Along either side sit numerous benches, and in between every other two is a garbage receptacle—each one marked with a PR. About halfway along the pier is a small shack offering BAIT and ROD RENTALS. Walking along and smelling the salt air Bill gets lost in more fleeting memories of the past. He’d worked extra hours and saved for six months because neither Ronnie nor Jess had ever seen the beach, and wanted to go that summer after Jess’s first year of school. They’d all gotten sunburns, and the souvenir photo that hung above the TV in the trailer had shown what looked like three giant, smiling, humanoid lobsters.
Click!
Bill is stopped by the sound of the flaregun’s hammer cocking back, yet again.
“I thought we had an agreement,” Angel says.
Bill takes a deep, calming breath.
“I just wanted to return your first aid kit,” he says.
“Set it down,” she says. “I’ll get it once you’re back on the bus.”
Bill lets out a short, quiet sigh, starts to lean down, to do as she said, then stops. He turns to face her.
“Why did you signal us?” he asks, unable to hide his indignation.
At first Angel looks angry, tensing up at his words; then she seems to relax a little, lowering the gun to “half-mast.”
“I didn’t,” she says. “Cara did.”
Bill just stares for a moment and then chuckles.
“She thought you guys—or whoever was in the truck—could rescue us.”
Again Bill stays quiet, looking down at the first-aid kit in his hand.
“I guess all kids her age are like that.”
He leans down, sets the box at his feet.
“My daughter was. She always saw the good.”
Angel lowers the gun, not sure what to say. She doesn’t flinch as Bill walks past her—mere inches away. She looks down at the box, steps forward and leans down to pick it up.
“We’ll rest tonight—in the bus. Tomorrow—when we leave… you’re welcome to join us.”
***
Bill can’t sleep on the bus. The seat wasn’t meant to accommodate slumber, and between Jim’s light, labored snoring and the ever-present din of the zombies, he knows that rest of any kind is an utterly futile endeavor. And despite the light breeze that comes off the ocean the air inside the bus has become both stifling and scented with dry blood. With a quiet groan, he sits up, looking over at his restlessly sleeping friend. He grabs his jacket, though doesn’t expect he’ll need it, and walks softly toward the back of the bus.
As he eases down, he is especially careful to keep out of the zombies’ reach, practically hugging the doorframe of the bus’s rear exit. Once his boots touch down firmly on the boardwalk, he moves swiftly away from the bus and walks, as quietly as possible, toward the end of the pier.
The salty breeze is refreshing, and the freshness of it even better, though it takes a minute for the smell of dried blood to fade from Bill’s nostrils. As expected, there’s no sign of either Angel or the children. He assumes now that they’ve been taking refuge in the small shop. As he passes it, he wonders briefly if he and Jim should consider staying a while longer. After all, it would be nice to rest for more than just a night. And with a little effort, they could probably wipe out the dead that surrounds them.
But he’d already said they would leave, and something inside him made him want to keep his word—if only for her sake. Still, he could at least offer.
As he reaches the end of the pier he stops, lays his jacket across the top of the guardrail and moves to lean against it.
Looking down into the blue-black water, he wonders if there are still fish, living fish; and if so, if they too have to swim for their lives from the undead. A puff of breath something like laughter escapes him.
“Hey,” a feminine voice says softly.
Shit…
“Sorry,” Bill says, guiltily turning around to face Angel. “I know I was supposed to stay on the bus. It was just so hot and cramped that—”
“It’s okay,” she says, and to his surprise actually offers something akin to a smile. He nods, offers his own. Then she moves toward the bench nearest the end of the pier and looks his way, motioning to it. Wordlessly he accepts the invitation, grabbing his jacket and then joining her. For a moment they sit quietly, and Bill is ultra-aware of Angel’s close proximity. His pulse quickens, and he is about to excuse himself, to get up and go back to the bus when she surprises him yet again.
“So… you had a family?”
Bill’s throat tightens.
“Were they,” she pauses, “I mean—was it when this all started?”
Bill swallows dryly.
“No,” he manages.
Angel waits and then realizes that it isn’t something he wants to talk about.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t—”
“It’s okay,” he says. “It was about a year before it started. My wife was playing with our little girl while I was working on my truck. I had my head buried under the hood, listening to—” he stops, the words catching in his throat, and takes a deep, shaky breath, “listening to Jess giggle. Her mom was playing with her, chasing her around outside our trailer.”
Angel sees that Bill’s hands are clutched tightly between his knees, and instinctively places a hand on his shoulder in a gesture of comfort. He seems to notice but makes no move to recoil or shrug her away.
“Then I hear a revving engine and squealing brakes…
“And then Ronnie screams…”
Angel bites back a shuddering sigh and feels the warmth of tears rimming her eyes.
“It was the town drunk,” Bill says quietly. “He was an old war vet who fell into a bottle after a dishonorable discharge and never came back out.”
Angel finally removes her hand from Bill’s shoulder, bringing it up to wipe a single, thick tear from her cheek.
“His lawyer claimed post-traumatic stress—which was probably true—and got him manslaughter.
“Two counts.
“After that, I fell into a bottle. Got into some trouble, too, a lot of fights at the local bar.” He chuckles thickly. “When this all started I was locked up in jail. If I hadn’t been, I’d probably be…” he trails off, gesturing toward the school bus, and presumably, the zombies beyond.
“I’m sorry,” offers Angel. Bill only nods, wiping his own hot tears away with the back of one hand. Again the two stay quiet for several moments, and again Bill considers returning to the bus, wondering if he’s in for another nightmare—like so many he’d had before.
“Will there be room?” asks Angel.
At first, Bill isn’t sure what the hell she’s talking about, then realizes that she can only be referring to his truck. He’s grateful that she let the subject of his past drop.
“It’ll be cramped,” he says. “But we can make it work. Do you only have the three kids?”
“Yeah,” she says. “And they’re not mine, by the way.” She actually chuckles softly at that. Bill looks at her in the moonlight and briefly remembers Jim’s words, then pushes them aside.
“So how—” Bill starts.
“I was a TA. And the day everything started, the school—a lot of the schools—just started loading buses and sending students home.
“This was the last stop on Fred’s—the bus driver’s—route. Port Romero doesn’t have a school, so a few kids from here go to school in Everett, where I’m from. Normally I wouldn’t come along for the ride, but there was just so much panic.”
A gust of cool ocean air washes over the pier and Angel shivers. Before he can think about what he’s doing Bill has draped his jacket over her shoulders. He feels like an idiot as she looks at him, wearing a thin, almost knowing smirk.
“Thanks,” she says.
Bill grunts in response.
“Anyway, we got stuck here. And Fred managed to block off the pier before he—” she stops, looking down at her hands. “I don’t even know where he got the sandbags. But, if not for him…”
Bill waits for a beat, watching her in the dim moonlight, and then realizes she’s basically finished.
“We’ll have to lure them away to get you all to the truck,” he says thoughtfully.
“The boys, they—” she starts.
“You mean the kids?” Bill asks, tone verging on shock. Angel nods.
“Jack and Pete, they’ve done it before.” She looks down, a bit guiltily. “That’s kind of how we’ve managed to survive this long,” she chuckles, but Bill can sense it is forced. “Snack runs, and competing with those things for… for seagulls.” She nearly cringes.
That explains that, Bill thinks.
“They’re smart. And they’re quick,” she says, her face now marked by optimism. “They can lure those things away; I can get Cara and help you get your friend to the truck.”
Bill cracks a half-hearted smile and actually considers that it can work. He nods and suddenly feels how tired he is.
“Okay, then,” he says simply. Angel smiles, and Bill feels a guiltily-familiar pang. He stands, stretches, and starts toward the bus.
“Sorry about before,” Angel says. Bill turns, and she is standing. “I mean about the gun to your head, and… all that.”
He smirks. “It’s okay.”
“It’s just… we’ve met some bad people since we’ve been here. Men who—” she stops, looks down, and Bill feels a surge of emotion, a sudden overprotective anger, making a pit in his stomach. “Well, you can imagine,” she finishes.
Bill takes a breath to steady his suddenly kick-started pulse. “What happened?” he asks.
Angel looks him in the eye, no hint of any definable emotion evident. “They were passed out, full of looted booze and tired from shoving the boys around and…” She stops, looks down again. “At least they left Cara alone.”
Bill swallows thickly and his jaw tightens.
“One of them had a big hunting knife. I got it from him,” she says. “And now they’re out there,” she gestures toward the land-end of the pier, “with the rest of those things.”
***
By the time the sun is fully above the eastern horizon the morning has begun to heat up, despite the breeze coming off the water. Bill had sat—sleepless—on the bus for an indeterminate amount of time after talking with Angel. He’d listened quietly to the zombies outside the bus, vainly scratching at the metal body, ever-desperate to get at the fresh meat therein. Over and over in his head, he’d accounted for the remaining ammo that he and Jim had between them. And he didn’t know how many extra rounds—if any—Angel had for the flare gun. Finally, though, by the time the horizon was just starting to lighten up, he had dozed.
Now, after being too soon awakened by the restless slumber of his friend, he sits up. Feeling more exhausted than ever, he looks over at Jim. Quietly he moves to kneel down in the aisle, doing his best to examine the wounded leg. Immediately he is hit with a distinct smell of rot and cringes away. From where he is he can see that the bleeding must’ve never fully stopped; either that or it started up again during the night, because at least half of the meager dressing is now soaked through and stained with partially dried blood.
With a quiet, tired sigh he pushes himself back up to his seat.
***
“Bill, this is Jack and his brother Pete,” says Angel.
Bill offers a nod to either boy; each looks to be in their mid-teens, both tall and lanky. He can see at least partly how they managed not to get snagged by the zombies yet—especially with the things slowing down as time goes on and decay takes its toll.
“And of course you already met Cara.”
Bill looks down at the girl—no more than eight—and offers a thin, friendly smile. She smiles back sweetly, and he has to choke back his emotions.
“How many times have you done this?” he asks the boy called Pete.
“Don’t know; we didn’t keep count.”
“We just went whenever we needed food or water, clean clothes from one of the shops.” offers Jack.
Bill nods.
“Okay. Get whatever you need,” he says to Angel. “We’ll take it to the bus, and when these two,” he gestures toward the boys, “do whatever it is they do, we’ll make a break for the truck.” He once again regards the boys.
“Whatever you’ve done before—whatever got you back in one piece, do exactly the same thing. Don’t take any chances. We only need enough time to get your stuff and my friend to the truck. And then we’re out of here.”
“That’s right,” says Angel, “nothing new, nothing fancy. Just lure them away and then circle back around.”
Both boys nod their understanding and agreement. Bill turns once more to Angel.
“How much do you have to get?”
She shakes her head. “Not much. The kids have their backpacks, and I have a bag. A few things the boys scavenged. Not a lot.”
“Okay,” Bill nods. “Just get whatever you need that you can carry quickly.” He starts to walk away, then stops and turns back to her.
“The bus—is there gas in the tank?”
She shakes her head. “The men who came before siphoned it. But after I... well… there’s about half of a can full in there.”
She points toward the shop, and he nods. He then looks at the flare gun, tucked into her waistband.
“Do you have any more shells for that?”
Angel takes the gun from her waistband and holds it up studiously.
“Just one,” she offers.
“Okay,” Bill says. “Bring that too.”
With that, he leaves her and returns to the bus to find Jim sitting down on the bus’s steps, peering out through the glass at the desiccated zombie faces that are pressed up against it, rotted teeth gnashing weakly.
“Hey, man, we’re almost ready to get out of here.”
Jim doesn’t turn to acknowledge him but speaks in a lethargic tone.
“You think it hurts to be dead, Bill?”
Bill stares down at his friend, considers the question in earnest for a brief moment.
“I don’t know, man. Just be ready, okay?” He starts to walk away, but Jim stops him, suddenly clutching at his pant leg with an iron grip. He looks up from the steps like a man literally at death’s door.
“I think we both know this is the end of the line for me, buddy.”
“You’re gonna be—”
“I’m gonna be dead,” he says placidly.
Bill wants to argue but knows he won’t win; he knows his friend is right.
Jim slips the AR sling over his head and holds the rifle up to Bill.
“I won’t need it much longer.”
Bill takes it wordlessly and continues staring down at his friend. Jim just sits there and goes back to staring out the bus’s door window, at the wretched zombie faces, like a man looking into a mirror-image of his future self. Bill slips the sling over his head and shoulder and walks away.
***
Just as Angel had said, each child totes a backpack. Cara wears hers as if she were going back to school, while Pete and Jack set their bags down among the sandbags. Each boy also carries a golf club, one a wood and the other an iron. Angel herself carries a small gym bag, slung over one shoulder. She holds the aforementioned gas can in one hand and Bill’s jacket in the other. She sets the can down and offers the jacket back to him with a smile. He takes it, and she then pulls the flare gun from her waistband, offering it as well.
“You sure you don’t wanna hang onto it?” he asks.
She shakes her head. “I’d probably set something on fire.”
At that Cara giggles, and Bill feels a shudder run up his spine. More than anything he wants to get them—all of them—to some kind of safety. He takes the flare gun, breaks it open to see the one and only round is loaded, and then slips it down into his pocket. An arm at a time he slips his jacket on, then picks up the gas can, giving it a shake. The liquid inside sloshes, but it doesn’t feel as though there’s very much of it.
“You really need the jacket?” Pete asks. “It’s getting warm.”
“This thing’s stopped more than a few bites,” says Bill.
“Okay, Angel, can you get Cara and the bags while I cover you with the shotgun?”
Angel nods, taking Cara by the hand.
“Whatever you do, don’t let go, sweetie,” Bill says to Cara. “Angel’s gonna take care of you.”
Cara nods and Bill turns his attention to the boys.
“Get ready,” he says. They both nod and Bill jogs quickly over to the bus. He sets the gas can just inside the open back portal, and then hops up in after.
Jim now sits in the driver seat of the bus, looking more wretched than ever. Bill brings the gas can and sets it on the top step where he can grab it on the way out.
“You good, Jim?” he asks.
Jim looks up at him tiredly.
“I’m getting you out of here, man,” Bill says, placing one hand on his friend’s feverishly warm forearm, giving it a firm squeeze.
“What’s that in your pocket?” Jim says in a croak, eyes going down to the flare gun. Bill glances down absently, and answers, “Flare gun.”
“Why don’t you let me hold onto it—just in case,” says Jim.
Bill studies him for just a moment, then pulls the gun from his waistband, as well as the single shell from his pocket, and hands over both. Jim forces a thin, half-formed smile and nods his thanks.
“Long as I’m still useful,” he quips.
Bill nods, offering another friendly arm-squeeze.
***
“Okay, whenever you guys are ready,” Bill says.
He, along with Angel and Cara, sits nestled against the sandbags while Jack and Pete make ready to climb over the hood of the bus and lead the zombies away.
Jack goes first, using the hubcap of the tire as a foothold to push off of and get up onto the hood. Once he’s up, his brother hands up the golf clubs. Pete follows suit and climbs up the tire and onto the hood like a smaller child navigating a jungle gym. Once he’s up as well, Jack hands one club—the wood—back to him.
Apoc Series (Vol. 2): Silence of the Apoc [Tales From The Zombie Apocalypse] Page 22
