He looked over at the face of his son Randy. Little Randall was a hellion, every bit the precocious 12 year old he could be. Randy struggled to make friends, and was very awkward socially. He'd talk at length about silly childish things for hours, and then get angry if you didn't engage him. Frequently they spent all day trying to keep him occupied so he didn’t go off wandering, trying to elude the dead people for fun. Even in his sleep the haircut he prized dropped down low, covering one eye. Trendy kid that one. Charles got a quiet laugh out of that. His wife Patty stirred against him, and he pressed himself against her warmth. She felt like the only warm thing in the world.
The roads to Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy might be terrible Charles thought. It was hilly, and mostly in a valley that turned into a collection bowl for bad weather. It could be awful driving to get there. But if Abby was right, safety was there, and possibly some food. At this point, staying here wasn’t an option Charles could consider for his family. Their home would not become their tomb. Tomorrow he would break the news that they were leaving.
In a world empty of gifts to give, he would give his wife and children the gift of hope. He would try and give them one more chance for survival.
*****
“We leave tomorrow. On Christmas kids.” Charles finished his speech with a grin on his face a foot wide. All night he’d gone over the details of his plan, and all these hours later, he was sure of it. For the first time in three weeks his daughter danced for joy. She leapt off the couch and strut her stuff around the living room silently. They didn’t dare make much noise today. For some reason a few of the dead people had wandered down to the end of their cul de sac and were just outside. Abby tore her little brother off the couch and got him dancing with her. It was the first time he’d seen them get along since everything changed.
He looked over at his wife Patty and saw the quiet satisfaction in her face. She agreed with him earlier when he told her his idea for the trip to the school. Together they tweaked the details and the plan was set. Tonight they would pack everything they wanted to take with them. Only the things they could carry would go. Everything else stayed behind. At dawn they would load the station wagon Abby got from the school the day the world went to shit. It was all wheel drive and would give them the best chance of making the trip. It was also inside the garage, which meant it could be loaded safer.
Charles would drive. They’d leave as soon as they could in the morning and head straight to the school, taking the route all the way around town to avoid driving anywhere near the high school. The last thing Charles wanted was to drag those bastards behind him. Fucking lampreys were all they were in his mind now.
They would drive the same route back to her school that Abby had taken to get to the house that day. She had already given them detailed information on where she had seen clusters of the dead people, and where she had seen some car accidents. There had been a lot of car accidents since the world ended Charles thought. People driving scared are dangerous animals.
He savored the celebration of his children for a minute, and then headed upstairs to begin packing his things. Patty waited a minute longer, then followed suit.
*****
In the garage the next day the engine of the station wagon turned over immediately. Charles was intensely thankful for the engineering prowess of the man who designed the car. He, his son Randall, his wife Patricia, and his daughter Abigail all sat in the car, excited and scared that they were finally leaving the home they’d taken to calling a prison. Charles waited a minute for the engine to warm up, and then he hit the switch for the garage door opener.
Nothing happened.
Patricia reached up and hit the switch again as Charles looked out the back window, perplexed. He’d put the garage door opener in this car just last night. He’d even put new batteries in it just in case.
“Dad,” Randall said in an irritated tone as he brushed the hair out of his eye. “There’s no electricity, duh.” He exchanged ludicrous looks with his sister. Parents. So stupid.
Charles kept the sternest face he could muster and gave his son the evil eye. Inside he was laughing at himself. His wife covered her mouth to stifle the smile on her face.
“Well then kids. Seatbelts on?” They nodded in response.
“Merry Christmas!” Charles put the car in reverse and punched it. The beige garage door blew off the tracks with a loud, cold shriek. It flew up and over the car as the wagon hurtled out into the middle of the cul de sac. A handful of the dead people were milling about around the car as he spun the wheels to straighten it out into the road. Two of them got close enough to grab at the window as they sped off.
“WOOOOOO!!!!!” Randall yelled as he gave one of the dead people the middle finger. His older sister Abby stabbed two powerful middle fingers up as a sign of solidarity with her brother. They high fived each other as Charles weaved around the other dead people in the road. He didn’t want to risk running over one and blowing a tire now. There wouldn’t be a second chance right here.
At the end of the cul de sac was the wrecked truck from a few days ago. The assholes who thought they were the new militia had crashed one of their lifted up Chevy trucks during a chase for the dead folks. Something had gone wrong, as was so often the case and one of the trucks had flipped over against a street lamp. Charles gave the truck a wide berth. Several of the dead that had flocked to the scene of the accident were already headed their way as they sped past.
The roads were a mess. Snow and ice were covering the streets in moderate amounts, but it was just enough to make driving the car feel loose to Charles. Every time he turned the wheel to go around a corner he felt the ass of the car sway a little further out then it should have. To avoid a spinout he kept the wagon at a steady and manageable 20 miles an hour.
Getting out of town turned out to be a piece of cake for them. They only encountered maybe 30 or 40 of the dead people walking around, dragging furrows in the snow as they went. Most of them were so bogged down by the few inches of snow they posed no threat to the family in the car. Charles actually thought to himself several times that if he had a good bat or an axe, he could clear most of the town out all by himself. That wasn’t the priority though, and he got the car and his family out of town and onto Route 18, the most direct route to Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy.
*****
It wasn’t anywhere near as bad as he’d expected. The roads were bad, but as long as he stayed slow, it was fine. It helped tremendously that there was no traffic. In fact, they never saw another moving car, or a human being the whole car ride. For that, Charles felt like he was given an invaluable gift that Christmas day.
The car ride was initially nerve wracking for the whole family. They hadn’t been this far outside of the house in months. In fact, most of the trip they spent squinting from the harsh glare of the sunlight. They’d avoided going out during the day almost entirely, and they’d put those trash bags on their windows to block the dead people from seeing them, and to try and keep in the heat. Their seclusion made their eyes weak to the bright daylight. After they’d left the house once they realized the dead people were spaced out enough that they could drive around them, and that the assholes from the high school weren’t following them, everyone’s demeanor dramatically improved. It almost turned into a driving version of ‘catch me if you can.’
What should have been an hour’s drive turned into a multi hour marathon. The slow speed Charles had to drive at combined with the constant need to go around crashed cars, downed power lines, broken tree branches, entire fallen trees, and the occasional walking zombie made things move at a snail’s pace. About three and a half hours into the drive Patty noticed that Charles had gone very quiet. She noticed he was gripping the steering wheel tighter than he had been, making his knuckles go white, and he kept looking down at the dashboard every few seconds. Patty waited until the two kids in the back were half asleep before she said anything to him.
“Chuck hun, somethin
g wrong?” She put her hand on his thigh, the typical comforting measure she took when he was driving stressed. Mostly it happened in heavy city traffic.
Chuck smiled and laughed at her, “Well I’m fine. It’s just this little light here has been on for about ten miles now. It’s right next to the big fat E on the gas gauge.”
Patty’s stomach dropped. They were easily 5 miles from the school still. And right on cue, the car coughed a few times, and the engine went belly up. Charles wrestled with the wheel and they drifted slowly to the edge of the road where the car died. They were out of gas.
The two kids in the back asleep slowly roused after the vehicle came to a full stop on the shoulder of the road. Abby wiped the sleep from her eyes and leaned forward between her parents.
She asked in a half asleep whisper, “What’s up?”
“Looks like we are walking the last few miles to Auburn Lake babe,” her mother replied soberly.
“Are you shitting me?” Abby rolled her eyes.
“Watch your language Abigail. Of all days it’s Christmas,” her father scolded her mockingly.
Randy sat forward and set his head on his sister’s shoulder. “Are we screwed here?”
The mom and dad contemplated their response before Charles finally snickered, and responded to his son, ”Well Randy, that really is a subjective question. Are we screwed because dead people are staying kind of alive and trying to kill us? Then yeah, we’re screwed. But in reality, things are decent. We just need to go for a little walk to get where we need to be.”
Randy scratched his head and sighed. “You suck dad.”
“Thanks son. Let’s get our stuff and get moving. If we hustle we might be able to get to the school by dark.”
*****
The snow wasn’t deep in the road mercifully. They had the good fortune of traveling from home, so they all had their winter boots and jackets. Randy of course being the typical 12 year old boy decided long ago that boots were “for pussies.” All he wore on his feet was an extra pair of socks, and his sneakers. Charles walked first, using his bigger feet to drag paths through the snow so his family didn’t have to wade into the full five inch deep snow.
When the sun was as its peak they saw the first dead person walking in the road since the car died. They came up behind him and got to within 20 feet before Charles motioned for them to stop. He turned around and got the golf club from Randy, handing him the shotgun in return. The family all readied themselves for the worst, and Charlie took off at a run at the zombie.
Even at his age Charlie was in good athletic condition. It helped dramatically that he hadn’t eaten a normal meal in a month as well. All that was left on him was skin, bone, and muscle. He trudged at a good jog behind the zombie and it wasn’t until he was ten feet away that it heard his muffled footsteps in the snow. It was a large man, very tall with broad shoulders. He had a full reddish bread that was clumped and matted with frozen blood and gore. All down the front of his tee shirt was the remnants of who knows how many human meals. Streaks of person covered him head to toe.
Charlie swung the 4 Iron as hard as he could like a baseball bat, aiming for the forehead of the dead man. The timing was off though. The huge bearded zombie raised his arm just enough to deflect the blow slightly, causing it to glance sharply off his head. The blade of the golf club took a divot right off the side of the zombie’s head, leaving a brownish patch of skull exposed. The patch of flesh flew twenty feet off into the snow, landing with a faint, wet thump. Charles wouldn't be replacing that divot.
Charlie lost his balance and stumbled forward, losing the golf club and hitting the zombie in the chest. The two of them tangled immediately and fell together onto the snow. The wife, daughter and son screamed and bolted towards the melee.
The father and zombie rolled around multiple times in the snow before the huge body of the dead man had Charles pinned in the freezing white fluff. The desperate father shoved both of his forearms into the neck and chest of the hulking dead man, pressing his desperate advances away. His beard, fetid and rancid hung directly into Charles’ face, leaving him gagging on the smell. The mouth of the bearded monster snapped shut over and over, trying to sever chunks of Charles’ flesh to no avail.
Randy, shotgun in hand, made it to the struggle first. He aimed the double barrel shotgun right at the side of the zombie’s head and squeezed one of the triggers. With an ear splitting roar the bearded man’s head disintegrated, sending a shower of gore all over the father’s face. A cone shaped swath of human destruction went out on the snow from where the blast happened. Randy was sent backwards a few feet from the tremendous kick of the shotgun. Charles gasped up breathlessly under the zombie at his family, and they got the headless body off of him.
Lying in the snow they clutched each other, desperate to survive. Charles labored hard for a long time, but when he finally caught his breath, they started moving again. No one said a thing to each other.
*****
They made the turn up the hill onto Auburn Lake Road about an hour before the sun set. The family was shivering in the cold air and they knew they had to move fast to get to shelter, or to get to the school. It was already cold, after it got dark, it would be frigid. Shuffling through snow is exhausting. Trudging through snow on an empty stomach is nearly impossible. Doing the same while heading uphill is nearly insurmountable.
Patty was the first to suggest they find shelter. “Charles, we need to stop. I can’t go on. Next house, we need to stop.” She was out of breath and her face was nearly blue from the frigid winter air.
The family of four stopped, all panting. Secretly they were all thankful that someone had finally spoken up. Charles bent over, putting his hands on his knees. His chest heaved repeatedly until he caught his breath. “Yeah okay. Next house.”
And they started again. Much slower this time, but they knew their trip would be over soon. Abigail envisioned finding a home with a fireplace like theirs. They could eat some snow, curl up in front of a fire, and spend one last night together as a family before they got to the campus. She smiled as much as her face would allow. It felt to her as if it was nearly frozen solid. Her teeth hurt it was so cold.
“Isn’t it weird how we haven’t seen any dead people?” Randy said in between deep breaths.
“A little yeah. But who knows. Maybe these people never made it home that day,” Charles replied as he grunted each step out, clearing the snow out of the way for his family.
Abigail saw the truck first, and pointed it out, “Hey, that’s one of the school’s maintenance trucks on the side of the road there.” The family all saw the Ford truck parked on the side of the road. It took them a few minutes to reach it, but after Charles approached it with his double barrel shotgun, it was found to be free of danger. He peered through the driver’s side window and saw the keys hanging in the ignition.
“It’s got keys!” He yelled back to his family.
“Try and start it!” Patricia yelled back to him as they moved to the truck to rejoin Charles. The dad opened the door and maneuvered his way into the driver’s seat. The seat was cold on his ass, but he was thankful to be off his feet. Pulling his glove off Charles flexed his fingers, trying to force warm blood into the tip so he could even feel the key to turn it. After rubbing his hands together fast and blowing on them, he closed his eyes, crossed the fingers on his left hand, and turned the key with his right.
The huge truck coughed a few times, and roared to life. Everyone started yelling in celebration. The truck hiccupped a few times as the moisture in the fuel line worked its way out. They all piled into the single bench seat and sat there for a few minutes, waiting for the truck to warm up, and the heat to come to life. Charles noticed the fuel was very low, but he knew the school as only maybe 2 or 3 miles away.
“Let’s do this kids.” And they were off.
Charles pulled an ugly nine point turn in the road and started the truck off up the hill to the campus. Eventually the road leveled o
ut and he slowed when Abigail warned him the bridge onto the campus was ahead. They all leaned forward on the seat as they rounded the final curve, exposing the giant 800 acre island that was Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy.
Dozens of buildings were spread out over hundreds of yards beyond the bridge. The bridge itself was obstructed by two large passenger vans, parked end to end in a V formation, blocking any vehicles from crossing.
“Smart.” Charles pointed at the vans. His family nodded their approval with him. “Well Abby, what now?”
Abby leaned even further over the dashboard and looked around at the expanse of the campus center. She saw the staff building she hid in that night so long ago, as well as the admissions building across the street. Beyond those buildings were half a dozen brick maintenance buildings as well as the school building and the cafeteria. The first car crash that started it all was still leaning against the school right where it happened in June. She shuddered at the flash of memory seeing the wreck gave her.
She peered further, searching the campus for more details. She saw the tops of the dorms, some far in the rear of the campus, visible only by their snow capped roofs. She looked to her left, down the campus street that started the big loop. Hall A was the closest dorm, and next to that was Hall E.
Abby’s eyes widened in amazement when she saw Hall E. Wordlessly she raised her finger and pointed at it. Her family leaned forward and looked at the building, failing to notice what had caught her interest.
“I don’t see anything moron,” Randy said.
With a smile, she replied, “merry Christmas shit for brains. There’s smoke coming out of the heating vents.”
And smoke meant a furnace, and a furnace meant heat, and heat meant warmth.
Alone No More Page 12
