When the Dead (33 page)

 Somewhere the building was burning, the air filling with
smoke, but it felt as though the air of 201 had changed for the better. Jeff
was looking to the future. With a gun, food and no way – beyond breaking down
the door – for the others to enter his apartment, he finally had options. The
only one he actually felt like pursuing was to find Markus. It was easy, in
Willow Brook, to take sides when you were surrounded by people driven by fear.
But
maybe
, Jeff thought,
if I find him and we’re alone I can convince Markus
to take me back.
And if that didn’t work, he always had the gun.

            He was packing a light bag for traveling as the
muted wailing of the smoke alarm stopped. He finished folding a sweater and a
change of socks into the bag and was standing up to leave when he heard a knock
on his door.

Molly stood outside Jeff’s apartment, the rope behind her
back, a lonely look upon her face. Jeff wasn’t going to let her in but he felt
the need to brag about his mission to rescue Markus and Molly could tell him
how to survive outside.
Hell, she’ll be happy I’m leaving,
he told
himself.

            “Molly, to what do I owe the pleasure?” Jeff
said with happiness that she knew was false.

            “I’m really sorry about everything that has
happened. I was feeling alone and we haven’t talked much beyond fighting more
recently. If you had a second, I was thinking maybe we could spend some . . .
time together,” she said with enough flirt to confuse and intrigue the man.

            “Yeah, things have gotten pretty bad between us.
I was planning a trip outside. Maybe you can help me with that?”

            “I think I can, you know, since I’ve been out
there before,” Molly nodded and smiled.

            “Great, great. Come in then. Have a seat. Do you
want anything to drink? I have wine.” Jeff allowed her in and took off his
backpack, setting it down inside the doorframe.

            “Wine
would be wonderful, thank you.” Molly looked around for the gun but she didn’t
see it.
The bag,
Molly determined. She watched his every move. With her
back facing away from him to conceal the rope and her body between him and the
bag she waited for the moment. He turned to the cabinets to find two wine
glasses.

           
Now!
She yelled at herself.
Do it now!
She lunged at him, threw the rope
around his neck and tightened it with everything she had. Jeff dropped the
glasses and brought his hands to the rope that was taking his life. She imagined
a similar scene, only with Jeff’s hands around his wife’s neck.
Don’t let
go,
she thought.

            “I
know you killed Hayden. She could have lived but you wouldn’t let her,” Molly
whispered in his ear. “Well I’m not going to let you get away with it!”

            Jeff’s
body went limp and heavy. Molly checked for a pulse and found that his heart
was still beating. She couldn’t shoot him with the gun he’d taken. It would
make noise; bring the others to his apartment. She lowered him to the floor of
the kitchen and continued the pressure to his neck until her arms grew weak.
When she checked for a pulse again she felt nothing. With tired arms she pulled
his body to the balcony and pulled and pushed it over the edge.

            “I
told you I’d help you with your trip outside,” she said to the corpse. “Say
hello to Sheila for me!” Minutes passed before his body came back to life.
Molly stayed and watched as Jeff Brown stood up and walked out of her life.

Isobel
stood in the third floor hallway looking down at Rob as he in turn looked down
at Ben. They’d dragged him out of the apartment while the smoke aired out.

“Hey, are you ok?” Rob asked as he shook Ben’s shoulders gently, trying
to rouse him back to consciousness. Ben coughed loudly, his eyes still shut, as
he curled into a tight ball. “None of that! You’ve got to get up!” Rob shook
him with more force.

            “Why
didn’t you just let me die?” Ben cried out.

            “Were
you trying to kill yourself? You could have killed the rest of us too with that
stunt! If you want to die, please do it in a more considerate manner.” Rob
pulled himself from the floor and started to walk away from Ben, who he
determined to be hopeless.

            “I
wasn’t trying to die. But I wouldn’t be hurting so much if I had,” Ben said.
“Things would be better.”

            “The
problem with this place, all along, is that everyone’s been thinking about what
they could do for themselves. Things might be better for you if you were dead
but what would it mean to everyone who’s left?” Rob asked him.

            “Selfishness.
It’s the American way,” Ben laughed.

            “Well
it sure as hell hasn’t done us one bit of good. Now get off the goddamn floor
and stop trying to ruin things for the group.”

Three
days had passed since Hayden and Vaughn’s death. Isobel hadn’t seen Molly for that
entire time. Ben and Rob confirmed that she hadn’t left her apartment to their
knowledge. They feared the worst but they couldn’t deal with another zombie in
the building to kill or an even smaller group, so Isobel was determined to find
out if she was alright. She grabbed the ring of keys and went to Molly’s door.

            Pounding
on it she yelled at Molly. “You have to let me know if you are still alive in
there!”

            Molly
was still full of anger that she’d been lied to by everyone, forced into
punishment for her own acts while Jeff had been given little more than a
warning. And while she had taken care of that she was still traumatized over
the event with Vaughn and Hayden. And even though they’d shared a moment in
Vaughn’s apartment, she had nothing to say to Isobel. In fact, she was happy to
see Isobel losing control. It was getting hard to concentrate on the book she
was reading with Isobel nearly breaking down her door. Molly looked around her
apartment for something to slide under the door. She found a piece of printer
paper and drew an unhappy face on it. She had considered leaving it blank but
that would look like a white flag of surrender and she was not surrendering.

She slid the paper under the door.

“What is this? Proof of life?” Isobel shot angrily through the door, her
words overwhelming Molly with sadness. “I want to see your face!”

Molly didn’t want to open her door. Isobel would force her way in beyond
the entry and see all the food she’d stolen. “Maybe tomorrow,” she said through
the door. In the entry sat Jeff’s backpack, in the backpack the gun. No matter
what tomorrow might bring, Molly was ready.

Rob appeared behind Isobel. “Looks like she still needs that ‘time’ you
were telling me about.”

“Can you blame her? She’s lost everyone; the baby, Jill and Hayden,”
Isobel said.

“Me,” Rob added.

Isobel patted him on the back. “I’m not going to tell you that things
will be ok because that would be stupid at this point.”

“Yeah. How’s Ben?” Rob asked her.

“Almost back to his usual self. He’s been reading a lot.”

“I thought he hated books with a fiery passion,” Rob laughed.

“Not funny, Rob. Hey, have you seen Jeff?”

“I checked on him yesterday but I couldn’t find him. He left. Maybe to
find Markus?”

“That’s probably for the best.”

Back in
her apartment she found Ben staring at the coffee table.

            “What
are you doing?” she asked warily.

“I thought ‘killing any undead’ would be the most difficult,” Ben said.  He
was reading a piece of paper on the table.

            “What
are you saying?” Isobel rubbed her eyes from tiredness.

            “Our
checklist. I thought number three was going to be hardest.” He slid the paper
across the coffee table. Isobel recognized her handwriting, remembered the
feelings of being organized, in control, sane.

            “It
was so easy. We checked it off like we were shopping for vegetables. This one
is where all the trouble lies,” she said as she pointed at number eight.

      8.         Wait it out until the end

            “I
fear we won’t survive to check it off the list,” Ben agreed.

            Isobel
stood up and went once again to her balcony to watch the dead; the street so
full of them, her life so empty. Only this time she wasn’t looking for the dead
she knew, she was looking for the ones she hated. She sought in the undead
crowd all the citizens that had driven her crazy while they were alive. She
looked for the people that couldn’t figure out how to function at a four way
stop. She looked for the folks that would stand in the middle of a grocery
store aisle, unmoving as she tried to squeeze by. She looked for the parents of
noisy, uncontrolled children. She looked for the people who littered, continued
shopping from the checkout line, parked crooked, and talked too loud at
restaurants, and the ones who didn’t use their turn signals. In the writhing
crowd of the undead she saw reflections of the downfalls of their group, the
weakness of the Cabels, the desperation of families trying to stay together
like the Coopers and the selfish lives of the city – so close to that of
Vaughn’s existence. Isobel found every last one of the failing, fragile, and
hopeless and then she didn’t care that they were all dead. She was
happy
they
were.

Dead
(ded)
adj.
1. . .  2 .  . .

3.
Lacking
feeling or sensitivity.

All this
waiting and she was finally dead.

Rob and
his son were coloring in the common area. He’d stopped looking outside every
day because the view no longer changed. The clouds rained and the dead filled
the streets.

            “Dad,
do you think the ‘copters are gonna come?” Gabe asked.

            “I
haven’t heard any for a long time, so I don’t think so.”

            “Maybe
a tank?” his son continued.

“No, Gabe. A tank would have come already too if it could.”

            “Maybe
it broke from driving over all the people and they just hafta fix it.”

            “I
bet you’re right,” was all that Rob could say. He had little hope left for
rescue. And if someone did come, how could they know it was alright to trust
them? The world was full of horrible monsters, dead and alive both.

When the
dead come back even if you don’t get bitten there are other infections that
will do you in. Infections of the mind and heart like hatred, paranoia, greed,
anger, and depression.

All of
these diseases spread like wildfire in Willow Brook. The building itself still
stands. The barricades have held firm. But inside the building, life crumbles
as the remaining tenants lose hope and the will to live on. In times of duress,
we
are the biggest threat to our survival.

When the
dead come back you are forced to choose only the lesser of two evils: cabin
fever over the zombie plague.

They
can’t get in and you can’t get out.