“Find the back door. Has to be one. Go,” I said, holding the door closed. “Move!”
The first zombie to reach the dental office didn’t bother with the handle. Maybe you could blame the cleaning staff. I don’t think he saw glass at all. His hands hit the door first. His wrists snapped back from the impact. His arms flattened, and then his whole front half slammed into the glass--momentum and all.
I took it as an opportunity, and ran. I sidestepped the front counter. Darting past hospital-green dental chairs, where large round lights hung overhead, I noticed trays of dental tools. I fisted away as many as I could grasp.
“Back here,” Allison said.
A bell jangled. They were inside.
The floor rushed to meet my face. The wastepaper basket had been in my way. I knew it now, as I fell. My knee hit the tile. I winced, and gasped, and for just a moment, drew my leg up and in.
“Chase!”
In an attempt to scramble to my feet, I felt hands on my back. “I’m good,” I said.
The groan and moan that followed almost made my heart stop. MY kids were feet away. I’d found them. I had them. And now I was going to get devoured.
The man’s weight was too much. The small of my back felt like it might break. The thing had to be kneeling on me.
I released the handful of silver instruments, which made a clinking noise on the tiles, and snatched up the one that looked the sharpest.
The zombie had me by the back of the hair.
I squirmed and wiggled, trying to throw him off me. The backpack might have been all that saved me from having the back of my neck chunked out by a rabid mouth of teeth. I kicked with my legs as best I could. All I kept wondering was, where are the other four? Is this it?
Coming at me were sneakers. Jeans.
The zombie pulled back on my hair, my throat was extended tight. My eyes bulged. Not just from the pain of my head feeling like it was being ripped off my torso, but because the person coming at me was my daughter.
Allison was right behind her, running at her, but too many steps away to stop Charlene.
The blade of the ax dragged for a half second, before she lifted and swung it in one fluid motion.
I would have screamed if my lungs weren’t being completely deprived of oxygen. I heard the thwap of the ax sticking into flesh.
The weight fell off my back. The hand that had me by the hair, released.
I was free.
I scrambled forward, my leg sending sharp shooting pain up my thigh to my hip, and down it to my toes.
“Are you okay?” Charlene was about to walk past me, looked determined to deliver another, possibly fatal blow.
I spun her around by the arm.
“She ran from me,” Allison said.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said. The sound of glass shattering was so ear-splitting loud, I almost covered mine. “Where’s Cash?”
“By the door,” Allison said and ran with Charlene and me following.
Charlene carried her own weapon. I had no idea what had happened to my shovel. I had a feeling; I was going to need it, too. “Baby,” I said. “Give me the ax.”
She re-tightened her grip on the wooden handle.
“Honey,” I said, “I need the ax.”
“I need the ax, Daddy.”
“You don’t need to fight right now.” I wanted to tell her she wouldn’t need to fight ever again. I thought that might be a lie. She didn’t need to be lied to. The truth was the only thing that would help us survive this mess. “Let me have the ax.”
I thought she might cry. As she handed it over, her arms trembled. Possibly, she was happy to be giving it up, turning the ax over. The responsibility, and the stress and the idea of killing zombies lifting off her, I hoped.
“I want you to stay close to Cash, okay? And both of you stay close to me and Allison,” I said.
Charlene stared at me. Tears rimming the bottom of her eyelids.
“Okay, honey?”
“I won’t let go of his hand,” she said.
“That’s my girl,” I said.
“We ready?” Allison said.
“We’re going to stay behind the shops. Run all the way across. We follow the buildings in the ‘L’ shape and it will bring us out right where we need to cross at Ridge,” I said. It was stating the obvious. I think I just needed to hear a plan out loud. It helped. Having direction.
“Got it,” she said.
“Then let’s go!”
The morning sun lit the lot. It should have been a consolation. It wasn’t, it was the opposite. Easier to hide in the darkness. I felt we were too exposed. Too out in the open. Staying close to the buildings, running around green dumpsters, and cardboard box piles, made me nervous. I felt something was always on the other side. We never slowed though. We didn’t use caution passing the potential zombie hiding spots. We flew past them. We had somewhere to be.
In bad movies, someone tripped, fell, and twisted an ankle. I almost held my breath as we ran, waiting for such a cliché to happen. It did not.
We reached the end of the lower half of the “L” shaped plaza. Here, we did stop. I held up my fist. The kids were behind me. Allison behind them. I checked around the corner. I expected to see at least some zombies.
I’d been wrong.
There was more than some. I counted ten.
“Chase?”
“Zombies. Ten,” I said.
“Fast ones?”
“Can’t tell.”
“I want my ax,” Charlene said.
I closed my eyes. “We can’t go this way.”
“We can’t go back the way we came. We don’t have time for that,” Allison said. I wish she’d stayed with Dave. The Humvee would be there, or was there. She’d be safe. It would be one less person I had to worry about. “Try the radio.”
“There’s nothing Dave can do,” I said.
“Maybe the Border Patrol is there, and they can help.”
“And if they’re not? Then Dave’s going to come. I don’t want him trying to save us. He has a chance to get out of this,” I said.
“We all do.”
I bit my lip and lifted the radio. “Dave? Dave you there?”
We waited. Silence. It boomed. Nothing.
“Dave?”
They might be gone already. Rescued. I lowered the radio; fit the clip onto my pants.
It crackled. “Chase? Chase, where are you? Over.”
I looked at Allison. “We have my kids. We’re behind the Toys R Us. Making our way back to you. The Humvee there?”
“Not yet. Over,” he said.
“You guys safe?”
“So far. We’re staying low. Keeping quiet. Over.”
“Listen, you don’t wait for us. Got it? You hear me?”
Allison reached for the radio. “What are you doing?”
I was saving lives. “Stop it,” I said.
I knew what I was doing. My kids were with me. I wanted them out of here more than anything. I shut the radio off. “We’re going to make it,” I said. “Humvee’s not there yet. So we have time.”
Allison shook her head. “Whatever you say.”
I ignored the poison in her words. Passive aggressiveness wasn’t going to change my mind. Not this time. I was going to save us. All of us. I just wasn’t sure how. Yet.
Chapter Forty-One
So far, we’d made it nowhere. We stood, the four of us, with backs to the cinder block wall. Possibly only minutes had passed. Felt like hours. I kept checking around the corner.
The zombies were still there. They milled about. They were closer though. We’d have to move.
“What are we going to do?”
I stared at Allison, then past her, and smiled.
“What? You have an idea.”
The sun finally worked to our advantage.
The daylight, you might say, had saved us.
I pointed.
Allison turned. She looked back at me. She was al
l smiles. “Let’s go kids,” she said.
I hoisted Cash up onto the Dumpster. It sat behind a Chinese takeout place. I couldn’t read the writing on the back door.
Sure, we could have tried all the back doors into the different shops. I didn’t want to be trapped inside. Who knew how many zombies might be lurking about.
Charlene climbed up next, on her own. She set her hands inside the slid-open Dumpster door, and planted a foot as high as possible, and hoisted herself up. She pushed up and stood onto the dumpster next to her brother. She held out a hand for Allison.
I gave Allison a lift.
Then I heard them. Unmistakable moans. Groans.
“Behind you, Daddy,” Charlene said, as Allison and she clasped hands. I pushed. Charlene pulled and Allison was up. And safe.
I handed them the ax. I copied my daughter. Hands inside the opening on the sliding door. Planted my foot.
“Daddy!”
I knew they were more than right behind me.
My dress shoes slipped on the outside wall of the dumpster.
I turned around, and ducked.
The zombie lunged. He fell halfway into the garbage. I grabbed his legs. He flopped inside the Dumpster.
I had mere seconds to try again. I wasn’t comfortable climbing the dumpster by the open door, so I closed it. I pulled myself halfway up.
“They’re all coming, Chase. Hurry. Hurry.”
I refrained from telling Allison she wasn’t helping by panicking.
My girls lifted me by tugging on the backpack.
I heard Cash. He was crying.
I’d comfort him, but not yet. We had to move.
Once we were on the dumpster, the ladder to the roof was easy to access. Would have been better if the dumpster was slightly closer to the back of the building. We’d manage.
The gathering zombies surrounded the dumpster.
We had no way down, or out. The ladder, the roof, was now our only option. My face felt hot. I knew I was sweating. “Allison, you’re going first.”
She didn’t argue. She knew she’d need to help get the kids over and up.
She stood on the edge of the dumpster. Fingertips of the zombies clawed at the toe of her shoes -- just out of reach from grabbing her foot and yanking her off, and down for their mealtime.
“Daddy!” Cash was shaking.
“We’re almost there, buddy. We’re almost out of here.”
Allison stretched a leg out towards the first ladder wrung.
“I don’t reach,” she said.
“You’ll have to jump to it,” I said. It was obvious.
“I don’t think I can,” she said.
“Alley, you almost reach. It’s not a far jump. Just keep your eyes on the ladder. Reach for the ladder with both hands,” I said.
She clapped her hands together. It would be cute if she were working up nerve to jump into a swimming pool. Right now, I was simply annoyed.
“Alley! Jump!”
Startled, she jumped.
In my mind’s eye I saw it. She fell. Twisted her ankle. The zombies were on her. Tore at her flesh.
It was not what happened.
She’d made it. One arm wrapped around a wrung at the bend in her elbow. Her feet dangled, taunting the zombies below. Except where she was, they could reach her leg. “Get up the ladder,” I shouted.
She climbed. Clung to the iron. I heard her panting.
“Alley?”
“Piece of cake. Easy, peasy.”
She either said it for the sake of the kids, or for herself.
“Okay, Cash. You’re next,” she said.
I grabbed Cash by the waist and lifted him. He squirmed. “No! No!”
I didn’t stop. Allison held out an arm. The other locked around the ladder. I set Cash into her hand, and she pulled him to her chest. “Climb all the way up,” she said.
He did, stepping around Allison. He stopped just as his head peeked over the top.
“Anything?” I said.
“No one’s up here,” he said. He finished the climb, and stood on the roof.
“You wait right there,” I said. “You’re next, Charlene.”
I reached for her waist.
“I got this,” she told me.
This was no time to demonstrate independence. Or was it. To prevent becoming an obstacle for my daughter, Allison climbed all the way up to the roof with Cash.
“Okay,” I said. “Go.”
Charlene made the leap from the dumpster to the ladder easier than Allison had. She climbed up and over.
Three down. Me to go.
Chapter Forty-Two
We stood on the roof of the plaza. I looked down at the dumpster. Thankfully, the zombies looked dumbfounded. They’d been outsmarted. Watched it happen and still couldn’t figure out how to get up her to eat us.
“Dad,” Charlene said, “how do we get back down?”
My eyes widened and I exhaled a puff of breath. Wasn’t exactly a sigh. “One problem at a time,” I said. I smiled.
We made our way along the roof, toward Ridge Road. “Stay close to the side,” I said. Worried the roof might not hold our weight. No reason it shouldn’t. Winters were brutal. Snow weighed a lot. But roofs also collapsed during winter storms. Why risk it?
We didn’t need to move slowly. We didn’t need to hide, really. We just had to walk, and made it to the end of the plaza.
Below us, I didn’t point out, but noticed, were more zombies. Too many. I couldn’t count them. We hadn’t attracted their attention yet. I didn’t think we’d been spotted.
Charlene was right, though. We were up here. No easy way down. And no reason to climb down anyway, not with that many monsters lurking. There had to be fast ones mixed in. They’d pick us off one at a time as we got off the roof.
I’d said one problem at a time.
It was time.
This was a problem.
“Everyone, sit,” I said.
We sat.
I needed the time to think. No ideas came to mind. I pulled the radio off my waist. Stared at it. I strained to look across the street. Olive Garden blocked my view, as did the footbridge over Ridge Road.
I listened.
I did not hear any vehicle engines. No gunfire. Nothing.
We were stuck. Stranded. I had food in my pack, we could stay up here a while. That wouldn’t get us rescued. It might buy us time though, until the zombies were gone.
I set my face into cupped hands. I knew I looked hopeless, but right now, I just was at a complete and utter loss.
“We’re going to be all right, Dad,” Charlene said. She sat next to me.
Cash came over, too.
Sitting on either side, they both put an arm around me.
It was hard not to smile at them. “Yes. Of course we are.”
“There it is, Chase,” Allison said.
I had not heard it, because it was not loud.
The huge Humvee was pulling onto Hoover Drive, headed toward Ridge Road. It maneuvered around abandoned vehicles effortlessly. “Will they see us?” I said.
We all stood. Arms waving. Cash was yelling, “Over here!”
The Humvee turned left.
Not right.
Headed west onto Ridge Road.
Not east.
“No,” Allison said. “Where are they going?”
They must have a schedule, I thought. I touched Allison’s shoulder. “We’re going to be okay.”
Maybe not. Our yelling had excited the zombies below. Agitated them. Possibly reminded them of just how hungry they really were.
We were now the blue light. The bugs coming at us from all directions.
I looked across the parking lot.
Son of a bitch, was about all I could think. Son of a bitch.
We were safest up top. For now. There were ways into the stores from up here. I just didn’t like the idea. Not at all. For now, we’d wait it out.
“Get down everyone,” I said. “St
ay low. Keep quiet.”
Cash had gone from looking victorious to crushed. His lips quivered. He buried his head against me. “We’re going to get away from here, little guy.”
We all laid flat on the rooftop.
Cash was pressed tight against me. “I do have a plan,” I said.
Allison looked at me, eyes wide.
I winked, and pursed my lips.
Her expression deflated. She knew I’d just lied.
I needed to. It felt necessary.
“What is it, Dad,” Charlene said.
“First, we need to wait for the zombies to forget we’re up here.”
“Will they?” she said.
“They lose interest fast, dear. Or they have short-term memory problems. Whatever it is, in a few minutes, they’ll all wander off, toward some other sound,” I said.
“They will?” Charlene did not sound confident in my assessment.
“We’ve done it to them before,” Allison said, almost beaming with pride.
It made me smile. “Yes, we have,” I said.
But would they? Only thing I ever seen them do was eat. Humans. Non infected people. They didn’t feed on each other. Why? I had no idea. Made no sense. Way it looked, the four of us, up here on this roof, we were it. The only meal for apparent miles in any direction. If I were hungry, I wouldn’t move from the food source. We were that source right now. Would they eventually all starve to death then? Would they naturally die off? Or would they adapt. Start eating cows and horses and dogs and cats and birds and vegetables. I had no answer to any of these stupid, stupid questions. We were--
Rumbling.
Distinct rumbling.
I shot my hand out. Allison took it.
We all rose to our knees. Cash pointed first. He knew.
No one spoke.
There wasn’t a need.
The Humvee was traveling eastbound in the westbound lane. Less stranded cars clogging the road. The fucking thing had to make a U-turn. A fucking U-turn.
They weren’t leaving us.
The radio came to life. “Hey buddy, hang tight!”
I held the radio in both hands. I stared at it. My smile was too big to hide.
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