Grabbing the bottle of iodine, I douse the wound in it, watching the flesh turn orange underneath the film of the liquid. I always thought iodine looked so weird when I would go get a shot or work with it in the clinic. It has a peculiar way of captivating the attention. I look down at it, still feeling bewildered by how it changes the skin’s color. It’s obvious why it does it, but it’s still a sense of childish fun that makes it curious to me. I look at it and I feel delighted by it. I can’t help the feeling. I smile at my injury, deriving what joy I can from it. Maybe I’m delusional. Who cares?
We have a few packages of needles and sutures still available and I’m grateful. I don’t know how I would be able to thread a needle in my current tremoring state. I’m not even sure how I’m going to get my hands to stop trembling to sew myself up. Pulling open the package, I look at the hooked needle, taking it and unrolling the thread behind it. It looks like a tiny metal claw. I’m going to stick this in my stomach and I’m going to sew up a wound that is never going to fully heal and will eventually kill me. It seems pointless. I wonder if there’s any way of getting some privacy so that I can sew up myself without them watching me, that way I could just wrap my wound and leave it like this. There’s something completely vain about all of this, we’re all just sort of accepting this lie and just making things feel like they’re all fine. I look at the needle in my quivering hands and I feel like I’m going to regret this. I don’t have enough time to fill my life with any more regrets.
Sticking the needle in my stomach is about as pleasant as I thought it would be. I feel the pain of the poke, and the unbearable sensation of having thread slipping through the hole I’ve just made. Piercing into the other side of the wound, I slip the needle through and bind the wound together. I pull the thread tightly. I’ve had more than my fair share of experience with suturing wounds, just never on myself. Why would I ever do this, especially without any kind of painkiller? I keep working, sewing what would be considered crude work, even in school, drawing the wound together until it’s completely bound. I look at the thread and the needle before grabbing the knife on my hip and severing the thread.
I give them an awkward smile, a sign that I’m done so that they can stop staring at me like I’m made out of glass and ready to shatter in an instant. They don’t know that at any second I might drop dead from one of a myriad of possible internal injuries. I probably have stopped my external bleeding, but honestly, in the end, that’s not going to matter. I’m no doubt still bleeding internally and without help, I’m not going to be able to stop the bleeding inside of me. But maybe it will stop. Maybe I’m experiencing a miracle right now as my body stitches and heals itself. I’m not a fool though and I know that I’m going to die from sepsis. I could go all Roman, and heat a piece of iron and plunge it deep into the wound and hope it will cauterize any damage, but the shock alone could kill me. Instead, I’m going to get an infection and I’m not going to last much longer. My death is in sight and with sepsis on the horizon, I know that my time is extremely limited. I have days, perhaps weeks if I languish slowly and only drink water. After that, I’ll be unable to do anything. I’ll be exhausted, worthless to them.
“Your turn, big boy,” I smile at Greg, turning towards him and looking weakly at the table where he’s going to need to lie down. If I can get him cleaned out, then I’m certain that he’s going to be the one who survives longer. The cold reality of that sinks in and I find it amusing that this morning, I figured that he’d be the one dead and I’d be the one alive right now.
“Are you okay to work?” Greg looks at me nervously. I’m not sure if he’s worried for me or if he’s worried that I’m going to hurt him. Either way, the question infuriates me since I have no time for stupid questions. Clearly he doesn’t know that every second right now is precious, but I can’t tell him either.
“I’m fine,” I tell him sternly, trying to tell myself that as well. I’m not sure either of us buys it, but it’s out there. Wrapping my stomach in the Ace bandage, I watch as he cautiously approaches the table. I shrug my shirt back on, trying to fight the chill that’s bleeding in through the closed doors of the cellar which are now jammed closed by an axe handle. But the cold doesn’t care. It comes through with the dampness of the rain, bleeding through the slits between the planks of the doors, chilling me to the bone. Buttoning up my shirt, I roll up my sleeves as Greg climbs onto the heavy, wooden table, looking at me nervously while I inspect his leg. I don’t like the look of it, but surprisingly it is improved from what I saw earlier. With a lot of luck, I don’t think he’s going to have to lose his leg.
I pull off my belt and hand it to him, feeling a sinking sensation deep in the pit of my stomach, knowing that this morning was just a precursor to this moment. I look at him as he takes the belt and looks at it. He knows what it’s probably meant for, but he needs to hear it from me. I understand that. I’m asking a lot from him in order to save his leg and save his life. I give him a comforting, compassionate look and wish that he didn’t have to endure this, but here we are. “I’m going to need you to bite down on it,” I tell him somberly. He takes the belt and puts it between his teeth after a brief moment of hesitation. I feel for him, but what has to be done, has to be done.
Watching him biting down hard on the leather, I give Greg’s leg one last look as I wrap my fingers around his cold, clammy flesh at the knee. I squeeze his leg tightly and slowly pull down on his leg, sliding my hands toward his foot as I go, squeezing him tightly as I go. I look at the wound as more puss, lurking deep within his leg, gushes out of the wound, followed by a flood of dark, blackened blood. Greg immediately covers his nose, even though I’m the first to feel the impact of the stench. I take it in silently, without complaint or bother. Crinkling my nose isn’t going to save me from this and making disgusted faces won’t help either. It has to be done and done right now. It’s for his benefit, and Lexi’s too. She’ll need the help once I’m gone.
I watch his upper leg drain until I’m at his wound, which is now an off purple and puffy red ring around a disgusting looking black mark that’s weeping puss and blood. I’ve opened the wound and it’s draining completely. Thanks to the belt wrapped around his knee, he won’t risk bleeding out from this little endeavor. I let go of his leg and look at Greg, who is snorting breaths through his nostrils while pinching his eyes shut. It’s a hard thing to accept, that your leg is rotting and dying. But hopefully, we’ll keep him alive and help him keep his leg.
Gripping his ankle, I can feel the swelling in his calf. Without hesitating, I squeeze the flesh again and watch as Greg writhes in agony, but I ignore him, reminding myself that this has to be done. Applying more pressure, I watch as more puss oozes out of the wound, followed by the dark, sickly blood that gushes out onto the table. There’s so much. The infection has completely set in. Not only does he have inflammation and infection, but I’m certain that his calf muscle is rotting. He’s not in a good spot right now and I feel scared for him. I want him to keep his leg, but that might be asking too much at this point.
His eyes are squeezed shut and when they do open, his eyes have rolled back into his sockets. The pain is too much for him. I look at him and wish that there was something I could give him to stop the pain or at least take the edge off. I can’t stop. I can’t comfort him while there’s still work to be done. Reaching over for the bottle of rubbing alcohol, I’m glad to feel that it’s mostly full. We’re going to need every drop. I twist open the top and place the cap safely within reach. I don’t want it getting knocked off and the bottle evaporating.
Tilting the bottle, I watch as the contents pour into his darkened, inflamed wound and he lets out a scream through his gritted teeth that would put a banshee to shame. His scream worries me, because if there’s anyone upstairs, they’re going to think that we’re torturing him or ripping him apart. I listen to him scream but I gently work the sides of the infection, massaging the burning disinfectant into the wound, hoping that it’ll ki
ll the bacteria that’s causing the infection. I watch as it drips, slithers, and winds its way into all the pores and cavities of his gaping wound. Sweat beads on his forehead and arms, as he growls with his head thrown back, the whites of his eyes exposed and glaring towards the rafters above. Raising his leg, I allow the alcohol to run up into the areas I can’t see as his screaming stops. He’s gone into shock, probably, but I still can’t stop. Not yet.
I look at the wound, as clean as it’s going to get, and I can’t help but feel like it’s not good enough. I look at this leg and I see that there’s so much infected tissue that I can’t help but think that it’s no longer salvageable. The dead flesh is going to need to be removed. I’ve done the best that I can with what we have and that’s not saying much. We don’t have the proper supplies that I’d normally use to surgically remove some of the rotting and infected flesh to prevent the infection and necrotic tissue from continuing to spread.
I leave the tourniquet on and decide that removing the leg may still be the better option, no matter how miserable and horrific that experience is going to be. I don’t want the infection to spread into the blood and to flood the rest of his body, so I decide that right now, keeping his leg numb is for the best.
I look at Greg, offering him a sweet smile and rubbing his shoulder. “I’m done for now,” I tell him calmly. “I’m sorry it hurt so much.”
“Son of a bitch,” Greg gasps, breathing heavily and trying to get control of himself. There’s nothing that I can do to help with the pain. We don’t even have alcohol that he can down a few shots of. I feel bad for him. Even if we had painkillers, little help they would be. The infection is worse than I would have imagined.
The truth that none of us want to accept is that there are three seriously injured individuals around a newborn and though right now, we have a place to stay, we’re still too low on supplies for that to mean anything of importance. We need supplies and we need medical attention. If Lexi wants to be here alone, then we can just stay the course and let the infection in my abdomen and the infection in Greg’s leg end us all. But I think she’d prefer it if she wasn’t out here in the vast emptiness of the apocalypse by herself. So I look at her and Greg, and I know that some of us are going to have to make the hard decision to get out of here and go in search of better supplies. Looking at Greg’s leg, I know that he’s not going to be able to walk on it in the morning. So that just leaves Lexi and me. I shake my head and lie down on a dusty, stained cot that rests against the cinderblock wall, not even caring where the blankets have been. Something tells me that tomorrow is going to be a very long day. Why are the last days the longest?
Chapter Eleven
The storm raged on through the majority of the night, God’s hands working over the fresh lump of clay that is our world. Lightning ripped through the sky as I lay on the cot too afraid to close my eyes. But when they closed of their own accord, I could only picture the faces of the dead. It wasn’t just Marko or Noah or the others we left behind, but it was the faces of everyone I used to know out there in the world. I see the faces of everyone whom I had been friends with before all of this happened. It was like all of them had died, even though I had no clue if they were alive out there, fighting and scraping by for survival or if they were among the bleached bones that now cover the surface of the earth. I see their faces no matter their fate and I can only imagine what it would be like coming home to all of them. If they are calling to me from the other side, they are as silent as the bones they left behind. All I see are their somber, quiet faces, staring at me. Finally falling asleep, I can no longer tell what is a dream and what is delirium. Instead, I am left with the silence. I am left with the welcoming embrace of sleep and I can’t help but wonder if this is exactly what death is like.
Eventually, like all stormy nights, the dawn came and I slept through it. Awaking, I am genuinely surprised that I survived the night. I figured that I would have died in my sleep from the internal bleeding. I thought they’d find me with a swollen stomach and they’d see that I wasn’t moving and they’d just sort of push me off into some hole to leave me for the zombies to find and feast upon. But when I open my eyes, I am pleasantly surprised to see that the world around me is still dark, save for the windows high up near the ceiling where the light pours in from what would have once peeked out through the flower beds. It’s enough to cast a warmer glow around the basement, making it look aged and forgotten. It reminds me of an old barn that no one had entered in a very long time.
As I sit forward, the night falls off of me like a waterfall of bad memories and I immediately realize that I feel sick to my stomach. The feeling down in the depths of my abdomen means only one thing, that my worst fears are true. I lie back down on the bed, not sure if I should feel bad or if I should feel relieved. I am dying. I am dead. Closing my eyes and blindly lifting up the bottom of my shirt and sliding my fingers up from my waist, I feel the wrap around my abdomen and I know without a doubt. With every little fact that I’m finding, it feels like there’s another nail being driven into the coffin of my life. I can feel the warmth emanating from my belly. There’s a heat there that is unmistakable, which is a telltale sign that I’m in serious trouble. The flesh around my wound is stiff, hard, and swollen. The infection is setting in and as of right now, there’s nothing that I can do to stop it.
Rolling my head to the side, I see Greg seated at a chair, slumped and slanted with a shotgun on his knees, gripping it tightly. I wonder if he’s remembered to put the safety on or if he’s sitting there with a live shotgun on his lap. It wouldn’t surprise me if he forgot again. I look at his leg. He’s rolled up his pant leg and I look at his pale leg and I know that he’s going to have to find a way into the future without me. Because, unlike me, Greg has a chance to survive. Seeing him reminds me that there’s a way to save him. I just have to find the right materials. I just have to get out there in the world and I’ll be able to find what I need.
The truth is, I’m fine with this fate. I would rather be the one dying than having to watch Greg die. It’s better to always be the martyr in the end than watching your beloved die in your arms. Yes, I’d rather be the one to give my life for his survival.
I push myself up, cautious not to use my abs as I do so. I’m going to do what needs to be done to save him. I will give whatever remaining little energy that I have to see to it that he survives. I look at his face, the face of the man that I fell so madly in love with once upon a time and I have to admit, I’m still madly in love with that handsome mug. He’s the perfect man. I could never have dreamt that I would find a man as perfect as him, so enduring and persevering all the way unto the end with me. I smile at the thought of him. We’ve been through the apocalypse together. How many couples can say that? I smile at the absurdity of it and I decide that it’s absolutely important that I keep him alive. He has to see the future. Unlike me, I want him to see what it is that Jason has in store for the world. I want him to see what it is he plans on doing to save all of humanity.
But more importantly, Greg will have the opportunity to protect and take care of my sister and my nephew. I glance over at Lexi who has set up a new little nest for my nephew. She’s going to need help out there in the rest of the world, whatever is waiting for her and Charlie. She’s going to need helping hands, a shoulder to cry on, and some muscle. She’s going to have a long road down the path of motherhood. I look at Charlie, thinking that he would have known Greg as an uncle even if the world had been normal. So why shouldn’t Charlie know Greg as the man who his aunt fought so hard to save? There’s nothing wrong with that. He’s going to need an uncle. Heck, Greg is going to be the closest thing to a father that Charlie will ever know. I think about my father and how important he was to me. Charlie should have that. Charlie should have a strong, daring man to look up to in his life.
Getting up, I stand on my feet and resist the urge to stretch. I want to stick out my arms and groan with euphoric ache as my entire body tenses, but
that luxury is completely gone. I’m stuck with the pains and stiffness that I dare not test. I feel like I’ve been plowed into by a train and that I’m stuck limping along. Someone should put me out of my misery soon. If there was a merciful God still alive, I wouldn’t be left to suffer.
I make my way up the wooden steps to the door that’s lurking at the perimeter of the large basement, the single door that we’ve all been looking at with nervous, cautious eyes. I decide that it’s time to see if there’s a way into the rest of the house. I’m not sure if I think that the door in the basement is the door I should trust. For me, I would set some sort of trap on that door. I figure that if anyone should try it out, it should be the one who is the closest to dying. In the dim light of the basement, I look at the door, searching the edges to see if I can find any trip wires or if there are any machetes waiting to swing down if I twist the handle of the door.
Nothing comes flying out at me, nothing swings down to cleave me in half, and nothing shoots at me. Releasing a sigh of relief, I listen to the door, trying to see if I can hear the sounds of movement on the other side. Through the entire storm, we had all been sitting down here, waiting for something to move, but there was nothing. I don’t think there are zombies up there. They would have come clamoring down on us when Greg let out his colossal scream during the cleaning of his wound. Pulling the door open, I decide that if I’m going to find anything on the other side of the door, it’s going to be the barrel of a gun waiting to take my head off.
LEFT ALIVE (Zombie series Box Set): Books 1-6 of the Post-apocalyptic zombie action and adventure series Page 92