He nodded, he still wanted to see. He shuffled on the bed, bracing himself. She showed him. He groaned and hopped off the bed and walked away, biting his fist and shaking his head. “We have to get you to a doctor.”
Kizzy looked down. Where could they go? Not to Yanloo City or even back to the country to Doctor Fuentes. They had come too far to do that now. She shook her head.
“Then what are we gonna do about this?” he asked. Kizzy thought for a moment. Maybe in the city there would be a hospital. There may be some medical supplies remaining there. She gestured putting medicine in her mouth to Diego.
“Painkillers?” Diego asked.
Kizzy shook her head and continued to put pretend medicine in her mouth.
“Food?” he asked.
She shook her head again.
“I don’t know what you’re saying!”
Kizzy did it all slowly this time. Pretending to put a bandage on her hand, putting a needle into it. She took a pill from an imaginary bottle and popped it into her mouth.
Diego shook his head. “I don’t get it. Medicine?” he asked as he scratched his forehead.
Kizzy exhaled and smiled. She exaggerated a nod as she patted him on the back.
“Where would we get that?” he asked. “A store or a doctor’s office or something?”
Kizzy gestured ‘come on a little more’.
“A hospital,” he said.
Kizzy clapped her good hand against her leg and gave him a thumbs up.
“This is kind of nice having you not talking,” he said.
Kizzy turned her thumb down and scowled.
Diego grinned and helped her to her feet. They left the building and walked out into the harsh daylight. The car was there waiting. The rear end was worn down and scraped to bare, wasted metal. Kizzy could see the burnt, scratched path they had taken to get to the parking lot from the street. They got into the car and pulled out.
As they drove the back of the car made a deafening scraping noise against the pavement. It gave Kizzy a headache. They traveled further down a two lane highway. Both sides were lined with strip malls and restaurants.
“The plague must’ve happened so fast,” Diego said.
Kizzy noticed there were hardly any cars in the parking lots. Everyone must have been at home when it struck.
They began to drive up a steep overpass and the car’s engine started to rumble. From her window, on the horizon Kizzy spotted the first of the sky scrapers in the distance. They stood stark and gray against the light blue sky and early morning fog. She nudged Diego and pointed to her window.
“Well, look at that,” he said. “Thought it would have been bigger. I guess everything seems smaller in real life. With any luck we’ll be there in a half hour.”
The engine let out a loud gunshot of a bang and the car began to slow. Diego’s eyes grew big and he sat back. He took his hands off the wheel and frantically scanned the dashboard for any signs of trouble. The car ground to a halt. He punched the steering wheel. “Piece of crap.”
He turned the key in the ignition, but the car was completely dead.
Kizzy laid her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. She was hoping for an easy morning, but that was now out of reach. She didn’t have the strength to make it the whole way. The pain in her hand was coming back and all she wanted to do was sleep. She looked at Diego, trying not to give away how awful she felt.
“My love kills me,” he sang with a sympathetic smile.
Kizzy tried to laugh, but only a weak grin came to her face.
Diego’s looked her right in the eyes and it felt as if that told her something, like he could tell just how much she was hurting. Could he really know?
“We could wait a while if you want,” he said. He put his hand on her shoulder. The touch felt like electricity.
That feeling scared Kizzy. She shook her head, opened the door and hopped out. She had no tolerance for wimps, and she wasn’t about to let herself be one.
Outside the car the breeze was heavy and the air smelled like fish and autumn. In the trunk they found a backpack to carry the painkillers and whiskey. Kizzy’s legs wobbled as she marched down the concrete overpass. The only sounds were their footsteps and the wind.
They walked for a couple hours over traffic barriers and through dock yards and parking lots before they finally came to the river’s edge. Diego breathed in deeply and smiled.
“Man, I love it out here. It’s like the whole world belongs to us.”
Kizzy smiled. His enthusiasm made her forget about her pain for a moment.
The city’s huge buildings sat like concrete mountains across the water. Vegetation grew up and on most of the walls.
To their left was a large stone suspension bridge. To the right, a smaller steel one for pedestrian traffic.
“Which one should we take?” Diego asked.
Kizzy inspected each one at a distance. The steel bridge to the right looked like it was a bit closer and the total length seemed shorter. She pointed to that one.
They walked through the tall marsh grass and up a hill to the bridge’s entrance. It stretched the whole way across the water. The road onto the bridge was blocked off with a sign “Closed for Construction”. The black asphalt that spanned the distance was full of holes.
“Do you think it’s safe?” Diego asked.
Kizzy stared at the crumbling road. It didn’t look safe. It almost seemed to sway in the wind.
They walked a quarter of the way across the bridge when they came to the first large crater. Kizzy took short steps towards the edge of it. Far down below the dark blue river floated by serenely. Suddenly a piece of the road crumbled away from the weight of her foot, exposing the reinforcement rod inside. The pavement she stood upon began to sink. She leaped back as it fell through and down into the river below. The pieces made small white splashes in the rushing water.
She looked over at the stone bridge which now sat even further away. The aching in her neck and head had returned. The pain fogged all her senses. She glanced back to Diego who looked down at the river below with big eyes. Kizzy heard something in the distance, it sounded like yelping dogs. Over Diego’s shoulder she saw a team of police led by a pack of viscous hounds approaching them through the dockyards. The dogs were barking like crazy, they were on the scent. Diego saw the look in Kizzy’s eyes and slowly turned to see the judgment that was coming for them. “This bridge it is then.”
They began to gingerly run out onto the roadway.
18
“Maybe we should keep to the side,” said Diego.
Kizzy could tell he was nervous.
They scampered with slow, careful steps along the side of the bridge in a smaller lane that had a picture of a bicycle painted on it. Diego led the way, Kizzy followed his steps, one foot at a time. She could feel the bridge sway whenever the wind blew. Her burnt right hand she kept at her side, while her good left hand held tight to the steel railing. Looking back she saw that the police had reached the entrance of the bridge. The dogs snarled and growled, as if they hadn’t been fed in days. She imagined them biting into her burnt hand. She pulled it even closer to her body.
When they reached the halfway point a strong gust of wind came whipping through the bridge’s steel pillars. The metal moaned and swayed. Diego looked back at Kizzy, his face was white.
“Just make sure you follow me closely, ok?” he said with a shaky voice.
He took another step and the pavement cracked and broke through. He fell forward into the void. Instinctively Kizzy leaped forward, wrapped her burnt arm around the railing and grabbed onto his jacket with the other. The pain in her right hand was overwhelming and her vision went white. Diego flung his arms until he could grab onto a piece of iron reinforcement rod. Kizzy changed he
r grip from the railing to a rusty steel suspension cord. It sang a twangy tune as she leaned against it. She pulled with all her might until Diego climbed onto the railing with both hands. She steadied herself on the cord again but noticed that it had all of a sudden become slack. She looked up and saw the top of it collapsing down towards them. She grabbed Diego and pulled him under the crossbeam that separated the bike path from the road.
The cord came crashing down through the asphalt, sending it in crumbles down to the river below.
Kizzy stared at Diego and felt like crying. She’d be careful not to follow his steps too closely. Then the entire bridge began to creak and bend. Kizzy glanced back to see that the police had removed the barrier and were now driving a vehicle out on the bridge towards them.
“Are they crazy?” Diego gasped. “This thing won’t hold them.”
The pavement beneath the car began to crack, and splintered out towards Kizzy and Diego. The police would either capture them or kill themselves trying to do it.
Kizzy tugged at Diego’s shirt, jumped onto the main road and began to sprint towards the other of the bridge. Every step she took felt as if the ground was falling out from under her feet.
As she ran she noticed a long crack forming in the pavement besides her. At first she kept ahead of it, but as the bridge began to crumble it shot past her and spread across the width of the bridge. Up ahead, in front of a parked car the road sank, dropping down six feet from the bridge’s end. The car slid forward into the gap. Kizzy nearly fell to the ground but pushed on the pavement to keep herself on her feet.
Could she make the jump from the top of the car? Her section of the bridge continued to sink. She had no choice. She sprinted forward and jumped up to the trunk, took one step forward to the roof and leaped up towards the end section. Her chest crashed into the hard concrete. She pulled and pulled herself up, the muscles in her back flexing to the max to pull strong and fast. Her fingers slid against the coarse concrete. She swung her leg onto the ledge and shimmied her whole body up. She rolled over onto her side and saw the bridge falling to pieces. Only the steel supports and railings remained. A few lucky police officers clung to them. Meanwhile another officer who hadn’t been so lucky had fallen with the rubble down to the violent, frothy river below. He appeared to die on impact. The police car crashed with an enormous splash, bobbed for a moment, then began to float down river.
But wait, where was Diego? He had been just behind her. Had he fallen with all the others?
She crawled to the edge and peeked down. The river was black and white and thrashed with all the debris with which it had just been fed.
Was Diego down there, smashed and drowned to nothingness? She began to feel a twist in her stomach. He had been right behind her, and she hadn’t even stopped to see if he was ok. He didn’t deserve to even be there. He should have been back in the city, free of all charges, while she was being executed. She had tricked him into being there. Her guts felt like the river. Choppy. Thrashing. Black and white.
She looked to the side and saw Diego climbing towards her on the other side of the railing.
Her heart leaped in her chest. Was it seeing Diego alive or knowing that she didn’t have to pay for her sins?
“Next time lets take a boat,” he said. He climbed from the railing to the concrete ledge she sat upon. They looked out over the bridge and saw the police officers crawling back towards their own side.
“They’ll have to go around,” said Diego. “That’ll buy us some time.”
They scurried down the off-ramp and into the belly of the gigantic buildings that towered like ancient trees above them. All sorts of grass and plants had busted through the sidewalks and streets. Vines grew up and around lamp posts, cars and walls. A huge flock of pigeons flew above them and took to nests on the hundreds of window sills of an office building. Their dried shit was splattered down the building’s facade. Twenty years worth of autumn leaves had created a layer of soil built up against the curbs.
Kizzy breathed in deeply. The place felt so ancient and strange, as if no one had ever lived there. But there used to be millions of people, going about their daily lives, 80 years at a time. Constant blips on the radar. Their ghosts seemed to be crying in the dust. She began to feel lightheaded and stumbled over to the hood of a nearby car.
Diego noticed this. “Just stay here, get some rest, I’ll go and look for a hospital or something.”
She nodded, took off the backpack and laid back onto the flexible metal of the car’s hood. This was as far as she could go. Her hand, her head, her neck, they all ached relentlessly. She closed her eyes and thought of being young. When you’re young you’re safe and that was what she needed in that moment. She had been hunted as prey for too long. All the nerves within her body were becoming frayed and shaky.
She awoke when she heard the howl of a monkey echo off the glass high up in the buildings above her. She opened her eyes. It was still daytime and a slight breeze was blowing through her hair. Someplace a the hinge of a door was creaking, continuous, metallic and ghostly. It was coming from a staircase that lead down into the ground. What was that?
Kizzy got up and walked to the stairs. Down below was a small concrete landing and a door that was opening and closing in the wind. She peeked inside. There were dozens of pillows and empty food cans in there. On the far side of the room was a stack of unopened cans. It was almost like a nest. What had made this? An intelligent animal of some sort?
Should she take some of the cans? She wasn’t feeling hungry, but she knew she needed to try and eat something soon. She would wait until Diego came back. She didn’t have the strength to carry the cans herself. She closed the door and went back to the car hood. At least a little luck had come their way. Diego would be back soon, and hopefully with some medical supplies. They would have a little feast and before the day was out they would find the Enoch building and Dr. Enoch would fix everything.
Then Kizzy could go back home. But that would mean parting ways with Diego and she wasn’t looking forward to that. He had become a friend, but a friend unlike any other she had ever made before. They just seemed to fit together like puzzle pieces in some strange way. There was something about being with him that made her content, she couldn’t quite understand it. At the very least, it distracted her from being sad. Maybe that’s all it was. Maybe she would never have someone like that again. Maybe she could visit him while he was out on his adventures. Or he could come and see her. She’d sneak out at night and they could sit together in the barn, and look up at the stars twinkling through the cracks in the roof.
Just then she heard a voice calling her name in the distance.
Diego came walking through the grass. “I think I may have found some supplies.”
Kizzy smiled and waved him over.
“What?” he asked.
She took him by the hand and led him down the stairs to the door. She turned the handle but it was locked. Kizzy thought for a moment, was this the right door? She pulled the handle again.
“What’s this all about?” asked Diego.
Kizzy tried to say ‘food’ but only a little drool came from her mouth. She wiped it away with her shirt sleeve and groaned. If only she had a pen and paper, this would all be so much easier. She shook the door handle again. What had happened? Had it locked itself when she closed it? It was all dusty and gray as if it hadn’t been used in years. She kicked it and marched back up the stairs to the car. She pulled the whiskey from the backpack, took a swig and swallowed the last four Tylenol.
“Well, I have no idea what that was all about,” Diego said as he came back up the stairway. His hands were casually stuffed in his pockets. “But I was saying there’s a hospital a couple of blocks from here.”
Kizzy nodded. She slid the whiskey back into the backpack and slung it over her shoulder. Only a little b
it further she thought to herself. Then the pain would be gone.
They walked through the tall grass beneath the looming steel and stone skyscrapers. Kizzy noticed her ankle was really starting to ache. She had twisted it when she saved Diego on the bridge and now that the adrenaline was wearing off the pain was shining through. She added it to the list of things that hurt. They stopped for a moment as Diego tried to get his barrings. Kizzy turned back to see how far they had come.
She saw a man dressed in red robes walk across the path they had made in the grass. He was tall and skinny. She turned back to Diego to see if he had seen the man too, but he just continued walking forward.
They came upon a clearing and there stood a plain orange brick building. The white letters above the doors read ‘Metropolitan Medical Center’.
Diego led her up the front steps. Somebody had spray-painted in black letters across the glass “#ENOCH”. He looked back at Kizzy. “That’s a little creepy, huh?”
He was able to pry the automatic glass doors open and he let Kizzy in first. After he climbed in the doors slid shut behind them. It made this great suction sound that Kizzy really enjoyed.
“I’m surprised it wasn’t locked,” he remarked. “This place must’ve been open when the plague hit. Do you wanna check upstairs or downstairs?”
Kizzy shrugged and pointed up. She walked to the steps that led up to the second story. In her haziness she had forgotten that searching the second floor required her to walk up stairs. She turned and try to call to Diego, but her mouth failed to make any noise. With a sigh she took the stairs. Each step upwards was difficult, but she wasn’t going to go easy on herself.
When she reached the top she paused for a moment to catch her breath. The second floor stretched out in both directions. She went to the right and opened each door that she came to. The rooms were all bare, with empty beds. Shouldn’t there have been plague victims in them? She remembered hearing in school that the plague killed so fast that people didn’t even have time to get to the hospital.
The Enoch Pill Page 19