by H. J. Lawson
“I know.”
I see Chen in the corner of the room: patient zero. She’s staring up at the ceiling, no tissue to her face. A smear of dried blood is crusted around her nose, but the bleeding has stopped. Her eyes flicker, telling me she’s still alive. Maybe the virus doesn’t kill everyone.
The school nurse, Ms. Butcher, has a paper mask over her mouth and nose, but her skin tone tells me she’s also got the virus. Must be the earlier stages, because her mask is still white with no trace of blood.
“Paige, what do I do?” River asks, clearly unsure of how to take care of herself.
“Are you infected?” A deep voice booms from behind me. I turn around to find a tall man in protective clothing. He has a full face mask on, unlike Ms. Butcher, with a plastic window in the front which reveals his features.
“Wh-what?” I ask, taken by surprise.
“Are you infected?” he repeats. Other people dressed like him walk past me into the nurse’s room.
“No, no I’m not.” He glances as me, clearly trying to see if I have any signs of the virus.
“Is your friend?” He nods at River beside me.
“Yes.”
“Then you better get out of here and back to your room before you become infected. I’ll take her from here.”
“Where are you taking her?”
“That’s classified information. If you stay in here you will also be infected, if you’re not already.”
“Is the virus really as bad as they say on the news?”
He looks at River. Her face has once again settled into a blank stare, lost to the world. “Yes,” he says quietly.
“Is there a cure?”
“We’ve not been informed. If there was, these kids would be the first to know,” he says with an edge of envy in his tone. And he’s right. These are the kids of the most powerful people in the world. And who’s he? I bet he has a family that won’t get the type of special treatment these kids are used to receiving.
One of the people in protective clothing is speaking to Ms. Butcher. She nods towards River, then turns to stare at me. Not the same blank stare as the other people with the virus—one of hope. These people are going to help them.
I look around the nurse’s office, taking a look at the friends I may never see again. That’s when I spot Alfie. He’s practically unconscious, with blood all over his white school uniform shirt. One of the men dressed in protective clothes is tending to him. Alfie looks at me, without the blank stare of the other kids in the room, and smiles at me, catching me off guard. He looks happy—is it because I’m not infected?
“River, I have to go. These men will help you.” She nods, clearly understanding that I can’t risk becoming sick. “Can you promise to call me once you get better?”
“You think I’ll get better?” River asks.
“Yes,” I lie. The truth is, I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again and I can’t deal with facing that right now. Although we come from different worlds, River is my best friend.
When I hug her goodbye, the guard looks at me like I’m a complete idiot. That’s because I am, but if my assumptions are correct, which unfortunately for me they normally are, I already have the virus and it’s just a matter of time before the symptoms start to show.
As I walk through the hallway, I think about the strange men in protective gear. It’s weird how fast they all got there. However, the President’s kid does go to this school, so they were probably on call for any disaster that might strike.
Chapter Four
When I get back to the common room, there aren’t as many girls there as when I left. Some are staring down at their phones, or jabbering away on them, waiting for their security to come and pick them up I guess. No one’s coming for me—I’m the one that has to rescue my family. The thought fills me with dread. I’ve always had to be the strong one, but can I do this? What choice do I have? I’m their only chance.
I get back to my room and recheck that I have everything in my backpack. I hear the sound of an engine outside and look through the window, hoping it is Willow’s bus. But it’s not. Alfie is on a stretcher, being loaded into one of the empty school buses. His pale white face looks up at me, still smiling. How can he still look so damn good when he’s so close to death! Only Alfie can pull off the deathbed look. For a moment I pretend this is just Halloween, and everyone is dressed up like ghosts.
The fantasy is quickly stolen from me—the next stretcher carries River. Her arm is dangling off the side and it looks like she’s moaning. She’s in pain. I put my hand on the window, hoping she can feel I’m close by, to ease her suffering.
Where are they taking them? I don’t know if I’ll ever see them again, and the idea hangs over me like a dark cloud.
I look around the room and can’t help but feel sad about leaving. I don’t know if I’ll ever come back here. I once felt so safe; even my mother thought I was safe here. I get why she wanted to protect me. I wanted that as well.
I grew up being scared of the shadows in the night. It was partly due to my mom telling me it was the shadows that took Brooke, and before that, all the nights she kept us hidden away from them. She would always choose, ironically, the darkest, smallest place she could find. She either locked us in the basement or my most hated place, the wardrobe in her bedroom. She would lock me and Willow in there all night. I’m still scared of the dark.
As always, my safe place is ripped away from me once more. After one last glance, I shut my dorm room behind me along with all the memories from the years of being a normal kid.
Now, I’m only focused on one thing, and that’s getting my sister and my mom. With my backpack securely on, I head back out to the common room one last time.
One of the girls I don’t know stops me. “Where are you going?”
“I’m getting out of here.”
“But you’re not allowed to leave the premises unless you have someone getting you.” Another girl with big glasses and a mousy voice joins in. They look alike, so I’m guessing they are sisters.
“Yeah, well, I’m not going to just wait around to catch whatever this thing is. We don’t know anything about it, but I would rather not have to get sick to find out what’s going on.”
Both of them look at me as if they agree but are too scared to take the risk. Personally, I hope they don’t say they want to come with me. I can’t afford to watch out for two more people on top of Willow and my mother.
“Where are you going?” the first girl asks.
“And how are you getting there?” the second one adds.
I haven’t really thought that far ahead.
“There’s no cab service,” the first one says. “And besides, the government said to remain indoors. How are you going to slip by them?”
I give an impatient sigh and try to remain polite. “Well, if they want to stop me they can try. I’ll figure it out as I go. Good luck.”
I don’t have time to go back and forth with these girls; I have to take action. I have no idea what I’m doing, but I gotta get going.
In the hallway no one stops me to question if I’m infected or not. At this point it’s pretty obvious who is and who isn’t. I make my way out the back door and into the school parking lot. Getting out went a lot easier than I thought it would, but I’m sure everyone has a lot more to worry about than kids trying to leave the campus.
A rack full of bikes catches my eye; I could ride to the train station in the next town, but that would take forever.
I glance over at my next best option - our teacher’s cars. Well, it would be if I’d had a driving lesson before. I’ve never had a single one. Zero, nada, nothing. I’m going to have to teach myself. Obviously I’ve been in loads of cars, so I just need to remember how those people drove.
Half of the cars in the parking lot are already gone; clearly a handful of people got out of here as soon as they could. The only ones left belong to the teachers who chose to stay and help over going home to thei
r families. There are some really special people who work here, and now I feel bad I’m about to take one of their cars.
I spot Ms. Butcher’s car, a gray Toyota Prius. Well, I hope it’s hers; to be honest it’s hard to tell since a few other teachers also have a gray Prius. You’d think it only came in gray as everyone has the same color.
The reason I want Ms. Butcher’s car is because she was on the school bus with the sick kids. She’s got a ride, so if I borrow hers I’m not stranding her. I try the driver’s side door and it opens. Of course there isn’t much to fear here, especially thieves, since we’re in the middle of nowhere in the most secure place in the world.
Now for the keys. I open the sun visor like they do in almost every movie I’ve seen where a car is stolen.
The keys aren’t there. Instead two prayer cards fall out. One has an image of a priest holding a cross up to the sun, with beams of sunlight shining on the cross. People bow at his feet. I flip it over and read ‘What does it profit a man if he gains the world and suffers the loss of his soul?’ Basically, if you give up your soul, you save the world. I rub the edge of the card, playing with it between my fingers. I would give up my life to save my sister. I just don’t plan to.
The next card is one of a guardian angel watching over two children, guiding them to safe passage. I’ll be Willow’s guardian angel. I stow it in my jacket pocket and decide to read the back when—if—I get a chance.
Now I need to figure out how to get the car working. YouTube is the next best option after a key. I hope it still works; it should since my phone is still functioning. I search how to hotwire a car. A two-minute video pops up and by the end of it, I am reaching under the steering wheel to pull out the wires. Methodically, I get to work.
It starts. Looks like my guardian angel is looking down on me.
Yeah, right.
Slowly I go in reverse, trying to remember every detail of every driver I’ve seen. I pull out of the parking lot and on to the road leading away from the school. Rosary beads dance over the mirror as I watch Rosehill shrinking behind me. My past stays with it and I keep going forward, to a future I never imagined would be my own.
Chapter Five
The main road is empty, much to my relief. It proves I’m the only one that didn’t listen to all the warnings to stay inside. Staying inside wasn’t an option for me.
I fiddle around with the car radio as I try to get a news update and watch the road at the same time. It really isn’t a good idea for a new driver.
A voice comes out of the radio. Bingo. “Stay indoors. Stay away from the sick, the virus is spreading,” the male news caster tells me. Tell me something I don’t know. Like if you’re not sick go here, or kids from Rosehill are located here.
“Do you have any useful information?” I ask the radio, as if it is Siri and she can answer my questions. It’s then I realize asking Siri isn’t a bad idea.
I rummage through my backpack that I dropped on the passenger seat for my phone and question myself as I do it. As if Siri, a voice in my phone that searches the internet, could really give me answers. Then again, what else do I have?
A car honk blasts from behind me, making me drop my cell phone on the floor. The annoying sound doesn’t stop; the driver doesn’t take their hand off the horn. Their lights are on full in the day time, blinking at me. From the sound of things they are right on the bumper of my car, so I swerve off the road and into the grass.
“What are you doing, you idiot?” I yell out the window as the car flies past me.
My hands shake on the steering wheel as I try to grasp my first road rage incident. I’m going to have to pay more attention if I’m going to get out of here alive.
Other cars start to fly past me; so much for thinking everyone stayed inside. It looks like I just got lucky when I left the school. These roads are normally empty, but not today. People want to get the hell out of here. Where are they going?
My mind jumps back to my original thought before I was driven off the road: Siri. Leaning down, I sweep up my cell phone. “Siri, where do I go to be safe?” I ask, feeling stupid as I do. Cars zoom by, drivers and passengers peering at me as they pass, trying to see if I’m sick.
Information pops up on my phone as Siri searches the web, and it’s not looking hopeful. It says, “Countries with small populations in rural areas are the safest place.” And it’s best to go where there is limited access to the rest of the world, meaning these places are almost impossible to get to. Dad’s plan of getting off the planet is the safest idea.
I slip my phone back into my backpack. Fastening my seatbelt, I wait for a gap in the speeding traffic, then nervously join them. It’s like I’m on my very own fairground ride; my knuckles are skeleton white as I grip onto the steering wheel.
It’s not long before cars start to slow down ahead, and I see others weaving around something. I’m the last car in the pack moving away from the school. I keep checking in my mirror to see if anyone is following me so I don’t get caught off guard like before, but there hasn’t been anyone for a while.
As I get closer to the area where the cars were slowing down, I can see why a car isn’t moving. It’s pointing in the opposite direction to us and it’s facing towards the school. Maybe it is a parent of someone at Rosehill.
I slow down as I get closer.
Once I’m directly across from the car, I can look into the car window. The driver is slumped over the steering wheel, with his face turned away from me, not moving. A woman in the passenger side has blood pouring out of her nose and her eyes are bulging out of her face. She looks like she’s staring right at me with an unblinking stare. She’s not moving a muscle. My heart races, my nails biting into the steering wheel. I can’t take my eyes off them. I’ve ever seen a dead person before.
My mind immediately goes to Willow, River, and AJ. Is this what’s going to happen to them? I can stop looking at the dead couple and suddenly the woman blinks. A scream escapes me before I can stop it.
The woman doesn’t say anything, nor does she glance at the driver. Her only focus is on me.
Her door opens and she awkwardly gets out of the car. I stay frozen, unsure of what’s going on. Blood is smeared across her face, and it stains her once white blouse. It’s like she stepped off a movie set, but that can’t be. This is my new reality. The woman looks to be around my mother’s age, early forties. She looks like a librarian, with her hair tightly pulled back in a bun, and her black skirt resting below her knees.
Slowly she makes her way to my car, then her hands rise up, outstretched. She looks like a zombie and not the funny type. Does this virus turn people into zombies? It can’t; zombies aren’t real, but she’s doing a good impression of one.
“You are the Seedling,” she mutters. “You are my Seedling,” she says with conviction and moves closer to me.
I fumble with the car, wanting no part of this horror movie. The car moves forward and the woman lunges onto the hood.
“Argh!” I scream. In a panic, I push down on the gas, driving forward with her on the hood of the car.
She grabs on to the windshield wipers, trying to hold on. Her grip loosens, and she loses her footing and falls on her back. With her free hand, she punches on the windshield repeatedly. “You’re my Seedling. No one else can have you, you’re mine!” she yells, cracks beginning to appear on the windshield. They grow with each punch; soon she will be through.
I slam my foot on the brake and the seatbelt bites into my shoulder. The woman flies off the front of my car and onto the road with a thud, leaving her in an unhuman position, her limbs awkwardly sticking out.
My hands tremble on the steering wheel. What have I done? Frozen, I watch for her to move but she doesn’t. A pool of blood grows beneath her body instead. With my eyes fixed on her, I reach for the door handle; I have to help her. Then, I stop shy of opening the door. What if she is alive and goes all crazy on me? I put my hand back onto the steering wheel and drive forward. The onl
y direction I can go is towards her.
Thankfully there aren’t any other cars behind me, but there will be soon. Lego-like cars are on the horizon, and I slowly drive towards the woman, but on the side of the road instead of the actual pavement where she lays.
The closer I get, it’s clear the women isn’t going to get up. Her white blouse is bloody and ripped. One of her shoes lays empty on the road, while the other one dangles from her twisted foot. Her eyes are closed and I’m waiting for them to open. “Please open,” I mutter as I drive by.
The women’s lungs expand as if my breath just flowed into her body. She’s alive. I didn’t kill her.
Her twisted limbs start to move. “Seedling… seedling,” she repeats, slowly at first, then it grows louder, deeper from the pit of the unknown. She rises to her feet and I put my foot down on the gas. I don’t want to be around when she’s able to come at me again.
I look in the rearview mirror.
She looks right back at me with an unblinking stare, her face is all twisted up, not from the accident – but more from anger.
Chapter Six
The image of the woman coming at me keeps replaying through my head. It isn’t a matter of who she was, it’s a matter of what she seemed to have become. A zombie. Which I know aren’t real. Once you’re dead, you’re dead. It’s a scientific fact. Yet, there was something clearly up with the woman before I threw her off my car. Is that really the next stage of the virus? You turn crazy? And what the heck is a Seedling? Everything is just getting more and more weird.
On the horizon, I see all the traffic leading into the city. Having never driven before, my confidence in being able to drive in such a busy place is zero. Plus, the traffic ahead looks like it’s at a grinding halt. Traveling by car isn’t going to be the fastest way to get to NYC; it never has been. And with the world turned upside down, it’s going to be frigging impossible.
I pull off the next exit, and find the nearest train station with the hope that trains are still running. I park the car and head inside to buy a ticket. There aren’t many people standing on the platform, and out of the people that are there, none of them look infected. They do glance at one another nervously, then look back down to their phones.
