Among the Living (27 page)

Les fires up the generator and follows the cable out of the bedroom, down the stairs, checking each connection as he goes. He hits the power strip when he is in the big living room, and the TV comes to life. He flips around, but there is little in the way of news. Some channel has reruns of an old primetime drama about doctors. This makes great background noise as he opens a can of corned beef hash.

Their four-star meal this morning will also include mandarin oranges and some fried potatoes. Last night they put the little propane stove near the fireplace and tested it. He can’t remember if this is one of the devices that can cause carbon monoxide poisoning, so he plays it safe by maneuvering the thing right under the fireplace vent.

He goes through a bag of spuds and finds a couple that are just on the verge of going soft. They have little roots growing out of them, but they are easily snapped off. He peels them into a plastic bag. That will make another sack for the guest bedroom upstairs later. They get a dash of salt and some pepper, and then he tosses them into a shallow layer of oil that shimmers in the morning light. The smell makes his stomach rumble. As they get close to being done, he dumps the can of corned beef hash in and starts salivating like a St. Bernard.

Angela makes it downstairs. She’s dressed in jeans and a tight t-shirt with the word ‘Paramore’ on it. It was her band of the week a year ago. Her hair hangs in her face, blond and frizzy. Probably needs a hair dryer to fix, not that he cares. She looks fresh from the shower, if a bit like a lost waif.

She stands at the bottom of the steps for a minute and closes her eyes. She inhales and smiles a shy smile as if she has a secret. Then her face goes flat and she walks toward him. Wondering if he is due another argument that will snap his considerable patience, he prepares for the worst.

“That smells amazing,” she says and stops to stare up at him. Without heels, she stands a full five foot two, not that he is a giant by any stretch. Just seven inches on her, which is considerably less when she wears high heels.

“Thanks.”

“Look, I …” they both start and then chuckle, and for a minute Lester feels like he is on some sitcom where everything is scripted and they follow roles. The words were there, somewhat rehearsed. He was going to apologize, but instead he waits for her to do it first.

She sighs and sits down on the couch. He dishes up a plate of food and hands it to her. She eats and stares at the TV, which is now broadcasting nothing but snow.

“Where’s the news and stuff?”

“Don’t know. They said there was a problem, and it just went dead a few minutes ago. I’m sure it will be back s-” he is interrupted by a loud rattling near the front of the house.

“What the hell?” He goes to the front door and pulls aside the curtain covering the little window.

“Oh fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

He turns and runs across the room to find his AR-15, which is against the wall, near the kitchen. He snaps it up and grabs an extra magazine while he is at it.

“Get every bullet you can find and pile them up on the table,” he commands as he runs back to the door.

“What’s wrong, babe?”

“Get every gun, every bullet you see. Just fucking do it!” he yells.

“God, Lester, what is wrong with you today?” But she stands and picks up the Glock and a box of shells that are on the coffee table. She brings them over to Lester, who has the magazine from the automatic. His hand shakes so badly he can barely get the damn gun loaded. He snaps bullets in as fast as he can, but some fall and clatter to the wood floor. She sets the gun down and studies him for a second.

“What is it, babe?”

“Get the other guns!” he screams in her face.

“Oh my God, you have really lost it today!” She storms to the door and pulls the curtain aside. She stares outside and then looks at him in disbelief. The blood drains from her face. “We are so fucked, Les.” She heads upstairs. He hopes she is going to get more ammo, not to get high.

* * *

Lester is ready for war. He has the AR-15 loaded and an extra magazine in his back pocket. The Glock is in the band of his pants, and it tugs them down, but he couldn’t give a fuck less. There are boxes upended everywhere with shells sorted. He has the old shotgun he bought at Walmart a year ago ready and near the front door. He gives Angela a quick rundown of how to cock the thing, eject the shells and reload it. The shotgun will be a last-ditch weapon just in case the deaders make it as far as the house.

“Why, Angela? Why are they here now?” he asks for the third or fourth time.

“Maybe they’re starving and they know we have food.”

“That is the stupidest fucking answer ... wait a minute. Holy shit, you are a genius.”

“What?”

“It’s the noise, the generator, it sounds like a goddamn chainsaw, and they are attracted to the noise! Go kill it. There’s a switch on the side; hit it until the thing cuts off. Go!”

“I’m going, Lester. Jesus.” She stomps off.

He steps to the door and puts his hand on the doorknob. He takes a deep breath. He just needs to get a quick count, see how badly they are outnumbered. He turns the knob and steps out onto the porch with the gunstock pressed to his shoulder.

There must be a hundred of the fucking things. They are a moaning mass that presses against the chain link fence, arms out as if they can reach the house from there. They range in size from short and female to large and fugly. He thinks he may recognize one or two of them from the neighborhood. Maybe he has seen them at the market or when he stopped for gas.

A scream from the other end of the street, and a woman in a floral print sundress runs in his direction. She whips her head back at a pair of deaders that are hot on her heels. She recoils when she sees the mass in front of his house and makes the mistake of trying to run the other way. She slams to a stop, dodges one way and is picked off by the other deader. She goes down howling, her screams echoing up and down the street.

“Oh God no!” he says and raises the rifle to his shoulder, but there is no shot. They tear into her, and her screams attract others. Some leave his fence and join the mass on the ground. Before a half-minute is over, the woman stops screaming and the street is quiet again but for the sound of tearing cloth—or it might be skin.

“You mother fuckers,” Lester mutters, hands shaking in rage. Not going out like that. Not going out like that.

One of the women in front has her shirt ripped off so her tits sway freely as she is pressed by the mass from behind. She may have been attractive at one time, but now her body is drenched in blood, and there is a dry mess down her stomach that may be puke. Hell, for all he knows, it is brain matter. Her hair is black on one side and hangs to her shoulders. There is nothing on the other side except bare skull where her scalp has been torn off.

There is a pair of Asian men who have identical bite marks on their necks, but they are as far from twins as they can be. One is tall and has reddish hair and a chunk of his neck missing. The other is short, older, serious-looking and missing a chunk from the other side of his neck. They stand together and howl at Lester. It’s like a sea of deaders that stretches away from the house and across the street … and more arrive by the minute.

He presses the gun to his shoulder, tight, aims and—BAM—the shirtless woman goes down. Her body flops over backwards from the impact, then lands in the mass of deaders.

BAM and one of the Asian twins falls. That shot was a beauty, took the guy’s brainpan and shoved it out the back of his fucking head. BAM, the stock hammers into his shoulder and another one drops.

“Get your ass out here and drop some deaders!” he yells.

A shot in the distance tells him someone else is having the same kind of trouble. Maybe it is the Guard dudes on the way. At this point, he would welcome them with open arms. Hell, he won’t even get mad if they want to stare at Angela’s rack while she serves them lemonade. He giggles maniacally at that image and then fires again.

Angela whirls through the door with the 9 mm in hand, aimed just like he taught her, arms out straight, elbow slightly bent. She takes up a wide stance and stares down the barrel, but she doesn’t fire.

BAM. A balding black guy loses the top of his head and flops into the heap. The others ignore his body and clamor to their feet. The stock hammers into his shoulder over and over as he drops one after another until all thirty rounds have either found marks or flown off into the distance. He pops another magazine in and then goes automatic by pulling the gun forward with his left hand, gunstock barely resting against his shoulder so he can ‘bump fire’ the weapon. Most of a magazine disappears in the wave of deaders as the gun bounces off his chest. His finger over the trigger means that with each recoil it fires again, and again.

“Shoot ‘em, Ange!” he pleads.

“I can’t shoot people, I can’t!” she cries.

“They aren’t people, Angela, they’re deaders. DEADERS! If they reach us, we are fucking dead.” But that’s not the only reason. He thinks of the woman he saw torn to shreds, and he is pissed.

“Oh no. I can’t!” she cries.

BAM, he drops a skinny guy who claws free of the mass. He is covered in fresh blood, and most of his chin is already gone. Strips of flesh hang as the bone works up and down. BAM, the gun rocks him back again, and he has lost count of the shots. How many does he have left?

“Do it! I need to reload soon!”

He looks out the corner of his eye, and she still has the gun leveled. She takes a breath, sights, and then the gun bucks in her hand so hard that she nearly drops it. The pistol flies up, but she recovers and lowers it. A woman with a missing arm drops to the ground, shot through the neck. It is a beauty; the bullet enters through a tiny hole and then exits with part of her spinal cord to pelt the deader behind her. She aims at that one and blows his face open.

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my fucking God,” she cries as she fires.

Lester smiles and wishes he could take a minute to reassure her, but there are more pressing matters at hand, like a shitload of deaders.

He fires again, and the shot slides along the face of a woman with red, frizzy hair and takes off part of her ear. She howls and staggers forward, flops over the fence, and just like that the tiny barrier that has protected them collapses in the middle. Several of the deaders pressing against the fence fall forward and land in his yard in a great rippling wave as the chain link tinkles together. It was just a matter of time, gonna have to shoot them all now. He sights the center of her head and squeezes, but the impact for which he is prepared doesn’t happen, as the hammer clicks on empty.

He reaches up and, with hand shaking, tries to hit the release. His finger fumbles over the latch, and it doesn’t come loose. The woman has a hard-on for him as she staggers forward.

Fifteen feet.

He hits the damn release again, and the magazine hits the porch.

Ten feet.

He grabs the metal magazine. Fumbles it in his hand and nearly drops it. He dumps a box of bullets on the small tabletop. Beer bottles from the day before fall on the deck and roll around like loose bowling pins. He grabs a handful of the shells and starts ramming them in as fast as he can.

“Lil’ help here, babe!”

Five feet.

The girl gets closer. One slow step at a time. She might move faster, but she is dragging her left leg, leaving a streak of blood with each step. Her eyes aren’t white; they have been consumed by that bloody pupil that looks like a crimson marble, which he is getting sick and tired of seeing. He gets half a dozen shells in, and it will have to do for now, because Angie is in her own world.

“BABE!”

He flips the magazine over.

Two feet.

He rams it home with trembling hands. Angie squeals, turns and blows the top of the deader’s head off.

“Sorry.”

“Jesus, that was a great shot.” He smiles at her and fires the six rounds as fast as he can. Then he has a few seconds to do a full reload.

She clicks on empty, so he rams the full magazine home and steps forward, resting his waist against the wood fence that encompasses the space. She sits back in the chair in which she lay tanning yesterday and reloads the pistol. Her hands shake, and she drops as many shells as she puts in, but she gets the job done. Lester watches from the corner of his eye and grins when she gets the gun loaded.

There is a crash from the back of the house that scares the crap out of him. Lester wants to run around the side of the house and see what the hell is going on. Probably nothing, probably just a dog wandering around. Yeah, that’s it, a dog. A big-ass dog whose only purpose in life is to scare the shit out of Lester. This is worse than a movie, worse than anything he has ever seen before. He fires again, and one of the deaders drops in his tracks. There are so many, though, and they are coming over the bend in the fence.

Another wanders into the yard and then another. This one looks like your garden-variety stay-at-home mom minus the kids and soccer-mom-approved minivan. He shoots three times, and three answering holes stitch up her chest until one takes out her throat and she flops down, hands at her side.