The Blood Will Dry

by Mary, Kate L.

  By the time I left the infirmary I was feeling more subdued. Instead of heading outside to patrol when it wasn’t even time for my shift, I went back up to my room to check on Bryan. If he blamed himself for the death of Hendrix and the other members of the platoon he was crazy, but I wanted to be there for him if he needed it. I knew what it felt like to blame yourself for things you couldn’t really control.

  The room was dark when I slipped inside, but I heard him shift and knew he was awake before he whispered my name.

  “I’m here,” I said, kneeling beside the bed without lighting the wick. “How are you feeling?”

  His hand grasped mine in the darkness and I actually felt my breath catch in my throat. Having his skin against mine made me think of the last time we’d been here together, how soft his lips were, how the gentle friction of his body against mine had made me feel like I was flying.

  “Sore,” he whispered, “and tired. Otherwise okay.”

  “Good. You should try to rest a little more. You haven’t been asleep for that long.”

  He let out a deep sigh and I suddenly wished it wasn’t pitch black. I wanted to be able to see his face, to know what he was thinking and feeling and if he was hurting more than he was letting on. Physically or emotionally.

  “My dreams are full of bugs and screaming.”

  I pressed my lips together for a moment before saying, “Scoot over. I’ll lay down with you.”

  He released my hand and disappeared into the darkness, making me suddenly feel alone. I knew he was only doing as he was told, but I found myself suddenly desperate to be with him. To feel his heartbeat and the sweep of his breath against my face, to have his strong arms wrapped around me.

  I moved so I was stretched out next to him and his arms wrapped around me. My back was to his chest and just like I’d thought, I could feel his heart pounding. In the stillness of the room it felt like it was just the two of us, Bryan and me, facing the future together. It was an unexpected but nice feeling, like taking your shoes off after being on your feet all day. It was a relief, but one I hadn’t even realized I needed.

  “What’s going to happen?” I whispered.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think they’ll come here?”

  “I think we’re about to enter a new phase of this invasion.”

  Just thinking about it sent a shudder through me. I thought we’d seen everything these things had to offer, but I’d been wrong and now we were facing something twice as terrifying as anything they’d done to us so far. Even the blast that had taken Michael and Cassidy from me, because it had been quick and over before I’d even realized it was coming. But this could go on for months, maybe even years. How long had the bodies Bryan saw been hanging in the hive? Had they been there since the beginning? Had they been alive and aware of what was happening to them this entire time?

  Even scarier was the knowledge that we had no real way of defending ourselves. We were sitting ducks here in the settlement, like the aliens had tucked us away for future use and would soon be coming to collect.

  At least the militia would be out on the road where they’d be able to make a run for it. Assuming they could regroup. It seemed that Bryan and the rest of his platoon were now not only without homes, but without a leader.

  “What are you going to do now?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I can’t imagine staying here forever, but most of our platoon was wiped out. We could join up with another group, but it’s tough to know when our paths will cross with another platoon. Those of us that are left will have to figure it out.”

  And then he would be leaving.

  I didn’t like thinking about it, but I realized a lot of it had to do with the fact that I didn’t want to be left behind. Not just by him, but by the people who were trying to do something. For the first time in over four years, I felt like staying here would be a waste. But could I go back out there? Could I join a militia again after all this time and feel like the months on the road were worthwhile?

  It was something to think about at least.

  What remained of the two platoons stayed with us while they healed and regrouped. Days passed and the vines covering the city grew thicker and longer, spreading out to obscure more of the streets than they’d ever covered before. But things remained quiet and there was no sign of the aliens, and slowly things in the settlement began to calm down and return to the way they had been before the platoon was attacked.

  Bryan stayed in my room. It happened without us ever talking about it, either for him to ask me if he was welcome or for me to invite him to stay, or even us discussing what it meant for either one of us. He was just there. After that first night he slept on the floor while I took the cot, and even though I told myself it should be strange or uncomfortable, it didn’t feel that way. It felt normal that he was curled up on the floor next to me. It felt right.

  “Have you guys talked about when you’re going to go back out?” I asked after we had put the light out and settled in for the night. He’d been sleeping at my side for four days already, and instead of finding myself wondering where this was taking us, I found myself wondering how much longer I could count on him being here. Not just wondering, but dreading the day it would change.

  It was so dark that I couldn’t see him from my spot on the cot, but I heard it when he shifted and I imagined him turning so he could face me even though it was too dark for us to see one another.

  “Not yet.” He paused and I held my breath, remembering how he had told me that he couldn’t imagine being here forever. “I think most of the guys are putting it off. We got our asses kicked pretty thoroughly. For me, I know it won’t be long before I get antsy.”

  I didn’t want to be unsupportive and even though I knew this attraction was mutual, I also knew that he wasn’t the settling down type. He hadn’t been before either, but that was for a different reason. Now it was because he wanted to set things right before he settled down, and as foolish as that idea was to me, it was also a noble one.

  Since the night we’d laid side by side on my cot, I’d been thinking about the militia more and more. I hadn’t told anyone about it yet, but I couldn’t deny that the more I thought about it, the more I could picture myself out on the road now that the bugs might be a threat. I didn’t want to sit here and wait to die. Not now, not ever.

  Bryan shifted again and a few seconds of silence passed between us before he whispered, “Diana?”

  “Yes.”

  Another pause and then, “Do you want me to stay?”

  “Yes.” The word was easier to get out than I’d expected.

  On the floor Bryan moved again, and then he was next to me and I found myself scooting over without even thinking about it. He slipped onto the cot, which was smaller than a twin size bed but still somehow had enough room for the both of us. I was wearing nothing but a pair of cotton panties and a threadbare tank top, and he was only in boxer shorts, and the sudden feeling of his warm skin, of his body flush with mine, was the most exquisite sensation I’d ever experienced. I’d forgotten how it felt to be in someone’s arms, how it could make a person feel whole and comforted and safe all at the same time. How the thump of a heart beating in tune with your own could drown out the entire world.

  The last man who’d held me like this had been Michael, my husband and Bryan’s brother, and a part of me thought that I should feel ashamed to be here right now, feeling so secure in this man’s embrace. But I didn’t. I missed Michael, always would, but I wasn’t the same person I’d been back then and neither was Bryan. In a way, we’d both died five years ago along with everyone else killed off in the first blasts.

  We didn’t kiss, but instead just stayed locked in one another’s embrace. Just like him staying in my room, we didn’t talk about what was happening, but seemed to instinctively know what the other one needed. Like I knew that in some ways Bryan needed to adjust to the idea of us more than I did. For me it felt like less of a betr
ayal because Michael and I had been in a good—no, great—place when he’d died. But that wasn’t the case with Bryan. They’d been estranged. They hadn’t spoken in over a year and there had been no reconciliation in sight. I couldn’t imagine how finding himself attracted to the very woman who had torn his family apart made Bryan feel, but I knew it would take time for him to come to terms with it.

  We slept that way, and despite the small cot it was the best sleep I’d had in five years. I didn’t wake in the middle of the night drenched in sweat after a dream in which I was forced to watch my family get blown to bits all over again. I didn’t get cold or wake up with my muscles in knots from the tension I sometimes felt during bad dreams. Instead, I woke with a strong arm wrapped around me and a hard body pressed up against my back. I came to feeling the rhythmic quiver of Bryan’s body when he exhaled, his breath brushing across my shoulder and filling me with a sense of security that I hadn’t known I could feel anymore.

  He woke only a few minutes after me, letting me know that he’d emerged from his own dream world by planting a kiss on my shoulder. I wasn’t sure if he knew I was awake, but I suspected that he did, and just like crawling into bed with me last night that little kiss was a way of easing himself into something neither one of us had ever expected to find. Contentment, security, and a future.

  Later that day, after a breakfast of magenta fruit, I went on patrol with Daisy. Bryan had gone to check on the rest of his platoon, and possibly to discuss what they would do if and when another group came in. It was a conversation I didn’t want to face or think about, but one I knew couldn’t be avoided. The people who volunteered for those positions weren’t meant to stay in one place.

  The street outside our building was now crisscrossed with vines, many of which had grown so much that they were thicker than my thigh. Daisy and I didn’t mention the change that had taken place as we stepped over them and headed down the street. Ignoring the vine’s sudden presence was impossible, but at the moment I was too shocked by how much the world had changed over the last few days. The vegetation had spread not just further down the street, but up the building we lived in as well. Before the militia’s confrontation with the aliens only one side of our building had vines on it and they’d barely reached the top. Now that side was covered in thick tendrils that went all the way up and curled over the roof. More had begun to snake their way up the front of the building as well, coming dangerously close to the door. If they continued to grow we might just find ourselves without a way in and out of the building.

  “Why?” Daisy whispered.

  She was standing at my side staring up at the building just like I was, the confusion on her face mirroring my own. I only shook my head because I didn’t have any more answers than she did, but we both knew the sudden change had something to do with the altercation a few days earlier.

  “You think they’re expanding?” Daisy asked.

  It made sense. The vines and other greenery had always been thicker close to the hive. Out there more of the former world was covered and more trees had sprung up, as well as more of the flowers that carried poisonous pollen. It was like a different world out there, while in the city we had been able to hold onto the memories of what we’d once had. The trees had died but we’d still been able to see them, the buildings still bore signs of the businesses they had once housed, and the street signs had stayed intact. We’d been able to hold onto our sense of humanity, had grown comfortable. Had thought we still had a chance.

  But now the foliage was spreading, and I couldn’t ignore that it all pointed to something big. A change was coming. One I was afraid we might not be prepared for. We’d gotten too complacent, too comfortable. We’d been living like ostriches, sticking our heads in the sand and hoping that if we just ignored the aliens they would go away. Until now, I hadn’t realized how foolish that hope had been.

  Daisy and I started walking, each of us holding guns that we knew were useless if we did run into the aliens.

  “Bryan wants to join up with another platoon when they come through,” I said before we were halfway to the crater that signaled the end of our settlement.

  “I’m not surprised.” Daisy eyed me for a moment before saying, “What’s going on with the two of you?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing and everything.”

  She nodded like she understood, but I wasn’t sure if she really did. If she really could. I still hadn’t filled her in completely on why Bryan showing up was so significant, on who he’d really been to me. She thought of him as my brother-in-law, which was true but also misleading. Brother-in-law indicated that we’d had some kind of relationship, which we hadn’t.

  “How’s Tyler?” I asked, both to change the subject and because I hadn’t seen him that morning at breakfast.

  “Better. Healing.” She grinned, and the look in her eyes was one I hadn’t seen before. Not that it should have been a surprise. This was the first time I’d ever seen her give one of the guys she’d met the time of day when they showed back up. Usually, she’d already moved on.

  “What’s going on with the two of you?” I asked, repeating the question she’d just thrown at me.

  She shrugged just like I had. “I don’t know. Right now I’m just enjoying playing Florence Nightingale.”

  I snorted because I’d already had the same thought, as had Alex. Daisy could be so dramatic. “I don’t think Florence would have approved of your bedside manner.”

  She just grinned.

  We reached the crater at the edge of the street and stopped only four feet from the edge. The vines coming out of it were so thick that the ground was no longer flat. My right foot was firmly planted on a fat vine and my left was wedged between a couple smaller ones. If I shifted my weight, I wobbled on the uneven ground. I remembered peering into that first crater five years ago, the one that had once been a mall. Back then there had been no vines or leaves or flowers sprouting up from the hole, and it was so deep that I hadn’t been able to see the bottom. When I’d looked down that day there had been nothing but darkness. Just like the one in front of me right now, that hole had encompassed nearly a quarter of a mile of what had once been a buzzing retail center, wiping out every inch of the mall that my family had been standing in.

  The blackness of that pit seemed to mirror the blackness that developed inside me that day. It had felt as big as the crater itself and twice as dark. Had felt like it swallowed me up. I’d joined the militia hoping to get revenge, but when that failed I’d retreated into this life. I’d cut myself off from people even as I’d lived side by side with them, never really letting anyone in completely.

  “I’m thinking of joining with Bryan,” I said, still staring down into the crater. The vines reminded me of how my insides had felt since I’d learned that the aliens were active again. Twisted and knotted.

  Daisy turned to face me. “Why?”

  “Because we can’t just hide here forever. I think I’ve been fooling myself for all these years. Telling myself that it was pointless to try. But even before the recent altercation I knew I was wrong. These things invaded our planet and killed people we loved and destroyed everything we had. Sitting back and just letting them live may be easier, but that doesn’t mean it’s right.”

  My friend watched me silently for a moment and I knew that the questions she’d been holding in for years were finally coming. The crazy thing was, I thought I was finally ready to answer them. For four years I’d refused to say what had happened out loud, but now I finally felt like I was healing and I’d reached a point where I could move forward a little.

  Daisy had just opened her mouth when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I spun toward it, my gun already up, but froze when I saw nothing. I knew it was there, though. I’d found myself in this exact situation enough in the early days of the invasion to know that it was hiding. Or in plain sight but too blended into the surrounding foliage for me to see it. Hopefully, there was just one of them.

&n
bsp; “Where is it?” Daisy whispered.

  Like me, she had her gun up and ready. The color had drained from her face and even in the fine mist that was currently falling from the sky I could see the sweat beading on her forehead. A single buzz started before I could say anything, quiet at first, but joined seconds later by more whirring. There was more than one, but even worse, they were talking to one another.

  I inched back, my gaze scanning the surrounding buildings as I backed away from the crater. Daisy moved with me, her arms trembling as her hands gripped her gun tighter. I wanted to turn and run, but I was afraid to put my back to the buzzing, afraid that if I did they would swarm and attack and we’d be dragged back to the hive.

  “We need to get back,” I said.

  I knew I was stating the obvious, but in the absence of anything better to say it just came out. Not that it mattered. I was pretty sure Daisy couldn’t hear me. She was too focused on studying the surrounding greenery as she walked backward, her eyes twice as wide as usual and brimming with fear.

  We’d only made it a few steps before I stumbled on a thick vine and nearly fell. A yelp came out of me, and Daisy’s hand shot out. She grabbed my elbow but her eyes were still on the street in front of us, and I wasn’t even sure if she was aware that she’d stopped me from falling on my ass.

  We weren’t going to make it back like this. We had to run.

  “Run,” I whispered, just loud enough for her to hear me. “We need to run.”

  She nodded once, and then we both spun around and took off down the street, sprinting toward our building. The buzzing increased the second we started moving faster, growing in intensity with each step we took. My heart pounded with the beat of my feet on the ground, and with every step I took the vines that crisscrossed their way over the street threatened to trip me up. The beat of the aliens’ wings grew louder and I found myself out of breath thanks to the combination of physical exertion and raw fear that was now surging through me. I wanted to look back, to see if they were coming after us and how many there were, but I was too terrified. Both of what I might see and the possibility of tripping if I dared take my eyes off the road in front of me.