She opened her eyes and took another deep breath. “And she kept yelling and hanging up on you.”
He snorted. “I remember.”
“She would get so mad,” she said, closing her eyes again. “It was so funny.”
Paul studied her yellow skin. It was burning up and she wasn’t making any sense. His heart pounded.
Her eyes cracked open again and found his still hovering above.
He rubbed her arm and forced a smile that was like forcing himself to eat cooked broccoli.
“Your mom and I are going to be fine,” she whispered, letting her eyelids drop again.
Paul cocked his head and dropped his phony smile. “What?”
She didn’t answer. She was already asleep again.
“I told you I’m not going anywhere!” Sophia shouted from the couch.
Paul jerked awake in the chair across from her, nearly falling out of it.
“I don’t even have my purse!” she yelled.
He sprang out of the chair and rushed to her side.
“Hey, hey, hey,” he said, stroking her sweaty face.
She shuddered beneath the blanket. “No!” she screamed so loudly, Paul jumped.
“Baby,” he said, lightly shaking her.
Her darkened eyelids peeled open and a smile graced her haggard face when she saw Paul next to her.
“Where am I?” she choked.
“You’re safe, baby,” he said, kissing her forehead and catching a whiff of something unpleasant. “Here, drink this.”
She sipped the water and swallowed with a sigh.
“I thought I was getting on a train without you.”
“You’re not going anywhere without me or your purse,” he said, smiling.
“Good.”
Then, just like that, she was in a deep slumber again. Tears fell from Paul’s eyes onto her pallid face.
Later that night, Wendy served Sophia some tomato soup she had heated up on the camping stove.
Paul’s stomach twisted when Sophia threw the soup back up almost as soon as she had swallowed it. She couldn’t keep anything down. Her eyes were sunken black caverns. His mind raced.
“Come on, try a little more for me,” Wendy said, bringing up another steaming spoonful.
Sophia shook her head. “I can’t.”
“It’s okay, babycakes,” Paul said softly, standing over Wendy’s shoulder. “Take a break and try to get some more rest.”
Wendy gave her a quick smile. “I brought in some books in case you feel like reading anything,” she said, patting some books on the end table.
Sophia nodded with her eyes closed.
It was a hopeful gesture, but not a very realistic one.
Sophia opened her eyes and looked to Wendy. “I want you to have my gun,” she said weakly.
Paul’s gut wrenched at the comment. He opened his mouth to protest but Wendy beat him to the punch.
“You just hang on to that cute pink gun because you are going to need it in no time,” she said.
Sophia shook her head. “I need you to take it and have my husband’s back.”
Wendy glanced at Paul and then turned to Sophia’s gun and holster lying next to the books.
“Promise me,” Sophia whispered.
Wendy took her hand and squeezed. “I promise,” she whispered back.
Paul rubbed his face and began pacing. This wasn’t happening.
Wendy paused, then rose from the couch and took the soup bowl back out into the kitchen with its granite counter tops and useless stainless steel appliances.
Paul stared at the gun on the end table, wondering how he could he have missed that damn pharmacist in the grocery store.
“Baby?” Sophia murmured, jerking him from his thoughts.
“Yeah sweetie, I’m right here,” he said, taking Wendy’s spot on the couch and grasping Sophia’s cold, clammy hand.
Her skin had turned a pasty white and was no longer sweaty. She also had a nose bleed that wouldn’t stop.
She looked into his eyes which were brimming with fear. “Do I look that bad?”
“What? Of course you don’t.”
“Yes I do,” she coughed.
“You’re gonna be back on your feet in no time. You just need to eat something.”
She frowned at him. “Paul, I’m really scared.”
“Don’t be,” he told her, his eyes welling up. He fought it, not wanting her to see him afraid. “I’m right here and we’re going to be back on our way to the beach in a few days. It’s just a scratch.”
“I don’t wanna die,” she said gravely.
He felt like someone had just knocked the wind out of him with a stomach shot. “Hey, hey, hey, you’re not gonna die,” he said, stroking her stringy, matted hair. “We’re gonna be boogie-boarding on the beach soon. You just need a couple more days of rest.”
He looked to his hand running through her hair and tried not to let her see his eyes widen when he saw all of the hair that had fallen out of her head into his hand. He slid it to her side so she couldn’t see.
“You’re gonna be okay. You hear me?”
She shook her head up and down and drifted back off to sleep again.
Twenty-four hours later, darkness had once again claimed the house, inside and out.
“Get away from me,” Paul said without looking at Dan.
“You don’t have to do this,” Dan said again, bending next to Paul, who had been sitting in the armchair for hours, watching her sleep. In the candle light, Dan’s eyes looked nearly as sunken as hers.
Paul didn’t respond. He couldn’t believe it had come to this conversation.
“Paul,” he started.
“If you don’t get away from me,” Paul said through gritted teeth, not taking his eyes off Sophia.
Dan dropped his head and sighed. He stood back up and walked out to join Wendy in the kitchen.
Paul stared at his beautiful girl shriveling away in front of his eyes. It was his mom all over again, only Sophia’s condition was accelerating much faster. His gun felt heavy in its holster.
“Paul?” she suddenly said, in a dreamy whimper.
He sprang from the espresso colored chair and rushed across the room to her side. “I’m right here, gorgeous.”
She smiled at him and let her hollow eyes close again. “Okay, I just wanted to make sure you’re still here.”
“You feeling any better?”
“Yep.”
“Good. You look better,” he said, stroking her pale face.
“Paul?” she said again, opening her eyes as far as she could.
“Yeah?” he said, a lone tear escaping down his face.
“I love you,” she said, peering into his eyes with as big a smile as her little heart could muster.
“I know you do, Sophia. And I love you more than anything in the world.”
“That’s right.” Her eyes closed again.
“That’s right,” he repeated, trying to take in as much of her as he could.
“Paul?” she asked, opening her eyes again as if he might have already left.
“I’m still here, sweetie.”
“Don’t leave me,” she whispered.
He pasted a smile across his face. “I’m not going to leave you. You know that.”
“You promise?”
“Of course I promise,” he said, his bottom lip quivering.
She shuddered. “I’m so cold.”
He pulled the blankets up to her chin and hugged her tight.
“I miss our bed,” she murmured.
He kissed her forehead. “I know you do, baby. I do too.”
Her eyes closed again.
He wrapped her in his arms. She was so cold.
In the kitchen, Wendy and Dan jumped when Paul’s handgun went off one time.
Chapter Seventeen
Paul’s foot went through the flat-screen TV. He screamed and threw a glass lamp against the broken TV on the floor, sending glimmering sh
ards flying.
Dan raced into the room, making the candles dance. One went out.
Paul fired three rounds into the TV. Debris jumped as did Dan.
With alarm coating his face, Dan looked down at Sophia on the couch. He gasped at the bullet hole in her forehead. Unbeknownst to him, she had just tried to take a monster bite out of Paul’s face while he dripped tears onto her lifeless body.
Paul stomped over to the front door, threw it open and thundered out onto the porch. “Come on out, you slugs!” he screamed into the night. “I’m right here!” Tears fogged his vision while pain and sorrow clouded his mind. He swore like he had never sworn before.
Dan yanked the blanket over Sophia’s bloody face as Wendy rushed into the room. She inhaled in horror behind him and shot her hands over her mouth.
Paul fired a string of shots into the moonlit night until his clip ran dry. He stormed back inside and grabbed a full clip from the small table next to the leather armchair. He ejected the spent clip and slammed the new one in with authority and tromped back to the front door.
“Paul!” Dan said, as Paul breezed by.
He ignored him and darted back out onto the porch. “I’m right here!” he yelled, firing off more rounds.
Dan went to the doorway, his mouth gaping.
“I’ll take all of you!” Paul screamed just as a flesh-eater shyly poked its head out from behind a thick Oak tree in the front yard. Paul stopped shooting and squinted through the shadows. “See there, Danny-boy, we got ourselves a contestant,” he whispered.
Dan’s eyes thinned as he looked past Paul into the darkness.
Paul chuckled. “That’s it, buddy, come on out. The buffet’s open all night long!”
“I’m not armed!” the thing yelled out from behind the tree.
Paul fired five shots at it anyway. The thing ducked behind the tree again.
Dan grabbed Paul’s arm and forced the gun down. “It’s not one of them!” he cried, wrestling Paul for the gun.
“I live next door!” the thing said. “I came over when I heard the gunshots!”
“It’s okay!” Dan said. “He thought you were one of them!”
“Oh, I’m not one of them!”
Paul pushed Dan away with his shoulder and raised the gun again. Dan quickly rebounded and tackled him onto the wooden porch, sending the gun sliding across the shiny porch. Paul rolled over on top of Dan and punched him in the face.
“Paul!” Wendy screamed from the doorway, her hands back to her face.
“My name’s Gary!” the man said. “Don’t shoot!”
Dan twisted out from beneath and pinned Paul’s arms to the ground. “Damn it! He’s not one of them!” he screamed, riding Paul away from the gun as blood dripped from his nose onto Paul’s face.
“Good for him!” Paul said, bucking his hips.
Dan almost toppled over him but regained his mounted position. “You’ve got to stop,” he panted, looking out into the darkness. “He’s not one of them.”
Paul closed his eyes and gave up, gasping for air while tears flowed out the corners of his eyes and rolled into his ears.
“You alone?” Dan asked into the night.
“Yeah, my wife died from cervical cancer six years ago! I live next door!” Gary said, nervously poking his head out around the old tree again.
“It’s okay! Come on up before the whole neighborhood drops by!” Dan said, scanning the entire front yard and turning back to Paul. “Are you going to stop? Or do you really want to kill an innocent man?”
Paul glared at him through bloodshot eyes. “Get off me,” he sneered.
Dan took a deep breath and got up. He grabbed Paul’s gun from the porch floor before Paul could.
In addition to being a widower for six years, Gary had also been a custodian at the local high school and had lived next door to the Jacobson’s for the past three years. Seated around the Jacobson’s kitchen island that was big enough for Gilligan’s entire crew, he told Wendy and Dan he had lived next to the Porter’s for two years before they moved out and the Jacobson’s moved in. He had lived next to a wooded lot for twenty-five years before the Porter’s had even built the house and Gary said he liked the wooded lot days much better. More birds, he told them.
While his house was nowhere near as grand as the Jacobson’s, the portly man proudly let them know it had the same magnificent views.
“The kind of views that make coffee taste better!” he cackled.
Paul cringed, curled up with Sophia’s body on the couch in the living room, his tears making dark spots on the sheet covering her body.
Dan asked Gary how he had survived this long on his own and Gary listed off his multiple hunting rifles, shotguns, and dried goods in his pantry.
“Don’t like to go into town much since Janet passed,” he said forlornly, staring at his hands wrapped around a can of Diet Coke on the granite counter in front of him. “But when I do, I stock up and as luck would have it, I went to town three days before I blew the first head off one of them demons.” His eyes slowly rose to Wendy and Dan. “Used to be Norman Hewitt, my mailman for the past ten years or so. Thought it was odd to see him out of his truck that day too. Man didn’t get out of that truck for nothin!” he snorted. “Got mauled by a pit bull one time and that was that.” His eyes fell back to his hands and he lowered his voice. “But that wasn’t Norman Hewitt anymore. That was for sure.”
Dan yawned as the fifty-seven year-old went on about the great bird watching, hunting and fishing in the area.
“You wanna see my John Deere stuff?” he asked.
Dan and Wendy traded looks.
“Maybe later,” Dan said dully.
“Well, I got a ton of it!” he said, taking a deep breath and going on and on about the homemade beer he brewed in his basement, his chickens, dogs, cats, tomatoes, peppers, corn and varieties of flowers growing in his sprawling backyard. He boasted about his eight grand children, Merle Haggard collection and the fact that he had single-handedly killed four walking corpses and burned their bodies in a dense brush pile out back.
Paul got up from the couch and stomped into the kitchen. “Do you ever shut up?” he yelled, slamming his fist down on the counter top.
The three of them jumped.
Gary dropped his eyes from Paul’s glare to his can of soda, a thick silence floating down upon the luxurious kitchen like a light bed sheet. Gary spun the half empty can in his chubby, dirty fingers.
Dan and Wendy looked up at Paul, fearful he might still kill the neighbor.
“I’m sorry,” Gary said, cutting through the stillness with a soft voice. “I just haven’t been able to talk to anyone since any of this began and I guess I got a case of the gibber-jabbers.”
No one responded.
Paul plopped down into one of the chairs at the island and dropped his throbbing head into his bloody hands. The more they had dried, the darker they had gotten.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Gary quivered, looking at Paul’s hands. “I’m sure she was a real sweet girl.”
“Oh, what do you know?” Paul said, back handing Gary’s Diet Coke against the yellow painted wall, leaving a brown running stain. He stormed back into the living room and dropped back onto the couch next to Sophia’s body.
Gently, he peeled the blanket back and splashed tears onto her wretched looking face. “I’m so sorry, baby,” he whispered with a trembling bottom lip. He stared long and hard at her to make sure this wasn’t all some kind of bad dream. “I’m so sorry,” he repeated. Salty snot streamed into his mouth. He kissed her firming cheek one last time, barely noticing the smell, and pulled the blanket back over her face. He didn’t want to remember her like this. He wanted to remember what she had looked like before this, when she was so beautiful and full of life. But he couldn’t. All he could see was the face of the thing she had turned into. He hugged her rigid body again, agonizing over the fact that he didn’t have any pictures of her. Not a single one. At some p
oint, he would have to go back to their house in Des Moines and get the photo albums in their spare bedroom closet. But how could he leave her here alone like that?
“Did you know,” he heard Gary say in the kitchen. “That two bottles of soda a week can increase your chances of getting pancreatic cancer? No foolin! Just saw it on the news a few days before the TV went out.”
Paul gritted his teeth and let his mind race. His hand slowly slid from Sophia to his holster. He felt the heavy weight of the gun inside it. The gun he had shot his baby with. The gun he wanted to shoot Gary with. That’s what he wanted. To shoot someone. Because someone had to pay for this. Reluctantly, he pried his hand from the gun and wrapped it back around his wife instead, burying his face into her stiff side.
“Hey Gary,” Dan said.
“Yeah?”
“You get a flu-shot this season?”
A moment of silence followed.
Then Gary grunted. “What’d I want one of them for? So the government can control my mind too? No thanks!”
Chapter Eighteen
The next morning, Dan hadn’t said much. He acted like he wanted to say something. Something about how sorry he was about Sophia or something about how things will get better or something about how he’s here for him. If he did, he decided against it.
He followed Paul into the attached three-car garage where they found some work gloves and two shovels. Beneath the early morning sun, they began digging a grave up on a hill in the Jacobson’s backyard, overlooking a valley of tall naked trees below. It truly was a majestic view and probably really something in the fall. Today, however, it didn’t seem like much.
Wendy got stuck watching them dig with Gary, who had returned from his house next door and was going on and on about all the different kinds of birds you could see out there. Blue Jays and Red-Bellied Woodpeckers and Pine Warblers and Northern Pintails and Hooded Orioles. And of course, the Mockingbird.
COLD FAITH AND ZOMBIES Page 11
