Roxanne's Story (Book 1): Survival in the Zombie Apocalypse (33 page)

“You went away for a long time after that, Roxanne.”

“Yes, but I’m slowly coming back.”

They were up at dawn since Jenny was tugging at her anchor, anxious to be away from her moorings. They did not eat breakfast, not knowing how rough it would become on deck or if they would be going into the water. They packed their personal gear in the raft and strapped it with the tarp to protect it against water damage, then tied it to the deck railing to prevent it from sliding off. They all went to the bridge to watch Brandon and to help him navigate, but Roxanne was concerned about Mutt.

“I don’t know where to put him so he won’t slide around and hurt himself.” Lucky suggested putting him on the bunk since it was a padded cushion but Roxanne wanted Mutt to be near her at all times. She had a rope looped on her belt and would tie it to Mutt if she needed to go overboard or abandon ship.

“Here,” Brandon went over to a bottom cupboard and opened the door. “Put Mutt in here, but leave the door open. At least he won’t slide from side to side. The only way he would slide out is if the bow tilts up, but it’s the best I can do if you want him close to you. You have little faith in me, all this planning to go overboard.”

Brandon raised the anchor and lowered Jenny’s paddlewheels. They waved at Martha’s house in case she was watching then they were on their way. The first two miles were no more than just another day on the Lake, but Brandon commented that Jenny had never been this fast before and that they must be in the current that feeds into the creek. As they approached what appeared to be the end of the lake and another shoreline Lucky said, “There!” pointing to his right. “Over there! I can see the runoff.”

Brandon could see white water against the rocks and wondered if his face went just as white. He changed over to the smaller rudders to slow their speed down and turned Jenny into the channel. The ride became rough but as long as he stayed in the middle he was in deep water and he wasn’t feeling any bumps or snags on the paddlewheels. His regained his confidence and looked behind him to give Lucky and Roxanne a smile. They both had their hands behind them so Brandon couldn’t see that they were holding on to the cabinet rails with white knuckles.

After another mile the creek narrowed causing the water to move faster and become more violent. “I can’t slow her down any more than this,” Brandon warned them. “We’ll need to ride this part out. I can drop the wheels down further and use them as a brake but I don’t want to do that unless we are in trouble. Don’t want to take the chance of smashing them up on something unseen underwater.”

Mutt gave up being knocked from one side of the cupboard to the other and came out in an attempt to reach Roxanne on the other side of the room. His nails couldn’t get a grip on the tile floor and he slid off to his right and hit the wall. Roxanne let go of the railing and was thrown toward Mutt but she managed to keep her balance. She reached down to tie the rope that was around her waist to Mutts collar and then held onto the railing as she made her way back to Lucky, keeping the rope short and Mutt close to her.

Suddenly the creek opened up again, the water became calmer and they all smiled at one another, but Lucky still had that hairpin turn in his mind. He would not be able to relax until Brandon had maneuvered that obstacle.

It was getting on to noon and they had been through several portions of the creek that narrowed and then opened again. Everyone was starting to get hungry and Brandon was wishing that he could find a calm place to anchor and rest his arms. Then Brandon saw the hairpin turn looming up ahead. Or rather he saw a wall of rocks in front of him and quickly calculated that he needed to make a direct right-hand turn without Jenny swinging too wide and hitting those rocks.

He knew that they were approaching too fast and at the last moment he released Jenny’s paddlewheels to act as a brake. When the paddles hit the water the bow lifted out of the water and then jerked around to the right. Everyone was thrown to the floor but Brandon held onto the wheel and quickly pulled himself up so he could see over the bow. Lucky and Roxanne stayed on the floor with their back against the cupboard that Mutt once occupied. They looked up to watch Brandon’s face and hoped to brace themselves in time if a look of horror came over him. Roxanne pulled on Mutts rope until he was beside her where she held him against her chest.

Brandon struggled with the wheel two more times, spinning it left and then right. He reached over to raise the paddles not wanting to keep them in the water in case there were hidden sandbars. After a while things appeared to be calmer; Jenny wasn’t rocking as badly and Brandon’s maneuvers at the wheel weren’t as drastic. They saw his eyes trying to focus on something, “I think I see the railroad tracks up ahead.” Both Roxanne and Lucky got up off the floor and turned around to look out over the bow.

“Thank God,” Brandon sighed. “I feel like a doctor who just performed successful surgery. Could someone wipe my brow, please?”

After dropping anchor Roxanne did not wait to eat, saying that she wanted to get Mutt on dry land. She said she would hunt up a squirrel or rabbit and took her crossbow, promising to stay close. She lowered herself down to the rowboat and they handed Mutt down to her, then her staff. Lucky gave her a late season apple to eat while on her search and pushed her off.

Lucky turned to Brandon, “I think we should probably pull the rowboat on board when we leave in the morning rather than tie her to Jenny. We were fortunate that the rowboat was on the right side of Jenny when we took that hairpin turn, otherwise it would have smashed up on the rocks when we swung out.” They watched Roxanne balance her staff in Mutts jaws and begin to row to shore.

Roxanne smiled as she rowed to shore. It felt good to be fully loaded again although she only had six shots in her pistol. But just feeling it there against her hip, her crossbow against her back, the new knife in her sheath and Mutt before her with the staff, it gave her a feeling of confidence again.

As soon as she hit shore and took the staff out of Mutts mouth he immediately jumped out of the rowboat and went under the bridge to do his business. She pulled the rowboat out of the water and waved to the guys still on deck. She climbed the bank to the top of the tracks and looked both ways, waiting for Mutt to catch up with her then she loaded an arrow. She didn’t see movement of Ze’s, people or animals on the tracks but she wanted to be ready. It was rather serene listening to the birds and seeing the change of colors in the fall foliage. She heard geese honking and looked up to see a flight passing over.

Mutt caught up to her and she looked down once more at the men to see that Lucky was getting his fishing rods out. “Well Mutt, I don’t see any buildings on either side so I guess it doesn’t matter which way we go. Let’s try west.” They had walked perhaps a quarter mile when she could see the backyard of someone’s home extending to the tracks. She knelt in the bushes for some time watching the house but did not see movement in or around the property. There was an asphalt road in front of the house that looked as if it might travel parallel with the tracks. If that was the case then there could be several homes along this stretch of road. She had not brought her backpack with her, carrying only a plastic bag to tie to her waist if she had snared a rabbit or squirrel.

She wanted to check out the home and if it held supplies then she would look for more bags, or use a pillowcase. She saw a child’s red wagon and decided that if it was a good haul she could use that too. She did not like crossing the open back yard since she was in full view of anyone who could be in the house. She crouched and ran to the steps of the backdoor and tried the door handle but it was locked. She went around the side of the house and noticed low windows at ground level which meant there was a basement. She peered in but it was too dark to see anything other than a furnace and hot water heater. She cursed herself for not bringing her flashlight and for being so sloppy. She glanced at Mutt but he was not showing signs of danger so she went around to the front door only to find that it was locked too.

She looked up and down the highway expecting to see a car come along at any moment and knew it was a silly thought but she could not bring herself to break into the front of the house out in the open like this. She went back to the basement windows and kicked one in with her boot then waited to see if the noise brought trouble. She looked at Mutt one last time and then made the crawl through the narrow opening and reached back to retrieve her crossbow. “I’ll open the back door for you Mutt, I don’t want you crawling through the glass,” she whispered. “The back door, Mutt” and pointed which way he should go.

Her eyes adjusted to the dim room and she saw the stairs which she cautiously followed up to the kitchen. She moved the curtains aside on the kitchen window to see Mutt waiting on the steps for her and unlocked the door to let him in but quickly relocked it behind him. From what she could see in the kitchen someone was still living here. There was the smell of food cooked recently and several bottles of water on the counter plus the smell of cigars. The place made her nervous and she wanted to get out quickly, only taking a few supplies and leaving the rest. She would not go further down the tracks to check for more homes deciding instead to go directly back to the boat.

She looked around the corner of the kitchen to see Mutt in a hallway off the living room scratching at a bedroom door. She walked up to the door and put her ear to it but could not hear any movement. She reached down and slowly turned the knob but it was locked. Mutt continued to scratch at the door so Roxanne stepped away and readied her crossbow, “Hello? Is anyone there?” she said.

She heard a gasp and a female voice spoke out. “Oh, thank god, thank god. I heard the scratching and thought it was a zombie. Please help me before he comes back. Hurry!”

Hurry! I can’t get to the door to help you. I’m tied up,” the woman’s voice pleaded.

Roxanne had never kicked a door down in her life and she wasn’t doing very well at it this first time. She slung the crossbow across her back and braced her hands on each side of the wall to kick at the latch. “Mutt, back up. You’re in my way.” On the third attempt the door finally broke its lock and swung partially open. She quickly brought her crossbow forward for she could only see part of the room and did not know if she was walking into another trap.

“Quickly, he’ll be back any moment!”

Roxanne nudged the door with her foot so it would open further and saw a woman in her early twenties tied spread-eagle on the bed. She was fully dressed in a printed skirt and a white tank top with long blond hair and a tan that did not seem to come from working in the sun. She was tugging at her restraints, pleading, “Quickly, quickly,” but Roxanne ignored her and walked over to the closet door. Keeping the sights up on her crossbow she pulled the door open but other than a few clothes it was empty. Then she got down on her knees and looked under the bed.

“What are you looking for? I told you it was just me. What are you waiting for? He’ll kill us both.”

Roxanne lowered the crossbow and began to cut the ropes from the headboard. “How many are there?” she asked.

“Just one.”

“Is he armed? Does he have a gun?”

“Just a knife, but he’s real quick with that. I’ve seen him throw it to pin a squirrel against a tree before it could move. And he…he killed my neighbor that way, by throwing it and… and…. then he kidnapped me.”

Roxanne moved to the foot of the bed and began cutting the ropes. “Which way does he come in, kitchen or living room?”

“The kitchen, why?”

“Because we’re going to wait for him.”

The woman gasped and got off the bed after Roxanne cut the last rope, “Are you out of your mind? He’s a murderer, he’ll kill us both, and he’ll have your head split open with that knife before you pull the trigger on that crossbow. I’m telling you, he’s quick and he’s canny. He will feel it as soon as he walks in the house.”

Roxanne smiled, “Then I will need to kill him as soon as he opens the door, won’t I? Are those windows nailed down?”

The girl went over to check and shook her head, “No, but he’ll see that they are open from the road and will get suspicious. Why can’t we just leave?” At that moment they both heard a motorcycle in the distance. “Oh shit, oh shit” the woman started to panic.