by Paul Bishop
“I never heard of them doing much in the daytime,” I said.
“And I never heard of anyone been close enough to them for long enough to know their habits that well.”
Chris lit his cigar and unfortunately, it wasn’t a Cuban. Acrid smoke filled the room and overpowered even the sweat smell we all gave off in equal measures, with Sammy taking two measures for himself.
“Can you put that out?” I said. “It stinks.”
He spoke with the cigar clamped between his canine teeth. “Do you know how long I’ve been saving this, girl?”
Gigi stood with more venom I’d seen in her in a long while. “Just because you’ve been holding out for a special occasion doesn’t mean the rest of us want the whole place to smell like your momma’s wet pussy.”
“Now, wait a minute—”
“Chris,” Elon said and held a hand up to halt the conversation before it turned any uglier. “Maybe you should stow it. Wait until we’re on the bikes.”
Chris took the cigar out of his mouth and studied it in his hand. I knew what he was thinking. He’d started smoking it because he wasn’t sure if he’d ever have the chance again. The truth was that he didn’t know if they would make it onto their bikes. He acted like it was the last call and he might as well drink up and smoke ʼem if you got ʼem.
I had to admit, I wasn’t so sure they could make it to their motorcycles either. Our cannibal friends might be looking at a midnight snack.
He downed his shot of moonshine and bit back against the burn in his throat. “I don’t know why I gotta take orders from you girls.”
The divisions had started. It was probably best for them to move on, even though they were our two most capable hands. If we let them go, next time the cannibals attacked, we’d be lunch meat.
In my head, I began composing my plea for Elon to take me with him.
“Seriously,” Chris said and placed the cigar back between his teeth, “who the hell put you in charge?” He flicked his Zippo again and relit it.
Charlie moved fast—faster than I thought he knew how, but someone had insulted his girls.
“She said put it out,” he said and slapped down on the cigar to knock it out of the man’s mouth.
And onto the alcohol-soaked bar.
The blast of hot air blew my bangs out of my face. The whole bar top immediately erupted. Charlie fell and Sammy slipped off his barstool to join him. Elon ducked under the overhang of the bar top, which left only Gigi and I to watch as Chris caught on fire.
The burst of flame splashed a fine mist of alcohol over him. His hands were already covered with it from the spill but now, the flames clung to his shirt and seeped through his hair.
All Gigi and I could do was point and shout for one of the men to do something.
Elon stood and searched for water to throw on him. He found nothing and Sammy and Charlie lay flat on their backs like a pair of tortoises.
“Give him your shirt,” I said to Gigi. With the practiced speed from a thousand nights on stage, she removed her shirt in seconds. I hooked my crutch around the shirt and flung it to Elon, who caught it like a wide receiver and tried to reach over the bar to pat Chris down.
His friend moved too quickly. Trapped in the narrow confines of the bar, he could only shimmy from side to side like a flaming duck in a shooting gallery. He knocked against other bottles and glass cracked, and the flames went higher.
“Turn the shower on,” I said to Gigi. She raced into the dressing room to follow my order. I crutched forward and held out my left crutch to him. “Grab on!”
He jerked out with a burning arm, the skin below the flames already turning brown like any well-done meat. Once I felt him latch on, I pulled and almost stumbled as I turned on one leg and led our human torch toward the dressing area. Elon followed, dodging flames and looking helpless. I noticed Chris’s eyes through the flickering orange. They were beyond pain, simply pleading for help or maybe to help him by letting him die.
Gigi stood aside and I guided him into the waiting shower. Flames turned to smoke and finally, Chris screamed. I saw raw, red strips of his flesh peel away and choke the drain. The cigar smell would have been a welcome odor. I felt terrible, but I couldn’t help wondering if they would like the smell outside and if it would wake them up and trigger an attack again.
8
As night deepened, the room had gone cold and I shuddered. It seemed like only a minute before that the room was alive with flames but now, we had Chris wrapped in wet towels and laid out on the stage and the alcohol had long since burned off the top of the bar. The night air crept in again and chilled our bones. For the burned man, it could hardly be enough relief.
The stage looked weird without the pole. I wandered to the corner and the second stage. I’d never seen anyone use it and the brass was tarnished on the unused pole. I touched the stained metal and my shoulders shuddered again at the cold. I’d hate to have to dance up against that with my bare flesh. I didn’t have to worry, though. We never had enough dancers, not to mention customers, to warrant polishing a second pole.
Gigi stared at the exit. From the expression on her face, I assumed she remembered what had happened to Rowena and turned away, changing her mind about trying to leave.
Outside, the tribe of cannibals uttered occasional war whoops to let us know they were still there. I heard the voice of the cannibal leader. “What y’all cookin’ in there? It smells mighty good.” Laughter followed. “Save some for me.”
A chill ran through me but it had nothing to do with the temperature.
Charlie cradled an almost empty bottle of hooch like a baby to his fat tits. Sammy sat in a chair and struggled to catch his breath. He’d tried for an hour with no luck.
Elon kept vigil over his friend and all of us had the respect to leave him in peace.
“Don’t you have any heat in this joint, Sammy?” I asked.
“I have an old propane heater,” he said. “It doesnʼt get used much.”
I thought of Chris and his reasoning behind his last cigar. “Well, if not now, when?”
He shrugged, having no rebuttal, and shuffled to his office to get it.
“I can keep you warm,” Charlie said.
“Yeah, you look like you’re nice and cozy there, Charlie.”
He stood, wobbled somewhat, and started a slow zombie walk over to me. “No, I’m serious. Janet, you gotta know I’ve been sweet on you since the day you walked in here.”
“Sweet on me or my gimps?”
“You know I think they’re what makes you beautiful.”
He reached where I stood and weaved on his feet like a boxer about to go down.
“What is it, Charlie? What is it about us girls that you like?”
“I dunno,” he said.
“Well, that’s a letdown.”
“I guess maybe…” he paused to think about it. “Maybe it’s that you didn’t give up. Me? I don’t think I could handle it if something happened to make me look like that.”
“Is this your version of a pickup line?” I asked.
“You know what I mean, Janet. You’re survivors. That goes a long way in today’s world.”
I liked thinking of myself that way. I’d expected him to tell a story about how his mother had died in front of him in a bloody car crash and this was now the only way he could get off, but he surprised me with his drunk—but logical—reasoning.
“Yeah, I’m a survivor, but for how long? Rowena was a survivor. Jacqui was a survivor.”
“Look at all you’ve been through already, girl. Out of all of them, I trust you to make it out of this.”
“That’s sweet, Charlie,” I said. “I think.”
He moved in closer. Here it comes.
“And the other thing,” he said. “I gotta think a girl like you might not have as many prospects anymore. I know how people look at you. Men who used to turn their heads when you walked by now won’t look your way. I think maybe, just maybe, a guy like
me has a chance.”
He moved in for a kiss. I smelled the hundred-proof on his breath and decided his exhale might self-ignite at any second. His face was smeared in sweat and his thin hair stuck to his scalp in slimy tendrils. Up close, his skin was pockmarked and rough, and broken veins wormed over his skin like night-crawlers checking for birds before they ventured out.
“Charlie, cool it.” I put a hand on his chest. His shirt was soaked with either sweat or spilled booze. I hoped for the booze. At least my hand would come back sanitized.
“Janet, you said it—if not now, when?”
“Never, Charlie.” I made my voice firm and my arm pushed him away more firmly.
“Leave her alone, Charlie,” Gigi said from across the room.
He leaned his weight against me and I teetered on uneven stilts. It wouldn’t take much for any man to overpower me. It was a fear I lived with constantly. After night after night of taking my clothes off in front of Charlie, what did I expect?
I pushed back, but he continued to lean forward. His eyelids drooped and he dropped the bottle from his slack hand. I knew I couldn’t hold him up any longer. We tilted and my good knee bent.
Charlie landed on top of me and at first, I thought I broke a rib.
He seemed passed out and didn’t paw at me or try to rip my clothes like a real rape. He was taking a nap on me. Somehow, I was insulted.
Both Gigi and Sammy tugged on his shoulders and lifted him enough that I could crawl out.
“Dammit, Charlie,” Sammy said.
“Are you okay, honey?” Gigi asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “Fine.” I rubbed a thick smear of alcohol sweat off me.
“Stand up, you old fool,” Sammy said. Charlie had opened his eyes and seemed lost. He stood, looked at his empty hand, and clearly wondered who the magician was who took his bottle.
“I’ll take care of him,” Sammy said. “You all right, Janet?”
“I’m okay, Sam. But get him out of my sight before I beat his ass with a crutch.”
Gigi held out the brick on a rope she’d taken from the office. “Oh, we’ll do worse than that.” Stripper code—you always have your sister’s back.
“I’ll handle him,” he assured us, and they walked away like two drunken sailors.
I saw the rusty propane heater he had brought with him.
“Care to join me?” I asked Gigi.
“Sure.”
I turned the knob and pressed the starter but nothing happened. I crutched over to the bar, found the slightly charred Zippo there among the burnt planks of the bar, and walked back to the heater, making sure not to look at Chris. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful. All I wanted was a little heat.
The lighter sparked and lit the pilot on the heater and I opened the valve halfway. I tried to find the balance that would let enough warmth flow but remain mindful of how hard it would be to refill the tank these days.
Gigi and I stepped close to the heating element and relaxed our shoulders a little.
“Just when I think things can’t get any worse,” she said.
“Yep.” I felt the slow ooze of heat from the gas. “Nothing will ever surprise me again.”
“Did you ever think you’d see it all and actually live to see more?”
I smiled. I thought about the last time I’d cried but I couldn’t recall it. Humans were funny like that. We could be overloaded and blow a fuse. In the same way the world went dark for a while during the Collapse, people could shut off like switches equally as easily—like the broken starter on the heater. I wondered what kind of spark it would take to get me back to normal again.
“Is this normal now?” I asked. “I should stop waiting for something else, huh?”
“I hate to say it, but I think this is what we have for a while.”
“So, before,” I said to Gigi, “were you a dancer?”
“I did my share,” she said. “I worked a few odd jobs. Once the doctors took my titty away, though, there was no more dancing for me.”
“Until now.”
Her smile was sad. “Until now.”
“And who did you lose?” She didn’t answer right away. “You asked me who I lost. So, who did you lose?”
Gigi stared at nothing and looked deep into the past. “Everyone, honey,” she said barely above a whisper. “Everyone.” She pulled her knees up to her chin and balled up like a fist. I put an arm around her. I knew what she meant.
The crash and the scream came at the same time.
I pushed up on my crutches and turned my head toward Sammy’s office door. It sounded like a dog fight inside. Elon’s head had whipped toward the sound. He turned to look at me but never took his hand off his friend’s chest.
The next scream I recognized as Charlie. I moved as fast as I could and Gigi followed.
I aimed my crutch at the door and punched it in. A splash of blood greeted me and drew a thin line of red from shoulder to shoulder. I could feel it pooling in the indents of my collarbone.
Sammy stood behind his desk, fending off a cannibal with his chair like a lion tamer minus the whip.
Charlie was yesterday’s meatloaf. Two more meat-eaters dug into him and gorged on his ample belly. Their bloodlust reduced them to lower than animals. If you saw two baboons acting this way, you’d think it was beneath them. One of them had some kind of blade and he sliced at the body as if to disassemble him like he was on a game show and he was being timed.
Gigi screamed over my shoulder.
Sammy held his attacker at bay with the two-by-four hammered through with nails. Once I managed to tear my eyes away from Charlie, I finally noticed that he was naked. It wasn’t anything I’d ever wanted to see. I looked at the dead man and saw that he was naked too, which simply made it easier for the savages to reach the inside with fewer layers to cut through. He must have looked like an uncooked sausage to them.
More blood splattered against the walls as the feast continued.
“What is it?” Elon shouted.
I knew I didn’t dare to go inside alone and try to rescue them. Well, Sammy, anyway. Gigi wouldn’t be much help and I felt volunteering Elon for the job would be like giving orders to a Kamikaze.
Anger roused me and I poked my left crutch at one of the cannibals who ripped into Charlie. I caught him in the ear with the metal tip, but he didn’t stop his grisly feast. I saw deep-red pools fill the victim’s cavernous midsection. Organs I couldn’t identify were torn out and quickly reduced to tangles of ground meat.
Driven by a need to somehow stop the slaughter, I poked again and the flesh-eater jerked a hand out, caught the end of my crutch, and yanked. I almost lost my balance but thankfully, had the good sense to let go. It clattered into the room and came to rest in a pool of Charlie’s blood and what looked like maybe his lungs. The feasters didn’t stop and only grunted animalistic sounds of anger and pleasure.
Gigi leaned away from the open door and stood hunched, about to be sick.
I shouted to Elon, “Get me a bar rag. Soak it in booze.”
Finally, I’d thought of one weapon I could use, but only one. As I crutched lopsided across the room, I tried to prep myself for the need to slug it out with these beasts.
Sammy’s terrified yelps followed my awkward progress.
I bent over and used my one good hand to unscrew the propane tank from the tiny heater unit. The hose came off and I smelled the unmistakable rotten-egg smell of the fuel. I snatched the Zippo off the stage where I’d left it and clenched it between my teeth as I limped along, the leaking tank held in my good hand while I attempted to clamp hard enough with my half arm to hold the crutch under my armpit.
Elon met me a few steps before the door. We traded quickly. He handed me the bar rag and took the tank but gagged when he took his first look inside.
“Holy shit,” he said.
“We gotta get Sammy out.”
He dropped the tank and ran forward with the wrench from Sammy’s arsenal dangling from h
is hand.
On the way, he sidestepped a cannibal who leaned in close and gnawed into Charlie’s inner thigh. The man must have known something about where the best cuts of meat are on a person. There was no way anyone would put their mouth down there deliberately. Blood from his victim’s femoral artery dribbled out. With his heart stopped, the blood no longer spurted.
Elon moved in behind the cannibal threatening Sammy. The nail-spiked two-by-four had done its job and kept the fat man alive. With a powerful swing, the biker thunked the wrench against the cannibal’s head but it only seemed to stun the guy. He turned fast. I’ll never forget the look on his face and in his eyes. They were nothing I recognized as human. Blood-streaked and growling, the creature clawed at Elon with two flailing hands.
He jumped back, avoided the swings, and took a two-hand grip on the oversized wrench before he swung with everything he had. The blow caught the man across the chin and for a change, the flesh-eater’s own blood streaked his face. As he fell, Elon reached a hand out and grasped Sammy by the wrist. He pulled and the fat man stepped around the chair and followed him out.
“Get behind me,” I said.
Overweight and naked, Sammy moved slowly past Charlie’s disemboweled body. The two feasters looked up from their dinner and eyed the two men as they tried to slip past.
He swung his plank of wood in a wide overhead arc. The nails on the end of the board swished past the cannibal he had aimed at and thudded into the floor, but a trio of sloppily driven nails thrust through the cannibal’s foot and pinned him in place.
A high, feral scream rose from the wounded man. Sammy began to tilt. His massive feet slipped in the mess of entrails and slimy blood surrounding the body. The fat man landed flat on his back.
Elon grabbed his wrist again and pulled hard. The large man slid on a slippery layer of O positive and barely made it through the door before the angry creature heaved at the two-by-four that stapled him to the floor.
The two men skidded through and into the main room. Sammy’s back was painted in blood, rolls of blubber sloshed from side to side as he settled, and his tiny penis hid beneath an overhang of fat. I still didn’t want to know why he was naked.
