Dead Living (13 page)

“Aaron! The window!”

He looked up to see a corpse hanging halfway
out of the passenger's window. Sam tried to lean to the side as it
moaned and reached for her. One of its eyes fell from its skull and
landed on the seat.

Aaron casually reach over the seat and
grabbed it by the back of what used to be its shirt.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Sam
screamed.

He tossed it out the window.

Sam was definitely driving fast. She ran over
undead that were in the way. Others reached for them, but had no
chance. Her heart was beating so fast she could feel it.

“Holy shit,” Aaron said from the back.
“Actually never been in a moving car before.”

“You're no use to me if you get bit. Be more
careful.”

“You know, you sure have a strange way of
thanking somebody.”

“No jokes! No sarcasm! Just focus!”

“Fine. There's the gas station, up on the
left.”

She saw it. There were plenty of walkers
nearby, but they were spread out.

“What the hell?” Aaron said as they got
closer. He removed his quiver and backpack.

“What's wrong?”

She saw it a second after he did. There was a
large dumpster in front of the only door to the gas station.

“You're gonna have to get out and help
me.”

“Shit.”

Sam put the engine in neutral and they both
jumped out. Aaron shoved a corpse to the ground as they ran to the
dumpster. The recklessness bothered Sam. It was like he wasn't even
worried about getting bit at all.

They shoved the dumpster out of the way as
fast as they could. Aaron could hear the undead around them
approaching. The closest few were maybe twenty feet away.

The gas station was a ruined mess. The maps
that used to be up front near the counter were nowhere to be found.
The floor was littered with old magazines, food wrappers, money,
some busted ceiling lights.

“I don't see a map,” Sam said. “And they're
getting closer.”

“On the floor,” Aaron said. He dropped to his
knees and started rifling through the trash. “There has to be one
here.”

Sam did the same. It took Sam a minute to
finally find a map book of Baltimore and the surrounding area, but
it felt like an hour. A corpse was at the door. Aaron shoved it to
ground, like he did the other.

“Is this it?” Sam said.

He scanned the cover. “Yeah. Let's go.”

They went outside. Aaron stopped Sam by
putting an arm in front of her.

The undead had gathered.

There were five corpses between them and the
car. Another five were approaching from one side. Two more, who
used to be children, came from the other.

Sam was terrified. One of her many nightmares
was finally coming true, surrounded by undead with no way out.

Aaron just laughed. “It's crazy how one turns
into twenty, isn't it?”

“Aaron-”

“You get to the car when I move, okay?”

“What are you-”

He charged at the five walkers in front of
them before she could finish. They all went to the ground in a
heap, including Aaron. Sam gasped, then her legs unfroze. She ran
to the car and jumped behind the wheel. A corpse was trying to
crawl in through the back window.

Sam didn't hesitate. She put the car in drive
and sped away. The corpse lost its grip on the back and tumbled to
the ground. She ran over two more as she left the station and hit
the street.

Aaron didn't know why he was surprised as he
pulled himself to one knee. Sam was a woman of her word. He watched
as the Civic disappeared down the street, the sound of its engine
fading in the distance.

Without food nearby, the undead once again
had no purpose. The group that had gathered started to break apart,
shuffling away randomly.

Aaron was upset. A lot of things hit him at
once. His backpack was still in the car, which meant his only
pictures of his family were gone.

Even worse, Sam was gone.

He had grown a little attached, even if he
didn't want to admit it. He knew they weren't even close enough to
be called friends, but it was nice to have someone to talk to. He'd
been alone so long, he didn't realize he missed talking.

The five walkers he tackled had gotten back
up. Even undead that Aaron assaulted wouldn't hurt him. He looked
at the closest one like a long-lost friend. Sadly, the walkers were
the closest thing he had to friends, until Sam dropped in his
lap.

“Can't say Sam isn't honest.”

He took three steps away from the gas station
when he heard something. It was the roar of an engine, followed by
the screeching of tires. The roar grew louder until Sam sped back
into the gas station. She cut the wheel and hit the brakes. The
back end swung to the side, knocking a group of walkers to the
ground.

“Get in!”

Aaron threw open the passenger's door and
jumped in before the undead could gather. She sped away. She had no
idea where she was going, but they had to get moving.

“I thought they'd be all over you,” she said.
“Are you hurt? Are you bit?”

“No, I'm fine.” He smiled. “So much for not
being a hero. Thank you.”

Her anger spilled over. “What the hell is
your problem? You got some kind of suicide thing going on? Don't do
anything stupid like that again!”

“Sam, I-”

“Just shut up! I don't want to talk to you
right now.” She tossed the map in his lap. “Just tell me where the
hell I'm driving.”

He opened the map. “Well, that means I have
to talk.”

“Aaron, I swear, if you crack another one of
your dumb jokes right now-”

“Turn right at Russell Street.”

“I told you before, I can't read.”

“The second intersection
coming up, turn right. You
do
know your left and right?”

Sam ran over three walkers as she plowed
through the intersection. “Another stupid comment, and I'll push
you out myself.”

Aaron tried to be quiet. He really did, but
he didn't view the world like everyone else. To them, the world was
a very serious and dangerous place. To Aaron, there was no danger,
at least not from the undead. He still held onto his carefree side,
the part of him that grew up with his wonderful family. Despite the
rough life, his family had fun and loved each other, and Aaron
absorbed all of that. It was never too late to smile, even in the
world of the dead.

He couldn't help himself. “You're really
pretty when you're mad.”

Despite the situation, or perhaps because of
it, Sam almost laughed. She was still angry at everything. She was
angry at the world for refusing to let people die a single time.
She was angry at Aaron for carelessly tossing his body into a pile
of walkers. Most of all, she was angry at herself for coming back
to save Aaron's life.

Even as she left Aaron at the gas station,
surrounded by walkers, she knew she would turn around and come
back. She just needed to shake the corpse off the trunk. She had no
intention of honoring her promise to leave him to die if he fell
behind, and she hated both Aaron and herself for it. She didn't
know what had changed in her, but she didn't like it.

I can't read the
map
, she thought.
I can't get very far without him. That's the only reason I
saved him.

She knew she was lying to herself.

*****

It took a few minutes to get to 295. Sam was
thankful Aaron kept quiet. She wasn't sure how much of him she
could take. He studied the map, only occasionally looking at the
road. She had to slow down at times to avoid dead cars, but managed
to do so without corpses getting close. The Civic was much more
maneuverable than a truck.

“I don't get it,” he said. “Lexington is just
a suburb. How is it safe?”

“It's
not
safe completely. But look at
Honeyton Road, where the school is.”

He found it on the map, and thought he saw
what she was talking about. It was only a few turns off of 295. It
was a long road, with no intersecting streets, with thick woods on
both sides and the river not too far behind them.

“Deserted road?” he asked.

“Yeah. Walkers show up every now and then,
but not in force. We've always got our eyes open.”

“Watch out for that corpse,” he said,
pointing. “We can't hit every one of them. The car's not in the
best shape.”

“Do you know how to drive? No? Then shut up,
and let me do the driving.”

As soon as she said it, something popped in
the engine. Steam starting flowing out from under the hood.

“What? Oh no, come on now, just a little
longer,” Sam said.

“What's wrong?”

“How the hell should I know?”

“You said you know how to drive.”

“That doesn't mean I'm a mechanic, asshole!
This is your car, ya know.”

The car slowed to a halt. Through the smoke
Aaron could see walkers on the road ahead, plenty of them. There
were a few behind them, and some on the opposite side of 295,
trying to climb the concrete barrier.

“I can't believe this,” Sam said.

Aaron shook his head. He let out a sigh, like
this was all just a minor inconvenience.

He climbed out and slowly grabbed his things
through the busted glass. He walked back to the trunk.

Sam was dumbfounded. She just followed him,
her mouth open the whole time. She stayed close to his side and
watched the undead approach.

Aaron looked at the sun overhead. He had a
good idea of where north was, but he checked the compass on his
wrist anyway, just to be safe. Sam noticed his watch for the first
time.

“Aaron, come on. We have to run.”

He ignored her. He placed the map on the roof
of the Civic. He tried to figure out where they were by the old
exit sign up ahead, which was barely hanging on the metal
frame.

“Let's go, dammit!”

He took note of the wind at their backs. The
undead wouldn't smell Sam.

“Perfect,” he whispered.

She grabbed his wrist and tried to pull him
toward the shoulder. The woods was just a few feet away. He didn't
budge, and instead pulled her close.

“You're gonna have to trust me.”

She shook her head. “No, I don't, Aaron.
You're crazy! We have to run. I've survived longer on the streets
than you, and you don't do that by sitting still.”

The closest walker was fifteen feet away.
Aaron didn't show the slightest bit of concern. It drove Sam
mad.

“You don't run without knowing where you're
running to. You want to run the wrong way.” He pointed to the other
side of 295, across the concrete barrier. “Go that way, into the
woods. Keep the sun just to your left. You'll run into a
river.”

“What are you doing?”

He rolled his eyes. “Will you just go? I'll
be fine, just a minute behind you.”

Sam ran. She jumped over the concrete barrier
into the woods. Aaron was nervous a moment. If she turned to look
at him, she'd see the walkers paid him no mind at all. All eyes
were on her. Luckily for him, she didn't look.

He gathered his bow and quiver.

Aaron didn't understand his relationship with
the undead. He wasn't sure if they thought of him as one of them or
not. It wasn't like they couldn't see him, he knew they could. He
had his own theories, but he knew he would never know for sure.

He
did
know that walkers grouped
together for a while would follow a leader, and he wasn't sure if
they thought of him as a leader or not. So he stayed around 295 for
a minute, just watching them. One of them used to be a cop, and he
immediately thought of Uncle Frank. Another was in the navy, its
once white uniform now torn and bloody. The interstate was a
melting pot of undead, from all races and walks of life. Aaron felt
sad when he thought about the last days of the world. These people
were probably all trying to escape, and start over with life. Now,
they were trapped on the interstate forever.

When a corpse tried to climb the barrier,
Aaron pulled it back. A few that were already on the other side
shuffled toward the woods. Aaron shot them each in the brain with
an arrow.

When he was satisfied the undead wouldn't
catch up, he jogged into the woods. Their moans faded and nature
began to take over. He thought back to his life with his family.
Crickets chirped, birds sang, squirrels ran through the trees.

In the middle of those sounds, he heard a few
cries of pain.

He saw Sam leaning on a tree with her head
down. She held her right foot just slightly in the air.

He could hear the river in front of them.

“Sam? You okay?”

She turned to face him. Her face was twisted
with pain, but she refused to cry. “I think I sprained my
foot.”

He bent down and took her shoe and sock off
as gingerly as he could. Her ankle was already twice its normal
size.

“Can you move it?”

She winced in pain, but moved it from side to
side.

“Okay, probably not broken. Let's go.”

“No.”

“We have to keep moving. We can walk the rest
of the way to Lexington, but we can't let them catch up. You can
lean on me.”

“Just go without me.”

He ignored her. He slipped her arm around his
neck and wrapped his arm around her waist. She pushed him back by
the chest to look in his eyes. They were still uncomfortably
close.

“I wouldn't do this for you,” she said. “I
would let you die.”

He smiled. “You're a liar. Let's get
moving.”

They spotted the river, which was a beautiful
sight, then turned and hobbled along next to it. Sam's ankle
throbbed in pain. She felt useless as Aaron helped her walk, and
hated the feeling. She had to stop for a minute every so often.
They walked for hours, until the sun started going down. Aaron
stopped for a rest himself. His lungs were on fire and every muscle
ached.