Alive! Not Dead! (22 page)

We all sat down on the couches.  Mindy and I sat on the couch that Rachel and I had just fucked on.  Mindy was sitting where
Rachel’s’ head had rested and bumped against the couch’s armrest as I fucked her.

I was starting to feel very guilty.  Here I had my new wife next to me; a gorgeous woman, someone who I loved dearly, someone who I would protect and die for.  But now, I ruined it.  I went behind her back.  I lied to her.  I didn’t know how I was going to be able to tell her that I had cheated on her.

We snooped around the lobby.  Behind the main desk there was a door that had been jimmied open.  Inside there were locked safes, stacks of money and in one corner a stack of about fifty
Dura flame
logs.  Mason hooted when he saw the logs.  Quickly he took three of them, ran out into the lobby area and lit the paper edges of the logs.  They quickly burst into flames.  The room lit up even more.

“Oh this is nice,” Mason said.  “
We gots us a campfire
!” he said hillbilly-like.  “We can make us a
big
fire in here!”

There was a large flume above the circular fire place.  The smoke from the
Dura flame
logs rose up out into the snowy sky.

We transferred all of our tents to the lobby.  Mason and I moved all of the couches except three of them along the wall with the fake flowers to make more space.  We decided to leave all of the food that we had carved and bagged in the kitchen walk-in.  It wasn’t that far.  We all decided that whoever had to use the restroom would bring back a sealed bag of food on their way back.

The logs burned for about four hours each.  They put off a nice bit of heat, too.  All
of us took off our jackets but still wore one or two flannel shirts; except for Mason, of course.

Mindy and I were sitting together on the same couch.  She had her back against an armrest with a pillow behind her.  Her legs were stretched out with her feet on my legs.  I was sitting up reading an old newspaper that had been on the lobby’s main desk.

Mason was sitting with Vera on another couch.  Mason watched the fire while Vera sat next to him, smoking one cigarette after the other.

Rachel sat on a couch next to us.  She, too, was sitting with her back against an armrest.
  She was facing Mindy and I.  She had her boots off.  They were sitting on the floor right below her.  She was thumbing through a magazine, looking at me but quickly looked back to the magazine any time Mindy stirred.

We were all quiet.  The fire quietly popped every now and then.

Mindy sat up.  She whispered to me, “I gotta go.”

“Ok,” I whispered back.

“Don’t forget to pick up a bag of food on the way back, Mind,” Mason said.

“Um ok,” she said, slightly embarrassed.  “Tell the whole world why
don’t ya, Mace?” she said, laughing.  She leaned down and kissed me on the head.  “Be right back.”

I smiled up at her.

She lit our kerosene lamp as she left with it.  As soon as she was out of the room, Vera looked at Rachel and asked Rachel “Well aren’t you going to go sit with your man now that Mindy’s gone?”

Mason looked at Vera questioning.

Rachel said, “Shut up, Vera.”

Vera took a long drag off her cigarette.

I didn’t say anything.

“You’re a sick whore,” Vera said still looking at Rachel.  “You
are
a whore, aren’t you?”

“You better shut up, bitch!”

“What the hell are you two talking about?” Mason asked, confused.  “Vera I’ve never heard you talk this way.  What’s gotten into you?”

She took another long drag off the cigarette.

I still was quiet.

“You’re a whore too, aren’t you Dan” Vera asked me.

Rachel was pissed.

“No, I’m not a whore,” I calmly said.  “But you do need to be quiet.”

“Ok what’s this about?” Mason asked.

Vera said “They fucked.  Right here in this room.  Rachel and Dan did.  I saw them.”

Mason looked at me.  He didn’t say a word.

Rachel was silent, too.  She didn’t want to say anything else or it would have gotten a lot worse.

Mason finally said to me “But you two just got
married
…”

I said “Don’t worry about it, Mason.  It’s not your business.”

“Fine,” he said.

“It’s not yours either, Vera; so please, shut up.”

“You’re a bastard,” she whispered loudly to me.  “How could you?”

I said “Just shut up.”

She was quiet.  She kept looking at me then back at Rachel.  She was very upset with us.

The fire popped.

Vera acted like she wanted to say more, but she didn’t.  I think she realized that her voice meant nothing.  What was done was done.  She couldn’t change it.

Didn’t mean she had to be happy about it, though.

I also knew that Rachel was pissed off.  She distinctly told Vera not to say a word – but Vera did.  Vera spilled the beans about it all.  I hoped that she wouldn’t tell Mindy.  That would be so devastating for her.

And for me.

Mason cocked his head to the side, listening.  He really didn’t want to say anything, but he said, “Do you hear that?”

“What?” Vera asked.

I listened too.  There was a strange pitch in the air.  For a second I thought it was maybe the sound of the log burning.  It had a quiet high pitch like the sound of water evaporating out of the burning log as it heated up.  Then, it was quieter.  It was barely audible but it lasted for a few seconds, then was quiet like a…

It was Mindy screaming!

“
It’s Mindy
!” Mason and I both shouted together.

We both jumped off the couches.  We ran toward the buffet.  We forgot to bring our kerosene lamps.  We ran through the dark casino.  Her screaming got louder as we got
closer.

It was very dark in the buffet.  Mindy’s screams were coming from the kitchen.

We slammed through the doors.  It was pitch black in there.

“Mindy!
You in here?”

“Yes…” she cried.  “Oh God, the lamp went out!”

“The lamp…”

“I can’t see, Dan!”

“Oh, shit! It’s ok, we’re here.”

“Who else is her
e?” Mindy asked.

“It’s me, hon,” Mason said.  “You’ll be fine.”

“Here, take my hand” I said.  “Just follow right behind me.”

She took my hand.  I led her out through the buffet and into the hall.  “There.  Better?” I
asked.

“I still can’t see anything,” Mindy said.  “How can you tell where we are?”

“Instinct,” I said, joking.

Mason was behind us, not saying a word, just following closely.

We could see better the closer we got to the lobby.

Rachel met us at the doors.  “Everything ok?” she asked.

“Fine,” I said.

As we stepped into the lobby, we saw that V
era was now lying on the couch.

Mindy and I came through the door first.  Mindy screamed.  Blood was pouring from Vera’s neck.  It
had been slit from ear to ear.

Mason hadn’t seen it yet.  “What’
s wrong?” he asked.

Suddenly Rachel grabbed Mason roughly from behind. She held the same red handled dagger to Mason’s throat th
at she had just used on Vera.  Savagely she slit his throat.  She let the dagger clatter to the floor at their feet after the deed was done.

Mason went down to the floor on both knees holding his throat.  Blood washed over his hand.  There was confusion and pain is his eyes as he went down.  He fell onto his back.

“
What are you doing
?” Mindy screamed.  She burst into tears.  “
Oh my God
!”

I knew why Rachel did it.  I felt so utterly horrible.  It was
all my fault.  I never should have given into her.

Rachel started crying too.  She st
epped over Mason’s dead body.  “I’m sorry, but I heard them conspiring against us last night.  They were planning on killing all of us.  Mason said there wasn’t enough food left for us.  They were going to kill us so they would have enough food for themselves until spring.”

“Why would they want to kill us?” Mindy screamed, crying.  “We were doin
g fine! Oh God, Mason! Vera!”

We were standing next to Vera’s couch.  Her neck was split open.

Behind us, Mason sat up.

A large dripping bruise had appeared on the right side of his face.  It went from the top of his head down the right side of his neck.  His eyes were blank as he got to his feet.

He grabbed Rachel’s shoulder from behind.  She had no idea that he had come back.  He took a deep ripping bite out of the top of her shoulder.  She screamed, trying to fight him away.

Mindy screamed.

Vera sat up.

Blood washed down the front of her Harley jacket.  She stood up.  She reached her hands out for Mindy.  Quickly, I jumped between the two of them and shoved Vera back.  She stumbled, falling into the fireplace.  She caught on fire, struggling to stand up.

Mason was now gnawing into Rachel’s shoulder blade.  Rachel was trying to get away, but Mason was too strong.  He pushed her down.  She fell onto her back.  Mason fell on her.

Vera was back up, now on fire.  Her long gray hair was burning.  Her arms were outstretched, on fire, reaching for Mindy and I.

Mindy was screaming and crying.

I kicked
Vera back into the fire again.

Mason scratched Rachel’s shirt open.  She rolled over onto her front, trying to crawl away as Mason tried to grab her and pull her back to him.  He was fumbling with her feet, trying to get hold.  Blood saturated her shoulder.

Vera was struggling to get out of the fire, but she couldn’t.  The fire had burned into the muscles of her arms.  She had no way to get out of the fire.  She lay there struggling and burning.  The smell of burnt flesh was overwhelming in the room.

Quickly, I ran over to Mason.  He didn’t pay attention to me.  The red handled dagger that Rachel used to kill him was now lying on the ground.  I picked it up.  Cursing, I jammed
it into the back of Mason’s head.  He went face down into Rachel’s torn back.

Mindy was standing in the middle of the room, crying loudly.

“I need to do this to Rachel too,” I whispered.  “She’ll change into a zombie…”

Mindy screamed “No!”

I
had
to kill Rachel.  Even though I knew she would eventually die from Mason’s attack, I had to kill her.  I told myself that there wasn’t a way to save her.  We had no medical training to save a person injured in such a way.

It was the humane thing to do, right?

I convinced myself that yes, it
was
the humane
thing to do.  Yes, she
was
going to die from Mason’s attack.  Yes, there
was
no way to save her.

You rotten bastard,
I told myself.
  You’re going to kill her to get her out of the way! You’re afraid she’s going to heal up and tell Mindy all about your affair! You’re afraid she’s going to heal up and want to have more fuck sessions with you.  You go ahead and kill her! Get her out of the way! Vera and Mason are already gone.  They knew about you fucking her.  Now kill Rachel. Make it sound like she is going to turn into a zombie.  Make Mindy feel sorry for her.

I dragged Mason’s body off of Rachel.  Her
shoulder was covered in blood.

In pain, Rachel laid there, out of breath.  “Dan…” she said softly.

I jammed the knife into the side of Rachel’s skull.

Her head clonked down onto the tile.

“
Oh my God!”
Mindy cried.  “
Oh Jesus.”

We burned them all.

Even though the smell was noxious, we stood in silence watching them burn.

Our friends were gone.

We moved our tent back into the buffet.  The smell was too strong in the lobby.

We didn’t talk very much.  Mindy cried a lot.  I cried, too, mostly because I was so mad at myself.  If I wouldn’t have cheated with Rachel then none of this would have ever happened and I never would have needed to murder her.

I can’t believe that I was so selfish.

The winter lasted a lot longer than I thought it should have.  It snowed all the time.  Luckily all of the food that we had cut up didn’t spoil.  We ate very little of it.

Anytime either of us had to use the restroom, we both went.  We didn’t go in separate restrooms, either.

We became like peas in a pod again.  It took a long time, but we overcame the depression of losing our friends.  We had been so
close to them.