Instinct (34 page)

One of the desk drawers was open, and Tim saw that it served as Ty’s bureau. The bookshelf was a pantry. The floor was covered in an area rug that showed cartoon kids playing on giant alphabet letters. He wondered how the giant man could fit on the bed. It was just bigger than a cot—even smaller than the hospital beds that were in almost every room.
 

“He’s here,” Ty said.

“How do you know?” Tim asked. Ty was already through the door. Tim followed. He shut the door most of the way and motioned to Cedric. “Stay right there.” He couldn’t bear the idea of shutting the door all the way. What if something happened and nobody was around to let the dog out?
 

Tim rushed to catch up with Ty.

They snaked through corridors. The big man moved with ease, even when there was barely enough light to see their own feet. He knew every obstacle. When Ty pushed open the last door, Tim didn’t realize that they’d reached the emergency room from the other side. Ty glanced around and then moved into the lobby. He headed for the hall.

“Wait. What if he’s…” Tim started.

Ty whirled and pressed his finger to his lips. He pointed through the glass and Tim saw the motorcycle sitting there.

Ty continued towards the hall. He pushed open the swinging door and glanced down the length before he committed. Tim slipped behind him before the door closed and they walked. Light came in through the rooms every few paces, dividing the hall into bands of light and shadow. Amy Lynne’s room was around the corner, in the wing. Ty moved silently as he approached the corner.

Tim waited a few paces back. He didn’t want his own clumsy footfalls to give the man away.

Ty didn’t make it to the corner. Jackson stepped around before he got there. His gun was extended and there was a bright madness shining in the boy’s eyes. Ty’s hands went up immediately, but he kept to his low stance. He either wanted to keep the option of springing forward, or he didn’t want to scare the boy with his size. Tim held his ground. He resisted the strong urge to run.

“Where is she?” Jackson asked.

They all heard Amy Lynne moan her response. She was only a few rooms away.
 

“She’s doing better, but she’s too sick to move,” Ty said. He lowered his arms when Jackson’s attention was drawn down the hall by the moans. Jackson kept the gun pointed at Ty and he backed up towards the sound.

Jackson disappeared through the door, leaving Ty and Tim out in the hall.

“Maybe we should fade away,” Tim said. “He can catch up with Amy Lynne and maybe cool down.”

“He might try to move her,” Ty said. “That could kill her.”

Tim nodded. He wasn’t sure he agreed completely, but when Ty moved towards the room, Tim followed.

They found Jackson hovering over Amy Lynne’s bed. The gun was sitting on the rolling table next to her pitcher of water and the plastic cup. Amy Lynne was mumbling something to Jackson. Her hands were gripping his shirt.

The boy whipped around. “You wouldn’t give her candy? She loves her damn candy.”

“Wait a second, son,” Ty said. “Sick people need healthy, balanced diets so they can get better.”

Ty moved forward and Jackson jerked back. He put his hand on the gun. “You’re not touching her.”

“Jackson,” Ty said. His voice was slow syrup. It was low and soothing. “The longer she takes to heal, the more likely she’s going to get some infection.”

“You might try to kill her.”

“Why would I do that?” Ty asked.

“Why would we fix her up and move her to this room just to kill her?” Tim asked. He realized that speaking was a mistake as soon as the words left his mouth. The kid had been focusing on the giant man in blue scrubs and wasn’t at all concerned with him until he spoke. Once he turned his attention to Tim, Jackson’s fear took over.

“You stole her away. You’re pissed because I shot at your stupid dog.”

Tim backed up. Jackson’s hand was closing tighter on the gun. Tim didn’t want to look down that barrel ever again.

“You guys get out of here,” Jackson said. He didn’t exactly point the gun at them, but he waved it in their direction.

Tim didn’t need any more invitation than that. He backed up. Ty pulled the door shut behind him. They moved down to the next room, where Tim had spent the night.

“I’m not sure he’s terribly bright,” Tim said.
 

“They’re still alive,” Ty said. “They must have some sense.”

CHAPTER 22: FARM

R
OBBY
SAT
IN
BACK
, on top of the big rear tire of one of the tractors. Romie and Pete leaned against the side of the machine. They looked across the back of everyone’s heads. Apparently, this was the first real assembly of everyone at the farm. Even the horses, who stayed well back from their fence, seemed to be paying attention. Pete rose up on his toes and moved his head back and forth, like he was counting. Robby had a pretty good idea that Pete wasn’t looking at all the normal citizens, he was focused on what he called the “Beardo Brigade.” He’d been obsessed with them ever since he’d come out of his stupor.

Members of the Brigade usually moved around in pairs. Today, they were spread out. They stood alone, evenly spaced through the crowd.
 

A nervous-looking man stepped onto the porch of the house, which was at the front of the group. He waited while the murmuring died down and he had everyone’s attention. It only took a second.

“My name is Travis, if anyone out there doesn’t um…” He looked down for a second, like the rest of his sentence might be written on the boards. “I’ve only been here a week. I was asking who was in charge, and it turns out that um…” He looked down again. “It turns out that nobody is. I thought maybe we should have an election.”

Pete turned to Romie and kept his voice low for an aside. “He could have said, ‘Let’s vote,’ and be done in two words.”

Romie barked out a short laugh and a few faces turned back to see who had broken the silence. The man’s stammering style might have inflamed Pete’s impatience, but it had also endeared Travis to a lot of people in the crowd. He had their ear and their sympathy.

“Anyway, I thought we should publicly nominate people to run, let them say something, and then we can do an anonymous ballot. I don’t know how exactly to do it. I heard someone say we could make a list of everyone and let them go into a room. I’m not sure how that would…”

Travis trailed off and several people took the opportunity to shout out their opinions on possible voting mechanisms. A few debates around the group broke out. Finally, in a move that clearly made Travis uncomfortable, he raised his arms, asking the group to be quiet.
 

“If we could just tackle the nominations first,” Travis said. “Then I suggest the nominees could settle on the voting scheme.”

The group was silenced by this. As soon as Travis had asked for input, it had all stopped.

“Does anyone have a nominee?” Travis asked. He turned left and right, looking for anyone to bail him out.

There was a man on the right side of the group who wore fairly clean clothes and had a well-maintained head of hair. Compared to the rest of the people, he looked very dapper. He raised his arm and held his palm straight forward as he spoke. “I nominate Tanya.”

With the exception of Travis, the people seemed to be sorted from front to back. The people near the front of the group had been together the longest, and the ones near the back were the most recent arrivals. Robby noticed that some of the people near the back, himself included, looked back and forth, looking for the woman who would respond to the name Tanya.

At the urging of those around her, Tanya made her way to the front. Hands guided her up the porch steps and she turned to address everyone.

The first thing Robby noticed about Tanya was her hair. His eyes moved back and forth from the nominator to the nominee and quickly decided that one or both of them was a stylist, and they cared for each other’s hair.
 

“I’m flattered, but I would like to withdraw my name. I care for you all deeply, but I don’t know a thing about politics.”

There was some dissension from the group, but also a few nods of agreement. Tanya made her way towards the stairs again, but paused before she descended.
 

“Oh, but I would like to go ahead and nominate Judy. She’s a smart cookie.”

Heads swiveled until people found Judy. She was standing very near a bearded man over by the pump house. She was almost hidden in his shadow. Someone reached out and touched her on the shoulder. It took a lot of urging from the crowd to get her up on the porch.

“Hi,” Judy said. She folded her arms awkwardly and blushed. She looked down at the porch and then cleared her throat. “I can be a real pessimist. Sometimes people take that pessimism for superiority, and sometimes they assume it’s wisdom. It’s neither one. I’m just pessimistic, you know? I’m not going to withdraw my name, but I think you guys know that there’s someone better here. I haven’t seen Luke in a few days, but I think maybe we should just elect him. He’s the real leader, you know?”

Robby couldn’t hear what Travis asked, but he gathered the question from Judy’s response.

“Yes, I guess I am. I nominate Luke in his absence. Let him come back to find that we’ve all elected him our leader, you know?”

A light applause followed Judy as she made her way down from the porch.

“How about Burlington?” a voice shouted.

Travis took the porch again. “Is that a nomination?”

“Sure,” the voice called.

This seemed to open the floodgates. Suddenly waves of names were shouted towards the front and Travis had to call for someone to get him paper. He borrowed one of the chore clipboards to use as a writing surface. The meeting began to break up while names were still being added to the list. Robby climbed down from the tractor’s tire.

“That was a goddamn travesty,” Pete said. “It was just the damn Beardos naming their friends at the end. Did you see that?”

“Wait, I thought they were the Beardo Brigade,” Romie said.

“Whatever,” Pete said. The three of them turned towards the tent area they had been assigned. They were finally kicked out of the house, and they had to set up tents for themselves. Based on the condition of the tents they’d been given, the group would run out soon.

Lisa joined them. She had a six pack of beer and held it out as she approached. They were walking slowly. None of them were too anxious to get back to the task of setting up the tents.

“Hey, look what Ollie gave me,” she said.

“It looks warm,” Pete said.

“Of course it’s warm.”

Robby reached for one and she pulled it away.
 

“Just kidding,” Robby said.

Pete kept turning his head to look back at the group of people who still surrounded Travis and the porch.

“You know those Beardos are going to take over the voting process and set it up so one of them is going to win,” Pete said.

“Always with the conspiracies, Pete,” Romie said.

“Well? What happened to your master plan?” Pete asked her. “You were so intent on getting us here, and then you just clammed up. What are we supposed to be doing now? What happened to your certainty?”

Romie shook her head and looked down at her feet as she walked. “I never said I knew what to do when we got here. I just said that this place would be safe from all the snatchers, and liquid, and fire. And it seems like it is.”

“Maybe safe isn’t the right word for it,” Pete said. “Seems like the dangers here are maybe not as obvious, but they’re still around. Whatever happened to you filling in the gaps from Romie’s premonition?” Pete asked Robby.

“We should talk about it when the time is right,” Robby said.

A pair of Beardos passed just as he said it. Pete turned down one side of his mouth and nodded.
 

“I’ve just about had it with being told what I can’t do or can’t talk about,” Pete said. “In fact, I’m going out to look for Brad today. They say we’re not supposed to go into the woods because it’s too dangerous? Well isn’t it dangerous for him then? I’m going.”

Robby turned to Pete and put a hand on his arm. Robby worked hard to not let his stature affect him. He knew he was small, and young, and it was difficult to get people to take him seriously. But if anyone should respect his ability to figure things out, it should be Pete. Still, he felt small standing in front of the man.

“He’s not out in the woods, Pete. If you want to rescue Brad, that’s not where you should be looking,” Robby said, keeping his voice low.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Pete asked in a hoarse whisper. “Do you know where he is?”

“I have a theory, yes,” Robby said. “Let’s look at the horses.”

They walked a short distance over to a bench that was set up under a pretty maple tree. It was positioned so they could sit and look out over the pasture. Robby sat on one end and Pete waved for Romie and Lisa to take the rest of the bench. After they did, Pete squatted down next to Robby.