by Geo Dell
I have this cave coming along fine. I've been stockpiling food. I should have no problem this winter. I have more than enough to see me through, a few dozen others too. I hope. I know there are people here. I know it, but for some reason they are staying hidden.
If I could find my way to a bigger city, I'm sure things would be fine. I wonder if I should stuff this stockpiling, and try to get to Syracuse... or Rochester... maybe even New York. It's close to four hundred miles, but maybe there are answers there. I just don't know.
I thought today about a radio. C.B., F.M., something. Even A.M. when I go tomorrow, I'll look for radios. Guess that's it. I'm hanging in here, still on my own.
Billy
He came from sleep fast, Jamie's face above him, her voice a low, panicked whisper.
“Wha... What... What?”
“Downstairs... It's downstairs,” she didn't finish but she didn't need to. A crash came to his ears, but he could not tell if it was from the downstairs hallway. At least he hoped it was the downstairs hallway, not the stairs outside of their apartment, or, God forbid, even closer.
He jumped from the tangle of blankets, started to pull his shoes on, and then reached for his machine pistol instead as another noise came from the hallway. This time it did sound like the downstairs hallway; the steel gate that closed off the lobby. Billy thumbed the safety off the machine pistol and ran for the apartment door.
The hallway was nearly completely black. The hallway windows let in the light from outside, but it was very little. He slowed and felt his way to the staircase. He sensed her before his hand brushed against her.
“Don't you fuckin' shoot me, Billy Jingo.” Beth whispered tightly. A small penlight clicked on and he could see her leaning against the wall from the upstairs apartment.
“No,” Billy said. It was stupid, but he could think of nothing else to say. “Going down,” he told her. He made the stairs and headed down toward the lobby. Behind him Beth had turned out the light, but he could feel her following behind him.
The noise became louder as they made their way downward. Billy tried to count the steps as he went. Fifteen to the landing, turn to the right, feel for the banister. Fifteen more to the bottom, but he missed the last step. He had made himself count the steps just earlier that day in case he had to navigate them in the blackness.
He nearly fell before his foot found the floor and he regained his balance. He could smell them now though, hear them. Just fifteen or so feet across the lobby. He felt Beth’s hand brush against his back. A second later she pressed up against him and whispered in his ear.
“When I flick the light on them, just shoot!”
“But what if...”
“Fuck What if... Just shoot. Who do you think it would be, the fuckin' Avon lady?” Silence fell. The noise stopped. “Goddammit,” Beth muttered.
A second later the penlight came on. It was like a floodlight in the narrow hallway. The gate was broken, forced part way open at the top. Another few minutes and they would have been through. Six dead were transfixed by the beam. Two with iridescent red eyes that seemed to glow in the light from the penlight. Both snarled and lunged at the gate to force their way through to them.
His pistol was in his hands, but it was like the beam had frozen him too. He did not begin to fire until after Beth's pistol began to fire. The noise was huge. Everything in the closed in space. All six of the dead fell and they thrashed on the floor. It was over fast. So fast that Billy had not even thought to breath.
He stood, frozen, looking at the dead. Two still moved. He walked forward and shot both of them in the head, one by one. The beam left them and moved to the doorway.
The aluminum door frame was buckled in the doorway. The safety glass had been smashed out and lay on the floor in one crystallized sheet. Two heavy sledge hammers lay just outside the doorway. Another three were scattered among the dead by the steel gate.
“Son of a bitch,” Beth breathed.
“Jesus. You don't think they were using those, do you?”
“Are you fuckin' kidding me?” Beth asked. She shone the light up and down the door frame. “We'll need a steel door and a welder to fix that,” She said.
Billy nodded, realized she couldn't see it, and then spoke. “We can get one tomorrow.”
She brushed against him as she squeezed past and walked toward the gate. His arm felt on fire from the softness of her breast as she had slipped past him. She turned and looked back at him. "They almost got in." She shone the light on the steel collapsible burglar door. It had been there for as long as she could remember, and she had lived in the building for several years. The top was nearly separated from the steel bracket that held the hinge mechanism. Billy got his feet moving, walked over and examined the top of the door.
They had hit it with the sledge hammer repeatedly. The steel had finally split, and it looked as though they had been trying to use sheer force to rip the rest of the bracket away from the wall where it was mounted. Billy stepped back.
“I think,” he began, and that was when a zombie came through the shattered aluminum door frame and slammed into the steel gate. Fingers shot through the gaps in the steel and clutched at Billy's arm. The Zombie missed the arm but got his shirt sleeve and immediately snarled and began to pull back.
It lasted less than a full second and Beth’s pistol roared. The zombie's head blew apart in the narrow hallway, black zombie blood running down the walls.
“Got you? Got you?” Beth asked.
“No... No... No, I …” Billy couldn't find the words. Something moved outside the door, and he opened up on it. A second later there were four more Zombies flooding through the door. None of them made it to the gate, tripping over the other dead, and both Billy and Beth were firing immediately. One made it back out the door, a hole in its side that had blown away part of its spine as it had exited. Billy could not believe it was still able to move, but it was. Canted to one side, legs spasming as it ran, causing it to lurch from side to side. It disappeared into the darkness before either of them could get another shot in. The silence came back full.
“You have got to get your shit together,” Beth said quietly.
“I got my shit together,” Billy shot back.
“You never saw that one coming through the door, if I hadn't shot it...”
“Well, fuck! … If you hadn't... Never mind... Okay... I'll get my shit together.”
She said nothing.
“Okay... Okay... Does us no good to get on each other... None at all... We can fix this tomorrow.” He looked around the lobby. Her flashlight was already flickering, causing shadows to jump and fall on the walls. Batteries were getting tougher and tougher to find. He looked at his wrist and cursed low. Old habits died hard. Watches were worthless now. He hadn't worn one in a few days.
“I don't know either... I think a few hours until dawn,” Beth said.
“Well I'll sit here and wait for it... All we can do,” Billy said. “Go on back up and get some sleep. I got this.” He settled back onto the step, sitting with his back to the upstairs.
Beth stayed silent for a moment and then came and sat next to him. “Got it with you,” she said. She sat next to him and he immediately lost his words. Her arm pressed against his own. The light snapped off, and the heat of her arm became everything.
“Billy?” His name whispered from the upstairs hallway. Jamie.
“I'm here until daybreak,” Billy whispered back.
Silence. And then... “It's safe?”
“They won't get past us,” Billy said.
She said nothing. A few seconds later the door slammed upstairs. Billy sighed.
“Sorry,” Beth said. She was aware how Jamie felt about her. Jamie and Billy were not really together, bu Jamie felt she owned him. Billy didn't help matters by staying with her, sleeping with her, yet not making it official, and she knew he was hung up on her too. So was Scotty. Ironically, she wasn't interested in either of them. She didn't feel like sh
e absolutely had to have a man to protect her, define her. Yet, ironically she reminded herself again, she was doing the same thing with Scotty. Staying when she didn't feel the same, couldn't feel the same. “I better go up... keep the peace.” Beth said quietly.
“Yeah... I'm good here,” Billy said. He wasn't though. He wanted her to stay; he just didn't know what he could do to get her to stay. Nothing, he supposed. “I'll be good. Morning's not far away.” Her arm pulled away, and a moment later he heard her soft footfalls on the stairs as she ascended them. Billy sat quietly, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, his machine pistol in his hands.
March 10th: 618 Park Avenue: Seventh floor. 2B
Donita's Notebook:
March 10th: Warming up; days are longer. It feels like spring. It's early March. No way should it be this warm. My watch is working again, no rhyme or reason.
Donita stood now, overlooking the city. It seemed that everything had changed in the last few days. Her watch said it was somewhere past midnight, if it could be trusted. It had quit, started again, and she had set it for 9:00 PM at sunset. The days were longer, but she had no idea how much. It should be close. But so many strange things had happened that she wasn't sure it could be trusted. The days seemed longer. What good was a twenty-four hour watch if the days were all screwed up? Longer? And everything else was bad too. Her own life was falling apart, and she couldn't even bring herself to tell Bear about it, or how much it scared her.
The old woman, Alice, had taken her dog Ge-Boo out a few days before, and she had not come back. Donita had opened the door a crack as she had been leaving and warned her again about how bad it was outside, but Alice had simply pretended not to see her, or hear her, when she had spoken. She had walked off down the hallway, smartly dressed, Ge-Boo wearing a small, pink sweater, and Donita had not seen her since.
Bear had called the elevator back up a few hours later, locked it down, and then jammed it open with a chair from Amanda Bynes' kitchen. It was clear that if Alice was not back, she would not be back. The streets had suddenly been crawling with the dead. The daylight meant absolutely nothing to them at all. An hour or two into the darkness the electricity quit, and the building, most of Manhattan with it, had gone dark. Now this.
Donita looked out on the city now. The fires were everywhere. Twice, a few days back, the planes had overflown the city. Bear had been down in the park trying to find out what was going on. She had been alone, jumping at every sound. The planes had swooped low, blue-tinged mist spraying from the open cargo holds: military planes, jets. She had seen them clearly from the seventh floor. Soldiers in gas masks stood in the open bay doorways and directed the thick hoses that sprayed the city. Three men crouched in the open cargo holds of each plane.
She had slid the glass balcony doors closed, fashioned a rag around her mouth and waited for Bear to come back. He had not been long. They had been able to smell something on the air, a thick, cloying smell that reminded Donita of old perfume. It had left a nasty taste in their mouths, but it didn't seem to do anything to them other than that. A few hours later, they had ventured back out on the balcony, the rags tossed aside. If it had been something to kill them, it would have already done that, they had both reasoned.
The city had fallen quiet. That night the recently risen from the dead were dead once more. They had fallen, sprawled into the streets where they had stood after crawling from their hiding places. Dead again. They had thought it was over. Hoped it was over.
Donita stood now and looked at the city. They weren't dead any longer. Whatever it had been, it had not been able to kill them, if that had been what it was supposed to do. In fact, it had seemed to make them even stronger once they had come back the second time; stronger and smarter. She could see them in the streets below now. They walked purposefully from doorway to doorway, testing the locks, stopping at every shadow. Investigating. A car here, a doorway there, looking up to catch her eyes. Maybe just to let her know that they knew she was still there. And Bear slept behind her in the bed, unaware of it all. Oblivious to it.
And there was irony here. Irony, because she was dying. She was dying, and she was sure that they knew it. She was sure that was the reason they kept looking up at her where she stood on the balcony, judging the time between now and when she would be one of them.
She blinked away tears as she looked out over the night darkened city: the fires that burned, the dead that prowled the streets. She had popped her last nitro the day before. It had taken the pain in her chest down, but it had not stopped it. Too much excitement. Too much damage from the drug use that had ravaged her body. She hadn't touched a thing in two years, but it had still killed her, just as she had known it would. It had just taken its time. Twenty-three and a bad heart. It thundered and trip-hammered in her chest. Out of sync. Out of beat. Out of time. And the dead knew it. They were only waiting for her to stop, keel over, and...
She wondered about that 'and' as she looked out over the burning city. And what? She would raise back to life? She didn't think so, but she didn't know. She was sure they had to bite you for that to happen. Even so, if you did come back on your own... She stood brooding, feeling the pressure build in her chest as evening came on and the fires continued to burn.
She couldn't make Bear do it, she decided at last, and there probably wasn't much more time for her. If she intended to go, she should.
She turned and looked at Bear's outline on the bed. She couldn't chance waking him either to say goodbye. And that hurt too, but it would probably not hurt for long. He would stop her, possibly read her mind. He had done it before; just seemed to know what she was thinking. She turned a few minutes later, walked quietly across Amanda Bynes' plush carpet, eased open the door and stepped out into the hallway.
Lenox Avenue
She slipped from the shadows and ran along from building to building until she reached the end of the block. She had expected to hear gunshots behind her. Expected to find herself falling to the ground dead, a bullet in her back, but the bullet never came. They must have stayed asleep.
They, were four guys who had come around a few days before. She had opened the door to her apartment. Stupid. If she could have gone back and undone it she would have, but she had been so scared. She had been so alone. The kid at the peephole had seemed so young. Scared himself. All she had done was open the door an inch or two, just slipped the chain, and the other three had slammed into it. The four of them had easily broken the chain and pushed past her into the apartment. She had given in. There had been no sense in fighting them. What could she do?
She had been their toy. Passed from one to the other. Yesterday morning they had come back from someplace with a new girl. She had no idea where they had found her. Sometime late afternoon, before dinner, they had killed her.
Something had occurred. She hadn't been able to tell what. But she had heard the shot, and then they had brought her out from the bedroom and dumped her on the living room floor. Naked. A bullet hole in her head. And she had known it would not be long before it would be her turn to be dead. She had just known it.
She had been cooking for them, a little grill out on the balcony. They went out and brought things back, canned stuff; she cooked it on the grill in a pot, and they ate it it like it was the finest gourmet food available anywhere. She had gone into the bathroom, opened the medicine chest and stared at the sleeping pills she had put there, until one of them, Randy, she thought his name was, had come and yelled through the bathroom door. She had taken the pills and dumped them into her pocket, flushed the toilet and went back out to the kitchen.
She had put all of them in the food. Mixed them right in with the canned spaghetti, and they had wolfed them right down. Never had a clue. Now they were all out. Maybe dead. There had been an awful lot of pills.
She had been with Bobby a few days before, when she had thought to get the pills. Bobby was nice, if there could be anything close to nice with these guys. He had looked her up and dow
n and that had been that. She imagined he had probably never had a woman that looked like her in his entire life. Maybe never had a woman at all. It was clear he was an inexperienced lover. He had no idea what he was doing. He was rough, cruel even. Nice only meant he didn't beat her, he still used her as he pleased.
He had taken her with him because the others had been out and he had not wanted to leave her alone in the apartment, guessing, correctly, that she would not be there when he came back. But, he had been bored, left alone, and he wanted to look through some shops and stores in the neighborhood.
It had been broad daylight, but there had been no one to stop him or any of the other gangs that roved the streets and did as they pleased. He had broken into a pawn shop. She had talked him into going into the medication aisle at the Korean store down the street. And she had picked up the sleeping pills. He had seen her do it. She had told him it was relief for period pain. She had picked up a box of pads too. He had turned red and had not asked her about them again. As a bonus, he had left her alone that night also, probably thinking that she had been indisposed. Fine. Whatever. It didn't matter any longer.
It was nearly dark by the time they had finally passed out. That had pissed her off. Pissed her off and scared her too. The dead were out here somewhere. The dark was their time.
They had died off when the planes had come over, but they were back now. Strong, or becoming strong. She wanted to get as far away as she could before the street was completely lost to the night. There were people down the street, two blocks or so down. She had seen them coming and going. Making sport of the zombies. Enticing them into chasing them and then killing them with head shots from the shotguns they carried; routing them out in the daylight and running them over with cars, shooting them as they roared by, racing the block from end to end in a souped up car they had gotten from somewhere. They had been out earlier. If she could get down the street, she was sure they would take her in. Positive.
