by Sweet, W. G.
“Which is why I'm doing it.” She stretched her legs, angled them across to the drivers side floorboard, and leaned back into the door. The last thing she remembered was smoothing the hair out of his eyes and then she spiraled away into a series of dreams.
CHAPTER FOUR
Billy and Beth
March 15th
It was late afternoon when Billy awoke. Somewhere in the day Beth had wound up beside him, two spoons in a drawer. He lay still unwilling to let her go, his hand was curled protectively around her. Beth moved and he felt the sleep leave her body. One moment all soft and willing, the next a live wire.
“You didn't cop a feel did you?” Beth asked in a mumbled half sleepy voice.
“Beth, can't you ever just say something like, I don't know, good morning?”
She twisted her head around and smiled. The secret smile she rarely ever gave out. The one that had started him falling in the first place. “Good late afternoon,” she said and the smile slipped away. There was still something there, but it wasn't that secret, vulnerable glimpse into her heart that it was usually. She stretched, yawned, and her feet came up against the door. “Next vehicle we get is an SUV so we have some place to sleep too.”
“I don't know, I kind of liked this,” Billy said before he could shut his mouth down.
Beth laughed and it was the unguarded Beth once more. “As long as you know what the deal is.” She twisted her head once more, and then her entire body so she was looking directly in his eyes.
“I... I know the deal,” Billy said. The press of her body was maddening.
“We really don't need to talk it out?”
“You know how I feel, Beth.”
“I do,” she nodded and her eyes became sad. “Let me just say these few things.” She took a deep breath and then began to speak. “I am attracted to you. I considered sleeping with you before you became my friend, before I knew it couldn't work between us. I even considered it after... Maybe ten minutes ago too, but it would cost me a friend because it wouldn't mean to me what it would mean to you.” She held his eyes as if willing him to understand.
“It's like you see me as this fragile little princess, and I am so far from that, Billy. So far. You have been on the bad side of me and so I can't see why you still try to see me that way.” She laughed. “It's a thing men do. Like... Like that is love, you see? Instead of love just being about all the other stuff... The things I admire about you, you about me. The things in common, the things that we share, the parts of you and me that are real that end up in the mix... But no, I'm a princess, unattainable beauty, something to worship, and it has nothing to do with what I really am at all. I have lived that way, tried to live up to that. It's not possible... The man I need is out there, I hope. Just someone that looks at me as me.” She watched his eyes.
“I think I can do that,” Billy told her.
Beth laughed.
“No, really. I think I can separate those things... I'm pretty sure.”
“Yeah? I think you like the idea of me... I think you want to fuck me... I think it might even hold together in a situation like this... At least for a while. And I think you could talk me into that comfort we could give each other, and I think you would feel completely different about me once that happened. You would think it meant that we were together, and it wouldn't mean that at all. It would mean we were scared and we took some comfort in each other... Because the attraction was there, and because it can just be about that sometimes.” She drew a breath. “But I think then I would go from princess to whore, because that's the way this world works, princess to whore in sixty seconds. I've seen it... I've felt it... And then I lose my friend, and I also hurt my fiend, because he doesn't want to see it, I mean really see it for what it is.” She reached one hand up and pushed Billy's dirty blonde hair away from his eyes. That hair, and the way it hung across his eyes was one of the things that had nearly made her give in. He looked like a little boy, vulnerable, maybe he would love her forever, never hurt her, never treat her badly, never leave, but he would be reacting to something in her that didn't really exist. Something only he saw. That little boy, awestruck, in love, but not the kind of love she needed him to feel, to be in with her... She sighed again. She could see the hurt in his eyes.
“We probably should get going,” Billy said. A smile played across his lips. Tentative, but there.
“Okay,” she laid her head against his chest. “I need a toothbrush... That little bastard made me lose my toothbrush.”
Billy laughed. “I got extras.”
She lifted her face up, “Really?”
“Really.”
She bent and kissed his forehead and then rose from the seat and looked around at the scrub brush and sand before she rose all the way up and sat on the edge of the seat while Billy straightened his long frame out and sat on the drivers side of the seat.
“That felt sort of, I don't know, brotherly... That kiss.”
“I hated my brother,” Beth said. She levered the handle and stepped down to the ground.
“Hey?” Billy said. Beth stopped and looked back at him, her eyes careful.
“I'll work at it... I mean,” he looked at a loss. “I don't want to lose our friendship.”
Beth smiled. “Thanks... I mean it. Now get out here and get me a toothbrush, Billy Jingo.” She laughed as she finished.
~
“So, look.” Billy jabbed his finger at the map and Beth leaned across and looked at the map. “Teddy Roosevelt Lake... Tonto National forest... Connected to Gila National forest... Cibola National forest. Pretty isolated.”
Beth turned her eyes back to the desert. There was little to see, but twice she had hit bushes that popped up out of what seemed like nowhere. They had passed under the truck, but there were cactus out here too in places, and she was pretty sure a cactus wouldn't just pass under the truck.
“So... Why there?” Beth asked.
“Just a place to get our shit together: Breath for a few moments, really look the map over and pick a destination.”
“Isn't that taking us closer to Yellowstone, or whatever is causing the problems to the north?” Beth asked.
“It is... But,” Billy checked the scale and did some quick measurements. “Still close to a thousand miles away from there.” He looked up. “I think it is Yellowstone. I heard something just before the shit hit the fan, something about the park in Yellowstone.”
“What was it?” Beth asked.
“I don't know,” Billy answered. He shrugged. “I wasn't paying attention... Wish I had been... Something like everyone in the park went off line... Like they couldn't reach any of the stations, rangers, whatever you call them... Something like that. And seismic activity, like an earthquake centered there.” He shrugged once more and shook his head.
“So it's a good place to stay away from,” Beth said.
“Yeah... I would say so, but we'll be a thousand miles away.” Billy shrugged once more.
“So?”
“So, head north... We'll have to cross a few highways... Just keep out from the cities... I mean Phoenix turns to suburbs that spread out a long way, at least that's what the map looks like. Like it just kept spreading and so they just kept adding names.”
Off to their left the city was easy to spot. There were fires all through it. In some places huge sections were on fire, in others it was scattered fires. There were no areas that didn't seem to be affected, and with the fires it was easy to track the edge of the cities as they drove.
Beth laughed. “So they just added names. Well, couldn't the same be said about New York? About any large city as it grows? Isn't that the way it works?”
“I guess... I hadn't thought it out, I guess.”
~
“Going to have to cut through part of the city,” Beth said a few moments later.
Billy looked up from the map as the truck rolled to a stop. “A river.”
“Probably a canal...” Beth said. “Either way w
e can't drive over it... Does it break anywhere?” She turned the truck and began to run alone the side of the canal heading for the city once more. In the distance several fires burned, but the fires seemed to be a few mile distance, nothing close. “Like a housing development or something,” Beth said a few minutes later as the truck bumped up onto a road that was paralleled by a brick wall. The wide concrete gutter was bone dry, the pavement smooth after so much time in the desert
“Not on the map...” He shrugged. “I just don't know, Beth.”
Beth had stopped on the edge of the housing development. It was dark, lit only by the headlights of the truck. Cars and trucks sat neatly in driveways. The streets were empty. Heavy dust seemed to blanket the whole scene. Little trails cut from place to place.
“Fucking spooky,” Billy said. “Volcanic ash?”
“Probably... What do you think the trails are?”
Billy frowned. “It has to be dead.”
“It doesn't have to be dead... Could be small animals raiding house to house... No garbage any more so they have to get into those houses and get what they can or starve... Or it could be dead.”
“Great, you had me ha...”
Something hit the truck hard and it rocked on its springs. The smell of death hit them about the same time, and Beth hit the gas, mashing the pedal into the floor boards.
A rotting hand came through the open back window and fastened around Beth's throat, her hands left the wheel as she was yanked backwards, and the truck spun hard to the left and accelerated, her foot still mashed on the gas.
Billy lifted his gun and shot the zombie in the face. It seemed slow motion at first, the face exploded as it fell away into the back of the pickup, Beth drew a deep breath and tried to grab the wheel but it was too late. Everything sped up to real time and the truck roared forward and slammed into the side of a house, continuing into it. Her foot had slammed down on the brake and the truck finally stopped several feet into the house.
Billy hit the dashboard hard and then rebounded and slid under the dash as the truck plunged into the house. Seconds later he scrambled out from under the dash, the smell of gasoline was strong, the smell of the hot motor equally strong. He looked over at Beth but she seemed dazed, her eyes unfocused, a trickle of blood running from somewhere under her hairline, mumbling softly under her breath. Billy levered his door open with a little help from his foot, it screeched as it opened. The screech of metal was very loud in the silence of the house. The headlights were still on, illuminating what looked to be a kitchen.
The smell of death came to him over the smell of gas and hot motor.
“Jesus, Beth. Jesus. We got to go,” Billy said loudly. He reached down, gabbed Beth's rifle where it had fallen to the floor and then shoved his gun into his holster. He was surprised he had the presence of mind to actually pull the strap over the hammer and snap it in place to hold the gun in. He reached over and pulled Beth to him, she came willingly. A second later he was outside the ruined truck and staring out the hole it had punched through into the house. He saw no dead, but he could smell them. He debated only briefly and then ran for the hole and the moonlit night outside.
The dead were all around, pulled from their wanderings by the sound of the wreck and the smell of the living. Billy shifted Beth's weight more fully onto his shoulder, and lifted the gun. Before he could fire the truck blew up behind him and he felt himself pushed by the blast out into the street where he struggled to stay on his feet. A warm rush or air moved rapidly past him and Billy got his feet moving only a second later.
The dead scattered. They made this odd clicking sound, a sort of strangled scream, which Billy supposed was all they could do with no air to move their lungs, as he ran they slowly disappeared into the hiding paces they had stumbled from. An SUV loomed out of the darkness, illuminated by the flames and the moonlight. Dusty, sitting in the driveway of a house three houses over from the one they had plowed into. A second later and Billy had the door open and Beth tumbled inside onto the passenger seat. He ran around the car to the other side and fired a quick burst at three of the dead that came from the side of the garage and started toward him in their stumbling, dragging way. They all three went down, but they were back up again almost as quickly as they had gone down. He was too far away for head shots. He got the handle open and jumped into the car pulling the door shut behind him.
He sat, his breath coming in ragged gasps and pulls. His lungs hurt, there was a stitch in his side and his heart felt like it just might explode at any second. He looked over at Beth, but her head was rocked back against the seat back. A sob escaped his throat, but he bit down on it, and breathing hard checked the ignition.
No keys, but that was what he had expected. What he hoped for was gas. The car should start, the gas was the important thing. He reached to the floorboards for his knapsack and a screwdriver to jimmy the ignition and that was when he realized he had nothing to get the truck started with. All he needed was a screwdriver to hammer into the ignition, pop the cylinder, and then start it. But he had neither the screwdriver nor a way to get it into the ignition in the first place. He fisted his hands and slammed them against the wheel. His head sank onto his hands.
“Smash it,” Beth said. It was not much more than a whisper, but it bought Billy's head up fast. Outside the truck the dead were gathering. Just three or four, but they could smell them, and it wouldn't be long until more showed up. He focused on her face which was ashen and blood slicked, unsure if she had really even spoken. She turned her face to him, eyes heavy lidded, unfocused. “Smash it, Billy... Rock... Rocks by the driveway... Saw them... Smash it.” Her head sank down to the dashboard and stayed there. A trickle of blood ran across the dusty plastic and rolled toward the edge of the dash before it slipped over the edge and continued down into darkness.
“Jesus, Beth. You're hurt bad, Beth.”
“Billy... Billy shut up and get a rock... Get it, Billy. Stop whining, get the fuckin' rock.” Beth told him. Her words were muffled, whether from the effort or the position she was in he couldn't tell. He picked up the rifle by the barrel and looked through the glass at the dead that were trying to figure out a way into the truck. He waited for the one near the drivers door to slip backwards along the side of the SUV and then he threw the door open and jumped from the truck.
He landed bad, on the very same rocks Beth had been talking about, and nearly went all the way down before he caught himself and slammed his knee into the pavement to stop himself. He had been unable to close the door as his ankle twisted and he fell away. The one that had just slipped past the door was already turning to get inside. He couldn't shoot, if he did he might hit Beth. He launched himself at the shambling wreck instead and knocked it backwards and to the ground. They were both snarling he realized a moment later when he shot it in the head.
A second one came around the back of the SUV. Billy took two steps and shot it in the head. The third was on the opposite side of the truck and seemed frozen, unsure what to do. Billy turned, picked up a large rock, and tried to step back into the truck. The ankle collapsed and he went sprawling, losing the rock, barely holding onto the rifle as he once again slammed his knee into the ground to stop himself from planting his face on the steel door sill of the car. The zombie on the other side made up her mind, stood to her full height, and sprang to the roof of the car. Billy heard the metal buckle as she landed.
A second later he forced himself to his feet, adrenaline flooding his body, leaving that sour electric taste in his mouth as it did. The zombie stood to her full height once more, nothing but tightly stretched skin and protruding bones, but determined to have him. Billy raised the rifle and shot her under the chin. She collapsed on the barrel and he turned as she spilled past him and burst open onto the pavement behind him. Billy took two shambling steps of his own, ankle and knee screaming, pain so hard that it made him stop and double up. He vomited, losing control for a brief instant. The pain was so hot. A second after that the ad
renaline kicked back in and he finished his shambling travel, managed to stoop and pick up another large rock and get back inside the SUV. He slammed the door on the hand of another zombie that had come out of the darkness. He heard the bones snap, and the fingers fell away into the SUV as the door thudded home. Billy collapsed against the steering wheel. He couldn't seem to catch his breath. He waited for his heart to slow down.
The dead seemed to be everywhere when he lifted his eyes a few seconds later. One was inches away, staring into his own eyes through the glass. Dozens of others milled about as if waiting to be told what to do. His heart staggered once more, and the rifle was coming up before he realized he could do nothing. He lowered the gun and raised the rock that was still clutched in one hand. He smashed it down on the cheap plastic that surrounded the ignition built into the side of the steering column.
Outside the zombies went crazy. Sounds did that to them, but to Billy it was almost as if they knew he was about to escape. The one next to the window stepped back and cocked it's head. Billy looked back at the column, smashed the rock down again and the pieces of the ignition fell to the floorboards of the SUV. A splinter of plastic cut his hand as he jammed his fingers into the opening and pushed down into the hole the cylinder had once occupied. It took a second to find what he was searching for, but once he found it his finger pressed down and the motor began to turn over. At nearly the same time the zombie dropped from sight outside the window.
The motor coughed to life just as the zombie shot up with a rock in its rotting hands and smashed it down on the glass. Billy let out an involuntary scream as the rock skittered across the glass and flew across the hood. The zombie did it's odd little scream and then fell out of sight once more. Billy slammed his hand forward, caught the shift lever and yanked it down into reverse. His foot was already mashing the gas pedal down, the engine was revving and so when the zombie came back up with yet another rock the front slammed into him as Billy spun the wheel, and the car began to race backwards, turning as it went. The zombie and several behind it flew away from the side of the car, the wheels hopped as it bounced over them and then caught. The car rocketed out into the street. Billy locked the brakes up to get it stopped and nearly stalled it as it ground to a stop. A second later he dropped it into drive and plowed through a group of a dozen or more of the dead as he fumbled for the headlight switch and roared off down the road.
