by A. M. Geever
She sighed, smiling at the noises he made, a familiar feeling of contentment spreading through her body. All she had to do now was switch breasts before he got too full and sleepy. She leaned her head back, had just closed her eyes for a moment, when his sharp teeth nipped her.
“Ow!” Her eyes snapped open. “Careful, you,” she said, looking down. “That h—”
Another sharp bite sent a spike of pain through her breast, but Miranda could only stare, horror rushing through her. A dark stain spread on her breast and nightgown, warm and sticky. Blood smeared the baby’s face, but…
“No,” she gasped, as sharp teeth bit her again.
She wasn’t holding a baby to her breast… She was holding a zombie. It grunted as it gnawed on her, tiny, perfect fingers opening and closing. Perfect, except they were blackened at the tips, the skin split and cracked. Its squirming body felt cold in her arms. The curve of his cheek was marbled with delicate black streaks just under the skin and smeared with her blood. She recoiled, pushing it away, but the zombie she had thought was her baby bit her harder, gnawing on her mangled breast. Blood flowed over her body, drenching the nightgown. She felt the scream clawing its way out, opened her mouth—
* * *
Miranda jerked awake, a strangled cry stuck in her throat. She bolted upright, gasping. Her body felt sticky from the sweat that covered her. She clasped her breast in her hand, her other arm crossing over her chest to protect herself. Heart thundering against her sternum, she looked across the room. There was no gliding rocking chair and footrest, no crib, just the chaise lounge next to a small table littered with books, and the little solar-powered lamp. She lifted her hands to her face, covering her nose and mouth.
“Oh fuck,” she whispered.
She rocked back and forth as the shock and fear subsided. Delilah wriggled closer, whimpering and licking her hands. Miranda buried her face in the pit bull’s neck, holding on tighter than she knew dogs liked.
“Oh fuck, Liley,” she gasped. “Jesus.”
She let Delilah go, though her trusty canine friend stayed glued to her side. She’d had a particularly bad run of nightmares lately. This was the tenth night in row. Sometimes, the baby was a zombie. Sometimes, Mario handed her their child, his face aglow with love and happiness, before he told her it was her fault that it was going to die. All were variations on a theme, like the director’s cut of a horror film with endless, alternate endings.
She squinted at her watch, then crawled out of bed. Five hours until she had to get up to go to P-Land with Rocco. She wouldn’t be going back to sleep. If she tried, she’d just lay there, staring at the ceiling or the insides of her eyelids, while the instant replay rattled from one side of her skull to the other.
She retrieved an over-sized tee shirt from the floor, tugging it on as she padded down the stairs in the dark. She smacked her lips, tongue tacky against the roof of her mouth from thirst. The kitchen’s linoleum floor felt smooth against her feet as she tugged on the handle of the fridge. She looked inside. Her lungs expelled a sigh that her body sagged into. There were still six bottles of hard cider in the empty, half-sized appliance. She’d had a few before bed, but hadn’t been sure there were more. She picked up three bottles in one hand, letting the fridge door swing shut as she pried the magnetic bottle opener from it. She opened the bottles, left two on the counter, and lifted the third to her mouth. The cold cider bubbled on her tongue and fizzed against the inside of her mouth, crisp and tangy. She swallowed, enjoying the chill as the cider made its way to her stomach. She leaned against the fridge, trying not to think about the dream. Trying to ignore the jumble of feelings it stirred inside her.
“At least he wasn’t in it,” she whispered to herself, because the dreams with Mario were always worse than those with just the baby.
She took another pull on the bottle, then another, and tried not to think.
“I think we can all agree on that,” Zoe said.
Miranda closed her eyes against the sunlight pouring in through the windows, almost whimpering with relief. Her head had started to pound about the time they arrived, one of those stealth hangovers that lulled you into thinking you were okay, until you weren’t.
Zoe, one of P-Land’s three governing council members, was a plump, middle-aged woman. Her long straight hair was always parted in the center, and mostly salt and pepper, but there was still some brown that hadn’t thrown in the towel. Miranda could never decide if Zoe was turn-into-a-Dasher plump, because she dressed in flowing smock dresses made of fabric so loud that looking at them hurt. Today was no exception. Her favored scents seemed to be a mix of weed and patchouli. She even had some of those hippy beaded necklaces and round wire-rimmed glasses.
Miranda liked hippies. They were usually good-hearted folks trying to put some positivity out into the world, and God knew the world needed positivity in a big way. Zoe was doing her damndest to give hippies a bad name, not in terms of her intentions, but execution. She kept saying things like ‘honoring the process’ and ‘I invite you all to think deeply about this’ and ‘it’s important that we be intentional.’ The woman was a marvel, really, but with the way her head was pounding, Miranda couldn’t appreciate the absurdity of it. If Zoe invited her to think deeply and intentionally while honoring the process about one more no-brainer decision, her brain was going to leak from her ears.
Rocco leaned over to whisper in Miranda’s ear. “If this goes more than another ten minutes, pretend you have the runs.”
She snorted. When Rocco’s eyes bugged out at her, she realized he was serious.
“We’ll have to take it to the working groups, of course, but I think once everyone has had a chance to discuss and process your proposal, they’ll agree it’s the most inclusive solution.”
For the mother fucking love of God, Miranda thought, lowering her forehead into her hand.
“Are you okay, Miranda?”
Miranda snapped her head up and smiled—she hoped sweetly. The last thing she needed was for Zoe to get on a tear about medicinal herbs. “I’m fine, Zoe. Just a little tired.”
Rocco gave Zoe a pained smile, as if the exchange between the two women hadn’t happened. “I think that would be great, Zoe. I can’t wait to hear what your working groups think.”
“I’m so happy we can have such a productive dialogue, Rocco. I know you’re not as much of a process person as we are here.”
All three of the P-Land council members chuckled good-naturedly. Rocco looked like he had a bad case of gas. Miranda could see it was taking everything he had to not scream, because it was taking everything that she had to not scream. They’d just spent an hour discussing her idea to include newer arrivals in the vaccination schedule. She and Rocco had agreed it was the way to go in ten seconds, making their decision-making process point-insert-a-shit-ton-of-zeros-before-a-one times faster. They still hadn’t gotten to the point of this meeting, either. Everything discussed so far could have waited.
“Why are we here?” Rocco said brusquely.
Miranda looked at him sidelong. His brow furrowed so deep that his eyebrows had practically knitted together. His mouth had become a hard, straight line, which was usually a precursor to—
Oh, there’s the scowl, she thought.
The council members quit chuckling and cast one another furtive glances. Zoe shifted in her seat, eyes downcast, shuffling the one piece of paper in front of her.
“We could have productively dialogued at our regular meeting,” Rocco said, impatience finally cracking his admittedly thin veneer of politeness. “Quit beating around the bush and tell us whatever it is you’re tap-dancing around.”
The council members weren’t used to Rocco being this blunt, even though Miranda knew he was holding back.
“Uh, yeah, well… There is one more thing.”
Heads swiveled to Toby. Toby was on the high end of middle-aged, with light-brown hair, thin eyebrows, and a small, tight smile. Every time Miranda had seen him, he wore h
iking pants, Keen hiking boots, long-sleeved button-down shirts that were light blue or tan, and the kind of vests once sold in overpriced camping stores. Before zombies, he’d probably driven a Subaru with a kayak on the roof, with both the ‘Darwin’ little fish with feet and a planet Earth ‘Respect Your Mother’ bumperstickers, kept chickens, and subscribed to an organic food farm share. He’d been an outdoorsy, science-loving, organic and local food-eating Portlander before it had become the punchline for a joke. Toby might drive Miranda a little nuts with the hemming and hawing, but he was on the right side of things. He also wasn’t very talk-y.
Toby pushed his wire-rimmed glasses up his hooked nose. What’s with these people and wire-rimmed glasses, Miranda thought.
“Uh, yeah, well,” Toby said. “We have a little bit of a situation.”
Silence, during which the three P-Landers traded furtive glances. Rocco had a shoot-me-now look in his eyes that seemed likely to veer into going postal.
“It might be helpful if you tell us what it is,” Miranda said.
“Right, right,” Toby said. “Uh, yeah, well… We’ve got a group that’s gone missing.”
“Missing?” Miranda said.
“Uh, yeah,” Toby started, but then Zoe cut him off.
“They’re two weeks overdue. A scavenging party, six people.”
“And you’re only just telling us now, after we’ve been sitting here over an hour?” Rocco said, his annoyance plain.
The corners of Zoe’s mouth turned down in an anxious, caught out frown.
“The thing is,” said Daphne, the last member of P-Land’s council, who hadn’t spoken until now. “They were looking for something important.”
Daphne bit her lip. She was the youngest member of the council, in her early thirties, with brown eyes, light-brown hair, and a freckled face that looked wholesome enough to have been plucked from an L.L. Bean catalogue. Miranda put her hand on Rocco’s arm as his mouth opened. With the way his jaw had tightened, and the scowl on his face deepened, she could tell he was about to lose it.
Miranda said, “Where were they going, and what were they looking for?”
“Uh, yeah, well,” Toby said. He cleared his throat. “We have a newer community member, Alec. He’s been with us a few months.” He gave a small, tight smile again, as if it was all he could manage for fear of offending them. “Uh…Alec had some information that we thought warranted following up on. On his way here, he met a man who told him about a cache of weapons at Nanitch Lodge—”
Rocco’s bark of laughter cut him off. “Are you fucking kidding me?” he said, incredulous. “Did he tell you the Easter Bunny is real, too? People’ve been talking about that place for years. If anything was ever there, it’s long gone by now.”
“We thought it couldn’t hurt to look,” Daphne said, her face flushing pink. Her clipped voice implied she didn’t appreciate Rocco’s mockery.
“Fucking sent people to Nanitch Lodge,” Rocco muttered, sounding incredulous.
“What’s Nanitch Lodge?” Miranda asked. Whatever it was, this was the first she had heard of it.
“It was a Boy Scout camp on Mount Hood,” Rocco said, his voice dripping with derision. “People have been talking about the hidden weapons up there for years, but you have to go through or around Portland to get there. Even if there aren’t zombies at Nanitch Lodge, getting there will kill you.”
“We don’t know that,” Daphne objected, her voice rising. “It—”
Miranda found herself grateful not to be on the receiving end of the filthy glare Rocco silenced Daphne with. He said, voice flat, “I suppose you want me to send Tucci and Rich up there to see if they’re still alive.”
Zoe’s hands flapped the air in front of her. “Let’s not argue,” she said. “In retrospect, maybe it wasn’t such a good decision, but…”
“I resent that,” Daphne snapped. “We took it to the community for a vote!”
“That probably took a year,” Rocco snorted.
Daphne glared at Rocco. “That’s the kind of attitude that gives LO a—”
“Okay, okay,” Zoe said, raising her voice and cutting Daphne off. “None of this is helpful. Let’s just take a moment to center ourselves, okay?” She gave Rocco a feeble smile. Good luck trying to placate him with that, Miranda thought.
“In retrospect,” Zoe continued, “I think that maybe it wasn’t such a good decision.” Daphne opened her mouth, but Zoe kept talking. “We would like Miranda and Rich to go look for them.” She took a deep breath. “It’s a big ask, we know, but they’re the only ones who can do it without being in danger themselves.”
“No way,” Rocco said, at the same time Miranda said, “Yes.”
Rocco side-eyed her. “No! No way.”
“Oh, stop it!” Her headache had decided to ramp things up, robbing her of patience for Rocco’s temper tantrum. “You’re annoyed they didn’t start with this, but you don’t mean that.”
Rocco glowered at her. “If Tucci and Rich are willing to go, fine,” he said. “But you shouldn’t beat around the bush. And you sure as shit shouldn’t be sending your people out like Ponce de Leon looking for the goddamned Fountain of Youth.”
An uncomfortable silence filled the room. Finally, Toby said, directing his words to Miranda, “Um, yeah, well… We really appreciate you even considering it, Mi—”
“Do the people they’re going after know they repel zombies?” Rocco said, interrupting him.
Toby froze, the bobbing of his Adam’s apple making him look like a startled turkey.
“Great, fucking great,” Rocco said. “Are they people who can keep their mouths shut at least? What about this new guy?”
“Keep their mouths shut? I think so,” Zoe said, sounding apologetic.
“So no,” Rocco said.
“It’s going to get out sooner or later,” Miranda said to him.
“That’s not the point,” he snapped. Rocco rose to his feet, advancing to the table to loom over the P-Landers. “If they find any of your people alive, they’re coming to live at LO. If they’re even thinking of flapping their jaws, I want them where I can remind them not to.”
He didn’t wait for an answer, but stomped from the room, cursing under his breath. Miranda stood, brushing her hair back from her face.
Zoe sighed, a defeated sound that bordered on a whimper. “That could have gone better.”
“It could have gone a lot worse,” Miranda said.
Toby said, “We didn’t think he’d get so angry…”
Miranda looked at Toby, surprised. She’d never heard him say anything that wasn’t prefaced with at least an ‘Um,’ if not the entire ‘Um, yeah, well.’
“He wouldn’t have, normally,” Miranda said. “We have people showing up because they’ve heard about the vaccine, and you know our food situation. Vaccine production and rollout has to slow down, like we discussed, since eating is a higher priority.” Her stomach plunged when she realized she’d mentioned the vaccine situation; Zoe might want to talk about it more. She added hastily, “Rocco told the whole community where things are last night, and that we need scouting parties to go out and look for food.”
Zoe nodded, brow wrinkling, a worried frown tugging at her mouth. “After ten years, everything nearby has been picked clean.”
“That’s not our problem,” Daphne muttered.
“What?” Toby said, almost yelping in surprise.
“Daphne,” Zoe scolded, scandalized. “You don’t mean that. They do things differently at LO than us, but we always help each other out.”
Daphne scowled at Zoe, before scowling at Miranda for good measure. “We lost some of our fields, too, when the sound defenses failed. We’d never have sent anyone up there for weapons if it wasn’t for them bringing their trouble up from San Jose.” She jutted her chin at Miranda. “If anyone should be solving LO’s food shortage, it’s her, not us.”
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Zoe snapped, two spots of pink color
ing her cheeks.
“If it’s all about food for LO, they’re not going to hold up their end to get supplies to make the vaccine, are they?” Daphne said, her face flushing a deep red. “I guess that’ll all be on us now.”
She stood abruptly, pushing her chair back so hard that it teetered on its back two legs before bumping back down. She stormed to the exit like a thundercloud.
With a touch of iron in her voice that Miranda had never heard before, Zoe said, “We’ll manage because we help each other, Daphne. We always have.”
Daphne whirled around, turning on Zoe like a caged animal. “Maybe that’s something we should revisit at some point.”
Miranda raised her eyebrows. She’d never seen Zoe snap at anyone; she hadn’t thought her capable of it. Usually, when someone went after Miranda like Daphne had, she at least knew them enough to have pissed them off. She’d exchanged pleasantries with Daphne maybe twice.
Zoe watched the younger woman leave, her face a study of pure astonishment. “Wow,” she said. “Well, I never.”
“Um, yeah,” Toby said, rising to his feet. His tone was apologetic. “Sorry about that, Miranda. She’s got a few friends in the group that’s overdue.”
Miranda waved his apology away. “It’s not like Rocco was a model of decorum.”
Toby grinned at that. “He’s got an Italian temper, all right.”
“Toby, don’t stereotype,” Zoe said absently.
“He does have an Italian temper,” Miranda said. “Rocco will settle down, and I don’t mind doing this for you. I know Rich won’t mind, either.”
Zoe’s watery smile seemed hastily pasted over her troubled expression. “Thank you, Miranda,” she said. “We really appreciate it.”
“You hear that?”
Miranda cocked her head and listened. If Rich hadn’t said something, she’d have thought it was the wind in the trees.
“There’s a buzz,” said Phineas, stopping as he pulled abreast between her and Rich.