by Tara Brown
“Celeste,” a careful whisper rode the wind to my ears.
Listening for one second more, I paused before I glanced back to Roz who impatiently awaited my next move. She was making me practice going in the front. Twitching my head back and forth, I lifted a gloved finger to my lips, hoping the fear in my stare kept her there and silent. She wanted to run. She was big on it. And fast.
The tremble of her gun, told me she was the right kind of scared. We both were.
There were different kinds of fear. There was normal fear, the kind you had at an amusement park or scary movie or even the kind you felt when you realized you’d lost your phone or thought maybe someone was following you.
I missed those types of fear.
Now all I felt was the one that kept you alive, the one that gave you pins and needles and screamed RUN without making a sound.
It owned me.
It crept up inside and lived and died and was reborn, all in the time it took to pull the trigger. An act I discovered wasn’t as hard as it should have been, not in the moment where life and death hung in the balance. Roz had done it in a heartbeat, without even thinking. Afterward, she said the longest part of killing another human was the exhale after it was done. The one second you spent wishing your life was different than this. This blood-soaked mess. That was the moment pain changed you. She peeled another layer right then and there. And you had to walk away, leaving that piece of yourself behind.
I hadn’t had to pull the trigger but I was scared I could. I would. And I would have to recover, fast.
We didn’t have the luxury of waiting around to feel remorse or sorrow or guilt. They didn’t belong in this world, not anymore. The good fear, the kind that kept you alive, took up all the space inside us.
A sound caught my ear, jerking my head to the right.
The wind picked up, dragging scratching leaves across the empty schoolyard, a place that didn’t appear to have seen children in a while. Thankfully.
Keeping low, I snuck to the front of a large black SUV and peered into the front seat, noting the keys in the ignition and a lack of sludge.
“Any blueberries?” Roz asked softly as she drew closer, watching my back as I peeked inside again.
“Nope.” I lifted the handle, grimacing when it didn’t open. “Ready?” I asked, holding the butt of the rifle, which we had decided was mine, in the air.
“Abandon it. We don’t know where those guys we saw are. They might be close. Let’s find one that’s unlocked.”
“No. I saw grocery bags in the back and I swear I saw licorice. And there’s no sludge. Might mean no bugs,” I offered up a little something to sway her mind.
“Fine, be fast.”
I moved to the back seat and held my breath, taking a single second to offer a “screw you” to the sky before I inhaled fiercely and smashed the gun into the window as hard as I could. It took two hits to break, sending tiny cubes of glass into the back seat as my hands and arms ached from the vibration. I dusted the glass off the window frame with my jacket and stolen gloves and reached in, unlocking the doors. If anything heard that, it was on its way, which meant hustle.
This was the moment we came to life.
The fear drove us, moving us like robots.
Roz was already scrambling into the front passenger seat, leaving the door open and scanning the parking lot with her scope. I did the same, reaching with a hand blindly to turn the engine on. The ding of the SUV coming to life was amazing but also terrifying. It announced where we were to anyone who had come closer after the smashing, and yet also meant we might get somewhere tonight.
Night was the wrong time to be sitting around waiting for trouble. Better to be moving. And Virginia hadn’t exactly shown us a warm welcome. The bruising on my back, not to mention the image of the dead teenaged boy we’d come upon haunted my mind, a reminder I wanted to be as far from here as possible.
In fact, heading south hadn’t been friendly at all. Every town we entered had a giant welcome sign lying about the warmth of their friendliness. New York might have been better than here, which was saying a lot.
I started the SUV, climbing in and closing the door at the same time Roz closed hers. I put the vehicle into gear and drove, heading left to get back on the small highway we were taking, hopefully heading west.
“This one’s nice, huh?” Roz asked, continuing to whisper which would’ve been amusing in any other circumstances. “But what’s that smell?” She wrinkled her nose, glancing back.
“Oh shit, the groceries must have rotted in the back.” I knew that was a possibility, but I wanted the licorice. “The owner must have gotten them before they died,” I said, my eyes playing a game of touching all the mirrors with a quick look and then back to the road to avoid cars and trucks and dead people.
The fifties and sixties had dumped the most bodies on us, something the South hadn’t coped with fast enough.
And now there was no avoiding them.
Blueberries.
We’d discovered others like the lady in the apartment back in New York.
A woman we had seen outside a convenience store told us that people who died sitting upright in their cars and houses, trapped the gases of their decay inside them. If nothing disturbed them, it was exactly as Roz had said, they swelled up like big blueberries, something from a scene in the Willy Wonka movie. We, unfortunately, discovered that once they were moved, they became sludge, losing all that fluid in a fell swoop and basically melting. I had never seen anything like it before, and I worried I might never stop seeing it.
The corpses weren’t what I’d expected, not at all. Sweaty dead people, bloated and gooey, wasn’t at all how movies portrayed them.
That wasn’t the only thing movies lied about.
The smell was another.
Humans were the stinkiest dead things ever. And they farted, even dead. It was disturbing on a whole other level. Getting them out of their cars was futile. You had better odds at leaving the doors open and coming back for the car later, after the wildlife and the wind cleaned it up.
“Oh my God, I need to get rid of that.” Roz groaned and climbed into the back seat. She gagged as she flung bags out the window. “Oh come on, there’s maggots and dead flies. I hate you right now!” She heaved, making me almost fight a grin. Bugs were not Roz’s thing. We discovered it in Virginia Beach. It was why we’d gone out to the pier in the first place. She’d felt sick from a corpse we’d come upon that was writhing with bugs.
All things that crawled or slithered put her into a panic. And now, with dead people everywhere, the bugs were thriving. They were literally the only thing thriving. And weirdly enough, the only thing driving Roz insane.
In the side mirror, I watched as white grocery bags were tossed out the broken window one after another. It was a waste, everything was now.
Life was a waste.
Continuing living was too, but I didn’t have the ability to do the other thing. I’d seen it, just once, but that once was enough to tell me I didn’t have it in me.
Julia had it. The image of her ballerina slippers would haunt me forever. For two more weeks.
Roz said she heard that in the beginning people did it all the time. After Julia, I stopped being sad, mostly. Not entirely but it was hard to add being grief stricken when you were scared and your mind had turned into a selfish monster. The moment we left New York, I chose fear; it at least would keep me alive.
The first stage of robbing us of our humanity was making us so scared we no longer cared when someone we knew killed themselves. The second was making us move bodies so we could steal their shit. By the time these two weeks were up, I wasn't so sure we’d even be human anymore.
A car skidded around the corner, stopping my heart until I locked eyes with a small kid in the driver’s seat. He and I shared a terrified expression as we passed, a moment I swear slowed for us to make eye contact and exchange stories. I hoped my eyes told him I couldn’t save him the way his
pleaded with me for safety.
He gulped, I did too. I drove on, he did too.
I inhaled quickly, jumpstarting my heart back to life.
“Jesus, they were tiny.” Roz handed me some licorice from a bag. “You were right, this was the only thing the bugs didn’t ruin. A sealed bag of licorice.”
“What were tiny? The kids or the maggots?” I asked.
“The kids, moron. The maggots were not tiny. I don’t think you understand how many dead flies we are talking about.” She shuddered.
“Gross, but yeah, those kids were tiny,” I agreed. My stomach ached with the idea they might be alone. But I was a false sense of security disguised as an adult. I didn't know what to do with a kid, how to care for them. Not with the creepy people chasing us or the food rotting and water in short supply.
But despite God and I not exactly being on speaking terms, not this week, I sent a small prayer that the kids would be okay.
“Well, so much for Virginia, huh?” Roz nestled her gun into her lap and sighed, seeming a bit discouraged.
“Yeah.” I felt the same but I hadn’t had high expectations for Virginia and hoped I was right about heading west. Home wasn’t just where the heart was, I had a feeling about it. It might also be the safer coast.
“I think we should stop at the next town to sleep and eat. My stomach should be settled by then.” She quivered again.
“You are going to have to woman up, my friend. Being squeamish in the apocalypse isn’t going to be awesome,” I teased a little. “Even if we only have two weeks left.”
“I know, it’s going to be the thing that gets me killed. I’m gonna be puking my guts out over some bugs and a nine-year-old is gonna cap my ass for my bottle of water.”
We both laughed, sharing a sick sense of humor. However, it was a requirement of the apocalypse. And ours was only getting sicker.
“So I have no idea what the next town is, but we’ll find a house and sleep.”
“Look out!” she shouted and pointed.
I swerved as a dog ran out onto the road. The SUV skidded to a violent stop, jerking us both back in our seats. Gulping for air, I heaved and threw open the door the same as Roz who was already holding her gun out.
My instinct was to help the dog, but I grabbed my gun too, just in case, and prayed this wasn't the moment I would have to use it. We’d practiced but I wasn't ready.
“Oh my God, he’s so fluffy. Like so fluffy. Look at the shiny coat!” Roz patted her leg but the scared dog was panicking. He resembled a huge and fluffy white golden retriever, but he was bigger. I’d never seen a dog like him in real life. He turned fast and ran right for me, startling me as he jumped into the SUV and climbed in the back seat. I started to breathe again.
“Oh my God, yay. We get to keep him, he chose us!” Roz was already attached, and I wasn’t sure how getting him back out would go. “I always wanted a dog.”
“But why’s he here all alone?” I spun in a circle, landing back on him.
If a dog could smile, this one was. Grinning like a son of a bitch, as my grandpa always said. He panted as if he was chill and this was no big deal. Like I hadn’t almost run him over.
“Stan!” A guy burst out of the woods, struggling to pull up his pants.
Roz and I both jumped.
He was about my age, maybe early twenties, skinny, and pale. His ginger hair was styled messy, suggesting he’d just had a shower. If it wasn't the end of the world, I might have called him cute, even if he was panicking with getting his pants up.
“Stop!” I lifted my rifle to his face, cute or not, making him pause. Maybe we both paused because for the first time in my life I had a gun on someone, and I wasn't sure who was more uncomfortable.
His jaw and pants dropped at the same time. “Wait!” His eyes drew into a plea. Innocent or guilty, Roz said we all looked the same a moment before death. “Don’t shoot. I just want my dog. I have a bad stomach and he was supposed to keep watch. Please. Stan, you asshole, get over here.” He slapped a skinny pale leg. There was desperation in his voice. “Please!”
“Stan?” Roz’s lips lifted into a grin, not that it affected her gun being pointed at his face.
“Yeah, it’s after Stanley Tucci. We—I’m—er—was a fan.” He took a step back, almost tripping on his jeans. “Can—can I pull them up?” He had on paisley blue and yellow boxers, which didn’t do much for his fair legs, except make them appear starker.
“Fine.” I held the gun tighter, though I didn’t think I needed to, which said a lot. We’d moved into survivor mode fairly fast.
His fingers trembled as he dragged the jeans up too quickly, scraping his legs. He struggled with the buttons, still panicking as he zipped them up.
“Why are you alone in the middle of nowhere with your pants down?” Roz asked. I shot her a dirty “stop asking him questions” glare, but she didn't dare make eye contact with me. The dog in the SUV was bad enough. We didn’t need to add a stressed-out guy to our party.
“My—Hunter—” He furrowed his brow and took a long breath, centering himself. “The person I was with died. I thought we were going to d-die together. But he left before me—” He bit his lip and I wondered if he sunk his teeth in so hard that the pain stopped him from crying or saying more.
“How old are you?” She kept going, still avoiding me.
“Twenty-four. I turn twenty-five in a couple of weeks. The night the twenties die, actually. So I guess I’ll see him again in two weeks.” His voice cracked and I knew we were done for. Not only was Stan in the SUV already, but the ginger had endeared himself to Roz with that voice crack and the fact he would die with us in a couple of weeks and he was all alone in the world.
Gingers with flushed cheeks and voice cracks were like bait for girls like Roz. Not to date but to take care of. She had that “take care of people” vibe that matched her foster kid backstory. It was them against the system, so it was always Team Kids for her. Which could land us in hot water if she tried to save the wrong person.
Though I doubted this guy had a trap set. He didn't seem organized enough. Or strong. I would bet money the dog had kept him alive all this time.
“Well, I’d say you can come with us, but you could be a rapist or something. And we don't trust strangers. It’s been a bad week for them.” Roz tried to sound tough, but her voice practically cracked as she tested him.
“No offense, but you’re not really—not really my type.” His eyes darted to me, pleading with a genuine lack of interest.
“Well, we kill racists too.” Roz lifted the gun back to a firm hold, completely missing his meaning, something I clued into when he said Hunter.
“He doesn't mean because I’m black, Rozzy.” I cracked a grin. “He means because we’re girls. You’re gay, right?” I couldn't help but laugh at her as I asked.
“Extra.” He nodded.
“Oh.” She gasped and lowered the gun. “But for the record, being gay doesn't mean you aren’t a rapist,” she added, though she no longer took him as that kind of threat.
“It’s not just that you’re girls.” The ginger shuddered. “I am also not a fan of someone crying while we have—make—have sex.” He tried to offer a smile but the discomfort of this moment plagued him.
“Are you seriously making rape jokes?” I lowered my gun too.
“I’m really nervous,” he burst with animation like this was a confessional and his personality was switching on. “I don't like guns being pointed at me and I hate being alone and I just”—he broke, sobbing—“I’m so tired and hungry and I don't know where I am. I get irritable bowel from stress, so I’ve basically been shitting myself for a week. When the power cut out, I came up from Florida, but I got lost and these guys were chasing me and Stan—God, he—”
“It’s okay.” Roz rushed him, forgetting everything we’d endured and threw caution to the wind. She wrapped her arms around him as he cried. The more she comforted him, the harder he sobbed. My eyes started to
tear as I understood what he was going through.
Roz, who was visibly attached as though they were already foster siblings, led him to the back seat where his dog was chilling like a villain. “I’m Roz and this is Celeste. We’re from New York. You can come with us.” It was a real switch to see her this way, compared to the last guys we saw. Though they’d chased us through the city, throwing bottles at us. She had actually fired her gun backward while we were running, as if she were a former gang member or super spy. We were two for two of groups of dudes around our age being horrible.
It was getting to be The Purge out there.
“I’m Milo.” The ginger sniffled and opened the door to the SUV. If it was an act, it was worthy of a ride. “Is-is that a maggot?” He stopped crying and focused on the seat next to the dog, squinting at it.
Stan, following his owner’s finger with his gaze, bent and licked the maggot, chewing it and swallowing before any of us could react. Roz turned and lost the last bit of whatever was in her stomach as it splashed onto the pavement.
I laughed as Milo rubbed her back. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry. Stan! That was nasty. Bad Stan! To be honest, he was my boyfriend’s dog. Hunter. He doesn't even listen to me. He barely likes me. I’m not really an animal person. I had a hamster once, but it died of a heart attack. I don’t normally have pets but Hunter insisted we get him. I think he’s a farm dog. And honestly, he’s the only reason I’m alive. He has uncanny instincts and he’s been leading me the whole way.”
All the worry I’d had about bringing a strange guy with us faded. Partly because said strange guy came with epic polar bear survival dog. Stan and I were going to be tight, I sensed it already.
Roz gagged and Milo rubbed her back and I climbed in the SUV.
It would be a long trip to wherever we were going.
Extra long.
Stan gave me a knowing look in the rearview.
He too could tell this was going to be extra.
12
The Forties
Zoey
Lance, the man Owen and West accidentally beat up, drank his soda and sighed, staring out the window. It was dark now, fall had officially landed in Virginia. The air was cold and the night came earlier and earlier.
