The Scattered and the Dead (Book 1): A Post-Apocalyptic Series (48 page)

“What was that?”

Erin was too busy scanning the horizon to answer.

“Was that a gun?”

“Put your shoes on.”

They wove back through the path in the cornfield. When the house came in to view, Erin crouched down, creeping to the edge. Watching for movement.

She didn’t know where they were or who they were, but their presence in their neighborhood felt like a violation. The house had come to feel like a safe place. Maybe the only safe place in the world. And now Erin feared to go inside because she was worried they’d be trapped there if someone came looking.

Almost as bad, the house held all of their supplies. All of their food. She’d completely taken for granted the possibility that someone could come take it. And there would be nothing they could do but sit out here in the dried up corn husks and shiver in their wet clothes.

“It sounded like it was coming from up by the house where we got the generator. That’s close.”

Erin shushed her. She continued scanning the area, eyes flicking from left to right and back again.

“If we snuck up through the woods,” Izzy whispered, “we could get a closer look.”

“No, we should stay here.”

Izzy let out a little grunt of impatience.

“For how long? I’m hungry.”

“Until we’re sure they’re gone.”

Erin thought back to the day they’d heard the engine, and they’d run into the woods to hide. The time she’d left Izzy behind.

They’d been ill-prepared then, and they were ill-prepared now. What if the worst case scenario came true, and they did have to run? If someone rode up the drive right now, they’d have to. And they’d be without food or water. No blankets. No dry clothes. Screwed.

Just like they’d needed to get serious about gathering food, they needed to get serious about security. It was life and death out here. No police or parents were around to protect them. Not anymore.

Every time she thought she was making progress, finally figuring things out, the world stuck out a leg and tripped her as she ran by.

Pain shot threw Erin’s jaw. She’d been grinding her molars together in frustration.

She unclenched her teeth and opened her mouth to stretch her jaw muscles out.

Izzy was being uncharacteristically quiet. Erin swiveled around and found herself alone in the field. An electric current of fear jolted through her and made her shoulders jerk. Her mind leapt to the most dramatic possibility first: they had taken Izzy.

OK, no. That was silly. There had to be a rational explanation. Maybe… Maybe she scooted off to pee or something.

“Izzy?”

It came out in a throaty hiss. Not quite a whisper, but not a full projection of her voice either.

The only answer was the scrape of dry cornstalks shifting in the breeze.

She tried to keep from panicking, but her brain fought her for that right, insisting that this was an absolutely appropriate moment to panic.

Again her thoughts went to the time she left Izzy behind. Had she done it again? The events were all jumbled in her head, like a deck of cards someone threw to the ground. Some landed face up, some face down. They were all out of order.

She started at the beginning.

They were swimming in the pool. Izzy was underwater, holding her breath. Erin was supposed to be counting. She heard the first gunshot and froze. It wasn’t until the second shot that she knew for sure. She climbed out and told Izzy to get out of the pool. There were more gunshots. How many more? Three or four, she couldn’t remember. They slid their shoes on over wet feet. No socks. They made their way through the corn, stopping when the house came in view. And then they squatted there. They. Or had she just assumed Izzy was there the whole time? She imagined Izzy trying to peel the flippers off so she could get her shoes on. Maybe she took too long and Erin rushed off without her. But no. She’d said something while they waited in the field. She was hungry.

Something rankled in her memory. There was something she was missing. Something else Izzy said. Erin closed her eyes, tried to let it come to her. When it did, her eyes snapped open.

A closer look.

That’s what Izzy had said.

“We could get a closer look.”

Mitch

Bethel Park, Pennsylvania

41 days before

He watched his sons eat in silence, their eyes still puffy with sleep. It was early for them, and in a way he hated to wake them, but he didn’t have a lot of time, something he thought Kevin understood, at least.

Matt’s blanket draped around his shoulders at his seat at the kitchen table. The blue bedspread wrinkled when he reached out for his glass of orange juice. It almost looked like a cape flapping behind him in the wind.

“Either of you ever driven a car before?” Mitch said, his voice sounding thick and sleepy even to himself.

Wrinkles creased both of the foreheads sitting across from him as all four eyebrows raised. All of the attention quickly turned away from the food. Kevin shook his head, and Matt followed his lead a beat later.

“I figured not. I thought maybe we’d head out to the backroads when you’re done eating, and you could give it a shot.”

He shrugged and added:

“Might come in handy sooner than later, I suspect.”

“Driving lessons? Me too?” Matt said.

“Yeah, why not? You may as well give it a try.”

Matt’s eyes were wide open now, early morning or not. He sliced a big wedge of pancake with the side of his fork, smeared it in syrup and chewed it as fast as possible before going back to slice off another chunk.

Kevin rolled his eyes, and Mitch smiled.

“Slow down, Matthew. You’ll choke.”

The sun reflected off of the gray surface of the asphalt, the rock and tar combination worn smooth by the endless rub of car tires. Mitch put it in park, and the car idled in the middle of the vacant road. He slid over to the passenger seat.

“You ready?” he said, looking at Kevin.

His older son pressed his lips together, but he quit doing it as soon as he knew Mitch was looking. Nervous and trying to hide it, Mitch thought. Better to be a little nervous than fearless, as far as he was concerned. Kevin slid out the back door and banged it shut behind him, a whoosh of the morning air rushing in with the door’s movement, still thick with humidity.

Mitch checked the mirror and glanced around as Kevin climbed behind the wheel and buckled himself in. Nobody around for as far as he could see.

“Ready?” he said.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Did you adjust the seat so you’re comfortable getting to the pedals?”

Kevin reached down by his ankles and slid the seat forward a couple of clicks.

“OK. Put it in drive and let’s do this.”

He had Kevin start with his foot off of the accelerator, letting the car crawl forward, so he could get a handle for the controls without the added pressure of speed. The boy panicked a little, jerking them to seatbelt-tugging stops four times in the first 30 seconds.

“Relax,” Mitch said. “Just relax. You’re in control.”

Kevin took a deep breath and let it out slow. He released the brake, and they rolled on. Over the next couple of minutes, something clicked. He seemed to pick up the nuances of the way the brake and the wheel gave him control over the car, that they were tools to be used subtly, not violently.

He loosened his death grip on the wheel and acquired a feel for how the vehicle moved, how it handled. Mitch had him speed up to 25 miles per hour, and they drove a while past fields of soy beans and corn, taking a right turn and two left turns. Mitch directed Kevin to build up speed little by little until they were flying along at the speed limit like it was normal.

“Look how quickly you figured that out. Experience is the only way to learn,” Mitch said. “What do you think?”

“I don’t know. It’s pretty fun.”

“Easier than you thought it’d be, isn’t it?”

Kevin nodded.

“I want to do it,” Matt said. “I’m supposed to get a turn!”

Mitch laughed.

“You will, you will. In just a minute.”

He looked into the back seat to see Matt clinging to the door, knuckles white. Apparently he wasn’t so comfortable with Kevin’s driving, which seemed funny.

They drove on. Mitch had Kevin pull into someone’s dirt driveway and back out for a little practice moving in reverse. That seemed to make the new driver uncomfortable. He slammed on the brakes again, giving them all a good shake. Things smoothed out when they got back on the road.

He made eye contact with Kevin at a stop sign, and he clapped a hand on his shoulder and smiled at his son. Even though his eyes hurt, and his head hurt, and the heat rolled off of his skull in waves, and the blackness inside spread until it would break and end him, he smiled so his boy would know he was proud of him.

“Put it in park,” he said. “We better give Matt a turn.”

Kevin put it in park, a skeptical smirk on his lips. Mitch gave him a look, a tilt of the head and a wry smile.

Matt released his vice grip from the door handle, and the boys exchanged seats. Matt looked so small behind the driver’s seat. Tiny.

“How much do you weigh? Do you know?” Mitch said as Matt buckled himself in.

“53 pounds.”

“And that’s all muscle, right?”

“Pretty much. Well, I guess some of it would be bone, too.”

He scratched his cheek.

“How much of it do you think would be bone, Dad?”

“I have no idea. But hey, you can reach the pedals and still see over the wheel, right?”

Matt’s feet kicked out toward the pedals, but they came up short. Even in this position, he could barely see over the wheel. When he slid himself down far enough to get a toe on the brake, he was almost laying down on the seat.

“Maybe not,” he said.

“Well, that’s OK. How about I work the pedals for you, and you can steer?”

“We can do that?”

“Yeah, you’ll just sit on my lap.”

“Will I really be steering, though?”

“Of course.”

Baghead

Rural Arkansas

9 years, 126 days after

The day fell to dusk fell to night, the dark deepening around them until it achieved full blackness. The headlights cut wedges of light out of the gloom, but they were no help inside the car.

If the Delta 88 ever had dash lights, they must have burned out long ago. Probably well before everyone got sick and died, Bags thought. This feature, or lack thereof, made him uneasy. When Delfino talked, it was a disembodied voice speaking from the shadows, and somewhere in the back a rabid girl still slept, but he was unable to check on her visually. The darkness imprisoned him. All he could do was stare straight ahead where the lights lit up the next section of road that they’d hurtle down.

Would she be confused when she woke up in the dark? Would she look out at the headlights and remember the car and the food and the guy with the bag on his head?

“You thought about a name?” Delfino said, startling Baghead from his thoughts.

“What?”

“Let’s say the rabid child back there don’t talk. Like, ever. Have you thought about what you might name her?”

“Nope. First of all, why would I leap to that conclusion? I said I figured she can talk when you asked me about that, remember?”

“Well, I’ve always liked the name Anya is all. Just putting it out there.”

Bags puffed an almost silent laugh from his nostrils.

“It’s not bad.”

“So listen, we’re going to be coming up on one of my stashes here before long.”

“Weapons?”

“Exactly. I’d hoped we’d get there before dark, but we didn’t. It’s OK, though. I’ve got lanterns we can use. Anyway, I’m going to feel a hell of a lot better once we’re armed.”

“Yeah, I can understand that.”

“Going back for the rabid child scared the bejesus out of me, man. I ain’t kiddin’. I don’t think I’ve unpuckered since. I believe those guns will help me unclench, and believe you me, I’m looking forward to that.”

“Always straight to the butthole talk with you, huh? You realize that’s your go-to reference for everything?”

“What are you getting at?”

“Nothing.”

The car hit a poorly patched pothole with a bang, and everything shook. Bags felt the impact like a jolt in his ribcage somehow, and he swore he heard the fenders rattle. He wheeled his head around to the back seat, staring into the dark, waiting for some sound or sign of movement back there, but none came.

“Almost expected that to blow out a tire or something,” Bags said.

“Shoot. Little bump like that ain’t no thang. Not for this tank.”

“If you say so.”

The quiet came upon them again, the road sounds seeming to drown out Baghead’s thoughts, leaving him to stare at the way the headlights hit the foliage on the side of the road. Individual stems and stalks and blades lit up, their stretched-out shadows slowly shrinking as the source of light closed on them.