The City Series (Book 2): Peripeteia
Eric drops my hand and walks into the clearing, keeping to where the Lexers won’t notice him on this side of the barn. I can’t call out, so I stand in the woods and will him not to do something rash. He stops at the corner of the barn with his back to me, and I witness the moment when every last bit of his hope dissipates. It’s in the drop of his shoulders, the way his knees dip infinitesimally before they straighten again, and I step from the trees to go to him.
Eric spins at a twig under my boot and whispers, “Get back.”
His face is unreadable. I shake my head and close the distance, then rest a hand on his arm. He points to the pickup. “John’s truck.”
Their neighbor John was here, which means Cassie was—he wouldn’t have been otherwise. And the SUV, most likely taken from somewhere outside the city, supports that evidence.
A branch snaps behind us. It could be a Lexer in the trench, or it could be loose in the woods. I won’t tell him we should leave, though we should. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.
My chest hurts for him, for Maria. I’ll have to return the unread letters of everything she wants to say to her daughters, and I would rather do almost anything than that.
Eric motions me to follow and eases open a door halfway down the barn. The interior smells of clean straw. Two goats lie in a penned area, decayed and so desiccated they give off no scent. I take in the wall of gardening tools, bags of feed, and bales of hay. It’s peaceful in here. We would’ve lived in the house and come out to the barn to milk the goats. Harvested vegetables from the garden, canned in the kitchen, and dried food in the sun. I can’t imagine every detail, but I think I would’ve liked it. It feels special the way the Vale of Cashmere did all those years ago, when Grace and I stumbled upon it in Prospect Park, and I understand why they kept it after their parents died.
We cross to a window to view the remains of the cabin and woods. “I want to find the Message Tree,” Eric says, his eyes on the burnt forest.
I’m afraid of those woods. The trees are so thick that even with the brush burned away it’s impossible to see what lurks from this distance. And I have no doubt something does. “I’m coming.”
Eric nods. The Message Tree once held a treehouse, and a hollow in the tree holds a coffee can where he and Cassie would leave notes when they were young. The hope is that Cassie has left one now. But if the patch of woods burned with as much intensity as it seems, the plastic lid has likely melted and any note gone up in smoke. Eric’s smart enough to know that, and I’m smart enough to know he has to check anyway.
We tiptoe through tall grass around the back of the barn and cut behind the garden. The woods we enter are a moonscape of black trunks and burnt ground. A sharp campfire odor stings my nose. Every tree looks the same to me, but Eric cuts through the forest at an angle, orienting himself by something only he sees.
Our boots crunch on roasted twigs and pick up a fine layer of ash. A shadow moves far off to my left and passes from sight before I get a glimpse, but the heavy tread of footsteps makes me sure it was a Lexer. Eric breaks into a trot, heading deeper into the woods, and my heart pounds loud enough to drown out other noises.
He stops at a storybook tree with bumpy, gnarled roots at its base and boughs thick enough to hold a treehouse, though what was left of it burned with the smaller branches. Its bark is charcoal where it hasn’t fallen away to reveal scorched wood. He reaches into a hollow and pulls out a charred metal can. As I feared, the plastic lid is missing, and the contents are a wad of melted plastic and soaked paper. Eric picks carefully at the sodden mass, but where it isn’t a ball of pulp, it’s washed clean of any writing from exposure to weeks, if not months, of weather.
“Are they new?” I whisper.
He shakes his head in uncertainty, eyes on his palm. A hundred feet away, a Lexer bursts from the dense foliage that the fire didn’t reach. It’s followed by another. Bushes stir, branches snap, and dozens more emerge, trudging toward us across open woods that stretch for miles. This isn’t like the city, where there’s a gate to close, a stoop to climb, a safe yard to cross.
Eric grabs my elbow and we race the way we came. The noises trailing us are answered by hisses from behind the garden, where our path is blocked by a dozen bodies who’ve moved up the hill. Shadows shuffle behind them in the woods by the road. Maybe they were in a stupor, dulled by the rain, but they’ve woken now and will cut off our escape.
We sprint through the overgrown grass in the clearing, past Lexers who’ve entered the driveway, and turn into the woods that have come alive with groans. I pull from Eric’s grip to vault the trench and push branches from my path. I keep his pace, though I wheeze to sustain it.
At the ditch, what was solid earth beneath Eric’s feet gives way under mine, and I slide into a bathtub’s worth of cold, muddy rainwater before I scramble to the road. I’m drenched from feet to hair. My socks squelch in my boots. My soaked pack drags down my shoulders. But I don’t slow until we’re on the bike, engine gunning, with a mob of zombies staggering on the road after us. Eric brakes at the bottom of the hill and his chest jumps with a sob beneath my hands. I rest my head on his shoulder as we pull away.
Chapter 60
We drove the parallel road that leads to John’s house, but the remainder of the mob on that side of the woods confirmed we wouldn’t find anyone living. Once the wrecked town of Bellville is far behind, Eric stops the bike and wanders into a field. I follow, pulling at my wet jeans, and put a hand on his arm. He keeps his eyes on a distant hill and steps away. It’s only a few inches, but it feels like a mile-wide gulf.
I move in front of him. Muddy brown eyes flick my way and then roam the grass. Before, he was on the verge of tears, but I don’t know what he is now. I put my arms around him. “I’m so sorry.”
His arms hang at his sides and the rest of him stiffens. Whatever he is, he doesn’t want a hug. I back away. “I’m going to check if my other clothes are dry, okay?” He nods.
One look in my pack, where water has seeped into the plastic bag that was supposed to keep my spare clothes dry, and it’s clear I’m wet until I find new ones. While I’m not the most comfortable I’ve ever been, I’ll suck it up like a big girl. I wait by the bike as Eric strides to a pile of bodies in the tall weeds. He rifles through one’s clothing, tosses the body aside, and does the same to the others. After a loud curse, he returns. I want to ask what he was doing, but his mouth is a firm line. He straddles the bike and waits for me while staring straight ahead, and we drive off without a word.
The warm sweat beneath my wet clothes cools quickly. Ten minutes later, when it’s turned to ice, he brings the bike to a halt at a new pile of bodies. Once again, he bends to the corpses, checking their pockets and heaving them out of the way when he doesn’t find what he wants.
“What are you doing?” I whisper.
Eric doesn’t answer. He’s angry, and hurting, and he has every right to both those emotions. I’m trying give him his space, but I have no idea where we are and I’m freezing. I’m entirely dependent on him at the moment, and the way he’s shut me out is sending me into a low-level panic.
He digs in a man’s shirt pocket, removes a pack of cigarettes, and lights one with the lighter he uses for the stove. One hefty drag later, it’s plain that Eric, the last person I thought would smoke, is enjoying this cigarette and has enjoyed them before. He offers me the pack and lighter without looking my way.
Fuck it. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t take up chain-smoking for the rest of my life, however short it may be. The nicotine flows through my bloodstream and to my extremities—what I can feel of them—like a benediction.
“Are you…” I begin, and then think better of it.
The cigarette travels to his mouth, and his next outbreath envelops me in a cloud of smoke. “Am I what? Okay? No, I’m not okay.”
I shake my head. I know he sees me because his bloodshot eyes move to me and away. “I know you’re not. But I’m here. You’re not alone.”
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Deep drag. Exhale. Maybe he remembers I promised him that much, maybe he doesn’t, but he tosses his cigarette to the ground and grinds it out with a boot. “Let’s go.”
***
I’ve been cold, but I’ve never been wet-on-the-back-of-a-motorcycle kind of cold. Numbness has turned to a full-body shiver that jars my neck and makes my teeth clack before it settles down again. I’m glad Eric can’t feel it under the rumble of the bike. I vowed I wouldn’t whine or whimper on this trip, and he doesn’t need another thing to deal with right now. I quiet the voice in my head that says he wouldn’t care right now, either.
We stop at three cars on a back road, abandoned but for the man still buckled in his seat, who snarls and claws out an open window. Eric hacks into his head, wipes his knife on the man’s shirt, and unscrews a fuel cap. I watch the woods for Lexers, banging my numb hands on my frozen legs, then wrestle my bottle from my pack’s mesh pouch with stiff fingers that won’t do my bidding. At my attempt to make a fist, they half-heartedly curl into a C. Fingers are weird if you stare at them long enough, like tiny people attached to your hands, and my tiny purple-gloved people have formed a coup against my dictator body.
I open the bottle with my palm and miss my mouth on the first sip. Water runs down my neck into my coat. More wet doesn’t matter. I look up when Eric slams something and realize I’m sitting on the asphalt. I don’t remember when I sat, but I like sitting. I could sit all day.
“Nothing here,” Eric says. “We’re leaving.”
Asking to sit longer wouldn’t go over well. I heave myself to my feet and find my legs have joined the Appendage Uprising, though I make it to the bike without falling on my face. After we pull away, I spot my Nalgene bottle on the ground. The sequence of events that would have to occur for me to retrieve it are overwhelming, so I wave goodbye as the blue plastic disappears from view. It’ll be happy out here. A free-range water bottle. Grace would approve.
The never-ending wind cuts to my bones, as though it’s winter rather than fall, and I want to sob with relief when Eric pulls over at the next cars. Fingers are in full-on mutiny, and, after a minute of grappling to get my pack’s zipper open for my spare bottle, I give up and drink from Eric’s water in the saddlebag.
“Nothing,” Eric says about the cars, then does a double-take at the empty mesh pocket of my pack. “Where’s your bottle?”
I try to wave my arm the way we came, but it weighs a ton and the best I can do is a twitch. “Left it back there.”
“You left it?” he asks, watching the road like my water bottle might come tromping along at any moment. “You knew you left it?”
I cross my arms, clamping my teeth together to keep from chattering. Maybe I should try to explain, but even thinking about speaking saps my energy. I’m too tired to care what he thinks. I’m tired of this trip and I’m tired of zombies, and I am fed the fuck up with Eric’s silent treatment. He’s barely said a word except to jump on the first mistake I’ve made. Because he’s fucking perfect and has never left anything anywhere. I would burn with anger if I wasn’t so cold.
“Can’t all be Golden Boy,” I mutter. I didn’t mean to say it aloud, but I’m glad I did. Fuck Eric and his perfect non-water-bottle-leaving self. Fuck him for not talking to me and for making me ride a motorcycle in the first place.
Eric’s eyes narrow before he turns away and sits on the bike with his back to me. I fight the impulse to yank his stupid hair. It takes three attempts to get my leg over the seat, and, once on, I grip the bar instead of his waist. I don’t want to rely on him for anything; I never should’ve relied on him to begin with. I wish I had my own motorcycle. I’d drive far away and find somewhere to sleep.
After close to forever, we stop in the driveway of a lone yellow house. I can’t stop shivering. My teeth hurt. My neck is cricked and keeping my eyes open is a losing battle. I toss my helmet to the ground and stagger through a low white gate to the porch steps. My plan was to search for dry clothes, but now I want only to rest. If there’s no gas here, Eric can leave and come back for me when he finds some. Or not come back. I don’t care. I don’t care about anything but lovely, heavenly sleep. I sink to the steps, rest my head on the stair rail, and close my eyes.
Chapter 61
Eric
Cassie is dead. Penny, Ana, and John, too. As much as I want to believe they escaped, all evidence suggests they didn’t get far. They might’ve been part of the mob that chased us, but I couldn’t stop to see. Couldn’t put them out of their misery. Couldn’t do a goddamned thing except walk away. Run away.
The knowledge has settled into me, frozen my insides. I’ll have to tell Maria about Ana and Penny. That coming moment repeats itself over and over in my mind, and it never gets any easier. The outside world scarcely makes it through the unrelenting buzz that shouts Cassie is dead.
They started a garden. Tomatoes won’t survive until later in the spring on the mountain, which means if I’d come from Philly—or made it out of Brooklyn—I would’ve been there. I could’ve done something. I could’ve seen Cassie again.
I failed her, and Maria, and my parents, and myself. That’s one big, fat fucking fail. I want to scream, to destroy something, and I can’t do that for the same reason Cassie is dead—the goddamned zombies. I should’ve known this reunion wouldn’t happen. There was no good reason to hold out hope that Cassie was alive when the rest of the world is dead.
Sylvie wants to make it better, or she did. I pushed her away, and now she’s staying as far away as possible. Maybe I should apologize for my part in it, but, as fucked up as it might be, I want her to try again. She gave up so easily, and I don’t like what that says about her or her feelings for me. I’ll get her back to the city, but I’m not sure what’ll happen after that.
I slide one end of the siphon into the tank of the sedan in the driveway and grind my teeth to keep the tears away. I’m not going to cry now, especially not in front of Sylvie. I squeeze the siphon bulb a few times, expecting nothing, but gas runs up the clear hose, marking this moment as the one thing that’s gone right today.
I fill the bike and then our fuel container. Sylvie ignores me from the porch steps. When I’m finished, I call her name. She doesn’t answer. I drop the container and stomp closer. She’s taking a fucking nap while I do all the work.
“Sylvie!” I yell. “Let’s go.”
She lifts her head, and I get a good look at her for the first time in a while, maybe since the cabin. Her lips are as pale as her bleached cheeks, which are stark white against her dark hair. “I thought I could sleep for a little bit,” she says.
Or that’s what I think she says. It comes out as I thaw I cuh shleep falil bit between teeth I hear chatter from ten feet away. She stumbles down the steps and weaves past me like she’s drunk.
The events of the last hours click into place. She fell into water and rode the bike, where her wet clothes and the wind wicked away her body heat faster than normal. She said she’d look for dry clothes, but I didn’t ask if she found them. It went in one ear and out the other when it should’ve set off alarm bells. She left her water bottle behind, had trouble mounting the bike, and though Sylvie has her fiery moments, she isn’t cruel, especially to me, and especially not in this situation.
I’m experienced enough to recognize the initial warning signs of hypothermia. She’s way past those and heading for the deadly stage. My frozen shock is replaced by cold horror that she could die. She will die if I don’t get her warm and dry.
I take her arm. She shrugs me off. You’re supposed to keep an eye out for the umbles—stumbles, mumbles, fumbles, and grumbles. She has every last one of them, has had them for a while. I thought she was being a world-class bitch, and the whole time she was dying right in front of my eyes.
“Sylvie, we need to get you warm. Let’s go inside.”
She totters a step. “No. S’go.”
I wrap my arms around her quaking body. The shuddering stops, and my heart
skips before it resumes beating at marathon pace. When it comes to hypothermia, if the person isn’t warming up, not shivering is worse than shivering. Shivering means the body is actively working to warm itself, that it hasn’t yet given up the fight. Not shivering can mean it’s thrown in the towel.
I lift her, deflecting her feeble push at my chest, and run up the porch steps. The door is locked. I set her in a wicker chair and try a window, ready to smash it, but the old wood slides up. Nothing inside. I retrieve Sylvie through the front door, pass a living room, and move down a short hall to the first bedroom. She curls into a ball on the bed with her hands tucked beneath her ghostly face. I need to get her under the covers. Keep her awake if I can.
I struggle with damp bootlaces and remove her soaked socks. Her feet are bluish. Her jeans and leggings are next, then coat and shirts and underwear. Her renewed shivering is a welcome sight. I throw back the covers and carefully lift her pale body.
“Wha’ we doin’?” she slurs, eyes half open.
I kiss her forehead. It’s a slab of refrigerated meat. “Getting warm. You’re going to be fine.”
“M’kay. Cold.”
“I know.”
I slip her under the covers, then rush to the other bedrooms. A kid’s room has a thick, furry blanket, and I grab that with all the others I can find. Back in the bedroom, I re-cover her with the furry one first, then pile on the others. My clothes come off before I get under, trying not to jostle her. I don’t have time to build a fire or make a hot drink—she needs my warmth, and the time away to heat water could be detrimental.
She’s skin and bones in my arms. If I’d made sure she ate protein earlier—ate anything—it might’ve staved this off. I would force it down her throat now if I wasn’t afraid she’d choke. I murmur in her ear instead of screaming. Sylvie doesn’t know about this stuff, and I disregarded every fucking thing I know about the outdoors because I was wrapped up in my own shit. If I’ve contributed to her death in any way, I don’t know what I’ll do. The thought is so agonizing that I moan. Her eyes flicker.