by David Rogers
“I know.” she agreed. “I’m just worried about getting to that part first. Isn’t that what you’re always telling me; one step at a time?”
“Well, yes.” he admitted as she stepped back and closed the hatch. “But it’s okay to allow yourself a little bit of brightness every now and again.”
“I’ll be more cheerful when we’re making time on 75. I promise.”
“Well let’s do it then.” he grinned, gesturing at the SUV. “We’ve got enough gas put over three hundred miles behind us before we do a refueling stop.”
“Let’s hope most of those miles can be pointed south.” Jessica said as she opened the driver’s door.
Austin gave her a look as he opened the door on his side; an expression of calm reassurance in place as he met her eyes. She nodded slightly, and he gave her a wink as he settled himself in the passenger seat. “Candice, you buckled up?” Jessica asked, glancing over her shoulder. The girl twisted and pulled her legs out from beneath her so she could drop into the seat and sit properly before reaching for the seat belt. When it clicked into place, Jessica put her own on, then started the SUV’s engine.
The day had dawned overcast and grey, with a lot of sullen looking clouds overhead that hardly moved. It didn’t exactly look like rain was necessarily imminent, but neither did it appear that it would be all that much of a stretch if any fell. Pulling back out onto the road, Jessica held the big SUV to just under forty miles per hour as she tracked east toward I-75.
The three of them had driven through half of Georgia via back roads by staying off I-75, and even now it was arguable whether or not it would just be quicker to cross into Florida directly rather than cutting over to the interstate; that’s how close to the border they were. But she wanted to try the Interstate out. It wasn’t that close to Valdosta.
The back roads dumped her out onto State Route-376, which fed over to I-75 without issue except for about ten wandering zombies they passed along the way. She kept her eyes moving – checking out the windows and in the rearview mirror – as she made the turn onto I-75, but nothing appeared to menace or obstruct their progress. The pair of lanes heading southeast were clear, with only the odd abandoned vehicle off to the side – plus those that had been left in the middle of the road, and the lack of other active cars – marking it as anything other than just another day driving from Georgia to Florida.
“We’re doing good.” Candice remarked as Jessica slowly started to relax, letting the SUV’s speed creep up toward sixty.
“So far.” Austin nodded, refolding the paper map and frowning at it thoughtfully. “This cuts off a little south of the border, but when we refuel we can look for one that covers Florida.”
“We’ve got the GPS.” Candice said.
“Yup, and what happens if it breaks? Or if we lose the car? Or if something goes wrong with the satellites that it needs to work?” Austin pointed out calmly.
Jessica glanced at him, then over her shoulder at Candice and nodded. “Austin’s right, we don’t need to rely on just the one thing. Having a backup is good.”
Catching his eye, she saw the mingled approval and amusement, and stuck her tongue out at him before she continued speaking. “It’s mid-morning now, and if the interstate stays clear, in two or three hours we should be past Gainesville and ready to do a fill-up. We’ll find a replacement map then.”
“You still want to try to skate past it on 75?” Austin asked as he got the map settled to cover the interstate’s corridor down to the Georgia-Florida border.
“I played with the GPS a little this morning while you were taking a bathroom break.” Jessica nodded. “The city looks to be off to the east of the highway, not right on it like Atlanta and most cities in Georgia are. I’m willing to take a look at it when we get down there. With any luck, things will be in good shape, and we can just keep going.”
“Worth a look, sure.” he agreed.
“If that’s the case, we can find a quiet exit somewhere between Gainesville and Ocala.” she said as she held the SUV right astride the dividing line between the two southbound lanes. It felt a little unnatural to her to be double driving them like that, but it gave her extra room between the emergency lanes and the grass and scrub undergrowth that lined the pavement to either side. This far south the trees were getting thinner, but she still didn’t want to chance a zombie abruptly staggering out in front of the SUV.
“If we can skip right past Gainesville, it’ll only be early afternoon.” she continued. “That’ll give us hours to find something and fill back up.”
“Are we going to sleep in the car tonight?” Candice asked.
Jessica shrugged lightly. “If we have to, we will. But if we get past Gainesville and find gas, then I’m thinking we’ll still have some time to find a house or something we can stop at. Maybe even fit in a little scrounging before we lose the light.”
“And tomorrow we finish the trip?”
Jessica gave Austin a slightly worried look. “The GPS screen isn’t that big, but while I was scrolling around on it earlier, I noticed there’s a big line of cities and towns that seems to stretch across most of the middle of the state.”
“How solid?”
“That’s what I’m hoping the paper map will make clearer.” she admitted. “But south of Ocala, 75 angles southwest toward Tampa, and State Route something or another goes southeast toward Orlando. Between them, it looks like a nearly solid barrier of civilization.”
“I’m sure we’ll be able to pick a path through it.”
“I hope so.” Jessica said. The look of all the densely packed city areas on the GPS’s little screen when she’d scanned across the area she’d found had worried her. A lot. There was another interstate, I-95, that went south; but it ran right along the state’s east coast. Driving directly through a number of major towns, and most of them beach towns at that, didn’t strike her as a particularly better option than just staying with 75.
Towns almost certainly meant zombies; because that’s what had happened. She wasn’t sure if it would be better for the city-fueled zombie populations to have spread out in the weeks since it all had started, or to have stayed concentrated where they’d . . . turned, or whatever. If they spread, they carried the danger with them. If they stayed, less danger elsewhere; but where a handful of zombies was one thing, a whole bunch together could be a serious threat.
Even if you saw them coming and were armed.
And towns might also mean people. She knew she was going to have to get over that sooner or later. Everyone wasn’t out to do evil. But the close encounter with the Eagle deserters from Knoxville, and the shortchanged standoff last night, had reignited her fearful shyness with a vengeance. The problem was she couldn’t afford to take chances. And, for better or worse, people were a risk.
And bad people could be a lot more dangerous than even a whole crowd of zombies.
“So you looked across Florida?” Austin asked idly, pulling her out of her thoughts.
“You took a while this morning.” Jessica said.
“I was taking advantage of the fact that we were leaving.”
“Ugh, did you wreck another bathroom?” Candice asked from the backseat.
Jessica craned her head to angle her view down as she looked in the rearview mirror, just in time to see her daughter wrinkling her nose up in dismay. Austin ate a lot – more than both mother and daughter combined – because he was a big and athletic man. When he ‘used the facilities’, he tended to use the hell out of them. A rule had sort of developed that sectioned off one bathroom just for his use, and he tended to abuse it when they were leaving a residence. Or, in today’s case, a shop bathroom.
Jessica laughed as Austin chuckled. “Afraid so girlie-girl.” he said.
“That’s really nasty.”
“Facts of life.” he replied in an unconcerned tone.
“When mom and I use the bathroom, it doesn’t smell so bad when we’re done.”
Jessica laughed
again. “She’s got a point.”
“I weigh more than the two of you put together.” Austin said, turning a little so he could shoot a wry look at the girl behind them. “Actually, I bet if we added you two up and doubled it, I’m most of that number as well.”
“So?” Candice asked.
“So,” he said patiently, “that means I eat more.”
“Don’t I know it.” Jessica sighed mournfully.
“Hey, I can’t help it.” he told Jessica. “Plus, I was shot you know.”
“We know.” Candice said, echoing Jessica.
“I promise I’ll do most of the scrounging when we get settled in after the trip.”
“Good. Feeding you is a lot of work.” Jessica said merrily.
Austin rolled his eyes at her. “You know you love it. You can’t wait for me to be back on my feet and healthy. You’ve got plans for me.”
“I do?” she asked innocently.
“I’ll bet you do.”
“What makes you think that?”
He gave her a wink. “You’ve always got plans.”
Jessica blushed lightly, then cleared her throat quickly. “Help with supplies and chores would be good. Having you healthy would be good.”
“It’s all good.” Candice chirruped.
“Got it in one Candy Bear.” Jessica nodded.
“Speaking of plans, what’s your plan for our destination?” Austin inquired.
Jessica blinked. “We’re not even in Florida yet.”
“Come on, spill it.” he said encouragingly. “You said you were looking at the GPS map, so I bet you came up with at least a couple of ideas.”
“Mind reading again?”
“You’re not as mysterious as you think.” Austin teased her.
Jessica felt her cheeks heating a little further, and spoke quickly; trying to distract herself. “Well, even though it might be tricky, I want to get south of Tampa and Orlando. Once we do, there are a lot of big lakes right through the center of the state; including the big one, Okeechobee.”
“Ok . . . Oki . . . Okie what?” Candice stumbled over the unfamiliar word.
“Oak-a-choo-bee.” Jessica said, drawing the syllables out to make the pronunciation more clear for the girl. “It’s an Indian name.”
“Lake would be a good spot.” Austin nodded. “Fresh water, maybe some fishing. I might even remember some of the hunting my dad tried to teach me when I was a kid.”
“You hunted?”
“A few times.” Austin shrugged. “I’m not so worried about the hunting part as I am the cleaning and dressing part after bagging something.”
“Squeamish?” she asked.
“No, but I have to admit I don’t think I remember much of anything about how to do the butchering.”
“Butchering what?” Candice wanted to know.
“Things I hunt. So we can eat them.”
“Like what?” Candice persisted.
“Whatever I can get.” Austin said carefully, giving Jessica a quick look.
She understood his reluctance to give a straight answer. “Candice, you know the food we eat starts out on a farm, right? Both plants and animals.”
“Right.”
“Well, hunting is when you find an animal that’s not on a farm.”
“Oh.” Candice said. Jessica was half expecting some sort of distaste or distress over the concept of killing and eating something, but the girl only sounded thoughtful. After a few moments, Candice shrugged. “Like birds and stuff?”
“Whatever I can get.” Austin repeated. “But, like I said, I don’t remember anything about how to handle things after the hunting part.”
“Well, if you’re not too squeamish with it, I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” Jessica said lightly.
“Oh, that part’s on me is it?” he demanded.
“If I’m doing the cooking part, then yes.” she admitted. “I know where meat comes from, but I think I’d have to be quite hungry to consider going to work on . . . something with a knife, after the fact.”
“Wimp.”
“Domesticated.” Jessica agreed. “Cost of living in a civilized society.”
“I’m not so sure how civilized things are anymore.” he replied.
“You’re not wrong.” she sighed. “Who knows. Maybe after you’ve brought in a couple of things, I might learn enough to help with the butchering part.” He burst out laughing, and she gave him a stern look. “What’s so funny now?”
“I’m just . . . did you ever read the Little House books?”
“What?”
“Little House on the Prairie.” he elaborated.
“Oh. No, but I watched the show when I was little.” she said, then blinked at him. “Wait, you read those?”
“Why’s that surprising?”
Jessica eyed him dubiously. “You’re seven foot a million, built like a linebacker, a soldier, an Army Ranger, a professional bodyguard, and probably know how to kill with your eyelids. You’ll have to forgive me if I find it odd that you read those books.”
“Why? You didn’t.”
“I read other things.” she said.
“Like what?”
Jessica blushed again, thinking of the dozens of teenage romance series she’d torn through during middle and high school. The last time she’d checked, there’d still been box after box of sweet and innocent tales of coming-of-age and school era love in the attic of her parents’ Dalton house. “Never mind that.”
“Now I’m really curious.” Austin said, clearly amused.
“And I said never mind.” she insisted.
“Well, I read lots of things. It’s not all that rare for soldiers to read. You tend to find yourself with idle time when you’re on deployment. Being in the Army isn’t just shooting and getting shot at. Sitting around on transports and at bases can get pretty boring if you don’t have a portable hobby.” he said, smiling slyly at her as he let the issue of her own reading habits go. “But I read the Little House books when I was younger than the girlie-girl here.”
“And what about me made you think of them and laugh?” Jessica persisted.
“It just struck me that if all this chaos goes on long enough, you, me, and a lot of other survivors are probably going to turn into pioneer people.”
“What’s a pioneer person?” Candice asked as Jessica sighed unhappily.
“Austin means we’ll get used to doing things without stores and stuff.” Jessica answered.
“That’s kind of hard.” Candice said solemnly. She didn’t do a lot of helping with most of the scavenging and chores – because Jessica wouldn’t let her – but she was around for some of it, and she’d seen how hard it was for her mother to gather and carry things like food, water, wood, and anything else that might be needed.
It wasn’t that Jessica didn’t want Candice to help; but she wanted Candice safe more than anything else. And so far, everywhere they’d gone hadn’t been ‘secured’ behind a safe perimeter, as Austin put it. Plus, the girl wasn’t strong enough to be a lot of help in most of the chores. She served as an extra set of eyes sometimes, like when Jessica cooked out in the yards of the houses they stayed at; but that was about as far as Jessica was prepared to go.
“It is.” Austin agreed. “And the longer we do it, the better we’ll get at it.”
“You know, if we get somewhere warm, figuring out how to keep or eat any fresh meat before it spoils is going to be an adventure in and of itself.” Jessica said, wrinkling her forehead in thought. “There have got to be ways . . . right?”
“I know smoke and salt are what they used before refrigeration became a thing. But figuring it out . . . I dunno.”
Jessica sighed. She knew salt had something to do with preserving meat, and smoke rang a bell, but she was in the same boat as Austin about how to do it. She had no idea what too much of either would do to something – other than too much salt would render it effectively inedible – but she knew pretty much exactly what would h
appen if they botched up a preservation attempt and ended up with something that was going to cause food poisoning.
That could kill. And even if it only sickened, that would be dangerous.
“I don’t know either.” she said after a few moments. “Guess we’ll have to take it slow like everything else. Maybe that radio broadcast is for real though.” she sighed, struggling to keep the wistful longing from her tone. “Maybe they’ll be able to clear things up so everyone can start rebuilding.”
“Maybe. But if they’re serious about spearheading a coordinated sweep of the entire continent, it isn’t going to happen anytime soon. And they’re all the way up in South Dakota, so however organized they might be, clearing their way from there all the way down to us will take quite a while.” Austin said neutrally. The look he gave her clearly indicated he wasn’t prepared to hold his breath waiting. “But back to us, something near a lake in south central Florida. That’s your plan?”
“That’s my plan.” Jessica confirmed.
“Any thoughts beyond that?”
“Two story house, as close to the water as possible.” she said, thinking. “A second floor balcony or deck would be nice. Lots of clear space around it. Maybe with a town or something no more than a few miles away for supplies.”
“That doesn’t sound too complicated.”
“I hope not.”
“You know, most people don’t retire to Florida until they’re older.”
Jessica eyed him. “Is that an age joke?”
“No, I’m still young.” he said innocently.
“You’re not that young.” she retorted.
He opened his mouth, his grin twisting a touch malevolently, and she spoke quickly. “Don’t you dare finish that thought.”
“I didn’t say a word.”
“I know what you were thinking.” she told him severely. She was five years older than Austin, something she’d let slip a few weeks ago when they were chatting idly after Candice had already been asleep. He’d about – literally, due to his gunshot wounds – split himself open laughing at that, and clearly hadn’t forgotten.
