Alive (The Crave)

by Martin, Megan D.

  When it finally moved, the large fingers made a searing trail up the back of her hand before flipping it over and lacing between her own.

  “Eve.” Her name on his lips pulled her from her stupor. Her gaze met his gray one. He’d taken his dark-tinted glasses off and she realized that the car was stopped in their usual spot on the side of the road. He wasn’t smiling anymore—no lazy or satisfactory one. His features were serious, his eyes seeming to probe into her very soul. “Did you know that holding hands is good for your heart?”

  “What?”

  Gage looked away sheepishly, before glancing back at her. “Someone did a study, they took couples and had them hold hands and watch a movie. Then they had some that didn’t. Then they asked them questions about a stressful…” He let his voice trail off and looked out the front window. “Never mind. It’s just something I heard.”

  Eve couldn’t help the smile that sprang to her lips. Gage was the most gorgeous guy she had ever laid eyes on, but she had never seen him act so…cute.

  “You’re laughing at me.” The sheepish look was still on his face. His eyes searched hers. His hand still clasped Eve’s in her lap.

  Eve shook her head and a bubble of laughter escaped her lips.

  “See you are!” He quirked his brow and pushed his bottom lip out in a mock pout. She didn’t know what it was about that expression, but it made her laugh harder. To the point where fat tears were rolling down her face and her belly was aching.

  When she finally calmed down, she looked over at Gage, but he wasn’t laughing with her like she thought. He had the most profound look on his face. His eyes were wide and his lips were parted. Embarrassment flooded into her cheeks and she quickly used her right hand to wipe away the tears on her face.

  A question that had been nagging at her for months, surfaced in her brain. “Why did you ask me to come to homecoming?” She had never planned to ask him, but now she couldn’t bear to get out of the car without knowing. She had already messed up—he wouldn’t be giving her a ride again.

  “Why didn’t you come?” His return question shocked her.

  “I—I couldn’t,” she said lamely.

  He released the grip he had on her hand.

  No! Just hold it for a little longer! Her mind screamed in anguish, but she said nothing out loud. He surprised her by trailing his fingers up her forearm, which was significantly smaller than her other since she’d had her cast and hadn’t been able to use it.

  “Does it still hurt?”

  She looked at him again and nodded. “A little.” Her voice shook. A tingling sensation shot up her arm. Something strange burned behind his irises.

  He pulled his hand back and set it on the gearshift, leaving Eve feeling lost and bereft without it. She recognized the signal. He wanted her to get out of the car. Anger replaced the tingling sensation.

  “Do you have a phone, Eve?”

  She pulled her bag into her lap and frowned. “Why?”

  “I, uh, was just wondering. I thought maybe…I could text you sometime.”

  “What?” The word left Eve’s lips in a breathless gasp. He opened his mouth again, but she cut him off. “I—no. I don’t.” Her disappointment at not having a phone couldn’t out weigh the joy that coursed through her body.

  Even after he pulled away and drove down the street, her body thrummed with utter happiness. The hottest guy in school asked me for MY number. Me! She flexed the hand that he’d held and pressed it against her chest.

  Gage was right. Holding hands was good for the heart.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Eve coughed and tried to blink, but her eyelids felt like they were made of sandpaper. She wanted to fall back to sleep, in hopes of feeling better later. Something nudged at her hip and she scooted away, keeping her eyes closed, but the nudging persisted. She sucked in a deep breath, and became immediately overwhelmed by the thick smell of bleach that hung in the hair like pungent rot, clinging to her nostrils.

  She opened her eyes and fought to sit up, ignoring the pounding in her head just as the moaning hit her ears. Her vision was a little blurry, but it didn’t keep her from seeing the appalling scene before her. A gray hand with skin peeled back nearly to the bone was fumbling against the denim of her shorts, desperately trying to find traction in the fabric. Only the hand wasn’t working on its own. It was attached to a decayed arm that oozed black blood, thicker than molasses, from multiple wounds.

  The arm reached between two rusted metal bars and was attached to the hideous body of a jenk, but it wasn’t just any jenk. This one was different. It was big, and not like it was a person who had been overweight before they became infected, but like they were bloated and full—a jenk who had just eaten. The woman’s skin was damp and greasy with black blood and her mouth gaped with fervor. Her eyes were the same as any of them. Bottomless pits covered in filmy white mucus, looking into the depths at a soul that no longer existed.

  Eve would have screamed if her throat hadn’t been so dry. She jerked away from the hand only to bump into a heavy body next to hers. She looked away from the hideous jenk to stare at the lifeless body of Gage. She had a moment of panic where she was sure that he was dead, but then noticed that his chest had a steady rise and fall about it.

  Her relief only lasted a moment though, when she noticed that there were more jenks reaching for Gage. He was shirtless and their gray decaying hands were only inches aware from his bare flesh. She gripped his chest and pulled him close to her body, though only succeeded in adding a few more inches in between him and the arms reaching for him.

  The fog in her mind somewhat cleared and she reached behind her back to grab her Craftsman, but ended up grabbing nothing but empty, dank air. A moment of panic seized her heart and she snapped her head back and forth, looking all around her. The reality of the situation became much worse. Where the hell is my pack? It wasn’t anywhere near her. She clenched her fists repeatedly trying to calm the erratic beat of her heart. I need it. All of the hard work I put into it. All of that money is mine!

  She took another deep breath. It’s okay just keep it cool you will get your bag back. She distracted her mind by taking in her surroundings. The rusted metal bars that kept the disgusting female jenk from tearing Eve apart created a full on barrier, Eve realized. There was one every six inches and each one was thick and circular extending horizontally from the wall at her back to the end of the little room they were in, which ended in a heavy wooden door some ten feet away, though the door didn’t reach to the ceiling. Eve was sure, that if she stood, she could see over it.

  The same thick bars were on her right, where there were flailing jenk arms desperately trying to grab at them.

  “Gage,” Eve whispered and shook his shoulder. This was bad. So very bad. She noticed several tiny wounds on Gage’s chest and remembered the tiny black darts that had been protruding from him when she lost consciousness. Her hand instinctively touched the back of her neck. There was no protruding dart, but there was a small wound that had scabbed over. Fuck. Where the hell are we?

  “Gage!” she whispered more urgently. He let out a low moan and tried to roll away from her. “No!” She gripped his shoulder and jerked, trying to prevent him from rolling into his death. She didn’t know if a fingernail scratch from one of those things could infect someone, but she didn’t want to find out, either.

  She looked around her, trying to decide if there was a better place she could move him to that would be farther away from the jenks, but saw none. The light wasn’t bright in the building, but she gazed above her at something that she hadn’t seen actively working in years. A light bulb. The soft glow was mesmerizing. Where are we?

  Gage grunted pulling her attention back to him, but didn’t try to roll back over. He ran a lazy hand over his face and Eve couldn’t help but think that this is what it would be like to wake up in bed with him. His glorious chest bare, all taut muscles covered with dark skin. Minus the drugs, the jenks, and the dirt floor
of course.

  “What the hell happened?” he groaned and blinked his eyes.

  “I don’t know, but it’s something bad.”

  He perked up at her words, blinking more rapidly, no doubt hearing the moaning of the jenks that surrounded them and smelling the sickening scent that was so strong Eve could taste it. Gage sat up quickly, grabbed Eve around the waist, and jerked her body to his.

  “Holy shit. Where the fuck are we?” His eyes zeroed in on the jenk on Eve’s side.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know…somewhere bad. We have to find a way out. Someone drugged us…or something.” The words sounded foreign coming from her lips. Drugs weren’t something that was too prevalent in the new world. People were too busy trying to stay alive to practice anything recreational. “And they took our stuff. My pack…Gage?” The entire time she spoke he never looked at her, his eyes focused on the jenk over her shoulder that was reaching for her. “What is it?”

  “This is so bad. Shit!” He ran a hand over his head finally looking away and down at his lap. “We are so fucked right now, Eve. You don’t even know.”

  “Obviously. But what aren’t you telling me?”

  Gage sucked in a deep breath and coughed loudly on his exhale. “God, they smell awful.”

  “Tell me what you know,” Eve said, trying not to let the frustration she was feeling sink into her words. He shook his head back and forth, as if he was trying to clear it. “Gage. C’mon.” She clutched his arm and gave it a shake. Well, fabulous. That was just what she needed—Gage to check out mentally when they were trapped in some sort of jenk museum. She shook him again and then an idea popped into her head. “Tell me something Gage, anything. Tell me a fact.”

  She’d noticed, though it hadn’t really clicked in her mind until that moment, that he used these random facts as a way to calm himself. He’d even used it when they were in a pond as a way to try and calm her down.

  He stopped shaking his head and looked at her. A faraway look blanketed his features. As if he was somewhere else, lost in a different place. “I watched you walk home three times before I worked up the nerve to ask you if I could give you a ride.”

  “Wha—”

  A loud banging noise on the other side of the large wooden door killed Eve’s voice in her throat.

  Gage jerked his head away from Eve, and pulled himself back to the present at the uninvited sound. The loud noise was followed by male voices. The gurghs that were flailing their arms trying to get into the stall with them, retracted their selves and moved toward the sound of the voices.

  Gage stood on shaky legs and was alarmed at the heavy weight against his left ankle. He looked down to see a thick rusted link encircling him. It was attached to a chain that anchored to the wall behind him. His feet were bare. Well, shit.

  “What the hell?” Eve stood next to him. He didn’t have to look to know that she was in the same predicament as he was. He positioned his body in front of hers as best as the chain would allow. He could tell by her tense body language that she wanted to protest, but didn’t, which was for the best, since she knew nothing about what they were dealing with.

  “Here they are.” A thick country accented voice spoke as two men came into view. “Wow, they’re already up. These ones are tough.”

  Eve gasped behind him, and even though he knew what to expect he still had trouble stifling his own gasp of shock. He knew the people who lived in the Lurker camps suffered from their addiction to eating gurghs, but he hadn’t seen one of their kind in a long time, about a year and a half since they’d had some of them stumble into Eden looking for help. If he thought those people had looked bad, these people put a whole new category on the scale.

  The two men had thin hair that was as white as snow. Hair that was so thin you could see clear through it to the wall on the other side. Their features were weathered and old. With thick wrinkles making the skin on their face sag as if they were a hundred years old, though he knew they were probably much younger.

  “Didn’t know ya were bringing me a nigger.”

  Gage clenched his fists. “What do you want with us?”

  “Oh, lookie there. The nigger can talk.” The second man spoke. This one was taller than the first speaker and though his hair was the same color, he had less of it. His pale head had barely any hair on it, but the hair he did have was long and hung past this shoulders.

  “How dare you—” Gage grabbed Eve’s arm and kept her from coming around him to lunge at the men.

  “Well, Willard. Looks like we got us a little fire cracker. I love me some fireworks.” The taller man’s chuckled revealing black decaying teeth. His eyes burned with lust, which boiled Gage’s insides.

  “I’ll show you fire cracker you ugly motherfucker! Where is my stuff? I want my pack!” Eve tried to lunge around him again, but she stumbled, the chain around her ankle jerking her back. He steadied her and stared into her sea-green eyes that were sparking with anger. He still couldn’t believe how different she was. The Eve he used to know would never challenge a grown man.

  “Chill out or you’re gonna get us killed.” He kept his voice hushed so the men couldn’t hear it.

  “No one is going to talk about me or you like that without paying. I have killed people for less.” She didn’t keep her voice down at all, in fact she practically spit the words at the men. “And I want my pack and my Craftsman. Now.”

  “What do ya think Willard, should I put good ol’ Estelle in there with them before we take her to butcher? Or should we go ahead and take her with us now?” The tall one ignored Eve words all together.

  “I don’t know, Bubba. Sister and the kids’ll be gettin’ mighty hungry.”

  “You’re right,” the tall one—Bubba—said. “Looks like y’all lucked out. This time.” He placed a hand on the edge of the wooden door of the stall, the withered appendage shook violently against the wooden panel, rattling it uncontrollably. He heard Eve suck in a breath behind him, as if she was just figuring out who these people were.

  “You go ahead and round her up. I’ll go tell Mason to be ready.” Bubba turned and flashed them a toothless smile before walking away from the door.

  Willard moved over to the stall next to them. “Hey, there Eteslle. You miss me, baby?” He was talking to the bloated gurgh in the stall next to them.

  Gage had known who had taken them hostage the moment he laid eyes on her. He’d never seen one like her before, but he had heard the stories from the addicts they’d taken in at Eden. He had been present while the town doctor had interviewed the two men for hours. The stories they shared were terrifying to say the least, but he would never forget what they did with the humans they captured.

  At first, they had claimed they would eat them, cannibalism as a form of survival, but once they’d started eating the gurghs things had changed. Something about the decaying forms of the infected was addictive. It didn’t turn the consumer into one of them, like Gage expected. Instead, the two men claimed that the flesh, the organs, that everything tasted better than a perfectly cooked filet mingnon. They claimed it was like heaven, that no food in the before could even compare to the succulent taste of dead gurgh.

  Once they tried it, they became ravenous for more. They started to need it every waking moment and were a part of a group that dedicated their time to catching the gurghs and eating them. They had started capturing, not just gurghs, but humans to—to feed to the undead—because a well-fed gurgh was a tastier one. Better in every way.

  The gurgh, Estelle, who was being led from her small prison, was one that had been fattened up, and now she was going to be dinner. Her obese state was a positive situation for him and Eve since they weren’t going to be fed to her, but who knew how long that would last. They needed to get the hell out of there. Now.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Olive had never hated anyone in her life. In fact, hate was a sin. That’s what her momma and daddy always told her. She didn’t hate Eve, even though most o
f the time she wanted to. She didn’t and she never would though, hate Eve that is. But things were different now.

  The last twenty-four hours had changed her life more than it had been changed in a long time and it wasn’t because Laney was dead. No, Laney’s death really had nothing to do with it. Olive didn’t cry for the woman. She had no tears left in her body to waste on another dead person. Death was the only constant in life and even that was tentative at best with all the jenks everywhere.

  What changed her life the most was the hate. Yes, the emotion that was blasphemous—wrong in every way. She could feel it for the first time in her life, though she swore she never would. And it wasn’t for Rose, like she expected. It wasn’t for the woman carrying the child, lumbering behind her right at that very moment. Olive’s hate was for the man who walked ahead of her. Reno seemed to have extra pep in his step. He moved more quickly than he ever had, though she could barely make him out in the looming darkness.

  The rain had finally stopped, though his movement hadn’t slowed for any of it. Usually they would stop and wait out the rain, but not today. Today, he hadn’t even looked behind him. Hadn’t said a thing to either of them. Not since they had stopped and things occurred earlier. Things she would be forever trying to wash from her mind, body, and soul.

  “God has a plan for you. For all of his good children.” Her mother’s words traced their way through her mind and were the only thing that kept her feet moving in spite of the hot rain that had poured down and the now impending darkness that they didn’t typically move through. The three bags on her back weighed her down causing her back to ache in terrible pain and her hands, tied behind her back, were totally numb. Olive wanted to ask Reno to stop, wanted to beg him, but she didn’t. She kept her mouth shut in fear of what he would do.

  A low moan sounded behind her. Olive glanced back at Rose who was moving slowly. In the fading light she could see the woman clutching her belly, her face in a grimace of pain. Rose met her gaze and shook her head fervently, as if to beg her not to tell Reno.