I climbed back down the ladder with the broom and walked over to the car. And yes, I did cringe like a little kid when I got near those bodies. I hope Lena didn’t have to do that, but then, if she hadn’t that would mean somebody else was there to help her, didn’t it?
I tapped on Ginny’s window in the back and she moved to the front passenger seat and rolled the window down so we could talk.
“Have you seen anything, darlin’?” I asked Ginny.
“No, not yet, but I think Maggie needs to go out, she keeps whining.” The little girl still looked upset, but she still wanted to take care of Maggie’s needs.
“Well, let’s get her out of there then. I haven’t seen any of those nasty things around.”
Maggie’s tail started thumping the back seat as soon as I said “let’s get her out” so I was pretty certain she was ready for some outside time. As soon as Ginny opened the door Maggie jumped out, found a spot by a lamp post, and did her business. Then she ran over to the store, sniffed around the back and then went to the front door and started scratching the glass and whining.
Having known Maggie for a few days now I knew this meant something. Maybe Lena was in there? Running over to the store I pulled on the door and eased myself into the doorway.
“You stay here, Maggie, I don’t want you getting hurt in there.” And because she was such a smart doggie Maggie sat down and held her paw out. I took it, said thank you, and eased into the store, making sure the door closed quietly behind me.
“Lena!” Again with the loud whispering. Somebody had been in here at some point, the door was unlocked. I didn’t want to “wake” them if I could help it, but I wanted to find Lena.
“LENA!!” A little louder this time. Nothing happened so I walked further into the store. I could see a door behind the cashier’s desk so I went back that way. The layout of the store allowed me to see there was nobody in that section. Reaching out I tapped lightly on the door.
Nothing happened so I opened the door. I really did! See, it’s open! Alright, alright, I’m really opening it now!
I was really going to have to invest in a flashlight, it was dark back there! Rather than walking into that dark area I decided to see if the store had a flashlight in it. At this point I didn’t feel like I was stealing anything. There was nobody left to pay, nobody to send me to jail so I walked over to the aisles until I found a flashlight, took it out of the package, and put the batteries in. Have light, will travel!
Walking as quietly as I could I went around to the back offices of the store. I could see part of the back was for storage as there were goods packed in every available spot but to the left was another door. Hoping against hope I walked to the door and, taking a deep breath, opened the door.
Someone was in there because I heard a scream and then something collided with me. My breath was knocked out of me as I hit the floor and I made a really weird noise trying to draw it back into me. Thankfully I hadn’t dropped the flashlight when I fell so I raised it to try to blind whoever was standing over me. I wasn’t going to just lie down and die here and it was the only thing I could think of to do. And then I heard laughter. Lena’s laughter!
“Oh, we do have to stop meeting like this. I can’t believe I laid you out again!”
Finally catching my breath I glared at Lena and sat up.
“I’m starting to think you just like having me on my back. Help me up.” I glared at her, trying not to let my smile break through.
Getting to my feet I gave my best friend a hug. She was still laughing and had noticed my little broom, obviously, as she started to laugh harder and asked me what I’d hoped to do with that flimsy thing.
Picking the broom back up I twirled it around between my hands.
“Well, I thought I could stun a zombie with my baton skills and distract them until I could make my getaway. Clever, huh?”
“Oh yes, because zombies are such huge fans of batons aren’t they? Where have you been? I was starting to worry you weren’t coming back. I imagined all kinds of scenarios that all ended up with me being alone in this world again.” She ended almost on a wail as she hugged me harder.
Leaning back I looked at her face, and yes, I did see the telltale signs that she had been crying. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her nose would have made Rudolph proud! My poor buddy!
Hugging her close again I told her how I’d lead the zombies far, far away and then come back.
“I’m hoping that means we’ll be alright for a while. Let’s go get Ginny and Maggie, hun.”
When we reached the front of the store we stopped and looked outside. The fog, somehow, had grown much worse while I was searching for Lena. We couldn’t even see the car now!
Maggie wasn’t at the door when we got there. I really hoped she hadn’t run off, but I should have known better. As we reached the car I saw that she was sitting outside the car. She’d gone to watch over Ginny, because she’s a good puppy!
“Come on ladies, let’s go inside, I don’t think we’re going anywhere else today. This fog is way too thick. Let’s get set up inside and hunker down for the night. I’ll see if there are any hot dogs left and grill you up a feast. Well, a hotdog with relish at the very least. Do you know how those hotdog things work by any chance, Maddy?” Lena’s voice trailed off as she walked to the back of the store.
Going back in I found that the manager’s office had a couch, a desk, a television, and not much else of use to us. Ginny went over the cashier’s desk and found a hammer but that was about all. No weapons of any kind. I always suspected gas station employees kept a loaded sawed-off shotgun under the registers, but I guess that was only in fantasy-land. As long as we kept moving we wouldn’t need weapons anyway.
Chapter Eight
That evening we ate ourselves sick eating hotdogs and chips, and Lena and I had a couple of beers with ours. We stopped at two bottles because it’s the zombie apocalypse; getting drunk probably wasn’t a good idea. Besides we realized we had a new role as role models when we saw Ginny watching us. We really enjoyed the hotdogs though and we talked about all of the foods were going to start missing as time went on and food started to spoil. Which reminded us of why we were rushing to Virginia. Fear seized me thinking not only of the zombies outside but the unknown factor of nuclear power plants. This was so not cool.
I think we were both on edge and neither one of us could sleep. We made Ginny a bed on the couch with some course blankets the gas station stocked as novelty items and settled down around the desk, playing cards by the light of a lamp.
“Are you sure we’re going to make it to Virginia, Maddy?” Lena asked quietly as she placed her final card down, totally spanking me at Gin Rummy again.
Glaring at the cards, that was the tenth game she’d beat me at, I looked up at her and growled.
“You’re way too good at this game! If you keep beating me like that you may not make it!” I said. “As for Virginia, I’m not sure now. I do know we have to leave Zombie of the Lambs behind or we won’t be going anywhere. He may still be alive out there, slithering around.”
“I doubt that, I’m pretty sure that second thump was his head popping.” Lena said, making me wish I hadn’t eaten so many hotdogs now.
I stood up, stretching my back and looking at Maggie to see if she needed to go outside. She hopped up, tail wagging, ready for a walk.
“I’ll take her out real quick, no stacking the cards while I’m out! I know you’re over there cheating somehow!”
Maggie started whining as we walked around outside, sniffing the air in an almost frantic manner, turning in circles and wandering all over the place. Oh this can’t be good, I thought as I looked around. The dog looked at me, whined really loud again, and then ran to the car and under it. I ran over to the car, trying to get her out of it, but only succeeded in driving her to the other side of the car. Maggie jumped, scraping her claws against the window of the car, as if she wanted to get in while she kept looking behind her. I’d alr
eady learned to trust this dog, an odd statement I know, but it’s true, so I knew that Maggie’s actions meant something.
I ran back into the store, rousting Lena and Ginny as I did, grabbing up the few things we’d brought inside as I tried to calmly tell them it was time to leave. Alright, perhaps I was screaming it at this point, but I had no idea what was coming at us. I suspected it was that horde coming back, but couldn’t prove it. Just as I was leaving I glanced back at the room and saw something gleaming under the desk. Looking closer I saw a revolver there, taped to the bottom of the desk, and pulled it loose. I hoped I’d never have to use it, but knew if it came down to it I’d do whatever it took to protect Ginny, Lena, and Maggie. Shoving the gun in the back my waistband I ran out of the store with my friends, all of us piling up into the car as fast as we could before slamming the doors closed. I squinted into the darkness, trying to see what had spooked Maggie so much, but couldn’t see anything.
As soon as Lena hit the lights we could see what had made Maggie so nervous. From every direction zombies were heading at us. There was a hole in the mass of writhing rotting bodies around the interstate that we could slip through but for the most part the area was surrounded with zombies for as far as we could see.
“Holy cow, that’s a lot of dead people!” Lena gasped out before she put the car in gear and hit the gas, sending us fishtailing out of the gas station. She winged a few ambling zombies, but we made it out of the parking lot without damaging the car. As I looked back I could see the horde changing direction to follow us just before Lena zoomed onto the wrong exit and sped onto the highway.
“Lena, you’re going in the wrong direction!” I shrieked out.
“Does it look like it matters, Madeline? There’s nobody on the road, I doubt there will be anybody on them at all. And if there are, we can just get out of their way. Getting off this highway onto I-40 might be hard though. I’ll cross the median here in a little bit.” She replied.
Looking over at her I couldn’t believe we’d just scraped by another close call. How many more of those did we have left? I looked in the backseat at Ginny and Maggie and smiled as I saw they were cuddled up together, sleeping already. Children just couldn’t fight their bodies, I guess. The sight of the sleeping pair reminded me of why we were fighting to stay alive. We were just going to have to stay vigilant, always.
We crossed over the median in the safest spot Lena could find, and then took the exit for I-40 heading in the direction of I-77. Something was glowing in the distance; it reminded me of the lights from some of the factories I’d seen when I was younger, back before all of the factories started closing shop to head off to Mexico or China. The whole night sky used to be lit up with the orange glow of security lights but I hadn’t seen that in years now. As Lena turned off an exit and onto a street in Hickory, heading to Maria’s house, we saw that the light was an entire block of mill homes burning. Every single home within a two mile radius was on fire and I knew there was no way anyone was alive in that inferno.
“If she managed to get out of that, Lena, I’ll never find her. I wouldn’t even know where to start looking for her.” I didn’t want to give up so easily on my cousin, even if she did irritate the life out of me and despite the fact that she made me think evil things, but I really had no idea where to look for her. I realized this was going to be another lesson of the ZA, knowing when to give up and live another day.
“What about your other cousin? Do you want to check for her?” Lena asked.
Sighing I turned in the direction that Amanda’s home was in and saw a glow in that direction too. “No, I haven’t heard from her at all and it looks like there’s more fire in that direction. I don’t want us caught in the middle when those two fires meet. Let’s get back on 40 and get to the RV place. It’s surrounded by a fence so we should be safe from any zombies there for a little while.”
Lena drove back onto the highway, her weariness showing in her pretty little face and the way she kept rubbing at her lovely blue eyes. This was my buddy, my friend, and she was exhausted, just as terrified as me, and still, she wasn’t complaining, only doing what needed to be done. I loved her even more for that.
We made it to the exit for the RV place, pulled into the parking lot just enough to get through the gates and I jumped out to close them up, sealing us in. I walked back up to the car and tapped on Lena’s window lightly, not wanting to wake up Ginny yet. Lena rolled the window down and looked at me questioningly.
“I’m going to look around the parking lot, see which of these is best, and then I’ll go in and find some keys in the office. Can you stay here with Ginny?” I asked.
“Sure, yeah, but keep where I can see you, alright?” Lena said, turning the car off.
The sudden quiet made it spooky in the isolated spot. There were no homes or other businesses on this little side-road, so I didn’t have a lot to worry about, the fence was locked, but I didn’t know what was in that office and I could smell zombie on the breeze that blew past my face. They weren’t too far away then. I walked along the parking lot, noticing that there were letters and numbers under each of the RVs I walked past and assumed those were going to help me find the keys.
I walked past all of the smallest ones, heading straight for the biggest RVs. Lena said this place was big we were going to so I wanted something we could all fit into comfortably. I walked up to the two longest and tallest ones and pushed on the door of one. I was surprised it opened, but reasoned that the person running the place must not have taken the time to lock the vehicles up. It didn’t occur to me to wonder where they were. If it had I might have assumed they’d wandered out of the fence, or run away, anything really.
Looking around the RV I saw marble topped counters, a normal sized fridge and kitchen appliances, a living room, two small sleeping berths that were in the popout sides, a bathroom with an actual tub in it, a bedroom in the back with a full-sized bed in it, and a laundry room. In an RV for crying out loud! Wow! I was absolutely shocked, but curious what the other one held so I quickly walked over to it. The first one was green with brown trim; this one was black with silver trim. The kitchen was stainless steel and black marble, more spacious, had two bedrooms, more storage, and an electric stove and heater. The other RV had a propane stove and heater. This one was going to be more useful if we could stockpile propane. But, if we couldn’t find propane, what then? We could at least hook up solar panels to this one.
I made a decision and went to the back of the RV. Yep, there was a tow bar. Going back to the front of the massive vehicle I glanced at the code on the ground, E43, and repeated the code to myself as I walked towards the office, turning on a flashlight. I put a hand over the glare, not wanting to attract any attention and slowly moved through the office.
What? I’ve seen the movies where people just walk in and get bitten by a zombie because they weren’t paying attention. I know how this stuff works and I don’t feel like being a zombie’s midnight snack right now, thank you very much. Nope, I’d like to keep all my parts alive, and if that means being quiet and taking my time then that’s what I’ll do. Now, if I were a box of keys where would I hide?
Running the flashlight along the walls I spotted an open metal box, easily locked up at night, with printed stickers marked with codes and hooks for keys. Walking over to it I flashed the light on the box until I saw the appropriate code, snatched at the keys and turned to leave. I held back a shriek as the weak light from the flashlight revealed a slow moving, very quiet zombie approaching me from a door I hadn’t seen when I came in. My super-detective routine hadn’t worked as planned.
I’ve learned by now to stay quiet, but that didn’t stop a squeak escaping past my lips. My blood pressure immediately shot up and my fight or flight response was doing a tap dance in my brain telling me to run far, far away. My brain also tried to remind me that I had a gun in my pants, har har, but I dismissed the idea. I knew now that noise drew them and I wanted to make this whole adventure as
painless as possible. I quickly made up my mind and ran past the zombie, pulling the door behind me as I went. There was no window in the door so I hoped the solid metal would act as a barrier long enough to hook my car up to the RV and for us to get out of here.
Running to the car, flashlight swinging enough to have me dropping to the ground if I wasn’t more careful with the light, I tapped on the window as Lena rolled it down. Maggie and Ginny were still asleep in the back but stirred as Lena started the car’s engine to pull it over to the RV. Looking around the parking lot I saw we had enough room to turn the RV towards the road while Lena tried to figure out how to attach the car to the tow bar. I’d helped my dad when I was younger, but it had been a while. Lena moved Ginny and Maggie into the RV and started looking at controls while I situated the car, attached the supplemental breaking system, and put the car in neutral. I hoped that was all I needed to do and patted my Dad’s beloved treasure before stepping away to get into the RV. I closed the door behind me and looked up at Lena in the driver seat.
“Are we going tonight or do you want to stick around here?” I asked as I settled into the seat beside of her, hoping she wanted to go as I watched the door to the office. I don’t know how long that door will hold against the zombiefied salesman it was holding back.
“I’m too wired to sleep right now; we might as well head out. You ready?” She asked with a grim smile on her face.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” I replied as Lena swung the RV around in a large circle before heading out of the gates. We were on our way. To what I wasn’t certain but we were on our way.
Two hours later and we were climbing up a mountain that was so steep the RV was having a hard time maintaining a speed over 25 miles an hour.
Seizures: A Tale of the Zombie Apocalypse Page 7