Love and Decay, Episode Eight

by Rachel Higginson

  Lifting my head to take in the target, I took a step forward until I was firmly planted. My feet were wide, my arms straight and supported.

  I flicked off the safety and used the tiny sight to align my shot. I breathed in deeply and with the breath came a gush of pressing memories that begged to be set free.

  I exhaled out slowly, letting them escape into the room around me- anywhere but in my head.

  I hesitated one more infinite moment and then I squeezed the trigger. My eyes stayed open, but stared unseeing while my hands popped up from the minimal kickback that I hadn’t been truly prepared for. Plaster and drywall shot out from where the bullet impacted the wall and the bottom of the paper rustled.

  I lowered the gun and then stared at the target for long, sightless minutes until I grappled control of my swirling emotions. When I could finally see again I groaned in relief- I’d actually hit the target!

  That was the good news.

  The bad news was that it wasn’t actually on the Zombie’s body. Although I did kind of clip one of the huge boobs so now it looked like it had a droopy, ill-placed nipple.

  But I hit the target.

  Feeling like that was good enough for a few minutes, I swiped the safety back on and set the gun on the table. I stepped back a few feet and waited.

  I stared at the gun for ten full minutes before I allowed myself to believe I still hated it as much, if not more, than before I’d pulled the trigger.

  My daddy was a mass murderer. My older brother followed in his footsteps without even once questioning his moral compass or pondering just how evil that means to the end would make him.

  I was a victim of their blind selfishness and greed and I didn’t want to end up like them just in case the addiction to killing innocent things in the name of the greater good happened to be genetic, triggered by a literal trigger.

  I picked up the handgun again and went through the same routine. It was easier to keep my eyes open the second and third time, but I wasn’t exactly a crack shot.

  I imagined Haley and Reagan the first time they held a gun. Maybe they were like my daddy and brother and immediately knew what to do with it- only they didn’t become soul-sucking tyrants after their first kill.

  I was born and bred for local pageants and parades. My mama was the proudest she’d ever been of me when I won homecoming queen my senior year of high school.

  I knew that wasn’t an excuse. I knew the other girls had been as sheltered and naïve as I had been. Maybe even more so, at least I’d seen my daddy put down a horse or two in recent years. And maybe if things with Logan hadn’t…

  I pulled the trigger again before I could even finish that thought. This time I clipped poor Zombie Dolly right in the crotch.

  I was a terrible aim.

  I decided not to waste any more bullets and call it a night. I knew Vaughan was at least right about that. Although we seemed to have plenty from our looting efforts over the past week, I was anxious to get back on the road.

  And any idiot knew there was no such thing as too many bullets in this world we lived in.

  I made sure the safety was on the gun and left it on the conference room table. I brushed my hands against my jeans, feeling the irrational need to go wash them thoroughly. What I wouldn’t have given for foamy soap and scalding hot water in that moment! Antibacterial and bottled water were just not going to cut it. Especially when I couldn’t afford to waste either.

  I found everyone else in the craft room, hovering over baked beans and canned peaches.

  During our time here, we didn’t just find guns and ammo, we also raided two grocery stores, three gas stations and a Wal-Mart. None of those places came without great risk, but somehow we’d managed to scrape it together and keep everyone alive.

  No thanks to me.

  We were slowly accumulating supplies and what substituted as life-insurance. It wasn’t a surprise that we’d opted to stay in one spot for this long when there was so much to offer here. Vaughan often debated with everyone the benefits of staying for more or getting back on the road. It seemed they were all surprised that our temporary home had remained this untouched for so long.

  From what I gathered they had all avoided big towns like this before now. I didn’t exactly understand why. They were incredibly under populated- or the people had moved underground, because I hadn’t seen another soul outside of our group since that pack of Suburbans that saved us when the van broke down. And because they were so vast and spread out, Feeders didn’t tend to cluster together. Except where there had been at some point massive bloodshed, they generally kept to themselves.

  But then again, these were all relatively younger turned Zombies.

  I hadn’t seen the red-eyed late-stagers since our first stop at the gun warehouse.

  They probably went where they could actually find food- but it was a little bit strange.

  I slid onto a chair Miller was already occupying and put my arm around him. I was not at all happy to see that there wasn’t any food in front of him, while everyone else seemed to be digging away in their measly meals.

  “Where’s your food?” I asked in a low voice, trying not to embarrass him.

  He wasn’t actually the type to embarrass easily. Before the apocalypse and even most of the time during- as long as my dad wasn’t beating him and my brother demeaning him- he was out going, laid back, and super goofy. But ever since we’d joined up with the Parkers and company he had gotten really sensitive. I hoped it had something to do with wanting to prove himself or looking up to the older guys, but I couldn’t tell because he wouldn’t talk to me about it anymore.

  “I ate it all, already.” He shrugged casually but his tell-tale eyes darted over to Page.

  “Liar,” I snorted. I caught Reagan’s eye and glared at her. I gestured with a slash of my hand through the air at the empty place on the table in front of Miller but she just pressed her lips together and answered with big puppy dog eyes.

  “I wasn’t that hungry,” Miller tried to lie again.

  To me!

  As if that were even possible.

  “Stop telling lies, Miller Dale,” I growled. “You have to eat!”

  He flushed at my reprimand and jumped up from the chair we were sharing. “Stop it, Tyler. You’re not my mom! Back off!” He stomped off without another glance back at me. He pushed through the door, letting it bang closed. I bit my tongue wanting to immediately reprimand him while simultaneously apologize to the room for his behavior.

  And then I felt like the biggest tool. That was exactly what I was trying to avoid. I stuck out my bottom lip and exhaled a huge breath through it so it would toss my dark hair out of my face. Finally I addressed the room by saying, “I guess I didn’t exactly handle that well.”

  That garnered a few low chuckles but most people’s attention was on their food.

  “Tyler are you mad at me?” Page asked with her cute as a button little voice.

  “Oh no, sweet pea, I’m not mad at anybody! I just want to make sure Miller eats his food so he can keep growing big and strong.”

  “So, you’re not mad that I took his food?” she whispered with a hand raised over the side of her mouth so the boys couldn’t hear it.

  “Did you take it? Or did he give it to you?” I asked carefully. She was only eight, but hot damn this girl was smart for her age. Especially since her formative years thus far were spent hunting Zombies- or the other way around- and not in a classroom.

  Page’s eyes went wide and then her expression turned knowing, “He gave it to me.”

  “Well, there you go, honey. You’re not to blame, it’s all Miller. And I’m not really mad at him so you don’t have anything to worry about, darlin’.” I grinned at her and then accepted my portion of tonight’s dinner in a rock bowl made out of smooth blue, crystal on the inside and rough gray stone on the outside.

  The benefits of finding a gift shop to occupy. Most of the items were trinkets or too heavy or bulky to move a
nd useless to our cause. But some of them made great plates. Like this one- although it was actually cute, it was definitely not a practical dish. More like an accent piece that belonged on a coffee table or end table.

  And it was heavy!

  I dug into my dinner and savored the taste of each bite. I would never go back to The Colony- never ever. In fact, they would have to drag my dead, lifeless, cold, maggot-filled body back if they even though I would go willingly. But they did have good food. Three solid meals a day, and plenty to fill your stomach.

  It was part of the farming initiative my daddy started. Not that those people needed much incentive to keep growing vegetables or raising livestock- we were a community of farmers before everything went to hell anyway. But the seed had been difficult at first.

  Now, two years later, there seemed to be infinite amount of seed and plenty of animals to not only feed them today, but keep them fed.

  These were the things that made me nervous- made me shake in my boots. My father was fattening up as many people as he could for what could easily surmount as the slaughter. He was placating them. Making them comfortable. The danger of this Zombiefied world was still there, but only if and when he needed it to be.

  I wondered if those people would ever realize they gave up their freedom for a warm bed and a decent meal.

  I almost hoped they wouldn’t. For their sakes.

  These people- the ones I was with now…. Reagan, Haley, the Parkers, they were what was supposed to happen after the fall of civilization. They became what everyone should have strived to be. But instead survivors let fear dictate their lives and the desperation to live control their behavior.

  Not every man my father put down was a good man. I saw plenty of people that deserved to be at the very least locked up just because they forgot what it was like to be a decent human being. Men that treated women like possessions, or children like they were disposable. Men that wanted greed and power almost as much as the men in my family.

  But what they didn’t get- what none of them got- was that being a human being wasn’t a right anymore- it was a privilege. Our rights and liberties had been stripped away, first by the infection, then by creatures willing to do anything to change us and finally by men like my daddy that wanted to gobble up whatever place of power was up for the taking.

  I couldn’t allow myself to become too attached to Reagan or Haley and especially not Page or her brothers. I had an agenda. But I would stay with them as long as it took to get me as far from here as possible. I couldn’t survive on my own, but I could learn from them. Miller could learn from them. And then when the timing was right we would disappear into the night and set off on our own adventure.

  “You look deep in thought?” Haley commented from across the table. Nelson’s arm was slung around her and he too was eyeing me carefully. “Are you still upset because you learned Dolly Parton was in fact not the greatest singer ever to have lived?”

  I smiled before I could stop myself and pushed up from the table. “Just thinking about Miller,” I confessed. “I should probably go find him.” I stepped away from my chair, thankful that it wasn’t my turn to do the dishes tonight and started to walk from the room. I couldn’t help throwing Dolly’s defense over my shoulder though, knowing I would get the last word in. “And you’re right about Dolly. She was so much more than just a singer. She was a role model, an icon, a diva of the highest caliber, and most importantly Haley Gable, she was a living legend. And now, may the good Lord have mercy on her soul, the greatest memory America could ever cherish.”

  I whipped the door open and snuck through it, suppressing my giggles while Haley threw out, “You know your obsession with her is unnatural! I’m going to have you checked for bite marks!”

  Chapter Two

  “Are you going to hate me forever?” I asked Miller after I slid down next to him on his little space of the wall. He had snuck to the front part of the gift shop where it was dark and crowded with debris. We usually tried to keep the group to the back of the shop where there weren’t any windows and the only door was a barricaded fire exit that only opened from the inside. The front of the store was usually guarded by two people- although it was empty up here right now.

  “Yes,” he sulked.

  I looked over at my little brother and admired his profile. He wasn’t so much a kid anymore as he was a young adult. His face was still boyish, but his jaw was strong and his eyes were wise. His body was lean and muscled after our hard lifestyle- because even if we were spoiled in The Colony, it was still hard work. His hands were bigger than my face. He was going to be tall. Maybe even taller than Kane.

  And he had been hardened over this life we lived. I wore scars as deep as the marrow in my bones. But I didn’t want that for Miller. I didn’t want him to be ruined by the terror of our past or the uncertainty of our future.

  “I’m sorry, Mill. I really am. I just worry about you,” he whipped his head around to retort something scathing, but I quickly pushed on. “You are a growing boy. Like a serious soon to be giant. I just want you eating. Everyone here works hard- harder than we ever had to before- to provide enough food for everyone. If you’re not eating…. it’s like saying that our hard work, Vaughan and Hendrix’s hard work isn’t good enough.”

  That was probably a little bit underhanded. But desperate times and all.

  He thought it over and then nodded slowly. When his dark eyes met mine again they were filled with concern, “It’s just that… I don’t ever want to feel like a burden. I don’t want them to have to work hard for us, Ty. I want to pull my own weight.”

  And then it all became clear. I understood his fear, the insecurity Vaughan would just decide to drop us off some place out in the middle of nowhere and drive off into the sunset while Miller and I lived for another four whole minutes. But after spending these last couple weeks with them, I wasn’t sure they were capable of that kind of cruelty.

  For all his faults, Vaughan seemed to be most concerned with keeping all of us safe- even Miller and me.

  “You are pulling your own weight,” I assured him. “You got nothing to worry about little brother. I promise you.”

  “What about you?”

  Well, hell. “Vaughan’s not going to dump me off either. We bicker, but deep down he likes me.”

  “Tyler, nobody likes you,” Miller pointed out.

  I knew he was right, but his words still stung. I was a calloused witch and I knew that more than anybody. My goal in life, or for the past two years at least, had been to keep people at a distance and I was succeeding in that by leaps and bounds. Still, it cut to the heart to hear my brother throw it out there so flippantly. I felt irrationally defensive. “They like me here.” At his look of disbelief I became really offended. “They do like me, Miller! Stop that!”

  “If you say so,” he groaned.

  I huffed and shoved his shoulder. Little brat. “They do, Miller Dale. And even if they didn’t, it’s not like they truly hate me or anything. We’re safe as long as we stay with the Parkers, alright?”

  “I know that, Tyler.” He was sounding more agitated than ever and I wondered if I was helping or hurting.

  “I mean it, we’re really safe.”

  “Can you just try to get along with them?” He sounded so sincere and his eyes were big and pleading. How could I say no to him?

  I let out a deeply exasperated sigh. He was going to give me gray hair. But it was nice to see him care about something again. It was nice to watch him look up to people again, especially when those people were worthy of my little brother’s attention. And I couldn’t take care of him on my own.

  That much I was certain.

  “Sure, Mill, I’ll try.” I smiled genuinely to let him know I was serious.

  He still looked unsure until Vaughan pushed off the dark doorway and stepped into the moonlight that slipped into the room through slits in the boards up front. I hadn’t realized he had been listening. I blushed fire engine red becau
se of the nature of our conversation and tried desperately to melt into the floor- it didn’t work.

  “Miller,” Vaughan walked toward us and squatted down so he could look Miller in the eyes. “Tyler and I argue sometimes, but we both care about each other. You and her are welcome to stay with us for as long as you want. If you ever leave it will because you want to, not because we want you to. You have nothing to worry about, alright?”

  Miller shifted anxiously but held Vaughan’s eyes- that was something my father taught him, never look away, never give up first no matter how scared you are. “Alright,” he finally answered. I could tell he still didn’t entirely believe him, but he gave Vaughan the answer he wanted.

  “Page is looking for you,” Vaughan said easily. He tilted his head toward the back part of the building and Miller stood up immediately. “And there was some leftover dinner if you’re still hungry. Everyone else is full, so you can just throw it away if you’re not going to eat it.”

  Miller couldn’t hide the light in his eyes at the mention of food. He looked to me for the extra encouragement and when he found it, he took off immediately. He really was a good kid.

  It was hard to say what he would have been like if this whole end of the world thing hadn’t happened. He was by no means spoiled when that was still an option in life, but he was comfortable. We all were. He was definitely showing signs of the whole obnoxious pre-teen bend and he didn’t always get along with my daddy but then Zombies became a real thing and his life was turned completely upside down. He was suddenly an outlet for my dad’s anger and building frustration. He was a disappointment to both my parents because he had neither ambition to take over the world or a natural inclination to torture and kill all living things. He had become hard, world wise and unforgiving. I hated the thought that his soul was corrupted while his life fell to ruins.