(Book 2)What Remains (29 page)

“Who needs a hospital when I have you?” I said
to the pretty young nurse who re-bandaged my forehead.

Calise finished her work then kissed my nose. “I
told you I would fix your boo boo.”

“I was wrong to ever doubt you, baby girl.” She
offered me a water bottle to wash down one of the painkillers I’d
just stolen.

After the drugs were in my system, Calise used
her sweet little hands to peel the padding off my forearm. It
didn’t seem to be broken, thank goodness. The area underneath where
the bat hit was a colorfully swollen mess. She rummaged through a
supply bag. Something was in her hand as she found her way to the
driver’s cab. I tried to tell the headstrong girl not to bother her
mommy.

I heard Calise speak very matter-of-factly until
the truck altered course to one side and stopped. The door opened,
I heard Sarah step out. I didn’t have the time to panic because she
returned in seconds. Satisfied by the mystery transaction, Calise
thanked her then was back at my side.

“Why did we stop?” I asked, sure I had come off
as irritable in spite of the tender care.

“Last year when Maddox accidentally hit me with
a stick in the yard, you told me I had to put ice on it for it to
get better. And it did get better. Daddy, you hurt your arm and I
want it to get better so I got you ice.”

My eyes became watery as she held up a plastic
sandwich bag packed with snow. The exchange moments before made
sense then. “You told Mommy that we needed ice for my hurt arm and
she found you some snow, huh?”

“Mmm hmm!” Her hair bobbed along with the
cheerful response. I kept the bag against the darkened spot until
it melted away. By then the arm was tender, but just like my pint
sized medical professional said it would, it felt significantly
better.

Outside of her exchange with Calise, Sarah
didn’t say more than a sentence in the time immediately after the
pharmacy. She quietly drove while occasionally checking the map
open on the seat. There wasn’t much to be said about what we all
went through at the pharmacy. As the hour passed my head cleared of
the fogginess but not of the horrid flashbacks of the eleven
minutes we ended up outside the safety of the truck.

Sarah wasn’t the only one who hardly spoke.
Maddox sat with his back against the rear door. He had a
distantness to him that I so badly wanted to pull him out of. I
didn’t see him cry or pout; he was just quiet. Trying for a
reaction, I lightly nudged him with my boot to no avail. Calise
finished the checkup then sat beside me.

“Hey, mister,” I said softly towards him.

He didn’t move. This apparently bothered his
little sister who wanted him to respond. In a pink flash she hopped
over to him. She had no idea what the other three members of her
family had just gone through or why we were all so quiet. As far as
she knew I got hurt, again, and everything else was fine. Her
little fingers assaulted his belly in hopes of tickling him.

“
NO, CALISE!
” he snarled. Startled, she
jumped back to nestle into my side with tears in her eyes.

“Hey now,” I interjected. “She didn’t mean
anything by it. She was only worried about you.”

“Fine,” Maddox mumbled. “Sorry, Calise. I’m
fine.”

She continued to pout into my shirt. I stroked
her hair while saying back to him, “No, I don’t think you are.”

The tone, the face, everything was akin to the
type of denial he once used when claiming he wasn’t tired on school
nights. “I am fine. We’re safe and that’s what matters.”

I’m sure he expected me to scold him like I
would have on a school night. However, what the boy had just gone
through was something no one, child or adult, should ever
experience. I kept emotion out of my response in hopes he wouldn’t
tune me out.

“You’re right. We are safe and that is what
matters. But I don’t think you’re fine. I’m not fine, neither is
Mommy. You faced situations that would send grown-ups running and
I’m so proud of you for it.”

A tear escaped his eye. “I tried to be brave.
Really, I did.”

Aches filled my body as pried Calise free then
scooted beside him. “You
were
brave, Monkey. You were braver
than I ever thought someone could be. Although, like I explained to
you before, bravery and fear keep each other in check. There are
scary, horrible things out there. My job was to protect you from
those bad things. I didn’t do my job right and you almost got hurt
because of it. Failing you like that is something I will never
forgive myself for.”

“That’s stupid, Daddy. If you failed then we
wouldn’t be talking about this now. Even if Mommy hadn’t come I
know we would have been alright.”

“You were right, buddy. You are incredibly
brave.”

I expected him to smile but instead he looked
confused. “Daddy, why was that man so bad?”

The man back at the pharmacy wasn’t bad; he was
absolutely deranged. I’d say he was more evil than the virus that
started all this. Calise was in close proximity to us so I had to
keep my responses vague. “I don’t know, buddy. Not sure I want to
know. Sometimes when everything around you is bad it can make you
forget what it is to be good. Like we said, there are good guys,
bad guys and even monsters in the world. We’ve come across them
all.”

“Does that mean that we might become bad guys?”
Calise piped up.

Maddox laughed. My mind ran through the faces of
the people I’d lied to, the cries for help I’d intentionally
ignored, the men I had murdered. I faked a laugh too then reassured
her, “No, sweet girl. As long as we’re doing things for each other
I don’t think we could ever turn into the bad guys.”

“How long before we get to Grandma and
Grandpa’s?” Maddox asked sounding more like his normal self once
again.

There were no windows in the back of the truck,
and the isolation skewed perception of time somewhat. It made me
feel a little bad for not being open to more stretch breaks earlier
in the journey. “I don’t know. Why don’t you guys have a snack
while I go talk to Mommy?”

They happily tore into the cashews I’d recovered
from the cluttered shelves of the pharmacy. I took a handful then
tried to balance. It baffled me how Sarah had been able to visit me
at the wheel so often before. I felt like a pet dog trying to move
in the car on a road trip.

The road looked clear and much of the snow was
gone. She was steering around a trio of stalled cars when I popped
out. I held out the cashews, “Hungry?”

“No.”

“Shouldn’t you eat something?” I stared at
maroon streaks painted along the side of the hood of the lead car
as we passed it.

“I said I’m not hungry.”

“Babe,” I said softly, trying to keep the
conversation private, “I’m just worried about you. Shouldn’t we
talk about what happened back there?”

“What is there to talk about? We got out. That
asshole was trying to hurt you. He had his arm around Maddox. I did
what I had to. What did you see inside?”

I tried to wipe the image of the stacked
children’s corpses from my thoughts. The smell was still stuck in
my nostrils. “Doesn’t matter. He was definitely some sort of
psychopath; that much was certain. I’m sorry you had to get into
any of that.”

“Cut that shit out, Nathan. I’m not a child.
You’re not the only one who has to protect this family. What
happened was what needed to happen. I took care of him. End of
story.”

“You’re right,” I conceded. “I’ll stop the
superhero bullshit. I am curious, though; after Maddox and I got to
the truck I heard a fourth gunshot. Did you kill him?”

“No, why would I kill him? He said I didn’t have
what it took to kill him. I could have, but why bother? He didn’t
deserve to die like that so I put a bullet through both knees and
both wrists... should have kept him out there long enough,” Sarah
said with an eerie calm.

“Long enough for what?”

We both listed to the side as she swerved the
wheel around to avoid a zombie with crushed legs. It looked like
the beast had already been hit by a car some time ago. The injury
didn’t deter it from crawling towards the truck. When it
disappeared from view there was a quick bump from some part of its
body that was caught under the rear wheel.

“Long enough for the zombies to reach him,”
Sarah replied. “Like I said, he didn’t deserve to die from a
bullet.”

Admitting that you disabled a person to be torn
apart by the undead shouldn’t have been such a casual statement.
However, I agreed with her completely. She didn’t even know the
full extent of the psycho’s crimes, yet what she did see him do to
her husband and son was more than enough justification for the
death sentence. That bastard deserved every second of agony that
was inflicted upon him. If there was enough left of him to
reanimate, then I’m sure the virus brought him back. Thanks to
Sarah, he would slowly rot away without enough function of his arms
or legs to curse anyone else.

Sarah reached over to the spot I set the loose
cashews. I was glad our discussion helped her appetite return.

“Where are we?” I asked with the open map in my
hands.

“Still on Route 58. It’s called the Jeb Stuart
Highway now… classy, huh? A few minutes ago it went down to one
lane in each direction again. We passed a dinky little airfield
too,” she said with a cashew in her mouth.

I examined the map closely. “I think we’ll get
off Route 58 in a little bit. If we could go the speed limit we’d
be there in under an hour.”

She laughed. “This is the first time you’ve
given me crap about driving too slow.”

I kissed her on the top of her head. “Want me to
drive?”

“With the knock you took to your head?”

I did have a hell of a headache.

“Calise bandaged me up. I’ll be sore for a few
days, but what else is new?” I lightly touched the bandages on my
forehead.

Another laugh came, this one louder than the
last. “Yeah, those Hello Kitty band aids look fierce.”

“It’s darker back there. I couldn’t see what she
was doing. Oh well, chicks dig scars, right?” I planted another
kiss on her head before wobbling to the back with the kids. “If you
need something let me know.”

The second I plopped between the kids the whole
truck shook with a loud thud. Recognizing the impact with one of
the infected I immediately reassured the kids. Calling forward I
said, “We still okay?”

“Umm…” Sarah audibly pondered a kid-appropriate
response, “this road has a lot of … speed bumps.”

Everything listed to the right. I assumed we had
made a full left-hand turn. Calise looked worried. “Is that the end
of Route 58?” I called to the front.

“Sure was!” she replied. “Almost there
guys!”

Cheers broke out from both kids. I was thrilled
to think we’d be there soon. However, my anxiety remained.
Internally I was unable to accept that we could actually be close
to relative safety at long last. Sitting in the back only allowed
my nervous feelings to ferment.

“Do you want me to come up there with you?”

“Nope.” Although she was blocked from my view, I
could still imagine the crafty smile on her face. Years of marriage
enabled her to predict my Attention Deficit Disorder fueled desire
to self-occupy in stressful times. “I was in the place you’re
sitting for most of the last two days. Also, you got kicked in the
head a few hours ago so you should rest. I want you back there with
the kids. I’ll let you know when we’re close enough to use the
radio to try to warn your parents.”

My eyes widened. “I forgot about the radio!”

A pair of curious glances came from my excited
outburst. Sarah, on the other hand, saw it as another sarcastic
opportunity. “Don’t worry about him, babies. Head injuries can make
you forgetful.”

“DADDY. DO. YOU. REMEMBER. ME?” Maddox
deliberately teased as if I had brain damage.

Calise smacked him. “Leave Daddy alone! He has a
headache… Daddy, why are you happy about the radio?”

I pulled her closer for a kiss. She’s always
been a daddy’s girl. From the beginning I’ve relished every sweet
thing she’s said or done to prove that. “Remember when we last saw
Grandma and Grandpa at their house?”

“I remember! I do! It was before you were gone
for a couple days.”

It was unfortunate that her frame of reference
was based around my absence. I counted on the dim lighting to hide
my reaction to the last part of her response. “Good honey, that’s
right. Well when Grandpa and I were talking I brought one of
these,” I lifted the radio for her to see, “so we’d be able to warn
them we were coming if all other ways of communication stopped
working.”

“Why did the phones and the TV stop
working?”

“Why would they still work?” meddled her
brother. “It’s not like the zombies stayed working at the phone
company or the TV stations. Don’t be stupid, Calise.”

Now I was the one who smacked him. “The only
thing that is stupid is talking to your sister like that.” He
looked guilty. “How often do we have to remind you that she is five
and you’re eight? When you were five we didn’t insult you when you
asked innocent questions.”

Our bickering apparently made their way up to
the driver’s seat because Sarah added, “And you asked
a lot
of them.”

“Cut it out and don’t do it again, mister.
Alright?”

He turned to Calise mumbling the way he did when
he wasn’t convinced wrongdoing had taken place. “Sorry,
Calise.”

“I’m still smart. Did you know that? I’m five
now but I’ll be six in February,” She said, her worry turning into
self-satisfaction.

“I know, Princess. We know how smart you are.
Just like your brother here.” In effort to change the subject I
said towards the blanket divider, “So, Mommy, when will we get to
use the radio?”