Blog of the Dead (Book 2): Life (7 page)

‘Like I’ve just been through a fucking car windscreen,’ he said.

‘No slurred speech,’ said Clay. ‘Good good. Any double vision?’

‘No,’ said Misfit. ‘Where’d you come from?’

‘This is Clay,’ I said to Misfit as he eased himself up to a sitting position. ‘Sean had to carry you from the car and we were being trailed by a crowd of zombies. We weren’t doing too well, until Clay came out and helped us. We’re in his place.’ Misfit looked first at Sean, nodded his thanks and then turned to Clay, and nodded at him.

‘Ah, it was nothing,’ said Clay, standing and picking one of his pimped up gloves from the coffee table. Who couldn’t do damage with these babies?’

‘Whoa,’ said Misfit in admiration at the sight of the spiked glove.

I sat on the sofa next to Misfit, whose head had been freshly cleaned and bandaged by Clay to prevent infection. Clay had offered to attend to Sean’s cut on his forehead, but he had refused, choosing to wipe the slowing flow of blood with the sleeve of his coat.

Sean edged his way around the narrow living room, perusing the personal belongings of the original owners, while Clay, who had changed into a fresh t-shirt, clean jeans and trainers, perched eagerly on an armchair on the other side of the coffee table. Obviously bored of gilt framed photos of people he didn’t know, and porcelain cats, Sean wandered back over to us, bent down and lifted one of Clay’s gloves from the table. ‘Pretty cool,’ he said, studying the metal spike before placing the glove back down. ‘Boxer, eh?’

‘Ha, yeah, I wasn’t born with a handsome nose like this,’ said Clay, pointing to where his nose bent in the middle. ‘Been broken twice. My mum was always saying to me, “Clayton, I didn’t give birth to that lovely face for you to go and make a punch bag out of it!” Bless her. I was semi pro but Mum and my sisters hated me fighting.’ Clay’s face darkened and his smile dropped. ‘May they rest in pieces …’ He cast his eyes down to the ground at his feet, his body tensed and I guessed he’d have loved a punch bag right then.

‘
So, how long you been living here?’ I asked, trying to change the subject.

Clay looked up at me, his smile back. ‘Ah, few months now,’ he said. ‘It’s not bad. I keep quiet and the hedge keeps me hidden from the street so I don’t get many zombies bothering me. And when they do, I give ‘em a bit of this.’ He leaned forwards and picked up one of the gloves before placing it down and leaning back into his seat with a proud grin. One of his feet bobbed up and down rapidly as though agitated but his face appeared calm. I’ve got the garage set up as a panic room with enough supplies to last a good month or so, if I do need to lay low.’

‘It’s just you here?’ I asked.

‘
Yeah. I like it that way, but you guys are welcome to crash tonight if it’ll help?’

I looked at Misfit. ‘I’m OK,’ he said.

‘You sure, mate?’ asked Clay. ‘No headache or double vision?’

‘
I’m good.’

‘
Thanks for everything, Clay,’ I said. ‘But we need to get back to our people. They’ll be worried.’

‘
Yeah, no worries. That’s cool. You got far to go?’

‘
No. Just around the corner and down the road – the old Martello tower.’

‘
Ah, yeah, I know it. Cool hideout,’ said Clay, nodding his head. ‘Many of you there?’

‘
Just five of us. And we’re not in the tower, that’s a bit of a shell inside. We’re in the caravans next to it, but, yeah, it’s not a bad spot. You’re welcome to come with us,’ I said. ‘You don’t have to be alone.’

Clay ran a hand over his mop of frizzy black hair, flattening it for a moment, only for it to ping back up as he moved his hand away. ‘Nah. Thanks for the offer and everything but I’m a lone warrior, you know?’ I thought I detected the look of someone who’d just said, ‘It’s OK, you have the last biscuit’, while hoping the other person would respond with, ‘No, no you have it’, instead of ‘Great, thanks’ before scoffing it greedily. But not really knowing him, I couldn’t be sure if I read him right.

‘OK. But you know where we are if you change your mind.’

‘
Yeah. Appreciate it … but I tried that shit before – being part of a team. Didn’t end well. I’m better off on my own. No attachments, you got me?’

‘Hey!’ I shouted through the fence panel when we arrived back at camp.

Kay bounded over from the roaring camp fire to let us in. ‘What the fuck happened to you lot?’ she asked, looking from Sean to Misfit, to Sean again. She twiddled with a lock of her blonde, bobbed hair before shutting and locking the fence panel.

‘Long story,’ I said, as the three of us staggered into camp alongside Kay.

‘Sweetie, what’s happened?’ asked Charlotte and she sprung over towards Misfit.

‘We had an accident. A car crash. Misfit got badly hurt but Sean helped us to escape some zombies. I’ll tell you the rest later,’ I said, and turning to Misfit I added, ‘I think you should go and lay down.’

‘I’m OK.’

‘No you’re not. You were unconscious for quite a while, you need to rest. Come on.’ I tugged on Misfit’s elbow in order to get him to move towards his caravan.

‘I’d best be off,’ said Sean.

I looked at him struggling to stay on his feet. ‘No. You should stay here tonight,’ I said. ‘It’s getting dark and you need to get some rest too. Stay. It’s the least we can do to say thank you for today.’

Sean opened his mouth to say something but the sound of an approaching bike engine cut him off. The sound grew louder until a bike pulled up outside the fence and the engine cut out. Two leather-clad figures climbed off the bike and removed their helmets. ‘Who are they?’ asked Sean, while Stewart trotted off to let them in.

‘That’s Soph and Chris. They live in a place a little way down the road,’ I said as Soph and Chris marched into camp towards us.

‘I really should …’ began Sean. I saw him put a hand to his head and his legs wobbled beneath him. Kay grabbed his arm to keep him upright.

‘Take him to my old room and make him sleep,’ I said to her as I turned and walked towards our visitors. Misfit and Charlotte followed me, and Stewart joined us once he had locked the fence panel. ‘What’s up?’ I asked glancing from Chris to Soph.

‘It’s Lucy,’ began Soph – Lucy was one of the survivors that lived at St Andrews, a big block of flats at The Durlocks where my wedding that never was took place. ‘She went out on a supply run yesterday and didn’t come back.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ I said, being no stranger to losing friends out there.

‘No,’ said Chris. ‘That’s not it. We found her, today – well, her body – in the alley behind St Andrews. She was murdered.’

‘What? You mean bitten …’

‘No, Sophie,’ Chris continued, ‘I mean murdered. By a human.’

Entry Eight

I lay on the sofa beside Misfit in his caravan. I watched him as he slept, checking that his chest still rose and fell, just as I imagine a new mother would with her newborn baby.

I noted he hadn’t displayed any worrying symptoms since losing consciousness when he went through the car’s windscreen … no dizziness, double vision, concussion or difficulty with speaking. And b
efore he laid down, I’d made him follow my finger as I moved it left and right, up and down in front of his face. I’m no doctor but I’d seen enough doctors on TV do that – back when there was such a thing – so I guessed it was the right thing to do. He followed my finger with his eyes, not moving his head; I guessed he’d watched enough doctors on TV to know that was the correct procedure.

But concern for Misfit’s health wasn’t the only thing that kept me awake. I thought back to earlier, when Chris and Soph were here. Once Kay had rejoined us having helped Sean to bed, we had sat around the fire as they explained what had happened. ‘Kelly found her body,’ said Chris. ‘She had gone down to the end of the garden to fetch a ball for Ella, that’s when she saw Lucy’s hand through the gate. There was a huge chunk torn out of her neck and shoulder. We’re guessing the attack happened somewhere else and she managed to stagger back as far as the alley before she bled to death or we would probably of heard something.’

‘The wound, couldn’t it have been a zombie bite?’ asked Charlotte, tucking a strand of long curly hair behind her ear.

‘Can’t have been,’ said Soph, her eyes wide as she looked from Charlotte to the rest of us. ‘If it had been a zombie bite, Lucy would have turned. She was dead, but there was no head wound. Her blood was red, not black. She wasn’t infected.’

‘Someone killed her,’ added Chris.

‘But who … why?’ asked Charlotte.

‘Who’s that guy, the one in the caravan?’ asked Soph, nudging her long blonde fringe from her eyes with a finger. ‘I haven’t seen him around.’

‘Sean,’ I said. ‘We met him yesterday … on the beach. He was …’

‘He’s looking for his sister,’ finished Kay. ‘He’s just some harmless bloke.’

‘You understand why we have to be suspicious,’ said Soph. ‘One of ours has been murdered. There’s someone out there with blood on their hands.’

Alarm bells rang in my head – blood on their hands. Sean turns up on the beach, not far from The Durlocks with blood on his hands and scratches on his arms. Prime suspect. But I held back, I said nothing about the blood on his hands or the scratches, even though I didn’t understand why.

I lay on the sofa now, trying to figure out why I hadn’t said anything. Sean could have run today after the car crash. Instead, he risked his own life to carry Misfit away from the zombies that pursued us. It’s quite likely that neither me nor Misfit would have made it back alive if it wasn’t for him. Would a murderer do that? But the scratches and the blood on his hands … My stomach churned uneasily. I tried to relax and get some much needed sleep but my eyelids remained wide, as though propped up with matchsticks – though, in this case, it wasn’t matchsticks holding them up but fear. What if I was wrong about Sean and he did murder Lucy? If he killed again, it would be my fault. And right now, he was in my camp.

The next morning, exhausted from lack of sleep, I was relieved to see all my team members alive and well and not the slightest bit murdered. Misfit was well enough to sit by the fire and eat some fish that Chris and Soph had brought us. Earlier I had changed the bandage on his head for a fresh one from a first aid kit. As I’d cleaned it, I noticed the wound, just below his right temple, was deep but not as large as I’d first thought. Ideally, he needed stitches but we didn’t live in anything close to an ideal world.

The hot topic was, of course, the murder. ‘Open your eyes, Kay,’ said Stewart, who, judging by the bags under his eyes, had slept as badly as me. ‘It has to be him.’

‘I don’t believe he’s a murderer,’ said Kay.

‘And you know him well?’ asked Stewart.

‘It’s in his eyes,’ said Kay. ‘He doesn’t have a murderer’s eyes.’

‘I don’t think that’s a very strong defence,’ said Stewart. ‘The shifty stranger that shows up on the same day that someone is murdered is innocent due to him not having murderer’s eyes. Case closed.’

‘And accusing him just because he’s a stranger isn’t a strong case either, is it? Fucktard,’ said Kay. ‘And what about that other bloke that turned up here, the smarmy git … it could have been him.’

‘It could have been anyone in this town,’ I said.

‘But most likely it’s the shifty, moody, hammer wielding stranger …’ said Stewart.

‘Maybe we should hand him over to Chris and Soph,’ suggested Charlotte. ‘Let them decide. I don’t feel comfortable having him here. I barely slept a wink last night knowing he was in the next room.’

‘They wouldn’t give Sean a chance if we handed him over,’ said Kay.

‘Lucy was one of their own,’ said Stewart, his brow creased. ‘What would you do if it was one of us that had been torn to shreds by a human?’

‘Exactly,’ said Kay. ‘They’d be blinded by anger and revenge and wouldn’t give him a chance.’

‘I wish I’d killed him on the beach the day we found him,’ said Misfit.

‘He saved our lives yesterday,’ I said. I had explained to the others the previous night exactly what had happened, how we had ended up in Capel le Ferne, the car crash, the zombies and how Sean could have run off and saved himself but how he had carried Misfit back to Folkestone. And how we ended up at Clay’s place but still Sean had stayed with us and ensured Misfit made it back to camp safely. ‘I think we owe it to Sean to let him explain.’ I stood up and stomped to my caravan. Inside, I knocked on the door of my old bedroom but I didn’t wait for a reply and pushed it open.

Sean perched on the edge of the bed, his head bowed. His long black coat hung over the door of the wardrobe. ‘The walls are thin,’ he said as he raised his head to look at me.

‘You heard what we were talking about?’

‘Some of it, yes.’

‘Did you kill Lucy?’

‘No.’

‘Were you involved?’

‘Yes.’

‘I think you need to tell me what’s going on,’ I said, standing at the foot of the bed.

‘I can’t. Just accept that I can’t.’

‘That’s not fair, Sean. You’ve just admitted you were involved – how involved were you? I’ve seen the scratches on your arms. I saw the red blood on your hands. And I’ve said nothing to anyone. I’m taking a risk, here, trusting you.’

‘Why?’ asked Sean.

‘Why what?’

‘Why didn’t you say anything about those things? I agree, I look guilty as hell even without those details. Why would you keep quiet for the sake of someone you don’t know when it could risk the safety of those you do know?’ asked Sean.

‘Are my people at risk?’

‘Yes.’

‘From you?’

‘No.’

‘You’re making it very hard for me to know what to believe and what to do for the best. You need to tell me – us – what’s going on. We can help,’ I said.

‘I don’t need help. Help would make it worse.’

‘How?’

‘What would they do to me if you handed me over to them?’ asked Sean, ignoring my question.

I studied his face. The gash on his forehead had stopped bleeding and had begun scabbing over. Beneath the wound, dried blood smeared his forehead and more blood had crusted on his eyebrow. ‘I don’t know. If they thought you did it, they might lock you up and throw away the key or they might kill you. I have no idea. They’re good people, brave, fair people but someone they care about has been murdered and to be honest, they’d be justified to do whatever they see fit with the person who did it. The last time anyone screwed with us, we killed them all,’ I said, remembering Caine and his cronies.

‘I didn’t do it. Just trust me enough to let me go. I can sort this but I need to do it alone,’ said Sean. He stood and lifted his coat off the wardrobe door and slipped one of his arms into it. I couldn’t help but look at the scratches on the other arm before it disappeared into the sleeve of the coat … scratches from a girl fighting for her life?

‘You’re asking for a lot,’ I said.

‘I’m asking –’ Sean stopped at the sound of a motorbike engine roaring in the distance, getting closer. ‘You have to get me out of here.’

I darted over to the window in time to see a motorbike with two leather-clad figures on it pull up outside our camp. It was joined by a van. The leather-clad figures got off the bike and removed their helmets – Chris and Soph. Then Kelly’s eldest sons Shane and Sam, looking so alike despite the three year age gap, climbed out of the front of the van. Shane opened the van’s back door and Josh and Cleo emerged. They each carried a weapon. ‘It’s too late,’ I said, watching Stewart jog to the fence. ‘They’re here.’ I knew I wouldn’t have time to get him around the back of the Martello tower so Sean could escape that way. ‘Wait here.’

Outside, I strode over to Chris and Soph who were already through the fence panel. ‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

‘We’ve come for that guy we saw last night,’ said Chris.

‘Sean?’

‘Yeah, Sean.’

‘Why?’ I asked.

‘Look, Sophie,’ began Soph as the rest of her people gathered behind her. ‘We don’t want any trouble and we’re aware of throwing accusations around but, the fact is, he turns up on the day Lucy’s murdered. You have to understand that we need to talk to him. Where is he, Sophie?’

I didn’t answer.

‘We only want to talk to him.’

Again I said nothing.

‘In there,’ said Stewart, nodding towards my caravan. Kay cast him a dark look while Soph nodded at Shane, Josh and Sam and they pushed past me, Shane with a baseball bat, Sam with a carving knife and Josh with a crowbar.

‘Hang on,’ said Kay, leaping in front of them. ‘You can’t just barge in here. This is our camp.’

‘And Lucy was our friend,’ said Soph, her long blonde hair swishing over the shoulders of her leather jacket as she spoke. ‘If he’s innocent, he’s nothing to worry about.’

‘And how do you decide if he’s innocent?’ asked Kay.

‘We just need to talk to him,’ said Chris.

Shane, Josh and Sam carried on towards the caravan. ‘You can’t do this,’ I said, storming after them. ‘Let me talk to him.’

Misfit grabbed my arm. ‘Sophie, let them take him. Like they said, if he’s innocent, he’s nothing to worry about.’

I turned and looked Misfit in the eye. ‘And you believe that? What if they think he’s guilty … what then? How can he prove he’s not? This isn’t about innocent and guilty. I think it’s too complicated for that.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Misfit. But I ignored him.

I watched as Shane, Josh and Sam disappeared into the caravan. I heard shouting, followed by a couple of bangs and the sound of something falling over inside the caravan, then I saw Shane and Josh manhandling Sean outside. Sean writhed and bucked in their grasp. As he neared me he stopped struggling and looked me in the eye, holding the gaze until Shane and Josh had shoved him past me. Sam followed them, grim faced. I watched as they bundled Sean into the back of the van. Cleo, Josh and Sam got in the back with him, while Shane climbed into the driver’s seat.

‘You’re making a mistake,’ I said as Soph and Chris turned towards their bike.

Soph stopped and turned back to me. ‘No, we’re stopping you from making a mistake,’ she said. She and Chris stood by the bike to put their helmets on. They climbed onto it, Chris on the back, and Soph started the engine.

‘Innocent until proven guilty!’ Kay yelled after them, but even her booming voice was drowned out by the sound of the bike’s engine as it turned and roared away down the track, back to the road. Shane turned the van around in the limited space and followed after them.

‘I’ve got a really bad feeling about this,’ I said as the sound of the bike’s engine diminished.

As the sun set that evening, the low clouds carried diffused strips of orange and yellow across the horizon. I sat in the Martello tower alone. I heard Kay’s voice from below, but I couldn’t make out her words. I leaned out of the window to see Charlotte and Stewart sitting beside the fire. Misfit sat a little way back from them, a piece of wood and a knife in his hands, his blade working erratically and frantically rather than with the care and emotion he normally put into carving his little sculptures. Kay stood beside Charlotte and Stewart, looking down at them. Her face was flushed and her hand movements were direct and hard as she spoke.

Stewart spoke now, his voice lower than Kay’s, but Kay put her hands on her hips and turned her head away as though she wasn’t listening. She looked up and caught my eye. The pair of us held the gaze for a while before I sat down and turned my attention back to the sunset.

I pulled my pouch of baccy out of my pocket. I unfolded it and looked inside – enough for one more smoke. I rolled the last of the baccy and lit my cigarette, taking in a big lungful as I watched a pink haze develop on the horizon. I heard the door to the Martello tower bang, then footsteps up the stairs. I span my head around to the left and peered into the gloom as Misfit’s head bobbed into view. I turned back to the sunset.