Grace Lost (5 page)

The cowboy returned the greeting.
“I’m coming in.”

He crossed the threshold to the
store, stepping over the body of the dead teenager.  His shotgun held in
his left hand, he extended his right toward Boggs. 
“Name’s
Gus.”
 The cowboy smiled, and lightning struck in the
distance. 
“Nice to meet you.”

Boggs took his hand, shook it
once, and replied with a curt “Boggs. Adam Boggs.”

The cowboy tipped his hat to
me. 
“Ma’am.”
 

I was shivering, and not quite
able to find my voice.  Boggs answered for me.  “This is Zoe.” 

The cowboy looked from me to
Boggs. 

“We’re together,” added my friend.

I looked at Boggs, not quite
understanding why he’d added that.  He returned my quizzical look with one
that suggested I be quiet and step closer to him.  I did both.  The
cowboy named Gus licked his lips and the new aroma of distrust mixed with that
of rotten flesh and fresh rain.  He turned and slowly walked to the counter
and leaned against it, his gun still lowered.

The cowboy broke the awkward
silence first.  “Is it just the two of you?”

“Yes,” replied Boggs, whose arm I
now clung to. 
“How about you, Gus?
Are you
alone?”  Boggs still held his pistol, now aimed downward toward the floor.

“I had picked up a migrant worker
on my way north, but those damn things had bit him at some point.  I had
to shoot him when he died and came back.  So yes, now it’s just me.” 
He paused for a thoughtful moment.  “I saw your SUV parked out front. I
was hoping to hot wire it since my truck broke down.  But then I saw those
bastards trying to get in here.  I figured someone alive was
around.”  He shrugged his shoulders and sucked snot up his nose.

I felt Boggs’ stance relax just a
bit.  “Thanks for helping out with those two.”   He tipped his
head toward the bodies outside.

The cowboy smiled in reply. 
“I hate to trouble you two, but I could sure use a ride.”

Boggs relaxed a bit more and put
his hand over mine as I squeezed his arm.  I was trying to let him know I
didn’t trust the man.

“Our rig isn’t big and it’s packed
full.  We can rearrange a few things and put one of the back passenger
seats up.”  I squeezed Boggs’ arm a little harder when he said this. 
“Zoe, grab your chips?  Let’s make this quick.”

Gus held his hand back out to
Boggs, some sort of masculine form of agreement mixed with thanks.  “Mind
if I grab a few things before we load up?”  Without waiting for an answer,
the man jumped the counter and grabbed as many cartons of cigarettes and cans
of chew as he could fit into a plastic sack.

Boggs looked at me and
whispered.  “
It’s
okay, Zo. 
Strength in numbers.
  
Just like
in the movies.”
   He winked at me.

 I nodded at him, let go of
his arm, and picked up my chips and bean dip.

The man came back around from
behind the counter.  “Ready.”

Boggs spoke to both me and the
cowboy.  “We need to rearrange the stuff in the rig.  Zoe, Gus and I
are going to go out and move some stuff around.  I want you to stay
inside.  You have a couple minutes to grab anything else you need. 
Keep it small.  It’s going to be cramped.”

“’Kay.
  But I don’t like it,” I answered. 

I watched them walk outside. 
Feeling suddenly very alone, my body shuddered.  I grabbed my own empty
plastic sacks from the counter and loaded one with Cherry Coke one-liters and
bottles of apple juice.  I put my Doritos and bean dip in the other. 
I walked with the sacks toward the back of the store where they sold a stock of
souvenirs and picked out a white t-shirt that said “Seattle” on the front with
a cheesy drawing of the Space Needle.  The only size they had was an
extra-large, but I took it anyway.

“Zoe.  Come on. It’s time,”
said Boggs, indicating that he and Gus were ready. 

I walked toward the door, stopping
at the body that lay in my path.  Boggs encouraged me with a soft
voice.  “C’mon, just step over.”  He held his hand out in an offer to
take my bags, then held the other out for me to grab for support.  I clung
to the t-shirt in one hand, and with the other held his hand tightly while I
stepped over the once-junkie-now-dead young man.  Boggs put his free hand
on my back and led me to the passenger side of the Explorer.  “Zoe, I want
you to sit in back.  Gus has his own gun, so I want you to hold mine.” 
Gus was several feet away smoking a cigarette and watching for more of the
undead.  Boggs lowered his voice.  “Remember what I told you about
it.  I’m sure this guy will be fine, but I’ll feel better if you’re behind
him with the gun.”

I nodded and slid into the cramped
back seat.  The smallish SUV was packed with what we thought might be
useful:  sleeping bags, pillows, a two-man tent, bottled water, food,
candles, a lighter, and the toilet paper that surrounded the photo I had
hidden.  Back in his garage Boggs had laid the back seats flat for more
stowage, so with my seat now upright the sacks from the store threatened to
fall on me.  The Kahr sat on my lap.

My shirt smelled like vomit from
my episode on the stairs before we left home, so I pulled it over my head exposing
my pale blue bra for only a moment.  Just as fast, I pulled the new
t-shirt over my head.  Gus was beside the car now, smiling at me.  He
winked.  My face reddened.  The cowboy got into the front passenger
seat at the same time Boggs slid into the driver’s position.  He took off
his felt cowboy hat and set it between the two front seats.

“We just filled the tank,” said
Boggs.  “We’re headed east toward the mountains, hoping to cross the
valley via Highway 2.”

Gus nodded.  “To head that
way we’d have to go south first.”  He tucked a pinch of snuff into the
inside of his lower lip and thought for a moment.  “Everett’s
overrun.  I barely got out.”  He pointed to the south.  “See
that smoke?  It’s the prison.   A helicopter went down right on
top of it. Roads are blocked once you cross the river just after Marysville.
There are wrecks everywhere, and these bastards are eating on people left and
right.”  He shook his head solemnly.

“Any ideas on where to head?”
asked Boggs.

“I’d suggest heading north, away
from the populated areas,” said Gus. “I have a survivalist uncle just outside
of Bellingham.  We can see about staying up there awhile.”

“Zoe, you okay with that?” asked
Boggs, looking back at me.  I
shrugged,
not
really feeling qualified to decide our fate.

“Does she talk?” asked the cowboy.

“Too much,” joked my friend. 
I rolled my eyes when I knew he was looking at me in the rearview mirror. 
I rolled my window the rest of the way down and dropped my old t-shirt to the
ground, where it landed in a heap.  The rain was still falling hard. The
car lurched forward as we began our trek north.

No one spoke for a good mile or
two, the tension in the car being intense.

Boggs finally broke the
silence.  “Gus, we haven’t been able to get any news.  What the hell
is going on out there?” 

Gus cleared his throat before
answering.  “The news came on late last night. 
Like
fucking H.G. Wells.”
  He spit into a paper cup. 
“The dead rising and eating the living.”
  He shook his
head.  “No one knows exactly, just that reports came in from Europe,
Australia, here, and Central America first.  No obvious pattern. 
Just like in the fucking movies. The news stopped broadcasting early this
morning.”  Several more minutes of silence passed before he
continued.  “You probably noticed you have to get them in the head or they
just keep coming after you.”

“Ya,” Boggs answered simply.

“Just like in the goddamn movies,”
Gus said quietly.

“We’ve seen
them
eating animals,” I said. 
“Cats, cows.”

“They seem to eat anything they
can kill,” said Gus.  “Back in town a group of them was eating on a dog
carcass.  I even saw one of ‘em chewing on a rat.  Not to mention all
the people…” his voice trailed off.  

After a long moment of silence he
spoke again.  “Just before everything went off-air there were reports
about containment. 
The government authorizing lethal
force.
  None of it made much sense, but that’s when I decided to
get the hell out of Dodge.  The hitch hiker I picked up said he heard
rumors of a terrorist attack.  His cousin at Fort Lewis had called and
said there had been reports of an unknown agent being dropped from the air, but
his cell went dead.  He never heard back.”

The first town we came upon was
small and boasted old homes from mining days.  Many of them were vacant
and boarded up.  We saw a scraggly mutt running down a side street, headed
away from us.  Aside from the dog, the town was relatively still.  We
coasted through, always watching for danger.  Several nearly identical
scenes passed us as miles were added to the SUV.  The types of houses
changed, as did the landscape, but they seemed to all tell the same story of
abandonment.

It was in one of the larger towns
that we noticed the first activity.  It was vague at first, a shadow out
of place here, a streak of movement behind a glass store front there.

“I think we might have company,”
said Gus calmly.  I thought he must have strong character to be able to
keep his cool.

“Think we should change our
route?” asked Boggs, just as matter-of-factly.

“Nah.
  I think we should just keep straight, get through
the town.  Nothing’s coming after us in the open,” answered Gus.

“Not yet,” I mumbled from the back
seat.  My gut was screaming
danger
and I wanted to be far away from
this place.  “I don’t like it here.”

“Me either,” said Gus.

The road veered to the right and
as we passed a drug store, the door opened.  A woman ran out and into the
street, waving her arms to get our attention.  Her long black hair was a
mess, and her face was streaked with dirt.  Our windows were rolled down
for fresh air, and we could hear her screaming for help.

“Roll up your windows!” barked
Boggs.

“We have to help her!” I cried out
in response.

From around a corner several of
the creatures appeared in pursuit of the woman.  They weren’t as slow as
the ones we had encounter thus far, and were gaining on her.  Most of them
wore bloodied clothing.  I watched as the woman looked back, her face full
of fear.  She ran toward our car as Boggs slowed. 

“We can’t risk it,” shouted
Gus.  “They’re too close!”

As he finished his thought, the
first of the creatures made contact with the woman.  It grabbed her arm
and bit down as she ran, causing her to scream shrilly in pain.

I started crying.  “We have
to help her…”

“No darlin,’ it’s too late,” said
Gus softly.  “She’s been bit.  Boggs, we need to get the hell out of
here, step on it man!”  His calm demeanor was cracking. 

More of the creatures were
emerging from the shadows, frenzied over fresh meat.  Their moans were
deafening.  The woman twisted away from the creature that had begun to
feast on her, and continued to run toward our vehicle.  Boggs increased
our speed, but she managed to reach us and slammed against my door.  I saw
her wide, pleading eyes as she came face to face with me, only the window
separating us.  Blood from the bite on her arm stained the glass. 
Her face was panicked when she realized we weren’t going to be the saviors she
had hoped for.  I looked back and watched her figure become smaller as we
drove away.  Tears streamed down my cheeks.  I clenched my eyes shut
as the creatures reached her in the distance.  I couldn’t bear to watch
her being slaughtered.  We drove in silence, aside from my occasional
sobs.

After a couple of hours of blessedly
uneventful driving, Gus instructed Boggs to turn right onto a seemingly random
road that was overgrown with rhododendrons, ferns, and weeds.

“My uncle Chuck has a place set up
out here.  He likes to be off the grid, hidden.  He’s a crazy old fucker
but an honest guy.  Trustworthy, if he trusts you.”   Gus came
across as a crude man.

Boggs turned off the main highway
and the Explorer bounced with the ruts in the old weathered road.  Puddles
had accumulated from the storm that had rolled in, and our tire spray hit the
bushes that lined the narrow road.  Thunder sounded in the distance and a
murder of crows flew noisily overhead.  I’ve always hated crows.

After several minutes and many
winding turns on the little road, a small windowless stone structure came into
view with an old single wide mobile home off to the right.

“We’re here,” said Gus.  “I
should go announce our arrival.”

Boggs looked back at me, then to
Gus.  “I should come with you, just in case…”

“In case what?” I asked with my voice
full of alarm.