Those Lazy Sundays: A Novel of the Undead

by Thomas North

  She shuffled through a stack of papers and picked out another e-mail, which it looked like they were printing and handing to her.

  This one is from Oliver in White River Junction. Oliver says, "Shot four of these people with my forty-four˗"

  She paused and scanned through the rest of the e-mail, then looked up. "Just as a warning, this is a very graphic e-mail..." she looked nervously at Bob Bartolo, who nodded, but otherwise remained silent. "...and uh, just be aware we're getting these as they come in." She began reading the e-mail again.

  Shot four people with my forty-four. Told them get off my property, they didn't listen. One attacked me, then all of them. Even I shot them, they didn't stop, just kept at me. They're not human no more, I don't think. Bled all over and shot two straight in the heart, didn't matter. They got me too, bleeding bad. Locked myself in the house now. They're still out there. Armageddon, I think is what this is. The Lord has come. Hallelujah.

  "Again, these are viewer e-mails, so we can't vouch for their opinions on the nature of what is going on, but these illustrate the gravity of what is happening. Jennette, Oliver, and any other viewers who may be trapped or injured, don't hesitate to call 9-11 if you can get through. We are passing some of these on to police and authorities, but we can't guarantee we can get you help immediately. As we've done all night, we will stay with you and continue to give you an opportunity to speak˗"

  An assistant came on camera and dropped another large stack of paper on the desk in front of her.

  "As you can see, we are getting more e-mails than even we can get through on the air, but rest assured, we will read through every single one of them."

  She turned to Bob Bartolo. "Now Bob, for people who are injured, we've been given some strong First Aid and other tips to deal with injuries."

  A graphic popped onto the screen, as Bob Bartolo took over the speaking.

  "That's right Elizabeth. If someone is injured, here are some steps you can take to assess-"

  Kate got up, checked once more on Phil, then left the room. She went back into the hallway, made another sandwich for herself, and drank another Coke. She was swallowing a bite of white bread and peanut butter when she heard a thump from the bedroom where Phil was sleeping.

  She jumped up immediately, grabbing the pistol from the chair next to her, and cautiously approached the doorway. She didn't know exactly what she was supposed to do, but in all the movies, the cops hugged the wall with their shoulder and then made one quick move into the room, pointing their gun at the same time.

  She did that, clumsily, and nearly dropped the pistol when she saw Phil's naked rear end across the room, a step into the bathroom.

  He grabbed a towel and wrapped it around himself, then turned around, and looked slightly embarrassed.

  "Sorry you had to see that," he said. "I woke up and I'm not feeling so hot. I feel like a bus ran over me, in fact. Thought I'd try to take a shower. I figured you and your friend... Jacob?"

  "Jack," Kate corrected.

  He snapped his finger. "Jack, right. Figured you two had things buttoned down pretty well... given that I was still alive when I woke up." He smiled, but followed it up with a wince.

  "Sorry," Kate said, blushing. "I thought maybe something had happened."

  "No problem. Thanks for checking up on me," Phil replied. He winced again, and then shivered.

  "God, I'm freezing."

  Kate took the hint. "Let me know if you need anything..."

  "Will do."

  He shut the bathroom door. The sound of a running shower came a few moments later, and Kate left the room, shutting the door behind her.

  She decided to try her phone again. They still hadn't heard anything from their friends since they were split up that afternoon aside from the one text message, and though they knew the phone lines were jammed or down, it wasn't a good feeling to not know whether they were safe or not.

  She got through on the fourth try to Sarah. The phone rang several times, and her heart beat faster with every ring. If it dropped to voice mail, it didn't necessarily mean that there was something wrong. It could just mean that Sarah was getting lousy reception ˗ which would be par for the course given where they were ˗ or that she'd lost her phone, or that she was simply asleep.

  But Sarah did answer. She was difficult to hear, her groggy voice mixing with a din of background noise, but she gave an unenthusiastic, "Hello," and then a second later, a much more enthusiastic "Kate!"

  "Sarah, my god!" Kate replied back. "God, I ˗ we ˗ were so worried! Is everyone okay? We got a text from Andy but we didn't know for sure..."

  "So far, everyone's fine," Sarah replied. "We're in the Allentown police station." She went over her day, explaining how they escaped the mob in Allentown and ended up in the police station, and telling her about Mike and Brent Williamson, and Andy being stuck in the dentist office down the street.

  "I take it you and Jack are okay?"

  "Yeah, fine. Just like you guys, stuck in a house." She gave Sarah the same rundown, telling her and Jack's flight from the original accident scene, and their fortuitous meeting with Phil, his injuries, and their flight upstairs.

  "So that man whose house you're in, Phil, he's hurt pretty bad?"

  "I guess," Kate replied. "He seems like he's in a lot of pain."

  "Jeez," Sarah replied.

  "Also, I uh..." Kate began, but hesitated. "When we were coming up the stairs, I shot some of those people. Phil gave us a gun, and um, they were attacking us."

  There was a long moment of silence.

  "You mean like... I mean, were they okay?"

  "I don't know, Sarah. I mean... no. I killed them. Two of them."

  "God," Sarah replied, then added, "Kate, with everything that's going on, I doubt anyone can blame you. You probably saved Jack's life, and Phil's, and your own. Whatever's happening, the people are dangerous, and it's sad but˗"

  "Sarah, I know... it's still really weird to think that I... I killed someone but, I know. I keep thinking about it and it was the only way. It's just... I'm still kind of in shock I guess. It's probably not worth talking about anymore, right now. I'm okay with it, it'll just take some time to get over."

  "I understand, Kate," Sarah replied. "So Jack and uh, Phil? They're both sleeping?"

  "Yeah," Kate replied. "We're sort of doing shifts. Phil has been sleeping mostly, I guess cause he's hurt, but he got up to take a shower a minute ago."

  "We're doing the same here. Brent is up right now. I guess those people can't get in, but we didn't want to take a chance."

  "You heard anything about when someone is going to come to get us out of here?" Sarah asked. "You said you had a television. Is the news saying anything?"

  "No," Kate replied. "I think they said they're not saying anyone for now because they don't know what it is. Like, they don't want to make the rescuers sick."

  Sarah sighed. "It's the same thing we've been reading. I can't imagine this is going to keep happening, though. I mean, the police, or the Army or somebody, they'll fix it like they always do. We just have to ride this out for tonight."

  "Yeah," Kate agreed, though her voice was laden with skepticism. ”That's what we're thinking too."

  They chatted for a few minutes longer, even moving onto other topics like music, and upcoming classes, a conversation that might as well have taken place in a dorm room on a normal Sunday night.

  "I should get back to sleep," Sarah said. "As good as I can on a wooden floor with a rain jacket for a pillow."

  "Guess we're better off in that regard," Kate replied. "Stay safe, Sarah. Hope to see you guys tomorrow when the police or whatever come to get things back to normal."

  "Yeah. Any idea if classes are cancelled tomorrow? TV said anything? The web site says local schools are cancelled, but it doesn't say anything about colleges."

  "No, just the same thing."

  "All right. Have a good night Kate. See you tomorrow!"

  "Yeah, see you tomorro
w, Sarah. Night."

  Kate leaned back in her chair grabbed another soda. She didn't care for soda normally, but she was tired, and she needed the caffeine. She noticed that the sound of the shower had stopped, and she glanced towards Phil's closed bedroom door. After a couple of minutes, the door opened and Phil limped out of the bedroom, dressed in a pair of striped pajamas. He still looked stiff, and walked with a pained look, like every movement hurt, and he looked unnaturally pale, like every bit of color had drained from his face.

  "I'm just going to grab a bite to eat and get back to bed, if you don't mind," he said.

  "No problem," Kate replied, smiling. "It's your house after all."

  Phil staggered to the chair next to Kate and sat down, then reached down for the bread. Or tried to. He groaned in pain, and sat back up, breathing heavily.

  "God, I feel like I turned ninety over night," he said.

  "Want me to make you something?" Kate asked.

  He shook his head. "No, that's okay, thanks though."

  He tried to lean down again, but again stopped with a groan of pain.

  "I'll get it," Kate said.

  She made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and handed it to him.

  "Thanks," he said. "I hate to be rude, but I'm going back into the bedroom. You're welcome to come in and watch the TV if you want. Not much else to do right now."

  "Thanks," she said, smiling. She followed him into the bedroom and sat in front of the TV again. The news was still going on with reading e-mails from viewers, cuts to their helicopter, and additional reports about the situation across the state, where things seemed to be getting worse, at least by the judgment of the newscasters.

  Phil gagged behind her, causing Kate to look over her shoulder. He spit out a chunk of sandwich into his hand, then pulled a tissue from the box on the nightstand and wrapped the partially-masticated sandwich chunk in it.

  "Just bought this bread and it's already stale," Phil said, grimacing.

  Kate frowned. "It was okay when I tried it."

  "Must've gotten a bad piece," Phil replied. He tossed the whole sandwich on the nightstand, then grabbed the glass of water and downed a few gulps.

  He laid his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes again.

  "Tired," he mumbled, and seemed to doze off again.

  Kate looked at him. The red comforter moved up and down, his mustache standing out all the more on his pallid face, barely distinguishable against the white pillow.

  IT HADN’T BEEN a dream. The horror of the day before, the mobs of sick people, fleeing for their lives, taking refuge in the police station. It had all happened. And it hadn't passed on like a thunder storm or cold spell overnight. The police, the National Guard, the Center for Disease Control, nobody had swept in during the night to fix things, or to rescue them. They woke up one by one to that reality. They woke up to the dingy, old police station, to the persistent growling and banging coming from outside, to the sight of pallid hands grasping at the bars above the jail cells.

  They also woke up to hunger.

  Kyle sat up in his place and groaned when he saw where he was.

  "Darn, I thought that I'd wake up in Disneyworld," he said, looking around. Sarah was already up, while Mary, who had been sleeping against him, was just stirring. Mike and Brent Williamson were also awake, though Mike was only sitting on the cot in the cell, looking dazed.

  Sarah was sitting against the wall with the laptop computer, with Brent sitting next to her, looking at the screen.

  "God I'm starving," Kyle said, his stomach growling. He stood up and stretched, and looked around the police station. A dim, gray light came in from the windows above the cell, adding to the gloom of the scene. Otherwise, things were exactly as they had been when they'd each gone to bed. They'd worked in shifts overnight, each of them taking a turn staying awake, holding Brent's shotgun, not that any of them, aside from Brent himself, had ever fired one. Mike was the only one who hadn't taken a shift. He'd slept straight through, and they hadn't bothered to wake him.

  "Anything new?" Kyle asked, walking over to Brent and Sarah.

  "Nothing," Brent replied. "Same bullshit as last night. Government has their thumbs up their asses, haven't given us anything."

  "Sounds like it's getting worse," Sarah said. "All the schools across the state are closed... across New England, I think. They're saying a whole bunch of towns are like here now. I was just reading an article that downtown Burlington is completely trashed, and these people are all over Church Street and everything."

  "Just means everyone else finally caught up with Allentown," Brent said, standing up. "Can't say I ever thought Allentown would be leading in anything. Figures it would be in this... shitstorm."

  They spent the next few hours doing what they'd done the day before: reading the news, sending e-mails and Facebook messages to friends and family telling them that they were okay, and trying to ignore the noise, which still hadn't abated. Sarah called Andy, and after not picking up twice in a row, he finally picked up the phone on the third call.

  He sounded groggy, but more than that, just off somehow, and it worried Sarah. He insisted that he was fine, just tired he said, but she grew more worried as they talked. It seemed ridiculous. He was just down the road. A quarter mile? A half mile? She didn't know for sure, but he said it wasn't far. He might as well have been on the moon. They hung up and agreed to talk again later that afternoon or evening. Andy promised to call her this time.

  She wasn't sure that he would.

  The news came quickly in quantity, but slowly in substance. It was mostly made of anecdotes, interviews with so-called experts, an abundance of speculation and innuendo, and re-hashed stories couched as new developments. More than anything, it was depressing, though nobody said that outright. It was depressing not because of what was in the news, but because of what wasn't: there was nothing to suggest that it would be over soon, that the answer was at hand ˗ that they'd all be able to go home and resume their classes, their businesses, their daily jogs and workouts, watch their favorite TV shows, play video games, visit porn sites, read books, sleep in a bed, take a shower, make love.

  Eat.

  It was three o'clock when Brent finally picked up the shotgun from the floor beside him and walked to the storage room again, pausing in the doorway. "Anyone up for a late lunch?"

  "Brent, what're you doing?" Sarah asked.

  Receiving nothing but confused looks, he continued into the storeroom. Sarah slid the laptop onto the floor and hopped up.

  "Where is he going?" Mary asked.

  "Outside, I think," Sarah replied, and hurried to catch up with Brent. Kyle and Mary followed behind.

  "Brent, seems like you're tempting fate here!" Sarah yelled, as Brent opened the door, revealing the stark, gray alley outside. He stopped in the doorway and looked back at her.

  He never saw the blur of motion from his left.

  WE APOLOGIZE FOR any technical or other issues as we continue our broadcast. For those who have been following throughout last night and into today, you'll know that we are operating on a skeleton staff. We have advised our usual day shift to not come in, and those of us who are here have been advised to not attempt to return to our homes, both for the safety of our staff and to comply with the Governor and Mayor's directive for people to stay off the roads. So, we are working in shifts here with the staff that we have, and we ask that you bear with us. Bob Bartolo and Elizabeth Etherton are both resting, and will be back on at four. We have breaking news coming in that the governor has signed an order asking all National Guard personnel to report to their units. I repeat, the governor has ordered all National Guard personnel to report to their units...

  "Damn," Phil whispered. He was still lying in bed. He'd managed to force down half of the sandwich that Kate had made for him last night, though he still swore that the bread had gone bad. He was awake, but felt like he'd been run over by a truck. He'd checked his wounds when he took a shower, and though
they hadn't gotten any better, they didn't seem any worse either, which was good. But he felt a hell of a lot worse. His body felt stiff, and he hurt all over.

  Jack and Kate were both locked onto the television, their concern growing by the moment. It didn't sound like this was going to be solved today. It almost sounded like it wouldn't be solved tomorrow, either. The man sitting at the news desk now was Harold Tomassi, the weather man. His messy silver comb-over and wrinkled suit were practically a trademark for the station's weather report, but didn't quite fit as well in his role as a news anchor, though there was a good chance that Bob Bartolo and Elizabeth Etherton wouldn't look quite so polished the next time they came on the air either.

  "Wonder how long it will take them to get the Guard mobilized," Jack said.

  "Normally they can get together pretty quick," Phil replied, his voice hoarse and barely audible, like he had a bad case of laryngitis. "But with these circumstances, who knows."

  "So we just stay here until someone on the TV tells us to do something else?" Kate asked.

  "Think so," Jack replied.

  Phil coughed behind them and opened his eyes. He reached for the water glass on the nightstand, and realizing it was empty, set it back down again, and started to push himself up.

  "I'll get that, Phil," Kate said, and got up, grabbed the glass, and took it into the bathroom where she filled it up from the faucet.

  "Thanks," he said weakly. "Sorry, I hate to be this much trouble."

  "Phil, you keep saying that. It's your house! You've been great to us."

  She smiled and handed him the water.

  "You know, I was kind of pissed, if you don't mind me being candid, when you two showed up here with those... people. But I'm glad you did. I'd be rotting here on my own otherwise."

  "Glad we can help," Kate replied. "Hey, you should try calling your family again. I got through to one of my friends last night. It took a few tries, but eventually it worked."

  Phil nodded. "That's a good idea," he said, a hint of enthusiasm coming through in his weakened voice. Kate brought the phone in from the hall and handed it to him. He dialed a number and waited. A few seconds later, he disconnected it and tried it again.