Creed (5 page)

I took two more steps forward before I realized that Mike and I were alone. Luke was still standing at the curb, staring at the mailbox. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

He shook his head, and I followed his eyes to the side of the mailbox. The number seven was plastered on the otherwise unadorned piece of tin. I knew what Luke was thinking, but the agony of the cold was settling into my bones and every muscle in my body was beginning to ache.

“Ah … yeah … no. Third house. That was the deal. I don’t care if it’s number seven or number three hundred and thirty-three. If we don’t find a phone or some gas, then we won’t see any of it,” I said, my mind still clinging to the futile hope that we would make at least the last set of the concert.

“See any of what?” Luke asked.

“Nothing,” I said. There was virtually zero chance we’d make it to the concert, but I wanted to at least make use of the hotel room. “Let’s hope somebody’s home.”

Mike rang the doorbell. When nobody answered, he put his ear to the door, listening for footsteps. Stepping back, he rapped his knuckles against the wood again and waited. “I don’t hear anything,” he said. “So much for your
lucky
number three.”

Luke grumbled something about the number seven and shoved Mike out of the way. He reached for the doorknob and twisted it gently. I held my breath, expecting to hear the catch of a lock at any moment, but it never came. One click later, the door swung open, a hazy light falling across us from inside.

“Look, they were expecting us,” Mike joked, waving me in. “They left the door unlocked and everything.”

“Are you insane?” I hissed, not moving. “We can’t just walk in. That’s breaking and entering for real.”

“No one’s home, Dee. And if they are, once we tell them we’re looking for a phone and some gas, they aren’t gonna call the cops,” Luke said. “Think about it. If we were running around their house with sacks full of their stuff, maybe. But not three kids looking for some help.”

I studied Luke’s expression, watching his eyes for any sign of doubt, but I saw none. I’d heard the intensity in his voice and knew full well that he wouldn’t have suggested this if he hadn’t thought it through a billion times. He was that type of person—the kind who formulated a backup plan for his backup plan.

Look at me, Dee,” Mike said as he waved his arms around wildly, dozens of crystallized pellets sticking to the sleeves of his shirt. “It’s freezing out here. Besides, Luke’s right. We’ll use the phone, wait for the tow truck to come pick us up, then be on our way. They won’t even know we were here.”

“This is crazy,” I said, exhaling loudly. Taking chances wasn’t something I was good at, and the thought of wandering into this house felt about as wrong as anything had in a while. “Fine, but only because we’re out of choices. And if I hear anything,
anything
, then we’re leaving. There’s something screwy about this place.”

I bit down on the inside of my cheek, silently cursing myself for getting us into this mess. On an ordinary Friday night I’d be at home, waiting for Luke to come watch a movie and trying to ignore the smell of Mrs. Hooper’s not-yet-
perfected veggie lasagna. Right about now, even that smell was appealing.

FIVE

A cold slap of air hit me the second I stepped through the door, the quick chill pushing me back outside rather than drawing me into the safe, dry confines of the house. Luke must have felt it too because he swept his arm backward, tucking me safely behind him. I wasn’t complaining. I was more than happy to let Luke be the first one through that door.

The breeze quickly died, and the fluttering curtains went still. Mike pushed past me and was ahead of Luke in two strides. “Door,” he said.

I stood there, silent, with no clue whether I should back out or come in and lock the door behind me. It wasn’t until Mike started walking down the hall that I realized what he’d meant. The entryway opened into a living room. There was a hallway beyond it leading straight to the kitchen and a back door. It was
that
door that was wide open. The shot of cold we’d felt was a cross-breeze created by our sudden entrance.

Mike put a finger to his lips, motioning for us to stay quiet as he shut the door.

“I doubt there’s anybody home,” Luke whispered into my ear. “But stay here and let me and Mike take a look around.”

I dug myself farther into his side. I wasn’t remotely interested in wandering around this house until we were certain it was empty. And I didn’t want Luke to either. But he smiled and peeled me off him, then motioned for me to stay put as he headed for the stairs.

Mike returned first, the ease of his stride letting me know he’d found nothing. “I walked around back,” he said as he triple-checked the lock on the front door. “Nobody’s out there. My guess is they left in a hurry when the sirens went off.”

As much as I wanted to believe it was the sirens that had driven the owners away, the logic of that theory couldn’t compete with my paranoia. “Or maybe they left when they heard us coming,” I said.

Mike shrugged. “Doubt it. They’ve been gone for a while. If they’d just left, I’m pretty sure I would’ve seen them out there, but there’s nothing but miles of fields. Plus, there’s snow on the ground. I’d see their tracks if they left recently, and there aren’t any.”

I looked out the front window, searching what I could see of the neighbors’ yards. Nothing but a clean slate of snow marred by
our
footprints

“Where’s Luke?” Mike asked.

I lifted my chin toward the ceiling. I could hear Luke moving around upstairs, the creak of the floorboards and the sound of doors opening and closing keeping me on edge.

“I’ll check the upstairs with him. Yell if you need us,” Mike said.

I stood there alone, listening to Mike and Luke’s footsteps above. Their voices were muffled by the ceiling that separated us, but I could make out a few words. Luke laughed, that low rumble of amusement that only Mike could draw out, and I instantly relaxed. If Mike was joking and Luke was laughing, then things couldn’t be that bad.

The heat clicked on, the soft whine of a furnace finally taking the chill out of the air. It was then, when my mind and body finally eased into the warmth pouring from the vents, that I looked around. I was standing in the living room. A very dull, very boring living room. The walls, the couch, even the curtains were beige. There wasn’t a single picture on the wall or knick-knack on the mantle. In fact, with the exception of the dying yellow embers in the fireplace, the sole color in the room came from the massive gold cross hanging above the mantle.

I couldn’t help myself. I reached up and touched the bottom of the cross. It was cool despite the fire burning below it. Even the Hoopers, the most religious people I knew—who went to church on Sundays and said grace before holiday meals—even
they
didn’t having something this big hanging on their wall.

Drawn to the warmth of the fire, I found myself lingering there, peeling off my gloves as I tried to absorb the heat. I kicked off my shoes and wiggled my toes in front of the flames until I felt the soft, painful tingle of life returning. Once my body no longer burned with cold, I’d be able to focus on the moment and how we were going to get out of this place.

“All clear upstairs,” Luke said, and I jumped at the sound of his voice, nearly toppling into the brick hearth as I spun around to see him. He reached out to steady me as Mike pulled back the screen and tossed in another log. The fire crackled, the embers suffocating under the weight of the new wood for a moment before flaring back to life.

“You find a phone?” I asked.

Luke shook his head. “I didn’t see one upstairs. Let’s check the kitchen.”

I stripped off my damp socks and laid them out by the fire to dry. No way was I staying here more than a few minutes, but even that could make the difference between my feet being wet or numb. I stepped around the corner, skidding to a stop as I took in the kitchen. The table was set, and something had boiled over on the stove. From the looks of it, they’d been getting ready to eat dinner when whatever drove them away came knocking.

“Like I told you, someone left in a hurry,” Mike said as he tossed the offending pot into the sink.

I glanced into the bottom of the pot, the brown, crusted mess on it heightening my fears. The weather may have been nasty, but not emergency-evacuation worthy. And definitely not bad enough to leave food unattended on a lit stove.

I turned back to the table and counted the number of plates. Three. Three sets of silverware. Three bowls of salad. Three glasses of milk. The napkins were tossed onto the plates and the bottle of salad dressing was tipped over, its contents pooling onto the nearest place mat.

Not thinking, I went over to the table and picked up the bottle. I used one of the napkins to clean up the mess before putting the salad dressing back in the fridge. I was planning to do the same to the butter and grated cheese when Luke caught my wrist and spun me around to face him. “Leave it, Dee.”

I yanked my wrist free, a brief flash of panic forcing me to push him away. I rarely reacted to Luke like that, hardly ever let my past override what I knew to be the truth. But here in this house, in this town, nothing felt right.

Luke held up his hands, the look on his face clearly indicating that my reaction stung. “Dee, I would never—”

I waved him off, unwilling to allow my issues to make the night any worse than it already was. Truth was, I trusted Luke completely. I knew he wouldn’t hurt me. Ever.

“Sorry,” I muttered.

Luke nodded, but he kept his distance as I started clearing the table again. It was a monotonous task, something dull and rote to keep my mind off the inevitable. We’d missed the concert, it was freezing outside, and the quick look I’d had of this house told me there was no phone, never mind people. And we were stuck here.

“There’s no phone,” I mumbled as I dumped the milk down the drain. I quickly circled the kitchen in search of the dishwasher. There wasn’t one. Of course not. Why would there be. “There’s no dishwasher. I bet they don’t even have a TV or a computer.”

Mike nodded, confirming my thoughts. I sat down right there on the kitchen floor, pissed that the night had been ruined, angry with myself for not checking the gas gauge, and more than a tiny bit scared. I hated feeling like this … like I had no control and absolutely no say in what happened next.

“It’s no biggie,” Luke said as he slid down in front of me and raised my chin so I’d meet his eyes. “We’ll try another house.”

That would be the logical solution, but my ability to reason had disappeared when I’d found myself playing hopscotch in a graveyard. “I don’t get it. Who doesn’t have a phone?”

“We don’t,” Mike said, and I glared up at him. I wasn’t looking an answer. I just needed to vent.

“No, seriously, we don’t,” Mike continued. “We haven’t had a land-line in almost two years. We only have cell phones.”

I knew that, but I looked to Luke for confirmation anyway. “Yup,” he said. “Mom had it disconnected. Said it was useless with how much we were on our cells.”

The Hoopers had a land-line, one of those old things still attached to the wall. But they could barely figure out how
to work voicemail, never mind learn how to text. Them having a wall phone made sense. The rest of the world … not so much. “So what are the chances any of these other houses have a phone?” I asked.

Luke shrugged, that familiar twitch of his shoulders that meant our odds weren’t good.

“Okay, then let’s go back to the car,” I suggested. “We can flag down the next person who drives by.”

“I know it seems safer there, but without gas, Dee,
we can’t turn the heat on. That car is nothing but a metal icebox now.”

“Then let’s head back into town,” I said. The house we were holed up in may have been warm, and there was plenty of food already on the table, but something about it freaked me out. “We can stay at that gas station until one of the attendants comes back.”

It was Mike who answered this time. He went over to the picture window and drew back the curtains so I could see for myself. “It’s dark out, and the wind is picking up. My guess is the snow isn’t going to let up for a while, and the last thing we need is to get lost out there.”

I knew what he was thinking. It was the smart thing to do, the safe thing, but that didn’t make it any less horrifying. “What? You think we should stay here? In somebody else’s house? All night?”

Neither of them spoke, and that was answer enough. “No,” I said, looking at my watch. “It’s barely seven. We have plenty of time.”

“No we don’t,” Mike said.

“But what if they come home? I mean, they aren’t going to be too happy when—”

“We already locked the doors,” Luke said, cutting me off.

My eyes trailed to the front door. Not only had they locked it, but Luke had jammed a chair up against the handle. “What’s that for?”

“Nothing,” Mike said. “We just want fair warning should this town come back to life.”

I thought Mike’s choice of words was interesting and almost asked him to explain what,
exactly
, he meant by “fair warning.” But to be honest, I didn’t want to know. Years of zombie movies had warped me, conditioned me to expect moaning throngs of rotting flesh in circumstances like this. And based on the primitive quality of the local cemetery, the dead wouldn’t have far to crawl to get above ground.