“So, tell me about the first time you heard about the infected. What went through your mind?”
Janet relaxed back into the couch, feeling silly for ever having worried about coming here. The woman was good at her job.
Subject File # 745
Administrator: It’s good to see you aren’t that worse for wear after your fall. We were all worried about you when it happened. Some a lot more than others. I was there when Veronica found out, she looked terrified.
Subject: Probably just scared she’d get stuck takin’ care of the girls by herself.
Administrator: You don’t really believe that do you?
Jackson stared up at the dark ceiling of the cabin, every crack and line in it and the wooden rafters already burned into his memory. His ankle and shoulder were sending a dull ache through his entire body, making it hard to sleep. He glanced over at the bottle of sleeping pills on the coffee table but he didn’t reach for them.
He hadn’t taken one yet, even after Veronica and the girls had gone to bed. He didn’t want to be groggy and out of it in case something happened. Not that he’d be much help in his condition.
He cursed silently to himself at his fuck up. When they needed all hands on deck, he’d managed to get himself laid up for weeks. He was going to be a drain on their resources, contributing nothing from his spot here on the couch.
He tried to shift around on the couch and realized that he had a more pressing matter than beating himself up. His bladder was full and if he didn’t get to bathroom soon, he was going to make an ass of himself.
Jackson cursed loudly as he sat up, pain lancing up his leg as he tried to lift it off the pillow. He went to grab at his leg and the pain echoed through his shoulder and he cursed another blue streak.
Veronica appeared in the doorway to her bedroom and threw her hands up. “What are you doing?”
“Gotta piss,” he said, “And I ain’t goin’ in a bed pan.”
“Stay right there, I’ll get you a bucket.”
“Ya ain’t gonna carry my piss outta here,” he grumbled and then bit back a groan of pain as he shifted his leg off the pillows with his good arm.
“It’s not a big deal,” she told him.
“Let me keep some dignity,” he said, taking a moment to rest his leg so the sharp pain in his ankle would go back down to a throbbing ache. “Bad enough I had to be carried in here.”
“Why do you think being helped is something to be embarrassed about?”
“Just wanna piss by my damn self so back off,” he growled at her, his pain adding an angry edge to his voice. He was about to apologize but he saw she had crossed her arms over her chest , looking at him with raised eyebrows but no anger in her eyes.
“Well, there’s no way you are making it to the bathroom on your own. You can barely sit up.”
He tried to fight back a grimace as he twisted himself around on the couch to drop his feet to the floor. “I can do it.”
“Quinton said you’re supposed to stay off your ankle.”
“Said to avoid puttin’ weight on it, not that I couldn’t,” he said, bracing his good arm on the couch to push himself to his feet. He kept all his weight on his good leg as he tried to stand but pain still shot through his bad ankle and he dropped back to the couch with a sharp hiss.
“If you insist then let me help you at least,” she said, moving to his side and leaning down to put his uninjured arm around her shoulders.
He was in enough pain to know that he wasn’t going to make it to the bathroom under his own steam and he let her help him into a standing position.
The distance between the couch and the bathroom was short but he found himself relying almost completely on Veronica to keep him vertical after only a few steps. He let out a sigh of relief when they passed through the bathroom door and the toilet was in sight. She helped him to stand in front of it and he braced his good arm against the wall.
“I got it from here.”
“Jackson,” she said, doubtful
“If I didn’t want ya carryin’ my piss bucket, ya really think I wanna do it while ya watch?” he growled at her.
“Alright but how are you going to unzip?”
He could hear the smile in her voice and as he looked down at the toilet, he realized she was right. He needed to brace his good arm against the wall to keep himself upright and that meant there was no way he was gonna be able to unzip and hit the bowl.
“Shit.”
“Look, either you let me handle the zipper and get your junk aimed at the bowl or you let me hold you up while you handle your business, so to speak.”
“A’ight, ya can hold me up but close yer eyes,” he said.
“Done,” she said and came to his side, squeezing into the space between him and the wall to prop him up. True to her word, she closed her eyes tight.
He unzipped but his full bladder suddenly got shy. He could hear her breathing in his ear, the warm puffs tickling his neck.
“You okay there?” she asked and he glanced over to see that she was smiling.
“Shut up,” he said, trying to focus on the task but nothing was moving.
“Can ya hum or somethin’?” he asked finally.
“I thought you wanted me to shut up.”
“This is so fuckin’ stupid.”
“Okay, okay,” she said and started humming loudly.
He let out a sigh of relief when his bladder finally got working. He finished up and pulled up his zipper.
“‘Kay, I’m done,” he said, nudging her elbow. She helped him to the sink to wash up and then back to the couch. This time he didn’t bother to protest. That short trip had exhausted him.
“I fuckin’ hate this,” he grumbled as he tried to get comfortable.
“Take one of the sleeping pills Quinton gave you.” She grabbed the bottle off the table and shook out a pill.
He thought about refusing but the pain was getting to him and he didn’t want to be stuck staring at the ceiling all night.
He took the pill and popped it in his mouth while she picked up his water bottle and went to put it to his lips. He grabbed the bottle out of her hand and glared at her.
“I can drink by myself,” he snapped at her and she rolled her eyes. “Sorry, but it ain’t just the pain I hate. I hate that I’m laid up when we got a shit ton of stuff to get done.”
“Jackson, nothing we are doing is pressing. We have all the time in the world to get things done.”
“Not the watchtowers. We gotta get ‘em up ASAP.”
“We’ve already got the platforms at the north point done and they finished the boathouse after you were hurt. We’re getting there, you don’t have to worry about setting back the construction schedule.”
“Ain’t just that. What if somethin’ happens? What if a bunch of people ride up here tonight? I ain’t gonna be able to help. Worse, I’ll be a fuckin’ liability.”
“We’re safe here. It’s not like out on the road. The likelihood of someone finding this particular island is so low.”
“Ya really think we’re the only people who thought islands would be safe? Ya saw the marina, it was empty. Where do ya think all those boats went?”
“I’ve read Elaine’s write up about this area. The lake’s got like 35,000 islands. I don’t think we have to be worried about people finding us tonight.”
He didn’t know how to explain to her that it wasn’t about an actual attack. He’d been welcomed into this group because he was useful. He brought something to the table and that earned him a seat. Now he had nothing to give them so what did that mean for his seat at the table?
“I’m still a liability and I ain’t contributin’. What’s the point of keepin’ me ‘round if I ain’t useful?”
She knelt down in front of the couch so she was eye level with him and he saw she was frowning at him.
“Craig spent almost all our time on the road laid up,” she told him. “It’s been weeks of him unable to do any heavy li
fting. He only recently got cleared for watch duty. You think anyone ever thought for a minute that he still wasn’t part of the family?”
He stared up at the ceiling, not wanting to answer her because he knew she wouldn’t like it. He didn’t think anyone thought about cutting Craig loose but that was because he was Craig. He was a good kid. He was their friend. He wasn’t an ex-con who was only here because the group wouldn’t turn away the two little girls he had adopted.
He turned to look at her. “We ain’t a family, not a real one. Your brother and sister and ya, yer a family. Malcolm and his sister and the kids, they’re family. Kim and Trey, family, but the rest of us? We ain’t family.”
Her eyes darkened and her lips thinned as she pressed them together and he knew he had finally pissed her off.
She shut her eyes for a moment and took a calming breath before she looked at him with a combination of anger and pity.
“Blood isn’t the only thing that makes a family. I get that you have issues with your own family and that makes it hard for you and so you don’t realize how insulting you are being right now.”
“I ain’t insultin’--” Veronica held up a hand to stop him.
“Yes, you are,” she snapped at him, “Because when you say we aren’t a family, you invalidate my feelings. I will not have you tell me that the people we fought beside, people that we bled with and mourned for, are not my family. I will not have you tell me that those two girls sleeping in there are not my family.”
He glanced over at the closed bedroom door and felt guilty. When he had said that, he hadn’t been thinking of the girls.
“And how dare you tell me that you aren’t my family because you are. A goddamn pain in my ass but still family.”
“I wasn’t talkin’ ‘bout you and the girls, I was talkin’ ‘bout the rest of ‘em.”
“That doesn’t make it better, Jax. It still invalidates the way the rest of us feel. No one sees you the way you see yourself. All of us want you here. I get that you’ve got abandonment issues but you need to stop pushing us away.”
She reached out and cupped his cheek in her palm. “You are a part of this family and nothing you do or don’t do will change that.”
The feel of her hand on him shook his defences and he found himself asking a question he had wondered for a while but had been too scared to ask.
“Ya said ya see me different than I do. How do ya see me?”
A soft smile formed on her lips and her thumb ghosted across his cheekbone. “A knight in shining armor.”
“C’mon,” he said, trying to move his head away but she reached up to cup his other cheek and held his head steady as she leaned in to meet his gaze so he could see the truth in her eyes.
“It’s true. You saved the girls, you saved me, and you saved my brother. I’m sorry Jackson, but that makes you a gallant knight right out of the storybooks. And I’m not the only one who thinks so. You have quite a few fans among us.”
The way she looked at him sent a flush across his skin and he felt himself sink further into the cushions of the couch, as if his body was starting to melt away. His eyes felt heavy and he had to blink a few times before he could focus on her and he realized that the pill was starting to kick in.
He tried to fight the drugs. He liked the feeling of Veronica touching him, her hands soft against his flushed skin.
“Yer such a liar,” he said with a smile. “I ain’t got fans.”
“You most certainly do,” she replied, her thumb skimming over his cheek again and he closed his eyes to magnify the electricity that sparked across his skin. “The girls think you hung the moon. Malcolm and my brother trust you with their lives. Mendez likes you, but you already knew that.”
Her hands pulled away from him and he frowned, reaching clumsily to grab her wrist as he opened his eyes to see her looking down at him with sad eyes.
“S’wrong?” he slurred out as she extracted her hand easily from his loose grip and placed his hand back on his chest.
“Nothing is wrong,” she said and stood up. “That pill is kicking in. It’s time to sleep.”
He tried to fight it. Something was wrong, he knew it. Something had made her sad. What was it?
“Wait,” he said but she shushed him and ran a hand over his forehead, brushing his hair out of his eyes. His eyes slipped closed and sleep started to pull him away but he could swear he felt her lips press against his forehead. Whispered words reached his ears but his foggy brain couldn’t focus on them and it wasn’t until he was right on the edge of unconsciousness that they echoed back to him before he slipped under.
I love you.
Subject File # 756
Administrator: So do you share Veronica’s hatred of secret keepers?
Subject: She said that?
Administrator: She said she hates people who keep secrets.
Subject: My sister has always seen the world in black and white. I think sometimes it’s better to keep secrets, especially if it means you are protecting the people you care about.
Quinton leaned back in his chair, reading over the results of Ruthie’s blood work. With Jackson’s accident yesterday, he hadn’t had a chance to review the results that Harold had left on his desk in the clinic. Today he was playing catch up, just like he used to at the hospital on his days off.
Everything looked great for Ruthie, the same as the other results he’d looked over so far. Considering everything they had gone through, all of them were surprisingly healthy.
He put Ruthie’s results in her chart and took the next one off the pile. It was Matthew’s but halfway down the page there was a break in the print out and the rest of the results were missing. Harold must have missed the error when he had done the print outs yesterday.
No big deal. He’d just get Harold to print it again.
He left the front room and headed back to the lab door and knocked on it. When he got no response, he knocked louder and waited but the door stayed shut.
He knew he could wait until Harold finally emerged from the lab to eat, the test results weren’t pressing. Yet when he looked down at the keypad on the lock, his fingers itched to punch in the code he’d managed to steal from Harold.
He took a moment to weigh the pros and cons of trying to unlock the door. If he unlocked the door, he would have played his hand to Harold about seeing the code. Harold would be sure to change it after that, but he would have already seen everything.
And maybe Harold had already changed the code. Maybe he had noticed him spying or maybe he changed the code every day. It wouldn’t hurt anything to try it out, just to see if it worked. If it did, he could sate his curiosity about the lab while getting the blood work results. Two birds with one stone. If it didn’t, he was right back where he started, no harm done.
He punched in the code but the light on the keypad turned red. Okay then the last number had to be two. The light flashed green and the door knob turned easily and he pushed the door open to reveal a set of stairs.
“Harold?” he called out but got no answer.
He knew Harold was down there, he’d seen him go down there after breakfast and as far as Quinton knew, there wasn’t any other exit.
Trepidation filled him and he flicked open the strap on his holster, putting his hand on his gun.
He descended the stairs to a small anteroom constructed of concrete blocks. A steel door with a small window was set in the concrete wall, an electronic keypad above the door handle. He went to the window and looked through to see a narrow view of the lab beyond it. He could see stainless steel surfaces with computers and microscopes. Two glass-paneled refrigeration units stood on the far wall of the lab, flanking a twin of the door that Quinton was currently standing behind.
He banged on the door and called out Harold’s name. There was no movement he could spot inside the lab. He pounded again, getting concerned about Harold. Did he collapse? Fall unconscious?
He tried the code on the keypad but it flashed red,
denying him entry. He was about to head back upstairs to find Angela to get the damn door opened when he saw the red light on the keypad of the other door flash green. A moment later, the door opened and Harold emerged.
He was wearing a white lab coat beneath a black lab apron, surgical mask and blue latex gloves. At least he assumed they were blue like the ones upstairs. Quinton couldn’t tell since the ones Harold was wearing were covered in blood and more of it was shining on his apron.
He pounded his fist on the door and Harold’s eyes shot over to him. Even with half his face covered and the thick glass window between them, Quinton could see the panic that filled his eyes.
He stood frozen as the door swung closed behind him and the lock engaged, the light turning red. Quinton waited for Harold to move, to come over and explain that this wasn’t what it looked like but he didn’t. He just stood there, staring at him, bloody hands hovering in the air.
The suspicion that had been coiling in Quinton’s veins grew tighter. When he had come down, he had been concerned for Harold’s well-being but now he only felt suspicion about what the good doctor was up to.
“Harold!” he yelled out. “Open the door!”
He pounded a fist against the door and Harold jumped and then he shook his head.
“You can’t stay in there forever. Just tell me what the hell you’re doing.”
Harold hesitated, his hands waving around like he wasn’t sure where to put them but then he stripped off his gloves, tossing them somewhere Quinton couldn’t see. He stripped off the apron and mask, tossing them aside as well and then approached the door to unlock it and Quinton could see the sweat beading on his forehead.
“You aren’t supposed to be down here,” Harold said when he opened the door but Quinton ignored him and shouldered his way into the lab. He looked around at the other stainless steel counters with more lab equipment on top and then spied the hazardous materials bin.
He crossed over to it and opened it, needing to see that it really was blood on the apron and gloves.
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