by G. Benson
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Dedication
Taren
Jim
Joy
Ro
Taren
Raj
Joy
Scott
Taren
Joy
Taren
Natalie
Joy
Xin
Taren
Raj
Ro
Joy
Taren
Scott
Joy
Taren
Natalie
Raj
Taren
Joy
Taren
Joy
Scott
Taren
Epilogue
Biography
Also by G Benson
Copyright
Acknowledgements
The biggest thank you to my beta readers. Thank you to Katja, who is the beta reader of my dreams. Thank you to Erin, who read half of this years ago and only got to read the second half this year—you’re wonderful. Thank you to Tig Ashton, whose every third comment was “grim”, letting me know I was really managing to hit true zombie gross-out factor. Thank you to Wendy Hudson, who helped me get the atmosphere of this down.
I’m hugely grateful to KD Williamson for her sensitivity reading. The best of the best.
I’m forever grateful to Ellie who beta read this, then proofread it. You’re amazing, and one day you’ll accept that without Homer Simpson giffing away.
This amazing cover was done be the very talented, and incredibly patient, Sam. Thank you for your creativity, time, and for formatting for me. When can we get that beer?
Finally, as always, thank you to Concha, who is the one who really got me into my zombie media obsession, and cheered for this book like she has for no other before it. Wife of the Year (Century).
Dedication
For Concha, my very own blood-phobic surgeon, who I wouldn’t trade for anything.
This book is for you. Who else would I write zombies for?
Taren
0600—so very, very early
“Perth citizens are warned that this virus is extremely infectious and anyone displaying the following symptoms should isolate themselves from others and seek medical help immediately: headache, stomach ache, vomiting, diarrhoea, chills, fever, rash, sensitivity to light, loss of appetite, exhaustion, strong mood swings, dementia.
“We repeat, this virus is extremely infectious and ask that anyone showing these symptoms seek medical attention. If feeling unwell, do not go to work and parents, please keep your children home from school.”
As the announcer on the news report repeated everything, Taren dropped her head back and groaned. Loudly.
“What’s up?”
With a flailing of limbs, Taren snapped her head up, nearly falling out of her chair. Hand over her chest like a dramatic medieval damsel, she blinked at her cousin, who was standing in the doorway where she had definitely not been before. Lola only smirked back, the bags under her eyes doing nothing to soften her amusement.
“Did I scare you?” Lola asked.
“Clearly. I didn’t even hear you come in. I was innocently enjoying my morning, the sun not even up. And then bam. Temilola, staring at me.”
“Oh, you’re full naming me. I see how it is.”
Rubbing her eyes, Lola collapsed into a kitchen chair. With her heart still racing, Taren stood and made a fresh cup of coffee. The smell, rich and soothing, rose up, steam floating into the air. Lola all but snatched the cup Taren held out. With an exhausted groan, she clutched the mug to her chest.
“Poor Lola.” Taren sat back down and considered the dregs in the bottom of her own cup. The urge to throw them at the TV screen gnawed at her. “How was night shift?”
“Hell. I hate this factory job.”
That stupid report was still playing in the background, so Taren grabbed the remote and muted it. “Didn’t you choose to switch to nights?”
“Only because the pay is so much better.”
The things one did for money.
“One more month, then you graduate and can enter the world of nursing.” Taren flashed a grin. “I still think it’s cute that you followed in my footsteps.”
“Cute or stupid? There won’t be an end to night shift.” Lola pursed her lips for a second, thinking. She pulled her legs up so her feet were on the chair, knees pressed into her front. Vitiligo had left a wide white patch over her knee, the skin around the patch as dark as Taren’s skin, and she traced her finger absently around the border of the mark as she often did. “I’m voting stupid.”
“True—what were you thinking?”
“Ugh.” She dropped her head onto her knees. “I don’t know!”
Taren couldn’t help but smirk at the theatrics. In reality, Lola had always said she was happy she’d waited so long to go to uni. It had given her time to figure out what she really wanted to do.
“No point lying—I’m looking forward to the day we work together.”
“Yeah, yeah.” The voice was muffled. Lola lifted her heavy head, blinking blearily, thin locs sticking up in places on her head. “Why were you groaning to yourself when I walked in?”
With that reminder, Taren slumped. “There’s a stupid new virus warning.”
“Oh, yeah, I heard about it on the radio when I drove home. It sounds pretty serious.” Lola paused. “And gross.”
Said the future nurse.
“Exactly. You heard about it.” When Lola only stared at her blankly, Taren straightened, energised by her own irritability. “It’s on television. It’ll be everywhere—bloody Facebook, Internet news, Twitter. There’ll be TikTok videos. Ugh.”
Yet still Lola stared at her with her eyebrows raised. “I know I’m tired, but I’m sorely missing your point here.”
“It means that every man and his dog will be in A&E with the sniffles, all thinking they’re dying.”
“Oh!” Lola’s eyes lit up, as if delighted that Taren’s day in Accident and Emergency was going to be the worst. “You’re in for the day from hell.”
“Try not to look so delighted.”
Lola pressed her lips together, which made her look like an amused lemon. “Sorry, I feel vindicated that when I wake up from sleeping most of the day away, you’ll come home from your shift in A&E looking like I feel right now.”
“You’re a terrible human being.”
“I know—but surely it won’t be that bad? People know the difference between being truly sick and having a case of needs-a-day-in-bed, don’t they?”
If only. Taren stood and put her plate and mug in the sink. “Oh, you have so much to learn, little baby nurse. They’ll be flocking to A&E and my day will be spent being coughed on and sending the majority home.”
Unable to resist, Taren ruffled Lola’s hair as she walked past, ignoring the indignant “Hey!” as she grabbed her satchel bag from the counter.
“You’re the high-and-mighty clinical nurse,” Lola said as she rearranged her hair, locs smoothing down. “Can’t you hide and delegate to the lower circle?”
Again, if only. Taren paused in the hall and started to tug on her shoes, calling back, “The doctors will delegate to me and then disappear. I’ll be on the floor.”
“Of course they will.”
“Can you help me loc my hair soon?” Taren called down the hallway, hand now adjusting the tight, corkscrew curls on her head as she glanced in the mirror by the entrance.
“We spent forever unlocking it your last year of uni!”
“I miss it!”
A sigh. “Next week sound good?”
“You’re the best.
”
Keys in hand and not feeling at all ready to face the day, Taren pulled the front door open, cool air harsh on her cheeks, sending goose bumps shooting up her arms. The light was becoming the grey of a looming dawn. Late autumn, and the chill clung to the air. She shouted over her shoulder, “Make sure you sleep enough.”
“Yes, Mum!”
Taren chuckled and got into her car. The engine turned over easily and she pulled into traffic. With one hand on the wheel, she rubbed her eyes under her glasses. Mornings sucked. After winding down a few more suburban streets, she hit the intersection that would take her to the freeway to get to the hospital—or she could turn left and make a stop at her and Lola’s favourite quirky café.
Warm air washed over her as she walked into the café. Baristas were lined up, trying unsuccessfully to hide their cracking yawns. The smell of pastries was overwhelmingly sweet. The mismatched furniture gave the entire place an eclectic, homey feel, and sinking into one of the soft armchairs in the corner and avoiding all responsibilities was incredibly tempting. Taren stared longingly at one of them. Right in her usual spot. All squishy and empty: calling to her. All she’d wanted while studying part-time and working was to be finished and earning proper cash, able to focus on one thing. But now there were days she longed to be back in university and slumped over textbooks in cafés, or taking the day off simply because she loved to procrastinate and she had no shifts that day.
“Hey!”
Taren grinned at the once shy girl behind the counter. “Morning, Trish.”
“Flat white, lots of sugar, yeah?”
“You know me, every time.” Taren winked, a touch smug at the flush on the girl’s freckled, rosy cheeks as she did so.
“So, uh, busy day ahead?” Trish flinched in her direction in commiseration.
“Heard the news then?”
“Sounds pretty gross. I’m glad I’m doing my PhD in Fine Arts.”
With Trish here, Taren could forget what was waiting at the hospital. Trish always did that. Nothing like coffee and sparkling blue eyes to brighten her day. It had taken a while to worm Trish out of her shell, but it had been well worth it. When Trish handed over the coffee, their fingers brushed, and another blush chased up Trish’s cheeks where pale skin had just started to reclaim its hold.
Warm, rich coffee spread over Taren’s tongue as she took a sip and then smiled. “Perfect.” That blush deepened. “Thanks.”
“See you next time, Taren.”
It had never gone beyond this, which was perfect for Taren. She swallowed another gulp of coffee. The last date she’d gone on had got her nowhere but embarrassment and a doomed sense of rejection—Taren was not thinking about Joy right now—so flirting was more than fine. It meant no hurt feelings.
Holding up her take-away cup in a final goodbye, Taren yanked the door open with her other hand. The comforting warmth and smell of the café was immediately sucked out into the cold air of the early morning. Someone was walking through, so she held the door open and stood to the side.
“Morning.”
Tearing her attention from her coffee, Taren laughed as she recognised the man who’d walked in. “You’re up early.”
Jim pulled up short, running a hand through his thinning red hair. The look he gave her coffee cup was pitiful. “Yeah, I know. When I signed on to be a medical pathologist, I thought I’d get sleep-ins.”
“Can’t you make your own hours? Not like your patients are going anywhere.”
He gave her a grin at the morbid joke. “I wish. Apparently, a few people were brought into the morgue in the last two hours and I got paged. My colleague on call didn’t show up after being in overnight.”
Jim eyed her coffee again.
Taren clutched it to her chest. “You can stop looking at it like that—get your own.”
He pouted. “Fine. Maybe I’ll see you at work.”
“Hope not.” Taren braced herself to step outside. “Won’t be doing my job properly if I do.”
The closing door cut off his chuckle. Taren sighed with relief as she slipped into her warm car to make the final part of her drive to work. She plopped her coffee into the cup holder.
The radio switched on automatically when she started the car.
“And new this morning, an unknown virus has hit the city. Apparently, no one except a few scientists in a lab—Royal Laboratories—are known to have it, however authorities are urging people to be vigilant!”
“That’s right, Tony. The virus has been around for a few days, though the bastards only gave us information today. If anyone is displaying the following symptoms, please—”
“Ugh.” Taren’s hand shot forward and turned off the radio. “I’d love to sue you for the bad day I’m about to have.”
She pulled the finger at the radio. Satisfying.
The ride to work didn’t take long and she was soon parked in the car park.
“Taren!”
The sound of her car door slamming shut bounced around the car park and she looked up at her name. The lights flashed as she locked her car, lighting up the gloomy space briefly and bringing a plump woman into view before she was swallowed by the gloom again.
“Hey, Xin.”
“Heard the news?”
They fell into step together as they made their way to the staff entrance of the hospital. Even in the low light, the dark circles were prominent under Xin’s eyes. Xin hated morning shift. She was one of the strange ones who preferred nights. “Yes—you as excited as I am?”
“I almost asked my mum to call me in sick, but then remembered I’m twenty-two, not twelve.”
“Tell me about it. It’s all over the news.”
The door opened from the other side, and they both smiled at the stocky man who was holding it open for them. “Hey, Scott.”
He grinned at them, smile stuttering when his gaze flicked to Xin. “Hey, you two. You both have a great day.”
“You too,” Xin squeaked, hand coming up to push her bobbed, dark hair behind her ears.
His skin flushed, so pale it was glaringly obvious, and he ran a hand through his blond hair, eyes averted.
Both playing with their hair. Interesting.
They continued inside, Xin adamantly not catching her eye. “I don’t really get why—a few scientists get sick and they have the whole city on red alert.”
“I’m going to ignore the utter awkwardness that appeared when fine Scott greeted us right now.” Xin bit her lip, and Taren tried not to smirk. “And I won’t comment on how I saw him buy you coffee the other day.”
“So.” Xin’s voice still held a squeak. “Overreacting to a virus?”
“Alright. Fine.” She still gave Xin a look as they manoeuvred around linen trolleys left in the hallway. “You know how they overreact—remember the swine flu hell?”
“Remember the part where I said I was twenty-two?”
Well, that was rude. Taren shot a glare at Xin and they made their way towards the changing rooms. “Oh, you’re funny. Make fun of the old people.”
Lockers stood in rows and they both sidled past half-asleep nurses tugging their scrub pants on and looping stethoscopes around their necks. There was a strong sense of ‘I could be in bed right now’ in the room.
“Sorry, Grandma, what happened back in the Summer of 2009?”
“Grandma! I’m barely mid-thirties.” Maybe more late thirties.
The nurse next to them, in her fifties, snorted as she walked out in her scrubs. Taren winced apologetically in her direction.
Xin could only shrug.
“Whippersnapper. Fine, swine flu induced utter panic everywhere. Some airports shut down, A&E was swamped, and everyone completely overreacted.”
“My cousin said her school actually tried to close.”
“Exactly. So this is what they do—create panic and us health care staff suffer the consequences as people come in with every symptom under th
e sun.”
Pulling on her scrubs, Xin asked, “I can imagine today will be similar?”
“With the extremity of what they were saying? Yes, yes you can.”
Sighing the sigh of the hard done by, Xin clipped her short hair back. Taren slipped into her dark blue scrubs. As always, it was like going back a step in her morning and putting on pyjamas. She ran her finger over the red piping on the shirt that indicated she was a clinical nurse, then slipped on her name tag.
Taren Makumbe, Clinical Nurse.
Totally worth all the extra hours put in.
“Can you believe there were days nurses wore white?” Xin said.
Taren chuckled at the disgust on Xin’s face. “Imagine after a Friday night in A&E—it’d end up red.”
“Or brown.”
“Ugh.”
“Well, it’s true, remember that food poisoning outbreak last month?”
“It makes me want to throw up just thinking about it.”
Xin looked wistful. “Too bad they weren’t only vomiting.”
They both clipped their nurse’s belts around their waists, settling the pouch on their hips. As they walked out, Xin sheepishly said, “I remember when I saw a nurse wearing one of these back when I was a student, and I thought it looked like a fanny pack and—” At Taren’s quizzical expression, Xin said, “A bum bag?”
“Yeah, fanny does not mean that here.”
“What? What does it mean if not butt?”
“Vagina.”
Xin stopped mid-stride and stared at her under the bright lights in the corridor. “You’re kidding?”
“No.”
“Oh no.”
“Said it near some embarrassing people?”
Xin started walking again, still appearing horrified. “You have no idea. Learning American English clearly has its downsides.” Xin had moved over from China in her teens and had come with a really high level of English after being in an American school all her life. It had led to several amusing moments such as this one, though. “Anyway, I thought bum bags were stupid and looked ridiculous—then my first shift finished and I went and ordered three.”
Taren patted her own, which was bulging with everything from alcohol wipes to tape. “Handiest thing on Earth.”
