by Tim Yingling
That night we stopped in Sutton. We could have possibly made it further, but I didn’t want to push the horses too much. We were making better time than if we were on foot. Phil knew the area better than I did. He found us a nice place to crash for the night. The next day, the 4th, we were at it again pretty early.
The conversations never got into anything too important. Kate did tell me why she wanted to keep calling me Sarge though. To her, and it seemed it was rubbing off on the others as well, calling me Sarge was a term of endearment. She saw the name as my name and no one else’s. I couldn’t argue with her on the matter. I understood where she was coming from, so I just let it go.
We stopped just on the outside of Charleston at a casino on the night of the 4th. We could have easily made it to my former in-law’s house that night (let alone Sara’s house), but I didn’t want to push the matter. Not to mention, it was the 4th of July. I wanted to give the kids some “fireworks.” I didn’t actually go out and find some to set off. That would be too dangerous. Instead, I gave the kids some personal fireworks. I let them gamble inside the casino.
The casino wasn’t even locked up. Well, it was locked, but there was a busted outdoor. Dangerous in itself, but negotiable. Turns out, there were people squatting inside the casino. Three of them, a husband and wife and their fourteen-year-old daughter. They didn’t mind that we barged in. They had pretty much been in there since the outbreak. We gave them as much information as we could. They didn’t have anything to offer us. They hadn’t even left the casino since the outbreak. Can’t blame them. When we left on the 5th, I offered them to come with us, but they declined. They saw themselves safer at the casino.
They did, however, have a nice night of gambling with us. We didn’t stay up that long. I taught the kids about blackjack, roulette, and poker. Phil taught them about craps; I still didn’t have any fucking clue what he was teaching them. And we all drank. The kids got some not so strong stuff. We were all drunk by eight and passed out by nine.
The next day, I’m sure the kids didn’t remember much of the night, Phil, Kate, the kids, and I set out around nine. We were in no rush. With the horses, we would make it to Debbie’s grandparent’s house by eleven. If she wasn’t there, we would check her mother’s house which isn’t that far away.
We rode into Grey, WV around 10:30. The town was desolate, which was no surprise to me. Even before the zombie outbreak, the town didn’t have that much to offer. If it wasn’t for I-64 and US-60 I don’t think anybody would want to come through Grey. Most of the people who lived in the town worked in either Commerce or Charleston. Hell, we didn’t even stay the night in Grey. We stayed at my old house in Commerce. But that’s for later.
It wasn’t that hard to get to the grandparent’s house. You could see the damn thing from the freeway. We rode down the embankment and passed through one backyard to move in between two houses. The street was deserted, not even a single car on it. All the houses gave the impression we were in a ghost town. Looking at Sara’s parent’s house gave me an uneasy feeling. The power had to of gone out about a week ago, so I shouldn’t be feeling uneasy. I chalked it up to the fact that my daughter was involved in the situation.
I dismounted my horse as I crossed the street. Kate followed my lead. As she got off her horse, she was on the same side as me, I handed her the reins to my horse.
She took them as she asked, “What are these for?”
I pulled my pistol just to make sure the safety was off. I kept it by my leg with my finger off the trigger.
“I don’t want you all following me in there.” Kate was about to speak when I put my hand up to silence her. “Remember how you felt at your parent’s place? Just think of it like that with me. I need to make sure it is safe in there.”
Phil was the one to answer for her. “Go ahead and do your thing.”
I nodded to him. He nodded back. Then I looked to Kate. She was scared. She was the only one out of everyone. Her fear wasn’t for me going in there. It was about what I was going to find.
I left them where they were on the street. The walk up to the house was the slowest I ever walked. I didn’t want to go into the house. Even at mid-day, the house was still dark. And I’m not talking about lighting. It was dark in nature. As if a lot of death had occurred in it recently. It could be that my mind was playing tricks on me, but I didn’t think so.
I didn’t bother knocking as I reached the door. What would be the point? If someone was in the house, they most likely had already seen me and didn’t want to come out. Either because they were afraid or because they didn’t want me there. For everyone that should have been in the house, with exception to Debbie, I could understand.
I transferred my pistol to my left hand as I tried the doorknob that turned easily in my hand. That didn’t help my nerves at all. The door opened slowly because I left my hand on the knob. I raised the pistol as I walked in, scanning the open floor plan of the house. I could see straight into the living room. There was no one there. The balcony on the second floor told me the same thing. The kitchen wasn’t too far into the house on my right. It offered nothing in the likes of humans as well. I searched the rest of the main floor to no avail. From there, I had two choices. I could go into the basement with one bedroom or I could go to the second floor with three bedrooms. I knew it was going to be easier to search the basement first, so that’s where I went.
The door opened just as easy as the front door. Looking down, I wanted to go back out to my horse to get my flashlight, but there was enough light in the basement to allow me to see down there. Not as much as there was on the floor I was on, but there was some. Somebody probably left one of the curtains open down there. Either way, it didn’t matter. I was going down without any extra light. Truth be told, I didn’t want any extra light. It would be easier for me to move around unnoticed if there was someone dangerous in the basement.
The steps on my decent didn’t make any noise until the last two. The creeks were definitely noticeable in the silent, dark basement. I knew I couldn’t do anything about them, that’s why I kept going. I could have jumped over them, but that would have made more noise. All the same, I was in the basement.
I looked to my left. In that direction was the bedroom Debbie stayed in when she stayed here. If she was going to be anywhere, she would probably be there. To my right is another family room that my in-law’s turned into a game room. I didn’t want to go there. Too much noise would come from it.
The door to the bedroom was five feet away from the bottom of the stairs, and standing wide open. I could see inside to the bed. More light shined on the bed than needed to be. The other light, the one making the basement too bright, was coming from the game room. I could see the blinds for the sliding doors were open. Didn't bother me any. I turned into my daughter’s bedroom.
The room hadn’t changed that much since the last time I saw it, almost eight years ago. The most noticeable change was the bed. It was no longer a toddler’s bed. It was now a queen sized bed. Why a twelve-year-old would need a queen sized bed was beyond me. The dresser had changed too. As a matter of fact, there was now two in there. The floor looked the same. A shit ton of dirty clothes littered the floor like the last time I had seen it. Although, the clothes looked to be a lot bigger than they would be for a twelve-year-old. I looked around some more to see it wasn’t just female clothes on the floor. There were male clothes as well. I opened the closet to see that it was filled with clothes for both a male and a female. Almost as if they had been there long before the outbreak occurred. It seemed my ex-wife hadn’t been telling me everything about her.
I turned to leave the bedroom that had formally been my daughter’s room before I noticed something I had missed before.
On the floor was a shoe. This shoe did look to be the size of a pre-teen’s shoe. The leg attached to the shoe was considerably smaller than my ex-wife’s leg as well. The leg, in turn, led underneath the bed. I didn’t bother the leg just yet. The way
the leg was laying told me the head to go along with the leg was on the other side of the bed.
I walked around the bed to the other side, the side the window was on. There was a slip covering the underside of the bed. I had to bend down to one knee to get to it. As I bent, my knees popped from the extreme overuse and the sudden not using I had done to them. That wasn’t the thing that concerned me. What did concern me was under the bed. I lifted the slip to look into the full of life eyes of my daughter. She wasn’t dead.
Once she saw me, her eyes came more alive than ever. I smiled at her as she screamed, “DADDY!”
I nodded to her as I offered her my hand to help her out. “Yes, sweetie, it’s me. Come on out of there.”
She took my hand to allow me to pull her out. She wasn’t even all of the way out from under the bed before she wrapped her arms around my neck. The initial reaction of the sudden wrap hurt, but it subsided a couple of seconds later. The joy of holding her again was far more exhilarating than that of the pain.
The joy didn’t last that long, though. The sound of the pistol being cocked came from behind me.
I didn’t look into Debbie’s face. If I had things may have turned out different. But what the person who cocked the pistol didn’t know was that I had my own pistol out. And little to his knowledge (which I still didn’t know at the time) was that my pistol was more ready than his was.
I turned slowly to look behind me. A man stood there. A tall man at that. He had to be above six-five if he wasn’t that height. And he was skinny too. A tall, skinny, black man was standing in the doorway to what turned out to be my ex-wife’s bedroom with a .22 pistol pointing at my chest. A light instantly dawned in my mind. I figured out who he was without him even saying a single word. The fact he still had the safety on an unloaded pee shooter didn’t help his case.
Sara’s one of those people who thinks she can run every aspect of everyone else’s life. It’s one of the reasons we divorced in the first place. She continually tried telling me what to do. I didn’t like that all too much, especially when she said I had to get out of the military. The marriage didn’t last much longer after. But it seems she found someone who she could tell what to do. When we were married, she didn’t like the fact I had weapons in our house. She allowed it only on the fact the weapons had to be unloaded. Not much has changed since then.
“Who the fuck is you? And why’s you gots your arm around my daughter?” the man said.
I turned to look at Debbie then back to the soon to be dead man.
“First of all, if you wish to speak to me, use proper English.” He seemed to be a little confused by me saying that. I don’t know why. But I stood as I said the next, revealing my pistol in the process. “And if you refer to Debbie, who is my daughter, as your daughter again I will rip your fucking throat out and stick it up your ass. Do you understand me, son?”
Fear lit up in his eyes. Not because of the pistol I held (he hadn’t seen it yet), but because I told him who I was.
“By your sudden silence, I see you know who I am,” I said. He nodded, so I went on. “You’ve made a few mistakes in the few short seconds we have been somewhat acquainted.”
Shakily, he asked, “Those would be?”
“Well, first thing, you are still pointing an unloaded, safetied pistol at me.” He turned the pistol to look at the safety. “Secondly, you have an unloaded firearm in a zombie outbreak. Now, the .22 won’t do shit to a zombie,” – I raised my pistol to show him I had it – “hell this won’t even stop a zombie if I shoot it in the head.”
He slowly lowered his pistol and head at the same time. “And the third?”
“I already told you what the third was. You called Debbie your daughter.”
I stepped closer to him. Debbie held tight to my hand. I looked at her pleading face. She didn’t want me to do anything to this man. It had to be because of her mother, that’s all I could think of. I wasn’t going to kill him anyway. I could still use him later as a decoy. While the zombies would be munching on his dumbass, I would be able to get away. At least, that’s the way I saw it in my head. Still, I had to make him fear me even more. I turned back to him and said softly, “And if you ever refer to her in such a manner again, I won’t hesitate to end you in the manner I mentioned before. Is that understood?”
He nodded, which was all he could get out. There were heavy footsteps coming down the stairs. Sara was saying, “Tayvon, those people are still out there, but they’re eating now. They have one more horse than people –”
That’s where she stopped. She made it down the stairs to see me standing in the doorway. Tayvon moved out of the way so she could see me.
I holstered my pistol as I said, “It’s not wise to leave a young girl unarmed in a situation like this, Sara. Where were you?”
She stepped up to me to try to establish her dominance in the situation. She was still trying to take control of a situation she had no control over.
“It doesn’t matter where I’ve been. What does matter is why the fuck you’re here?”
The anger in her voice was a show. I could tell by the way she was talking she was trying to make it seem she preferred Tayvon over me. When I looked up, her eyes pleaded with me to do something drastic. I had no choice.
I kept my voice neutral as I talked. “I came here get my daughter” – I looked to Tayvon on that part – “to come with me.”
Tayvon stepped up. He thought he had authority here. “Well, you’re ain’t taking her anywheres. She be staying ight here wit me un Sara.”
I grimaced at him, but asked Sara my question. “Does dumbass talk like this all the time?”
“Who dumbass be, mutterfucka?”
I punched him in the throat. I couldn’t take the way he was talking anymore. It physically hurt my ears. The punch dropped him where he stood. He wasn’t expecting it. He didn’t have enough time to get his hands to his throat before he hit the ground.
“If dumbass.” I had to stop and make a point of something. I pointed at the heap on the floor. “By the way, your name is now dumbass.” I turned back to Sara. “If dumbass wants to come with us, then he can. I know you will be coming because I’m not leaving Debbie here with two untrained people. Especially, two untrained people who have no ammo for the pistols they’re carrying.”
Tayvon started to get to his feet as he said, “Yous muttfucka.”
I punched him on the top of the head. It hurt my hand a little bit, but it seemed to hurt him even more. He fell back down to the floor again, leaning against the door jamb with dazed eyes. Debbie kind of gave a little laugh with the last punch. She seemed to be the only truly happy one to see me.
“Please stop hitting him,” Sara said. She looked around me to Debbie. “And it’s not that funny, Debra.”
I looked at Debbie as she said, “Yes it is. I find it funny because someone is finally putting dumbass in his place.”
Sara and I said at the same time, “Watch your mouth.”
I added more onto my statement. “Go up to your room and pack a bag, a book-bag, with a couple of days’ worth of clothes. We’ll be leaving in the next hour.” I turned to Sara as Debbie exited the room. “Now, you and I, not dumbass, but you and I have some things to talk about.”
She moved into the room as she talked. I let her pass by me. Once she sat down on the bed, I walked further into the room. When I could see out the window I took a quick glance, and I am glad I did.
“It doesn’t matter what you say. We are not leaving this area. I’m not saying you have to leave here, I’m just saying that you are not staying in the family house. We have a heritage here.”
I scuffed. It was the only thing I could do. What she said didn’t make a lick of sense to me.
“First off, Sara, this isn’t your family home. Just because you all live here now” – she seemed to be shocked by that statement, so I had to address it – “oh yeah, I noticed that you have lived here for a long time. That means you have been lying
to me and stealing from me. But I am willing to ignore that. Can I go on?”
She nodded. Tayvon managed to get his feet under him. He moved to the bed to lay flat on it. I paid him no attention.
“As I was saying, just because you all have lived in this house for a number of years doesn’t mean that it is your family home. Just remember that when we use to full around back in high school, you lived in Commerce. You’re parents haven’t lived in this house for but ten years. And secondly,” I pointed out the window, “it seems that your heritage here is chained up outside. Seriously, how did you chain your dead parents up like that and not become a zombie?”
Sara and Tayvon looked outside to her parents. They were indeed chained to a tree together. Around them were carcasses of dogs and cats. From what I could see, there had to be at least twenty of them. That told me her parents haven’t been dead that long. But it has been long enough. What hurt me the most was that Sara left her parents someplace for Debbie to see on a regular basis. This shit is traumatizing enough for a child without having to see their grandparents become zombies and then look at them every day as such.
“They’re still my parents and Debbie’s grandparents. We can find a cure for this thing. I know we can. So, don’t you dare sit there and think you are going to end their lives with a bullet to the head. I’ve seen the movies, I know how it goes with these things.” There was hurt in her voice for the way I was talking. Hurt wasn’t the only thing, though. The other thing wasn’t just in her voice, it was also in her eyes.
I could read that she wanted a reason to leave the area. She had nothing to keep her at her parent’s house. I don’t know why she just didn’t take off in the first place, but if I had to guess it was probably because she didn’t know where to go. She needed guidance on the matter. Tayvon wasn’t the type of person to give her that type of guidance.
I shifted my eyes to Tayvon and back to her quickly. He wanted to say something, but kept his mouth shut for the time being.
“Sara, look at you two. You have no ammo for your pistols. You are traumatizing Debbie by having your parents out there. You have no means to protect yourselves once those things out there draw in more zombies. Actually, I’m surprised they haven’t done it yet. Debbie is extremely eager to get out of this area. She wants to leave. Dumbass there is a little bitch. I mean he let you tell him not to load the pistols.” Tayvon shot up and I pointed at him. “Lay the fuck back down before I put you down a third time.” He did as he was told. “See, he’s a bitch. You need to come with me and my friends. There is no way around it. We can protect you.”