by Zuko, Joseph
Karen got everyone, including herself, calmed as much as possible. It took a little time to get the girls back into the computer game.
“Mama needs to get something from the kitchen. I will be right back.” Karen stepped into the kitchen. She moved so fast she slipped on the blood and almost fell on her ass. Karen slid the gun back into its holster. The water in the sink was running the whole time. Karen turned off the hot tap. Even with all the blood on the floor and the shock she was almost certainly suffering from, she still felt hungry.
“What a weird time to be hungry.” It was normal for her to talk to herself. The girls needed to eat for sure. Eating would make her feel better. It always had. She found a pizza in the freezer and fired up the oven. A few of the towels that hit the floor earlier had sopped up some of the mess, but she would need to clean it all.
Who was going to clean up Steve’s body?
There was no way she could drag his body anywhere.
Fuck, what a horrible day.
“Where are you Mama?” Valerie asked from the bedroom.
“I’m cleaning and making pizza. Are you hungry?”
“Yes.”
“Play your game and I’ll be there in a minute.” She pushed the towels around on the floor with her foot. Then Karen remembered she had rubber gloves in the bathroom for when she dyed her hair. Karen put on a pair and lifted the heavy, wet towels into the garbage can. She was on the verge of puking the whole time she cleaned the bloody mess. She sprayed bleach all over the floor and used a whole roll of paper towels to clean the last of the crimson goo.
A few minutes later she snapped off the gloves and tossed them into the garbage. She placed the pizza into the pre-heated oven. The bleach smell gave her a headache. Karen did not want to open a window so she flipped on the exhaust fans to vent the room out. Her mind was all over the place. She couldn’t focus.
She wondered if she could pull the knife out of Steve’s head?
She needed to carry another blade, but what if she pulled the knife out and he came back alive?
Does it work that way?
Fuck!
Karen wanted to punch something! She did not have another sheathed knife in this house and she couldn’t carry a blade in her back pocket. She could slice her ass cheek off. Then it hit her. She knew what she could do. Karen opened the drawer and pulled out a handful of butcher and steak knives.
She left one on the counter by the sink. Karen then stabbed a knife into the sheetrock by the backdoor. She stabbed two more into the wall close to the front door. The last three she forced into the wall in the bedroom. It felt great to stab the walls of the shitty apartment. It also felt like the act of a crazy person. Stabbing the walls just so she had a knife at the ready.
“What are you doing? Do you hate the wall?” Valerie looked up from the game.
“No baby. Mama is just trying to be prepared.” She forced the last knife into position. Outside Karen’s apartment some tires screeched across the parking lot. Karen stepped to the window. She peeked without disturbing the blinds and giving away that she was home. The neighbors’ van ripped into the parking lot. It was Cliff and Tina.
Chapter 7
Blood coated the front of Cliff and Tina’s van. Chunks of human remains were wedged into the grill. The infected man that was banging at Karen’s back window stood in the center of their parking space. Cliff spotted the infected as it bolted for their moving vehicle. When he got closer to it Cliff popped open his door, swerved the van and the open door knocked the shit out of it. He jammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop, then put the van into reverse and backed over the dead body just to make sure the job was done.
Cliff did a sloppy job backing his van into his parking spot. The back wheels hit the curb hard. Cliff and Tina looked around. They made sure the coast was clear.
Inside the van Tina gave Cliff a nod, “Let’s go!” she clutched the bloodstained butcher knife and was ready to strike. Cliff hit the button to power the sliding side door and helped the oldest child, Eve, out first. Tina took her by the hand and pulled her toward the stairs that led up to their place. Cliff scooped the two younger girls out of the van but took care to angle his cleaver’s blade away from their soft skin.
He tapped the button on his keys and the van’s door powered shut. He stomped up the flight of stairs two at a time. The noise boomed throughout the complex. If there were any more of those monsters close by, Cliff just rang the dinner bell.
Tina got the door to their place open and the five of them scooted safely into their home. Cliff set down the two girls and they ran off to play with their sister as if it were any other day. Cliff felt a little lightheaded. It was only one flight of stairs but he did not normally do them two at a time with a girl in each arm. He only had to climb the stairs about twenty more times to unload the van.
He was super stoked about that.
“Be my lookout from the bedroom window,” Cliff asked his wife as he gave his back a stretch.
“I’m coming with you,” Tina said in a way that told Cliff not to argue the point.
“Eve, watch out the window for any of the sick people. Only call down to us if you see them. Do you understand?” Cliff waited for her head to nod before he headed back out the front door. On the trip down the stairs they did a better job of keeping quiet. Cliff took the lead as they crept to the main floor. The window opened above them.
“I don’t see anything,” Eve whispered down to her parents. From this window she could survey the entire complex.
Cliff hit the button to open the back hatch and put the keys in his pocket. The giant pile of food waited to be lugged up the fifteen steps behind them. The boxes of beer were on the top of the pile so they took them first and dropped them off in the front hallway.
Up and down the stairs they went. Nothing was bagged at the store. On the second trip they brought a set of tote bags to help load out more. Sweat dripped from their every pore.
During one of the drop-offs, Eve’s panicked voice called them from their bedroom, “Mama, Daddy someone’s taking the food!”
“Motherfuckers!” Tina darted out and down the steps.
Cliff was on her heels.
“Get away from our van!” Cliff threw his dad voice at the twenty-year-old guys standing at the back of their van. One of them had a neck tattoo just below his ear. He had a big bag of rice tossed up onto his shoulder. The other had long black hair and an armful of steaks.
“Holy shit!” screamed Tattoo Neck.
A couple of steaks hit the ground as Long Hair retreated. “Move it, bro!”
The guys took off running the second they saw Tina’s knife. Cliff spotted a rock the size of a baseball in the flower garden in front of the apartment. As he zipped by the rock he snatched it up. Every spring Cliff played centerfielder on the company softball team. They were six games into the season and undefeated. Cliff planted his leg and fired the rock. The thing was a heater. A definite strike. The rock hit the small of Long Hair’s back. It knocked the wind out of Long Hair and he dropped to his knees. The packages of steak tumbled to the ground as he fell to his face. Cliff and Tina closed the gap between them.
“Jesus, Cliff!” She couldn’t believe her husband almost killed a man over thirty dollars worth of meat. Cliff couldn’t believe it either. He was not thinking straight. He knew you needed a certain amount of calories a day to survive and the primal part of Cliff’s brain equated this theft to his family’s premature death. Maybe he overreacted a little, but after the shit day he was having who wouldn’t want to kill someone?
Neck Tattoo dropped the bag of rice and tried to help his injured friend. Tina and Cliff were too close for him to get his buddy up.
Neck Tattoo put his hands up in the air, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Don’t kill me!”
Long Hair writhed on the ground in agony. Cliff and Tina’s knives were at the ready, but they were not exactly sure what the hell to do.
“Our kitchen is empty! We
don’t have any food! I’m sorry!” Neck Tattoo screeched.
Cliff and Tina shared a quick glance. Neither of them had ever been in a situation like this.
What is the right move here? Tina thought as she lowered her knife and squatted down next to Long Hair.
“Let me see it,” she said as she pushed him to his stomach and lifted up his t-shirt. A dark red circle had already formed next to his spine.
“Do you live around here?” Tina asked.
“We just moved into D eight.” Answered Neck Tattoo
“If you have any spare ice or a cold pack you should ice this to keep the swelling down. Take a few Tylenol. I hope this is a lesson to you. Don’t steal someone’s food. They might fuck you up big time.” She stood back up. Tina aimed the tip of the blade at the food on the ground. “You can have this, but that’s it.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Cliff took a step closer to his wife.
“They need to eat too. We’re neighbors,” she said as she turned and headed back to the van.
“Are we feeding the whole complex now?” Cliff called after her.
“No, just them! I don’t know, maybe the ones that need help. Goddamn it, Cliff. I don’t know! Let’s go!” Tina did not stop to look back. The conversation was over as far as she was concerned. Cliff gave the two thieves a nasty stare as Long Hair fought to get to his feet.
Neck Tattoo gathered up the packages of meat and the bag of rice.
Cliff followed his wife back to the van. All the time he kept his eyes on the two young men. Long Hair hobbled his way over to building D as Neck Tattoo carried all of the food. Cliff scanned the apartment complex. Eyes watched them from every building.
How many other people are sitting with empty kitchens?
It had not even been a half hour since tons of shit exploded into the fan and they were already throwing rocks and fighting for food. They muscled the last of the supplies up into their place. Tina locked the door and turned her back to it. She leaned against the door and could feel the cold metal through her shirt. The cold felt great against her sweaty skin.
She dropped down to her butt and joined the massive pile of food in the front hallway of their place. The butcher knife shook in her hand. She let it fall to the floor and rubbed her palms together. A headache had already started to creep its way in. Stress, dehydration, fear and muscle fatigue were taking their toll. The muscles in her quads ached from the steps and she could already feel the knots forming tight in her back.
One of the cases of beer sat beside her. She ripped into it and took out two cans. Cliff stepped over a bag of beans and joined his wife on the floor. She handed him one.
“Thank you.” Cliff said with a grunt as his butt landed on the floor.
They popped the tops and took long drags of warm beer. The children played quietly in the back bedroom. Two of them pretended to be puppies as Eve trained them to roll over and play dead.
“This is a…situation we are in here,” Tina took another sip and rubbed at her thighs.
“If this thing is worldwide…then we’re in it deep,” Cliff wiped some sweat off his forehead.
“Oh fuck!” Tina gritted her teeth.
“What?” he sat up straight.
“Your Mother!” Tina held her hand to her mouth as if another word could further curse the situation. Cliff’s mom lived in a retirement community a mile away. She was in her seventies, but her body had withered away after years of substance abuse. She had been quite the rocker chick and lived the hard life for decades. “You have to go get her!”
“I can’t leave you and the girls!”
“You can’t leave her there alone. That would tear you up inside. You know it. You have to go, now!”
“We can’t take care of her here! We don’t have the right equipment.”
“If it’s her time to pass, she would want to be here with family. Not in that cold old folks home.”
“You’re right. I’m just scared to go outside again.” Tears formed in his eyes.
Tina reached out and pulled him in for a hug. He rubbed the tears out of his eyes and pushed himself up off the floor. He drained the rest of his beer and then opened the hallway closet, took out his heavy leather welding jacket that he wore to work.
“Girls, come here.” Cliff called his children. The little ones gathered around him.
“Daddy has to go get Granny. You stay as quiet as you can and behave for your Mama.” He squatted down to their level and wrapped his arms around all three of them.
“I love you.”
“We love you too Daddy,” Eve dropped her head onto his shoulder.
Alex, the five-year-old noticed his red eyes, “Why are you crying, Daddy?”
Cliff struggled to find the words.
“Daddy’s worried about Granny. That’s all,” Tina rose from the floor and finished off her beer.
“That’s it. Daddy’s worried.” He gave each of them a kiss and one last good squeeze.
“Don’t worry Daddy, it will be okay,” Eve whispered.
His grip on them was tighter than normal and they grunted from the pressure. He gave each girl a little bonk on the noggin. A forehead-to-forehead kiss.
“Bonk, bonk, bonk,” they said it together. He stood back up, zipped his jacket and reached for his truck keys that hung off a hook by the front door. His hand rested on the doorknob as he turned back to face his wife.
“I’ll see you, girl.” It was something he had said to her thousands of times over the years, but it was the first time it brought Tina to tears. Cliff checked the peephole.
All clear.
He raced out the door and Tina locked it behind him. Again his boots crashed down onto the concrete steps leading out of his place. His heart pounded, not from the run, but from the Mount Everest sized pile of fear that was piling up around him. He felt stupid for leaving his family, but the idea of someone chewing up his mother ripped out his heart. It was a five-minute drive to her place. He should be there and back in fifteen.
Cliff unlocked his 2002 black Dodge truck. He needed to drive it to carry his mom’s wheelchair back home. A bunch of building supplies lay in the bed. Some extra stuff he had to clean up yesterday at work. He looked back at his apartment before hopping into the cab. Four heads looked down at him from his bedroom window. He looked back at the top of the stairs to his place. He could build a barrier with these supplies. A little something to keep the freaks from his front door. He gave his family one last wave and tossed the meat cleaver into the passenger seat as he hopped up into the truck.
The Dodge always smelled like the job site. Dirt and fresh cut lumber. He slammed the door shut. He had to because it was the only way to get the damn thing to close anymore. It had been like that ever since he was at work and moved his truck out of the way of a cement mixer. He left his door open because he needed to move fast and get back to his spot on the concrete pour. He tapped the gas and had only moved backwards a couple of feet when his door crashed into his boss’s brand new seventy thousand dollar Ford F-450 Platinum. It screwed up the hinges on his door a little and he could never afford to get them properly fixed, but the damage to his boss’s truck, oh baby. He destroyed the fender, passenger door and rear quarter panel. Almost lost his job and the ribbing that followed lasted for months. No insurance meant that he had to pay out of pocket. No cash meant that his boss had to garnish his wages for a year. It was a rough twelve months.
Every time Cliff got into his truck he was reminded about that horrible day. This time the thought of that horrible day only lasted half a second. Today was ten times worse. He twisted the key. Both the engine and the radio kicked on. The beefy system spewed brutal heavy metal. The tires threw little chunks of asphalt as he sped backwards. He jammed it into first and tore out of the lot. He watched as a few families loaded up their cars to bug out of town.
Should he load up his family and head out to the woods?
Or batten down the hatches and hold tight till al
l this shit blew over?
Will it blow over?
Could the government rally and stop this from spreading?
It was so hard to tell which move was the right one. The heavy metal music got his blood pumping. He hammered his fist down onto the steering wheel and kept beat with the song. At the edge of the lot Cliff came to a stop and checked the street. He did a quick look to his right and his heart wanted to shoot out of his butt. A young woman sprinted across the street. Her face torqued with fear. A pack of infected monsters pursued her relentlessly. She changed course and headed for Cliff’s truck the second she saw him.
“Please!” she called out to him. Her blood stained hands waved in the air to make sure he had seen her. Cliff was compelled to help her but the six infected were so close to reaching her. He pulled the emergency brake, reached for the cleaver and threw open his door.
Chapter 8
The heavy metal rock blasted from the cab and muffled the woman’s cries for help. Cliff put one foot on the asphalt. The young woman was ten feet from the front of his truck. Cliff had the cleaver up, ready to fight when one of the infected reached out and clutched a fistful of her long blonde hair. Her head snapped back. She came to an abrupt stop and her feet flew out from under her. The woman fell brutally to the rough street surface. The infected were upon her. There was nothing he could do but watch them tear her apart. Their mouths ripped into her soft tanned skin. Her eyes turned white as they rolled back into her skull.
Cliff hesitated for a moment. He was driven to save her but knew she was lost. He climbed back into the cab, yanked the door shut, dropped the emergency brake and stepped on the gas. As he pulled away, Cliff spun the dial to max on the sound system so he did not have to hear the screams of her death.
Cliff made a few turns and fished his cell phone from his pocket. He kept one eye on the road as he speed dialed the retirement community where his mother lived. It rang and rang. No answer.
“Fuck,” he hung up and put the phone back in his pocket. He weaved past a couple of cars that were parked in the center of the street. Their windows were busted out and blood coated the seats. The tires screeched under the Dodge as he course corrected after the last car. Cliff checked the speedometer. He was doing sixty on a street zoned for thirty-five.
