HVZA (Book 2): Hudson Valley Zombie Apocalypse 2

by Zimmermann, Linda

  “My...mm-mom died last year,” the boy said in a tone that almost wrenched their hearts in two.

  “I’m so sorry, Donnie,” Eddie said softly, gently pushing back the long, tangled strands of hair from the boy’s face. “Your mom was a wonderful person.”

  Giving the boy a moment to linger in his grief, Eddie then asked if he remembered Little Eddie’s mother.

  “Mama Izzy gave me a chocolate bunny for Easter last Sunday,” Donnie said with slurred speech, clearly just a little too intoxicated to think clearly.

  Eddie shot a furrowed-brow look at Becks, who raised her arms and shrugged her shoulders, as she said, “Sorry. I’m not up on the latest recommendation from the American Medical Association on how much blue Curaçao to pour down a kid’s throat!”

  “Yes, yes that’s right,” Eddie continued smiling. “Mama Izzy gave you a chocolate bunny for Easter. Have you seen her since then?”

  “She’s real sick, like my mom was,” the boy replied, drooling ever so slightly.

  Becks and Eddie exchanged wide-eyed looks and nods before he continued.

  “Yes, Mama Izzy is sick and needs our help. Donnie, where can we find her?”

  “The nice lady is helping her,” he replied just before he yawned and closed his eyes.

  “No, Donnie, please stay awake,” Eddie said, gently shaking the boy until his eyes opened again, although Becks could tell they were most likely focusing on double images as the liqueur really started to kick in. “What’s the nice lady’s name, and where does she live?”

  “She’s a nice lady. Nice, nice, nice, nice,” he replied, and then started giggling at something he found funny.

  “Yes, she’s a very, very nice lady, and I want to go see her,” Eddie said, shaking the boy a bit more forcefully. “Let’s go see her, and maybe Mama Izzy will have another chocolate bunny for you.”

  “No, the brothers would take it. They would see her give it to me and take it away.”

  “Why would the brothers see?” Becks chimed in. “Does the nice lady live near The Capitol?”

  “She has to!” Donnie said with some alarm. “She has to keep everything clean so she lives right across the street…right there across that street so she can clean, clean, clean, clean, clean.”

  The boy paused only so he could blow spit bubbles, which by his drunken expression were the most fascinating things he ever saw in his life.

  “Donnie, how do you know Mama Izzy is with the nice lady who cleans The Capitol?” Eddie asked, trying to make sure they didn’t head out on a wild goose chase on the words of a highly inebriated 9-year-old.

  The boy had obviously grown weary of the all the questions and wanted to get back to his spit bubbles, so he concentrated all of his limited attention on one final statement.

  “When I went to get my rations I saw the nice lady helping Mama Izzy out of the shed and across the street to the nice lady’s house. It’s yellow. The nice lady has a yellow house, like the color of the ribbon around the neck of the chocolate bunny!”

  “I know that place,” Eddie said, standing up, his hands instinctively gripping the pistols on each hip. “It was the Saltzer’s house. They used to run the dry cleaners next door.”

  “So what are we waiting for? Let’s go!” Becks said, anxious to complete Plan A and get the hell out of this stinking town.

  As she turned to go, Eddie grabbed her arm to stop her.

  “Wait, we can’t leave Donnie!” he said, incredulous. “We can’t leave this poor boy alone in this rat nest!”

  Becks felt a twinge of guilt that she hadn’t experienced any guilt at the thought of leaving an innocent, defenseless child in these circumstances.

  “We can’t take him,” Becks replied with that measured and firm tone she had to use when she worked in the emergency room at Nyack Hospital when people were being unreasonable—which was most of the time. “How are we going to rescue your wife with a drunken kid who could start screaming at any second?”

  Becks recognized that Eddie Tasi’s heart was so big he wanted to save the whole world, but sometimes you had to make terrible choices. The conflicted look in his large, expressive eyes showed that he knew it had to be Donnie or Izzy, not both. Becks felt bad for him, but time was wasting. The gunfire at the front gate had already stopped, so their diversion had lost most of its usefulness. Not to mention they would be going right to the heart of the security zone around The Capitol.

  “But, but we can’t leave him here all alone. He’ll die,” Eddie said with tears in his eyes, the scene of his own boy’s death obviously playing over and over in his head.

  “Look, how about we get your wife, and tell the nice lady to look after Donnie?” Becks offered, somewhat disingenuously. Everyone in town must have known about Donnie being alone, and if the nice lady had wanted to help, she would have by now. Becks suspected the boy’s emotional problems made him too much of a handful for people who were hanging by a thread to their own sanity.

  “Yeah…” Eddie said thoughtfully. “Yeah, that could work. And once we get Izzy out of here and she bets better, I can come back for Donnie.”

  Becks just smiled and agreed. It was clear that Donnie wasn’t the only one who didn’t have a grasp on reality.

  Eddie shook the mouse droppings out of a couple of blankets and covered Donnie, who was already fast asleep in the chair. He also placed a bottle of water and a couple of granola bars in the boy’s lap. He suggested cleaning up the place a little, and putting some boards over the broken windows, but Becks would have none of it.

  “We need to go rescue your wife. She needs you, now,” Becks emphasized, trying to get Eddie’s head back in the game.

  “Yeah, okay, okay,” he replied, putting a fatherly hand on the boy’s shoulder, and leaning down to whisper in his ear. “We will be back for you, Donnie. Izzy and I will take care of you like you are our own son.”

  Eddie at least insisted on wedging the splintered pieces of the back door together enough to keep out the cold, and then they left through the front door. As bad as all the rotting garbage in the street smelled, it was like a breath of fresh air after the fetid stench inside the house. Becks forgot about the raccoon on the walkway, which made an unpleasant crunching sound beneath her boot as they made their way to the street. Lowering their night vision goggles over their eyes, they began their roundabout journey to the yellow house where the nice lady lived.

  As the house was just across the street from The Capitol, where torches burned all night and four guards were posted at all times, Eddie decided to give that location a wide berth and approach the house from the street behind it. As they drew closer, they could clearly hear the commotion at the front gate, which was just a block and a half from The Capitol. They were already loading bodies on a truck, and firing the occasional head shot to make sure the undead stayed dead this time.

  They had to scramble once to hide beneath a pile of leaves and brush as a patrol car took to the streets to search for any stragglers or breaches in their defense line, but other than for that tense moment, the coast was clear. A small, eight-unit apartment building was on the property behind the yellow house, and as they crept past several bedroom windows on the ground floor, they couldn’t help but peek inside. One of the small bedrooms had at least six people huddled together on the floor in sleeping bags, with a single, pale candle for lighting. They weren’t sure what was going on in there—were these people all forced to share a single room, or did they feel there was safety in numbers? The next bedroom they passed had no light, but from the distinctive sounds of the man and woman inside, they had no doubt as to exactly what was going on in there!

  Momentarily distracted by the noisy encounter, Eddie and Becks refocused and looked for a way to quietly and easily get over the tall chain link fence at the back of the property. There were no holes in the fence, so Eddie grabbed one of the support posts and slowly but surely bent it down almost to the ground. Becks just shook her head and smiled as she accepted
Eddie’s hand to assist her climbing over the now prone section of fence.

  Surprisingly, the nice lady’s backyard was neat and trimmed. An Adirondack chair sat next to a semi-circular flower bed and birdbath, and on a warm, summer day it must have been a serene haven from the crazy post-apocalyptic chaos of the world. Frost had long ago killed all the flowers, but Eddie stooped over to pick a few dried marigolds.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Becks whispered, not believing her own eyes.

  “Izzy loves marigolds,” he said as casually if he was picking out a bouquet at a flower shop. “She will like these.”

  Becks had no reply as they spilt up to look in the two windows at the back of the house. Eddie saw that the kitchen was dark, but Becks could see through the dining room to the living room, where a few candles illuminated a figure on a couch. She couldn’t see anyone else, but a brief movement of a shadow suggested there was another person in that living room.

  The original plan was to break in through a door or window, find Izzy and take her, or, if they encountered the nice lady, explain who they were and hope she wouldn’t start screaming. The latter plan may have worked out on Maple Street, but across the street from The Capitol, where several guards had gathered on the sidewalk to have a smoke, even the briefest scream would attract unwanted attention. Instead, Becks came up with Plan A-2.

  Waiting for the guards to finish their cigarettes and get back to their posts, Becks then cautiously went around to the front of the house—leaving her goggles, hockey stick, and leather jacket covered in silverware with Eddie. She knocked on the door and attempted to look as casual as possible. She also tried not to notice the front curtain being pulled back so whoever was inside could get a good look at her. The curtain fell back into place, and the shuffling of ill-fitting slippers followed, leading up to the door. Several locks were clicked, and the door opened a crack.

  “What do you want?” a female voice said in the shadows.

  “Hi, we haven’t met yet. I’m Samantha, and I’m kind of new here,” Becks began in as friendly and non-threatening a manner as she could muster. “I was just on patrol with some of the guys and they mentioned you’re taking care of a woman who is really sick. I used to be a nurse’s aide—ages ago—but I thought I would use my break to see if I could help in any way.”

  “Oh, uh…yeah, I guess so. I’m Jennifer. And I guess it’s okay for you to at least take a look at her. But I couldn’t let you do anything without the consent of the three—I mean two, brothers.”

  “Of course not! Just want to see if I can help,” Becks said, not hesitating to literally get her foot in the door.

  When she stepped inside, she saw a 40-something woman who probably looked at least ten years older than she was. She had short, blond hair, rather thin and limp, but clean. Stress and poor nutrition had engraved deep, dark circles under her eyes, and she walked with a slight Quasimodo hunch and sway. It had possibly been the result of an injury, but Beck’s suspected some sort of congenital malformation. In the dim light, she also detected some bruising on the woman’s left cheek. Knowing what she did about the brothers’ proclivity for smacking people around, she suspected the marks were the penalty for some minor transgression.

  “Here, this way,” the woman said timidly, avoiding eye contact. “Isabella is in here. I couldn’t get her upstairs, she was too weak. I’m trying to keep her warm, but I don’t have much kerosene left for the heater.”

  Even as Becks approached the woman on the couch, she could plainly hear the rasping and rattling of lungs stricken with pneumonia. Placing a hand on Isabella’s forehead, which was wet with sweat, Becks estimated that her fever was about 104 degrees. She was dehydrated, her pulse was rapid, and her lips were slightly blue from lack of oxygen. If the pneumonia was bacterial, and Becks had immediate access to potent antibiotics, IV fluids, and an oxygen tank, she might have some chance of saving her. As it was, Isabella Tasi had a day, maybe less, before she would be joining Little Eddie.

  “Jennifer, listen to me very carefully. Isabella is in critical condition. Do you have any kind of medical facilities here? Any supplies, or nearby hospitals or physicians’ offices where I could get supplies? Any erythromycin, doxycycline, vancomycin, anything?” Becks asked, dropping the phony nurse act and sounding very much like a doctor on a mission.

  “Uh, we, uh, have a clinic, but you need special permission from the brothers for any medications. There’s no doctor in town, but Sally, the girl who used to work at the drugstore after school, might be able to help. She’s the closest thing we have to a doctor,” Jennifer replied, getting a bit frazzled. “But you will have to ask the brothers in the morning.”

  “I’m afraid we can’t wait that long,” Becks said as she walked toward the kitchen.

  “Wait, where are you going? What’s going on?” Jennifer asked, as she shuffled after Becks in her oversized, fuzzy slippers.

  Before Jennifer could reach her, Becks had unlocked the back door, and Eddie quickly came inside. Jennifer looked as if she about to scream, or faint, but a sudden look of recognition spread over her face.

  “You’re Isabella’s husband!” Jennifer gasped, as if a spirit from the grave had just materialized next to her stove. “But, but, you’re supposed to be dead!”

  “Eddie, this is Jennifer,” Becks said quickly, hoping the woman’s shock wouldn’t turn to screaming. “She’s the nice lady who is caring for your wife.”

  Eddie extended one of his massive hands and Jennifer blinked several times and accepted the friendly handshake, although it was clear she was in sensory overload and didn’t know what to do. Harboring an enemy of the state would get her more than a slap across the face, but she couldn’t turn away a man who was willing to risk his life to rescue his wife, either.

  “Where’s Izzy?” Eddie asked, already hurrying down the hallway.

  Becks had wanted to tell him the situation and prepare him for the worst, but she might as well have tried talking to a passing freight train.

  Eddie gently cradled Izzy in his arms, kissed her hair, placed the dried marigolds in her hand, and spoke words of love and comfort. However, when there was no response, his eyes became wild with fear and he turned to Becks.

  “What’s wrong? What have they done to her? She’ll be okay, won’t she? You’re a doctor, do something!”

  Jennifer also turned to look at Becks as it finally dawned on her that this was the infamous doctor who she had heard had done so many terrible things. It was obvious that the brothers had been lying, but harboring two enemies of the state would mean banishment, or worse.

  “You’re supposed to be dead, too!” Jennifer exclaimed, as her voice reached another octave higher. “Oh, what am I going to do!”

  Becks ignored the nearly hysterical woman and spoke plainly and directly to Eddie.

  “It’s pneumonia and it’s bad. Very bad. Even if I could get her to a hospital right away, there would be only a slim chance of saving her. I’m sorry, but with no medical supplies I can’t do anything.”

  The grief and rage that played across Eddie’s features was both heartbreaking and frightening. At that moment he became a ticking time bomb, and the only question was when he would go off.

  “Eddie! Eddie, listen to me,” Becks pleaded with the big man as she grabbed him by the shoulders. “I know what you’re going through, but don’t do anything stupid. Let’s be smart about this. Let’s talk about this.”

  “Done talking. Time to start shooting. This is all the brothers’ fault. They’ve taken everything from me. They have to die.”

  Despite Becks’ tight grip on the shoulders of his jacket, Eddie only needed one hand to push her away. She stumbled backward over a foot stool and fell hard to the floor, and the loud sound brought Isabella out of her stupor.

  “Ed… Eddie…baby, is…that you?” Isabella whispered, barely able to say two words without having to struggle to take a breath.

  Eddie’s rage suddenly melted as he rushe
d to his wife’s side and took her hand. Becks picked herself up from the floor, rubbed her sore hip, and moved close enough to hear what the dying woman was saying.

  “It’s me, Izzy! It’s Eddie! I came for you, baby. I’m going to take you home and you’re going to get all better,” he said, wiping away tears that were now flowing freely.

  “Oh…Eddie…we never…lied to…one…another before. Don’t…lie to me…now…sweetie.”

  A violent coughing spell ensued that looked as though it would tear the fragile woman apart.

  “Can’t you do something!?” Eddie shouted, grabbing Becks’ arm so tightly it hurt.

  “I’m so sorry. There’s nothing I can do,” Becks replied, wincing from the pain of the desperate grip, but not backing away from it.

  Fortunately, he let her arm go to hold both of his wife’s hands. When her coughing finally subsided, Isabella was so weak she only had enough strength for a few more words.

  “Love…you always…baby. Bury…me…with…Little Eddie.”

  With that her eyes rolled back and closed, and her breaths became slow and shallow. Becks felt her pulse and put an ear to her chest. Then she looked Eddie right in the eyes and just shook her head twice. It would be any time now.

  Chapter 10

  For as many times as Becks watched someone die, it never got any easier—unless it was someone she was trying to kill, of course.

  Isabella Tasi inexorably sank deeper and deeper into that black void that for her would finally bring peace after years of torment. For Eddie, it would plunge him, heart and soul, into complete darkness. He spent every minute by her side, alternately speaking words of love and then falling silent, at a total loss for words. Becks and Jennifer sat at a respectful distance, not saying a word, and occasionally dozing off for a few minutes at a time.

  It was during one of these naps a few hours before dawn that Eddie shook Becks awake. She instinctively reached for her pistol, but one of Eddie’s big hands clamped down, preventing her from pulling it from her holster. He gave her a moment to recover her senses.