by Kenny Soward
“Hm.” Jake grunted and blinked. He lay on his side with his neck bent at a strange angle, and his hip lay across something hard. His legs were curled beneath him, restless and aching. Then he remembered that he and Marcy had fallen asleep in a car last night after escaping the people at the tuna warehouse.
“You up?” Marcy asked from the back seat.
“Yeah,” Jake grumbled, sitting up slowly and rubbing his sore neck. His hip had been resting on the center console of the car, and his upper thigh felt like it had cramped during the night.
“Thanks for letting me sleep in the back.” Marcy put her hands on the seat and peeked between them, the lenses of her glasses looking fogged up. “You’re such a gentleman.”
“And a scholar,” Jake sighed and stopped rubbing his neck, turning his attention to his legs. He tried stretching them every possible way, but nothing could relieve the ache.
“You want to get out?”
Jake took a look out the window and saw it was still raining. “No. We should eat something before we go out in that.”
“Good idea,” Marcy said, handing him a bottled water and a smashed bearclaw in a crisp plastic wrapper. “Nothing like breakfast in a stranger’s car.”
“Yeah,” Jake said with a chuckle, gladly accepting the food and drink.
They didn’t talk as they ate, and despite feeling tired and worn thin, the food in his belly did wonders. By the time he’d finished his water, he was ready to get out and take a look around.
“Do you think we should head back to the Westin?” Marcy asked. “I mean, I knew we’d eventually see people, though I didn’t think we’d have to run from them.”
“You’re right,” Jake said. “We should probably get back, but I’d at least like to get to I-93 first. It’s not too far, right?”
“From what I remember,” Marcy said as she wiped the window clean and peered out. “It should be less than a quarter mile that way.”
“Then it’s settled,” Jake said. “We’ll get to I-93, have a look around, and then go back to the Westin. We can check some places out on the way back and score some food.”
“Just not from the fish warehouse,” Marcy replied with a sour face.
“As much as it pains me to miss out on all that tuna,” Jake said, “I agree we should pass on it.”
They opened their doors and ventured out into the pouring rain. Jake circled around to the back door, opened it, and grabbed his backpack from the rear floorboard. Then he went around to join Marcy, and they moved carefully between the parked and spun-about cars, heads swiveling back and forth as they moved out of the lot and back to the street. Jake glanced over the tops of vehicles to the red tuna warehouse, not seeing any movement outside the building.
“Hoarding all that tuna,” Jake mumbled.
“This way,” Marcy said, pointing to a street that ran west.
As they approached, Jake saw a street sign, but the wind had bent it all the way over so that the words were upside down. He craned his stiff neck to read it, saying, “Boston Street.”
“It sounds familiar,” Marcy said, and Jake stepped past the sign and walked up the sidewalk.
While Jake knew this had been a real street a few days ago, it was now just another piece of land strewn with rubble. A large semi-truck had jackknifed and turned on its side in the middle. The back doors of the truck were thrown open, and a mound of rubble had spilled out. As Jake and Marcy approached, he noticed soaked packaging was strewn everywhere. Jake kicked some of the packaging aside to reveal stainless steel instruments and machines. They had a precise look to them, like they belonged inside a laboratory.
“It’s medical equipment,” Marcy said, then she saw Jake’s questioning expression. “I handled some medical malpractice cases back in Indianapolis, so I’ve seen hospital inventory sheets with stuff like this on them.”
“It must be worth a fortune,” Jake said with a wide-eyed expression.
“High six figures just from what I can see here,” Marcy said with a knowing nod.
“Well, I’d call the police about it, but…” Jake let his words trail off, not wanting to state the obvious.
“Shall we continue?” Marcy asked, turning her attention back to Boston Street. “It looks like the street is rising.”
Jake moved out ahead again, navigating puddles that were as big as ponds. Marcy was right, Boston Street was rising on pillars in the distance.
“That’s got to be it,” Jake said, increasing his pace and moving to the guardrail on the right side.
As they trekked higher, Jake took in more of the city around them. Eventually they came to the highest point of the Boston Street Bridge, and he did a full turn, looking everywhere. He’d hoped to see blue lights or a big, white tent city, but there were only buildings with their roofs torn off, their brick skins shredded away to expose the wooden bones beneath. There were huge pools of water covering parking lots and roads, bodies floating in them face down. I-93 was muddled with wrecked cars and trucks, abandoned by their owners or occupied by the dead. Jake looked away from the vehicles with the dark, motionless forms behind the wheel.
“Well, that was a bust,” he said in a sinking tone.
“Not really,” Marcy said. “At least we know what’s out here now, and we didn’t drag fifty people along with us and put them in danger for no reason.”
“Thanks,” Jake said. “Still, it doesn’t make me feel much better.” He turned his attention to the north where several department stores sat relatively untouched on the west side of I-93. From their position atop the bridge, Jake had a clear view of the loading docks on the nearest string of stores, all littered with overturned trucks and garbage.
“Are those people?” he asked, squinting at the rear of a store with Best Buy painted on the back. It appeared several operational cars had pulled up to the loading docks, and a half dozen people were moving merchandise out of the building and into their trunks.
“Those are looters,” Marcy said with a faint nod.
“I guess we shouldn’t be surprised,” Jake said. “It’s every man and woman for themselves out here.”
“Should we stay low?”
“I don’t think so.” Jake said, glancing at the thin, metal railing. “We’re a hundred yards away, and they’re not worried about us.”
A black Escalade came tearing around the back of the building in a squeal of tires and angled straight for the looters. One of the looters started to run but took two steps and stopped.
The Escalade weaved around an overturned car and stopped between two of the looters’ cars. A group of people in dark outfits brandishing handguns slid out of the Escalade and approached the looters with casual swagger. From the bridge, Jake could see their tattooed arms and wild haircuts, some shaved down the sides.
“Must be a gang,” Marcy said, sinking down behind a railing that couldn’t possibly hide her.
The lead gang member was tall and formidable, and he waved his gun around at the looters, shouting at them before he motioned to the Escalade.
Two looters carrying a large flat-screen TV delivered their stolen merchandise to the back of the Escalade where another gang member had popped the rear hatch. The two men put the TV into the back of the Escalade and then backed off. The gang leader waved his gun at another man carrying a box, directing him to do the same. The man protested, shaking his head and shouting something back.
“Uh-oh.” Marcy clutched Jake’s forearm.
“This isn’t going to turn out well,” Jake said as the two men continued to argue.
On cue, the tall gang member stopped waving his gun and pointed it at the man with the box. Before Jake could blink, the muzzle flashed, and a pop reached them a second later. The man carrying the box collapsed with a new red hole in his head.
Marcy gave a gasp and sunk to one knee as Jake’s guts turned to liquid.
The rest of the looters immediately carried their goods over to the Escalade whether everything could fit or n
ot. The leader of the gang shouted more words Jake couldn’t hear, but it was clear he was warning the looters about disobeying orders.
One of the gang members strode out farther into the lot, head swiveling in all directions. His eyes moved across I-93 before landing on the Boston Street Bridge.
“Get back!” Jake hissed as he grabbed Marcy’s hand and dragged her away from the edge so they couldn’t be seen from the parking lot.
“Did they see us?” Marcy asked in a panicked tone before she turned back the way they’d come, but Jake stopped her.
“No, this side is closer.” Jake pulled her toward the west side of the bridge. “And we’ve got some cover.”
There was a building between them and the Best Buy parking lot, and Jake kept them behind it as they jogged to the west side of the bridge.
“There,” Jake said, pointing to a small copse of twisted trees and debris that had blown against it. They dove into the mess of garbage and crouched down, looking out through the gaps.
“I don’t think they saw which direction we went,” Jake said, clenching his hand in his lap.
“Is that just wishful thinking?”
“I hope not, but be ready to run.”
Within a minute, the rumbling engine of the Escalade reached their ears just before the big vehicle rolled slowly past their position heading south across the bridge.
“See?” Jake said. “They must think we took off in the other direction.”
The engine rumble grew distant before it reached a steady level. They heard doors opening, and a moment later the doors slammed shut.
“Someone got out.” Marcy’s voice edged high again.
“They’re probably just looking around,” Jake said, and he gripped Marcy’s shoulder to reassure her.
The engine kicked up, and they heard the gravely sound of wheels turning on cement. Then the engine grew louder until the big Escalade rolled past them heading west.
Once it had fully passed them, Jake released the huge breath of air he’d been holding. “That was close.”
“Did you hear the people they dropped off get back in?” Marcy asked, squinting through the gap in the garbage, her pallid expression showing just how nervous she’d been.
“I don’t think they did.”
“So, they’re just out there walking around, looking for us?”
“I don’t know,” Jake said with a frown. “Maybe they’re guarding the bridge, waiting for survivors to cross. Or maybe they moved deeper into the city to scout. One thing is for certain.”
“What’s that?”
“We’ve got more to worry about than the weather.”
Chapter 14
Sara, Gatlinburg, Tennessee | 12:35 p.m., Sunday
To Sara, it sounded like the roof of the cabin might blow off at any moment. The first floor rested on a big I-beam that ran the length of the structure, and it shook every time the wind kicked up, sending thin trails of dust floating down. Zoe was trying to be brave, but the ferocity of the storm wasn’t like anything she’d ever experienced in her young life, and she cried fearfully no matter how much Sara comforted her.
“Your dad and I built this cabin,” Sara said with measured assurance. “We’d never let it fall down on us.” Her maternal instinct to do everything she could to protect her children just wouldn’t quit no matter how much confidence she had in the cabin’s structure.
“Pull some of those five-gallon rice bins down and help me make a bunker,” she said to Todd, removing her arms from around Zoe.
“Do you think we need it, Mom?”
“Can you convince me we don’t?” Sara asked him with a pointed look. “Even if it’s a quarter of the power it was when it came ashore, it could blow the roof off.”
“I can’t argue with that,” Todd said, going over to the shelves and pulling the rice bins down one at a time. Once they’d gotten thirty of them down, Sara helped move them over in the corner to form a square structure. When they had them stacked three high, Sara pulled one section out slightly so she could enter and exit easily.
“Strong enough to stop an army,” Todd said, grinning as he patted the top. The little bit of exercise seemed to perk up his spirits, whereas Zoe just wouldn’t settle, not even when Sara put her in the bunker and explained how safe it was.
“I love you, Zo,” Sara said plaintively, “but you’re really making it hard for Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mom.” Zoe apologized, stopping her crying long enough to pat Sara’s shoulder with her little hand. “I’ll try to do better.”
“You never used to be afraid of storms.” Sara bit her lip in consternation.
“Dad let her watch that Twister movie,” Todd said with a nervous shrug before he glanced up at the ceiling. “That’s probably why she’s so scared.”
“What? Twister?”
“A few months ago. You fell asleep, and Dad wanted to show me this movie. He said some guy named Bill Paxton was in it.”
“I know the one.” Sara’s brow furrowed, then her voice raised in realization and alarm. “Your dad let her watch that?”
“She came down after it started, and Dad let her stay. He said PG-13 was okay.”
“It’s fine for you, not for your sister,” Sara said. “I’ll have to talk to your father about that when he gets here.” Sara hugged Zoe to her, thinking for a way to calm her youngest one’s nerves. She looked at Todd with a question in her eyes, and he only shrugged as if to say, there’s only so much a brother can do.
“Todd, could you watch your sister while I get the head gear out of the emergency locker?”
“I can do it, Mom,” Todd said in an insistent tone. “Dad trained me on the emergency gear.”
“Okay.” Sara sighed as she felt the familiar friction of raising a teenager. Todd wanted his independence in all things, although Sara’s instinct was to protect him.
Todd went over to a set of lockers next to the gun safe. He opened the middle door and took out a set of bicycle helmets along with gas masks, utility belts, rope, and other survival equipment. They’d originally put it there in case a forest fire broke out like it had in the Smokies several years ago, but now seemed like a great time to put it to the test. Especially if the roof started to fall in on them.
Todd brought over the helmets and held them up.
“You want to put your helmet on, hon?” Sara asked, taking the smallest helmet from him. “We’ve got a fort. Might as well play soldier.”
“No,” Zoe said, pushing the helmet away.
The wind howled again, and the house shook. This time it was a long, drawn-out rattle that grated on Sara’s nerves and made her want to scream. Tears formed in her eyes, which she quickly wiped away.
What would Jake do? Sara asked herself. How would he get Zoe calmed down?
And then she knew.
“Hey, I know,” Sara said, noticing a plastic bin they’d brought downstairs by accident. It was full of some new games and activities they’d brought to the cabin to add to their collection here. Sara stood, went over to it, and removed the top.
“How about Zombie Kidz?” Sara lifted the game out of the box and held it up for Zoe to see.
Zoe’s head peaked around the fort opening, tears already drying up. “We can play now?”
“I can’t think of a better time, can you?”
“Nope,” Zoe said, a tiny smile breaking through her stormy expression.
“First, you’ve got to put your helmet on,” Sara said, pointing out the obvious.
“Oh, yeah.” Zoe took the helmet where Sara had set it down and plopped it on her head.
Todd reached for his helmet, too, mouthing the words, “Way to go, Mom.”
Stifling a grin, Sara brought the game over, handed it to Todd, and then went over to their shelves of stores. She looked through a box of packets until she found what she wanted.
“Not only are we going to play Zombie Kidz…” Sara turned around and shook the packets she held.
�
�Hot chocolate!” Zoe yelped in excitement.
“Stay over there and help your brother set up the game, and I’ll make the goodies.”
Sara grabbed a couple of bottled waters from a shelf, walked over to a small utility area near the steps, and removed an electric kettle from a shelf. She plugged it in and turned it on, thankful for the generator’s energy. It only took five minutes for the water to boil, and during that short length of time her daughter completely transformed into a happy kid again. She could see their helmets above the top of the bunker, Zoe giggling and joking with her brother as the storm raged above them. The cabin shook, and Sara could hear the windows rattling all the way downstairs, but the kids didn’t seem to care.
Once the water was finished boiling, Sara found three paper cups and filled them with the chocolate powder. Then she poured the boiling water into the cups, stirred the contents with a nearby spoon from their stock, and brought them over to the kids.
“All ready.” Zoe grinned big and gestured at the game board where it rested on one of the five-gallon bins, all the pieces arranged in perfect order.
“Looks like game night!”
“You have to put your helmet on, first,” Zoe said in an exasperated tone, pointing at Sara’s helmet where it sat on the wall of the bunker.
“Right.” Sara served the hot chocolate, put on her helmet, and pulled up a five-gallon drum of rice to sit on. “Now, I’m ready.”
Soon, they were drinking hot chocolate by lamplight as zombies infiltrated a cardboard city, and the storm faded into the background.
Chapter 15
Jake, Boston, Massachusetts | 12:45 p.m., Sunday
Jake and Marcy stayed hidden for forty-five minutes, waiting to see if the people dropped off by the Escalade were still around somewhere.
“You think it’s safe now?” Marcy asked from where she huddled against him. Even though their ponchos offered some protection, their shoes and jeans were soaked through, making the cold seem even colder.
“We won’t know until we look.” Jake’s arm was wrapped around Marcy’s shoulders to draw their body heat together, and her head leaned close to his. A whiff of her hair brought the faint scent of sweet shampoo, and it reminded him of Sara. He closed his eyes for a moment to center his emotions. He could be mad and frustrated at not being able to get home, or he could get back on his feet and do something about it. Jake lifted his arm from Marcy’s shoulders and stood up from where he’d been crouching. “Let’s go.”
