Becky wasn't doing so well. Things got really rough after we were first bitten, but the fever seemed to have leveled off some. I never watched someone turn and had no idea how long it would take.
So many thoughts had crossed my mind since yesterday morning. I thought about trying to find a way to end Becky's pain and not let her become one of those things out there. I didn't want to think about her turning into a dead-brain. Focusing all my thoughts on her made it easy for me to not think about what I was going through. I could forget that I was turning also.
I wasn't able to find anything suitable enough for the task, and instead I bandaged up her arm as best I could. I wished Jeremy would have ended it for both of us. The only thing left for me to do was make sure she was as comfortable as possible while her mind died.
After pulling out a table from one of the private dining nooks, I was able to rig a bed for us both to lie down on comfortably. The booth cushions came out easily, and I wrapped tablecloths around them to hold them together. I even found some actual blankets in the kitchen that I covered her up with. Throughout the afternoon, she lay there sobbing while I made what preparations I could before the fever left me too ill to continue.
We had plenty of water near us, buckets to throw up in if we needed them, and some uncooked spaghetti noodles. I figured that was safe to eat, and if it wasn't safe, it didn't matter anymore anyway.
By that evening, I was too exhausted to go on. I lay on my pallet beside hers and the hours slipped by. At one point, her muffled sobs stopped and I panicked, thinking she had turned. After a nervous inspection, I found she had just fallen asleep. I lay back, feeling the fever moving through my body. Somehow, I relaxed enough to drift into an uneasy sleep myself, not knowing if I would wake up in the morning.
The restaurant was dark when a shriek woke me. I sat up frightened, wondering why I wasn't in my bed at the Powell's when the memories seeped in through my fevered haze, settling heavy in my nauseated stomach. Becky was sitting up, hunched over her blankets. The whites of her eyes shown in the dark restaurant and she was panicked. She still hadn't turned.
I grabbed one of the empty bowls as quickly as I could and got it underneath her bowed head before I collapsed. The sounds of her retching filled the silence, and I tried not to let my own groan escape. I wasn't successful.
"Joss?" Her voice was weak, and I did my best to sit up and guide her back to her pallet.
"How are you feeling?" I asked, trying to get us both rearranged.
She groaned and I could barely hear her. "I don't feel good."
I reached out a hand to her, and she found it in the darkness. "Me neither,” I replied. "Are you cold?"
"A little. I'm okay," she whispered back. "Are you sure we're dying? Maybe we're just sick."
I sighed, wishing that were the truth.
There was silence again, and I listened to her wheezing. I had only seen a few people get bitten and they had all turned. I decided it wouldn't hurt giving her that hope, though. If it would ease her last few hours and days of conscious thought, I would do it.
"Maybe we are just sick. I haven't seen that many people get bitten,” I finally said.
"I haven't seen anyone get bitten,” she said, "But I helped take care of Julie when she got the flu. We didn't have any medicine, and she never was very strong. Mama had her too early." She paused at that, drifting back into painful memory. "Mama was head-sick for a while too after Julie died."
I sighed again, partially from the weight of it all and partially to get my breath. I wondered what this would do to Mary. She was so adamant about not letting Becky come with us, and the horrible thing she feared would happen had actually happened. Finding the energy to talk was difficult but I struggled through it, not wanting to give in to the silence.
"Who is Seth?" Her soft, seeking voice brought up my own painful memories. "I heard you calling out for him in your sleep."
I wondered now if this is what Seth went through. I figured it didn't matter what I said anymore, and there was no reason to hide my memories from Becky. "He was my brother,” I finally got out. "We lost him a little bit before Ali and I found you guys." I swallowed the lump in my throat.
Becky asked, "Did he get bitten?"
I nodded in reply before realizing she couldn't see me in the dark. I couldn't bring myself to answer out loud, but I think she sensed my movement. She squeezed my hand tightly in response.
"Seth and I grew up in a little town in Oklahoma. I was only nine when all this started and Seth was graduating high school that year. We were lucky for a bit. The world was collapsing around us, but we lived out in the country and nothing reached us for a long, long time."
The effort it took to talk was draining, and long pauses separated my sentences. I could tell Becky was patiently listening by her hand that held mine. She was gently caressing my thumb with her own and would lightly squeeze my hand in response to my words.
I continued. "Dad taught us both how to hunt, and there were streams nearby. We had a few neighbors and we all banded together to get a farm going so we could eat. We had a nice little community, just like at the farm. Life was not the same, but we were surviving.
"It lasted like that for a few years. All it took was one dead-brain to come along and ruin everything. It caught Mom out in the garden and," I couldn't go on. I had seen her body even though Seth tried to keep me away. It was such a bloody mass of flesh there was nothing left of her to recognize. There wasn't enough left of her to turn either. At least she didn't have to go through what I was going through now.
I didn't want to cry, but the tears were running down my hot cheeks. I heard Becky sniffle too and wondered if I could remember a good time to talk about, but I couldn't. All the good memories belonged to the dead now. All except Ali, and I would never see her again. I determinedly wiped away the tears.
"Can you keep going?" Becky asked. "I've only lived here. I don't know what it's like anywhere else."
"Yeah, I'll try,” I answered, not feeling at all like talking, but I continued. "After what happened with Mom, we started putting up perimeter fences. It was hard since the houses were so far apart. I remember we used all the wire fencing at the local hardware store, and a few of the men had to run to town to get some more.
"They came back with candy, canned goods and tons of other stuff. It was great for all the other families, but Dad wasn't ever the same. He did what he could for a while, but it ate at him every day. I didn't understand it back then, but I know he was losing his mind.
"One morning, Seth and I woke up and he was gone. Seth thinks he went out to kill as many of those dead-brains that he could find. Revenge for killing Mom, ya know? We decided we were going to follow him, and there was no one there to stop us.
"We never did find him, but we didn't stop moving, either. That was a couple years ago." I had to stop then. Talking was exhausting, and I needed to take a break. The silence seeped back in, more oppressive than it was before. It was unbearable, but I didn't have a lot I could combat it with.
"Becky?" I asked into the darkness.
"Mmm?" she answered. She was exhausted too, but I hoped she could give me one good memory.
"Do you have any happy stories?" My request was met by a few minutes of silence before she started talking, her voice low and weak.
"Christmas," she said. "Every year, Papa makes sure we get a good Christmas. He goes out to find us a tree, even though it's not always a good tree, but he gets us something. Even if it is some straggly looking loblolly pine sprout, he brings it in and we decorate it with whatever we can make.
"At first, I thought it was stupid that he was trying to hold on to that old tradition. It was Kevin that helped me realize what Papa was doing. When I pitched a fit about having to decorate another tree, the look on Kevin's face made me realize why Papa always did it. He made sure we stayed a family. He made sure we had hope.
"I never said anything bad about Christmas again after that." She had to pause, and I heard her take in a few deep breaths. I feared she might be done and was grateful when she kept going. "On Christmas Eve, we would make sure we got what presents we could together. We put them under that old tree and on Christmas Day, Mama would make as big a meal as she could. We ate until we were full and then opened all our presents. Kevin made me a stick doll once. It wasn't anything but two sticks tied together with some string and he'd poked at the wood with a knife to make a face. It was such a horrible little thing, but I loved it. It's still sitting on my dresser under my mirror.
"After dinner, we would sit in the living room and sing all the Christmas carols we could think of. Every Christmas, Papa made sure we always had good memories." As her voice trailed off, I realized that was the most I'd ever heard her say at one time. The idea of Christmas was beautiful, and the pain and longing inside me brought more tears. I thought she was done, but in the silence, her voice wavered from a whisper and bloomed into the most beautiful thing I'd ever heard.
Silent night, holy night
All is calm, all is bright
I knew these words. I did my best to join in with her, hoping I wasn't destroying the beautiful sound of her voice.
Round yon virgin mother and child
Holy infant so tender and mild
Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly peace
Our weak voices faded away, and the silence boomed loudly in my ears. I stared into the darkness, completely drained. Too weak to continue our conversation. Becky must have sensed it because she moved close and slipped her arm around my waist, snuggling against my shoulder.
I had never been this close to a girl before, and this felt really nice. It was the comfort I needed, and I didn't want her to let me go. I reached my arm around her and she settled down against me. The heat from both our fevered bodies was stifling, but I didn't care.
I closed my eyes and let sleep overtake me, all the while thinking that this was a good last memory.
~ ~ ~ ~
Dawn was shining through the windows when I woke again, and I doubled over with severe stomach cramps. I was barely able to grab a bowl before I started throwing up everything I'd ever eaten and then some. Tears were streaming down my face from the effort by the time I was done, and I slid the bowl away and collapsed back on the pallet.
It took a few minutes for me to recover. Once everything settled, I felt better than I had for hours, even though the fever still gripped me. I sat up to check on Becky. She had been still on her pallet while I was puking, and that worried me. I crawled to her, moving her to see if she was okay.
She rolled over, listless at my touch, and began whimpering and shuddering in convulsions. I dreaded doing it, afraid of what I would see, but I forced myself to pull her eyelids open to see if she had turned. Her irises were still a beautiful, light blue.
I heaved a sigh of relief but that was short lived. I didn't know what else I should do.
Her whole body was shaking and spittle foamed at the corners of her mouth. I pulled her against me and held her, rocking her as she shook. My tears landed in her soft blonde hair, and whispered comforting words to her, hoping she could hear me. I was so scared and helpless. There was nothing else I could do for her. The turn was going to happen soon but a part of me wished she would die of the fever. I wished again I had the strength to end her pain.
It could have been hours or it could have been minutes. My only sense of time was the sun steadily growing brighter through the windows. She finally stopped her violent shaking and drifted in and out of fevered dreams. I didn't have the strength to keep holding her and had to ease her down to rest against my side.
Every now and then she would call out for her mother or father. Sometimes she would just scream. She was never lucid, and I cringed knowing this is what I would be going through in a few hours. Again, I wished for the strength to kill us both.
Drifting in and out of sleep, the sickness grew worse. I was unable to keep myself awake to watch over Becky. Something inside me thought that if I stayed awake to watch over her, the inevitable wouldn't happen, but I didn't have the energy to keep my vigil.
I was dreaming fever dreams, and during the short periods of time my mind was able to reconnect with the waking world, it was difficult to distinguish reality from dream.
I was at a wedding. I was in a tux, standing as Seth's best man beside him at the altar. I could hear the wedding march playing, and the pews full of red-eyed dead-brains stood up to honor the bride as she appeared at the end of the aisle. My father was there, leading her alongside him. The veil covered her face so I couldn't see who it was, but I knew it was Ali. We waited for her as the song droned in the background, and she was walking so slowly. The dead-brains moaned and clawed at us, but they were chained to the pews.
When Ali finally reached us, Seth smiled as he lifted her veil to reveal her red eyes. I screamed as she lunged forward, her teeth sinking into Seth's throat. Blood sprayed everywhere.
My screams woke me, and I felt I was being smashed by Ali's dead weight on top of me.
No, not Ali. Ali's not here. Ali left me. Did she die? Did she turn too?
I pushed Becky from my side, trying to check on her as I did so, but immediately lost myself in the fever again.
Now I was walking in a field of wild flowers, and Ali walked beside me. She was telling me things I needed to hear, important things, but the wind stole her words. She was trying to tell me how to save Becky. I was pleading with her, but she seemed unconcerned. When Seth appeared in the distance, Ali started running towards him and I screamed for her to wait.
I ran after her, calling out to her, but she was too fast. Ali looked over her shoulder at me and I could see fear in her eyes. Why was she so afraid? I looked to Seth for a clue, but he was as frightened as she was. His terrified eyes were glued to me.
I tried to call out to them, but it came out as a growl. Ali continued to run to Seth as he waved her on, and I realized they were running from me, but why?
Because I wanted to kill them. The need to catch them and rip them apart drove me on. When Ali tripped in front of me, I fell over her instantly in a rage. She turned to fight me off...
But it was Becky I was staring down at, not Ali. Becky's panicked and pleading blue eyes were staring at me in horror. We were in the restroom in Bobby's Bar and Grill, and it was me that was trying to kill her.
I screamed in outrage and terror at what I had become and jumped away…
Falling backwards from my pallet onto the restaurant floor. The rough fall jolted me out of the horrible nightmare. I was crying, sobbing, wanting it all to end, but I didn't have the strength to pull myself off the dusty floor.
I managed to raise my head enough to see Becky's lump under the blankets. She was so still, and I was so afraid and so… angry! I needed to check on her, make sure she was okay, give her all my life force and will so she would make it through this. She would be missed. There was no one left to miss me, but I couldn’t. I remained weak and helpless.
By strength of will alone, I rolled to my stomach. Resting there for a few moments, I summoned the energy to drag myself toward the pallet. I had only fallen a few feet away, but it might as well have been a mile. With one last burst of energy, I pushed myself forward as far as I could, and was able to reach out and touch Becky's leg.
That's as far as I made it when I fell into a swirl of fever dreams again.
Hours later, I was in the same position. The sun was already high overhead, dimming the light that was coming in through the windows. I was soaked everywhere, and for a moment I thought I had knocked one of the water pails over.
Then I realized it was sweat. I was sweating everywhere, profusely. My fever had broken. I was still extremely weak from the sickness, but the nausea was gone. I reached for Becky, the hope blooming in me that she was okay too. My hand only touched empty blankets, and I raised my head enough to see the pallets. Becky wasn't there.
Blinking in confusion, I didn’t know what to think. The brief hope I felt was rapidly disappearing. How could she have had the energy to move anywhere on her own? Then I remembered how I had ended up in the floor and thought maybe she had moved during her nightmares.
I gathered my growing strength and looked around at what I could see of the restaurant floor. She wasn't anywhere.
Panic bloomed in my chest when I heard footsteps coming from the other side of the restaurant, from the other side of the big glass dividing wall. Looking under the table legs, I could see Becky's white sneakers and blue jeans as she stopped in front of a table. The sound of clattering dishes followed, making a clunking sound, as they were set.
I swallowed hard, trying to clear away the dryness in my throat and pushed myself up to a sitting position.
"Becky?" I called to her softly. She turned at the sound of my voice, facing me. Her red eyes stared through me.
~ ~ ~ ~
I collapsed to the floor like I'd been hit. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't focus. So many thoughts were whirling in my mind, it was like grasping at smoke.
Am I a dead-brain?
My heart thundered as I panicked.
No, I couldn't be. I knew who I was. I knew who Becky was.
I covered my face with my hands, willing myself to be dead. I just wanted to be gone. I lay like that for a long time until I heard Becky moving around again. I spread my fingers so I could watch what she was doing through my hands.
She was shuffling between the tables, setting plates on one, then taking those same plates and setting them on a different table. I rolled over on my side and sobbed. She was gone, and I would be gone soon, too.
I decided I would lie there and wait. Again my thoughts turned to Seth and I wondered if this is how it all happened with him. The fever. The sickness. The horrible nightmares assaulting him right until the end.
Was there a beyond? Was Becky already there now, or did her body have to die first?
I thought about trying to end Becky's sad un-life again. I forced myself to sit up and watched her for several minutes. She ignored me.
Reaching for one of the many bottles of water that I had left sitting out, I guzzling the whole thing down, surprising myself. I grabbed a second and drank over half of that one before I was satiated.
Again, I had to rest for a few moments, waiting for my energy to return. Then I pulled myself back onto the pallets, my eyes never leaving Becky for long. I hoped I would have the energy to kill her before I turned into a dead-brain, too.
As I lay there, I began to wonder why she didn't attack me. Maybe she was different? Maybe there was something still inside her that remembered me? Maybe she could sense that I was turning and knew to leave me alone?
I once again thought about Ali and Seth, the dream I had of their wedding dredged up memories. Seth wasn't much older than Ali, maybe a few months at most. They absolutely hated each other when they first met, but that had changed by the end.
I remembered the first time I saw her. I was hiding in the dusty ceiling of a grocery store, knowing I was about to be killed. The visions of all the furious red eyes under me, reaching up to grab me, still haunted me from time to time. At least they couldn’t climb, but I was going to fall. The thin framing wasn't made to hold my weight.
Seth had been my only hope, but he needed to come back for me soon. He had sent me up to the ceiling and ran off with what looked to be about ten dead-brains chasing him. He was trying to draw them away from me, but not all of them followed. I'd been up there alone for what seemed like forever when I heard a girl's voice calling out, asking if I was okay.
I could see her at the end of the aisle. I told her to run.
But she didn't run. She pulled out a huge revolver and started shooting. Blew six of those dead-brains away without even pausing, and stabbed the other three in the neck, dropping them all.
She looked at me, her bright green eyes glowing with life. She could have been a super hero. She was vibrant and so alive. It didn’t make sense to say, but she was the most alive person I had ever seen, before the world turned and after. It made her beautiful, and she was in control of this chaotic world.
Then Seth wrecked her truck and she was stuck with us. It made me so happy to have her with us. It had only been Seth and I since we left Lawton trying to find Dad. Ali and Seth didn't get along at first. They were so stubborn, but I was glad to have someone else around to talk to besides Seth.
It took a while for me to get Ali to talk, but eventually I wore her down. She was quiet, and all kinds of pissed off about her truck, but Seth was really sorry for that. He didn't know it was hers when he took it. He was just trying to save me.
I guess we only got to spend a few months with all of us together. Ali was awesome. She taught me how to shoot better than Seth could. I don't think he much cared for being beat at that, but Ali was really athletic and knew a lot about guns. She even knew stuff that Seth didn't know.
I don't know what happened that night Seth got bitten. Ali went in to get some supplies and told us to stay behind. When she was gone too long, Seth went in to find her. Ali was the only one to come back. As soon as I saw her face, I knew Seth was gone, but I didn't want to believe it. I couldn't imagine losing him. She held me back from running in to find him, and we both cried. She had to drag me away because I wasn't going to leave him on my own. He couldn't be gone. I couldn't let him be gone.
Before the dead-brains came, he was the one that was always there for me. Because Mom and Dad were so busy working all the time, it was Seth that made the most time for me. He was the one that helped me with my homework and played video games with me. Every now and then when his friends came over, he'd let me watch movies with them if I behaved. I always looked up to him so much. He was the perfect big brother.
Knowing that he wasn't there anymore hurt more than losing Dad did. Ali was crushed too. I always thought they might want to get married someday, if there could still be weddings in this world. It was horrible. I was so sad, and Ali got really quiet after that. She hardly talked at all. I caught her crying a lot at first, even though she tried to hide it from me. She never told me if she let Seth turn, or if he died from his wounds.
I lay still while my thoughts ran all over the place, waiting for the inevitable. I didn't understand why it was taking so long for me to turn, but then I wasn't sure how long Becky had been gone before I woke.
What was this going to feel like?
With the fever gone, and the awful vomiting stopped, it almost felt like I was getting better. I’d lost the will to move, though. It was easier to lie here and let the minutes pass by while I listened to Becky shuffle the table settings around.
I picked at the bandages on my hands, finally pulling them away to expose the blisters underneath. I was mildly surprised to see how well they had healed, and thought ruefully that I could have been able to work in the gardens today. It even made me sad knowing that I would never work in those gardens again.
For hours I waited as the rest of the day passed by. My thoughts continued to wander randomly, and I cherished the memories while I still could. The light was starting to dim in the building signifying early evening, and somehow, I was still me.
I decided to test my muscles to see if I could stand. Maybe I had made it through? Maybe not everyone turned when they were bitten? That thought made me angry. Why would I be the one to live when I had no one, and Becky had her whole family that needed her there?
As I stood, I felt the strength flow back into my limbs. I was weak but thought I would be able to walk now. My clothes were wet, and the smell of vomit was everywhere. It was probably on my shirt. I needed to find some fresh clothes to change into, but I didn't think I would find anything here in the restaurant.
Becky was ignoring me, still moving from table to table, setting and resetting the dishes. I tried walking on my wobbly legs to see how far I could make it and surprised myself by being much more surefooted than I thought possible. A few years ago, I had come down with a pretty bad stomach virus and didn't remember recovering this fast.
I wanted to see what I could find in the adjacent gas station before it got dark and stumbled out the front door, barely catching myself against a rusted pole that held up the awning. It groaned at my additional weight but held. I thought I'd better slow it down.
Stay vigilant. Move slowly. Ali taught me that. Always be aware of my surroundings and never assume a place was too small for a dead-brain to hide in. The dead-brains out in the field were too far away to notice me, but in the dying light they were also hard to spot. I was second-guessing my decision to take a trip to the gas station, afraid I might get ambushed, but decided it was now or never.
I took one slow step after the other to the neighboring building, keeping my energy in check. Once there, I made sure to look through all the windows for any signs of movement before I decided it was safe. I gave the door a tug.
A bell hanging above the door announced my entrance, and I winced. If there were any dead-brains in here, they knew I was in here now. I stood there, waiting, but nothing came. Maybe I had caught a little bit of luck.
Judging by the disarray of the store, it looked like someone had been through here before, but not everything was taken. My first thought was to check behind the counter for a weapon. I figured if there was anything here, that would most likely be where it was stashed.
I was rewarded when I found a wicked looking axe behind the counter. The curved blade was painted red and the metal head was fitted into a solid wooden handle that tapered into a point at the bottom, making both ends dangerous. It was a vicious looking thing but much too heavy for me to try to do anything with while I was so weak.
I opted for the lighter-weight aluminum baseball bat, which I was also able to use as a cane.
The next thing on my list was finding a change of clothes. There were some Texas Longhorn t-shirts hanging in the front window, so I grabbed one. They didn't have my size, and the one I grabbed hung on me like a sheet, but I was thankful I could get out of the rotten smelling shirt.
As I dropped the disgusting garment on the ground, a flash from outside the window caught my eye.
Headlights.
I froze. It had to be Jeremy coming back. Why? He knew what was going to happen, did he come back to kill Becky? Kill us both?
I ducked down to hide myself, suddenly worried and scared. What if he did come back and killed me without even talking to me first? I didn't think I was going to turn now and, although the thought of living in this world wasn't the greatest option, I really did not want Jeremy to kill me.
As the headlights drew closer, I realized it wasn't Jacob's truck. Who the heck could it be? I had never seen this vehicle before, and I wasn't about to take any chances, so I kept myself hidden.
I watched the black truck roll to a stop in the middle of the street, and then the driver stepped out into view.
My heart skipped a beat when I saw her unmistakable red hair.