by RR Haywood
They don’t reply but back up as Heather leans down to peer through the flap to an interior filthier than the outside. The stench of faeces is overwhelming. Urine and sweat, greasy hair, unwashed bodies and stale breath. A little girl at the back staring wide eyed and silent. A mop of black hair matted and greasy. Her face covered in food and orange streaks from the bag of cheese balls in her lap. A sight of abject misery in a pink princess dress torn and ripped, bright red shoes on her feet that look so vibrant against the squalor and filth of her skin and the dirt encrusted on her hands.
‘Right out, come on,’ Heather motions at the little girl at the back. ‘You can’t stay here, come on…all of you…we’re going…come on…’
‘But…’ the older girl starts to protest, backing away further into the tent as though to protect her sister.
‘No, you’re leaving with us. You can’t stay here, you’ll die…look at you. Oh my…no no…’
‘But the things can’t smell us,’ the boy blurts.
‘I bloody can,’ Heather fires back. ‘We’re leaving right now…come on. You can’t stay another second.’
‘Are we going to the fort?’ The boy asks.
‘Is mummy at the fort,’ the cheese ball covered girl at the back asks.
‘Mummy’s dead,’ the older girl tells her in a tone rising in panic. ‘We can’t go…the things don’t come here. It’s not safe. It’s…where…we don’t want to go.’
‘We’ll find somewhere else for you…some other survivors or something but you can’t stay here. Not like this, come on…quickly…’ Heather waves her arm at the older girl and boy, beckoning them to come out.’
‘It’s not safe,’ the older girl blurts. ‘They can’t smell us and…’
‘You are not staying here now come on, get out,’ Heather says, the stench overwhelming her senses, the sheer depravity and squalor of it making her speak faster and harder than she intends. The children shy back, retreating into the safety of their flimsy home.
‘You have to leave,’ Heather says, feeling the frustration of scaring them while trying to deal with the smell and the heat and the desperate need to get out.
‘Go away,’ the older girl scuttles back to shield her sister while pulling her brother behind her. Her lips tremble, her whole body shaking with fear.
‘You can’t live like this…it’s…’ she casts about scowling with distaste, ‘it’s disgusting and dangerous…’
‘Those things will…’
‘They won’t do anything…come on.’
‘But,’ the girl stammers, edging further back in the pop up tent.
‘Look,’ Heather stops in the opening seeing the fear pouring off the children. Well, the older girl and boy while the youngest one at the back eats another cheese ball while watching the proceedings with interest. ‘Okay…er…Heather, I’m Heather. What’s your name? Look, you can’t stay here. It’s filthy and…there’s flies everywhere and maggots. Oh my God look…there are maggots in here. Stop her eating those crisps…right get out, right now. Out. I’m not playing now. She’ll get diseases. I won’t hurt you, come on. No I said out. I promise I won’t hurt you but you are not staying in here. All of you get out…grab your sister…Oh my God she is filthy…look at you all. Right, just stand there and…Paco, take the bag. What’s your name?’
The older girl stares in abject amazement at being shifted and moved so quickly from the safety of the tent. ‘Subi,’ she says meekly.
‘Subi?’
Subi nods, her head bobbing up and down as she stares at Heather. All three do the same. Standing in a line staring in wonder.
‘You can’t have those,’ Heather plucks the bag of cheese balls from the youngest girl’s hands and flings them aside with a tut. ‘Oh look at your hands, no don’t touch your face. Subi, stop your sister touching her face. What’s your name?’
‘Rajesh. Are we going to the fort?’
‘I don’t know anything about a fort. Find some clothes…Subi, help your brother and grab clothes. No, actually they’ll stink. I can wash them…get clothes. We need a bag. Rajesh, do you know where the bags are? Get a rucksack. Subi, you get the clothes…oh my…oh dear, the state of her. What’s her name?’
‘Amna.’
‘Amna?’
‘Yes,’ Subi says politely, still scared as she edges to the clothes rails while watching Heather warily.
‘Amna, don’t touch your face…Rajesh? Where’s that bag? Subi, get some clothes. We’re not staying here for a second longer than…what’s that?’
‘Bag,’ Rajesh says holding out the Batman rucksack.
‘I’ll grab a bag. Wait here…’ She darts off further into the clothes section, rushing frantic and sick from the smell and the sight. Flies buzz in front of her face, crawling on every surface. She spots the bags and moves down the line to the adult walking bags and grabs a dark green Berghaus. ‘Get the clothes in here. Amna, stop touching your face. Rajesh, what size are you?’
‘Um….’
‘He’s six to seven,’ Subi says, her tone still polite and formal.
‘Six to seven…right, pants, socks…t shirts…trousers…you’ll need shoes. Subi? What size is Amna?’
‘She’s four.’
‘Okay, three to four or four to five?’ Heather barks the question, peering at the labels on the hangers.
‘Er, she is…’
‘Doesn’t matter,’ Heather starts grabbing clothes that get thrust into the bag that stinks as bad as anything here. All of it is tainted. ‘Subi? What size…’
‘I have mine.’
Heather turns to see Subi clutching a pile of clothes held over her arms. ‘Put them in the bag…good, right we’re going right now.’
‘But…’
‘Subi, you cannot stay here. You’re coming with us. Paco, you carry that bag and I’ll take this one…no. You might need your hands free. Er…I’ll take the big bag, Subi, you take this bag. Got it?’
She stands back, taking in the three filthy bedraggled children and Paco standing as still as ever with sunglasses covering his eyes. ‘Okay,’ Heather says, biting her lip. ‘We’re going…’
She leads them off, pausing to let Paco fall in at her side while checking the children are staying behind them. The children stay quiet. Too stunned to think of words but they cling close to each other with Subi holding her sisters hand who looks so awful in the princess dress.
The walk out is nearly as bad as the walk in. The smell, the heat, the closeness of the air and the flies buzzing furiously at being disturbed. Whole clouds of them that rise and swoosh around their heads. At the door she notices the pause of the children who slow down and stare terrified at the open world outside with hands covering eyes to shield from the glare of natural sunlight.
‘Come on,’ Heather urges them along, ushering them into the car park as she aims for the far side in a direction going away from the town centre. She gulps the fresh air, breathing deeply but still tasting and smelling the inside of the store. The three children look even worse outside now they’re away from the squalid conditions inside. The contrast to the relatively unmarked road surface is stark. Greasy hair, filthy skin, clothes torn and encrusted with grime and food stains. They’re as bad as Paco before she washed him.
What now? She needs to find other people to take the children but the evening is wearing on. It’ll be dark in a couple of hours and being out after dark is not an option, not in a town anyway. They’ll have to find somewhere tonight and start searching for people tomorrow.
‘Where’s the fort?’ She asks as suddenly as the thought pops in her head. She turns to look at the children. ‘This fort? Where is it?’
They don’t reply but look down at the ground and at each other. Shock and terror evident in their faces and movements. ‘You said about a fort,’ she prompts, not understanding why they’ve gone so quiet. ‘Subi?’
Subi looks up, a glance of eye contact then away again. ‘Some people came in…’ she trails off.
‘And?’
Subi shrugs, her thin shoulders rising to fall. ‘We hid but…we heard them.’
‘What? Heard what?’
‘About the fort.’
‘Yes. What about the fort? What fort?’
‘The man said they were going to it…to the fort…’ Subi explains.
‘Said they had army there,’ Rajesh cuts in. ‘People and…doctors…I heard them. I was hiding…’
‘Well where is it?’ Heather asks but the children stay silent. Nervously glancing up to her then over to Paco who walks on and only looks at Heather. ‘Did they say where it is?’
Subi shakes her head. Rajesh drops his eyes while Amna picks her nose.
‘Stop her doing that,’ Heather says quickly. ‘Why didn’t you talk to them?’
‘Scared,’ Subi says quietly.
A fort. What fort? What people? Christ they need to be away from this town before the night comes. ‘Walk faster,’ she says, giving voice to the thoughts in her head. ‘It’ll be night soon. Paco? What’s up? Oh you want my hand, okay…you okay? Let me take the top off your neck now. God it smells of that place. You do too,’ she sniffs him close and shows a look of yuck. ‘Are you hungry? We’ll get some food soon.’
Subi glances at her brother then back to the huge man that stays silent as the woman fusses and talks softly to him. They hold hands but she’s got rubber gloves on. She looks away when Heather scans the area, dropping her gaze and wishing they could go back to the supermarket. It stank but it was safe and she did her best but the maggots kept coming. She threw them out every night before they went to sleep but there was always more in the morning. Rajesh scratches the itch in his scalp then the itches on his legs and arms. Subi knocks his hand away, squinting her eyes at him to stop it.
They walk in silence, rushed and hurried along at Heather constantly telling them to speed up. Amna walks steadily at first, staring round in interest at a world she hasn’t seen for so many days but her legs grow tired from being unused for too long. She starts dropping back, tugging on Subi’s hand to slow down.
‘Keep walking,’ Subi urges her, pulling her gently to catch up.
‘What’s wrong?’ Heather asks, turning to stare back.
‘She’s tired,’ Subi says, polite and formal.
‘We need to go faster,’ Heather says, frustrated at the lack of pace and the ever growing need to leave the streets and town behind. She checks the sky, seeing the deeper shades of blue.
‘She can’t,’ Subi says.
‘Carry her then,’ Heather says, breaking her contact with Paco to turn a full circle.
Subi hefts her sister up and walks on. Her own legs are tired too. She feels drained, weak and exhausted. Fear and worry add to the problems but she goes on without complaint. Leaning slightly to the side to compensate for the bulk of her sister held tight to her hip.
This is no good. They’re not going fast enough and it’s later than she thought too. The sky is darkening far sooner than she expected. The urgency grows. The need to move and find shelter. She looks back with irritation at Subi struggling to carry Amna and Rajesh running to catch up. They look exhausted but they need to go faster.
‘Can he carry Amna?’
‘No,’ Heather’s tone is fast, too fast and it brings an instant sting to Subi’s cheeks. ‘No he can’t,’ Heather adds, her tone softer. ‘Give her to me, now come on, we have to be quick.’ She takes the girl in her arms, recoiling at the stench and feel of her greasy clothes. She pushes on with fast strides as the shadows start to lengthen and grow. Down a residential street full of houses and not one of them looks safe. Broken windows and doors. Bodies in the streets. Blood stains everywhere. They turn a corner into another one with half the row burnt to the ground from being hit by the lightning in the storm. Trees uprooted and blown through more slate roofs that sag to crumble inwards. Debris everywhere and the smells of burnt chemicals add to the already offensive stenches wafting up her nose.
‘Tired,’ Rajesh stumbles. His big sister takes his hand to pull him on, running to catch Heather and Paco striding ahead. Why can’t the big man carry Rajesh? They could go faster.
The next street is no better and they rush down the middle breathing hard with sweat shining on filthy faces. Rajesh and Subi gasp and feel their legs hurting from the pace but they keep on, rushing to close the gap that extends when they drop back too far.
‘Christ,’ Heather mutters, her eyes glaring at the sky and the inky blackness starting to show. Keep going. Find the edge of the town and get into the countryside. She spots the man before Paco. A shift in movement ahead of something flitting in the lee of a house.
‘Paco there,’ she snaps, her tone telegraphing the need for him to tense and lift his head. He spots the infected running out and bursts away with a snarl to charge down the road.
‘You two, up against that wall…quickly…stay behind me and don’t move…’ she pushes Amna’s head into her neck, turning the girl away from seeing. ‘Don’t look…you two don’t look. Come here,’ she reaches down to draw Rajesh in to her legs then twists to get Subi’s head turned. ‘Don’t watch.’
Subi does watch. She stares round Heather’s legs to the big man running at the infected who charges towards them with his hands clawed and ready to bite. She sees his eyes and the way he moves and knows they should have stayed in the supermarket. She’s seen them kill. One bite, one drop of blood and you die. That’s all it takes.
Paco slams him down as easily as the others he’s killed. A solid charge into the infected that takes him off his feet to drop and get stamped only to be lifted and put back down again but harder. His skull pops, his neck breaks and it’s done. Over in a few seconds.
‘PACO!’ Heather screams at the woman raging down the path of a house halfway between Heather and Paco who spins, locks on and goes from static to sprinting in the blink of an eye. Heather forces the children back, clutching Amna tight as the woman comes on. Her eyes flick from the infected to Paco who closes the distance to snatch a hand out which grips the infected woman’s head and sends her lurching back into his arms that twist and snap as his foot drives down into her knees.
Done. Two killed. Paco stands tall, his arms wide and his stance held ready. He looks down to the first one killed then to the woman. He stares round, daring anything else to come before turning and walking back to Heather. Subi watches his manner change. The wildness of him morphing as his arms relax, his fists unclench and his eyes soften as he stares fixed at Heather.
‘You okay?’ Heather asks, moving out to meet him. ‘Did they get you? No…I can’t see anything…show me your hands. Both hands. Good, well done,’ she smiles at him. Not a smile but a wide grin so full of life and warmth. Her hand goes out to touch his cheek, the back of her fingers brushing down to rest on his shoulder. ‘We’ll get some food soon I promise…and you kept your sunglasses on,’ she adds in a chuckle.
Subi takes her brothers hand who finally opens his eyes after being told not to look. He sees the two new bodies and feels Subi pull him as Heather and the big man start walking away. Subi doesn’t say a word but stares between them. The way that man moved. So fast. He was so fast and he killed them. She saw it. She saw it happen. They pass the body of the woman and she looks down seeing the open red but now lifeless eyes staring up from a neck twisted to be broken. ‘Come on,’ she pulls her brother’s arm to catch up.
Twenty Six
They found the edge of the town but that wasn’t enough. They got onto a country lane but that still wasn’t enough. They walked and walked as the sky grew darker but that wasn’t enough.
Subi knew they couldn’t go on any further. It was getting harder and harder to find the strength to pull her brother along. She was exhausted, drained and feeling sick. Her brother moaned then went quiet which worried her all the more.
‘Perfect,’ she hears Heather mumbling quietly from ahead and rushes once again to catch up.
‘In here,’ Heath
er pushes the five bar gate open, ushering Subi and Rajesh through while trying to lift Amna higher in her arms. The girl weighs a ton and is hot too. Her body warmth making Heather grow uncomfortably hot and sweaty. She closes the gate and leads them across the paddock to the stable block on the far side. She spotted the end barn from the road and the hose reel on the side told her there was running water.
She finally lowers Amna down at the barn and sags with relief as the bag slides off her back. Her own legs tingle from work and her back aches from the weight she’s carried. She groans inwardly on seeing the clasp and padlock on the barn door and wastes more time finding a length of metal to wedge down to try and prise the clasp off. Subi watches that too, wondering why she doesn’t ask the man to do it. His muscles are huge. He could it easily.
‘Paco,’ Heather gives up, waving for him to go closer. She guides his hands onto the length of metal in a way that makes Subi think maybe Paco is blind, but then he got those two things in the street. ‘Hold here, now pull, got it? Pull down…hard…like this…’ Heather strains to pull at the lever. ‘Pull…pull, Paco…go on now…hard…like this,’ she shows him again, straining to pull on the metal. ‘Pull…pull….hard…’
Paco pulls with ease. The clasp pops to fall off as Heather beams and rubs his arm. ‘Well done,’ she says, grinning widely at him.
Paco has learning difficulties. Subi can see it now. Her mother said people with learning difficulties need lots of patience and kindness.
‘He’s Paco Maguire,’ Rajesh announces, making Heather spin round to face him.
‘He isn’t,’ Heather say quickly.
Subi blinks. Paco Maguire. That’s Paco Maguire. From the movies. She goes closer, staring up at the man standing so relaxed with his arms hanging loose at his sides. She’d seen the bandage on his neck and arms but knew there was a familiarity about him.
‘It is,’ Rajesh persists. ‘He was in the movie and…’
‘It’s not…it isn’t,’ Heather says.