Living With the Dead: This New Disease (Book 5) (24 page)

Posted
by 
Josh
Guess
One
of the people I've been taking care of here at the house died this
morning. Her name was Norma Smith, and I called her Mrs. Smith. An
old habit from working at the nursing home, not using someone's first
name if they're older than I am. Funny how that little foible came
right back to me when I invited these folks into my home.
She
didn't pass in her sleep. Most of the people sick with the new plague
who lose the fight go that way. Mrs. Smith woke up for a few minutes,
her eyes glassy and her breathing harsh and shallow. There wasn't
much in those eyes, desperate pain faded to resignation. All animals
seem to know when their final moments are on them, and people are no
different. I sat with her for those last few minutes, watched the
remaining strength flow from her muscles and bones.
I held her
when she died.
I should have felt more. I didn't cry for her.
A light sadness crept over me that I couldn't do more, that the life
she fought so hard to keep was taken from her in a way she just
couldn't combat. Being there for her as she died was the least I
could do for her. Sadly, it was also 
all 
I
could do.
Norma's death marks an interesting turn to how the
new plague is playing out around our home. We seem to have reached a
point of rough balance between the number of people falling ill and
the number getting better or passing away. There's some hope that the
worst of it is over. As we are now, we can maintain things until the
sickness burns itself out.
We have hope, as always, but not
expectations. Because basing your plans and future on what you'd like
to happen is stupid. We expect the worst as always and will work from
there.
Trying to comfort Norma was a strange thing for me. I
couldn't help sitting there and recalling the times I'd done the same
before The Fall, trying to be there for the people I took care of at
work when one of them was moving on to whatever is next. I don't even
know if I believe in an afterlife anymore, but I damn well believe in
life.
Think about it for a minute. Every person around you is
a walking miracle. We're these animals, evolved enough to have the
capacity for logic and self-awareness to a degree other creatures
can't manage. We're the apex species of planet Earth, a biological
anomaly. A quirk of nature.
Each of us is a conglomeration of
experiences and events that make us who we are. We've loved and
hated, risked everything and taken the easy way out. We've been kind
and cruel, had moments of deep insight and impervious denial. Some of
us have specialized in understanding the strangest and most esoteric
fields of study while others are dedicated generalists. Those
experiences and the knowledge that comes with them are as invaluable
for their inherent teachable data as they are for what they represent
about the species.
What kinds of knowledge did Norma have to
share with us? What things did she know that might not even seem
important but somewhere down the line could prove crucial to some
endeavor? What about the wisdom that came from the experiences
gaining that knowledge, you know?
We're more than just
repositories for information. One of the things that makes the human
animal so unique, so damn amazing, is our ability to learn
overarching lessons from our experiences. Through understanding, we
grow wise, and we share that wisdom with those who come after us.
In
the world that was, there were so many people that we lost sight of
how important those lessons were. Sitting here tapping away at my
keyboard, hearing the shouts of sentries on the walls as zombies
taunt them below, I can't help but feel envy for Norma and her escape
from this. She's at peace now.
The rest of us may have lost an
invaluable resource. The worst part of that is not knowing if we have
or not. I think, should we weather this storm, that we should take
steps to change that.
Rest well, Mrs. Smith. You'll be missed.

Posted
by 
Josh
Guess
My
schedule is completely fucked at this point. I've been getting very
little sleep lately, usually in little hour or two hour chunks
between checking on the folks living in my house. Jess isn't working
anymore. She can still move around on her own but she's so weak at
this point that she has passed the daily administration of her areas
of responsibility to others.
Patrick or one of his nieces is
always here with me now. Pat has the new baby, which I've been remiss
in even mentioning given all the chaos lately, making the fact that
he spends so much of his free time helping me out all the more
impressive. It's not that I need help with the work necessarily, just
that there isn't enough time in the day for all the things I have to
do plus the work I may potentially do 
and 
sleep.
Take yesterday, for example.
After my post went up, the bells
started ringing. It wasn't a large assault, but it was global. New
Breed came at the walls from every direction, in small groups. They
carried big wooden boards, probably taken from one of our hidden
supply caches (not hidden well enough, obviously), and they were
doing their damnedest to get a foothold on the walls to scale
them.
There are numerous little crannies and crevices in the
wall between the stones where those boards can be jammed to provide a
decent ramp. Just over ten feet high, the New Breed only needs to get
them about six feet up to have a good shot at getting over the
edge.
So that was what I did yesterday for several hours. I
ran around the walkways defending the northern section, alternating
between firing arrows at close range (for accuracy--after all, shots
to the head are the only ones that count) and waylaying those that
made it over with one of the heavy machetes the folks in North
Jackson made for us. That entire section of wall, roughly a quarter
of the whole, was manned by twenty-five people. Five groups of two in
set positions, working a small area. Five 'flying units', like me,
running between longer chunks and helping where needed, and ten
sentries posted up with long guns, sending out precious bullets into
the heads of zombies who got past us or were making their way to the
wall, depending on the circumstances.
It was exhausting.
Fighting for hours on end with only short breaks to get a drink of
water or wipe zombie gore from my face took its toll on me. It was
well into the afternoon before I made it home, where Pat had set up a
rotation to care for my people. Jess is in better condition than the
others at the house, so she did a bit of light work to help out. She
cooked, which is rare for her. Even that much effort took a toll on
her, but she seemed genuinely happy to do something for me. For
us.
Somehow I stayed awake for a few hours after that, but
sometime between seven and eight I fell asleep. The good thing about
turning my house into a tiny care facility is the abundance of places
to comfortably fall asleep. Mattresses are all over the place, my
couch is super comfy, the floors are littered with piles of pillows.
I picked the couch.
And I didn't wake up until five this
morning. I slept very well, the deep sleep of a person on the edge of
losing it from bone-deep tiredness. I was angry when I finally came
to, but I couldn't maintain it for long. Jess, my patients, Pat, and
his nieces conspired to let me rest. There was some food ready, which
helped mitigate my crankiness.
I guess I just felt like they
didn't think I could do it. Like I wasn't tough enough or dedicated
enough to catch a nap, get up, and take care of business. That may
sound stupid, and I fell kind of stupid, but even if that's not the
lesson my wife and friends intended to teach, it was correct. There's
a lot on my shoulders and my stupid, pig-headed pride needs to be put
on the backburner. I can't do this alone, that much is clear. The
community at large needs every able-bodied person ready to fight at a
moment's notice, and I'm in that category.
I'm thankful as
hell for the help, that's all I'm saying. I need it, no getting
around that fact. The girls are too young to be in combat, but one or
the other of them will stay here while the other serves as support
staff for those who do the fighting.
But even if there's a
period of peace and the New Breed gives us a break, I still can't do
it alone. Staying in the house, working nonstop on one thing or
another, letting the worry build up and having virtually no
socialization...that was a recipe for disaster.
Having them
here gives me time to do something completely alien: to just sit down
for a few minutes and breathe. To do nothing, to have a brief time
with no responsibilities and no immediate worries. I did that for
half an hour after I woke up this morning, just sat on the couch
after my light breakfast and enjoyed the cool breeze through the
windows, the sound of crickets and morning birdsong. My cat, Simon,
came in from his prowling and sat in my lap. Can't remember the last
time I was able to give him some much-needed ear scratches. It was
nice. I feel like an almost-new man.

Posted
by 
Josh
Guess
I
can't help feeling incredibly strange about the fact that I'm not
sick. I spent a good portion of yesterday thinking back on the new
plague and our experiences with it. Just like everyone else, I've
been exposed, there really can't be any doubt about that. I spent
weeks tending to the people from Louisville that first fell ill with
it. I've been around sick people nonstop for a long, long time.
But
some of us just aren't catching it. Maybe whatever strain of the
zombie plague we have inside us just waiting to take over when we die
is too tough for the new kid on the block. That might be it, or I
could simply be the next one to wake up barely able to breathe. Who
knows?
On a deeper level, this bugs the shit out of me. It's
not as though I want to get sick--all of you know how much I hate
being helpless and unable to stand and fight when needed--but me
being one of the people still hale and hearty touches on a larger
trend for me: I've been very lucky.
Not falling victim to the
new plague is only the most recent sign. Yeah, I've been injured
several times, but that doesn't make me unique among survivors. We
live in dangerous times and work often has to be rushed to get done
at all. No, I've been super lucky. A combination of that and some
foresight let me save some of my family members, though the majority
of them died. One of my brothers and my sister lived, and their
families. My mom made it through The Fall itself. The majority of
people in New Haven lost literally every person they knew.
I
don't like it, mostly because I constantly feel as if the other
cosmic shoe is going to drop. That some huge tragedy will rain down
upon me and make mockery of the good fortune I've had so far. When
the universe aims to balance the scales, there's isn't dick you can
do to stop it.
Y'know, if you believe in that kind of
thing.
I guess I'm just feeling bad for all the folks who're
suffering with every breath right now. I see it in my wife, the folks
I'm caring for at the house. I saw it in the patients at the clinic.
Hell, I 
know 
how
awful it is, from severe bronchitis three winters in a row, and one
bout of pneumonia that would have killed me had I not grudgingly made
a trip to the ER. It wears you down, fighting just to make your chest
expand, to drink in trickles of the oxygen you always took for
granted.
All I have to do is go fight zombies. Compared to
what these folks are dealing with, that's a fucking breeze.
Stupid
survivor's guilt.

Posted
by 
Josh
Guess
This
morning I was put in a situation that required me to prove whether or
not I meant what I said about the community coming first, even as I
stay home to care for my wife and others. One of our key allies in
the local area, and by that I mean within a hundred miles or so,
asked specifically if I'd help them with a project. They said I was
their first choice, for my familiarity with the area in question as
well as having worked and communicated with me more than any other
citizen of New Haven.
Understand, these folks are critically
important friends of New Haven. They offer us tactical assistance in
extreme need, and beyond that they're good people. And yeah, I know
the part of the country they live in very well. Of all the people
here, only the team I took with me across the country and I have
spent any time there. Me more than anyone else; when I was a kid my
mom and dad used to meet there sometimes to exchange me between them
for the summer.
And the job itself is something I have
experience with. I can't say more than that right now, but there are
some pretty compelling reasons for me being the one to
go.
Obviously, that would mean leaving Jess and my guests.
Jess wants me to do it, and the others are behind her on this, those
of them that can still talk. Pat has offered to take care of
everything, to schedule duty between himself, the girls, and Becky. I
don't want to go, that's my gut reaction, but I have to consider the
larger implications of refusing.
When I told Jess that I'd be
devastated if something happened to her while I was away, she pointed
out that given the new plague's seemingly instantaneous ability to
kill, she could die while I was in the bathroom. Life is random,
death is random, and if you wait around worrying about what will
happen if you move, nothing can ever get accomplished.
Have I
mentioned how wise my wife is? I really should make a habit of doing
that.
I'll go, of course. I can't refuse the request in good
conscience. This is a delicate situation that our allies can't afford
to attempt on their own. Once I've done the job and can explain,
you'll understand why that is, and why I can't go into more
detail.
Will told me that should I choose to leave, I will be
able to take two people with me. What I'm being asked to do is
dangerous to the extreme, but we can't spare more than that. Really,
we shouldn't be sparing anyone since people still get sick almost
daily and there are many hundreds of pissed-off, hungry zombies
buzzing against the walls, but exceptions have to be made sometimes.
We're doing something to help ensure the survival of an entire
community, a group of more than three hundred people.
It would
be awful for me to be away if something happened to Jess. Logically I
would understand my own faultlessness in that situation, but just
imagining the scenario makes the guilt center of my brain (which
feels suspiciously like my heart) go into overdrive. However, while
that would make me feel terrible, not going to help people in
desperate need and by so doing possibly doom them to violent deaths
would be the worst kind of immoral act by way of neutrality.
Letting
those people down, letting them come to harm because I was too
selfish to take a risk, would be awful in ways I can't describe. I've
done many terrible things since The Fall began, but not when I could
avoid them. Through those hard choices and scarring acts, I've always
tried to do what's best for the community. I've done immoral things
to serve a larger good. Maybe that's why I can look myself in the
eye.
But if I refuse to go, I don't think Jess would be able
to do the same. I would prove myself to be a different man than she
married. Less than I was. I can't let our allies down, but in the end
I make the choice to go because I want her to be proud, more than any
other factor.