. “Just be careful.”

  “I’ll fill the tank first, since that’s the first priority.” He climbed out of the car and quietly closed it. Then he filled up the tank completely, his back to the Subaru the whole time. He gave me a thumbs-up when the gas started pumping. We were both relieved that the pumps were still working, since they ran on electricity and we didn’t know what the situation at the power plants was like.

  Once he finished pumping, he carefully put the gas cap back on and closed the gas door. Squaring his sloping shoulders, he pulled up to his full height of about five and half feet, and walked to the station.

  It was then that I realized I was still clutching the steering wheel with white-knuckles and my heart was pounding so hard that it hurt. I wanted to open the car door to yell at Joshua not to enter, but I was scared to attract those creatures. I sat frozen, mouth dry, staring at the gas station.

  Chapter Eleven

  Ty

  The store looked deserted, but that’s the way I always remembered it being. Dad always used to mutter, asking how Bo could stay in business when it was so quiet here. The big thing I remembered from the store was Bo’s fondness for country music—the cornier and peppier the better. He’d blast it so loud that I wondered the man was going deaf. Sure enough, as I stepped through the door of the store, the country music was playing away.

  One thing I’d worried about was that looters might have come to the store and wiped it out before I’d gotten here. But apparently I shouldn’t have worried because the stores were still stocked. This was a place where you could find almost anything—from live bait, to baby chicks, to to old-fashioned candy and soft drinks. The wooden floor sagged and I bet it creaked. That is, if I could have heard the creaking over the country music.

  Now all I needed to do was somehow convince Bo that I needed a bunch of stuff from his store. Maybe if I told him that he could put it on credit to Dad? But there was something in me that made me hesitate to call out for him. Where was he? Could he hear the bell ri
ng when I walked through the door? Or was the music really that loud?

  “Bo?” I called out softly. As I walked and looked around, I felt a tingle up my spine. “Bo?” I reached over and took a baseball ball out of a rack on a shelf. Just in case.

  There he was. Directly ahead of me. Leering at me with blank eyes from around a clothes rack. Name on his shirt. Spattered with blood.

  He charged me and I swung the bat blindly in front of me. I took a deep breath, focused, and then poised the bat again as I backed toward the door. Bo advanced, moaning softly, stumbling toward me, undeterred by the baseball bat.

  That was how the next few minutes went. In slow motion I walked backward to the door, brandishing the bat ahead of me and watching Bo as he kept advancing. When I got outside, I heard the car door open. My eyes still trained on the store owner, I said urgently, “Ginny, stay where you are.”

  “No, Ty,” her voice pleaded with me.

  I made my voice as calm and reasonable as I could. I noticed that the zombie in front of me didn’t seem to be listening to our conversation at all. Its eyes were trained on me as its mouth worked open and closed. “Ginny, it’s okay. He doesn’t understand us. Listen, I’m going to lead him away from the store. He’s not very fast. I’ll head over to the far end of that field and then run back to the store. I’ll go in through the front door and lock it behind me. Do you think you can drive the car around to the back of the store? Wherever the back door is.”