by Bobby Adair
“Thanks.” Bitch.
Marcy interpreted my tone. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
I shrugged. “Yeah, whatever.”
Amber stepped in, “She didn’t mean it like that, Zed. We’ve just been stuck in here for two days. We look out the window and we see what’s going on. We’ve been online; we know what’s going on everywhere. Marcy hasn’t been able to get her parents on the phone since Monday. My dad tried to drive in from Lubbock to get me, but he can’t get past the roadblocks around Abilene. We’ve lost our friends. We’re tired. We’re hungry. We’re thirsty, and we’re scared.” Tears filled her eyes.
I looked down at the floor. I felt bad. I wasn’t emotionally attached to the ones I’d lost, and as long as my temperature didn’t continue to rise, at least I had a good chance at remaining alive. For the girls, however, the losses were real, and death loomed large.
“Look, I don’t mean to be a dick,” I said. “It just kind of happens by itself. Marcy, can you pop open your laptop and pull up a campus map? I have an idea that might work. It might take us all night to get to the other dorm, but if we’re careful, I think we can do it.”
With the map in front of us, I explained my plan and was rewarded with a tiny spark of hope in their eyes. I told them to pack up their backpacks.
Marcy said, “I don’t even know what to take.”
“Whatever you’ll need for the rest of your life,” I told her with a straight face, then smiled.
Marcy smiled and rolled her eyes. Amber suppressed a laugh.
In a tense situation, any joke will do.
“I don’t know anything about all this end of the world stuff,” I said, “but if I were you, I’d wear the most rugged shoes I owned. Wear some jeans. Bring some socks and undies, maybe an extra shirt. Bring your computer and charger if you want. Don’t bring more than you can run with. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last few days, it’s that you’ll have to run.”
“Why do we need our computers?” Amber asked.
“As long as we have electricity and an internet connection, they’ll come in real handy,” I said.
Both girls nodded.
“Okay,” I said, “let’s get these desks moved as quietly as possible.”
Moving everything while making no sound took a while. When we finished, I very slowly opened the door and peeked out. The hall was empty. I looked to the girls for final confirmation. They nodded.
I headed to the north end of the building. The girls closed the door behind.
I walked as quietly as I could up the hall. I heard no sounds from any lingering infected, but every shadow I passed made me nervous.
At the end of the hall, I slipped into the stairwell and stopped on the landing to listen. No sound came up from below.
I made my way down to the first floor and out into the hall. Just outside the stairwell, the girls told me there was a public restroom. I entered and closed the door silently behind me. I methodically checked each stall to ensure it was empty. The window on the exterior wall had been replaced by translucent glass block. That was good.
On the way out, I checked the door, and indeed, there was a deadbolt lock that could be set from the inside. That was a piece of luck. I closed the door and went back upstairs. From the hall, I texted the girls. A moment later, they opened the door and let me in.
“The bathroom at the bottom of the stairs is clear,” I told them. “The way there is clear. If we go quietly, we can make it.”
Amber nodded.
Marcy’s fear was getting the best of her. She stared through me.
I said, “If you want to back out, now is the time.”
“No.” Amber shook her head and authoritatively said, “We need to go. It’s our only chance.”
“Okay,” I said. “Remember—quiet.”
It took several tense minutes, but we made it down the hall, down the stairs, and into the restroom. I locked the door as we stepped in, then rechecked each stall to ensure that it hadn’t become occupied during my short absence.
“Okay,” I whispered to the girls. “Are we cool?”
Moving was doing Marcy good.
Amber nervously smiled.
I said, “The entrance to the bio-chem building is just across the street from the door at the bottom of the stairwell. I’m going to head across and find us a room there on the first floor. I’ll be back. Keep the door locked while I’m gone. If the infected come, remember, stay quiet. I’ll find a place to hide close by until they wander off. If all goes to shit, then I’ll just shoot them all and we’ll run back up to the room and hope for the best.”
Amber said, “Go ahead. We’re good.”
“Yes,” Marcy agreed.
I left the restroom and crept out across the street and into the bio-chem building. I found our next leap-frog room there on the second floor, just a short distance inside the building. The first floor wasn’t an option. Many infected were silently squatting in the hall up at the other end of the building.
In that fashion, we very slowly worked our way across campus, staying mostly inside, sometimes traversing the length of a building on the first floor, sometimes on the second, and sometimes on the third or fourth.
Thankfully, the school was in a summer session. During the regular semester, there would have been ten times as many students around, hence ten times as many infected in the buildings. As it was, I suspected many of the infected outdoors had wandered onto the campus from the surrounding city.
It took hours, but we arrived at the last outdoor space we had to cross—the street near where Felicity had run earlier that day. Unlike Felicity’s crossing, ours was uneventful. The door on the western end of the dormitory opened as we approached.
We’d made it.
Chapter 28
I stirred when the sun came up and the room got warm, but I pulled my pillow up over my head and extended the darkness.
Later in the morning, voices crept through, but I kept my eyes closed tight and sleep came again.
When I finally did roll over and surrender to the strident sunshine, it was close to ten in the morning. I was alone in the room. I stared at the bunk above me, listening to the morning sounds coming in through the windows and thinking about the previous day’s events. The breeze disturbed the window blinds. Grackles annoyed one another in the branches of the giant oaks. A squirrel chattered a warning. Occasional gunshots in the background were starting to seem ordinary.
The door opened and I tilted my head to see Jerome come into the room. He looked worried.
“Hey,” I said.
“You’re up?”
He came over and sat in the desk chair nearest my bunk. He took a long look out the window at nothing, then said, “The ROTC guys don’t like me.”
“Jerome, I don’t think junior high social concerns are at the top of the list of things we have to worry about.”
He grimaced. “You say that now, but they don’t like you either.”
“Big deal.” I rolled over on my side and then sat up.
“Zed, they’re afraid of us. That Mark guy said we’re an abomination in the face of God.”
That took me by surprise. “Did God tell him that?”
Jerome ignored me. “They think that because we’re infected, we’re a danger to them.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. Did you tell them that they didn’t have to worry?”
“Of course, I did.”
“And they didn’t believe you?” I asked though I couldn’t imagine why they wouldn’t.
Jerome shook his head.
“Why not?” I asked. “You’re from the CDC, if anybody knows what’s going on, it’s you.”
Jerome stared at the floor. “Yeah, well, that’s just it.”
“What’s just it?” I asked.
More staring. More waiting. He said, “You’re going to find out soon enough, so I might as well tell you.”
“Okay,” I prompted.
“All
that stuff I told you about the infection—I learned most of that on the internet.”
I swung my feet onto the floor and leaned forward, my interest piqued. “So, are you saying that the CDC didn’t send you to Africa?”
Jerome shook his head.
“So, you didn’t have any real experience with the infection when the CDC sent you to Austin.”
Jerome took a moment to respond. “The CDC didn’t send me to Austin.”
“So what, you just left Atlanta and came here on your own?”
“Zed, I’ve never been to Atlanta.”
“What? What are you saying, Jerome?”
Jerome sighed and looked out the window. “I don’t work for the CDC.”
I was taken aback. “But…”
He muttered, “I own a sub shop over on Guadalupe Street.”
“You own a sub shop across the street from campus?” I said more than asked as the volume in my voice grew.
Jerome nodded.
My temper flared. I wanted to punch him in the face. I wanted to punch him in the face a bunch of times. I jumped up from the bed and he flinched away. I paced around the room and drew several angry breaths. “Why are you telling me this now, Jerome? I already bought your line of bullshit about the CDC.”
Jerome stared out the window but didn’t answer.
“Well?” I prodded.
“Because those ROTC guys—Tom and Mark—they used to come into my shop all the time. They recognized me.”
“So, you’re just a lying pussy. That’s the bottom line here, right? You made up all that shit so that I’d get you out of the gym, so I’d take all the risks while you sat up here in the room all safe and sissy-like, too valuable to go outside.”
“It’s not like that.” Jerome was looking at the floor.
My fists were clenched. My voice was harsh. “I don’t see how it couldn’t be like that. But hey, why don’t you fuckin’ tell me what it’s like?”
Jerome didn’t.
“Well?” I demanded.
No reply.
“You fucker,” I muttered. I grabbed a warm can of soda and a package of plastic-wrapped something-or-other off of the stack on the desk and headed for the door.
In a weak voice, Jerome said, “Zed, I’m sorry.”
I ignored him and slammed the door shut on my way out of the room.
Wilkins was coming up the hall just in front of me. “Mad?” he asked.
“God damn Jerome,” I groused.
“I guess you found out he’s not with the CDC.”
“Yep.” I stomped down the hall. Jerome had literally sent me out among the infected, based on something he’d read on the internet. What really bothered me though, was the question of my prognosis. Was I going to turn? Was I going to become a mindless zombie, squatting in the shadows until a normal with a gun put me down?
I stomped into the common area with a scowl on my face. Murphy was sitting on a couch, chatting up Amber and Felicity, back to his loquacious self. The only difference from the time I first saw him was that he was a much paler brown than before.
“Thank you, thank you so much,” Amber told me as I walked up. “You saved our lives.”
I shrugged. It wasn’t nothing, but what else was I going to do? “Anybody would have done it.”
“Not Jerome,” said Felicity.
Murphy laughed heartily at that. “Man, I would have come with, but I was passed out from the infection.”
“Yeah,” I agreed and sat down on the couch. I opened my tiny donuts and cola. “Where is everybody?”
“They’re downstairs, fortifying the windows, I think,” Felicity said.
“With what?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she answered.
“I guess it doesn’t matter.” I shrugged. “It needs to be done.”
Murphy spoke up, “Wilkins wants everybody to meet at three o’clock to talk about our situation.”
“Wilkins does?” I asked, unnecessarily.
“Yep,” Murphy said. “He’s in charge, right?”
I looked around. “Nobody told me.”
Amber shook her head and raised her palms. “We’re new.”
“We’re all new,” I told them. “Did you guys eat already?”
“Vending machine food never tasted so good,” said Amber.
“It’s going to get old in a hurry,” said Murphy.
We all agreed, then ran out of words. I started eating. Without the talking, the mood blackened as we were all left to our thoughts about what was going on outside—about what had happened over the past few days, the things we’d all seen, and the bleakness of the future.
It was Murphy who piped up first, “Man, the last thing I remember was you and me were in that creek bed. I don’t even know how we got in the creek bed, but I remember walking in the sun.”
I looked at him, “You don’t remember the transients? The guy who drove us to the hospital? The gym? Anything?”
“No man, nothing.” Murphy said loudly in a voice that was used to being at the center of attention, “Like I said, I was feeling like crap and walking up that creek bed with you, and that’s it.”
“I guess you were pretty sick.” I half smiled. “Probably delirious with the fever.”
“I guess, man,” Murphy agreed. “I didn’t know what to think when I woke up cuffed to that bed yesterday.”
“Jerome didn’t tell you anything?” I asked.
Murphy said, “No, mostly he just stared out the window. When I’d ask him a question, he’d shush me.”
I took some time to relate to Murphy the story of how we made it from the creek bed to the dorm. The girls listened with great interest. I purposefully didn’t mention the jail and Murphy didn’t bring it up.
When I finished, Felicity asked, “So you guys and Jerome are all infected.”
“It seems so,” I answered.
Amber scooted up in her chair but took a moment to formulate her question. In the end, she went with bluntness. “Are you guys going to turn out like…like the others?”
“The other infected?” I asked, though I knew what she meant.
Amber nodded.
“I don’t know.” I looked around and scratched my chin. “Jerome says no, but he just read that on the internet.”
“So you could turn any minute?” Amber pushed on.
“I don’t know. I think if it was going to happen, it would have.” Not really a lie—perhaps a hope.
Murphy added, “As long as I don’t get any whiter, I don’t care.”
We all laughed. We needed the levity.
“What does it feel like?” Amber asked.
“What?” I asked.
“Being infected,” she clarified.
“Like the flu, a really bad flu,” I answered.
“No,” Amber said, “I mean now. Do you feel normal?”
“Mostly, I guess.” I looked down at my hands, legs, and feet.
“I feel just fine,” Murphy added, “except bright light is hard to see in.”
“Our pupils are stuck in a dilated state,” I clarified.
“What?” Amber asked.
I said, “Jerome told me. When you’re infected, your pupils dilate and stay that way.”
“Does the bright light hurt?” Amber asked.
“No,” I shook my head, “it doesn’t hurt. It just feels uncomfortable.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
I turned to Felicity. “Do you remember that infected guy that jumped out and bit me on the arm when we were in the tunnel?”
She nodded, shuddering at the memory.
“I felt the bite, but it didn’t hurt. I mean, I could feel the pressure of his teeth on my arm, I even felt my skin tearing, but there wasn’t any pain.”
“Maybe you hit your head too hard when you fell against the wall,” Felicity speculated.
I leaned forward and put Amber’s hand on the large knot on the back of my head. “I felt it hit. But this didn�
��t hurt either.”
“Oh,” she said.
“Yeah,” I nodded.
“So, you’re like a leper?” Felicity asked.
“I don’t know anything about that,” I answered. “I can feel things just fine. I just seem to be losing the ability to feel pain.”
“Do you think you’ll get to the point when you won’t be able to feel anything?” Amber asked.
“I hope not.” I really hoped not.
Amber took out her telephone, checked it, and started to put it away.
“Hey,” I said. “Can I borrow that to make a call?”
“Sure.” She handed it to me. “Do you have family to call?”
I shook my head. “I need to call one of the nurses over at the hospital.”
I dialed the number Steph had given me. Murphy and the girls started talking again.
The phone rang a half-dozen times and went to voicemail. Into the phone I said, “Steph, this is Zed. Murphy and I made it out of the gym and we’re okay. Call me at this number when you can. Bye.”
I handed the phone back to Amber.
She asked, “Girlfriend?”
“Nope. Just a nurse who helped me and Murphy out.”
Chapter 29
In dark sunglasses, Murphy and I were outside, scavenging what we could off the dead soldiers in the quad. I was picking through the remains, and he was hauling the booty. At the moment, he had three rifles, two vests with clips and whatever else attached, and a couple of helmets, all covered in crusty blood.
We’d been out in the heat all through the noon hour. I was sweaty, tired, and feeling angry.
Murphy and I had talked while we were inside after bringing in a previous load and rinsing the equipment in the downstairs showers. He confirmed what Jerome had told me earlier, that Mark and the other ROTC guys were afraid of us. As for Jerome, he was nowhere to be seen, though he could easily have been assisting us in equipment collection.
While outside, we didn’t speak much for fear of attracting unwanted attention from the infected. In the sweltering silence, I ruminated darkly about the social dynamic. I was angry at Jerome for being right about how I’d feel about that. I’d probably saved the life of every one of those toy rifle-toting ROTC pukes. Now, because of Murphy and me, they were all armed. They had a chance at survival. But they thought they were better than me. That pissed me off the most. I hated that.
