Z Children (Book 1): Awakening (30 page)

SUSAN &
FAMILY

The Nancy-Grace

The water lapped at the edge of
the sailboat in an easy, consistent rhythm which made Susan want to just drift
off into never-never land. 

She knew she was
supposed to keep an eye on the bobber as it floated off the starboard side;
after all, it was her day to catch dinner, but the weather was so damn nice.
Susan sat up a little higher against the cabin, the kids were still asleep, and
looked at the sun still low on the horizon. The last three days had been
peaceful, almost nice enough that they could all forget about everything that
had happened. The
Nancy-Grace
had performed as advertised; there was
plenty food and water; Sophia and Marcel had been full of life and laughter…
just so hard to imagine, in this setting, the crumbling society on land. The
land she could easily see from her position on deck.

It was the end
of everything. Zombie kids and infected adults. But all she saw was blue water
and an even bluer sky. It was amazing how distance made terrible things sink
into the background, become white noise, easily ignored.

Taking a drink of
desalinized water, Susan focused on the bobber for a while and then looked at
the shoreline. They had stayed close in case the weather went bad and they
needed harbor, but so far no emergencies had arisen. They hadn’t even seen a
single soul at the marina, nothing to spook them further out into the ocean.
Susan’s father had mentioned a couple of times that they should sail onto the
Islands around Grand Bahamas. He was adamant that they’d be safe there, with
plenty of places to make landfall, fish, find water.

Her dad had been
right about the
Nancy-Grace
. Susan should simply trust him, go along
with his plan. She didn’t like disagreeing with him, but she couldn’t leave.
She couldn’t imagine letting the land disappear on the horizon. Sherry was out
there. Sherry was like her sister. She had to give her time, a chance to find
her way here. 

And she’d
called. She’d called Susan’s phone. She was sure that it had been her, even
though Sherry hadn’t had a chance to say a single word before the cell phone
died.

Her dad had
capitulated, but not entirely. A week. Then friend or no friend, he was getting
his daughter and grandkids to safety. She’d nodded, agreed, but knew in the pit
of her stomach that she’d put up a fight when the week was up… if Sherry hadn’t
made it.

So they were
waiting, fishing, hoping, and waiting.

Please get here,
Sherry.
Susan mentally pleaded.
Please. I can’t leave you behind. I can’t.

Susan began to
doze again; the sun had raised a little higher, rays of light warming her face
and pink shooting through the sky like cotton candy streams. The kids were
stirring in the cabin now. She could hear Marcel and his customary loud groan
as he stretched out the nighttime kinks. Then Sophia, as she told Marcel to
hush, that her brain was still sleepy. She sounded back to normal fussing with
her brother, which made Susan happy since she’d acted a bit under the weather
since arriving in Corpus.

The old cork
bobber began to bounce playfully, a fish tugging at the line, and it soon
disappeared completely beneath the glassy water. Susan gave the reel a yank,
setting the hook. Whatever was on the other end of the line was big and strong.
The pliable, heavy rod bent, yanking the tip downwards. She had to move then,
pushing her feet against the side of the boat and locking her knees trying to
gain control of her catch, which was speeding towards the bow. Knowing she
wasn’t strong enough to keep her position, Susan righted herself and also sped
towards the front of the boat, nearly ending up on her ass and dropping the rod
as her foot caught on a lifejacket. Sophia’s lifejacket, which was supposed to
be stored away at night.

Even living on a
boat, the kids are still trying to kill me with their crap.

The deck was
covered in morning dew and as she neared the bow, Susan found herself gliding
forward as if on roller skates. “Help!” She hollered, her midsection ramming
into the front of the boat and the top half of her body bending over the side,
her hands desperately gripping the rod. 

“Dad, a little
help here!” The catch was strong and incredibly fast; Susan’s hands were aching
and her stomach was throbbing from its impact with the boat wall. “DAD!”

 Resetting
the drag was slow on the old reel and the rod threatened to snap each time the
fish took another sharp turn. Suddenly, Susan’s undersea opponent decided it
preferred the stern and off she went, narrowly avoiding the lifejacket and
slipping across the floor. As she stumbled past the cabin door, Susan saw her
dad just standing there, a devious smirk on his face like he was enjoying his
daughter’s predicament.

“Any time you
want to lend a hand!” Susan shouted, her voice now tinged with anger. “This is
NOT amusing!”

“It is to me.”
Her dad called back.

Circling around
the cabin, the fish… or whatever it was… below moving erratic and directionless
now, Susan’s right foot landed inside an open cooler, the one dad stored the
gutted fish in. She surfed the deck for a few feet, trying to pull her foot out
while maintaining her grip. When she did free herself, Susan grimaced at the
fish guts and blood soiling her pant leg. The sight of it brought the smell of
it, and she almost gagged as she tripped toward the bow again.

Reeling in the
line seemed impossible. Every time Susan gained an inch, the freedom-hungry catch
stole a foot. “Damn it!” She screamed, forcing the reel clockwise. She was
hungry; her kids were hungry. Dad might be hungry, but apparently not hungry
enough to help her catch the damn fish, so screw him. Grunting, she leaned
backwards trying to brace herself and gain advantage.
God, I can’t do this.
Why’d I have to get some super powered fish when it was my turn to catch
breakfast?

Susan gasped as
cold salt water was dumped onto the reel and her hands. “What the…”

“It’ll cool it
down.” Grant Fields took the rod from his daughter, holding it tightly and
maintaining control of the catch with his gnarled old hands. “Go get me a club;
I think you tied into a Dorado. Little shallow for them, must’ve been hunting.”

Susan was
irritated at the humor in her Father’s voice, but if the tables were turned,
she’d be laughing her butt off. And frankly, Susan was just relieved that she
wasn’t fighting that whale anymore. Dorado’s could be as big as thirty,
thirty-three pounds. And talk about delicious; Susan couldn’t remember the last
time she’d had mahi-mahi. If only they had a couple of limes on the boat, maybe
some fresh sour cream.

Running back
into the cabin, Susan grabbed the fish club. She nearly tripped over Sophia and
Marcel as they came up from the bunks below to see what all the fuss was about.
“What’s going on?” Marcel, always curious and questioning.

“Wow, look!”
Sophia this time, pointing.

The trio looked,
gasping when they saw the giant golden, blue, and green fish, its scales
glinting in the morning light. “Granddaddy’s caught a big one!” Marcel
exclaimed. Susan’s gaze snapped to his little, innocent face. She wanted to say
that it was her fish; that she’d done all the work, but the damage had been
done. Granddaddy was the hero of breakfast, not her.

“Susan!” Grant
Fields called. “Where’s that club?”

She could tell
that her dad had the fish under control; it had to be exhausted, after the long
battle of wills. She took her time getting the club to her dad anyways, a
little payback for laughing at her as she slid across the deck covered in fish
goo.

The twins
watched in awe as their grandfather put the large catch out of its misery.
Susan, for her part, looked away, choosing to forego the sight of killing.

Even with the
light anchor, the boat had drifted closer to the shoreline, courtesy of the
light breeze. They’d have to shift positions after breakfast. Maybe they could
use it as an excuse for more sailing lessons. It was important that everyone
knew how to handle the boat- even Sophia and Marcel, who seemed impossibly
small when they were practicing handling the rigging with her dad.

Behind her, she
could hear Marcel and Sophia’s fascinated voice as her dad fileted the fish.
“Gross!”
“Cool!”
As if they hadn’t seen him filet dozens of fish in the past few
days. Of course, they’d caught none as beautiful or large as the Dorado before.

Susan was about
to turn back to her family, to the fish and the good eats it would bring, when something
caught her eye at the marina. She tried to focus, squinting her eyes as if that
would let her see farther and more clearly. It was large, like a small house.
Brown, big, and it had definitely not been there before. 

“You not want to
eat, Suz?” Grant Field’s voice jarred Susan back to reality.

“Yeah, I’m
starving.”

“I think we
still have some tortillas and refried beans, want to fry up some of the fish?
I’ll finish fileting and clean up out here.”

“Sure, Dad.
Although, it should be a sin to ruin that fish with lard-laced, canned beans.”

“Suit yourself.
I’m all about fish and beans.”

“Trust me, Dad.
We all know. You may have slept through your gassiness last night, but it
sounded like you were bombing a city.”

Grant Fields
snorted loudly. “Go warm up my beans, Suz. I’d hate to leave a few buildings
standing.”

Even partially
fileted, the fish was still huge. Dorado, almost worth surviving an apocalypse
for. Taking the fish pieces wrapped in white paper her dad offered her, Susan
started walking back towards the cabin. She couldn’t help herself though, she
had to sneak a look back at the marina. It was still there- the dark brown near
the boat hanger. Susan, still holding the chunks of mahi-mahi, walked over to
the helm and grabbed the binoculars that were stored at its base in a cubby.
They were an eBay item- old WW2 eyepieces from a destroyer. The glare-resistant
coatings on the lenses were dynamite out here, where the sun gleaming off the
water was often blinding.

Susan lifted the
glasses to her face and focused on the docks. The battle-proven binoculars were
somewhat scratched, but still far better than any new pair you could buy at a
store. She scanned the brown structure. It was an RV. A gigantic RV. She’d
never even seen one so big. It verged on the ridiculous.

There were
people standing outside the vehicle- a man, a woman, and a child. What the hell
were they doing? Standing out there exposed like that. Didn’t they know what
was happening in the world? Were they just volunteering themselves as walking
happy meals for the not-so-happy killer kids?

Susan’s gaze was
glued to the two adults, who stood face-to-face, obviously in a heated
discussion- the woman’s arms gesticulating in the air, the man’s head shaking
stubbornly. The child was just standing there, looking from woman to man until
he got sick of whatever the two were fighting over and went back inside the RV.
She didn’t blame him; that pair did not seem like pleasant company.

There was
something about the way the woman was standing, the way she held herself, the
color of her hair, and profile of her face that seemed familiar to Susan. She
watched the duo in fascination, front row seats to an end of the word marital
spat. The woman crossed her arms in front of her, a defensive action that made
her shoulders slump. Then it hit Susan. Hard, like a punch to the gut.

She’d been on
the man’s side of this argument, facing that exact same woman, stubbornly
refusing to move out of town after her horrible divorce. It was Sherry.

Against all odds,
she’d made it to Corpus. Susan didn’t know who the kid and the man were and she
didn’t care. Her friend had made it, her soul sister. Almost dropping the
glasses overboard, she raced to one of the safety features her dad had
installed before her mom had passed away. Yanking a thin cord, a cord that was
attached to an old tug fog horn, Susan sent an ear-splitting blast of sound
across the shallow ocean waves.

One. Two. Three
blasts. She tugged hard and long. Her excitement overruling every other thought
or feeling in her body.

Releasing the
cord, Susan held the binoculars to her face and found Sherry again. She’d
stopped fighting with the man, and the boy had reappeared and was now standing
in the open doorway of the RV. Susan raised her left hand and waved like a
maniac.

Sherry started
jumping up and down, also waving, her large bosom bouncing visibly even from so
far away. Susan’s heart felt like it would burst from her body. True,
incandescent happiness, that’s what she was feeling. Everything would be okay
now; everything would go back to normal. She was so entrenched in her own happy
feelings, so focused on waving to Sherry, that Susan did not realize her father
was moving towards her rapidly.

“What the hell
were you thinking?” Grant Fields was at his daughter’s side in an instant. “Why
the hell would you sound the fog horn? Why?” His expression waged war between
anger and confusion.