by Ryan Casey
Sarah sniffed. Nodded. “Better.”
“Where’s your water?”
She pointed over her shoulder, back in the direction of the spot where Holly abandoned them. “Dropped it back there. Felt a lot better since, weirdly.”
And then she stopped.
Stared ahead.
“Sarah?”
Hayden walked up to her. Saw her looking at something. Something down the road.
But when he turned, there was nothing there.
Nothing but cracked concrete. Crows perched on the edge of battered traffic lights. Blood smeared across the pavement, leading right up to the steps of a flat.
The smear of blood ending at the pram.
“Sarah, it’s—”
“The water,” Sarah said. “The—the water. I … I’ve felt better. Since the water.”
“You’re not making sense.”
She looked at Hayden. Looked right into his eyes. “Holly. Back at—back when we set off. She—she gave me her water. She gave me it. And … and since then I—”
“What’re you getting at?”
Sarah paused. Paused to take a breath. Silence filled the road.
“I think she might’ve been poisoning me,” Sarah said.
Hayden couldn’t understand Sarah’s words. Not at first. He couldn’t comprehend the implications.
“Sarah, that’s … that’s not—”
“I remember thinking. I remember thinking it tasted—tasted off. Right from the start.”
“I think you’re being paranoid.”
“I think you’re being blind,” she said.
And Hayden understood exactly what she meant right away.
Even though he walked, even though Sarah walked with him, he couldn’t feel his body.
He’d trusted Holly. He’d been the one to let her in.
And she’d been the one to betray that trust.
“That bitch,” Sarah said, tears streaming down her face. “That fucking bitch.”
“We still don’t know. For sure.”
“I know she—”
“But if she did it means you’re … you’re not infected.”
Hayden saw a momentary light in Sarah’s eyes. A sudden flash of realisation, of understanding.
But then that faded.
Faded in an instant.
“I nearly died,” she said. “I—I might still die.”
Hayden walked up to her.
Took her hand, boiling hot but shivering.
“I’m not going to let that happen,” he said. “Now come on. We’re going to get some answers.”
They walked further down the endless road. It was painfully silent. Torturously empty. Wouldn’t believe that the presence of zombies could actually be a good thing until you experienced it for yourself. At least when you could see them, you knew they were there. You knew where you stood.
On this road, abandoned cars. Broken down cars. Smashed windows. Blood-soaked concrete.
And silence.
“I don’t know how you can be so sure,” Sarah said.
“About what?”
“About us making it to Holyhead. About ‘getting answers.’”
Hayden moved the cap around in his pocket. Wasn’t sure he was even following the right road, but it was the best road to Holyhead. Holly had been pretty insistent of that. Unless that was just a trick too. Unless that was just another part of her plan.
Whatever. They had to push on to Holyhead.
“Whatever Holly lied about, there’s something in Holyhead. Some reason she’s heading there.”
“Because she’s fucking crackers?” Sarah said.
Hayden stared ahead. Felt raindrops dripping down his still-bare chest. “There has to be a reason.”
He felt the cap between his fingers again when he saw the movement up ahead.
His first instinct was to reach for the wrench in his pocket. To go ahead and attack the zombie before it reached him—before it reached Sarah.
But then he looked a little closer.
Saw the Honda Civic.
Saw the source of the movement.
So his muscles loosened.
He raised a finger. Pointed up the road.
“There,” he said.
Sarah started to say something but Hayden didn’t hear her.
He was already walking down the middle of the road.
Fast.
Powering towards the source of the movement.
The petrol cap now in hand.
When he reached the Honda Civic, when she turned to look at him, tears streaming down her face as she leaned against the side of the car—a puddle of pungent petrol spilling onto the road—Hayden couldn’t say a word.
He could only look at Holly.
Stare at her.
Stare at the guilt in her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Holly said. “I’m—I’m so sorry.”
But Hayden still couldn’t bring himself to forgive her.
Only to reach into his pocket for the wrench.
Step towards her.
Thirty-Two
Hayden lifted the wrench and stormed towards Holly.
Everything was a blur. Sarah grabbing his arm. Pulling it back. Holly with tears running down her face as she leaned against the broken-down Honda Civic, the same Civic Hayden had removed the leaky petrol cap from when he’d first seen Holly disappear. Mainly because he worried about someone taking it. Of what they might do.
But also because he worried about Holly taking it.
A small, niggling part inside asking the question: can you trust her? Should you trust her?
And as it turned out, the answer was a resounding “no”.
“You could’ve killed us,” Hayden said, lifting the wrench higher, moving closer to Holly.
“Hayden—” Sarah said.
Hayden pushed her back. “You could’ve killed us. You—you fucking left us for dead.”
“I didn’t mean for it to turn out this way,” Holly said. Her voice sounded worn out. Exhausted, even. She didn’t look like she had any fight left in her.
“Then how the fuck did you mean it to turn out, hmm?” Hayden asked, doing all he could not to crack Holly’s skull for her betrayal. “How the fuck was this supposed to end?”
“Just—just—”
“What aren’t you fucking telling us—”
“There’s no safe place in Holyhead!”
The words cut through Hayden’s consciousness like a chainsaw through wood. They echoed down the silent dual-carriageway. Words he’d suspected. Words he’d expected, even.
But words he didn’t want to hear.
Because hearing them meant making it this far was all for nothing.
Hearing them meant there was no hope. No hope at all.
Hayden lowered the wrench. His heart pounded. He could taste sweat dripping down his lips. “Why lie?”
Holly didn’t answer. She just leaned against the car. Head pressed right up to the window. Moving it from side to side. Crying.
“I said why fucking—”
“I needed—I needed to get there,” Holly said. “I—Someone I love. My husband. Ex-husband. He’s there. He works there. And I just … I wasn’t strong enough. No one’s strong enough alone. Please. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Hayden struggled to wrap his head around the harsh reality of the words. Holly just wanted to find her husband—her ex-husband. She needed someone to help her get to Holyhead.
“You used us.”
“I know and I’m—”
“You almost got us killed. You … you got Gary killed.”
Holly kept on shaking her head. Kept on sniffing. Rain trickled down from the grey storm clouds above.
“Tell me one thing.” Sarah’s voice. Hayden had almost forgotten she was here with him. So entranced in the moment. So gripped by rage.
Holly lifted her head and right away Hayden saw guilt in her tear-soaked eyes when she looked at Sarah.
�
��The water,” Sarah said, her voice quivery now. “You … you spiked it. Didn’t you? You spiked it.”
Holly’s bottom lip shook.
She didn’t shake her head.
Didn’t protest.
She didn’t have to.
“You evil fucking bitch,” Sarah said. But there was a fragment of relief to her voice too. Relief at the fact that she wasn’t infected. She hadn’t caught the virus after all. “You … you selfish fucking—”
“I never wanted to hurt you,” Holly said.
“How can you say that?” Sarah shouted. “How—how can you possibly fucking say you never wanted to hurt us when you—when you tried to kill me? When you left us both for dead?”
Holly didn’t have an answer to that.
All she could do was shake her head.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Hayden’s mind raced. Raced with all kinds of thoughts, all sorts of theories. Things Holly had told him. Truths and half-truths he’d believed.
“The bite,” Hayden said. “The bite. On your arm. The story about … about surviving. Surviving a bite. Not getting infected.”
He didn’t want to ask the question.
He didn’t want to know the truth.
But he had to.
The look on Holly’s face didn’t change.
She didn’t say a word, not right away.
And that was enough for Hayden to know.
The bite mark was a lie.
“I … I was with another group,” Holly said. “And bad things, bad things happened to them. So I … I moved on. I moved on but I was so scared. I needed—I needed something that made me extraordinary. Something that—that made me more than just an ordinary woman. I needed …”
She looked down at the bandage around her arm.
She didn’t have to say any more.
Hayden couldn’t speak. Not for a moment. And while he was angry, there was another prevailing feeling inside. The feeling of intense grief. The death of hope. Holly had been a beacon of light in a dark, violent world. She’d been an end goal. She’d been extraordinary, just like she said.
But she wasn’t.
She was just normal.
A normal girl who’d dragged them miles across the country in hope of finding her ex-husband.
“Why lie?” Hayden asked.
“What?”
“Why lie to us? About all this? Why lie?”
Holly wiped her eyes. Stepped away from the car. “If I’d told you the truth, would you have helped me make it this far?”
Hayden didn’t answer.
Figured he didn’t need to.
They stood there in the wind. Rain falling down heavier. In the distance, right up the road in the direction of Holyhead, the silhouettes of zombies. Zombies drifting towards them. Edging closer. Far enough away for them not to pose a threat right now, but on their way. Like they always were. Like they always would be.
“I know what I did was bad—”
“Bad?” Sarah shouted. She sat on the concrete shaking her head. Colour had returned to her cheeks in abundance. Red. Angry red.
“I—I can only say I’m sorry. But—but I was desperate. I needed someone. And … and all I can say is I’m sorry. Please.”
Hayden walked over to the Honda Civic.
Opened the boot, pulled out a rubber pipe from inside.
Stuck it in the petrol tank, then walked over to a white Seniors coach, stuck the other end in its fuel tank.
Let the petrol trickle from the higher tank of the coach into the Honda Civic.
Not lots, but enough.
Enough to get them to more petrol.
Enough to get them away from here.
Nobody said a word while Hayden filled the Civic’s tank. Just watched the shadows of the mass of zombies drift closer. Heard their echoing groans pick up in volume, in intensity.
When he’d drained the coach of all the juice he could, he took the pipe away, shoved it in the Civic’s boot and slipped the petrol cap back on the tank.
He walked up to Holly. His wrench still tight in his sweaty palms. Heart still racing. So many things he wanted to say to her. So many things he wanted to do to her, to punish her.
He took a deep breath in through his nostrils.
“You did what you had to do to get this far,” Hayden said.
And then he opened the car door.
Waved at Sarah to get inside.
“But this is as far as you go,” he said.
He climbed in through the passenger seat and clipped his belt on while Sarah started the engine.
“Wait,” Holly said, slapping her palms against the windscreen. The tears flowing again. “Please. I—I’m sorry. Don’t leave me out here. Don’t—”
“I wouldn’t shout too loud,” Hayden said, as Sarah turned the car around, back in the direction of Riversford, back in the direction of their home. “The zombies’ll be on to you in a few minutes. I think now’s a good chance to run.”
He nodded at Sarah.
Sarah put her foot down.
Accelerated back down the derelict dual-carriageway.
As they moved, Hayden heard Holly crying. Heard her shouting, screaming at him to come back.
Saw her in the wing mirror. Saw her and the shadows of the zombies behind her, getting closer to her, closer and closer.
Above her, the sign to Holyhead. The sign to the false beacon of hope. The place they’d trusted in, believed in, given everything up to get to, gone.
“You okay?” Sarah asked.
Hayden stared at Holly in the cracked wing mirror as she got smaller and smaller, smaller and smaller, until she was gone.
“I am now,” he said.
But he wasn’t.
He really wasn’t.
Thirty-Three
Holly stared at the oncoming mass of zombies and wondered how the hell she’d fucked up so much to end up in this position.
They were beautiful, in a way. The infected. The way they moved so uniformly, like towels drying on a washing line in the wind. She thought back to her old house on Cranston Drive. First place her and Andy had bought together. Barely earning enough to pay the mortgage, but fuck, that didn’t matter. What mattered was they had a home. A place they could call theirs. A proper place with a nice kitchen and a double bed and a cosy lounge and, yes, a washing line.
A washing line, even though it always rained. Always frigging rained.
But it was home.
And it was lovely.
And then Andy met someone better than her and it was gone, he was gone.
She listened to the echoing cries of the zombies, the cold wind creeping through her shirt, tingling her already icy skin. She wasn’t afraid. Wasn’t afraid to look them in the eyes, look her own fate in the eyes. Not anymore. Because she’d got what she deserved. She’d done a terrible thing—no, done terrible things—and she was being punished for her mistakes. It was only right that she paid for her mistakes.
She owed it to Sarah.
To Hayden.
To all the people who’d fallen because of her—fallen trying to help her, protect her, look out for her because they felt she was important—she owed it to them.
She licked her dried, chapped lips and wished she had some water. Water. What she’d done to Sarah’s water. Tampered with it. Made her sick. That was an awful thing to do. Something she’d done early, something she regretted the more she got to know Hayden and Sarah, the more she learned about them, the more she saw them as people. Not just taxis, not just a vessel to get her to Holyhead, to get her to Andy, but people.
She’d crossed a line when she’d given Sarah the pill-filled drink. She knew that. Knew it was something she’d never be able to get away with—that she’d never forgive herself for.
She’d made a mistake.
She’d made so many mistakes in the name of reaching her ex-husband.
In the name of standing by his side once again.
In the name
of love.
Hadn’t everyone made a mistake in the name of love at some point in their lives?
Holly looked over her shoulder. Looked down the road where Hayden and Sarah had driven. She couldn’t blame them for turning away. Couldn’t knock them for turning their back on Holyhead. Sure, her story about Holyhead was lightweight in the first place, but one thing she’d learned in her time in this new world was that people would go to crazy extents in the name of one small thing: hope.
She’d given Hayden hope. She’d given Sarah hope.
Now she was paying the price for tearing that hope away.
It was only right.
She turned back around and looked in the middle of the mass of zombies. Got herself ready to set off. To walk. To find another way to Holyhead. Because she couldn’t give up. She had to keep on going. Had to keep on fighting, right to the bitter end.
When she looked down the road, she saw something.
Something different. Something in the middle of the zombies. Something that wasn’t there, not before. Something …
Her fists tightened.
Her mouth opened.
Her heart picked up.
She saw what was ahead.
What was coming towards her.
A silver vehicle. About the size of a coach. Ploughing its way through the zombies. Accelerating right towards her.
Holly swallowed a lump in her throat. Held her breath. Tried to cook up a story. ’Cause these people could help her. They could take her to Holyhead.
But no. They were coming from Holyhead. They were coming from Holyhead so they had to know. Know she was lying.
She had to think of something else.
Something to convince them.
Something to earn their trust.
She tore the bandage away from her “bitten” wrist as the vehicle powered closer, the smell of gasoline rich in the air. Scratched at the healing wound until it bled again, looked fresh. She tore away some of her shirt. Made herself look broken, lost. Like she’d been in a car accident. Or like she’d been walking out here for days. Walking for days, narrowly surviving, and …
The vehicle stopped right beside her.
The engine didn’t stop, though. So loud, blocking all sense of her surroundings. She looked up at the side door to this coach-like vehicle. A massive coach spray-painted silver, all of the windows blocked up.
