“So this is your whole group?” Cole asked. “There isn’t anybody I haven’t met yet?”
“Nope,” Roy said. “This is it.”
“Amazing,” Cole said, and Roy had the feeling that he had said it more to himself than anyone else.
“How’s that?” Roy asked with curiosity.
“Well, you have children here, a doctor, and it looks like besides the teen, you have only Amanda and yourself to protect everybody. It’s amazing that you have survived this long out here, considering.”
“Amanda’s what’s amazing,” Roy said, very typically remaining modest. “She’s looked out for us and saved our asses a time or two.”
“Do you have any idea what would happen to you all out here if those raiders discover that you have a doctor in your camp? They would kill every last one of you to get to her,” Cole said, suddenly feeling alarmed that it was his responsibility now to make sure that didn’t happen.
“How many are there?” Roy asked as they made a slow stroll up the hill.
“There were fifty of us in the one camp and about thirty-eight or so in the opposing camp,” Cole said, “until the fire.”
“The other camp got pushed out by the fire and lost about twenty or so in a horde that was drawn to the fire. The rest of their camp swooped in on us, like they were hopped up on drugs or something. There was a shoot-out. We lost twenty, and all their people died or fled. Our leader told us to pack up, and we left to make camp in the desert a number of miles from here. When Cody and I escaped, that left them sitting at twenty-eight, and trust me, you don’t want to tangle with them. The leader might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he’s ruthless and heartless.”
“You say escaped like you and Cody were prisoners or something,” Roy said, stopping at the top of the hill.
“We were, but I need to talk to everybody about this because there are some things that you all need to know, except maybe the wee little one,” Cole said, continuing on.
Maryanne and Cody had made biscuits and had simmered the apple-pie filling in a pot, adding a lot of additional cinnamon for spice. Each of them received a juice box and a sports drink. For Cole and Cody, who had been surviving off of leftovers that were meager, it was a meal fit for a king.
“See, Dad,” Cody said, with his mouth full and pieces of biscuit flying out, “I told you that people need good cooks too and not just fighters.”
“I can see that, son,” said Cole, with his eyes alight with mirth.
“Maryanne’s a doctor, and she’s going to teach me to be a doctor too. You’ll see, Dad, there’s a place for me in this world,” said Cody, following it up with a forkful of pie filling.
“Is that true?” Cole asked, stunned, looking to Maryanne. “You’ll teach him? He’s real smart, you know, that’s what they said back in the LBZ”
“I will be absolutely dedicated to teaching this fine young man everything that I know about medicine,” said Maryanne, looking to the boy with pride.
“Well, all right then, we’ll stay if you’ll have us,” Cole said, wearing an expression that told of his amazement.
“What about me, Mom? Will you teach me?” asked Sam, feeling a little jealous.
“Sure, honey, if you want to learn, I would love to teach you. But I thought you wanted to be a fighter and learn from Amanda and Roy?” Maryanne said.
“I know,” Sam said with a sigh. “It’s so hard to do everything. I’m not really that interested in being a doctor. I was just wondering if you would teach me, is all.”
“Of course, I would, sweetie, but maybe you should work at being you and not worry about trying to be somebody that you’re not,” her mother answered.
“Good advice, Mom. I want to be like Amanda. I’ll work on that,” Sam said, before stealing a glance to Amanda’s still sleeping form.
Maryanne caught the glance and couldn’t help but be concerned by the ramifications if Amanda were indeed infected by the virus.
“Cole used to be a police officer. I’m sure he knows a thing or two about fighting,” said Maryanne, trying to distract her daughter’s attention and possibly to set her up with another mentor, should Amanda not survive this.
“Cool,” said Sam, but her voice lacked enthusiasm.
Sam was surprised that she suddenly didn’t feel hungry anymore. She picked at her food, thinking that Amanda must be hungry too and worried that her friend might not wake up and that she would never be able to talk to her again.
“How about you take a bath after breakfast, sweetie? You can put some water in a bucket and scrub down. It wouldn’t hurt for you to change your clothes either,” Maryanne said to her daughter.
“Sure, Mom,” said Sam, surprising her mother that she didn’t try to argue about it.
“The two of you sure came back to us a filthy mess, all covered with soot and all,” Maryanne said.
“If you wouldn’t mind, Cody and I should clean up too,” Cole said. “I can’t remember the last time we bathed or washed our clothes.”
“It was back in Oregon, in the creek. Remember?” Cody said, setting his empty plate down and beginning to work on the juice box.
“That was one cold creek. I remember,” Cole said, once again fascinated by his son’s ability to retain information, even under these difficult types of conditions.
“It sure was cold,” said Cody. “It made my balls shrink up,” he said, before looking around and turning a bright shade of pink.
“Sorry,” Cole said, “he’s used to just having me to talk to these days.”
Cole shot his son a look, and Cody shrugged in response.
“It’s okay,” Roy said, giving a chuckle. “You’re among family here.”
“Just the same, I’ll talk to him about appropriate breakfast conversation,” Cole said, sounding serious.
O
Amanda awoke to the sound of snippets of conversation and metal utensils scraping on plates. When she opened her eyes, she was surprised to see that the sun was out. Normally, she would have been uncomfortably hot by now and unable to sleep, but as it was, she still felt like she could lay here for a while. She pushed herself up, feeling the groan from her muscles protesting loudly at the movement.
She looked herself over and was shocked to see that her left arm was covered with a gauze bandage. She wondered when that might have happened. Amanda had only a vague memory of Maryanne caring for her; it was all a bit fuzzy. But it didn’t surprise her to see that she was wearing her friend’s clothing. She did remember that part of the experience.
When she stood, she had to hike up her pants because they wanted to slip down. She stooped to roll up the pant legs. Maryanne was much taller than she was, and she didn’t want to add further insult to injury by tripping over the excess pant legs while she attempted to join the group for breakfast. She realized that Sam must be worried sick about her and wanted to assure the girl that she was okay and fever-free, for now at least.
“Amanda!” Sam screeched when she saw her slowly shuffling toward them.
Sam jumped up and went running to her, nearly knocking her over when she gave her a strong hug.
“Be careful with her,” Maryanne said. “I’m sure she’s still not very strong yet.”
“Why don’t you take her arm and assist her?” said Jason.
“Sure,” Sam said, grabbing her right arm not so gently and beginning to escort her over.
“Thanks, kid, I’m just feeling a little weak, is all,” Amanda said, not liking the sound of it.
Amanda was not accustomed to being doted upon and was looking forward to feeling better so that she could get back to taking care of herself.
Maryanne jumped up to go and fix a plate for her, when she would have preferred getting it herself.
“Sorry, I didn’t take you any dinner last night because you were sleeping so deeply. I figured that you needed it,” Maryanne said, sounding earnestly apologetic.
“That’s fine. I would have been too tired to
chew,” Amanda said, stifling a yawn.
“So how are you feeling?” Jason asked.
“Tired, worn out, beat up, and my arm hurts like hell.”
“No fever?” Sam asked, looking excited.
“No fever, not yet, anyway,” Amanda said. “One can hope.”
Maryanne set down a plate that was loaded with food, and Amanda knew that she would never be able to finish it all. Red seemed to be cognizant of that and was hanging by close, waiting patiently. Amanda smiled, as Maryanne set the juice box and sports drink bottle down beside her.
“Cody helped prepare the food. He’s quite the cook and wants to be a doctor,” Maryanne said, catching Amanda up on some of the goings-on around camp.
“I’m glad that you’re fitting in around here,” Amanda said to the boy.
“I know you, Amanda,” Maryanne was saying. “And after breakfast, as your doctor, I’m ordering you to go lie down again. I don’t want you down unloading the truck or sharpening your knives or washing dishes or anything like that. Do you get me?”
“I get you,” Amanda said, admiring her friend for a minute, with how strong she could be at times.
“I really want to be a doctor if you can talk to people like that,” Cody said with an awed expression.
Everybody laughed.
Amanda was glad to see that Cody was fitting in so well around camp. He seemed to be good for the group’s morale. She eyed Cole, trying to get a read on him. Him, she wasn’t so sure about. She would give the man the benefit of the doubt because he obviously loved his son.
“Cole and Cody came from St. Louis,” Roy said.
“What was it like there? And you two had a long journey. I would like to know about that too,” Jason said.
“You know, the last radio broadcast that we’ve heard came from St. Louis,” Roy said casually.
“Oh, you heard that,” Cole said. “The last job I was tasked to do in my role as a police officer was to hold the station against the hordes. We failed. I had the broadcaster show me how to make a recording and set it on a loop before my fellow officers evacuated them. They failed too. The officers and the station personnel didn’t make it.”
“I thought I recognized your voice,” Roy said. “That was you on the recording that we listened to over and over until it stopped broadcasting?” Roy was clearly impressed that he had met the man that he had already felt a bond with so many months ago.
“Yes, that was me, and I thought I was the one that wasn’t going to make it out of there alive to get back to my son. I was wrong to have had them evacuate the way they did, through the back. I had to go out through the ceiling of the building. I building-hopped until I could climb down and make a run for it. Officer Davis, the lady that I told you about, Roy, had stayed at my house to look after my son for me. I made it back home, stealing an abandoned squad car, and loaded us up to leave. Officer Davis wanted to go check on her brother and sister, and I never saw her again.”
Cole sighed and looked weary after having told the story.
“Sounds tough,” Roy said and then dropped into silence.
When it came down to it, they all had a story to tell since the infection had spread, and for the most part, all their stories were filled with tragedies and disappointments.
Roy could relate to Cole’s guilt over the loss of lives because he too carried the same guilt, but from an earlier time.
Chapter 60
Tammy had left the group to go back and get to work on her coloring. The young girl was taking the task of becoming an artist very seriously. Her mother congratulated her on her pictures and kissed her on the forehead before the girl left with the little dog in tow.
Amanda set her plate down, allowing Red to finish off the second biscuit with the apple pie filling, much to the dog’s delight. He would have two breakfasts this morning, which was what Amanda felt that he had earned after such a hard day of work yesterday on so little food.
“Here,” Maryanne said, handing another pain pill to Amanda. “I can tell you’re hurting.”
“I don’t want to waste our supplies,” Amanda said, complaining.
“They are supplies that you attained for us, and now you will use some of them. End of story,” Maryanne said, and Amanda admired the doctor part of her that was so forceful when it came to her patients.
Amanda swallowed the pill with no further complaints, and Maryanne handed Jason one too. He took it without saying a word, clearly not wanting to cross her.
“I have to say that I am truly impressed with what you’ve been able to do out here,” Cole said. “But there are some things that you need to know, for your own safety.”
This piqued Amanda’s interest, so she said, “We’re listening.”
“The raiders, as you call them, are looking for your group. It seems that some months ago, they got the drop on two of you in town, and there was a shoot-out, and you killed two of them before escaping away.”
“Yep,” Amanda said, remembering the incident.
“Yes, that was Amanda and I,” Roy said.
“Well, one of the men you killed had been their leader. His brother took over leadership, and he’s put a steep price on your heads. Lucky for all of you, he’s not too bright and can’t seem to figure out how to find you. I could have helped him with that, but I didn’t. I just played dumb.”
“Well, thank you for that,” Maryanne said, sounding flustered.
“That’s something I didn’t want to hear,” Amanda said, sounding chagrined. “Now we have a bunch of cannibalistic raiders out to get us. That’s just great.”
“What?” Maryanne screeched.
Amanda winced. Apparently, they had not been told about that yet.
“It’s true,” Cole said. “When the fire started and all hell broke loose and they fled for the desert, they took two of the enemy raiders and decided to eat them. There was a lot of concern around camp that with the fire destroying all the supplies, they wouldn’t be able to support themselves. So their not-so-brilliant leader came up with the idea of eating others.”
Cole sounded like he had nothing but contempt for the group that he had been with, and Amanda was looking at him, studying him. Maybe, she considered, he’s not so bad after all.
Nobody said anything for a full minute, apparently needing to digest the information that they had just heard. Maryanne was looking like she might throw up her breakfast.
“I can tell that you are all good people, and I’m sorry for having to deliver this kind of news, but you need to know. They sent Cody and I to go dig out a new latrine, and we took off. I wasn’t going to be any part of that and needed to get my son away from those people. Up until then, they had always kept Cody and me apart unless we were with the whole group, probably to control me better. But I saw our chance, and I took it. Luckily, we ran into you and Sam,” he said, looking to Amanda. “Because, as my son pointed out, we weren’t likely to have survived with nothing but two shovels and a burnt-out city.”
“We’re glad to have you,” Maryanne said, slipping her arm around the boy that had not left her side all morning.
“That’s craziness,” Sam said. “Amanda, you were right about those raiders being bad news.”
Amanda didn’t feel any consolation in being right. She was worried about the future of their group and how they might take action to defend themselves against them because she knew that sooner or later, they would need to. It was a big desert, but not so big that they would never be found, even by a not-so-bright leader. She sighed, suddenly feeling exhausted again.
“So how is it that you and Cody ended up joining up with them?” asked Amanda, feeling exasperated with Cole.
“I took out of St. Louis, looking for a safe place to raise my son. When we left, I had a small arsenal. It was crazy in the city. I wanted to help, but there was nothing to be done. The city was lost. I stopped to rescue a woman with her two kids on the way out of St. Louis. She wanted to be dropped at her parent’s house a
few counties over, and we did that. I kept driving. But things were bad everywhere. We got carjacked in Idaho and were lucky to leave with the shirts on our backs. I hot-wired an abandoned truck, found a shotgun, and we kept rolling. I don’t know why I thought that there might be some safe place to be, but I did,” Cole said, stopping to take a swig of the sports drink.
“One night, I thought of the desert and how that might be less populated, you know, safer. But when we arrived and got out of the truck, they got the jump on us. The new leader, the not-so-bright one, put a gun to Cody’s head and said that either I joined them, or they’d shoot him. I joined but was looking for an opportunity to leave the whole time. Their leader’s plan was to gather a small army and march against the other raider camps. Me, I was considered expendable, and Cody, well, I don’t want to think about that. When the shooting broke out yesterday at the tractor supply store, I tucked Cody under a desk in the office and did my best to hold the other raiders off. I guess the leader thought that he could trust me after that, and he let Cody go with me to dig the latrine. We escaped, again with nothing. I have the feeling that there is safety in numbers, but deciding whom to hook up with is tough these days. I’m glad that you found us.”
“Sorry, for being so judgmental,” Amanda said, feeling contrite. “I would have done the same thing in your shoes.”
Roy could tell that Amanda and Cole were both two strong personalities and that it would be inevitable for them to butt heads now and then. In fact, he could see it already. He sighed, not looking forward to diffusing the situations that would arise between the two of them.
“Welcome, home,” Maryanne said. “I’m glad that you found us too. You know, it sounds like we could use your expertise to help us defend ourselves from them.”
“That’s what I’m worried about,” Cole said. “There isn’t much for manpower here compared to them. What do you have for firepower?”
“Cody and I are going to wash up these dishes. Amanda is going to lie down, aren’t you Amanda? So why don’t Roy, Jason, and Cole, put your heads together and work on this?” Maryanne said, once again taking charge of the group’s personal logistics.
Amanda Carter in the L.A.Z., life after zombies Page 41
