by M. D. Massey
“Oh, yes, it is.” I have never met a more enthusiastic woman in my entire life.
As soon as we walked into the house, which was lavishly decorated for such a cozy home, Margaret had us sit at the dining room table. Harold opened a bottle of wine. “This is a spectacular year. Once I told Henry about this wine, he bought us several cases to keep us stocked up.”
“Well, aren’t you a peach?” I said with a grin.
“That I am, my love. That I am.” We laughed and sipped the delicious wine.
“Is there anything I can do to help with dinner?” I asked Margaret, hoping she would say no.
“Oh no, sweetie. You sit just there and enjoy yourself. It’s almost ready. I just need to dish it up.” She smiled and headed back into the kitchen. Harold, Henry, and I kicked back, enjoying our glasses of wine.
Within minutes, dinner was on the table. She served us salad, beef stew, and buttermilk biscuits. Henry groaned when she placed the bowl of stew in front of him.
I loved that groan. I heard it several times the night before…and maybe a few times before lunch, as well. When I smirked at him, he reached under the table and squeezed my thigh.
“Best ever. I swear.” Without pause, he dipped his spoon in and lifted it to his mouth. Margaret glared at him with a raised eyebrow, stopping his spoon in mid-air. “Yes…sorry,” he said, setting the spoon down and pulling his salad in front of him.
“Still too hot to eat. Salad first, like always, my boy.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he muttered in embarrassment. I laughed. I loved seeing him knocked off his high horse.
Margaret cleared her throat as Henry ate his salad in silence. “So, tell me, Elaina. How did you two meet?”
Smiling, I told her the story of Henry saving me from the flat tire and phone thieves. His parents beamed with pride over his chivalrous behavior. I failed to mention he was practically living with me the very next night.
The conversation carried on throughout the course of the evening, two more bottles of wine consumed. For dessert, Margaret served us French Silk pie and coffee in the living room.
Completely full, I settled in between Henry’s arm and chest. He was so comfortable. Their conversation became more distant as I melted into him. I tried to keep up, but I kept fading out. The next thing I felt was Henry rubbing his cool fingers on my cheek.
“Love… Wake up,” he said softly in my ear.
“Oh god. I’m so sorry!” I sat up with a snort and wiped the drool off my face. When Henry laughed, I glared at him.
“Oh sweetie, it’s fine.” His mother winked at me. “I fed you a rich meal and you had a couple glasses of wine.”
“She told me she didn’t sleep well last night. Something about a nightmare,” Henry said. Nightmare, my ass. I glared at him.
“Oh, really? Henry gets horrible nightmares, too. Like night terrors. I hope it isn’t like those. They used to scare the hell out of us.” I knew all too well about those night terrors. I’ve had to talk him down from a few in our couple months of being together.
I casually swatted my hand through the air. “Oh, it was just a regular old nightmare. I just couldn’t go back to sleep after it.” In reality, neither one of us slept much. We made love three times during the night, and again in the morning. I wasn’t sure what had gotten into him, but he was one horny toad.
“Glad to hear it. You should get this wonderful young lady back to her home, Henry, so she can get to bed.” I was sure sleep wasn’t in Henry’s mind. He was going to try to jump me again. I could tell from the devious look in his eyes.
“Yes, I do believe I should.” He smiled at me.
We said our goodbyes and headed out to his truck. He leaned back in his seat and laid his head back on the headrest, letting out a loud sigh of relief. I laughed at him. For some reason, he didn’t think I was funny.
-October 2014-
“So, what you are telling me is that everything is a lie?” I felt sad and helpless as I stared at Henry, waiting for a truthful response.
“No. Not everything. Remember, I love you so much. I cannot express that enough. I wouldn’t have proposed if I didn’t. You are the first woman in my life who has brought me to my knees. Others were just a fling or a one-night stand. What I feel for you is, without a doubt, real. My love is real. It’s not a lie.” I wasn’t sure if what he said was true, but I wanted to believe that he truly did love me. He paused for so long, I thought he wasn’t going to finish. “But, yes, my life is a lie.”
As angry as I was, I loved him with every fiber of my being. I nodded, letting him know I believed his love for me was real, even though I was unsure.
Claire lay back on the couch, staring at the ceiling, looking completely and utterly lost. I was with her on that. “Can we get to the point? I lost Marc out there to those…whatever they are. I don’t give two shits about your love for one another at the moment! Just get on with it, would you?” Her words were laced with venom and frustration. She was angry, her proper etiquette flying out the window, and rightfully so. I was angry for her.
“Claire, I’m so sorry for what happened to Marc. I considered him one of my friends.” Henry’s apology seemed genuine. He took a deep breath. “I’m an agent for the government. My job is to keep tabs on special diseases. One, in particular.” Henry rubbed his five o’clock shadow. “A few years ago, I relocated to the States to keep track of it and provide necessary action against this disease.”
“What kind of disease?” I hoped curiosity wouldn’t kill this cat.
“In layman’s terms, it’s a zombie virus. Or, as we call them, ‘undeads’.”
“Shut the fuck up.” I sat back and rolled my eyes. “That’s not real. What a joke! That’s just in movies and TV shows. It’s just something that was made up. Something all those doomsday preppers prepare for. No fucking way.” I kept mouthing, No fucking way as I looked over at Claire, whose mouth hung open, as if in shock.
“Yes, fucking way. My job is to keep track of it. Our governments created this bloody virus in the lab, and my government wants to keep tabs on it. It’s extraordinarily dangerous…as you have already experienced.”
I flashed back to Henry taking out our pastor and limo driver. I felt sick to my stomach again.
He continued. “Your government doesn’t know about me. They have no idea England has planted people like me here. That is one reason I haven’t told you the truth until now. If they knew about me, I would be in danger. You would be in danger. Anyone affiliated with me would be in danger. I was just trying to protect you.”
It was a difficult pill for me to swallow. I felt like my stomach was trying to escape out of my mouth.
“Elaina, if this virus gets out of control, we, as a population, would be annihilated.”
“Out of control?” I laughed, knowing what I saw today was the purest example of out of control. “If you’re supposed to be keeping track of it, how did it get out then? Sounds like someone’s going to get fired. And why the hell would they create something like this?” I admit there was a little attitude behind my words.
He ignored my “getting fired” statement. “Well, they created it because they can. I don’t know why they did it. It’s a super virus. The only cure is true death.”
“True death?”
“Yes.”
“Like on that vampire show when they say true death?”
“No…well, yes, sort of, but not vampires. There’s no such thing as vampires!” He sounded offended at my reference.
“But there is such a thing as zombies?!”
“Once the virus enters the body, the body ‘dies’.” He used air quotes. “Then it reanimates. The virus lives in the brain. It’s attracted to the electrical signals and feeds off clean blood. The person could be missing all four limbs, have bled nearly every last drop, and they would reanimate. It drives the body to hunt down more blood.”
“Wait. Are you saying that Marc is out there eating people?” Claire shook all o
ver. I could tell she was going to sob again.
“Yes, my dear, I’m sorry to say.” Henry reached for Claire, but she shoved his hands away. “If he hasn’t had a true death, he’ll be doing the same to others as Pastor Jones did to him. I only gave the pastor and the limo driver true death because they were the immediate threat. I needed to get you two out of there before something happened to you.”
She fell over onto my shoulder and cried. “I can’t believe it. My Marc…”
Henry shook his head. “Once he’s exposed to the virus, he’s no longer the person you knew. It controls the brain.”
Claire curled up into a ball on the couch, her head in my lap.
I didn’t even know how to console my best friend. There were no words that would have made it better for her. Or for me. My family, my friends, his fake family… They all were in danger, or had become the danger.
While sitting there, trying to process all the new information, we heard a high-pitched scream come from outside. Henry jumped up and looked out the front window.
“Shit!” He jammed his hands in his pockets. Looking for keys maybe? “Shit,” he said again as he dashed off to his bedroom, quickly coming back, hopping on one foot as he tried to pull on his boots. Using a key, he unlocked the trunk. There was another, more modern trunk with a keypad inside. He punched in a code, the lid clicking open. I couldn’t believe what I saw.
It was a cache of weapons. There was some serious shit in there, and I couldn’t believe my sweet Henry was versed, or even involved with it. He pulled out a shotgun and loaded it, then jammed extra shells in his pockets. He pointed a finger at me. “Stay here. And I mean it this time. Do not leave the flat, and lock the door behind me.” He ran out, slamming the door. I did what I was told, then ran over to the front window. I covered my mouth when I saw a poor woman being eaten by another…human.
“Should we call the police?” Claire asked, staring out the window in disbelief.
“Uh, I don’t know. Let’s wait until Henry comes back…if he comes back.” My voice shook.
It was official. I, Elaina Leigh Cooper, was scared out of my fucking mind.
I was so scared, I lost my sarcasm. I couldn’t crack a joke or roll my eyes. I was transfixed on Henry—or was it Liam. Henry. Yes, he said Henry.
He was an emotionless machine, like he had been killing these so-called undeads his entire life. He walked up behind the undead and raised his shotgun, pumping it. Just as the former living human turned around, Henry pulled the trigger.
The undead’s brains splattered all over, the body crumpling to the ground. He looked down at the woman who lost her life to this former human. I saw him say something to her as he stroked her cheek gently while she cried. She reached up to him. He touched her hair as he spoke to her. She nodded. He pumped the shotgun again, put it to her head, and pulled the trigger.
Both Claire and I screamed. I whispered, “Oh, my god, Claire.” Tears welled up in my eyes. We had just witnessed a murder. Was it really murder? Would killing a person infected with the virus be considered murder, or humane?
I was so confused. If Henry were who he said he was, he knew what he was doing. He knew that if this woman became undead, we would all be in danger.
“Elaina, I don’t think I can handle all this.” Claire dropped to her knees, crying.
“I am not sure what to even think. Just an hour ago, I was marrying the man of my dreams. We would be at our reception right now, having drinks and dancing like fools. This can’t be real. I can’t believe Henry has been hiding all this from me.”
“It is real, Elaina! Wake up! Marc is gone. Everyone who attended the wedding is gone. We’re all going to die, Elaina.”
I knelt on the floor next to her. “We’re all going to die anyway.” I tried to tuck my emotions away so I could console Claire, but I didn’t always say the right things.
“It’s not supposed to be like this!”
“You’re right. It’s not. I’m sorry.” I reached and grabbed her hands, both of us jumping when we heard pounding on the apartment door.
“Elaina! Open the door!” I got up, walked to the door, and touched the knob, hesitating. “Elaina, please. Open the bloody door!” How could I be sure we were safe from Henry? What if he had been bitten and I let him in? He would kill us both. “Elaina! Claire!”
He kept pounding. I looked at Claire for permission. She looked at me for permission. Then she jumped up and rummaged through the chest, pulling out some sort of archaic-looking double-sided axe. She handed it to me. “Here. Take this.” I felt empowered with this well-crafted medieval-style weapon. I held it up like a baseball bat.
“Elaina! Come on!” Henry screamed.
“How do I know you aren’t bit?!”
“I’m not bit!”
I choked back tears, realizing my life was forever changed. “How do I know you aren’t lying to me, like you have lied about everything else? How do I know for sure?” The crying, girly side found its way to the surface yet again, the tears running down my face.
“Elaina, please. Open the door. I’m not bit. You have got to believe me.”
When I nodded at Claire, she leaned against the door and unlocked it. As she cracked it open, I raised the axe over my head, ready to strike. I stood there in disbelief that, at any given moment, I may have to kill my Henry. But was he really my Henry since my Henry was a lie?
“Slowly, Claire,” I whispered. I could see Henry’s eyes. The same eyes that were full of love whenever he looked at me I took a deep, staggering breath. I nodded to Claire and she opened the door all the way.
“Jesus Christ. I didn’t think you would ever open the door.” I stood holding the axe, ready to strike. He stopped short, putting his hand out in front of him. “Elaina, are you mental? Put the bloody axe down. You are going to hurt someone. Yourself, more than likely!”
“I can’t.” My voice shook.
“Listen to me. I’m not bit. Look.”
He leaned the shotgun against the wall and slowly turned around, holding his hands up, trusting that I wouldn’t strike. He lifted his shirt for me to see his deliciously trim body. He had blood and gore splattered on his clothes, but I didn’t see anything that looked like an injury.
Relief overwhelming me, I dropped the axe and jumped into his arms. I wrapped my arms around him so tight, I could have crushed him. He hugged me back just as tightly. I was so scared, but his strong arms made me feel safe. I had to learn to trust this new Henry. I just had to. What other option did I have?
When I heard the door slam, I looked over and saw Claire standing there, trying hard not to cry. I felt guilty for showing my love for Henry in front of her. She had just lost her longtime beau. I didn’t know if my family was safe. Grief and regret filled me as I pulled back from his embrace.
“Henry, we have to go back.”
“Back where?” he asked.
I looked at him like he had two heads. I knew he couldn’t possibly be that dumb, could he? “The church! We need to go back to the church.”
He shook his head. “No. Absolutely not.”
“Yes.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “No. It’s far too dangerous. I don’t want anything to happen to you. To either of you.” He looked at me for a while, then looked at Claire. She stood by the door, her head hanging. “Claire, I’m sorry. We can’t go.”
“My family is there, Henry!” My muscles twitched from anger. “We need to go get them to safety! I love them…” My voice trailed off.
“I realize that. I love them, too, but we cannot go back there. It’s too dangerous.”
“I need to go back and see if any of them are still alive. Or go to their homes and see if they are there.”
His sigh was heavy as he stood with his hands on his hips. He jammed his hand through his hair a few times. After pacing around, mumbling to himself, he reached into his pocket. “Here.” He handed me his cellphone. “Before something happens to my signal, start
calling everyone you know who was there.”
I realized my bag was still at the church, along with my wallet and phone. What if my family was trying to call me? What if they thought I was hurt or dead…or undead or whatever the fuck you called it.
I called my mom’s phone…nothing. My dad’s…nothing. Nick’s…nothing. I panicked, not knowing what to do. I tried my mom’s phone again. When someone answered, I let out a breath, but it wasn’t my mom.
“Hello? Hello? Help me. Help me, please!” It was a man with a high-pitched voice I didn’t recognize it. “Please help! I’m stuck in the flower shop across from the Heritage Family Worship Church. There are people eating people. Oh, my god! Please!” His words came out rapidly.
Henry grabbed the phone from me. “Hello?”
“Please, help me…” The voice trailed off.
“Sir, where did you get that phone?”
“I found it in the street and picked it up. I was coordinating a wedding at Heritage. The Daniels-Cooper wedding. Do you know them? Please, send help! I called the police station, but they aren’t answering. I can’t even get through to 911. There are people covered in blood trying to get into the shop. I’m so scared!”
Henry covered the phone with his hand and whispered, “It’s Nate, the wedding coordinator.” Nate was this tiny flamboyant man who thought everything he touched turned fabulous. He had an ego bigger than anyone I had ever met. There was never a hair out of place, and he was always in an expensive suit.
Nate didn’t recognize Henry’s real voice. He was yelling when Henry put the phone back to his ear. “Sir! Sir! You have to calm down. I need your help.”
“No, you don’t understand! There are people eating people! I need your help! I’m trapped!”
“Sir, I understand what you are saying. Can you tell me what you see? Do you recognize anyone? Anybody from the wedding party?”
“Uh, oh god. There are so many lying on the ground. Some eating others. Others roaming around aimlessly.” Nate was quiet for a moment. “Wait! I think I see a normal someone.”
“Okay. Can you tell me where you see them? What do they look like?” Henry was so calm and collected. My heart was about to leap out of my chest as I clawed at his arms, trying to pull the phone down to my ear so I could hear, as well.
