by Zuko, Joseph
“I’m just bringing these up to the guys.” She raised up the two mugs of coffee and headed for the steps. “Resume your freaky married people talk.” She marched up the steps and the second her head disappeared into the attic the couple got back to it.
Sara found the cardboard mannequins interesting. Well at least she thought it was interesting that a grown man would spend time and money making them for just one day of the year. She asked Karen about them when she got back to the kitchen after taking Jim and Cliff’s coffee order. Seeing Michael Myers laid out in the attic brought a flurry of memories to her. Halloween was one of her Mom and Dad’s favorite movies. When she was in her teens they watched it as a family every year on the big day. Her father explained each time they watched it how this was the movie that started it all. ‘All of the movies after this one are cheap copycats.’
Sara’s folks were very religious, her Dad even spent a few years preaching, and for the most part they were not fans of rated R movies, but for whatever reason, Halloween had a special place in their hearts. The first few times she watched it with them, Sara chalked up their admiration to the fact that the sinners got what they deserved. It made sense. The character Michael Myers, punished fornicators and Dad preached about that moral every Sunday. As Sara grew older, the more she understood the truth about this silly slasher flick from the seventies. Sure, old Mom and Dad enjoyed the thrills and suspense, but what they really loved about the movie was Jamie Lee Curtis’s character, Laurie Strode. She was pure, wholesome and pitted against evil. She was strong and fought to stay alive. Laurie, the angel, with the help of Doctor Loomis, was able to defeat Michael, the devil, in the end. Sara’s parents loved those kinds of stories. When ultimate good thrashed ultimate evil.
Sara crept past the fake Michael and toward the opening in the roof. She stood up in the hole and scooched in next to Leon. The horde came into full view and Sara pondered,
Are we good enough to beat this devil?
“Here is one coalminer,” said Sara as she handed it to Cliff. It gave her a sense of escape and joy pretending things were normal as if it was a regular day at work. “And one double cream and sugar.” She handed the mug to Leon. “When I was at work I would normally say to the customer that ordered a drink like this, ‘You want some coffee with that cream and sugar,’ you know, to break their balls, but since you already had yours busted today, I’ll leave you alone.” Her smile was genuine and her joke was only an attempt at forming a bond with these guys, but the look on Leon’s face. He appeared mortified.
“I’m messing with you. Calm down. You look like someone pissed in your Count Chocula.” Sara lightly socked him in the arm.
“Thank you,” said Cliff before he took a sip, not paying any attention to their awkward exchange.
“Yes, thank you.” Leon’s expression returned to normal once Cliff didn’t take the opportunity to rib him some more.
“Okay, I’m off to deliver more coffees.” Sara turned for the attic.
“Has Jim found any rope yet?” asked Leon.
Sara rolled her eyes. “Nope, not unless the rope was in the back of Karen’s pants. When I left them that’s where his hands were heading.”
Karen got a few passionate kisses in before Jim said, “I really should get back up there.”
“Fine, but tonight, your ass is mine Mr. Blackmore.” Karen smacked him hard on the butt cheek.
Jim gritted his teeth. “That really stung.”
Karen bugged out her eyes. “I know.”
“Have you seen any rope in here? We need to secure ourselves to the roof. Cliff almost fell.” Jim lied. Horribly.
Karen read him like a book for kindergartener’s. “Cliff, almost fell?”
He knew he had been caught, but he kept at it like his five-year-old daughter would if she was fibbing to her Mama. “Yep, it was him. Not me.”
“Well let’s find Cliff some rope. I think I saw some in the box of camping supplies.” She moved for the far wall. “I finally got around to cleaning this garage. Can you believe it?” Karen popped open a box.
“It’s the cleanest I’ve ever seen it.” Jim lowered his voice as he followed her. “By the way, where did you find that guy Leon?”
Karen produced a bundle of nylon rope from the box. “Why?”
“He’s just… I don’t know… something’s off about him.” Jim took the rope from her.
She hushed her voice, “I know, but keep this in mind okay, the girls and I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for Leon. He got us here. He built the barricades. He made the kids pancakes.”
That struck a chord with Jim. He had made his kids pancakes almost every Sunday. “Were they better than mine?” Jim joked.
Karen’s expression got real serious. She always had a difficult time lying to her husband.
“What? I was joking. Were they really better than mine?” He couldn’t help but sound insecure.
“He worked for a pancake house in Bend, okay.”
“So he’s a ringer.” Even Jim couldn’t tell if he was joking or really jealous. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. I don’t care. Where did you find him?”
Karen couldn’t lie. “In jail, the police station on Mill Plain, close to our apartment.”
“He’s a criminal?” Jim squeaked.
“Kind of.”
Sara descended out of the attic.
“What did he do?” Jim moved in closer to keep their conversation low.
“He said he was arrested for car theft.” Before Jim could say a word she kept going. “In these circumstances what does it matter that he was in jail. He’s not applying for a job here. It’s about survival, and the truth is we need him.” Jim looked confused. “He can hotwire a car. I’ve seen him do it twice.”
Jim thought it over and she was right.
No real surprise there.
“Well, I can’t wait to try some of those world class pancakes.” Jim leaned in and gave her a peck on the cheek. “I’ve got to go kill some zombies.” Jim picked up his coffee.
As he passed Sara she said, “I’ll be up in a second to help.” Sara shuffled next to Karen, waited for Jim to disappear into the attic, lowered her voice and asked, “What’s up with that guy, Leon?”
Chapter 14
Blaine gritted his teeth as he firmly held a smile on his lips. The roar of the engine along with the whistling of wind zipping through open windows masked the sound of him quietly talking to himself.
“Santa’s sleigh zips silently through the slip stream.” He hadn’t uttered this sentence in two decades. All of the death. The loss. It put him on edge, there was no doubt of that, but what really rattled Blaine’s cage was riding in this bus. It brought back a flood of terrible memories. He suffered from hour long, painful, rides to and from school. For nearly seven years he was teased mercilessly for being shorter than the others, a little effeminate and worst of all for his horrible lisp.
Say, suffering succotash! Billy Boyd would yell in his face as he viciously slapped him across the back of his neck.
How many boys have you kissed with that silly little mouth? Becky Morgan asked as she pulled Blaine’s hair. The kids weren’t creative with their insults, but it hurt to be an outcast.
Riding in this bus, completely surrounded by death, was triggering flashbacks of all his worst memories. Every bully that ever gave him a beating. All of the wet willies, wedgies, Indian burns, spit wads and pink bellies. The gangs of cool girls that loved to inflict psychological trauma on him. All of it came crashing to the forefront of his mind, imploring him to revert to old habits and turn all of his “S’s” and “Z’s” into “TH” sounds.
Blaine concentrated as he weaved through a horde of infected. He pulled his tongue back from his teeth as he spoke, “Santa’s sleigh… Santa’s sleigh.”
A little trick he learned to keep the teasing at a minimum was to sit right behind the driver and make friends with them each year. Blaine glanced up at the mirror hanging above his h
ead. It made him giggle a little that his friend, Dallas, was the one sitting in that same seat. Back then he prayed for a friend like Dallas to come along. Someone big, strong and loyal would have been heaven sent.
A friend won’t let a bully pick on you. His mother would tell him between long drags of her cigarette. Good advice, normally, but it was a struggle for Blaine to make friends. When he was at school he forced his friendship on the nurse and the lunch lady. He would even go as far as hanging out in the janitor’s closet at recess to avoid getting picked as the target for a rousing game of Smear the Queer. Being buddy buddy with the different staff members at the school didn’t help his prestige, but at least it was safe. Elementary and middle school was an absolute nightmare, but one day, toward the end of eighth grade, a miracle happened. His mother lost her job and they were evicted from their apartment.
Oh happy day.
This turn of events would have been hell for most kids, but for Blaine it meant moving out of town and living with his grandparents. He had a chance for a fresh start. All summer long he spent hours every day in front of the mirror, practicing and rehearsing. He was bound and determined to vanquish this lisp before the start of high school. After three months of daily perseverance he had conquered his speech impediment. On top of that, Grandma was happy to drop him off and pick him up every school day. He quickly made friends and his life flipped one-eighty. He enjoyed going to class knowing if the teacher called on him to solve a math problem he could clearly say with confidence. “The answer is sixty-six,” and no one would snicker. Now a days, Blaine was the only one who knew about his speech problem and he wanted to keep it that way.
“The sun set smoothly in the west.” He executed the sentence perfectly. His resolve hardened. He wasn’t about to let his mouth embarrass him. He took another glimpse in the mirror at his friend. Dallas was wiping blood from his face and shirt. Shock had taken up residence on the big man’s face.
Watching a brain pop out a skull will do that to a fella.
The mirror above Blaine’s head cracked as a hole the size of a dime appeared in it. Half a second later he heard the sound of the gunshot.
“We’re under fire!” he screamed as he cranked the wheel. Ahead of them were hundreds of apartments, an office building and a gas station. The shot could have come from anywhere. As the bus rounded a corner, another shot tagged the right side of the rig. A dime sized hole punched through the glass. The sudden change in direction sent the gear flying across the bus. Dallas and Theo’s rifles clattered along the floor as the two men tumbled into the aisle. The front tires bounced up onto the curb and chewed into the sod. A third shot pinged through the metal siding and into a rear seat, sending chunks of foam into the air. Blaine pushed his foot to the floor and the war rig scurried off the main road and into a cul-de-sac. The houses blocked them from the shooter, but there was nowhere left to run. Blaine stomped the brakes and the bus skidded to a stop just before the plow crashed into the side of a mini-van parked at the edge of the cul-de-sac.
Blaine spun in his seat, jaw chattering with fear and asked, “Is everyone alright?”
Shawna and Charlie peeked out from their seats. They stammered out the words, “I’m okay.”
Theo had fallen face first from his row and slid up under Charlie’s chair. He wiggled his body out from under the seat and squatted in the aisle. “I’m fine.”
Dallas laid flat on his spine as he cradled the back of his skull. He pulled his hand from under his noggin and the tips of his fingers were red. “I’ll be alright.” He searched for his rifle, found it and sat up facing Blaine. “Could you see where the shots were coming from?”
“No.”
Theo cracked, “Who was that?”
“Why would someone shoot at a school bus?” Shawna grabbed her rifle and tucked its stock into her armpit.
“What if there were kids on this thing?” Charlie scanned his side of the rig.
Dallas got to his feet, keeping his head below the open windows and waddled to the back of the rig. “They saw the mods on the ride and figured we were rolling heavy or they’re just crazy.” He inched his way into the backseat. He held his nose millimeters from the glass as he looked around the entrance to the neighborhood. A hundred corpses littered the ground. “Anyone pack a set of binoculars?”
“Yeah, I’ve got one,” Charlie picked up his bag. A couple seconds later he produced a set of military field glasses. He hopped out of his seat and handed them to Dallas. “What is it?”
Dallas raised the glasses to his eyes and his vison zoomed in on the dead. Most of their limbs had the typical bite marks he was getting used to seeing on an infected body. He scanned the lifeless corpses on the road and adjacent yards. Each one had been taken down with a single headshot.
With no airflow in the rig to keep them cool it felt like the temperature rose twenty-degrees in only a few minutes. Dallas wiped a wrist across his brow and it was sopping wet.
The pack of infected the bus passed moments ago came stumbling onto the side street. The sound of the rumbling bus called to them. The lead runner’s skull split open and its body crashed to the asphalt. A second later the gunshot echoed around the neighborhood.
“Wow!” Droplets of sweat ran down Charlie’s chin and fell to the black floor of the bus as he perched himself right behind Dallas. One row from them sat Shawna and Theo. Both were perspiring heavily. The shooter scalped four more infected bodies in as many seconds. Only six of the posse remained and were out of the shooter’s sightline.
“That’s no amateur.” Dallas handed the binoculars to Charlie. “They were taken down by headshots and judging by the sound of the report. They’re half a mile away.” Dallas moved to the open side window at the rear of the bus and aimed his assault rifle at the remaining six. He clicked through a dozen shots and finished off the pack.
Charlie grumbled, “He must be hanging out on the top floor of the office building. That’s where I’d be.”
“If we try to drive our way through, he’ll shoot the tires. We’ll be stuck out in the open.” Theo headed back to his seat and grabbed his gun.
“So we’re trapped?” Shawna looked to the big man for answers.
Dallas touched his skull again. His index finger gingerly danced around the wound as he checked the houses lining the roundabout. Most of them were single story ranch style homes, but the one on the corner stood tall and proud with the only second floor on the block. He faced his team and wiped the blood onto his camo pants. “Charlie and I enter that house there.” He pointed to the second story building. “He’ll be my spotter. You two keep an eye on the bus as Blaine gets the rig turned around. We wait until the sniper takes a shot at an infected. Then…” Dallas faced the others, a fresh toothpick already pinched between his fingers, his tongue snagged it from his grasp and tucked the sliver of wood into the corner of his mouth.
The weight of their predicament crashed into them.
Shawna was deadly serious as she asked, “You’re going to kill them?”
“We don’t have a lot of choices here.” Dallas moved from the rear seat and made his way to the front.
Theo fingered the bullet hole in the seat cushion, “They shot first, Shawna. What are we supposed to do?”
“I don’t know. It just seems wrong.” Shawna followed him to his seat as he opened the camo case. A beautiful hunting rifle with a high powered scope lay in the custom cut foam.
Dallas traded the assault rifle for the hunting model, nodded at Charlie and asked, “Are you good with this?”
“Affirmative,” said Charlie as he stepped into the aisle and headed for his rifle.
Dallas wasn’t a hundred percent sure if he was good with this. How could he be? Killing a deer wasn’t the same as killing a human. When the time came and the crosshairs were dialed in, could he pull the trigger? He loaded a round, pushed the bolt forward and stepped for the door.
I guess we’ll see.
The diesel engine rumbled behind t
hem as Dallas and Charlie sprinted for the house on the corner. Blaine had to make a six point turn to get the bus facing the exit. Shawna and Theo stayed alert with their rifles aimed out the sides of the rig.
The two men glided onto the yard of their target home. Dallas took the lead as he marched up the steps and closed in on the front door. Dallas reached for the knob and gave it a twist.
Locked.
Charlie watched their backs.
“We’ll have to break in.” Dallas stepped away from the door.
Charlie kept his voice to a whisper. “Have you done this before?”
“No.”
“What if there are civilians or hostiles? What’s the plan then?”
Dallas fired his powerful boot into the solid wood. The frame splintered and the door swung open. “Improvise,” said Dallas as he slung the rifle’s strap onto his shoulder and slid his sidearm from its holster. As they entered the house they checked their corners. Dallas entered the living room. Charlie closed the door behind them and locked the chain. The place was messy. Pizza boxes, empty two liters of Coke and beer bottles covered every flat surface, but there was no sign of a struggle. Dallas moved slowly through the room minding every bit of furniture, readying himself for a surprise ankle biter.
A noise came from one of the rooms upstairs. They flinched and aimed at the steps. It sounded like someone had fallen from a bed.
Dallas took a deep breath and headed for the stairwell. He slowly worked his way to the landing, trying not to make a peep. Charlie stepped backwards as he walked. His rifle swept back and forth as he watched for a sneak attack.
Halfway up the next flight of stairs Dallas spotted a bloody handprint smeared along the white sheetrock. His throat felt dry. Bloody sneaker prints ran down the steps and faded as they hit the main floor. Something ran around in one of the rooms. It crashed into what sounded like a desk. A handful of items, including something made out of glass smashed to the floor. A flock of butterflies swarmed inside his belly. Dallas had gunned the infected from a distance, but never fought one up close and personal before.
