by Ryan Schow
Thinking of going number two in the previous owner’s pans is yet one more thing I’ll have to get used to in this miserable existence. And how embarrassing is it going to be walking your pan out back in front of everyone knowing it’s got your business in it?
A huge sigh escapes me. “This sucks.”
“I know.”
“You want to go scrounging for wood and things to burn, or should we find a way to drain the water heater, see how much water is in there?”
“Is there a hole out back already?”
“Not yet.”
“I say we find some shovels and some buckets for the water, and maybe use the fallen fence around back to gather up some firewood.”
“We need to mark the poop pan, too, just in case we forget and decide to cook up some beans or something…”
Now I’m making a face and she’s biting back the laughter.
“You’re sick, but I love you,” I say.
“I love you, too, Mom,” she replies. “We’re going to be okay.”
“That’s my line, sweetheart.”
“That doesn’t make it any less true.”
Chapter Forty-Eight
Standing inside the small restaurant amongst all the dead bodies, the light of a mid-afternoon day cutting through the windows, Rider decided it was time to head back to the compound. He took a deep breath, looked around. There were five of them. And a lot of blood. Running his hand through his hair, he realized he was too good at this.
Pulling back his hand, he saw the blood flecked on the outside, and the wet mess smeared on the inside. He looked at it, frowned, then realized he had blood in his hair.
How did that happen?
Replaying the fight in his head, he realized it happened when one of the guys coming after him got in the way of a bullet and he caught the spray. He wiped his face, brought back a red hand.
Great.
Looking himself over, he saw blood on his clothes, the smears of it on his shirt and on his thighs from where he’d broken one man’s neck to conserve on bullets.
He found this place because of the noisy gas powered generator. That was the dead giveaway. It so happened that these were the skin heads he was looking for anyway, so when he rolled his sleeves, it was because he planned on getting dirty.
Wet work could be clean or dirty depending on the number of men, the weapon of choice and the landscape. In this case, the guys were in a small cantina, which is where he followed them back to after he’d watched them kicking down people’s doors and taking their things. That wouldn’t have been a big deal if they were ransacking empty places while leaving the occupied homes alone.
Unfortunately, they were a pack of characters. When they shot an old man and took his stuff without breaking a sweat, he realized they needed to go. It didn’t have to be messy, but it had to be done. Five on one though? In a space as small as a cantina?
Yeah. It was bound to be bad.
A real dust up.
Looking down, seeing the blood on his boots, he realized the clean up would take at least a gallon of water, and he probably couldn’t salvage the black t-shirt. The black leathers, though—he’d keep those no matter how much blood he got on them.
They were his favorite.
The closest body was at his feet. He stepped over it, went to the next one, which was flopped on his back on a table with his head in a pile of salsa. He grabbed the man by the belt buckle, dragged him off the table. He then hauled the next two through the restaurant and stacked them near the others. In the back, where the kitchen was, another guy was crumpled in a heap against the wall. He had a third eye, this hole had a long red tear leaking from it.
He grabbed a wrist, dragged him across the stained concrete floor littered with chip crumbs, wood splinters and broken chairs. He draped him over the other guys.
Looking at the pile, he saw not just bodies, or the horrors of his past being cemented over with new horrors, but a better world. Guys like this, in the apocalypse, eventually they’d have to be dealt with. Rider thought it was best to do it on his terms. Less good people died that way.
“You the jury?” a voice asked from behind him.
Rider spun around, drawing his weapon and laying it on a woman in leathers with big breasts, bottle dyed hair and a ton of wear on her face. She wasn’t armed. Her face was painted with make up, but it wasn’t fresh, and the tattoos snaking down her arms spoke of wild times and a youth that now sat too far in the past to be sexy.
She was someone’s old lady.
“Yeah, I suppose.”
“You the executioner, too?” she asked, pulling out a cigarette. “Or are you just a buzzard picking the dead clean?”
“Executioner,” he said, lowering his weapon.
She offered him a smoke, but he politely declined. She lit the fag, took a deep draw, then blew out a stream of smoke.
“It’s just as well,” she said. “They weren’t good guys.”
“But you ran with them anyway?”
She took another draw, then with the cigarette in her bejeweled hand, she pointed to the one with the third eye and said, “Me and Randy got along alright.” She had press-on nails that were too long, unless you were into painted claws. Two were broken off and her fingers looked nasty. “This was his place.”
“He’s Mexican?” Rider asked, looking down feeling like he missed something.
“You gotta be Mexican to run a cantina?” she said, like it was the craziest thing she’d ever heard.
“I’m sure it’s got to help some. Authenticity and all that.”
“Whatever.”
“So what do you want to do?” he asked.
“What do you want to do?” she countered.
“I’m going to take their guns, their ammo, and then I’m going to get some guys to come back here and grab what else we can.”
“So you are a buzzard.”
“I guess I am.”
She nodded her head, really going after her cigarette, but not in a rushed way. It was almost like she was trying to contemplate a future without Randy and it wasn’t going so badly.
“Can I grab a few things first?” she asked, dropping the cigarette and crushing it under foot.
“Whatever you want. You have someplace to stay?”
She laughed, and from the gravely sound of it he could tell she had a rough life full of heartache and bad decisions. The woman was a walking cliché. So much so that he felt bad for her.
“I can take care of myself. But that’s sweet of you to worry.”
“Grab what you want,” he said, standing back.
She moseyed in, looked around, then walked past him and said, “You ain’t hard on the eyes.” She slowly reached out and dragged a finger across his upper chest, seductively, but with almost nothing behind it. He flinched on the inside, but didn’t show it on the outside. “Yeah, you ain’t bad at all. You got a woman?”
“Yeah.”
“Probably young, right? Perky tits, perfect skin, lots of life still left in her eyes.”
“Something like that.”
“Guys like you always go for the young ones.”
“It’s not that,” he said as she bent down and took one of the weapons on the ground. It was a black Springfield XD that looked like it’d seen better days. For a second he wondered if he was going to have to shoot her. Was she be so dumb as to draw on him?
“This was Randy’s gun,” she explained. “Bought it stolen last year. Had the serial numbers filed off so he could shoot someone if he had to and not get caught. And you know what?”
“What?”
“He never had to, but he did anyway. This kid,” she said, her eyes on him, but her thoughts lodged in the past. “He didn’t have to shoot the kid, but he did anyway.” Now her eyes cleared and she was seeing him. “Things changed between us that day. Then all this happened,” she said, waving a finger around.
“Yeah,” he replied, almost like she didn’t need to say anything else.<
br />
She looked down at him. Randy’s face was pale, dead, nothing to Rider. But to her, he was the guy who changed her.
Aiming the gun at him, she put three rounds in his face, then stood there.
Rider went rigid as hell, but outside you wouldn’t know it. He was ready for anything, prepared to put her down if she turned that smoke wagon on him. Instead, she just stood there, looking at Randy, her eyes now bearing an incredible shine.
He opened his mouth to say something, but instead she stepped over one of the guy’s legs, walked in back then returned a minute later with a plastic jug of distilled water and pound and a half of frozen meat in a carry-out bag.
“Good luck to you,” she said as she walked by him and out the front door.
He just stood there, aghast.
Taking the time to check his own weapon, he realized he was just about out of ammo. He had two rounds left in one of his Glock’s, and one round left in the other. After that, it was just his knives and one stick of bubble gum.
He put the gum in his mouth, slid the foil wrapper in his pocket.
As Rider collected the remaining weapons from the five downed skin heads, he blew small bubbles and thought of Sarah. He found himself smiling. Sarah, the Cuban born American with cute dimples and a shyness about her that was beginning to change him.
He caught himself daydreaming about her and frowned. The newness of this thing was going to get him killed. Still, the way she smelled first thing in the morning...her hair, the skin of her shoulder, her neck…
He shook the memories loose, tried to focus.
In the back kitchen, through an open window with a view of the alley behind it, an orange extension cord ran from a noisy gas-powered generator inside to a small, horizontal freezer/refrigerator. The air was tinged with exhaust fumes, which couldn’t be helped since they needed the window cracked open to make way for the electrical cord. He was about to pop open the freezer/refrigerator when his eyes jumped left then shot wide open.
“Qué tenemos aquí?” he said with a satisfied grin.
On a wall of shelves opposite the freezer next to the prep counter were half a dozen sacks of pinto beans, several large jars of jalapeños, green and chipotle chilies, a dozen cans of enchilada sauce, adobo sauce, red sauce and green sauce.
Now all he needed was a cold beer and a lime…
Up ahead, there was also a walk-in refrigerator. He opened it, hopeful, but instead the smell hit him so hard he felt both gut-punched and smacked in the face. Holding his nose, he backed up from the warm, spoiled-meat-smelling fridge and slammed the door.
His stomach rolling, Rider turned to the fifties style coffin-sized freezer. It was dull white with chipped paint and rust, but this of all things offered the most promise. Inside he found several cuts of beef, chicken and fish, all chilled, all fresh.
“Jackpot,” he said.
On the other side of the freezer, leaned up against the wall, were a pair of old twenty gauge shotguns, and one black twelve gauge. A Mossberg.
Oh, baby.
It seemed his luck was heading in the right direction. He picked up the Mossberg, turned the weapon in his hands. He recognized it immediately. It was the 590A1. The dead giveaway was the heavier barrel, the bayonet lug and the aluminum trigger guard and safety. He opened the magazine from the muzzle end of the weapon, found it packed with five rounds. He checked the chamber and found the sixth. A small smile crept onto his face, one he didn’t restrain.
Time to toss the joint, he thought.
He rifled through cupboards and drawers, turned over boxes and pans, found an old safe with the door creaked open. There wasn’t any money inside, but there were two boxes of three inch shotgun shells. He grabbed both, put the boxes in a nearby plastic bag. There was also a half-empty box of .45 rounds. Setting his Glock’s on the prep counter, he ejected the magazines, packed them with fresh ammo, then doubled up the plastic bag and dropped the .45’s in with the shotgun shells.
He was loaded down and sore, but heading home with some good news. The bad news was that his chest felt like it’d been struck with a sledgehammer and his leg still hurt. After a few blocks, he found he was having a hard time walking and breathing.
“For the love of God,” he muttered, finally stopping for a rest on someone’s front stoop.
After a few minutes, he caught his breath, then touched his chest where he’d been shot. It hurt like hell. He was alive though, thanks to the vest.
The Nano-Protek “Civvy” lightweight body armor was made with carbon nanotube technology. It wasn’t heavy or bulky like Kevlar, but it was just as strong. So far it saved his life five or six times. That didn't mean he wouldn’t be aching for the next few days. He would be. And Sarah was sure to ask him if he had a death wish. Did he have a death wish? Is that what this is?
It wasn’t out of the question.
One of these days, one of these idiots was going to shoot him in the face and he’d just drop dead with his fancy body armor and no one would care how lightweight it was except the guy who stole it off him. Sarah would break down and anyone who knew him would say they saw it coming.
He told himself he had to be smarter than this, that maybe he wasn’t as good as he thought.
Rider stood back up and headed out. He had a lot of time walking home to rethink his self-destructive behaviors. By the time he reached his block, he was short of breath again, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t hurting. It was really piling on now.
“What happened to you?” Waylon asked, looking at all the blood on him.
“You know,” Rider said.
“Let me guess. Some people died, but they were the right people to die.”
“Something like that.”
“You get anything good? Other than the Mossberg and whatever’s in the bag?”
“Steaks. Some fish. A bunch of meat patties. Plus enough beans to feed a small army.”
“When are we going?” Waylon said, suddenly alive.
“Gotta round up a few guys. Guys with good backs and an hearty appetite.”
“I know a few like that,” Waylon said, chipper. “Present company included. By the way, we took in another family while you were gone. Mom and dad, two teenagers. Boys. Hey, you okay?”
“Once I have my ribs wrapped, I’ll be fine. You really want to go? We could use a hand, and some extra security.”
“Hell yeah,” he said. “Getting spelled off in an hour, so after that.”
He found Sarah inside. She saw him, tried not to freak out at the sight of all that blood, then said, “Let’s see what you’ve done to yourself this time.”
“You’re mad,” he said as he followed her to the infirmary.
“More like disappointed.”
“Your ass looks amazing in those jeans,” he said, trying to break the ice.
“Well you’re not going to get any of it if you’re dead,” she said, opening the door and motioning for him to sit down.
Sitting on the makeshift table, he let her cut off his shirt then undo the shoulder straps and the waist straps of his body armor. She drew a sharp breath when she saw his chest and ribs.
“What were they shooting?”
“Nines, mostly. But I think this was a forty-five,” he said, pointing to a spectacular bruise forming on his left pectoral.
“Does it hurt?” she asked.
“Naw,” he said.
She poked it and he damn near jumped through the ceiling.
“I knew you were a liar.”
Holding his side, he said, “I was just trying to look good in front of you.”
“Perhaps you should stop getting yourself shot then,” she suggested. “Or is that the point with you?”
“I think I might’ve cracked a rib.”
She gave a look, touched them more gently, then said, “You’re fine. They’re probably just bruised.”
“These guys, they were bad news.”
“And now they’re not?”
“We ha
d a talk. I didn’t like the way it went. They drew first, but in the end, that was their last mistake.”
“What was their first mistake?”
“They killed an old man for four cases of water and a grocery bag half full of dried goods. I’m sorry, but I think a man’s life is worth more than that.”
“So other than getting shot, did the rest of it go the way you thought it would?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest and giving him the look.
“Pretty much.”
She frowned; he smiled. Shaking her head, she picked up Rider’s body armor, looked at it, put her finger in the impact points.
“It’s so light,” she said. “How long is it supposed to last?”
He shrugged his shoulders, instantly regretting it because the pain in his arm…oh, the pain!
Collecting himself, he said, “Hopefully longer than I’m hoping for.”
“Got another one of these things in a girl’s size?” she joked.
“If we go out, you can wear that one. It’s adjustable, and lightweight, and it’ll stop most everything these guys are shooting.”
“Well let’s get those ribs wrapped,” she said. He took a shallow breath, then another, and then he nodded. When they were done, Sarah said, “She’s awake.”
“Who’s awake?”
“The woman you saved. She says her name is Margot.”
“Finally a name,” he said, easing off the bed.
Motioning toward the vest, he put out his hand; she frowned again and handed it over.
“Since you cut up my t-shirt, this will have to do.” She smiled, cocked her head sideways and leveled him with the sexiest of smiles. He walked forward and said, “Can I kiss you?”
“I’d be upset if you didn’t,” she replied. “But not with that bloody face.” She wiped his face mostly clean, then he stood and kissed her soft at first, then a little harder, sliding his hand around her waist and pulling her toward him.
When their mouths came apart, she pulled back and took a breath.
“Wow,” she said, grinning.
“Uh-huh.”
They walked into the room where Margot was sitting up and drinking water from a water bottle and a straw.