by Haga, A. H.
“Kit? You awake?”
I let out my held breath as she poked her head into the nest. “Where were you?” I asked, aware that my voice was hard.
Shadia blinked at me. “I checked out a few of the closer houses. Like we talked about.”
“We talked about checking it out together,” I snapped.
Shadia’s whole face softened. “Habibi, what is this really about?”
“Don’t disappear on me like that, OK?”
“OK. I’m sorry.” She crawled over and hugged me to her, kissing away the one tear that escaped from my eyes.
I sniffed, blinking away tears. “You’d better be.”
She chuckled and squeezed before sitting back on her haunches. “Have you taken your meds?”
“Not yet.”
Giving me a mock-frown, she started looking around until she found my medication and a can of cola to get it down.
“Did you find anything?” I asked before putting the pills in my mouth.
She smiled. “A wheelbarrow.”
My eyebrows shot up. “A wheelbarrow?”
“Yes.” Her smile died, and she looked away. “I thought maybe you could sit in it, and I could push you until we find a better solution.”
I looked at her for a long time before I started laughing.
“What?” She asked. “It’s a good idea.”
“It is, it is.” I snorted. “The mental picture was just really weird, is all.”
Pursing her lips to keep from laughing herself, Shadia swatted my arm. The look on her face made me laugh harder, and with a mumbled ‘why, you’ Shadia clambered over me and started tickling me again, yelling that she would give me something to laugh about. Between screaming in laughter and begging her to stop, I managed to wrap my arms around her and turn us around until she was beneath me. Pinning her arms across her chest, using my whole weight to keep them there, I kissed her nose and all over her face until I could control my laughter again. When I pulled back, Shadia was grinning from ear to ear. Her arms free, she reached up and pulled me down again, kissing me over both eyes, on my nose, on both cheekbones, my lips.
“How tired are you?” she asked in-between kisses.
“Not at all,” I answered the next time she moved to kiss another part of my face.
Her lips trailed from my jaw and to the base of my throat. “Are you sure?”
I bit my lower lip to keep from gasping. “Yes.”
Her hands slid from my shoulders and down my naked back, leaving trails of fire until they rested on my hips. She moved her own hips beneath me, lifting a leg to push against my groin. I let the gasp out this time before looking down at her face. It wore a wicked smile, and her eyes were warm and narrow as she looked at me. I drowned in those eyes and let her flip me before we drowned in each other.
Excerpt from Medical Notebook
Unlike in most TV shows, books, and comics, these zombies were controlled by nature. Meaning they would decompose as normal bodies, if a little slower. The more fresh meat they ate, the longer the body was held together, but even the best hunters would eventually rot away their muscles, unable to move, leaving the worm to starve, and finally letting the dead rest in peace.
36
I slept fitfully that night, constantly dreaming of Shadia disappearing. When I woke, whimpering, she was right there, shushing me and holding me. Finally, I slipped into an exhausted sleep after the day’s events and dreamed no more.
The next morning, we ate a quick breakfast before Shadia cleaned up my nest. I sat and watched, not allowed to help. That was OK. I’d stopped, after all, and as I feared, getting my body going again was hard. Shadia brought our bags outside before she came in to get me.
I hadn’t been outside since arriving at the old train station, and what greeted me gave me a start. There were bodies everywhere, all dead and … melting.
“Where did they come from?” I asked as Shadia tried not to step on any of them.
“They were here when I arrived,” she answered.
“But … why didn’t I hear them? And why do they look like that?”
“Like what?”
“All melted.”
“They’re decomposing.”
“This fast?”
“I think the rain may have had something to do with it. And you didn’t hear them because they were too weak to do anything. When I came, most of them were just leaning against the wall. They hardly even turned when I killed them. I blame the fire you had going inside. It was warmer than me.”
“Warmer?”
“Yes. I think they can sense heat, like a snake. That is why they were drawn to the fire instead of us, and why they were drawn to André when we stood side by side. He had a fever, so he was the warmest of us.” She stopped at the other end of the street, away from the bodies.
“That makes sense,” I mumbled, thinking about every encounter we’d had. How the zombies seemed to see us even when we were inside a building and away from the windows. The wheelbarrow Shadia had found was wide and covered in blankets that looked rough but would cushion my butt over the metal.
After a little back and forth, Shadia was able to lower me into it. It was just as hard as I’d thought, despite the blankets, and smelled of hay and kibble. There was no sign of the source of the scents, so I was pretty sure it was the blankets. Someone living around here must have had bunnies or something, and a hoard of them, if they needed a wheelbarrow to feed them. I wondered what had happened to the animals now, but decided not to ask. Hopefully, they’d gotten out and were free somewhere. More likely, zombies had broken into their cage and eaten them.
Shadia arranged the blankets and bags around me so I wouldn’t be thrown around too much as we moved, and I took comfort in her closeness as I tried to forget about the bunnies. I was suddenly really glad the apocalypse had forced us to become vegetarian.
“Ready?” Shadia asked as she repositioned one of the bags so I could get to her ax easier.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I answered and huddled into the fabric around me.
Shadia bent and kissed the tip of my nose, pulled up my bandana to cover it, and walked out of sight.
The wheelbarrow jerked, and I gripped the ax hard as I swayed off the ground. It felt like I was on a boat, waves hitting against the sides, as Shadia found the balancing point before she backed up and turned, wheeling me down the slope toward the road.
The rest of the day was mostly uneventful. We met two zombies that Shadia took out long before they became a danger to us. The encounters made it clear we had to find another ax, as Shadia didn’t want to leave me without one, and I didn’t want her to get any closer to the zombies than she had to, which happened when she used the knife to give them mercy. She didn’t disagree with me, but wouldn’t go searching for one either. If she stumbled over one, however, she would take it.
“Promise?” I asked.
“Yes.”
I heard a smile in her voice and wondered why, but didn’t ask. Instead, I leaned my head back, squinting to keep the weak sun out of my eyes, and looked up at her. “Pinkie promise?” I lifted my hand, all fingers but the pinkie curled into a fist.
Shadia sighed and rolled her eyes, but wrapped one of her pinkies around mine. “I swear.”
I would have answered ‘good’ and told her I loved her, but the wheelbarrow started tipping when she let go with one hand, and I was too busy not falling out or dumping all our stuff on the ground to speak.
We moved past houses and homes, fields, and forests. Now and again, we saw the edge of a town or settlement not far away, but we never got near them. We ate on the go, not wanting to spend any more time in the open than we had to, and before dinner, Shadia said we were close.
I sat up straighter, having been napping in the barrow, nursing my stomach, that was feeling seasick from the motion and the uneven ground.
In front were houses, and past them even more houses, but all seemed quiet.
“Were th
ere many zombies here?” I asked, not taking my eyes off the road.
Shadia only made a ‘hmm’-sound that could mean both yes and no.
We passed the first houses and came to an open area with football fields and playgrounds. There were tents and chain link fences set up, but no sign of people, living or dead. A church came into view, and I saw that the front doors were covered in a rust-like color. I’d come to associate it with dried blood, but again there were no bodies.
There were no bodies until we entered the town proper, where the road was splattered with the remains of them. It looked like someone had driven over them again and again, not stopping until there was nothing but mush left.
My stomach heaved, but I was able to keep my small lunch down as I turned and looked up at Shadia. She didn’t look down, just stared right ahead, her jaw set end eyes hard.
“I’m glad I’m not on your bad side,” I said, and she snorted, her eyes softening and jaw loosening as she glanced down at me. “I mean, look at this. You went full Mad Max on their poor asses!”
She snorted another laugh, and I smiled as I turned back around.
Ahead, I could see a sign pointing to the station, but my eyes were drawn to a set of open doors. Beside them stood a sign saying ‘library’. There was no blood and no bodies.
I turned again. “Wait, did you take time to go to the library?”
This time, Shadia actually laughed. When she stopped, she jostled the wheelbarrow to turn me forward again. I narrowed my eyes at her.
“It was boring just waiting for you,” she finally answered.
I chuckled and turned forward again. Leave it to Shadia to break into a library during the apocalypse.
There wasn’t really a proper train station waiting for us as I had expected. Shadia rolled me past the big parking lot. It was splattered with blood and body parts, and it looked like she’d been just driven around and around, killing anything that followed her.
Instead of the train station, she took me to the fire station, which made me smile. No wonder she knew where there might be more fire axes. There was a lot of blood here as well, but she rolled me past it and around to the back, where she parked by a door.
Without a word, she lifted me from the barrow and carried me to the door, using a key to open it, and carried me inside like I was a bride on my wedding night. I considered making a joke but was too tired, the sight of the library and the blood having taken the last of my energy.
Shadia seemed just as exhausted as she only carried me up three sets of stairs and into a room filled with single beds. She lowered me onto one of them, and I smelled her jasmine scent on the pillow.
“I’ll get our stuff. You rest,” she said and kissed my temple.
I smiled at her as she stood and left the room before I closed my eyes.
I didn’t sleep, but I may have dozed as Shadia moved around downstairs. I heard her lock doors and start a car. Finally, she came upstairs again and dragged one of the other beds over to stand beside me. She’d brought food, and we ate in bed before we lay down, holding each other.
I was deep in my own thoughts when she spoke. “How did you get there?”
“Hm?”
“How did you get to the old station? You never told me.”
I drew in a deep breath and held it for a moment before I told her about the trip down-river, about the boat, the planks and crawling, the house, the long-board, and finally the old station. It wasn’t a long story, and it almost felt a little anti-climactic compared to Shadia running around looking for me. I’d spent two weeks getting from the river and to the station. It wasn’t even far inland. That said, I had to take my health into consideration. I was both proud and felt like a failure by the time I was done speaking.
Shadia lay quiet for a time before she pushed up on one elbow and looked down at me. She stroked a faded green lock of hair away from my face. I’d been chewing on it while waiting for her to speak. Was I that addicted to chewing gum? I’d eat my own hair if I didn’t get any?
“I am so sorry,” Shadia said, her brown eyes meeting mine and holding them. “I am so sorry; I couldn’t save you.”
“Hey!” I reached up with one hand and rested it against her cheek. My skin looked pale, almost blue, against her warm tones. “What’d I say about saying sorry?”
She smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. Instead of answering, she lay on top of me, wrapping both arms around me and squeezing. “I am never letting you go again!”
I laughed and mock-fought to get away. Even as we laughed and joked, I could feel the fear in her. The fear that she’d almost lost me. The fact that she was blaming herself. The fear of what those two weeks would do to my health.
With Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, everything you did came with a price. How high would that price be for me? And when would I have to pay it? Today? Tomorrow? In a month? Whenever the crash came, it would come hard, I didn’t doubt that for a second, and hoped the constant reminder of us not being safe would be enough to get us to the cabin. Would hold it off until we actually were safe.
I didn’t sleep much that night, just dozed on and off. It was a relief when my alarm woke us at nine in the morning.
We ate breakfast in bed and cleaned up in the bathroom before Shadia carried me downstairs again and into the garage. There were two firetrucks there, gleaming red and white in the light coming through the frosted windows. I couldn’t help staring. I’d never actually seen a firetruck up close before.
“Why can’t we take one of them?” I asked as Shadia walked to a dirty SUV standing between the cars.
“I don’t know how to drive them,” she answered and opened the passenger door.
“I do!”
“No, you don’t.”
“Aw, come on! It would be awesome.” She gave me a look as she helped me into the seat, and I rolled my eyes. “Fine. Not like we’re into driving firetruck anyway.”
She cocked her head and opened her mouth to ask what I meant, but the grin on my face must have given it away. “Kit, that’s nasty.”
“I said we weren’t into it!”
She slammed the door and stuck her tongue out at me. I waggled my own at her, and she laughed as she headed toward the stairs again.
One more trip and all our stuff was in the car.
“Speaking of firetrucks, have you had your period yet?” she asked, moving things around in the back of the car.
“No,” I answered, looking away. “It’s not like I’ve been able to eat any more over the last month.”
She didn’t answer, but I could feel her worry across the length of the car. I’d stopped having my period two months before the first zombie case. I didn’t eat much, and stopping the menstruation cycle was a natural part of starvation, but it wasn’t a healthy thing, so it worried everyone who cared about me. It worried me as well.
Without a word, Shadia closed the door with a slam that made me jump. She gave me an apologetic smile as she slid into the seat beside me and started the car. Squeezing my thigh, she stepped out again, leaving the car door open. The garage doors were electric, but there was a pulley system on one side, and she used that to drag it open.
I sat forward in my seat, afraid there might be undead waiting on the other side, but there was nothing. Not even a bird to stare at us in wonder.
When the door opened enough to let us drive under, Shadia jogged back and crawled into the seat.
“Seatbelt,” she said.
I pulled at it to indicate I was ready, and she closed her door and revved the engine. We left the town of Sande behind, never looking back.
37
Being back in a car was both weird and calming all at once. It felt like things were normal. Like we were just going to a doctor’s appointment or to some friends, or even the movies. Before I got too sick to hang out with our friends or go to the movies, anyway. But in-between that feeling of normalcy was the constant fact that things weren’t normal. That when Shadia made a sharp tur
n, it was to avoid a car left in the road, blood on its windows, or the crawling torso of some unlucky soul. Shadia actually drove over the torso, making sure to crush the skull in the process. It was the merciful thing to do, we agreed.
I dozed a little, and we talked about this and that. About what we would do when we got to the cabin. We hadn’t brought the wheelbarrow or a new wheelchair, so we knew we had to find something that would make it easier for me to move around. Then again, maybe I wouldn’t need it? Maybe all of this had been the cure I needed? It was OK to hope, right?
We were almost at the old border between Vestfold and Telemark, and Shadia was mumbling about us having to find some more gas. She had, apparently, not thought about stealing gas from any of the other cars in Sande, and I couldn’t blame her. I hadn’t thought of it either, and I was the one who was supposed to have watched a bunch of zombie shows.
I had the map open in my lap, looking for the easiest way to get to a town. There was apparently a small hamlet not far from here, and we had to drive past it anyway to get to the freeway. While we’d avoided it so far, we had to get onto it now, as it was the fastest way to the cabin. The alternative was driving farther inland and possibly lengthening the trip by two hours. Now that we were so close, we didn’t want to put it off any longer. We were almost safe.
“Whalla,” Shadia said, but I wasn’t sure if it was a curse or surprise, and I barely had time to look up before she stepped on the brakes and we skidded to a halt.
I was about to ask what was up when I saw it.
We were on the top of a hill, the road leading into a small dump before going up another hill. There were trees all around, and we had been driving alone for a long time. Now, as I watched, another car stopped halfway down the hill opposite us. It was a blue truck, looking well used. Nothing like the black cars of Nicholas and his men. Still, that’s where my mind went.
“You think it’s them?” Shadia asked, taking the words out of my mouth.
“Nicholas?” I asked, just to be sure, and she nodded. “No,” I continued, tasting the word. “I don’t think they’d drive a car like that. He was too proud.”
