Flu (11 page)

    She opened the patio doors, nervously and excitedly pointing the revolver at the two men inside.

    "Front door key. Where is it?"

    "No way," said Lark, shaking his head, "We have no idea who-"

    "It's the fucking police!" yelled Geri, her patience completely shot. "So give me the fucking keys, now!"

    "How do you know who it is?" argued Lark.

    "Because they look like the police, they shoot like the police, they dress like the police and they're in a fucking police Land Rover!"

    "This is bullshit…" McFall offered, also not convinced.

    "I swear to God, I will shoot you right now unless you -"

    "Okay!" Lark yelled, seemingly fully convinced she would shoot him. "In the bottom drawer of the kitchen

    She was gone before he even finished his sentence, taking care to close the patio back up again. She threw the patio keys on the kitchen table, still keeping the revolver in one hand, searching the bottom drawer of the kitchen unit with the other. Sure enough, she found a set of what looked to be house keys under some drying towels and dishcloths.

    The banging continued, more frantically, now. The voices of the two policemen were becoming more panicked. Geri limped towards the door, groping for and trying each of the keys on the Yale-shaped keyhole.

    Eventually one turned and she went to pull the door open wide, frustrated whenever it caught on the security chain. Swearing, she shut the door, again, undoing the security chain and pulling it open.

    The next few seconds were a blur, Geri being knocked to the ground as a mass of police riot gear, dead grasping hands and panicked voices poured through the front doorway. Geri fell hard against the hallway wall, losing consciousness for the second time within a week…

Chapter Seven

    Pat sat on the sofa, his 9mm sitting on the coffee table beside him. A damp, blood-stained cloth rested in his hand. He was leaning back, blowing out some air as if suddenly able to relax. His face was clean, and Karen could make out his furrowed brow, again.

    "Doesn't look like you've been cut, or anything," she said, smiling.

    Pat looked at her with no expression.

    "It was trying to bite me," he said. "Did you see that?"

    If she were completely honest, she had been terrified that he
had
been bitten. She had completed a first aid course recently, in preparation for some youth work in her church. She knew from the training that a bite would be one of the worst ways for infection to spread. He would have almost certainly become infected, were that thing to have sunk its teeth into him. A part of her realised, then, just how much she depended on the man on the sofa opposite her. Even though he was stubborn. She reckoned he didn't believe what those things were capable of, that his theories on them had been proved all wrong from this most recent encounter. For a man like Pat, a man who held steadfastly onto all his beliefs and ideas, through rain and shine, to have to admit to being wrong about something would not sit well.

    But Karen felt something else, as well.

    "Did you see
me
shooting it?" she exclaimed, excitedly, like a little girl after a fairground ride. Her heart was pumping, but not nervously. She felt strong and powerful, as if able to take on the world. She remembered reading comics that her brother used to like, when she was little. She had always been attracted to the female super-heroes. Crimefighters who wore heeled boots and super-sexy outfits. She used to tie her coat around her neck, like a cape, and pretend to be one of them in the playground. All the other girls would be playing with skipping ropes while she played 'super heroes' with the boys.

    "Sure I did," Pat said, the hint of admiration spreading across his face. She knew he would have to give it to her. She had saved his life, after all. "You did really well, today," he continued. "Really, really well."

    Karen beamed, lapping up the praise, regardless of how economically it was relayed to her. In fact, it seemed even more ingratiating coming from a man like Pat, who was so economical with words. She thought about the word 'praise' - what it meant. What it
really
meant. It was bandied around a lot in her church. They should all praise God for all the things He had done for them, all that He had given to them. But, if she were to be truthful, she never meant those words when she sang them. She thought back to the Sunday mornings during 'praise.' How some people around her, young people like her, seemed to so confidently raise their hands, close their eyes and squeeze out the praise. Some would cry, others would smile and laugh. But she could never do any of that. She would have felt too much of a fraud because, if she were honest, she just wasn't feeling it like that.

    She lifted the handgun (
her
handgun), playing with it as she moved around the kitchen, aiming it at her reflection in the candlelit room's window. Pat had told her it was a 9mm. She studied it, noticing the words '9mm' were indeed inscribed on the jet-black barrel, beside the letters 'USP.' She decided she was going to keep it really clean, really polished, as if new.

    "Careful with that," Pat warned. "It's not a toy."

    "Don't worry, I've got the safety on," she said, waving her hand at him and pointing at the lever as if to say
I'm an old pro, now.

    "Well, just be careful…" he said, grumbling to himself like the old man he was.

    When she held the gun, it made her feel confident. As confident as those people in the church. It was as though she were beginning to feel like more of an equal to Pat, no logger needing his protection. She even felt like his ally, since the incident in the flat, as opposed to a liability. Someone he could depend upon, perhaps discuss plans with and gain insight from. She felt like a different person altogether when she was holding the gun. She could imagine herself even wearing different clothes. Out with the cute dresses and flat pumps. In with the combats and DM boots.

    "I want to shoot more of them," she said, suddenly.

    Pat shook his head.

    "Too dangerous," he said. "Plus, we really have no need to go outside again. Not for a long time." He pointed over to the opened cupboards, stocked to excess with tinned goods and bottled water. "We've only cleared a few floors and we have enough to do us for months. We should find enough in the other floors to keep us even longer."

    "But I want to hunt them!" she protested, like a child begging to go to the park or swimming pool. "I'm a good shot - you even said so yourself. Come on! Let's go shoot some more. Even if just from one of the windows, lower down."

    "No!" said Pat, quite sternly.

    It unnerved Karen, a little, knocking her out of her excited tirade.

    "It's not a game!" he continued. "Those used to be real people, you know. They aren't just dummies for you to take potshots at! They were people like you and like me. People with feelings and emotions and -" He stopped, suddenly seeming aware of himself. He stood up from the sofa, looking away from her. A heavy mood seemed to have descended upon him. Karen had never seen him as intense as this, and she didn't like it. "I'm going to bed," he said. "Make sure you blow out those candles."

    And with that, she felt small again. The child in their 'adult-child' relationship. It was almost as if he were saying, 'You've had your fun, now get back into line.' And she didn't like how that made her feel.

    Karen set her gun down, carefully, on the table. She walked, quietly, over to the sofa and picked up the damp cloth he'd left lying there. She tutted at the state it was in. It used to be pure white. She found herself wondering how she'd get the blood stains out of it.

Chapter Eight

    "Miss? Are you okay? Miss?"

    Geri was lying on the sofa, coming to. She could hear commotion in the living room around her. It panicked her, at first, and she almost jumped to her feet before being stopped by the stranger in the flak jacket and helmet.

    "Just relax…" he said, easing her gently back onto the sofa. "You took a knock to the head, but you'll be okay."

    Geri ran a hand through her still-damp hair. She hadn't had any time to dry it from her bath, earlier, and for some reason felt embarrassed by that. She could feel a plaster on her left temple, where she'd obviously fallen. A tender lump rose up from its centre.

    "Thanks for letting us in," the young police officer said. "It's pretty wild out there."

    Geri smiled back, shaking his hand gently. She was feeling a little nauseous.

    "Least I could do," she said. "Good to see you still out there, doing something about that mess."

    The cop looked momentarily uncomfortable, offering only a weak smile in response.

    Geri winced, scrunching her eyes up as she let the wave of sickness pass.

    "You okay?" the young cop said.

    "Yeah, just feeling a little sick," she said. "I'll be okay. Making a bit of a habit of falling down, to be honest."

    She looked to the other man, broader and older than the one talking to her. He stood by the window, looking out onto the street. His attention was on the dead and the dead alone. He had completely ignored her. It was almost as if he hadn't noticed her, and to a girl like Geri that was very bad manners, indeed. "Are they still out there?" Geri asked, slightly interested in the answer, but mostly to introduce herself.

    "We got rid of a lot of them," he answered, still peeking through the curtains. "There are still a few lingering about, though." He looked at Geri, his face a lot more serious and less kind than his partner's. "They're dumbfucks," he said. His accent was gruff, thick like porridge. "After a while, they forget what they were doing, why they were doing it and move on. There were about thirty of them outside, five minutes ago, but now there's only about five or six of them left." He stood back, as if proud of himself.

    Sure, he may not have been a 'people person', but Geri was still comforted by his presence. Stern, no-nonsense and built like a brick shit house. Wearing the uniform and carrying a gun. In a world like this, those kinds of specs would do a girl alright. The perfect double act, when paired with his calm, handsome mate. Her very own
Starsky and Hutch.
The complete package seemed to say
Just relax. Everything will be fine now that we 're here.
And she wanted so badly to feel relaxed.

    "The two men in the patio," the younger cop said, suddenly. "Who are they, and why have you locked them up?"

    "Oh, them?" Geri laughed, genuinely having forgotten all about her two ex-captors. "They were here before me. They tried to lock me in there, thinking I had the virus, but I managed to get the better of them."

    "I'll bet you did," replied Young Cop, almost flirtatiously.

    Geri smiled, slightly embarrassed. She didn't know why she was getting on like this, like a starry-eyed little girl. She supposed it was the uniform. It didn't just offer comfort and security to her. It was more than that. Like many women she'd known, Geri had always been a sucker for a man in uniform. That and the sudden lack of anything even smelling like talent in this new fucked- up world she found herself to be in.

    "So, what's the plan?" Geri asked, looking to both men in turn.

    The two men shared a glance that unnerved Geri slightly. Smiling, the younger one reached his hand forward to help her up from the sofa.

    "The plan is as follows," he said, placing his other hand on his partner's shoulder, "we'll let the big man, here, keep watch, while you give me a guided tour of the house. Preferably," he said, "with a cup of tea in my hand."

    Geri smiled, accepting his hand to pull her up from the sofa.

    "Do you take sugar?" she asked.

    "Always," he said, smiling.

    Lark stood up, nervously. He walked to one end of the room and then back. He repeated this action several times over, pacing like a caged animal.

    He thought back to when things were a lot simpler and less fucking hazardous to his health. Back when he had worked the desk at Belfast's infamous Gen X tattoo shop, suffering little more than stoned sixteen year olds with false ID and a grumpy bitch of a boss. Of course, he'd often moaned about life then, too. That was his nature - glass half-empty and all of that shit. But he'd had it pretty good, considering, and a large part of him was starting to realise that.

    He picked up a pan from the floor, aimlessly, then threw it back down, as if piping hot, realising it was the one that Geri had pissed in for three days.

    "Fuck this shit!" he spat, kicking the cupboards under the sink just a little too hard and hurting his DM-clad foot. He really had thought he was doing the right thing by quarantining Geri. That's what they had said to do in the news, right?
Quarantine your family,
they said.
Quarantine your neighbours, yourself, even. If symptoms such as sneezing or coughing or prickly throats develop,
they said,
you need to QUARANTINE.

    Of course, towards the end, they sent the fucking pigs around, wrapped in yellow plastic and breathing like fucking Darth Vader, to do all the quarantining themselves. And that's what worried him about the two newcomers, because Lark had been witness to a couple of incidents where the 'quarantine' had been replaced by 'extermination'.

    He'd been staying with a couple of mates. They'd been kicking back, drinking a lot of beer and smoking a lot of gear while the whole world went to shit. It seemed to be the best way of dealing with it, the only way of dealing with it.

    Until one of them got sick, that was.

    They never found out who it was who called the police, although Lark reckoned it was one of the bitches who were hanging around - no one seemed to know them too well. Either way, the cops came calling all too soon. A few of them kicked up a fuss. Anarchist types, in the street-understanding of the word, not too shy of fucking shit up when something needed sorting. They weren't too keen on the cops taking their friend away, so they put up a fight, some silly cunt deciding to pull the oxygen tank from one of the cops' back. It was maybe meant as a joke, when Lark thought back on it. Or a joke with a jag, at the very most. Just some pisshead mucking around, acting the big man in front of his mates. They were all pretty mangled by that stage, and probably not capable of very much in the way of a reasonable struggle. But the cops took it very seriously. Seriously enough to blow a hole right through the poor bastard's head with a Glock 17.