"I know when it is," she said defensively. "It's just..."
It’s in May, Ipes told her. Remember last year we had a picnic? Mommy picked us up from kindergarten and she said that thing about May showers bringing all the flowers.
The memory came back to her in a rush. The park was warm and sunny; there had been gifts and food that she couldn’t remember. Daddy tried to teach her to throw a Frisbee, but she couldn’t make it go straight. It would wing off to the right, every time, where it would immediately go spinning away on the ground. Once a happy dog had chased it and she had chased after the dog and daddy had chased her.
Mommy stayed with the food and sang under her breath. She never sung out loud except when she was alone and so Jillybean only caught snippets as she ran past; it was a love song and it made Jilly want to stop and listen, but she never did. Eventually she tired of the Frisbee and the dog left to be with its owners. At Daddy’s suggestion they walked along a river and picked flowers, making a straggly bouquet that her mommy exclaimed over.
“They’re beautiful, Jillybean, just like you.” They hugged until Jilly couldn’t breathe and then her mommy recited: “April showers bring May flowers.”
“My birthday is in May,” she told Ram in a small voice. “I’m a May flower. On the seventh, I think. Is that nearly now?”
The man snapped another board, sending splinters flying. “Almost. You’ll be seven on the seventh. You know seven is a lucky number?”
“It is?” she asked before consulting a higher power than either Ram or Ipes: the fortune that she had scraped out of the cookie from the night before. She had liked the saying on it and so had laid it out to keep it from being crushed. Now she flipped the little rectangle of paper over where there were numbers printed.
“You’re right!” she exclaimed. “There’s a seven right here. Hey, Mister Ram, what is a lucky number? What’s it do for you? Does it help you win at cards? I heard that once.” As she spoke, her curiosity over the magic of creating fires had her edging close to the wash tub where Ram was now kneeling as if in supplication. He wasn’t rubbing sticks together like she thought he would. Instead, he had built a small teepee out of chunks of wood and was using a lighter to set some paper ablaze within it.
He blew gently on the flames and stuck out a hand to her. “That’s close enough. You don’t want to ruin that fancy dress. Have you seen yourself in the light? There’s a mirror. Go take a look while I get this going.”
Immediately the idea of fire and lucky numbers left her as completely as if they had never been. Jillybean hurried to the mirror and stared at herself until it seemed as if an unfelt wind began to turn her left and right. The “wind” lifted her knee-length dress slightly with each turn. And then it spun her about completely and the dress flared higher.
She didn’t even notice that Ram had created his fire until he came to stand behind her in the mirror. Around a smile he said, “You’re very pretty.” This caused her to go red and the twirling ceased. Ram nodded as if this was normal or proper and said, “I’m going to get a kettle from next door. Can’t have tea without a kettle, right? While I’m gone, you should go into the front room. I just don’t like the idea of you so close to the fire when I’m not around.”
Obediently she started for the front, but he stopped her without effort. “Don’t forget these,” said, holding up her sneakers. “There’s broken glass all over the place in there.”
It was with reluctance that she took them. They had once been a pretty silver accented by the Nike swoosh and laced in bright pink; now they were mostly grey with mud stains. Also, each was split at the toe where her feet were slowly erupting out of them.
What really bothered her, however, was that they didn’t match her dress. It's why she had kicked them off in order to twirl. “Can you get me some new shoes, too, if they have any. White would be good.”
“Shoes?” he asked. By the look in his eyes, Jillybean could tell that fashion was a foreign concept to the man. “I don’t know if we have time,” he added.
Jillybean was long experienced at working a father figure around her little finger. She toed a button and put her head down. “I guess. It’s only these are too small for me. My foots stick right out the front.” Here, she held up the shoes and pointed at the holes: Exhibit A. “They really hurt and give me blisters, see.” Now she put a foot up to display: Exhibit B. This exhibit wasn't too convincing since there wasn’t any evidence of blistering. Undeterred she went on, “The water must have washed them away. And asides my old shoes don’t go with my dress, which I might as well not even wear, even though it’s pretty.”
Ram scratched his head; her arguments had clearly failed. It was then that Ipes helped out. He whispered, Please, you meant to say.
She was quick. “Pleeease, Mister Ram?”
“Fine. I’ll check out a few of those houses up the road. Remember, I can’t guarantee anything.”
“Thank you. Thank you. Try to get them without heels. You know what heels are, right? They make you tall, only I can’t walk in them and my mom doesn’t think a little girl should wear them. I won’t look like a lady and I’ll break my ankles. That’s what she says.” Here she paused only long enough to draw in a big breath. Ram held up one of his brown hands to keep her from going on.
“Stop your singing, Little Bird,” he said. “I told you I would try. Now stay away from the fire and keep an eye out for stiffs.”
She wondered at the word: stiffs.
He means monsters, Ipes informed her. As if you need any advice dealing with monsters.
“Yeah, I can deal with the monsters,” Jillybean said to her friend as she watched Ram slip away. They were in the front room standing at the broken window. “Unless it’s little kid monsters like at that school.” The thought of them, of their greedy mouths and tiny, pointed teeth gave her the shivers.
Ipes was watching the man as well. What’s he up to? Look at him. Look at him go from car to car like that.
Jillybean shook her head in wonder. “He is going tall.”
And he has the nerve to tell us to watch out for monsters! Ipes cried. He crossed his arms in indignation, while his tale bristled like a pipe cleaner. It’s almost as if he's on parade out there. You know what his problem is?
The little girl shrugged. “No, but he is getting me new shoes. So maybe we shouldn’t be so mean.”
Ipes ignored her. His problem is that he still thinks like a man. Like he’s still at the top of the food chain. He stalks like a lion when he should be scampering like a squirrel. After yesterday it should be obvious that he is now the prey and not a predator.
“Maybe,” Jillybean replied. She was quite smitten with Ram and couldn’t imagine saying anything negative about him.
If Ipes had eyebrows they would have come smashing down in a glare. Instead he wrinkled his big nose a bit and asked, Maybe? in a high voice. Maybe nothing. He’s barely watching his flanks. And did you see how he crossed that intersection? I could have…
A rock went skittering across the asphalt of the parking lot, freezing Jillybean in place. It was for a split second only and then she slunk behind a fake plant that was a few feet from the front door. There she filtered the sound of the rock through her mind, fixing it with a likely origin. It wasn’t from a monster; there would be moans drifting on the quiet morning air. It wasn’t from an animal either. The largest mammal left in Philadelphia was the raccoon and they never sent stones skittering; they were much too careful.
That meant the rock had been kicked by a human.
More sounds: breathing from at least two people. They were mouth breathers, trying and failing to be quiet. Someone crunched glass underfoot, only to be shushed by another. Jillybean’s mind now had a firm picture of their number: three, of which at least one was male.
Against the counter across from her, a shadow bobbed and then almost above her a face appeared in the window. The person was black and a man. He had a patchy beard that went halfway down hi
s neck and nostrils that were wide and very deep.
Was he a good guy or a bad guy? Ram had told her of an ongoing war in Philadelphia—was this man apart of it? And if so was he like Trey who had turned out not to be so bad?
With the limited information she possessed, she decided to ere on the side of caution. For her caution was a serious thing and she might have been made of stone for all she moved.
The bearded man gestured toward the door where two seconds later another man appeared. He was tall, though not as tall as Ram, and she could tell he was skinny despite the layers of mismatched clothing he wore. He was black, like his friend, and had the most unique hairstyle Jillybean had ever seen. His afro was tight and thick, four inches tall and flat on top. Yet what made his hair so truly distinctive was that he was bald down the center of his head. He quite literally had a “U” on his head.
Peering through the leaves of the fake bamboo, it was all she could see. It was as if nothing else mattered; she couldn’t stop staring. The man had his head down, searching the floor for a quiet path through the glass and that soft looking U went this way and that in a beguiling fashion. Eventually he stepped into the work area of the drycleaners and the spell was broken, at least for the moment.
The man with the U had carried a big gun that required two hands. The person who came next into the dry cleaners had only a pistol; it was flat grey and seemed to weigh a lot. The woman who carried it also held it in both hands and still the weapon shook. Much like the other man, the woman captivated Jillybean.
She had thick strands of brown yarn for hair and soft mocha skin. Though she wore clothes that were just as mismatched as the first man, somehow she made it look fashionable. She also wore glasses with pink frames and Jilly wanted pink glasses too.
The woman followed the man inside, and finally came the bearded man she had first seen. Though he was smaller than the other two he was clearly the most dangerous of them. His black eyes were sharp, dancing here and there, while his feet crept through the glass like a panther might. Jillybean shrunk back.
Drawn by the smoke, the three went towards the sewing room where the lady called out in a soft, nervous voice, “Anyone dere? We doan wanna hurt no one. We jes wanna talk.” Her accent was thick and strange. To Jillybean it sounded part southern and part foreign.
After a second of waiting, the man with the U head peeked into the sewing room and then blew out a sigh of relief. “Whoever was here, dey are gone now. Mebe a walh.”
“I don’t think so,” the bearded man said in a voice untainted by an accent. “The fire is new. No one makes a fire and then just wanders off. But I think you can relax, Donna. They aren’t a bunch of bandits. My guess is, it’s only a man and a boy. There are only two tracks in the dust; one big, one little. And look at these clothes.”
He held up Jillybean’s borrowed Eagles sweatshirt and pegged jeans. The woman, Donna let her gun drop to her side. Jillybean took heart that there was someone in the world more afraid of her than she was of them.
“So what do we do?” the man with the U on his head asked. “Do we jes wait cheer, an sees if’n dey come back?”
As Jillybean was trying to decipher the words, the bearded man answered, “No. I don’t want to spook them. Remember those hillbillies from last week? Too many people are altogether too trigger happy these days. We’ll write them a note. We’ll see if they want to meet up on highway.”
The more Jillybean heard these people speak the less she was afraid. In her mind there wasn’t a need for a note or a meeting out where the monsters could see them. Boldly, she stood and went to the doorway that led into the work space of the drycleaners.
“Das a soun’ plan,” Donna said. “I doan wanna…” Movement out of the corner of her eye had her turning. For a split second, the little girl in white and the woman with yarn for hair stared at each other, then in a blink, the girl was snatched out of sight and Donna screamed.
Chapter 22
Ram
South of Philadelphia
By chance, a sparrow whisked, low across his field of vision and as he tracked it, he turned just in time to see three strangers enter the drycleaners. That they were human did nothing to calm the sudden spike of fear in his chest. In fact it only made it worse. Zombies were horrible creatures, but, sadly, humans could be worse in their cruelty.
Unarmed and uncaring of that fact, Ram sprinted down the street, racing until he felt that his heart would burst. Though whether it was from the exertion or out of fear for the little girl he didn’t know. Like Julia before her, his heart had latched onto Jillybean, leaving Ram without recourse—he would die for her.
Julia had said he had a hero complex, but that wasn’t entirely correct. He had come to the conclusion that the world was beautiful only because beings as lovely and brave and sweet as Julia and Jillybean existed in it. Without them, the world wasn’t worth living in.
Ram wasn’t a hero; he was selfish. When Julia had died, a part of him had died as well. It was the part of him that had seen a real future in this new world. A future where he could be happy. Where he could have a family and love and security; things he would have been embarrassed to admit back when he was a D.E.A. agent.
Now these intangibles felt to be the most important things in the world.
Without them there was only revenge and death left. He had sought both but found Jillybean instead. Just as with his dead love, he had instantly found her to be precious and something worth living for, and dying for.
It was why he raced past the carpet store and the Chinese restaurant and stopped in the entrance of the drycleaner. He could not see the three humans; they were around the corner slightly and out of sight. But Jillybean was right there, steps away, standing in the doorway that headed back to where all the washing machines sat slowly losing their shine.
Ram took one big step and grabbed the girl around the waist and yanked her back as though she was as light and insubstantial as a kite.
A woman's scream ripped the air and now Ram was sure the hunt would begin. He turned on his heel and charged back the way he had come.
“You do not need to be afraid,” Jillybean said with such assurance that Ram gawked at her instead of watching where he was going with the result of nearly tripping over a lip in the sidewalk. He stumbled and only just caught himself on the doorjamb of the carpet place. Going with his momentum, he ducked into the dark store and stood panting against the wall.
“They don’t want to hurt us,” Jillybean said, calmly. He had her around the chest, in the exact same position that she held her zebra. “Listen,” she commanded. The world had grown so quiet that he could hear their conversation from two doors down.
“Dair was an angel,” Donna cried. “Right dair. I saw her wit my own two eyes!”
Jillybean giggled and whispered, “She thinks I’m an angel.”
“Quiet, please,” Ram said, listening. Someone was crunching glass, slowly moving toward the entrance to the drycleaner. It was the sly sound of a man on a hunt. “We’ll go out the back door,” Ram whispered, starting toward the rear of the building.
“Mister Ram, I overheard them,” Jillybean said. “They only want to talk. They were going to leave a note asking to meet us. We don’t have to be afraid.”
“They’ve got guns and we don’t,” Ram said in a growl.
“Does that mean we’re going to be afraid of everyone?” she asked skeptically.
Ram paused at this. “Maybe once we leave the city, we can take some more chances.” The words rung false even as he said them. The truth was, that unarmed as he was, he was afraid—afraid for himself, but more afraid for Jillybean. He knew the evil in people better than anyone.
“I don’t think they’re from around here,” Jillybean said. “They talk really funny. And they were more afraid of me than I was of them. We should at least see what they have to say.”
They were at the back door, he glanced up and down the alley; it was free of zombies. “Fine, I'll ta
lk to them. You stay out here. Do not come in.”
“But…” was all she had time to say before he shut the door on her.
He would talk…or that was the vague plan. Instead he loped back to the front just as a black man came up to the front door with a pump action shotgun at chest height. Ram stepped behind one of the carpets that were propped up against the wall. As he was bigger, faster, and had the element of surprise, it was nothing for him to take the gun from the unsuspecting man.
“What do you want?” Ram asked two seconds later with the gaping bore of the shotgun pressed to the man’s neck. The inquiry was ill-conceived and so without waiting for a response he immediately changed his question to, “Where are you from?” He thought it a more informative question, though the possible answer scared him. What would he do with the fellow if he was from Philadelphia and thus part of the race war? To execute him in a summary manner, Ram deemed was outright sinful. However to disarm the lot of them could leave them in state worse than death.
Thankfully the man grunted, “Cincinnati, Ohio.”
Ram began to relax, but then he remembered how Jillybean had mentioned them speaking in a strange manner. This man didn’t have any sort of accent. “Do you have any I.D. on you?” Ram asked.
“Are you serious?”
It did seem like a preposterous question and yet he felt it would go a long way to his trusting the man. “I am serious. Things around here are messed…”
“Steve?” a man called, nervously from the street. “You cool?”
“Tell him you’re good,” Ram ordered Steve, inadvertently pressing the gun harder into the man’s neck. “Then tell him to go away…”
“Why should I?” Steve asked, turning to face Ram. “I didn’t do anything to you. There’s no need for this.”
“Maybe there is from my point of view,” Ram said. The words had just slipped from his mouth when the other black man peeked into the store. Upon seeing Ram he immediately began to jabber in some strange language—it seemed French-like, but with a twang. He was answered by a woman and very quickly Ram had two guns pointing his way.
The Undead World (Book 2): The Apocalypse Survivors Page 19
