Those Who Remain (Book 2) (18 page)

I keep going, hugging myself. Classrooms pass by, and for a second it’s like I’m back at school, sneaking in earlier in the morning to pull a prank on Jenny. Shouting and yells break the illusion. I dash inside a classroom and hide behind a teacher’s desk.

They are looking for me. I need to get away.

The windows are all boarded and locked. My only way out is through the front door. As I get up to prepare to run, my eyes fall on a gun lying on the teacher’s desk. I take it, hoping it’s loaded and ready to shoot.

I poke my head out the door and make sure the corridor is empty before exiting. The voices are distant, but not enough, so I start to run, to where I hope is the front door. My teeth rattle against my skull, heart beating faster. I’m too exposed. Someone will see me.

Almost slipping on the waxed floor, I turn a corner.

A man faces me. I face him. I freeze as he widens his eyes.

“Hey there,” he says after a brief second. He takes his hands out of his pockets and takes a step back. “You woke up, huh?”

I move back and lift the gun.

“Whoa, I’m not here to hurt you.” He walks forward, hands up in a gesture of surrender. “We were worried about you. Are you feeling better?”

My hands shake, finger on the trigger. Is he lying? Does he want to distract me and take my gun?

“What’s your name?” He asks.

I look at him, up and down. He’s young, like a college student. He’s wearing red and green sneakers, fainted jeans, an open winter coat and a T-Shirt. The T-Shirt has Yoda on it with a quote below the old Jedi Master’s smiling face: “My finger you shall pull”.

“I’m Laurie….”

He smiles, and moves in closer. “Nice to meet you.”

I lift the gun, aiming at his chest. “Don’t. Stay where you are.”

“Okay, okay.” He steps back a little. “Let’s take it easy.”

“I just want to leave.” My voice trembles. “Just leave me alone.”

“Why?” His tone is soft. I stare at his green eyes—they are red and puffy. “Being alone sucks.”

“It’s safer. It’s… I’m better off alone.”
People just lie and leave you. Or die. They always die.

He shakes his head. “No one is better off alone. You are safe here, we can protect you. We have a whole town of people. No zombie will hurt you. I promise.”

“I’m not afraid of zombies.”
I’m afraid of you.

He chuckles. “Yeah, you seem pretty tough. But aren’t you tired of being alone? We have food here. Lots of food. Even pizza. This town is safe. You don’t need to be alone anymore.”

I hesitate for a second. “You… You have to promise you won’t hurt me. Promise me.”

“Sure. I promise. So, you can lower the gun now, right?”

I nod slowly and take a step in his direction. The instant I lower my gun, a scream pierces my ears, and my finger slips on the trigger. A gunshot rings loud around us and I wince, a burnt smell invading my nose. When I open my eyes, the guy is touching his chest as blood spurts from his mouth.

“No… No, no, no. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I run as his body falls backwards on the ground.

He coughs blood. I cover the hole in his chest with my free hand. He tries to speak, but the red liquid floods his mouth.

“Please… Please. I’m sorry. Don’t die.”

“It’s… O-okay. This…” He coughs blood. “I’m….”

He can’t speak anymore, spilling blood over his T-shirt and my hands. His eyes stop looking at me, instead focusing on the ceiling. He’s dying. And it’s my fault.

Steps. Running. Hushed voices. Yells. My heart pounds against my chest.

They are going to kill me now. If they catch me… If they find me… They will kill me. This is my fault.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper to the man on the floor. “I’m so sorry.”

I run as fast as I can, as far away as my feet can take me. Out on the street, darkness hides me. Shops, cars, houses, I leave it all behind. Flashlights blink as I glance back, but the voices become distant. I find cover between the trees, crunching snow until I trip and hit the ground.

My hands freeze against the snow as I force myself up. I run deeper inside the forest, stopping for nothing. After hours, my feet finally give up.

I sit with my back against a tree and hug myself. I choke back tears, but they won’t stop. They keep falling and falling.

I want to go home. I just want to go home.

The Geek X

January 8th, Friday, 10 am

Roger's house smells like an old lady's house. He has three cats, who are the true rulers of the place. They like me as much cats can like an intruder in their own home. Which means they hate me. Somehow it works out, because I hate myself too.

Roger tries to distract me with all sorts of talk. He starts with the obvious: movies. He takes me to Movie Night, but the basketball court just reminds me of Ma. He brings me comics that Old Hank's sons collected, thinking I had never read them, but he was wrong. He tries to get me interested in the town's problems again, but I don't care anymore. The town can go to hell. I should've taken Ma alone. Helping Redwood was a horrible idea.

For the sake of my friend, I try to pretend I still care about stuff. My mouth forms smiles, spills out jokes and sarcastic commentary. For his part, he pretends to believe it and tries to hide his pity most of the time. Lily helps, in a weird way. When she's with us, my smiles don’t look so fake, and it gets easier to fool myself into thinking being okay is going to be possible. Someday.

After a while, I can't pretend anymore. It's too much effort. It hurts too much. Roger sighs a lot, and finally gives up. Lily takes over. I have no idea why she even cares, but one Friday morning she knocks on Roger's door and asks me to go hunting with her.

I say yes, because, well, why not. As long I don't have to touch a gun, and speak at all, it's okay. She tracks something, maybe a deer, I don't know. I'm just glad it's not snowing. Maybe. I trail behind her, hands in my coat's pockets.

“So, how long until you stop moping around?” She says, adjusting her rifle against her left shoulder.

I stare at her, confused. “Sorry?”

“You heard me.”

The best thing I can give her is a shrug.

“Do you plan to drink all of the remaining beer in the world and stare at the walls ‘til the day you die from doing nothing at all?”

“Excuse me for not being chipper.”

“Danny, your mother was tough as nails. She was a warrior. Better than anyone else in this shitty town. If she saw you now she would lecture you until you stopped being an idiot.”

“But she’s not here to do that. That’s the point. Aren’t you paying attention? My mother fucking died. She
died
.”

I can’t believe I said it out loud. My heart reaches my throat, the lump making hard to breathe. I could give anything to be someplace else, preferably dark and lonely.

We stop walking. Lily places two hands on my shoulders. I stare at her. She’s has dark mysterious eyes, a long nose and shining black hair in a tight ponytail. I like her ears too, not too small, but not too big either. Just the right size. Roger’s lucky she likes him back.

“I know. But enough is enough. You moped around for one month, Danny. You can’t keep doing this. It won’t change anything. She died, but you didn’t. You need to get yourself together and survive.”

I could roll my eyes, but it seems too much effort. “Easy for you to say, your mother is still alive.”

“Yeah, she is. But she left me, like it was the easiest thing to do. It made me feel horrible. Like I wasn’t good enough, and it was my fault. I know what it feels like to have a deep black hole inside your chest. Sometimes I think I’m just… Wrong. But I kept going, still am. Bad things stay with us forever, but that doesn’t mean we get to mope around and be useless.”

I chew the inside of my mouth. It’s hard to believe she’s telling me all of this, but somehow it makes me feel something, even if it’s feeling worse. Why is she opening up to me like that? What am I supposed to say now? I’m so glad you also feel like crap too? That doesn’t sound right.

“You are not very good at this.” My intention was to make a joke, but the monotone ruined it.

“I know. But we figured it was time to bring out the bad cop.”

I smile. A real smile. So she was the bad cop to Roger’s good cop. Makes sense.

“So suck it up. There are zombies to be killed.” She points at the ground. Human tracks are in front of us.

“I don’t think I have the stomach to do that anymore.”

“Then you can be the bait.” She gives me a radiating smile. “Let’s move.”

Her company distracts me from thinking too much about other things. She pushes me hard, never letting us stop for a rest. I kinda like the pain. It’s better than the nothing, the emptiness inside me. She’s not exactly my friend, so I don’t need to fake being happy around her either. A relief of its own accord.

“You know, I would never guess you, of all people, would try to save the town,” Lily says, crouching in front of a frozen scrub. “If I remember right, you kept saying you were the new George Lucas, and were going to move to Hollywood. And never, ever, come back.”

As she touches the vegetation in search of clues, I flex my gloved hands. “I used to say lots of stuff. Really dumb stuff.”

She turns, giving me a roll of her eyes and a smile. “Come on, Danny. It’s okay to admit you like Redwood.”

I sigh. I used to think I wanted to save town, but the truth is without Ma, I don’t really care about it. Redwood was her home. Her pride and joy. She worked her ass off to help to make the town a nice place for everyone. It wouldn’t be right if the zombies destroyed all her hard work. Not after everything she went through with Dad. If I could keep everything the same, protect Redwood from the worst of the zombie apocalypse, then we could keep on living like nothing had changed. I didn’t want Ma to suffer the things survivors of zombie movies had to suffer.

“I guess you like the town now, since you’re staying for good.” Hopefully she won’t notice I ignored her question. “You are staying for good, right?”

What surprises me is that I don’t actually want her to leave. She’s my buffer right now. The filler of awkward silences between Roger and myself after one of his disastrous attempts at cheering me up. If she leaves, then I’m going to be truly lost.

She gets up and wipes the snow off her pants. “Why? Do you want me to leave too? You should sign Linda Fords’ petition then.”

I let out a snort. “Of course there’s a petition. That woman wastes no time. Gotta admire her efficiency, at least. Too bad zombies aren’t afraid of lawyers.”

We both laugh. Mine is a short, bitter laugh. Deep snow slows our pace. Cooped up inside Roger’s guest-room, I didn’t even notice yesterday’s snowstorm. My butt is freezing. “But, really… You are staying in town? No second thoughts?”

“I’m staying.” She sighs. “There’s nothing left out here for me. Father’s gone.”

I watch her from the corner of my eyes. There’s no hint of regret. “Oh. Sorry about that.”

“I made my choice. No use being sad about it.”

“Good, because I’m pretty sure that’s your old hunting cabin.” I point to our right, at a wooden cabin between the trees.

Lily stops moving, color drained from her face. I find it mildly surprising that my own sadness makes room to pity her. Before we say anything else, she starts to walk toward the cabin.

Then she runs.

She’s too fast for me. When I reach the cabin she’s already placed her gun on the kitchen table. Whatever she thought she would find in here, it’s gone. She looks around the empty house with a frown, twice passing a hand over her red nose. Is she going to cry?

I don’t know why, but seeing her like this, broken, I just have to walk to her and place a hand on her shoulder.

“Lily?”

She walks away from me, sitting on a chair next to the fireplace.

I sit in front of her. “I’m sorry. I guess he really left.”

Her silence makes the whole place feel even more cold and empty. I get up, bring in a log and start a fire. Lily does nothing but hug herself. I feel bad for her; in a weird way we both are orphans now. Except, in her case, she’s better off. Too bad she can’t see that.