by R. J. Spears
To make matters worse, if my suspicions were true, it looked like Bloom had bit his son giving us the cold equation choice. We’d have to kill the boy or wait for him to turn and then send him outside to live among the undead.
I hated to pile on, but I felt I had no choice. I leaned into Greg’s space and said in hushed voice, “He bit the kid before going out the window.”
“Oh God, no,” Greg said looking over to the mother holding the little boy, both of them sobbing, the boy holding his wounded arm.
CHAPTER 18
Heaven or Hell
The next few hours were some of the worst for us. The fractures already apparent between our cheerless band of survivors were getting larger as the debate over what to do with the little boy raged on. There was an obvious split in ideologies with the true believers on one side and the warriors on the other. The poseurs sided with the warriors because the kid was only a threat. The lost kept out of it.
Making it worse was the fact that this was the first time that Greg had openly and adamantly disagreed with Pastor Stevens. It was as if the very soul of our existence was being placed on the block -- of what we wanted to be and what we might have to be. No one in our congregation idealized our situation. We all knew and acknowledged that survival was what we were doing. What was in question was how we were going to do that and remain true to our humanity and our faith. I had once joked that we were playing for apocalypse style points, but my sense of humor had run dry.
“This is a child of God. He gets to make the decision on the child, not us,” Pastor Stevens said as the town meeting raged into its second hour with everyone involved and sharing their opinions. There had been some ugly moments in those early days, but we had made it past them. Something in the air made me question if we would be able to maintain that solidarity.
“It’s too big of a danger to keep him with us,” Greg said pounding the table as he sat beside Pastor Stevens. “We’ve talked about this. We all agreed that we cannot -- no, we must not keep the infected with us. We have to...” he paused, looking for the most tactful way to say it, “We can take care of this or we can put him out. There is no other way.”
“He’s just a kid!” someone shouted from the pews.
“Do we have an age limit on who lives and dies now?” another person stood shouting in the direction of the first person. The conversation was edging out of control for the second time in the last half hour. A third person entered the argument and the whole conversation was in danger of exploding.
I sat in the back of the sanctuary with no one around me. I was hearing what was said, but was not really listening as I kept replaying the scene over and over again in my mind. If I had slept in my cubbyhole and not the roof, things could have been different. If I had acted sooner. If I had gotten in that room just a few seconds earlier, I could have possibly saved that kid. If, if, if. But I failed again.
“He’s going to die anyway,” Steve Hampton said rising from his seat taking center stage and the crowd hushed up. There it was. The truth we had danced around all evening.
Because it was that asshole, Steve Hampton, saying it didn’t make it any less true, no matter how much we didn’t like the messenger. “Have we seen anyone survive a bite from one these things?” It was a hard point to debate, but Hampton was right. If we did nothing the virus would take its course.
“It’s not a question of what will happen eventually,” Pastor Stevens said, his face showing the obvious turmoil brewing within him, “It’s a question of what we do now. And I’m afraid any decision we make will define us...make us less than we are. Less than we should be.”
“Our survival is at stake. We can’t afford to hold on to those sorts of high ideals,” Hampton said, turning to take in the crowd and a few nodded their heads in agreement. “When the outcome is already a foregone conclusion, the risk is too high. In fact, it’s reckless to make any other decision than the one that is plainly in front of us.”
“Thank you, Mr. Hampton,” Pastor Steven’s said trying to reset the tone of the conversation. “What I’m saying is that we can’t afford not to hold on to those ideals or else the risk is high that we will lose what is most essential to us -- our humanity and compassion.”
Murmurs rolled through the crowd. Hampton sat down, but he had taken the Pastor’s legs out from under him, and the Pastor knew it. It wasn’t a final blow, but the pulse of the crowd was moving away from the moralistic argument to the pragmatic.
Pastor Stevens looked into the crowd as if he were trying, through force of will, to sway the audience. His face faltered though, betraying the fact he knew he was losing the battle. Still, he fought the good fight.
One of the back doors cracked open behind me, and I leaned back to see Kara’s face fill the gap. The expression on her face brought me out of my pity party. She was adrift in the middle of the ocean, making that last desperate throw with her life preserver. With everybody engrossed in the debate, I was the only one to catch it. I quietly left my seat and went to her. When I got into the hall, I noticed that her legs seemed shaky and she had a vacant look on her face.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Mrs. Bloom,” she said, but her voice was so quiet, I could barely make out what she said. “She wants to take the boy and leave.”
“What?” I asked the news stunning me.
“She’s leaving with the boy.” Her eyes implored me. “We have to stop her,” she said grabbing my hand and led me to the stairs. We rushed down them and into the basement to Doc Wilson’s infirmary. As we approached the door, I could hear Doc Wilson’s soft voice.
“Ma’am, you don’t want to do this,” he said.
We entered to see Doc Wilson with his arms spread wide trying to create a human barrier to restrain Mrs. Bloom.
“Doctor, I know you did your best, and I’m not blaming you, but we have to leave,” Mrs. Bloom said, her voice raw with emotion and her face streaked with tears. She clutched the boy to her body. I could see his bandaged arm. I could also see his cheeks flushed with the fever which was the first sign that the infection was on the move through his bloodstream. The fever started and was usually followed by convulsions or delusional babbling as the person’s temperature would spike above a hundred and six degrees, boiling the higher thought functions right out of the brain. It wasn’t a pretty picture and once it started there was no stopping it. At least not any way we knew.
I had no idea what to do. She knew what was coming. We all did, but I had to try.
“Mrs. Bloom, what’s your boy’s name?” I asked.
It took a moment for her to track in my direction. “Conner.”
“Conner, that’s a nice name.” Lame, I know, but I was just trying to make a connection. Anything to keep the conversation going. “Do you think Conner wants you to go with him? Really, if he understood what that meant, do you think he would really want you to leave?” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and soothing, but it backfired as the boy shrank in towards his mother’s embrace. What did I expect from a six year old?
“We can’t stay. They won’t let him stay,” she said pointing upwards towards the sanctuary.
“Maybe we can do something,” Doc Wilson said, reaching for straws.
“Like what!?” she said switching from fear to rage in a heartbeat. “He has the infection. We both know where this is going.”
“But you don’t have to go with him,” I said.
“He’s just a boy. I can’t send him out alone.”
Kara moved up beside me, “But what about your daughter? Are you going to leave her alone?”
With my laser focus on Mrs. Bloom and the boy, I had totally neglected to see the Bloom girl standing off to the side of the room next to Naveen. While Naveen looked stricken, the Bloom girl was totally devastated. A zombie infested world was bad enough, but at least 24 hours before she had an intact family. Now her father was dead, and her brother was about to follow. The question was whether her mother would ab
andon her also.
“Don’t you say that! You have no right. You have no right at all.” Her face broke and the tears started up again. “If we stay, you know what they’ll do to my boy.”
“Maybe we can talk them into letting him stay,” I said.
“You know you can’t. We all do,” she said and it was like a slap. “There’s no more time to talk.” Before I could react, she produced a small, but deadly looking .38 revolver.
“Mommy!” the little girl yelled.
“Madison, please be quiet,” Mrs. Bloom said. “You’re going to have to be strong.” Then just like Grinch, she thought up a lie and she thought it up quick. “I’ll come back when I can.”
She inched forward with the gun pointed ahead of her. Doc Wilson drifted away from her, giving Mrs. Bloom room to exit, but Madison Bloom made a break for her mom. Before she could take a step though, Naveen grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
“No, Madison, you should stay with us,” Naveen said, holding Madison’s arm.
“Madison, you need to stay here,” Mrs. Bloom said, but her voice was softer now. “It’s going to be okay. These people will take care of you while I’m gone with your brother.” She took in each one of us with a pleading glance.
Had I been a true movie hero, I would have had the right line or just the right move to disarm her, but I was no hero. Far from it. All I did was back into Kara and moved her out of harms way as Mrs. Bloom moved her aim from me to Doc Wilson. As she passed by, she turned to face us, backing away slowly, holding the gun shakily in her hand. She stopped at the threshold and wavered there for a moment. I hoped she might change her mind.
“Maddy, Mommy loves you. You know if we stayed what they’d do to Conner. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She found whatever resolve she had left her and stepped out of the room. The next thing we heard was their feet on the stairs, followed by a door shutting.
We never saw her or Conner again.
When is a dream not a dream? When it’s reality. But this wasn’t reality. It couldn’t be reality. Or, at least, not a reality that I wanted.
I was standing at the back of the sanctuary. I don’t know how I got there. I was hurt, and I wasn’t sure how that happened either, but it wasn’t too bad. The worst part was that I knew I was in trouble. Big trouble.
Someone was chasing me. I didn’t know who, but there was even more danger.
The sounds of shots being fired filtered in from outside the church. It sounded like a full-out battle. I reached to my side and found out that I had no weapon. That wasn’t very comforting.
A moon beam, coming through a large hole in the wall on the east side of the building, bathed the room in a pale blue light giving it a ghostly feel. People were seated in the pews, silent and still.
Someone shouted from outside the sanctuary. I think they said they were coming for someone, but sound in this reality (if that’s what it was) was muted and murky. Whatever they said, I think they were coming for me.
I moved into the sanctuary away from my pursuer and as I approached the first seated person, I turned and looked at them. It was my old Sunday school teacher, Mrs. Casey, and it was clear to me that she was no longer among the living. This did not bode well for me, but she didn’t bolt from her seat and come at me.
This was beyond strange.
Footsteps echoed in the hall, and I moved deeper into the sanctuary, afraid to look at them. It was only when I made it to the front that I dared even to take a glance and when I did, I froze in near panic. The person sitting in the front row was Pastor Stevens. Like Mrs. Casey, he was clearly now a zombie. He sat as placidly as the others.
Zombies don’t act this way. The see food and they’re up and running.
The inverse was the same for us -- we see a zombie and we’re running, but my feet are locked in place and I’m wondering what the hell is going on when the door of the sanctuary bursts opens.
That’s when I woke up. I was bathed in sweat inside my sleeping bag wondering what had just happened. It was like a dream, but not a dream. I didn’t even want to think of what it was, because I was the last person in the world that God would send a vision. I was just barely tolerated by the Warriors and True Believers. I didn’t need to rock the boat any more than I had. Better to say nothing.
CHAPTER 19
Redemption
We went on, but there seemed to be something essential missing. We hadn’t driven the infected child out, but there was little doubt that we would have, had the boy’s mother not taken the decision out of our hands.
The “one for all and all for one” attitude that had carried us through those first dark days was rapidly dissipating like blood drops in water. At the smallest infraction or perceived, slight tempers flared and words were exchanged. Greg and his warriors broke up several near-fights in the days following the drama with the Blooms.
As for my own little soap opera; I felt further isolated from the group. If they had been on the precipice of tossing an infected kid out, what hope was there for a fuck-up like me? I held onto hope that something would happen -- something that would redeem me, but I felt that hope dwindling. Still, something held me there. Maybe I was just going through the motions?
My practice was to sit in the last pew in the sanctuary barely listening to P
astors Stevens’ messages. The majority of people crowded toward the front. Why I even attended the worship services was beyond me. I guess it beat another hour of isolation.
I used the time to daydream of living in a cabin deep in the woods or an apartment in some abandoned city where the dead and the living no longer roamed. Any place but the place where I had to face my failures on a daily basis. Ah, self-pity, a delightful way to spend your day.
Caught in this fantasy world, I was shocked when a hand fell on my shoulder. I looked up and saw Pastor Stevens looking down at me. His expression held none of the pity or disdain of the others. What it conveyed I couldn’t make out but there wasn’t any of the judgment or disgust behind his eyes that I had become accustomed to.
A couple of people turned and noticed, but looked back to the front of the sanctuary. He gently squeezed my shoulder for a second, removed his hand, and walked up the aisle, his Bible held in his other hand. He mounted the stage and laid the Bible on the large wooden pulpit. He took a moment to put on his reading glasses and leafed through the book to a pre-selected passage.
Finally he cleared his throat and said, “What is the nature of God?” He paused and looked around the sanctuary, taking in the faces one at a time. When he stopped on my face I wanted to look away, but something in his gaze held me.
“What is the nature of God?” he repeated. “I know some of you must think that He is cruel. That He has turned His back on us. Well, I don’t think that way. I think the true nature of God is different from our situation. I think He continues doing what He always has done. Really. Think about it. What is the one thing that He does every day for you that you need more than anything?” Again he paused, letting people think. Letting the question sink in.
“Who here hasn’t gone before God and asked for something they needed more than anything else? Who here hasn’t made a big mistake or many mistakes in their lives? What do we desperately need to have more than anything else?” His voice was strong and filled the sanctuary.
“Forgiveness.” He let that hang in the air. “Forgiveness. Each day we go to Him, we bring our baggage, our trespasses, our sin. And He does what He has always says He will do -- He forgives us.” He let that sink in.
“This whole situation has changed us. Made us different people. But we have choices. We can be the people the situation makes us be, or we can be the people we should be. Sometimes, yes, we will be the people we have to be, but that doesn’t mean that God doesn’t look down and forgive us. And we should do the same for each other. Shouldn’t we?”
Again, he paused as he surveyed the congregation. When his gaze came to me, I felt the hot sting of tears in my eyes.
“Sometimes,” he said and his voice caught, “Sometimes the hardest person to forgive is ourselves.” He took a moment, gathering his composure and gave me the slightest of nods. “Now, if you’ll turn to the book of John, chapter 4.”
Pastor Stevens went on to tell the story of the woman at the well and how she was forgiven. I didn’t hear all of his lesson. Silent tears stream down my cheeks, but I held my head up and I listened.
When he said the final prayer, all the strength left my body and I felt completely wrung out, unable to move. I slumped forward, laying my arms across the back of the pew in front of me, and placed my head on them. I heard the creak of people standing, no one speaking. I heard them coming up the aisle toward me. I sensed them as they came near. I felt their hands on my shoulder, mostly just a pat, but there were a few hard squeezes in there among them.
One held onto my shoulder longer than the others. I didn’t look up to see who it was, but heard Greg’s voice pitched low in my ear, “You did what you could to save that family. You did. The Bloom girl is still alive because of you. That’s the second one. You’ve done God’s work, Joel.”
I waited until the sanctuary was empty and then even longer before leaving. Waiting and composing myself, I might have even said a prayer.
CHAPTER 20
Interloper
It was like being released from a life sentence or being exonerated from a crime that I hadn’t committed. The true believers embraced me again. The warriors were split, but Greg must have turned the corner with Pastor Steven’s sermon because my name appeared on the duty roster again. The poseurs put me back at arm’s length since there was nothing to be gained from me. The lost still kept their distance. What mattered, at least to me, was that I was back in the good graces of the true believers. Kara even started speaking to me again. Not that it went any further than talk.
