Dysphoria and Grace: (NA Apocalypse Romance) (The Night Blind Saga Book 1)

by Christina Rozelle

  “I bent down to pick up his toothbrush, but instead I folded up under the sink, cradling it, sobbing like a schoolgirl. Hao was never the enemy I made him out to be. He left me alone because it was my wish. He never hated me or my sins. He forgave me, respected me when there was no one else left that did. Hao was no enemy . . . and he was never coming back.”

  He pivots toward me, takes my hand, and smiles. “That’s why I got you out of that place. Because we’re one in the same, you and me. Both lost souls that needed another chance to make it right. You were mine. I found you, helped you find your strength again . . . You ever heard of Murphy’s Law?”

  “Uh, yes. I think so. Everything that—”

  “Can go wrong, will,” he finishes for me. “Yessir. But let me tell you a little something about Murray’s Law. When you’ve lost it all and you have nothing left to lose, when you’re stripped of all choices but to live or die, that’s when you get to choose whether to rise above or fall, defeated. That’s what you get to do now. It’s time to go back and make it right.”

  “Go back?”

  “Yes, Grace. There are people out there who need you.”

  “How do you know my name? I never told you my—”

  “Stay strong, girl. Tell it no. And I’ll see you on the bright side.”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  “Dru’s taking a shining to this one,” someone says, and I awake in darkness, wrists bound. I panic, try to yank free.

  “I don’t blame him,” he continues. “I mean—goddamn, look at that fuck box. I ain’t seen a pussy like that since . . . I fucked it about an hour ago.”

  Another one joins him in laughter, and he coughs, followed by the smell of marijuana smoke. “Yeah, she’s a hot little nigger. Nice ink, great tits . . . but she’s spent, man. We should just toss her out front to the sick.”

  “That’s inhumane, dude. At least put a bullet in her head first.”

  They laugh again.

  For a moment, time stands still, as I fumble for a grip on reality. Is this a dream? Or . . . was that the dream?

  No. There’s no way. Murray was too real. He got me out of that place, took me to safety, fed me, took care of me . . .

  “Nah, for real though, bro,” one man says. “Dru’s gonna move her up to stage two soon and get her fed and treated. Three more solid weeks after that and she’ll be set for life.”

  “How’s he so sure about this?”

  “I don’t know, man. He’s Dru. Dru knows shit about Yes that we don’t, come on.”

  “True, true.”

  I come to my senses, mostly coherent for the first time since I buried my family and chased a bottle of acid with a bottle of ancient scotch. That’s the last memory I have that makes any real sense. Not that chasing a bottle of acid with a bottle of scotch made any real sense to begin with.

  But being in space, then leaving here, Murray—all of that was a dream? Maybe a completely vivid, weeks-long, out-of-body acid trip or something. Even so, he was as real as any person I’ve ever met. His history, his time in prison, his confession about Hao, his wife, Mary, and his PTSD. How could I dream all of that?

  Could Murray have been an angel of protection, sent from the Goddess, or somewhere else? Why wouldn’t he tell me that’s who he was? And why would any of them waste time on me anyway?

  “You’re a human being, ain’tcha?” Murray says in my memory. “We’re one in the same . . . Both lost souls that needed another chance to make it right. Time to go make it right, Grace.”

  The door closes, and I’m left alone in my bewilderment. Make it right, how, Murray?

  Everyone I love is dead.

  I rub my blindfold against my upper arm to try and get a good view of the room I’m in. Black plastic drapes over the windows, one corner fallen to show the gray sky. A ceiling lined with acoustical ceiling tiles, like the room I was in with the cop who violated me. Eve.

  Riverbend. I must really be there, inside. Murray had told me they’d taken it after the outbreak, and that I’d gone there blazing bullets from Henry’s SUV. Flickering images of that dance through fractured mind-space. I probably came here to kill them.

  When I remember the way Murray had taken me—through the air vent—I crane my neck to find a metallic, grated rectangle on the wall above my head and to the right, beneath the desk he’d set me on top of. I wonder if it does go anywhere, and if there really is a Humvee waiting at the bottom. Tunnels that conveniently lead underground, safe from the runners, and the “Suits,” as Murray had called them.

  Only one way to find out. And why the hell not?

  I’d rather die being eaten alive by the dead, than be ripped to shreds from the inside by the living.

  Not much time to plan before the door opens again. Beneath the blindfold, I see a younger guy, maybe eighteen, thin, freshly shaven. He regards my nakedness, then unzips his pants with shaky hands. He’s nervous.

  “Hey, sexy,” I purr. “Can you take this off me? I want to see you.”

  “Well, I’m not really supposed to do that. Sorry.”

  “Are you gonna let those assholes think for you? Come on. Take this off. Please. And kiss me. I know you want to.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, he does as I ask, removing the blindfold. He leans forward to kiss me, and I thrust against his erection. “Untie my hands so I can touch you.” I follow it with a flick of my tongue in his ear, and this time he doesn’t miss a beat. He has my ropes untied from the bar in seconds.

  “You wanna fuck me, don’t you?” I ask him.

  “Yeah.” He sheds his pants. “So bad.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Ben.”

  “Then fuck me, Ben.”

  And with my invitation, he spreads me open wide and pushes into me. I summon rage to aid me, remembering what they did to Eve. The look on her face when she said “Can you believe they . . . made me . . . like it?” And there was nothing I could do. The damage was already done.

  “Does that feel good, baby?” Ben asks me.

  “Yes.” I run my fingernails up his back as he closes his eyes and moans, then, I wrap the ropes crisscross around his neck and pull tight, rolling on top of him. I press my knees into his chest and he flails, his neck veins and eyes bulge, as I extract every last drop of my rage, until finally, he falls limp.

  I work the ropes free from my rope-burned wrists, take his black shirt, pants, and belt, and put them on. He won’t be needing them anymore. And when I’m dressed, I climb up onto the desk, and find two large latches on either side of the vent. I unlatch them, and pull the covering open on its hinges. It’s the same size it was in my . . . vision, or whatever, with Murray.

  Only now, I see there’s no way a grown man of his height and girth could fit into this ventilation shaft. A look around the room finds it just how I saw it with Murray, though: two fold-out chairs and an IV rack, a bar bolted to the wall at the head of a mattress.

  It takes three attempts, but I finally hop up onto the lip of the shaft. The inside is different from how I remember it with him; smaller; rougher, older. Realer. When I get far enough in, I stretch my arm behind me to guide the vent covering into place, then begin to crawl, replaying the moment he’d asked my name and I realized I didn’t have one. I’d never allowed myself to be Grace, and Ophelia had died with Eve . . . But then, when Murray told me to go back, he’d called me by my name. What’s always been my name, whether I embraced it or not.

  The shaft narrows and I have to wriggle through portions of it like a snake. There’s some worry about getting stuck, but I’m thinner, and continue to slide through the winding passageway with only a little difficulty. Down. That’s my only guidepost. And where I’ll end up is a mystery. I doubt there are secret tunnels beneath my city, though.

  The shakes and nausea start after about thirty minutes and I have to slow down. My arms are cut and bruised and throb at the creases where they kept me drugged. My vagina cries out in both pain and need. Whatever it was,
it made me want to be filled more than anything else, even more than X. This was different, though. There wasn’t the intense, euphoric high like X, just compliance. Complete and total compliance.

  Through the walls, most floors are silent, but on a few of them are the sounds of children crying, women screaming, and men cursing, talking, or moaning. If I get out of here, I should tell someone about this place; about what these men do to women and children.

  But who would I tell? There’s no one left.

  Unless . . .

  “Gideon County is a couple miles North. We can go there instead,” Murray had said. And that Springdale County was once Gideon County, years ago. Somehow, I don’t think that’s true. But maybe he was telling me something else.

  I have to find Gideon, tell him how sorry I am. He’s the only family I have left. And my gut tells me he’s still alive.

  Even though he left unarmed, and in the middle of the day? The voice of reason fills me with doubt as I maneuver my way down what I believe to be the last section of vent. The air pressure changes and my ears pop again. The adrenaline starts another cycle throughout my body, making me tremble, then gasp at the shock of sudden, fresh, night air.

  Lights up ahead, and I’m shimmying my way forward, toward them, hoping it’s not a train.

  THIRTY-SIX

  It’s not a tunnel but a parking lot, and the lights belong to a camouflaged helicopter—a Black Hawk. On the side is a symbol of some sort, but I can’t make it out clearly from this angle. The blades begin to rotate, blowing my hair from my face when I get up next to the vent.

  Dusk, like with Murray. How could there be so many similarities? All the years of Zalaan and never did I experience something like that. The synchronicities are uncanny. And Murray was a real man, a man with a past and a future. A man with details, from the way he pinched his beard and furrowed his brow when he talked, to the snowcap with a frayed edge, and the PTSD episode with the fighter jet. His remorse for the way he’d treated Hao that mirrored my own feelings about my parents.

  He was real, and those things were real . . . even if they only happened in my mind. He saved my life. Without him, I may not have decided to fight, to do what it took to survive.

  Three men in army fatigues salute as the chopper lifts off the ground, then they about-face and head toward the building. I scan the parking lot for a few minutes, listening for sounds, as the pain blossoms all over from the fading euphoria, but especially between my legs. My body’s bruised, same as my soul.

  They took things, but you’re not broken. You can recover from this, okay?

  Words I’d said to Eve to suture her wounded core now come floating back to me, in her voice, as though she were singing them from Beyond.

  I know, Evie. I love you.

  I love you, too, Phelia. You can do this.

  I am, Evie, I’m moving forward . . .

  A sob escapes me and I let it for a moment, unable to ward off the utter, soul-cleaving sadness that I will never see my best friend again.

  But my body can heal, and so can my mind. So maybe my heart can, too, if I find a safe place to go. And maybe I’ll find Gideon, and tell him how sorry I am.

  I steady my breaths, waiting for the right time to rattle the vent covering in front of me. I don’t know if it’s screwed or latched into place, or how loud or hard it will be to open, but I tuck my fingers into the slits and give it a jiggle, finding it loosely held into place. With some more jostling and the shred of strength I have left—which is only from adrenaline at this point—I work one side of the cover free from the wall.

  It’s a cloudy night. When I stick my head out to survey the area, there’s no moon, and the parking lot is dark, quiet, and empty.

  Now or never.

  I squeeze through the opening, scraping my shoulder on a rusted metal corner.

  Great. If the runners don’t eat me, I’ll die from tetanus. If not that, maybe AIDS.

  Things aren’t looking too hopeful.

  I press up against the brick wall and steady myself, dizzy, weak, hurting, horny, and sick. It doesn’t help matters that I’m barefoot.

  Off in the distance, at the edge of the perimeter, I spy a corner where two hastily-erected chain link fences come together cockeyed, leaving a space wide enough for a body to crawl through. My feet bolt before my brain can react, and when I realize what I’m doing, there’s a glint of gratitude for my dark hair and Ben’s choice of dark clothes for the evening.

  I step on a few pebbles, which send jolts of pain through my feet, but I keep on at a steady pace, past Connie’s Boutique, as fast as I can go until my lungs won’t work anymore and my heart pumps lava. I trot the last few yards until I drop to the ground by the fence and clumsily crawl through, gasping for air.

  My shirt gets snagged, but after a couple of tugs I’m free and stumbling through the parking lot on the other side. I reach a parked car—one that’s been stalled here for weeks with an orange WARNING sticker placed on the windshield by Riverbend’s tow company. Seeing this car reminds me that this is real—this is the world I was in before, but with the light turned off. This is flip side of the coin. This is when the weak become strong and adapt, or else they die.

  After making sure I’m not being hunted or followed, I puke stomach acid onto the cracked pavement. When my stomach settles again, I cross the abandoned street to the residential neighborhood behind the shopping center, ducking into the first bushes I find. There’s a pair of bodies at the end of the street, but I can’t tell if they’re runners or not. I’m not ready to find out.

  I shiver, teeth chattering and muscles rigid from the adrenaline overload. But also, there’s relief for having escaped, and pride for outsmarting them. Now, if I could only use my wits to locate Gideon . . .

  Wipeouts—the water park. It’d been his idea to go there. What if he’s there now? If he managed to get there in one piece, I can, too. And if he didn’t . . . maybe I won’t, either. And wherever we both wind up in the end, maybe it’ll be together.

  My head throbs, and I shake violently. I’m crashing, hard. This is going to be bad. But at least the streetlights are out now. Though my head spins, I trace in my mind the city streets that would take me to the water park. It’s five miles, at least. If I don’t die from withdrawals, maybe I’ll find a car. Then again, if the Suits were to find me driving a car, I’d wish I were dead already.

  Maybe traveling at night, on foot, is best. I’ll need to find supplies, though. Shoes. Food and water. Medicine.

  The first house I come to is locked, so I stagger through the yard to the next to find the front door of the light blue, two-story house standing wide open. I peek inside, listen, and hear nothing, so I close the door softly, heart pounding. Weapons. I slip into the kitchen and take a butcher knife from the knife block, then move through the rest of the house with it raised in a shaky fist.

  I check two bedrooms and find them empty, then the guest bathroom and master bedroom at the end of the hallway. The car is missing from the garage, door busted through as though someone had broken in to steal the vehicle. I close the door behind me and lock it, then make my way to the front door to lock the deadbolts. I’ll stay here and rest for a while, gather supplies, wash and doctor myself with whatever I can find. Then I’m on my way to Wipeouts off of eighty-four and Ridge Point Road, where Evie’s parents took her as a little girl. A place I always wanted to go.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  I wake up in an unfamiliar bed with the sun in my face, disoriented for a second or two before remembering where I am now. The stale, clean sheets stick to my wounds as I uncover my quaking body and attempt to sit up. I vomit over the side of the bed, and cringe. Everything hurts, and I’m pretty sure I’m dying.

  “Ophelia, I don’t know how to move on from this. How do you . . . not let it break you?”

  “You look it straight in the black, evil eyes and you tell it to fuck off. You tell it you won’t be broken so easily. Then, you get up and keep moving.”<
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  And for Evie, I do.

  But walking hurts, and dizziness makes it hard to get to the bathroom. When I finally limp there, it hurts to pee. I blot myself with a towel from the rack nearby, cringe, and cry out, then hobble to the medicine cabinet, praying for something good.

  When I open it, my heart sinks. Almost empty. Only bottles of rubbing alcohol and Bayer aspirin occupy one shelf. The thought of putting alcohol on any wounds right now makes me ill, but I unscrew the cap anyway and dump it over my two shoulder wounds before I can change my mind. The burn brings me to my knees, biting my lower lip to keep from screaming.

  I should probably give my parts a good dousing, too, but can’t bring myself to do it. The thought of more pain between my legs brings nausea, black dots sweeping across my vision in a hot wave.

  When I can stand again, I work my way to the kitchen and swallow three aspirin with a found bottle of water. I find some crackers, moldy hot dog buns and flour tortillas, and fruit that’s starting to rot in the refrigerator. I check the pantry and my stomach gurgles at the cans of pork-n-beans with peel-back lids. I polish off one of the cans and half of the bottled water, then eat a half-sleeve of crackers before my stomach says no more. And then, I puke it right back out.

  Not good. Murray had given me some medicated tea to help with the dope sickness. But I don’t discover any magical elixirs stowed away anywhere in the kitchen. I peek out from behind the window sham to find an empty front yard. This area of town seems to have fewer runners to worry about, at least.

  No sooner do I have that thought, than a group of them pass by the tree in the front yard. I duck out of sight before they see me, but still my chest thumps with fear. After they’ve had enough time to pass, I move through the kitchen, down the short hallway, and to the first bedroom. In the light from the curtain-covered window, I scope out what appears to be a guest room, with worn photographs of children from infant through grade school, high school, and graduation on a cloth bulletin board on the wall. I assume grandchildren, as well. The people who lived here may have been elderly. Not looking good, as far as survival supplies are concerned.