“Lucky won that one,” Paul says.
“Shut up, Paul,” Indy says. “I love that kid’s sass, but don’t tell him I said that.”
“He knew it was spinach,” I say. “Carlos doesn’t know any of the plants.”
“I guess he won’t starve to death.” Indy straddles a chair the wrong way and rests her arms on the back. “What are we doing today?”
“Everything’s repotted for now. Aside from that, there’s not a lot to do.”
The greenhouse can only hold so much, and we’re limited to fall crops until spring. It’ll be enough for a small amount of fresh vegetables during winter to go along with the last of the fall harvest they preserved while Sylvie and I were upstate. Almost every potato will go back in the ground next year, and once we have enough for both eating and seed, I’ll rest a little easier. The Irish lived on potatoes for centuries, and so can we, added to whatever else we can grow and scare up.
“Day off,” Paul says. “Sweet.”
“You wish,” Indy says. “The minute you walk out that door, Guillermo will be on you with something to do.”
“I’m too stealthy for him.”
“I’ll bet you anything you get caught.”
“Anything?”
“Within reason.” Her gaze coasts up and down his broad frame. “I’m not sleeping with you, if that’s what you’re thinking. You’re not my type.”
Paul spreads his arms to the side, matching her smirk with his own. “I’m everyone’s type. But I don’t give it up that easily. You’re going to have to beg.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” Indy says.
They shake on it, and then the three of us inspect the plants for anything that needs attention. Sylvie joins us, Bird in her arms, when we stop at Rissa and April. She taps Rissa’s foot with hers. “How’s it going?”
Rissa rolls onto her back. “We’re bored.”
“Why don’t you listen to the shortwave?” Sylvie asks.
“I wish we could listen to music,” April says, loudly and with a glance at Micah.
Micah ignores the obvious self-invite, but Carlos drops the trowel he uses to attack the garbage can’s soil and licks his lips. “Let’s go to our house.”
April and Rissa jump to standing. “Carlos, you know Guillermo—” Micah begins.
“He’s not my father,” Rissa says, stomping her foot. “You’re as bad as him, Micah.”
Micah shrugs. “This wasn’t my idea if you get caught.”
Rissa eyeballs us, and though Guillermo would not approve of their plan, we pretend to be hard-of-hearing grownups while they gather their belongings. I am not getting involved. Neither is Indy, who nods permission at Lucky.
Sylvie feigns interest in a plant. “So that’s broccoli?”
“What gave it away?” Paul asks. “The fact that it looks like tiny broccoli?”
“If you weren’t Eric’s best friend, I’d—”
“Be all over me?” Paul asks. “I know.”
I laugh. He’s in rare form today. “Why are you in such a good mood?” Sylvie asks.
“We have the day off. The sun is shining. My kid is at Emily’s until dinner. What’s not to love?”
“We have the day off?”
Paul nods. Indy lets out a noise to contest that assertion, and Paul flaps a hand. “Indy thinks Guillermo has radar and he’ll find us.”
“Indy’s right. Where should we go? Our house?”
“Our house?” Paul asks. “I’d rather work.”
“He might not come looking there,” Sylvie says. “Anywhere else is fair game.”
“Remember how they gave alcohol to the people who did watch?” Indy taps a finger on her lips. “I know where Eli put his. It’s in our house. He won’t miss some—we can water it down—and Guillermo won’t look there now that we live with you.”
They grab their jackets, and I follow them from the greenhouse. This is like high school, except we’re adults and trying to get out of work that needs to be done. I don’t like shirking responsibilities. “Maybe we should put in a few hours, then drink later. None of us have watch tonight.”
“You’re kidding,” Sylvie says as we walk across the park. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“Eric likes to pretend he isn’t a total nerd,” Paul says. “But he is. He doesn’t like to shirk his duties. Right, bro?”
Seeing as how he just used the same word I did in my head, I don’t have much of a leg to stand on, but I say, “If wanting to be done with work before I get drunk is being a nerd, then yes.”
They shriek with laughter and then hush each other. Sylvie pinches my cheek. “You are. It’s cute.”
Just the thought of alcohol is making them drunk. I walk ahead. “Are you guys coming or what?”
“Ooh, Eric’s getting tough on us now,” Paul says.
The three of them together are an immature force to be reckoned with, and I’m often the stooge. I’m first up the stairs to Indy’s house and in the vestibule when I spot people in the small parlor room through the door glass. Grace and Eli, yoga mats facing each other, and Eli is leaning off his mat with his lips on Grace’s.
Sylvie steps into me. “What’s the—” It’s followed by a sharp intake of air. “Holy shit.”
“Abort! Abort!” Paul whispers.
They fall out onto the stoop in hysterics. Sylvie and Indy high-five, and we move out of view down the street. Indy taps Sylvie’s shoulder. “Don’t try to tell me I can’t say anything.”
“Not yet. We have to wait until it’s official,” Sylvie says, and Indy groans.
Sylvie’s smile is both joyful and devious. Her tight jeans, combat boots, and the messenger bag looped across her chest lend her an air of toughness, but I know firsthand how tender she is underneath. She catches me watching and moistens her lips unconsciously, the pink tip of her tongue visible for a split second. I can think of something I wouldn’t mind doing this afternoon, and I’m pretty sure she’s game.
Fuck work. I have no idea what I was thinking. We put in longer hours than everyone else this summer and we should enjoy our few hours of found time, even if alcohol is out of the picture.
“Hey!” Guillermo’s voice carries from the park. He jogs toward us up the sidewalk. “There you are. I couldn’t find you in the greenhouse. Can you come to the office?”
“And the winner is…” Indy says.
Paul groans under his breath, then says, “Sure, bro. We were gonna get drunk, but an office meeting sounds much better.”
Guillermo laughs at what he assumes is a joke. “Next time, man. Felipe just got back from checking out some places on the map, and he found a good one. We’ve got to get there before it’s gone. Shit’s getting cleared out fast.”
We’re sure it’s Sacred Heart. They’re still around, and every now and again we head over to check out the church, though we don’t go in. With their lights and generators, they can’t be doing too badly. Neither are we, but if we want supplies, we can’t outwait the zombies and weather any longer. I figured it would happen—I guess we all did, since no one looks surprised, but they do look as unenthusiastic as I feel.
“We need some adscititious goods, anyway,” Sylvie says, then kisses my cheek to make up for our lost afternoon and the fact she just snuck in our word.
“It said attained from something on the outside, like court testimony, not actual things,” I argue.
“The English language is fluid and ever-changing. How else to explain the incorrect and unceasing use of the word literally? Try not to be such a nerd.” I pinch her side to make her squeak, and she says, “Still my point, Dorkatron.”
Halfway down the block, Guillermo searches the street. “You see Micah and Carlos? I might want them to come tomorrow, and I don’t want to have to go through this twice.”
I picture them hanging in their house with girls. Music playing on a phone, maybe enjoying a beer squirrelled away from the party that seems so long ago.
“
Nope,” I say. “Think they’re on a roof somewhere.”
Sylvie clasps my hand. I may be a nerd, but I’m sure as shit not a snitch.
Chapter 71
Sylvie
Evidently, there’s a hierarchy when it comes to stupid. Stupid as shit is attempting to get into Fort Hamilton before the zombies freeze. Incredibly stupid is a hospital. Plain old stupid is the nursing home that’s less than a mile from us, but also a block away from said hospital. But stupid means no one has tried to get in there and empty it out, and we’re the ones dumb enough to try.
The streets are clear of stopped vehicles around the hospital, probably because anybody with any sense drove as far away as possible, and we spent yesterday afternoon making a path in the congested blocks between. Felipe reported there’s an abundance of food inside, and that we can leisurely fill the trucks in the underground parking garage before we make our way back to the park. Easy-peasy. Except that nothing involving zombies is ever easy.
Guillermo is excited, brown eyes alight and hopping from the truck to the van. “You ready?” he asks those of us on bikes.
We travel in our usual team—Me, Eric, Grace, Eli, Indy, and Paul. I like that the six of us are automatically lumped together because I trust them. It’s not that I don’t trust Rob or Dennis or Felipe, I just don’t know them as well.
We’re here to perform the initial distraction, and, when that’s done, to help load food. Or so I’ve been told. “What’s our purpose again?” I ask. “I’m starting to think we’re bait.”
Guillermo pats my hat and gets into the van. I eye Grace. “Are you at all worried he didn’t answer that question?”
She rolls her eyes and adjusts her handlebars. No one is answering me today. “Am I invisible?” I ask Eric.
“Did you hear something?” he asks Paul.
The gate rolls open and we’re off. Not only do we need to arrive first, but the trucks will attract any nearby lurkers on the way, and those of us on bikes don’t want to get caught up in them. The temperature dipped last night. The Lexers aren’t frozen, but a few have patches of ice crystals on their exposed skin and move a little slower.
I mention this to Eric, coasting on his bike beside me, and he nods. “But I’m sure by the time afternoon rolls around they’ll be up to speed. Literally.”
“Correct use,” I say. “That must be why I love you.”
It’s an uneventful ride to the block before the nursing home. Eli plants his feet on the ground and goes still while he calculates the scene ahead. When everyone else is dying a fiery death, Eli will calmly assess the incident before he puts us out with a hose.
The hospital is on the avenue to our left, the nursing home on the corner, with its garage entrance on the side street. We might be able to get trucks into the garage, but the Lexers outside the hospital would follow and we’d never get out.
Eli points the way we came. “We go down the next block and lead them southeast.”
Eric unclips the radio from his belt and tells the vehicles to sit tight. Clouds of frosty breath become more frequent as we contemplate what comes next, but we take off without discussion. Two blocks over, we make our way down. A multi-level parking garage takes up the street beyond the hospital, and nothing pours out of its entrance to eat us.
“Should we yell?” Grace asks. Her eyes are huge, but she didn’t say a word about not coming. Or about kissing Eli. I’ve given her the twelve hours she was allotted in which to tell me. I even conspired to be alone in the same room with her several times to give her the chance. But, nada.
Indy rings the round bell on her handlebars, a loud braaang that immediately starts hundreds of bodies walking this way. A Lexer limps from the nearby garage, screwing up our timing. I reach for my pistol—I’ve wanted more target practice ever since the boat—but he’s down with a bullet in his forehead a second later.
My ears ring from Eric’s shot. He holsters his gun and notices my hand. “Sorry. Next one.”
The mob continues our way, encouraged by the gunfire. Maybe they’re slower than usual, but not slow enough that this is the brightest idea we’ve ever had. When the first of the pack are close enough to smell, we pedal.
Riding at a slow pace, we still end up two blocks ahead. While we wait for the mob to close the distance, an Orthodox couple round the corner. He wears his suit and her wig is askew. They could be out for a peaceful Shabbat stroll but for their bared teeth and blood-brown hands.
I draw my gun. “You too, Grace,” Eric says.
Grace pulls her pistol. “I’ll get her.”
I sight down the .22. The man’s head shifts side to side while he walks, but he’s coming straight on, and I aim for the center of his face. When he’s close enough that my dinky bullet might scramble his brain, I pull the trigger. There’s no explosion of gore like with Eric’s gun, but a hole appears beside the man’s nose and he drops, the toes of his dress shoes pointed to the sky.
Grace takes two shots. At the second, the woman’s wig separates from her body along with the top of her head. Grace’s pistol is more of the brain-eruption type.
“Time to move,” Paul says.
After ten more blocks, we leave the mob marching forward and circle around to the nursing home. The vehicles are outside the garage, having been radioed by Eric that the coast is clear, and we follow them down the ramp after we lower the door.
It’s dark but for the headlights. The van and truck pull to a stop at a stairwell, and Guillermo hits the concrete floor with a whoop. “That’s what I’m talking about!”
I come to a stop beside him, set my bike’s kickstand, and put my hands on my hips. “We totally were bait.”
He laughs. “You get cake for this.”
“And alcohol.”
Guillermo offers a hand to shake on it. I knew we were bait, and he knows I knew, but you have to work the system when you can.
“She drives a hard bargain,” Eric says, then asks me, “Is there ever a time when you’re not angling for sugar or mind-altering substances?”
“Never.” I take in the garage, which is the same as every other underground garage: concrete walls, lined parking spots, elevators, and stairwells. “What now?”
“Now we go up.”
Rob and Dennis have exited the truck’s cab, and Felipe is out of the van. “It was empty,” Felipe says. “But that could’ve changed. Smells fucking horrible. All the patients are dead.”
Guillermo is first at the stairwell door. We file up the stairs and into a spotless, sunlit lobby, then follow Felipe’s directions to the French doors at the end. Our weapons are out, but it feels dead in here in the best possible way. It smells dead, too, and that part I could do without. Rob and Dennis, just ahead, bury their faces in their sleeves. I gag at the odor that assaults my nose from the hall. Indy coughs beside me.
“Oh my God, that is horrendous,” Grace chokes out.
Life is stinky these days, but this putrefied meat smell is horrendous. Decay and shit and stagnant air, all rolled into one olfactory extravaganza. Just inside the doors to the hall, a sign points the way to the dining room and kitchen.
“This is bad,” Eli says, which is the understatement of the year. But Eli never complains, so that means it’s doubly horrendous.
I don’t want to talk for fear I’ll taste this smell, but at least it’s dead dead bodies. I risk speaking and say to Grace, “You didn’t puke. If this didn’t make you puke, I think your gag reflex has improved by a thousand.” She winks above the hand pinching her nose.
We hit a bank of resident rooms. The beds are occupied, blankets pulled up to chins to expose only their heads, but the shrunken skin stretched over skulls, rotted eye sockets, and open-mouthed grimaces are more than enough detail for me.
Grace bends to deposit chewed nuts all over the carpeted hall. I pat her back. “Spoke too soon.” She spits and then laughs. Grace throws up as though it’s nothing, while I go to extreme lengths to avoid it.
The dining
room is an atrium, the tables set with real china for a meal that never arrived. Beyond that is the kitchen. It doesn’t smell good due to food that’s rotted away, but it’s an improvement over the hall.
The pantry off the kitchen is the motherlode. Giant cans of fruit and vegetables, egg noodles, dried potatoes, pancake and waffle mix, gravy, rice, hot and cold cereals, and baking supplies. I spot a few twenty-five pound bags of sugar that I want to kiss. Salad dressings, cooking oil, and drink mixes abound, along with approximately twenty large bags of prunes. Cookies, chips, and Jell-O round out the meals.
Rob and Dennis both say, “Holy shit.”
“Goddamn!” Guillermo yells, hands clutching his head. He does a little jig and then kisses Felipe full on the lips.
Felipe elbows him off. “What the fuck, G?” He wipes his mouth, but he laughs along with the rest of us.
I can’t stop smiling. This is so much food. I hoped, after I saw the nine floors of this building, that it would be as ample as was foretold, but this is beyond my wildest dreams. It’s not as big as the chip warehouse, but it contains the variety we’re lacking in our food stores.
Time is of the essence, in case the mob returns, so instead of eating it all as I would like, we find a gurney and wheelchairs to help transport it to the stairs. The others start on that while Grace, Indy, and I search the higher floors.
Patient rooms line the halls. The smell is worse, if that’s possible, and every last person is dead dead. Their positions in their beds give the impression they were sent off peacefully, maybe unknowingly. It’s preferable to starving or being eaten, but wandering around a nine-story mausoleum that’s been visited by a well-meaning Angel of Death is exceptionally gruesome.
A room behind the nurses’ station holds medications arranged by patient name. We take whatever seems useful, including prescription painkillers we’ve yet to find elsewhere. I worry briefly about Jorge and then dismiss the thought. He had access to this stuff before the virus and stayed clean, and he’s no different than he was then. He might be happier in many respects, and Maria is better than I hoped.