Water laps at the concrete base of the city, flotsam and jetsam hitting with soft clunks. Across the water is Brooklyn. Behind me is the rest of Manhattan, with the Hudson River on the other side, and then the entire continent. We used the binoculars to check Jersey on our return trip from Brooklyn. The mobs haven’t abated.
A newer zombie hits the wall face up, and her mouth opens in a pitiful growl. “Shut up,” I say, which only incites more growling.
Her hand scrapes the concrete while her head dips below the surface of the dirty water. She resurfaces, gargling a fetid substance in her throat.
“Shut. The fuck. Up.”
She doesn’t. I draw my .22. There was a brick of ammo in my BOB, and it’s fucking useless against Sacred Heart anyway. I aim for the woman’s once-blue, now gray, eye. My bullet leaves a fluid-filled hole where eyeball once resided, and the sound of the shot knocks me from my rage. I’ll get in trouble for that; you can’t shoot guns in StuyTown without a clear threat.
The radio crackles behind me. “Everything okay down there?”
I spin around. Roger stands across the path, radio at his mouth. “Fine. Sylvie’s gun was jammed, and we had to fire a test shot.”
“Copy,” the voice says. “Out.”
“Thanks,” I say. I face the water, where the woman bobs silently on the coming high tide.
Roger leans on the railing a few feet away. “What did I say that made you want to shoot me?”
I close my eyes. I am so tired of looking at these buildings, this river, this city. “You were categorizing the assorted motives to kill children, as if one were more horrible than the other. What’s the worst? When you make soup out of them?”
“Wow, put that way, I can see how I sounded like a real asshole.”
God help me, but I laugh. It’s either that or cry. “You did.”
“I’m sorry.” Roger digs in the inner pocket of his coat and thrusts a pack of cigarettes in my direction. “You want? Or did you quit?”
I take the pack and light one with the lighter in my bag. “I quit out of poverty.”
“You could ask for one.”
“I don’t like to ask for things.”
I try to return the pack, but he waves it away. “I owe you for being an asshole.”
“True.”
“Tact isn’t my thing,” he says. “What I meant was that you can try to reason with someone who killed for gain. Countries, governments did it all the time. Stop your genocide and we’ll give you foreign aid. That kind of thing. Yesterday’s evil empire becomes today’s European utopia, like Germany.”
“Except they had to be shot down from attempted world domination twice, and we had to kill Hitler first.”
“Good point. But what if he’d been willing to reason before he went full-on Hitler?”
“Eric would never agree.”
“But you would?”
“I don’t know. Would I want to? No. Would I to keep everyone alive? Maybe.” I take a drag and drop my head on the exhale. “And, if you knew me, you’d know how out of character that is.”
“We do a lot of things we think we’d never do.”
“Like what?”
He watches the water. “Bang dope into my arm, for one.”
I’m not surprised at this admission. Roger’s got the look of someone who’s seen and done a lot. “Sweet Lady H,” I say. “One of Mom’s favorites.”
He laughs, light brown eyes turned amber. Roger managed to keep most of his decent looks; it’s a good thing he didn’t give meth a whirl.
“Be proud you stopped,” I say. “My mom…let’s just say you wouldn’t want to end up like her.”
“Didn’t have much choice. You know what saved me from being eaten? Couldn’t get a bag that Friday, with the curfew. After that, there was no leaving for anything. I spent the next three days kicking dope while the world went to shit.”
“What? You didn’t have a week’s worth put away for a rainy day?”
Roger sees my grin and snorts. Junkies don’t have an emergency stash for long; it’s always an emergency. He stretches his arms above his head. “We should get back to our post.”
We head for the gate. As we pass through, Roger says, “Maybe Eric’ll change his mind.”
“I don’t think so,” I say.
Eric’s told me about the little girl whose father was shot in front of her. How he dragged her to safety, to someone who might’ve been her mother, only to have her die anyway. Though I saw plenty of madness, I didn’t have a front row seat to zombies devouring the smallest and weakest the way he did. I wasn’t buried under lies by Walt, then under zombies, and, finally, under humiliation. I can’t ask him to be untrue to who he is on such a fundamental level. When it comes down to it, I don’t want to.
Once we’re at the guardhouse, I ask, “Will you be okay for ten minutes? I have to do something, but I’ll hurry.”
“Sure.”
I race through the gate onto Avenue C Loop, then through the inner gate with a wave to Casper and Chris. I find Eric in the garden, as I knew I would, and I pull him into the shade of a building.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
His hand rests on my arm. It’s the first time we’ve touched in days, and that simple gesture connects me to him. It’s comfort, and acceptance, and love. It’s wanting me to be safe and happy, to protect me from things he doesn’t need to protect me from, because he’s Eric. As Paul said, sometimes our best qualities are also our shortcomings. Often, in fact.
“We can’t just storm in there,” I say. “We’ll lose for sure. We have to get weapons, here or somewhere else. And we have to do reconnaissance first. What if Susan or Dennis are there, or their kids, or—someone? If there’s no one to trade for, then we do what needs to be done. But we do it smart, and we do it together. And if we can’t win without losing each other, we walk away.”
Eric’s troubled look is replaced by the peace I know well. He’s right, and I’m right, and Brother David is right. It doesn’t make sense that we can all be right, that what should be black and white is shades of gray, but I think it’s the truth.
Eric tucks my hair behind my ear, smiling, before his lips brush mine. “Deal,” he whispers.
27
Eric
Over the winter, StuyTown had left the searching of office buildings for last on their list. There were only so many freezing days in which to find food, and they kept to places they’d be likely to find it. “Remember when we searched an entire building and found one Nutri-Grain bar?” Julie asks.
“Worth every second,” Chris says.
They sit beside each other in the van on our way up the FDR to Midtown, followed by three trucks. Last winter, Central Park and StuyTown agreed to mark buildings they searched. This means we won’t waste time in places they’ve cleaned out, but it doesn’t account for other stray groups of people. Like Mo, whom we haven’t heard from since his note, though we left one for him that he may have read but never answered.
Sylvie sits between me and Paul in the back row, her head against my shoulder and hand on my leg. I kiss the part in her dark hair and she squeezes in reply. I hated the conflict between us, but I needed something to assure me we’re moving forward with Walt. Though I’d like to murder him as soon as possible, we’ll do it smart, as Sylvie rightly insisted. We don’t want to hurt our own people who could be in SPSZ, and there’s no point in gaining back a Safe Zone if most of us die in the process. All those months ago, I felt that losing Sylvie wasn’t worth a plot of land in Brooklyn, and that hasn’t changed. I can’t say I like the idea of waiting for freezing weather, but it’s not as if we have a choice, and it gives us time to come up with a strategy.
Paul turns from the rear window. “Why’d he come?”
He is Landon, who drives a truck with Indy. He’s unaware of our possible move to the High Line, but he wanted to get in on the ten percent, which Sylvie joked he’d turn in for credits with which to buy batteries. She said i
t only in my hearing; we’re under strict instructions to be nice to Landon in the name of harmony. I don’t like the guy, but I don’t dislike him the way Paul does. With a blowhard like Landon, it’s best not to engage. Paul likes to engage.
“Don’t start, Paul,” Sylvie says. “But, if he gets really annoying, we’ll use him as bait.”
Paul grunts as we bear right up an exit ramp that spits us out alongside the United Nations complex. Heavy black chain link fencing has been moved to the ramp, and we slow on the approach and pull to the shoulder. Once we see the intersection beyond has only a single Lexer and the remains of a multi-car collision, Louis jumps out to open the gate. The three trucks go through, and Kate follows with the van.
“How am I doing, Paul?” she calls after we’ve collected Louis and hit the streets.
“Pretty good.”
“That’s high praise coming from Paul,” I say. Kate lifts a fist.
Sylvie points out a glass building to our right. “That’s the Ford Foundation. I was there a couple of times. The entire thing is an atrium and they have a cistern on the roof to water the plants. Maybe we should steal it.”
I take in the building before it passes from view. The bottom is boarded up due to construction, so I can’t see inside, but that cistern could come in handy. “We can check it out on the way back if there’s time.”
42nd Street is wide and passable, and the Chrysler Building looms up ahead. The bottom burned, but the steel arches of its Art Deco crown and spire still shine. Sylvie ducks to see out the windshield. “That might be my favorite building.”
“Mine, too,” I say.
“And you might be my favorite boyfriend.”
“You’re my third-favorite girlfriend,” I say, and she sticks out her tongue. “Don’t stick it out unless you’re going to use it.”
“Maybe I plan to.” She runs her tongue along her top lip in jest. Jesting or not, it makes me want to use my tongue on her.
“Guys, please,” Paul says. “I came to be subjected to zombies, not your PDA.”
Julie hangs over the back of her seat. “That reminds me. Paul, I have three prospects for you. Girls.” Paul goes still, a blush slowly creeping up his neck. “Wait, you like girls, right?”
Sylvie claps her hands. “Yes, he likes girls. Who are they?”
“Yolanda, Anne, and Noli. They all think he’s hot.”
“Not Anne,” Sylvie says. “She buys those Moleskine journals and drinks too much wine. I think she writes tortured poetry in a drunken haze.”
Chris slaps his knee. “Why don’t I work at the store?”
“Because you’re lucky.” Sylvie tilts her head to assess Paul. “Noli. She’s cute and her purchases are normal.”
The blush has reached Paul’s ears. He’ll be brick red soon. I could let him dangle out there, since he busts my balls every chance he gets, but I feel bad for the guy. “Can we let Paul find his own prospects?” I ask.
Julie and Sylvie fix their attention on me, as I knew they would, and Paul shoots me a grateful glance. Before they can argue, the van slows outside our destination: a glass building that stretches half the length of the avenue block. Thirty stories of glass, which’ll mean a well-lit interior, and no red X on the side street entrance, which means Central Park hasn’t been there.
Kate backs over the curb into the small front plaza and then up a few shallow steps to the glass doors. What I can see of the lobby is empty. “Looks good so far,” I say.
The trucks follow Kate’s lead and back to the doors. Brother David and Roger exit one, followed by Jorge and Casper in another. We step into the warm air, where I pull my knife and wait for Sylvie to ready her chisel. I’ve come to agree she wields it more skillfully against zombies than most people wield a blade.
Indy arrives from her truck with Landon on her heels. “What’s the plan?”
“Stay tight in the stairwells,” Louis says. “Everyone on one floor at a time. We do Sylvie’s office first.”
“I hope there’s something left,” she says.
When we considered the best places to search, she mentioned her old office building. Being a newer, hip agency, they supplied plenty of food to get the creative juices flowing. And, she says, a few other offices in the building did the same.
We try the doors. Locked, another good sign.
“Smash it?” Paul asks.
Louis holds up a steel item shaped like a pistol, though where the chamber would be is flat and square. “Lock picker.”
He sets a bent piece of steel in the keyhole at an angle, after which he inserts the long pin at the barrel end of the lock picker. He clicks the trigger several times, then shakes his head and repeats the process. This time, the lock spins. All told, it took about a minute and made far less noise than smashing glass.
In the lobby, the guard station is unmanned and the hall behind is dim, though the doors provide enough light to see empty elevator banks. Jorge opens a stairwell door and listens to the darkness, then waves the beam of his flashlight around.
“Down here!” he calls. At no response, he says, “All right, let’s go.”
We take the stairs in pairs with flashlights. At the tenth floor, we step through a sleek lobby into an open workplace with four walls of windows, though a few are hidden by offices built out from the wall. In the center of the space, a wide staircase rises to the next floor.
“They broke through the ceiling when they took over the eleventh-floor offices,” Sylvie says. “The staircase doubled as bleachers for the big screen.”
Those not lucky enough to have an office sat at desks with huge monitors, in Aeron chairs that cost an arm and a leg. Modern couches form a seating area on the distressed wood floor, and stainless steel lights hang above a long wooden table on one side.
Sylvie leads us that way, toward a kitchen area with cabinets that match the table. “There should be stuff in the cabinets, in the upstairs kitchen, and in the storage area. They delivered it once a month on Fridays, so maybe it was that Friday.”
“I can’t believe you worked here,” Paul says.
“Me neither.”
“What’d you do?” Roger asks.
“Sold people things they didn’t need, and sold my soul.” Sylvie tromps across the floor, ducks behind the kitchen island, and pops up. “It’s here!”
Single servings of Thai noodles, Barilla pasta meals, and macaroni and cheese hit the counter. I open another cabinet: salami and cheese snacks partnered with bags of nut mix, crackers and tuna salad that I’ll avoid like the plague, cereal cups, instant oatmeal cups, and a few display boxes that contain an assortment of breakfast items, from mini boxes of Frosted Flakes to Pop-Tarts to organic granola bars.
Sylvie points a few people in the direction of the storage room, then takes my hand while the others pull coffee pods from cabinets with joyful shouts. “Let’s check the other kitchen.”
I trail her up the steel and wood stairs. The second floor is an open floorplan like the first, though a line of offices stretches the length of one side, their walls made of translucent glass. Another, smaller, kitchen area is similarly stocked. Sylvie opens drawers and doors, throwing things on the counter as though she can’t wait to leave.
“Did you have your own office?” I ask. She nods and climbs onto the counter to reach a top shelf. “Can I see?”
She freezes for a few seconds, then lowers herself to the floor and heads for a lone office in the far corner. The space outside the room holds desks and computers, art boards and drafting tables, as well as a long table of art supplies, including finger paints and Play-Doh.
“Bryce thought creativity was stimulated by hands-on activities,” she says. “He was a cool guy. A little overenthusiastic, but cool. He was good to me. I felt bad I was leaving.”
Her office door is open, and we step into a bright room with a dead tree in the corner. The desk is large and neat, though the windowsill has various knickknacks and a picture of her and Grace taken years a
go, when Sylvie’s hair was long. They lean their heads together, pretty faces sunburnt and smiling to beat the band.
“Italy,” she says. “When we backpacked around Europe. We always said we’d go back one day.”
I hand her the frame. She tucks it in her messenger bag and sits on the edge of her desk while I look around. A bookcase holds advertising books and two awards. The wall by the window has a framed copy of Advertising Age, and the Sylvie who graces the cover couldn’t be more different from the one in the photo of her and Grace.
Her hair is lustrous, her eyes made up, and even her jeans, boots, and black shirt look costly. She sits in a red chair, leaning back with a small smile, though I recognize the faint get out of my face expression. Even not Sylvie, she’s Sylvie.
Sylvie Rossi Sets the Ad World a’Blaze, the text beside her image reads.
“Get it? Blaze Advertising?” she asks. I spin in time to see her eyes roll while her dangling feet tap the desk legs. “Bryce framed it, though I asked him to burn it. He thought I was kidding.”
Maybe she believes I think less of her, but there’s no doubt in my mind that the Sylvie of before is the Sylvie in front of me in all the ways that count. She had a job that enabled mass consumerism, but there are reasons why it makes sense: her intelligence, her ability to read people, and, mainly, the lack of security for most of her life.
I had a job from age fourteen on, but I also had parents who supported me, financially and emotionally. College was a given, as was the belief I could do whatever I wanted, be whomever I wanted. I can’t say I wouldn’t be milking Wall Street for every penny I could, had I grown up in her circumstances. And the most impressive part is that she did it all on her own.
“You’re amazing,” I say.
“You don’t have to start with all that.” She waves a hand. “It wasn’t exactly a noble profession.”
“So you sold some shampoo and coffee. Who cares? You didn’t write propaganda for the Nazis.”
Sylvie laughs and then tsks at me. “Don’t you dare call it shampoo. They were lifestyle body products.”
The City Series (Book 3): Instauration Page 18
