by Russ Melrose
My senses had awakened and I felt the same adrenaline rush I'd felt earlier. But despite all the aroused energy, I couldn't seem to get myself to move. Then a vicious headbutt from the stout pudgy man and the window crack lengthened dramatically and forked outward in random directions like lightning. A couple more blows and the window would shatter. I needed to get out and realized the only way out would be the door to the backyard. I just needed to move. I was panicked but lucid at the same time. I looked back at Alex as if he might be able to help, but he remained motionless on the floor with a gaping hole in the back of his head. I noticed the Glock lying close to Alex and thought it might be my salvation, but my feet remained pinned to the floor. My body was riddled with fear and simply wasn't responding to the alarm my mind was sending out. Then everything seemed to happen at once.
I heard the glass crack and break and I turned my head to see a large slab of glass come crashing down to the floor where it shattered and exploded. I took a step back, but a few of the shards ricocheted off the floor and into the pant legs of my jeans. Pudgy man and the woman next to him were clambering to get over the window sill and get into the living room, and other infected were trying to climb over them to get in. They were in a frantic state.
A great urgency swept over me and gave me the impetus to move, but my mind and body were still out of sync and in my haste to get to the Glock, I stumbled and fell and landed in the water next to Alex. Alex's eyes were remarkably still and there was nothing he could do to help me now. Pudgy man was halfway into the room, only being held back by the others trying to climb over him. I reached out and grabbed the gun and the surgical masks and scrambled to my feet. I hustled toward the hallway as pudgy man landed with a thud onto the floor, splashing water across the room. His gray face and bald head were a crazy network of veins and arteries and smeared blood. He desperately reached toward me and tried to get up at the same time. I ran into the dining room which separated the living room from the kitchen where the back door was located. A sudden inspiration had me tipping over chairs in the dining room to create a barrier between the dining room and the kitchen. I raced to the back door and heard pudgy man slosh across the living room floor as I opened the door to the backyard.
I locked the back door and slammed it shut. And while it made little sense to lock the door from inside, it somehow, quite illogically, made me feel safer. The infected had shown no aptitude where doors were concerned and they'd made no attempt to get in the house through the front door which I suddenly realized I had left unlocked.
Being out in the open, I found I was able to breathe and clear my mind. The backyard would offer me a respite, at least for a while. If the infected didn't know how to open a door, then it would be difficult for them to get into the backyard. There were only three windows in the back, one above the sink in the kitchen, a small bathroom window with thick, opaque glass and another window in Alex's bedroom. None would be easy for the infected to navigate. Alex usually kept his bedroom door shut, so the kitchen window would seem to be the only possible entryway into the backyard.
It occurred to me that the infected weren't going to give up no matter how difficult it might be for them to get into the backyard. They had shown themselves to be determined and relentless. I knew I needed to have a plan. Then I heard moans that seemed to be much closer than the moans emanating from the front yard. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rise, and I strained to hear where the moans were coming from. A sudden crash and the sound of wood splintering answered my question.
I ran over to the side of the house and saw one of the vertical wood planks in the fence separating the two houses cracked at its midpoint. They must have followed the sound of the back door being slammed shut. At least two of them were ramming their bodies into the fence, and I could hear several more infected headed to the fence. The fence was flimsy at best and had been that way for a number of years now. The six-foot wood fence had turned gray from twenty-five years of neglect. It hadn't weathered the years well at all.
I fit the surgical masks into the back of my jeans but kept the Glock handy. I quickly headed for the fence in the back of the yard and started to pull myself over. It was more of a struggle than I imagined, and I had to drop the gun on the other side of the fence. The fence groaned bearing the brunt of my weight, and as I slipped over into the neighbor's yard, I glanced back and could see the fence beginning to buckle under the assault of the infected. Even though I landed softly on the grass, I felt a sharp pain in the shin area of my left leg. I pulled up my pant leg and discovered a thick red welt where a glass shard had struck my leg. I was lucky my leg hadn't been cut. But my leg was the least of my worries. I knew it wouldn't take long for them to get through the rickety fence now, no more than a few minutes.
The surgical mask was bugging me, so I removed it.
I felt nakedly conspicuous at the prospect of skulking through neighborhood backyards carrying a gun like some criminal, but there was no going back.
It took me several hours to get home to my condo apartment limping through two miles of backyards. The adrenaline released through my circulatory system created a kind of frantic edge that gave me the energy and alertness I needed to make it home. As long as I was extremely careful when it came to crossing streets, I knew I'd be okay. And after an early incident with a German Shepherd, I steered clear of backyards with dogs. I didn't have to worry about people. I never came across a single person hanging out in their backyard. I imagined they were glued to their televisions, mesmerized by coverage of the crisis.
It was dark by the time I got home. My arms were so sore from lifting myself over fences, I could barely move them. My shin throbbed with pain and I was a mess. But I welcomed the soreness and the pain. I was even grateful for it. For they provided me with a distraction I desperately needed.
Chapter 2 – Black Saturday
It was the glaring light that woke me. It filtered through the sheer drapes covering the balcony's sliding glass door and penetrated the tissue of my eyelids. Its unrelenting brightness nagged at me and caused me to stir slightly. And even though I stubbornly refused to open my eyes, my senses began to awaken.
The first thing I noticed was the rancid smell of vomit. I had a fleeting memory of hovering above the toilet, retching violently and hugging the bowl. I couldn't be sure if the smell was from the memory or from something I was smelling now. My confusion faded as I became aware of a throbbing in my head. I observed its rhythm and could feel it contract and release with each pulsing of blood through my brain. I stayed perfectly still, afraid the slightest movement might cause my head to split in two.
My mouth and throat were bone dry. I was severely dehydrated from the excess of alcohol from the previous night. I tried licking my lips but there was no moisture in my mouth. I wanted to fade back into the comfort of darkness, but my awareness continued to sharpen and there didn't seem to be anything I could do to slow it down. I suddenly became aware of a host of sensations throughout my body. There was a dull aching in my shoulders and upper arms along with a biting pain in my shin from where the glass shard had struck me.
I wondered how long I had slept, but I still didn't want to open my eyes to check the mantle clock. I nestled my eyes deep into the crook of my arm, seeking a safe haven from the light. But the smell and the aches and the pain wouldn't go away. Over the years I had rarely experienced a hangover. Three to four beers were usually the maximum I would allow myself to drink and I rarely exceeded my self-imposed limit. But last night I simply couldn't stop myself, nor did I want to. My usual cautiousness with alcohol stemmed from my mother's free-wheeling ways during our childhood. She was a happy drunk, laughing and stumbling about. But she never drank alone and never took into consideration how Alex and I might be impacted by her partying.
The moment I thought about my mother, thoughts and images of Alex and the events of the previous day began to proliferate through my mind. But none of it seemed real. Not Alex being infected and turning
into whatever it was he turned into, not the Glock, not the mob of infected trying to get at me, not the pudgy man headbutting the window. None of it. It felt more like a bad dream than anything, but more often than not dreams fade away and this memory lingered vividly, was almost palpable. Then there were my injuries. They were certainly real. But real or not, I didn't want to think about what had happened yesterday. I knew I had to do something to get myself away from thinking about it. And that's when I finally decided to open my eyes.
It took me a few moments to orient myself. I had fallen asleep on the couch which was now much further away from the television than I remembered it being. It took me a few moments to remember what I'd done. After arriving home the previous evening, I had barricaded the door to my second floor apartment. The door was the only accessible point of entry, and despite the achiness I felt throughout my body, I moved half the furniture in my condo apartment, including the couch, between the front door and its opposite wall which was about ten feet away. It was a snug fit that made it virtually impossible to open the door without first moving some of the furniture out of the way. I remembered how constructing the barricade had made me feel somewhat secure and had eased my feelings of vulnerability. I was convinced then as well as now that there was no way the infected could get into my second floor condo apartment.
I knew I had to get up and get moving, so I coaxed myself into sitting up. I was careful not to move my head too fast. But moving my leg actually turned out to be the most painful part of sitting up. I wondered if the shard of glass had actually cracked my shin bone. The acrid smell of vomit still stung my nostrils and I noticed a large smear of dried up food particles on the thigh area of my jeans. I needed to clean myself up, get a shower and a change of clothes. I also needed to drink plenty of water and take some Ibuprofen, maybe 800 milligrams. I needed to get my head clear, but I also needed to take it slowly.
The television was still on, though I had muted it at some point during the night. There was a helicopter camera shot of a massive traffic jam on the freeway. At the back end, a few cars were peeling off, making u-turns and headed in the wrong direction on the freeway. A number of people scurried about between the rows of cars. It didn't make any sense. Why would there be a traffic jam on a Saturday morning. For a moment I questioned whether it really was Saturday but dismissed the thought as quickly as it had come up. The helicopter's camera panned up the rows of cars to the source of the jam. Just past a freeway exit, a large group of police cars and military vehicles had barricaded the freeway. Apparently, the barricade had been placed just past the exit to allow the cars to funnel off the freeway via the exit. But the freeway exit was bottled up, littered with wrecked cars, and there were people climbing all over the cars trying to get in. It was difficult to see exactly what was going on as the helicopter camera wasn't very steady and the helicopter seemed to be some distance away. Then I realized the people vandalizing and ransacking the cars weren't really people at all. They were the infected and they were everywhere. I grabbed the remote off the coffee table and got up from the couch and limped cautiously over to the television, doing my best not to put any pressure on my injured left leg.
The camera was now focused on the exit and the helicopter was moving quickly toward it. The scene came into better focus and it was horrific. The infected were battering the windows with their fists and heads. They had broken the windows and windshields of several cars and had dragged a number of people out of their cars and were violently ripping them apart. Some people struggled to get away, but there were too many infected. The camera panned to the streets adjacent to the exit and showed scattered groups of infected still coming, staggering up the exit ramp.
The camera suddenly focused on a woman exiting her car with a small child in tow. She was maybe in her late twenties and wore a colorful summer dress. The little girl must have been about five. The woman gathered her daughter up in her arms and hugged her to her chest and headed toward the embankment. One of the infected who was hammering away at a car window with his head spotted her and moved to head her off. He was tall with an elongated gray face, wearing a cowboy shirt and jeans and boots. The helicopter moved in closer and the downdraft from the rotor blades whipped the woman's dress tightly against her legs and wildly tousled her hair. The infected cowboy stumbled about in the downdraft which allowed the woman to reach the embankment first. She half slid and half ran down the sharply angled embankment, holding her daughter tightly against her. When the gray cowboy reached the embankment, he took a single step over the embankment and tumbled head first down the slope, rolling over again and again.
When the woman reached the bottom of the embankment, she began running parallel to the freeway and well away from the nearest street. The young girl cleaved firmly to her mother's chest with her arms and legs tightly wrapped around her mother's slender torso. The infected cowboy slowly gathered himself up, one of his arms now permanently twisted at an awkward angle and continued his pursuit. The chopper veered around and headed back to the exit ramp and focused on the chaos there, but I'd had enough.
I turned the television off and hobbled to the bathroom to take a shower, and I did everything I could to nurse my hangover. Before my shower, I took plenty of Ibuprofen and downed it with a large glass of water. I sat in the shower so I wouldn't put too much pressure on my leg and doused it generously with warm water. The evening before I'd iced it while drinking my first couple of beers. It was a nasty looking welt and the dark purple bruising was easily the diameter of a baseball. My shoulders and upper arms still ached, but it wasn't too bad. My headache had dissipated, but I felt tired and foggy headed. As I sat in the tub with the warm water cascading over me, I thought about Alex, and couldn't get away from the sight and sound of the shots I'd fired at my brother. The scene lingered in my mind like a bad dream that wouldn't go away. And though I clenched my jaw and did my best to fight against it, I began to sob in fits and starts.
*****
I spent much of the afternoon picking up and cleaning the apartment. I needed to keep busy. I washed the dishes by hand for a change and meticulously cleaned the kitchen and dining room. I picked up the empty beer cans off the dining room table—I counted nine of them—and remembered how I had poured the last three beers in the fridge down the kitchen sink. I could recall feeling woozy and a bit nauseous at the time and didn't trust myself to stay away from the last few Bud Lights.
In the evening, with the help of the internet, I managed to piece together exactly what had happened on the freeways that day. Road blocks had been set up overnight by what was left of the police, the highway patrol, and the military. The idea to quarantine larger cities and try to contain the virus within their boundaries had come from Homeland Security. It quickly turned into a disaster. Here in Salt Lake City, they blocked freeway entrances all throughout the valley with road-closed signs, and they set up blockades made up of police and highway patrol cars and military vehicles on the freeways. Any road that provided a way out of the valley had been blockaded, canyons included. But that didn't stop people from trying to leave.
Tens of thousands of people attempted to leave the valley that morning, and they weren't about to let a few signs stop them. They quickly took down the road-closed signs and headed out onto the freeway, and everyone quickly followed their lead, desperate to get away from the growing hordes of infected. That's when the chaos really began. The authorities had anticipated the possibility and had set their roadblocks up just past the last freeway exits out of the valley. The idea was to channel the traffic onto the last freeway exits and force people to stay in the valley and head back to their homes over surface streets. But not everyone wanted to get off on the exits. A number of them approached the blockades and challenged the officers and servicemen. A few warning shots were fired. Then traffic at the exits quickly became congested and frustrated motorists began honking their horns. It was only a matter of minutes before the first groups of infected showed up, drawn by the noise and
the commotion. They climbed onto the cars that were trying to exit the freeway, causing several accidents. Everyone panicked and the infected just kept coming. The military and police fired on the infected, but before long they too were overwhelmed.
Just five days into the crisis, a number of media outlets were still operating and several helicopters were filming the disaster across the valley as it happened. Not long after they'd arrived at the exits, the infected spilled onto the freeway and began going after people in their cars. There were thousands of cars backed up from the blockades with nowhere to go. At first, most people stayed in their cars thinking they'd be safe while a few left their vehicles and made a run for it. But as it became obvious that the infected could eventually find a way to get into the cars, more and more people chose to run. While a few people managed to get away unscathed, most who ran were bitten or mauled or eaten, and those that fled that day with their wounds spawned a new generation of infected. The feeding frenzy had gone on all day, but I stayed away from the television.
As I read various accounts of what had happened that day, I couldn't help but wonder about my fifth grade students from the past year. I wondered how many of them might have been caught out on the freeways that day. School had been out for a little over a month and some of their faces were still fresh in my mind. The thought of them being infected plagued my mind, and I did everything I could to let those thoughts fade away.
After turning off my laptop, another disturbing thought crossed my mind. What would have happened if Alex hadn't gotten infected and we'd followed through on my plan to head to the cabin? We would have been trapped out on the freeway like all the others, battling for our lives. And since it had been my idea to essentially cut and run, it would have been my fault if we'd gotten trapped out there with little chance of survival. But it didn't matter. Alex was already dead, and you can't kill someone twice.