Roxanne's Story (Book 1): Survival in the Zombie Apocalypse (44 page)

He rowed back and prepared the fish to find that both Lucky and Brandon remained quiet except to help each other set up camp. He knew that he had to approach the subject of tomorrow and had been delaying it for as long as he could. “We have enough drinking water to get back to the Plantation. The Bayou can provide food, but it can’t provide water unless you dig a well or catch rain water,” he said as he held out the pan and portioned out the fish to Lucky and Brandon. Brandon stopped to open a can of dog food for Mutt, not wanting him to choke on the bones of the fish. It was one of the few cans they had left from Martha. He wondered how she and Joe were doing. He put the dog food on a plate next to him, but Mutt picked up the plate in his teeth and took it back to the base of a tree where he had been sitting. Brandon turned around and looked at him, getting his feelings hurt that Mutt still did not want to share food with them.

“I figure,” Smokey continued, “that we will be back in a day and a half since the trail is marked and we won’t be making any wrong turns.” Still, there was no response from the men. He wondered if they had been hatching a plan to overcome him and take the boat out on their own. “Do I have any objections here that I need to address about tomorrow morning?” he asked in a stern tone.

Brandon shook his head and leaned forward toward the fire with his arm over his knees, “I will always feel as if I abandoned her but we could be out here for months and never find her. After……after you had us check for her body underwater, I realized that we would never know if she was dead or alive. As much as I hate to, I’m ready to go back tomorrow.”

“I don’t know this territory,” Lucky said. “I feel helpless. None of my training was for tracking in the swamps. I’m useless here. Like Brandon, I will always feel guilty but my only hope is that Roxanne will find a way to survive.”

Smokey was right and it only took one and a half days to return to the landing at the plantation. Roxanne had now been missing for five days. As they were gathering their supplies from the boat Lucky untied Roxanne’s staff and said, “I almost feel that we should have a memorial to her staff. No one uses this,” he said holding it up. “No one.”

She woke in a white haze and thought that her spirit had levitated into the clouds on her way to heaven. She could hear thunder in the distance and the clouds began to swirl into the shape of a blurred face. The thunder became louder and turned into an echo asking, “What’s your name, girl? What’s your name?”

END OF SEASON ONE.

(Editor’s note:
Follow Roxanne’s Story in Season Two as she lives and learns how to survive in the Bayou)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Diane Butler was born and raised in Waldorf, MD and now resides in the state of Virginia. After the death of her third husband Jim Barbour, she began to write short entries of a woman surviving a Zombie Apocalypse and posted them to a Chat Forum. A few fans started to follow the story and asked for more. Mrs. Butler is in her senior years and had never previously written but as the fans encouraged her she began to expand the storyline which is now the 2-part novel Roxanne’s Story.

Roxanne’s Story was originally the writer’s past-time as she was grieving the loss of her husband. She did not have children and is currently working part-time for a Government Contractor outside the city of Washington, DC. She is a fan of action adventure stories and loves a good monster movie. She is fascinated by the old south of centuries ago and the architectural design of plantation homes to allow air circulation so that each room could catch a breeze. The Bayou is where Roxanne’s Story will continue in Season Two, the second saga of the heroine’s travels to find a safe haven during the Zombie Apocalypse.