by K. Massari
want to find it. But yes. It works as … a garbage disposal of sorts. What goes in doesn’t always come back out. That’s what my dad told me.”
“Good. Good riddance.”
“That’s all I know.”
“Well, thank you, Caleb. We’ll try come morning.”
This was met with disapproval. They wanted to go look for the rift right away. Caleb understood their feelings of helplessness, he himself was scared out of his wits because of the walkers. He had narrowly escaped being bitten. He saw others being eaten.
“I’d have to agree with you we have to do something, anything, to fight for our lives and for our country - for the whole planet!”
“Okay, let’s hit the sack and see what we can do when the sun is up.”
The meeting was adjourned. Dale left, he marched out and his men stomped angrily after him. The only one in the room was Caleb, and he found himself surprised he was no longer a prisoner. They had ripped half of his hair out, though, when they were dragging him.
“It’s your duty as a wife …” Roger purred.
He did not smell the same. He reeked of aftershave, and not of cigarette smoke.
“Have you ever killed someone?”
“What?” Roger sat up in bed, as if he had been slapped.
“You’re not Roger, you’re some time puppet.”
“My dear, I have no idea what you are talking about. Does Halloween scare you that much?”
“Halloween never scared me.”
“Then what is wrong?”
“I want to go back to my time … and my place in the world.”
As if anxious someone could be listening in on them, Roger bent his head close to hers and whispered in her ear:
“We can’t go back there. That world is in flames. Destroyed.”
“Do you really know that?”
“The dead have conquered it.”
“Did they come out of here? Were the dead hiding in the rift of Ford Road?”
“Yes. The ones that could not move on.”
“Oh, heavens, but that would mean they were the criminals and the bad people in their lives.”
“I don’t really know.”
“You are one of them.”
“I am a monster. Yes, but He wanted to … forgive me.”
“Who?”
“He asked if anyone wanted one more chance.”
“And you said yes.”
“It was not unconditional. I had to find someone who could love me. Then, I could take some of my people with me. On my new journey.”
“Is that why you’re putting on this act? Are you trying to make me love you?”
“I guess I never really thought about it. I don’t really … know what love is.” He paused and shrugged. Then he said:
“I guess I’d just like to forget.”
“And not be Roger anymore?”
He nodded. She could understand that, but it was not her choice. “I need to go,” she said bluntly.
“You were close. I thought you could really love me.”
“That was in reality. Outside of this … side show.”
“Okay, it’s just not working, huh. We’ll try and sneak out, tonight. After the Halloween party.”
“Why is this party so important?”
“Because the spirit will be there.”
“What kind of spirit?”
“Some of us think it’s the Savior.”
“At a Halloween party?”
He looked at her and she could tell he was puzzled. She touched his arm and turned to look at the night sky through the window. It seemed unnatural, full of distorted clouds and stapled stars. When she glanced back at Roger, he was clearly not the same beautiful, terrifying man she knew. He was a wax figure, mechanical at best.
“We have got to get out of here.”
“This was the only other option.”
“Could you take me back to the gas station where we met?”
“Is that what you really want?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
“Really?”
“I don’t want to let you go. And I have no idea if we can even make it that far.”
“How about you take me there in this world … and we see what happens?”
“All right. I’ll check to see if the kids are still asleep. Then we can hit the road.”
“Ford Road?”
“Yes.”
“Who are those children?”
“The children we might have had.”
“Yes, I thought of having children with you.”
“Did you … love me … a little?”
“I would have wanted to.”
She smiled. “But Roger? This here. This ‘inside’ Ford Road. This just isn’t right. We must leave. Or I’ll go crazy. Please.”
She kissed each of her four children goodbye. She shed a few tears, but this was not reality. Then, hand in hand, Tracey and Roger rushed out to the car. Just in time. The earth beneath their feet began to rumble violently and shake, as a bulldozer came tearing through the bowels of Ford Road. Dale and Caleb had found the entrance to the rift and were now foraging through with pickups and an army of beheaded but moving walkers. In the beds of the trucks there were stacks and stacks of dead mutilated bodies as they had learned to kill the walkers.
Tracey gasped as the rift’s edges started to burn and explode. Roger calmly started the car and drove in the opposite direction. From out of all the houses, people were pouring into the streets in their pajamas or naked even, and they held onto each other for support, seeing their once safe and sweet world being ravaged and invaded by power-crazy walker-hunters. Some were truly angry and mustered guns and knives. They were rushing forward as a group in the direction of the intruders.
“Who is that?” asked Tracey. “The macho driving the bulldozer.”
“Some fool.”
“Roger! Roger!” Dale called out.
“He doesn’t know me,” Roger said calmly, watching the spectacle in his rear view mirror.
They sped off, and Tracey recognized the highway they were approaching. She sighed a great sigh of relief. Roger, though, was changing. His hair was growing longer by the minute, his complexion was returning from pale and waxen to rosy and tan and strong. His glasses disappeared, and his goatee grew back. An intricate tattoo on his arm flushed up from the depths of his new skin. The landscape was breezing past and Tracey let the window roll down. They were back to being partners in crime, Bonnie and Clyde on the road.
Driving for what seemed like hours, Tracey relived their relationship and especially their love-making in her mind. Every precious second. She admonished herself to remember the fear, because Roger had been strange and unsettling and still was. Despite that, the time with Roger had been great, intense; she had felt emotions and sensations she hadn’t even known she had.
Off the highway, a glazy orange sun was setting and figures appeared black against the horizon. Roger had tears in his eyes. Tracey took a sip of water.
“I am always asking questions.”
Then she added:
“I’m sorry.”
“They’ve come to say goodbye.”
A muffled sob escaped him. He waved wistfully but none of the shadows waved back.
“They are my family, some of the neighbors, others were strangers. I saved as many as I could. I collected their photographs, their journals, their computers. I brought everything back to the house, you helped, remember? I was going to shield them, I was going to invite them to the inner sanctuary of Ford Road. I failed.”
“The end shattered my dreams,” he continued. “But the Father told me I could try …”
“When did you meet the Father, Roger?” Tracey asked, sitting up straight, looking at his exquisite profile.
“I was driving into Ford Road one day …” he answered. “And I zipped out on the other side somewhere else …
“So are you saying there’s more?”
“Yeah.”
“What was the Father like?”
“He was nice-looking. He sat on his porch. It was an old farm house out in the country. And it was autumn. I felt so at home. I have never felt that way before.”
Roger smiled at her, then stared at the highway in front of them again, detached. Tracey thought he would not let her know more.
“I jumped up a few stairs to the man and my heart swelled with love. It was magic. A golden light engulfed me. It was like being hugged by a million angels. Just to be near.”
Tracey was impressed, but more than a little scared. She fidgeted in the passenger seat, as the sun disappeared behind the horizon and the darkness crept in.
“Roger,” she said softly. “Are you sure this was … the Father?”
“It’s what he told me.”
“Does he love us … love us all?”
“You and me, huh Tracey, we don’t live like that.”
“No, we don’t, Roger. We live our lives as though the Father in Heaven business is just bullshit.”
“He told me to try and save people, he also told me I was forgiven, and that I should try to love someone deeply … before the end.”
“Me?” Tracey was wide-eyed and tears began to flow.
“Yeah, you, sweetheart. YOU.”
Tracey covered her face with her hands. Her small frame was quivering. To be loved. By Roger. And saved. All in one final day.
“Do you want to go back?”
Slowly, she let her hands slide off her face. It was dark out and no cars were on the highway. Only shadowy figures to the sides. She knew right away in her heart it was somehow over, as much as a part of her wanted it to continue.
“I can’t tell Roger. How much of any of this is real? I guess it’s just better to go back to … being me.”
“I hate to hear that. But you’re right. It’s over, isn’t it? That’s the feeling I’m getting, too. There’s no more time left.”
Up ahead, she could see the Sunoco. She clicked herself out of the seatbelt. Good to go. There was no one around,
