Aftermath (Invasion of the Dead) - Part I (5 page)

She
shuddered, pushing in closer to Dylan.

“
You okay?”  He said.  She shook her head and he placed a hand over hers.  Any other time it would have been thrilling, but she couldn’t shake the feeling of despair.     

Nobody spoke as t
he car sped down the highway, edging closer to home passing more rolling paddocks and long patches of wild scrub.  The air through the gap in Greg’s window turned colder, and a mass of imminent grey clouds gathered in the west.  In an effort to get home quicker, Callan decided on an alternative route, leaving the main highway. 

The
y hit the brown gravel and the Jeep began a mild vibration, soothing Kristy, and her eyelids grew heavy.  Eventually, she dozed.  When she woke, the others were climbing out. 

“Toilet stop,” Dylan said.

The dirt area contained a small brick structure, several galvanised metal rubbish bins, and a couple of wooden slabbed tables and chairs.  Beyond the clearing though, dense scrub spread for miles in every direction.  Above, a grey sheet of cloud had drifted over.  Kristy stretched as the boys disappeared into the toilets.  The place had an unusual silence, lacking the pretty bird melodies to which she had grown accustomed over the past month.

Sherry hung back. 
“That was the most disgusting thing I have ever seen.  I wish that guy had killed himself wherever it was he came from.” 

Kristy stared.  Classic Sherry insensitivity, she thought. 
You might be better off without her, Cal.
 

“
Do you think it’s bad at home?”

Kristy said,
“I don’t know.  Trying no2t to think about it yet.”

“
What’s going on with you and Dylan?”

“
What do you mean?”

“Has anything happened?
  Are you ever going to do anything?”

“No.  Not yet.  I mean, we’ve chatted
a lot
but nothing else has happened.”

“
Really?  Not even by the fire after we’d all gone to bed?  I don’t believe that.”

Kristy
bunched her nose.  Maybe this was her chance to ask Sherry for advice.  “I don’t want to scare him off.”

“
You’ll scare him off if you
don’t
make a move.”

“I suppose.”  Greg walked out of the toilets in their direction.  “I like him so much.  I don’t want to screw it up.”

“
You won’t,” Sherry said.  “Take a chance.”   

“
What about Greg though?  I think he might like me too.”

Sherry
’s eyes widened.  “So?”

“Well I don’t want to hurt him.  He’s like
my brother.”

“Fuck him.  Figuratively.”  Kristy’s mouth fell open.  “He’s a big boy.  He’ll get over you.  Besides, he’s had the hots for you forev
er and if he hasn’t done anything by now, he never will.”

Kristy
stared.  She knew Sherry could be cruel, but this was unprecedented.  The discussion made her more depressed.  She had to change the subject, and recalled her conversation with Callan.  “Remind me not to get on your wrong side.  What about you and Callan?  You two have been distant this whole trip, is everything okay?”

Sherry considered this.
  “I know you’re his brother and all, but…”  Kristy raised her eyebrows.  “I just feel like we’ve drifted apart.  We want different things now.”

Damn it
, Kristy thought.  Callan had suspected right.  “Have you told him?”

“No.  Not yet.  I was going to talk to him when we got home.”

“What’s changed?  And when?  I always thought you guys were rock solid.”

“He’s just… different now
.  So am I.”

“
I think you should talk to him, tell him how you feel.  You owe him that.  Surely you can sort it out.”

“I will.
  I don’t know.”

Greg
approached.  “Who’s hungry?”

In a low voice, Sherry said, “Don’t
you tell him.  Let me do it.”

It struck her then
that Callan was right to be worried.  He adored Sherry, but Kristy felt a pang of concern at how he would react to her feelings.  “I won’t.  But don’t wait too long.”  Sherry walked away.

“
Hungry?” 

“
Yes,” Kristy said, pushing her lips into a smile as Greg arrived.  “Starving.” 

She tried to shake off the conversation.
  Insensitivity was part of Sherry’s personality and they all accepted it, but this went deeper.  She seemed genuinely unhappy.  The idea of them breaking up was shocking.  She would give her a day or two to speak to Callan before talking to him. 

Greg
passed her a cup of coffee from a flask they had prepared at the lake.  “Thank you,” Kristy said with a smile. 

She marvelled at the change in
him over the past four weeks.  Whilst he still burped, swore and drank too much beer, he had shown a side uncommon in men, uncommon to her, anyway.  Greg had shared the burden of chores and followed her instructions without complaint, including washing clothes, dishes and cleaning up.  He had also cooked, served, killed and cleaned their meat catches with a sense of satisfaction.  Whenever he had made food or acquired a drink, he always asked others, especially her.  She had known for some time that Greg liked her.  He hadn’t made it obvious, but something Callan had said at a party awhile back made her aware.  She was flattered, but having known him since she they were teenagers, she considered him a brother rather than a potential lover.  

“Nice?”  He said.

She nodded, sipping.  “Yeah.” 

Since they had found the old couple at the gas station, Greg’s frivolous nature had vanished.  “You’re not m
aking jokes or playing around anymore?  I don’t remember seeing you like this.”

He shrugged one shoulder
.  “Something’s not right here.  I’ve got a bad feeling about this one.”  He considered his next words.  “To be honest, I’m scared.”

“You?  Scared?” 
The idea twisted her stomach.  Greg was what Callan called
country tough,
a man who had fought bushfires and floods, toiled for days on end without rest, and suffered injuries working on the land that would have sent lesser men to hospital.  Kristy had never known him to be scared.  
 
 

“
Losing your parents makes you different.  It’s not something you can control.  You’re vulnerable.  You can be tough, fight hard, and never give in, but still lose.  My grandparents are all I have left, all I’ve really known.  If they’re gone.”  He glanced off into the bushes.  “I don’t know what I’d do, but I’d be alone.”

Kristy flushed with sorrow.  It was a
huge contrast for a man who previously had never seemed to take life seriously and or have a worry in the world.  She realised that the rest of their problems were faint compared to his suffering.  Greg was an electrician, spending his days wiring houses around Albury and Wodonga.  He worked hard, enjoyed the football, and his mates.  Kristy had never seen him so serious, despite the challenges he had overcome.  She felt a sudden admiration for him and wished she could ease his concern.

“No you won’t,” she said, taking his free hand.  “
I don’t think that will happen and I pray it doesn’t, but if it does, you’ll have us.  Callan and I, we are your family.  We’ve always been family.”  She thought about the next sentence, but then she couldn’t stop it.  “I’ve always thought of you as a brother.  You
are
my brother.” 

H
e scrunched his face.  “A brother?”

Regret filled her. 
“We’ve known each other since we were, what, I must have been six?”

He chuckled.  “
I used to pull those long blonde pigtails of yours.”

Kristy laughed.  “You did.  But you also beat up any boy who tried to hurt me.”

“Yeah, I nearly broke Brad Taylor’s arm when he tried to kiss you.”  They both laughed. 

Kristy remembered the incident.  She
had suspected Brad liked her, but he spent days chasing her around the schoolyard calling her names she didn’t know existed.  Eventually, Kristy had grown sick of it and faced him.  Brad had grabbed her shoulders and tried to plant a kiss on her lips, but she had fought him, screaming and kicking.  Nearby, Greg had leapt on the smaller boy, pinning his arm behind his back until through tears, he had apologised.  “Nobody bothered me again.”  

“
So that means… as a kind of brother…”

A sickly feeling reared,
and her mouth curled down at the edges.  She tried to explain, but only shook her head and said, “No.  Not that.  I’m sorry.”   

“That’s cool.
  Cal would probably kill me anyway.” 

“Yeah,
” she said, knowing the truth.

H
is face looked flushed and one finger curled around his necklace.  She scratched for a subject change.  “What’s that?” 

“
This?  It was my fathers,” he said, thumbing a silver medal on the end of the black chord.

She frowned.  “I haven’t seen it before.”

“Nah, just put it on today.  I wore it the first day but didn’t want to lose it in the lake.  My grandmother found it while she was cleaning out some old boxes.  It’s a service award from the Vietnam war.”

“
Your father was in Vietnam?”

Greg smiled.  “Yeah.  He did two tours.”

“Wow.  I never knew that.”

His
mouth curled down and he looked off into the distance.  “Grandma says that’s why he was so fucked up.  He came back the second time with gunshot wounds and got hooked on the painkillers and then moved to the grog.  She said he could never get over the shit that happened there.  You know he died choking on his own vomit after drinking for three days straight?”   

Kristy was speechless.  They knew the death of Greg’s father had been alcohol related, but the circumstances horrified her.  She felt
a deep sadness. 

The others appeared from the toilets.

“If you can keep this to yourself, I’d appreciate it.”

“Of course,” Kristy said.  “Greg, I’m so sorry.  The rest of us take our parents for granted.  What your father must have gone through… and then you not having him
as part of your life.  It makes me so sad.”

He nodded.  “Me too.”

Kristy visited the bathroom under a cloud of melancholy, and then they sat on the grey faded tables eating packets of potato chips and twisties as boiling grey clouds crept across the sky.  A cooler, moist smell had drifted in on the breeze, promising rain.  Callan and Greg secured the Jeep’s cover as the girls sought jackets to curb the dropping temperature.

“We’re about two hours from Albury,” Callan said.  “
This might sound a bit crazy but I’m gonna use an old back road my dad used to take me on that runs alongside the Murray River, rather than stick to the main highway.  We’ll meet up with the Hume Highway just below Holbrook.  Come into town from Table Top road.”

“Why?”  Greg said.

“It’s quieter.  Less people.  I don’t want any more confrontations like the one we had.”

“
No towns along those roads,” Dylan said.

“Just a tiny gas station my dad used to stop at.  It’s probably a little quicker, too
.”

“There are farms all around here,” Sherry said.  “Should we stop in and see if they can tell us anything?”

“The old man came from one of those farms,” Callan said.  “They might be infected.  He mentioned someone getting his wife.  Sounds dangerous.  Could be looters about, too.”

“What about going to the police?”  Sherry said.

Callan said, “Nothing out this way, but it’s a good idea and we should head there when we arrive into Albury.”

“
I agree,” Dylan said.  “You know we should be prepared for the worst.  If this thing has gotten into the town, there’s a fair chance some of the people we know might be infected, or worse.”

“Let’s not
get presumptuous,” Callan said.

“He’s right,” Sherry said.  “The newspaper said millions were dead on the east coast.”

“Doesn’t mean Albury is infected.”

“That w
as three weeks ago,” Dylan said. 

Kristy said,
“The old man said the symptoms started yesterday, which indicates the virulence is high and it moves quickly.”

“
Will they be working on a vaccine somewhere?”  Greg said.

“Maybe. 
Do you remember the H1N1 virus a few years ago?  It took a few months to formulate a vaccine.”

Callan laughed.  “You’re dramatizing it.  Flu strains come and go every few years.  Who knows if that guy wasn’t
just crazy?”

“Just be prepared,” Dylan said
, walking off to stretch his legs.