Sitting there, smothered by an awkward and painful silence, Fran finally let her eyes slip from Tom and over to the bulk of the stranded ferry looming on their starboard side. With the two men strenuously grunting beside her as a soundtrack to the slowly passing hull, Fran’s gaze wandered disinterestedly over the impotent monolith. Taking in details both obsolete and outdated, she read the scene before her like a single snapshot of the past frozen for eternity. Even though she couldn’t see up onto the ferry’s broad flat deck, the dozen or so vehicles crammed across it did little to hide the tragedy that had occurred here. Doors left gaping, windscreens either smashed or covered with dark nameless smears and remnants of hastily abandoned luggage left where it fell, all bore witness to passing of the Dead. But it was the two shadowy silhouettes standing motionless beyond the wheelhouse’s dark grimy windows that truly whispered of the last moments of these unlucky ferry goers. Almost as if she could see into the past, the clues wound themselves together, painting a picture both bloody and tragic. Who knows how long it had taken those safely moored midway between the banks of the river Fal to find they had unwittingly carried their downfall with them. Surely as the realisation had hit home some must have tried to swim to shore, battling desperately against the current only for the raging waters to pull them under; mercifully granting them a peaceful demise while those they left behind fought for lives destined to end in terror and bloodshed. And then perhaps as the last two survivors managed to barricade themselves within the wheelhouse, a hidden bite or possibly even an unknown heart condition had claimed one of them, dooming the other to share both an unending hunger and the curse of a true death denied them both.
Fran was just wondering why those at White Oak Park had left the two cadavers as grim but active custodians of something that could have been used as a useful bolthole, when beside her Mike spoke; breaking her from her gloomy reverie.
‘We’ve got company,’ he said, as three men suddenly appeared on the approaching shore; a young woman following up the rear.
Blinking away imagined images of the ferry’s final moments, Fran turned her attention to the new arrivals; instantly noting that each of them was armed with either a blade or a club of some kind. For a moment she thought they were going to pile into the small rowing boat pulled up onto the exposed muddy shore but as their frantic running footsteps slowed to an uneasy and more cautious approach, the three men and the young woman came a breathless halt at the edge of the slipway.
‘Wendy, honey,’ called Tom, the strange familiarity smarting like a papercut to Fran’s ears, ‘you know these people?’
‘What? Oh, yeah… they’re okay,’ replied the teenager, barely looking away from Poppy to identify the strangers.
With Wendy’s endorsement hardly instilling her any with sense of security, Fran mentally broke down the threat that each of those on the approaching landing strip posed. The large bald man now standing on the concrete causeway, his purposefully nonchalant stance doing little to hide the strength and authority he held, was by far their main cause for concern. But Fran knew all too well that books shouldn’t be judged by their covers; after all she herself had used other people’s assumptions to her own advantage on many an occasion. So as Fran’s calculating eye read each detail of the young woman with the two men whose appearance was similar enough that they could only be brothers, she understood any one of them could truly end up being the most dangerous of the group.
Of those awaiting Wendy’s return it was the young woman that seemed to do so with any obvious sense of anxiety; shifting her weight nervously back and forth from one foot to the other as the barge drew slowly closer and closer. But there was something about the way she watched Tom, her gaze lingering before discretely moving onto Mike and then Kai that didn’t sit right with Fran and it was only as Fran and the woman finally locked eyes with each other that she recognised it for what it was; quite ironically, it was now their turn to be read. Clearly this young woman, whoever she was, was simply playing the role expected of her and Fran had to give it to her, she played it well. So as their eyes met, Fran had her answer; the bald man was simply muscle, a brutish smoke screen to fool those too blind to see; it was the young woman they should truly be wary of.
‘Wendy, you alright?’ called the large bald man, just as the prow of the barge started to scrape along the sloping concrete slipway that rose out of the water and onto shore. ‘Was it Ray? Ray and the others? Wendy… Wendy, I asked you a question, girl!’ he continued; the teenager simply ignoring him and acting as if the man’s concern was little more than an irritation.
‘Wendy,’ said the young woman, her tone calm yet full of warning.
‘Christ! Yes!’ snapped Wendy, finally tearing her attention away from the infant to look at those waiting on the landing strip. ‘Yes, it was Ray. Yes, I got away and yes, I’m okay. Yes, Yes and Yes… Jesus!’ with her last words coming out little more than a hiss, she angrily stomped away from the cart, along the length of the barge and stood at the prow beside Tom openly glaring at the bald man.
With the squeal of wood rubbing on concrete and an abrupt jolt, the lip of the barge finally locked into positon, at last allowing Tom and Mike to let go of the thick ropes.
‘Damn,’ Mike mumbled, rubbing his neck as he tried to sooth his aching muscles, ‘glad I don’t have to do that every day.’
‘Wendy, we… I was worried,’ stated the young woman, her face suddenly softening with a look of genuine relief as she ignored Mike and rushed onto the barge to pull the teenager into a fierce embrace. ‘And he didn’t hurt you? Are you sure?’ she went on to say, finally pushing her at arm’s length, as if to search her face for unspoken answers; gently pushing a lock of the teenager’s dark fringe back behind her ear as she waited for a reply.
‘Emma… don’t…stop it,’ grumbled Wendy, seeming almost embarrassed by the young woman’s concern as she wriggled free of her arms. ‘Yes… yes, I’m okay. They hurt my wrist a bit and my shoulder aches from when Kai knocked me over but… oh, Kai, he’s the foreign looking one by the horse,’ she went on to say, nodding to Kai who was just removing Star’s feeding bag. ‘Anyway, he got me away from Ray and then Tom kept the Dead away… Tom kept me safe.’
As she made the last statement, Wendy span and threw her arms dramatically around Tom, pinning his arms to his side as she beamed up at him.
‘He saved me,’ she went on to say, turning her head to look back at Emma.
‘Got to keep my girl safe,’ said Tom, the phrase falling from his mouth without him even realising what he was saying.
Emma looked from Tom to Wendy, her odd smile doing little to hide the confusion in her eyes.
‘Well…erm…’ Emma started to say, taken aback by both Wendy’s strange actions and Tom’s turn of phrase, ‘well… well, thank you, Tom… I mean, thank you, thank you all of you.’ Pausing to make eye contact with each of those on the barge. ‘You saved my sister and I… I honestly can’t thank you enough… Now,’ she continued, holding out her hand for Wendy to take, ‘I guess we’d better have Norma take a look at you anyway, just in case… Wendy.’
For a brief moment, Wendy looked back at up at Tom.
‘You’re going to stay?’ she said, though to Fran the girl’s words sounded far too much like a statement of fact rather than a question.
‘Of course I’m staying, Sweetie,’ he replied, a soft smile on his lips as if amused by her question. ‘I’m not going to leave my girls… not again.’
‘Good,’ said Wendy, with an exaggerated nod; the childlike action at odds with her teenage body.
‘Wendy,’ Emma urged, gently tugging on her sister’s hand, ‘come on, let Tom and the others get settled. We’ll see them later… I’m sure Dennis,’ she continued, her eyes briefly flicking to the bald man, receiving the smallest of nods from him in reply, ‘Dennis will look after them.’
And with that Emma slipped her arm around Wendy’s shoulder, led her off the barge and up the concrete slipway tow
ards a cobbled road that disappeared into the woodland. Only once did the teenager look back at those left on the slipway, flashing a broad smile in Tom’s direction before slowly turning back to her sister to whisper something; something that caused Emma to glance back at him too.
‘Hi, Dennis… Dennis Fowler,’ said the bald man, introducing himself as he nodded from Tom to Mike and then to Kai; it did not escape Fran’s notice that both she and Sam were omitted from the man’s brief welcome. ‘And this here is Brett and Grant Nash,’ he continued, jerking his head in the direction of the two younger men; one of whom was using a large knife to clean the dirt from under his fingernails.
‘Hi,’ / ‘Alright,’ said the two brothers in unison, each talking over the other.
By comparison both Brett and his brother gave little more passing acknowledgement to Tom, Mike and Kai and instead had nothing but smiles to offer Fran and Sam; Sam’s greeting only momentarily wavering when the brothers noticed the baby nestled in her arms. If their actions hadn’t been so transparent Fran may have even found it comical but then as the smiles of welcome deteriorated into something else, something more grubby, she knew she would have to keep an eye on these two; boundaries would certainly need to be set and pretty sharpish.
‘Right, first things first,’ said Dennis, his words punctuated with a soft whistling that took Fran a moment to realise was due to two of his front teeth being missing, ‘any of you been bitten… now, before you answer,’ he continued, holding up a finger to silence any hasty reply, ‘I’ll warn you if we find out you’re lying, and we will be checking, believe me… well, then we’re all going to have a serious falling out … I don’t give a monkey’s who you just saved… you put us in danger and you’ll be sorry for it… all of you. So best to be up front about it now… and you can just go back the way you came and no one has to get hurt.’
‘No… no one’s been bitten!’ said Tom almost blurting out the words; a hint of panic creeping into his voice as if to be sent away was unthinkable to him.
Dennis looked at Tom, his eyes narrowing suspiciously; unsure of the man who could clearly handle himself and the Dead, yet was so desperate to stay.
‘And what about the rest of you?’ Dennis finally asked, his hand resting purposefully on the handle of the machete hanging from his belt. ‘Anyone got anything they want to share with the group?’
‘It’s like Tom said,’ confirmed Fran, speaking up for the rest of them, ‘we’re all clear, no one here’s been bitten.’
For a moment Dennis simply looked at Fran, clearly trying to gauge if she was hiding something from him.
‘Okay, okay, you had your chance…’ he finally said, turning away from them to walk back up the slipway, waving for them to follow; the two brothers trudging after him like bored but obedient lap-dogs. ‘Now, let’s get you all checked…Oh,’ he continued, abruptly turning back to look at them, ‘and I guess, welcome to White Oak Park.’
***
‘G…give us a hand w…with this, will you,’ muttered Kai, battling to get the duvet evenly into the corners of its cover while, lost in thought, Fran sat at a small dressing table absentmindedly toying with an artificial flower she had plucked from the vase in front of her. ‘Hey… Fran,’ he continued, the absent reply and furrowed brow a clear indication that she hadn’t heard him. ‘Fran… Fran?’
Only when he stepped directly behind her, shaking the duvet cover so that his reflection in the mirror finally caught her attention, did Fran shake herself from her thoughts and realise he was in fact talking to her.
‘W...what is it?’ asked Kai, sitting down on the edge of the bed as he watched Fran’s reflection in the mirror.
‘Hmm… what? Sorry?’ she replied, her reflection breaking eye contact to turn and look at him directly.
‘W…what’s the m…matter?’ he repeated, finally conceding a two-nil defeat in favour of the duvet cover and letting it drop in a rumpled heap to the floor.
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she began, tossing the partly dismantled silk flower behind her back onto the dusty dressing table, ‘it’s… well, don’t you think it’s all been a bit easy?’
‘Fran…’ Kai started to say before she waved away his words, stood up and walked over to the bedroom window.
‘No, wait… hear me out,’ she interrupted, suddenly bathed in the warm orange light of the setting sun streaming through the window. ‘What I mean is, this place… I mean getting in, it’s all been too easy… far too smooth.’
‘You w…wanted them to say n…no?’ asked Kai, confused by Fran’s concern.
‘No, of course not,’ she replied, shaking her head, ‘but… well, you and I both know that there are a lot of loonies out there, if this place was yours wouldn’t you want a little more than some bratty teenager’s say-so before you lay out the welcome mat? And apart from checking for bites, what else do they know about us? Not much! They’ve happily given our group three tree houses,’ she continued, waving to the well-furnished room they were currently sitting in, ‘and just left us to it with some line about someone coming to get us for dinner later… Yeah, perhaps they are doing so well here that they have plenty of food to spare but even so, either they’re insanely confident about their ability to protect this place or they’re just being mind-bendingly stupid… and to be honest… between stupid and naive, I don’t know which is worse,’ she finished with a sigh, pushing herself away from the window to walk across the smooth wooden floorboards and plonk herself down on the unmade bed next to Kai.
‘And?’ prompted Kai, knowing from the look on her face that she hadn’t finished.
‘And… and I don’t like the way Tom is around that Wendy girl,’ she muttered, bending down to pick up the crumpled duvet cover. ‘I mean, what happened back there? One minute he was Tom, crazy but still Tom, and then the next he takes things to a whole new level of crazy… and what makes it worse is that he suddenly has blinkers when it comes to criticizing this place.’
‘Or c...criticizing W…Wendy,’ added Kai, putting his arm around her shoulder.
‘Hmm,’ Fran agreed, chewing her lip, ‘I think to him they’re one and the same… Look,’ she continued, shifting her positon on the bed so that she could look at him, ‘I only met Tom a few weeks before we ended up at your boarding school and I met you. So… that’s about...what, three and a bit… four months ago? But we’ve been through a lot together… I just thought we’d grown close… you know, had each other’s back first and everyone else coming up a close second… but he…’
‘Fran,’ Kai interrupted, gently taking her hands in his, ‘Tom is a b…broken man. Yes, he f…functions day to day but his m…mind is b…broken and each day it cries out to be healed… For some reason W…Wendy has heard this cry and has managed to p…pull him back from the brink.’
‘But for how long?’ whispered Fran, looking down at their entwined fingers.
Slowly releasing her fingers, Kai took hold of her chin and tilted her face to look back up at him.
‘How long does anything last now?’ he said, his soft heartfelt words unhindered by his usual stammer.
For a moment they looked at each other, silently lost in their own thoughts and then almost gingerly, Kai leant slowly forward and gently kissed her lips.
‘No m…matter how long I have,’ he whispered, slightly pulling away from her; his fingers lightly following the line of her jaw, ‘I w…want to spend it with you.’
‘Kai, I…’ she started to say, her heart aching at the truly tragic quality to his words; for deep down she knew that with the Dead forever at their heels the certainty of their lives was now measured in days and months rather than years or decades.
But whatever she was about to say was abruptly cut off as Kai kissed her again. Yet this time his kiss was lingering as if he was attempting to freeze the moment; a moment where only the two of them truly existed and the horrors of the world around them were nothing but images from a fading nightmare. But eventually he had to pull away
and as their lips parted they almost physically felt the truth and desperation of their precarious life rush in to fill the void.
‘W…we don’t have to stay here,’ said Kai, lifting Fran’s hand to kiss her fingers, needing to feel their connection once more; if only for a second. ‘W…we’re not prisoners.’
‘I know,’ sighed Fran, nodding wearily, ‘but… but this is the first time I’m not sure if Tom would be coming with us.’
With that there was suddenly a soft knocking at the front door.
‘Guess it’s show time,’ said Fran, pushing herself wearily up from the bed; missing Kai’s touch the moment his hand fell from hers.
Walking from the bedroom, through the lavishly decorated open plan kitchen-cum-living room with its carefully coordinated furnishings, Fran couldn’t help but wish they’d found things slightly different at White Oak Park. Yes, the deluxe interconnected tree houses offered them a comfort and safety that they hadn’t experienced in a long while, but there was something about the place that rubbed her up the wrong way; something that itched at the back of her mind like the worst of headaches just waiting to happen. She couldn’t put her finger on the exact cause just yet but it was there and she was sure of it; just as sure as when she opened the door and saw the young woman called Natalie standing there, that the haunted look in the woman’s eyes spoke of more than sleepless nights plagued by the nightmares that they all shared.
‘Hi…’ said Fran, as she pulled open the door to find the woman nervously chewing on her fingers as she looked back over her shoulder, ‘it’s Natalie, right?’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ replied the young woman, her eyes seemingly forever on the move as if to let them settle on Fran’s face would somehow make the existence she found herself in solidify into a stark and unwelcome reality. ‘You… you’ve both got to come… Dennis says... he…’
Star Drawn Saga (Book 2): Lost Among The Dead Page 20
