“Have you ever stopped to think that I’m worried sick about Eric? That my brother is somewhere out there?” My voice rises. I look at Ana. “And Maria? Do you really think that I would want them in harm’s way?”
The traitorous tears well up in my eyes. No one takes a crying mad person seriously, and it’s so frustrating that my anger is linked to my tear ducts. I think of something mean to say and, instead of holding back the way I normally would, I say it. That’s what Peter does. “Maybe you do think that. Maybe you can’t remember what it’s like to have people you love. People who love you.”
I’m glad when he flinches. I want to hurt him. I may as well treat him like the person he’s accusing me of being.
He recovers from my dig and his eyes go dark. “Well, at least I’m not pining after someone who doesn’t love me anymore.”
I’m confused for a second, until I realize he means Adrian. Penny’s mouth drops open. I step forward with my hand raised.
Nelly puts an arm around me. “Okay. That’s enough. Peter, you need to stop. Now.”
Nelly’s face is expressionless, except for his eyes, which are icy. Peter looks triumphant until he catches sight of Nelly’s other hand, tightened into a fist. He takes a step back.
“You two.” I point at them with a shaking finger. “You may not want to believe things are different. But they are. They are, and if you act like they’re not, we’re all going to end up dead.”
CHAPTER 69
John has timed our target practice for a day when he’s supposed to check in with Farmer Franklin. I’m glad when he insists Nelly and I come. I don’t want to go back to the house and live in those cold freezes and awkward silences you have when you’re fighting with people, when you’ve said too much.
I already feel bad about what I said to Peter, about no one loving him. It was an awful thing to say, and I deserved what I got back. I sit in the backseat ruffling Laddie’s fur, and I replay what Peter said. He’s probably right. After all, it’s been two years, enough time for Adrian to have moved on.
“He’s not right, you know,” Nelly says over the crunch of the tires on the dirt road.
We’re heading down to where the valley opens up and farms are tucked away in the thick stands of trees. When I don’t answer, he turns back to watch me. I shrug and give a weak smile.
“He knew exactly what to say, what would hurt you the most. So he said it,” he says.
“So did I. But that doesn’t mean he’s wrong.”
“Look at me.” I tear my eyes away from Laddie and look into his earnest face. “He’s wrong.”
I want to believe him, but he can’t know that for sure. I shrug again. The day, which had seemed so bright, now feels like I’m looking at it through a gray haze. My stomach feels heavy.
Peter’s right about me living in a fantasy world, but he had the fantasy wrong. Like a little girl who believes in fairies and unicorns, I’d been thinking that Adrian and I would live happily ever after. That belief had given me a tiny bit of hope that this could end well, if we survive long enough. But now I see how foolish I’ve been. I have to focus on the here and now, not on someone who’s probably thinking of me as someone he once loved. If he’s even thinking of me at all.
John turns down a long driveway. “This is the place. Richard, that’s Farmer Franklin to you, said he’d have some more hay and feed for the goats. That’s funny, the gate’s open.”
We head through the gate to a yellow farmhouse with a porch out front and a wreath on the door. A terracotta planter has tumbled over and spilled dirt down the steps. The wood frame behind the screen door is splintered. Broken glass sparkles in the grass. There’s a barn and yard for the animals to graze, but it’s empty and that gate is open, too.
“This doesn’t look good,” John says. He drives around the house over the bumpy grass, but it’s empty except for the Franklins’ cars. “I’ve got to check it out.”
“You’re not going in by yourself,” Nelly says.
“Okay, we go in slow. I’ll take the main hallway down the house to the kitchen. Nelly, you’ll cover the left, that’s the family room. Cassie, you’ve got the right. Dining room with separate entrance into the kitchen at the back.”
We nod and open our doors. Laddie stops at the bottom of the steps and whines deep in his throat. John puts a hand on his head. “Heel, boy. Stay.”
Laddie watches us mount the steps with worried eyes. John uses his back to hold open the screen and motions us behind him. The smell of decomposition, all too familiar now, wafts out. I hear the distant cluck of the Franklin’s chickens, but the house is completely silent.
“Richard?” John yells. We stand and wait, but nothing greets us.
There’s a small foyer with a shoe bench, but most people around here reserve the messy entries for the mudroom, usually off the kitchen. That’s where you’ll find the rubber boots and jackets with hay still stuck to them. I move into the dining room. The painted wood floors creak under my feet as I pass the dining table and chairs.
There are a few empty liquor bottles on the kitchen counters, along with plates of congealed and moldy food. A sun porch runs along the back of the house, but a peek out the door tells me it’s empty.
“Cassie.” John comes into the kitchen from the hall entrance. “We’ve found them. Some of them, at least.”
I follow him into the living room. The two rooms on this side are furnished with couches, an area rug, and a computer desk. A television hangs on the wall, alongside photos and paintings. It’s just the kind of comfortable place where you can put up your feet and get into a movie.
Or it was, because now the colorful throw pillows are scattered and Mom and Dad Franklin sit in two kitchen chairs, dead for many days. The ropes that held them fast while they were alive have sunk into their bloated tissue, but I can see where they come out of flesh and tie underneath. What appears to have been a teenage boy is face-down and splayed on the oak floor, like he was running when he died. The bodies look as if they’re being eaten from the inside out, and in places the skin has sloughed off in sheets.
It strikes me that every time I think I’ve seen something truly awful, I come upon a new horror, something I never even considered. I hold the bandanna I’ve taken to carrying to my face and breathe. They’re so putrefied that it’s impossible to see how they were murdered, but it’s obvious they were.
“They have two girls. Let’s check upstairs,” John says.
The upstairs is empty, except where someone rooted through the drawers and didn’t replace the contents. On the way down I notice the staircase is lined with photographs, starting with a pudgy blond baby and ending with a family photo, taken at Disneyworld and foil embossed with last year’s date. I stare at it until I’m sure.
“Those girls, the ones in Wal-Mart?” I ask. John and Nelly stand at the base of the steps and nod. “One of them was her.”
I point at the daughter with long blond hair and straight white teeth. The whole family stands, arms around each other, having the time of their lives.
“How about the other one?” John asks.
I’m usually good with faces, but she had been strangled and her face was too blotchy to see clearly in the dim light. In the picture she’s laughing and looking up at her dad, who has on mouse ears and looks so incredibly goofy you really can’t blame her.
“She had curly hair, just like her. But I can’t say for sure.”
John’s face is stormy; I don’t know that I’ve ever seen him look like this. His brows meet over his eyes and a muscle flickers in his jaw.
“Let’s go,” he says. “Obviously someone around here is very dangerous. They don’t know about us, and I want it kept that way.”
Outside, John opens the chicken coop. We don’t spare the time to figure out a way to bring them home, but maybe they’ll survive free-range for a while. We kick up dust as we head back down the long driveway, and when it clears I see them pecking around in the grass, enjoying th
eir freedom.
CHAPTER 70
Nelly leans back on the couch with his beer. “This is nice.” He takes a swig and makes a face.
“You must mean the company, not the beer,” Penny says.
Ana and Peter are sleeping at John’s house tonight. He promised them a movie during his few generator hours. I’m sure they’re as happy to be there as I am to have them there. After we listened to the nightly radio update, the four of us left. The radio said the same things, but when they mentioned Kingdom Come Farm, I didn’t feel that sense of well-being. It just reminded me of how idiotic I am.
Penny holds out her bottle. James, Nelly and I clink our bottles on hers and sip. I shiver when the bitter brew goes down, but it’s better than nothing.
“Is it supposed to taste like this?” I ask.
Nelly shakes his head ruefully. “Definitely not. I think I know what we did wrong for next time, though.”
I upend the bottle and gulp. I’ll never get shitfaced if I don’t get serious about drinking. And I’m serious about it tonight. I want this day to be over, and getting drunk and passing out seems like the only way I’ll fall asleep. The last drop of beer swallowed, I unscrunch my eyes to find the three of them staring at me.
“That sure cleanses the palate,” I say. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and reach for another.
“More like destroys the palate,” James says. He takes a few gulps. “You know, though, the more you drink, the better it gets.”
I nod but don’t reply because I’m guzzling the next beer. Nelly holds his bottle in his lap. I wave my hand at him. “C’mon, Nels. Drink up.”
He and Penny exchange a glance before he looks at me from under his furrowed brow. Penny’s mouth is twisted to the side.
I look from one to the other. “What?”
“Don’t forget watch tonight,” Nelly reminds me.
We’d been getting lax about it, but the Franklins were dressed in their pajamas, after all. The radios work between our houses, and they’ll be on all night.
“I have last watch. By then I’ll be fine.” I shrug and change the subject. “You know what we need? Music. It’s weird to sit around drinking without music.”
Nelly looks like he wants to say more, but he drops it, much to my relief. If I have to talk about Adrian or think about him for one extra second, I’ll scream.
“Yeah,” he says dreamily. “What I wouldn’t give to plug in my iPod and listen to a whole playlist.”
“I’m just tired of having the most ridiculous songs on Earth in my head,” says Penny, who walks around singing jingles and TV theme songs half the time.
We all do. I have no idea why the theme song to The Golden Girls has taken up residence in my head, but it seems to be what happens when you’re denied any other music.
“There’s a windup record player in the basement,” I say. “But it only plays seventy-eights. My dad had plans to rig it so it would play all his forty-five records, too. There are hundreds.”
I jump up and slam my empty bottle down, almost knocking over the oil lamp on the coffee table, which Penny steadies. “Let’s find it! C’mon, James.”
I know I’m manic, but I need to do something. I grab a third beer and head for the basement. James follows with a lantern. I see the big wooden box on a shelf in the far corner of the basement.
“Here it is.” I pull it out and point to the numerous boxes of records above it. “I’ll grab the 78s.”
Back upstairs, we unlatch the box and place a record on it. A grinding noise comes from somewhere inside, but the record won’t spin.
James inspects it. “I might be able to get it working if I open it, but I’d need better light.”
Our nights are dark, the way they were before electric light was common. Our lamps cast enough light to read, but not enough to do tasks that require we see tiny parts. And we don’t waste batteries for things that can wait until daylight. I sigh and finish my beer. My nose is numb, a sure sign I’m getting drunk.
“I just wanted a dance party,” I say to Penny. She pushes her glasses up and smiles sympathetically. “A stupid, measly little dance party.”
I know I sound whiny, but if I can’t have the big things, then I want a small one. I crack open a fourth beer.
“Cass and I used to have dance parties from when we were little up until, well, now,” Penny explains to James. She grins at me and holds up her bottle.
“Long live dance parties!” I yell.
I crash my bottle against Penny’s and lick the splattered foam off my hand. I drink, and now this beer’s half empty. That’s how I’ll see things from now on, I decide: as half empty instead of half full.
“Viva la dance party!” she yells back.
“Oh, Lordy,” Nelly says.
Our giggles turn into guffaws, but then my guffaws turn into a sob.
Nelly looks at me with concern.
“Don’t,” I say, and wipe away the tear that’s escaped. I don’t want anyone pitying me, to acknowledge how weak I’ve been. “Please. I’ve had my one crack-up, remember? I’m fine. Can’t we just drink and have fun?”
He looks like he’s going to say more, and I brace myself, but he gives in. “Yeah. I think that can be arranged.”
He guzzles his bottle as Penny and I cheer him on.
CHAPTER 71
“You’re on,” James whispers.
I wipe the crust out of my eyes and sit on the edge of my bed. “I’m up. You can go to sleep.”
The fire is still going and the living room is warm. I pour a cup of tea and sit at the table. I feel a little better than I did. I wouldn’t recommend drinking as a regular problem-solver, but it helped; my feelings aren’t as raw as they were. Although when I think about how I believed I could find Adrian and he would want nothing more than to pick up where we left off, my entire body gets hot with embarrassment. I’m such a fool. It makes me angry that everyone knows. And I’m sure Peter is gloating that he’s right, that he’s exposed me.
I think I see something at the window and freeze, ready to sound the alarm, until I realize it’s my reflection. It feels like the night holds only murderers and rapists and walking dead. I’m afraid to look at the windows for fear that a ghostly white face will suddenly appear, bent on my destruction. It’s not necessarily a new fear; I’ve been scaring myself like this since I was little. The only difference is that now it’s not only within the realm of possibility, but there’s also pretty much a guarantee it will happen eventually.
I decide to make bread instead of sitting here alternately scaring and berating myself. I love making bread by hand, although when my arms are tired from kneading I think longingly of my mother’s beloved electric mixer with the dough hook attachment.
I take out the flour, yeast and salt, and measure the quantities I know by heart. I drop the dough on the wooden counter in a puff of flour. I fold it over and punch it, then fold it again, letting myself think only of how it feels under my hands, how it turns from clumpy and sticky to smooth and elastic. I put it in a bowl by the stove to rise and rinse my hands.
I want to call over to John’s on the radio, but there’s a one out of three chance I’ll get someone I want to talk to, so I dismiss that thought. I feel so alone. We’re separated from the rest of our families, from the rest of the planet, really. There are others out there, obviously—we hear them on the radio every night—but we may never see anyone else. We may struggle on here and then end up like the Franklins, and no one will ever know how hard we tried.
I hear a noise outside and jump up, hand on the radio, but I recognize the tick-tacking of Laddie’s claws on the porch. He wags his tail and gobbles his treat happily when I let him inside. He knows I’m a sucker for the pathetic I-need-a-doggy-treat face he’s perfected. He climbs up next to me on the couch and nestles his body along my legs as I stroke his head. Now I’m not as scared, since Laddie will alert me to anything in the woods way before it can get to the window. We sit in silence f
or a while.
“You’re a good old boy,” I tell him. His tail flops twice. “It must be nice, being a dog, huh? You don’t have all these issues with people. You just like them or you don’t.” He looks into my eyes like he understands. I scratch behind his ears. “And everyone likes you. How could they not? ‘Cause you’re so handsome. You’re the handsomest dog in the world. Yes you are, you puppy-dog. Yes—”
Nelly interrupts my silly baby voice. “You know, there are humans around here you could talk to.”
I don’t turn around, but I can hear the smile in his voice. “I prefer dog therapy.”
He sinks into the chair across from me and yawns. “Of course you do.”
The wind-up clock on the mantel reads five a.m.
“What are you doing up? Go back and get some sleep.”
“I couldn’t go back to sleep,” he says, annoyed and bleary-eyed. “It would appear I’ve gotten used to having company in my bed. Of course, it’s completely the wrong kind of company, but I keep waking up and looking for your blanket-stealing lump.”
I’ve been teasing Nelly that he likes sharing the bed but won’t admit it. I clap and laugh. “I knew it!”
He pretends not to hear me. I grab the bread bowl while he puts on coffee. The dough has risen, so I punch it down, turn it out and shape it into three round loaves. I place them on the wooden peel to rise and let the oven warm.
“Mmm, bread,” Nelly says. He bends over and inhales the yeasty scent. I lean on the counter and try not to smile. “Yeah, yeah, I’m secretly in love with you. I can’t live without you. Won’t you please marry me, fair maiden?”
He falls to one knee, hand outstretched.
“Oh, shut up,” I say, and smack his hand. “You’re worse than me. Why can’t you admit you need some comfort? At least I can admit to that.”
He gets up. “You’re a girl. And you suck at admitting it, too.”
We turn as John bursts in the front door, still in his pajamas. “Peter and Ana are gone. They took my truck and left a note saying they were going to town.”