She looked around for a brief second, wondering if she was part of a terrible prank.
“Hello? Who said that?”
Her husband's body shifted.
“Ouch, that sucked,” the zombie replied.
In those final seconds before they fell in the water, Liam threw the knife to try to kill his zombie dad, but it missed its mark and went into the zombie's side. Now that she'd pulled it free, it seemed to cause pain to the corpse.
She raised the bloody knife in the air, ready to stab it-him-in the head. The necessary final act of every zombie.
“It's me, Lan. Is my voice working? I said I love you, too.”
She dropped the knife, as much out of shock as relief she wouldn't have to use it. Yet, she was afraid to bend down to him.
“It can't be,” she said wistfully. “I saw you. You were a zombie.”
They were brought together so Jerry would infect her in front of Liam. Elsa Cantwell had arranged the encounter as payback for the troubles her son had caused her and by all indications the slimy woman had succeeded. Liam's horrified expression was the last thing she saw before Jerry lunged at her and they both fell off the boat and into the brown muck of the river. The current pulled her away before seeing Liam's fate.
Over the long hours floating down the river she'd alternated between fits of crying and bouts of rage. It never seemed important to untie the ten-foot rope on her leg that linked her to Jerry, but now she was glad she waited.
“I know how you feel,” he said. “I can't believe it, either, but here I am.”
It appeared to take a lot of effort, but Jerry rolled himself over. She saw his face had regained its color, and much of the bloody discharge that was standard equipment for the zombies had been washed away. He didn't look quite back to normal but was maybe close to how he might look if he was taking his first steps after a bad bout of influenza.
“You cut your hair,” he said, wincing in pain. “Looks nice.”
She felt herself choke up. Elsa had shaved part of the left side of her head to make it easy for Jerry to take a bite from her neck. It looked anything but nice.
Lana touched that part of her scalp.
“Thanks. But, Jerry, we buried you in the ground. You were-”
“Dead,” he said simply. “I know. Well, I don't know that part. I don't remember anything happening on the ground, but the proverbial white light consumed me the whole time.”
“You went to Heaven?” she asked, hoping for concrete evidence of just that.
“I don't know, honestly. My head is all fuzzy.” He put his hand on the side of his head and bopped it a few times as if to clear the water from his ears.
She didn't know how to feel. Shock, certainly. Disbelief was a close second.
“Where did we first meet?” She wanted to quiz him to confirm his identity.
“Big Texas Bar and Dance Emporium.”
“First words to me?”
“Would you care to dance?
“First time we got together?”
“That trip to Minnesota to see your aunt. She had to drive to town on business and we had the place all to ourselves. The window of that bedroom was situated just perfect, so I could watch the sun set on your soft skin. It was the most gorgeous sunset I've ever seen.” He tilted his head, “Until just now. Seeing dawn's first light on you right now is the most beautiful sight of my life.”
She fought her emotions to keep from blushing. Her body had done some hard time since that sunny bedroom so long ago. Her head was partially shaved, she got punched a few times, and was thrown into the stinky river. None of that could have done her any favors in the beauty department. Then again, Jerry always did have a way with words.
But she couldn't afford to let sentiment cloud her judgment. She wanted to drop down and hug him, but something wasn't right about the whole affair. After seeing millions of zombies scour the land and the world of men fall apart like wet cardboard, she thought of herself as immune to girlish fantasy.
“Your husband is alive,” she thought. “That makes TOTAL sense.”
“Are you a robot? A cyborg? Some kind of living manikin?” Her science fiction repertoire wasn't very deep. That was Liam's area, but she'd picked up enough watching movies with him over the years.
“I just am, babe.” He gazed in her eyes and a familiar signal passed between them, like she'd been given access to peer into his soul. They were the same eyes she'd come to know better than her own.
She fell to him. “Oh Jerry. How is this possible?”
Tears followed. The hardness of numerous days on the road of the zombie apocalypse, many without him by her side, faded away. He wasn't dead. He wasn't a zombie. He was just Jerry again.
“I don't care,” he replied in her ear. “I just want to enjoy your warmth.”
They hugged for a long time. Eventually that turned to kissing.
When they broke contact, it wasn't because she wanted to stop.
“I have to move,” Jerry said with disappointment. “There's a rock in my back that's going to kill me again.”
The laughter wiped away the tears of sadness.
She helped him crawl up the bank until they both sat on a long rock. They joined hands and watched the water of the river crawl by. The mist-shrouded far shore seemed every bit of a mile away.
“Where do you think we are?” she said when the silence became too much.
“Alive,” he said. “That's good enough for me.”
She giggled, then pretended to look around the rocky riverbank. “I need to find someone else alive and see if you're visible to them.”.
He looked taken aback. “You think I'm a ghost?”
She held his intense brown eyes and felt his return was too good to be true. She'd had no sleep, endured prolonged dehydration, and suffered grief and high anxiety for days. Combined, that could make her think a lot of crazy things. Especially the one she wanted more than anything since the day she buried him: to see her husband alive one more time.
“I, uh ... ” She wasn't sure what she thought.
He finally cracked a smile, unable to keep his straight face. They both started to laugh. Hers was nervous at first, as if there was still a joke being played on her. But in seconds she let herself go and the laughing became loud and playful.
If he was a ghost, then she would embrace her insanity. If he wasn't, then she'd just witnessed the biggest miracle to take place since Jesus rose from the dead. Too bad there wasn't a priest around to confirm the event for posterity.
The gravity of the event made her stop laughing, but she played it off as needing to get moving. She pulled him off his seat, worried that he'd been put back in her life for a special reason. If she could get him far away from the place of his rising, maybe she could keep him all to herself.
It made her feel like a terrible church-goer, but miracles only come along once in a lifetime. For a wife that had her husband returned to her, she guarded that achievement with fierce jealousy.
“Let's go, my love,” she said in a dreamy voice.
She guided him away from the river.
2
They only got a few steps before Jerry fell to his knees. She held on as best she could.
“I'm not myself,” he quipped.
“Your leg?” she asked. His lower leg had been broken clean through on the fibula a few weeks ago. It's what spawned the infection that eventually took his life.
“No, my broken leg feels a million times better.”
“Really?” The fact he could get up and walk at all was a minor miracle. Sure, it paled next to coming back to life, but she was overwhelmed with emotion with every detail of the reunion.
“Is it your side?” She pulled up his shirt like a doting wife but gasped because the knife wound had already partially healed.
“It's not my leg or my side. I'm just dizzy.”
She searched the riverbank for somewhere better than the open rocks near the water's edge.
&
nbsp; “Can you make it over there, to those trees? It will shield us when the sun comes up.” It never really got cool in the overnight hours, but being out of the water made her appreciate the thick humidity was going to ruin the day.
He nodded, and they tried to walk again, but he fell to his knees. “I'll crawl,” he croaked.
“No, this is fine,” she replied, trying not to sound disappointed. She'd hoped he'd be endowed with superhuman powers as long as miracles were happening.
“Nonsense,” he said. “We can't stay in the open. I don't want you out in the sun.”
She laughed. “You sound like Grandma Marty. You never think of yourself.”
“I guess some of her good parenting rubbed off. I learned from the best.” He laughed, though he was faced down on all fours.
She wanted to blame herself for a series of bad decisions the last few weeks that led to the probable death of Liam back on that barge, but she didn't want to saddle Jerry with the same guilt. Not yet, anyway. Someday they'd have to talk about it.
So, she helped him crawl over the rocks and dirt until they made it to where they agreed was a comfy place to hole up. She spun him over, so he could sit against the trunk of a large Willow.
“You good?” she asked.
He responded with a thumb up.
She studied his face and eyes and didn't see anything out of the ordinary, now that he was alive.
“Alive?” she thought.
She smiled and reached her hand out for his chest. He tried to intercept it, but she waved him off.
“I have to check something,” she said matter-of-factly. She was in charge of the family medical dealings because of all their prepping back before the zombie apocalypse, but now she had nothing but her hands with which to treat him.
He looked at her seriously, then smiled. “My heart?”
She held his gaze and nodded.
“I know you have one. But I have to feel it. I have to know you're really here.”
“Feel me up. I don't mind.” He put his hands behind his head like he was relaxing on a Hawaiian beach.
“Uh, okay Mr. Miracle.”
She couldn't help but exhale with relief when her hand immediately felt the powerful heartbeat through his damp shirt. Instead of pulling her hand away, she bent over, and placed the shaved side of her head upon his chest. The sound of his heart made it all so much more real.
“It is the most beautiful sound I've ever heard, my love.” She was once again moved to tears.
“Hey,” he whispered. “It's going to be alright.”
Lana listened to his beating heart in one ear while the sound of rustling leaves filled the other. A Cardinal tweeted from somewhere nearby. The bubbling river drifted by as it had done for ages. She could almost ignore the damp air.
It was a little piece of Heaven, but it had to end eventually.
“I just had my husband returned to me from the grave, and all I can think about is our son. I think he's dead, Jerry.”
Jerry gripped her hand tightly. “How? Why? What happened?”
Lana took a few seconds to collect her thoughts. She'd been replaying it over and over in her head, but it always ended with Liam somewhere out of her sight.
“We were on a barge with Liam and Victoria and some others. A bitch named Elsa wanted you to infect me in front of Liam because he'd hurt her boyfriend, or something.”
She choked up.
Jerry rubbed her back as she tried to continue.
“She made Liam watch me and you fall over the side. She made him watch us die.” A heaving sob caught in her throat.
The rubbing on her back became more fervent. “Hey there. He's a strong kid with a resourcefulness I didn't know he had. I took him shooting and camping and showed him the tools he'd need to survive any calamity, but after what I saw him do between our house and that Boy Scout camp, I'd say he taught me a few things, too.”
He brushed the hair from her face, so he could look at her directly.
“One day I'm going to tell him that,” he said softly.
For a few minutes she was content to rest on his chest and enjoy the sounds of life. But much too soon her mind was consumed by a crosstalk of questions and possible answers.
“I gave Liam that letter,” she said when she could talk without sobbing.
A chuckle in his chest interrupted the peace of his heartbeat. “And?”
“He wasn't too happy.”
“I'm sure he got over it,” he replied.
“No. He really didn't. He didn't want to know his family had ties to a revolution. I had him safe with the Patriot Snowball gang in downtown St. Louis, including Travis and Haylee, but he snuck out by himself and went across the city, so he could be with Victoria.”
“Are you freakin' kidding me?” he chuffed. “Well I guess I didn't teach him as much as I thought.”
“Don't be too hard on him, Jer,” she chuckled. “We both did silly things. I jumped in a panzer tank and chased after him.”
“Panzer is German for tank, honey.”
“Seriously?”
Jerry gave her a sheepish look. “Sorry. You were saying?”
“I chased him in a German Tiger tank ... ”
Lana gave him a sideways glance as if seeking his approval for her description. It was all in good fun, and she relished every word he spoke, even when he corrected her military lingo.
All he did was grin, so she went on. “Yeah. I think we both went nuts after losing you. Each in our own way. We went out into danger and somehow both ended up in Cairo, Illinois. I saw him for two horrible minutes before ... the end.”
“But Liam survived his journey there,” he said with enthusiasm. “He crossed the city alone. I'd say that was the dumbest thing he's ever done, but I guess I can understand. I'd do the same for you.”
Her sobs ramped up again, but he was quick to intercept them.
“Hey,” he said, lifting her chin. “I didn't mean it like that. Liam did good. He learned my lessons. If he can cross a city of zombies in one piece, I bet he figured out a way to survive in Cairo, too.”
“You really think so?” she pleaded, her eyes damp with tears.
“Oh, sure. Our family has a history of tough fighters. You. Marty. My dad. And now Liam.”
“You, too,” she added.
“Yeah, even me. Fighting back from the grave-” His voice trailed off.
She watched his eyes convey momentary confusion, then go back to normal.
“So, all we have to do is get your dizziness under control and we can go back up the river and see our son.”
“I'd love to see the look on his face when I show up alive,” Jerry replied.
For a long time, she drowned herself in the orderly rhythm of his heart; it provided an anchor to all the chaos that she'd faced of late.
Before she fell asleep she thought briefly of the large explosion she'd seen and felt as she floated away from Cairo.
“No use souring the mood,” she thought to herself. If Liam didn't die on that boat at the hands of Elsa Cantwell, he surely avoided that massive explosion. He seemed to draw disaster to himself and thrive on it. That made her laugh a tiny bit.
Her watch read 4:44.
She nodded off while absently wondering if she heard boat horns.
3
The slapping of water against the shore woke her. It was darker than it was while holding Jerry, like it had become night again, but he remained in the same place under the Willow tree.
A well-lit towboat pushed a grouping of barges down the river. Its wake trailed behind, making lots of noise as it struck the rocks.
She stood up, ensuring Jerry remained out. He needed his sleep, she assumed, more than she did.
To the left, upstream, another towboat waved its spotlight from side to side. The long beams penetrated a thin veil of fog near the water's surface. It reminded her of a spaceship for some reason.
When the waves of the first boat passed, everything settled down
at the shore. The engines faded on the one downstream, and the other wasn't close enough to hear.
A lone cricket chirped in the distance as if something needed to make a sound.
“Hello, Lana Marie,” a man's soft voice called from a nearby bush.
“Who's there?” she shot back with balled fists.
A soldier stepped from the darkness. He had a glow to him, like a television screen. When he got close, she recognized him from old photographs.
“Grandpa Al?” She'd never met Jerry's paternal grandfather, but Grandma Marty talked about him all the time, including how he'd fought in World War II. She knew his life's story better than she did her own grandparents-both of whom passed when she was a teenager.
“Hiya,” he said, seemingly reaffirming her guess.
“Oh no, am I dead?” She spun to Jerry. He remained where he fell asleep, but she kneeled to check his heartbeat. When she found it, she looked back up. “He's alive.”
Al continued to gaze at her with a friendly smile but said nothing.
“Am I sleepwalking? Liam swore he did this. And he saw you.”
“And he was right,” he said in a friendly voice. “You thought he was lying?”
“Maybe. No. I guess not. Not with everything else going on in the world. Things aren't what they used to be. I've just seen Jerry rise from the dead. Now I've seen a talking bush.”
Al laughed. “I assure you, that is all coincidence.”
“Um, rising from the dead? How can that be a coincidence?”
He turned serious, though still had a partial smile. “I meant the bush. Resurrection is not a miracle. That's science, my dear. All of this that you see in this broken world is scientifically possible. And be glad, too. There would need to be so many miracles any deity would grow bored down here.”
He swept his arm out over the river. “Though a few good miracles could stop those boats. I wouldn't complain if God got a little involved.”
She cocked her head. “So, you're saying God could get involved?”
He smiled, then offered his hand to pull her up.
She obliged.
“I'm saying I have no idea what God does. Maybe she takes an interest. Maybe it humors her to nudge a few people in the right direction. Or, maybe she put me in my position, so I could do the nudging. I honestly don't know.”
Zombie Escape_More Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse Page 24
