Jess watched as Patricia rubbed his shoulder.
“It’s not 21, but it’s not bad considering.”
They sat in two small tables. The old couple’s grandchildren sat alongside Dustin and Michael. The youngsters all played with the collection of toy cars and figurines garnered from the loot pile.
Patricia had her silver hair pulled back into a bun. Her face was smooth, apart from the corners of her eyes and mouth, where little lines arched outwards like weathered cracks in concrete. Her eyes seemed fixated on something far off in the distance and when she spoke, still looking ahead, she made Jess jump slightly.
“Thank you for letting us come with you,” she said.
Jess turned his gaze down to his hands. His skin was dry and his fingers ached.
“Don’t thank me yet,” Jess said. “I just hope we’re doing the right thing. You might have been better off staying back at the store.”
Jess could see out of the corner of his eye that Patricia was now looking at him intently. A hand fell upon his arm.
“We would have run out of food eventually. We love those kids, but we’re not young. I can’t keep up with you.”
“That doesn’t mean that I know what I’m doing and that you should follow me blindly. I just, I react. That’s what I do. It’s some weird fatherly reaction I suppose. You get used to having to react fast. But in no way does that mean that I’m reacting in the right way. I haven’t a clue what I’m doing.”
“That’s what raising children is all about,” Patricia said. “You make your decisions based on what you think is right and you pray you did the right thing. From what I see of those two boys back there, you’ve been doing a good job.”
“That’s nice of you to say,” Jess said. “Can you keep an eye on them for a few minutes? I need to do something.”
He went back to the refrigerator with the defrosting meat patties and grabbed a half-dozen of them, slapping them on top of one another and put them in a bag.
He went out to the van and opened the back. Toni was still tethered by the rope.
Jess took a patty out of the bag and threw it in the van, near her feet.
Toni dropped to her feet and smelled, deeply, then found the meat with her mouth and hungrily ate at it.
Jess threw the rest in at the back of the cargo area and waited for her to move. She crawled back to the back, searching for the meat.
“I’m so sorry Toni.”
She turned slightly, smelling the air over her shoulder.
Jess pulled the door down, locking it in place.
Jess alternated the high beam headlights – turning them off and on – trying to decide which method provided a better view for the drive. With the high beams off, the flakes of ash were visibly blowing against the windshield of the van. With it on, the lights just reflected off the flakes, creating a kind of sparkle-show several dozen feet in front of them.
Jess felt Dustin’s weight upon him as the boy had fallen asleep. Michael appeared determined to get some kind of reception on one of the smartcards and was tapping away at the glass screen.
The stereo had been playing low. There was no reception to be found on the radio. The car’s hard drive was loaded with hits from three years ago threatened to lull them all to sleep with overly familiar melodies. Jess wondered if he was sleeping too. He wished the nightmare was just that.
One summer when they were still a family they found this cute little town with a river that ran down the middle of it. You could easily discern that the river was the main artery of the town. Little cafes were built around its edges. Lush gardens of flowers of all colours were planted along its length.
Jess and Toni had dreams of owning a cottage in the north. Everything was beautiful in the summer and nearly inhospitable in the winter. The allure was that you move far enough north and there isn’t any rush hour traffic to contend with and no noise. Just the sound of the wind whistling through the trees and kamikaze waves hurtling themselves upon the shore.
Jess saw the familiar signpost as his beams lit up the green reflective material as they passed. The Town of Nancy Bay was probably just a brief drive through for most – another blip on their destination to somewhere else.
Jess and Toni were introduced to the area when they were looking to rent a cottage for a summer family vacation. They found this particular town where the tourists were all largely gone by the beginning of September. The long, winding river divided the town in half. It had an eerie silence when there were no youths riding their jet skis up and down its length. The river was fast-moving and the water was often choppy, making for a popular draw among young adults looking for dangerous thrills.
Midway through the town, a solitary island sat wedged between the two rivers – albeit briefly – and was connected to the mainland by a single bridge made of wooden planks and rope to hold it together. On the island was an old but restored lighthouse that was locked up for much of the winter. The structure served as a kind of museum for the town in recent years, showcasing old black and white photographs of significant city events, like the crash of a passenger boat in 1947 that led to the death of 11 people. Medium-sized boats were common on the river back then, when it was wider and deeper than it is now. The lighthouse was necessary to warn incoming vessels in times of dangerous weather that limited the view of the route.
They were clearly all tired and in need of some rest. The lighthouse museum seemed as good a place to stop as any. The children had begun to notice moving forms off to the side of the road. The things were seemingly roused by the sound of the passing vehicles. The source of the movement was too far away to make out, but still the children pointed in fear.
“There’s someone out there!”
Jess never stopped; never took his foot for even a moment off the gas pedal. Twenty minutes ago they came across a large pileup of cars and had to go off to the shoulder of the road in order to get by.
There were at least five hurt people stumbling out of the deformed wreckage. One was missing an arm – just a bloody stump cut off at the shoulder with glistening sinews hanging loosely where bicep and forearm should have been. It was the sound of the vehicle that caught their attention. They weren’t moving forward like creatures in dire need – they were just curious figures wondering who it was making the noise.
One of them got close enough to get in the van’s way. Jess heard the cries of the boys over the screeching tires but he also saw the way the thing moved forward. It did certainly stumble like something hurt and if it had a second hand, it too would have been pointed forward in search of something to grab.
When it slammed against the front bumper and then against the windshield, Jess saw, in that split second, that he couldn’t have made a difference. He couldn’t help but think of them as things. They couldn’t be saved. He couldn’t pull over and save them all. He had his children to think about so he didn’t let up and if anything, he pushed harder down on the gas, probably killing it by sheer speed and impact.
The old couple in the car behind them followed his lead.
On the way to the lighthouse, they found a supermarket on the edge of town. It basically denoted the start of the tourist area. It was the biggest building in the entire city, with a parking lot to match. There were eight cash registers, four of which were always manned by some pimply-faced teenager who played with her hair when she didn’t have a customer in line. You had to put a five dollar coin in the shopping cart to free it from the long line that was chained together.
Jess opened a drawer in the console and retrieved five such coins – one each for him, Michael, Patricia and George. The toddlers sat in the seat of the cart intended for children.
“I know we’re all hungry,” he said, “but try to get what we need, not what your stomach is craving for. We might not be able to fit it all in the cars either, but let’s be fast, sensible and overzealous. Aim for cans or glass bottles first. And most importantly, stay together.”
It took them all of 10 minutes to make their way through the aisles and to fill up all four shopping carts. Michael went down a kitchenware aisle that none of the others thought was worthwhile to visit. Little towels and kettles and the like were here. Nothing that they could really use – the lighthouse seemed to be well stocked in terms of equipment and the like. Walking on, Michael saw a section for knives. He saw a small foldable knife used for fish. He broke the package open and put it in his pocket.
Back at the vehicles, only the contents of about three of the carts were able to fit in the car and van, and that was making use of every possible inch of space available – except for the back of the van where Toni was.
“Shoot!” Jess said, as they were just about to get back in their vehicles.
The others looked at him, waiting for an explanation.
“Dustin needs some iron pills. I forgot to grab them.”
He turned in a circle, looking for any of the infected. He saw none.
He held his smartcard out in Michael’s direction.
“You stay in the car.”
Michael snagged the smartcard and Jess jogged back to the store, holding a single finger up in the air for the older couple in their car.
I’ll be one minute.
Before he made it inside, the bottle of booze in his pocket fell out of his jacket and rolled across the gravel in front of his feet. He turned around to survey the vehicles. He figured they were too far away to determine what exactly had happened.
He ran down the length of the store, surveying the aisles until he found the one he needed. After checking the expiry dates, he pocketed two bottles of iron pills. Near the cash registers were little refrigerators of pop cans. Most had glass doors that were smashed or cracked. Jess reached in at the one closest to him and grabbed a can, suddenly craving the sweet bubbly concoction.
He drank down half of it and let out a large belch. The bottle of booze weighed down the sides of his jackets and made it sit unevenly on his body.
“You just don’t give up, do you?” Jess said to no one.
His voice echoed down the interior of the store and then vanished.
“Okay, just this once.”
He pulled the bottle from his pocket, unscrewed the lid and proceeded to fill half the can of soda that he drank with the booze.
Michael went right back to playing a game with Orson and Dustin asked for the smartcard.
“Why?” Michael said.
“Because I’m bored. I just want to check the radio. I won’t start the car. You just turn it one notch and all it does is power the radio. I’m sure Orson knows that.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because, unlike you, I’m not skipping auto class.”
“Shut up doofus!”
Michael passed over the smartcard. Dustin put it in the dashboard and the radio came to life and the music started up.
“Boys, I’m not sure your father wants you doing that.”
“It’s fine Orson, we’re not doing anything,” Dustin said.
“Jesus,” Michael said. “If I have to hear that song one more time I’m going to lose it! Music to cut your wrists to!”
Dustin pressed the button to activate the FM radio. It was just noise that came through the speakers. Crackling static on every channel.
“Man, that might actually be worse than Coldplay,” Michael said.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Three large bangs shook against the metal wall behind their backs.
“Where’s dad?” said Dustin, pulling himself away from the back of the seat. “Why’s he taking so long?”
“He’ll be here in a minute,” Michael said. “Why don’t we have a quick peek?”
“What do you mean?”
“The little window here. We can just pull it halfway open. I want to see how mom is doing, don’t you?”
“Dad said she’s sick.”
“The window is smaller than your head. She can’t hurt us.”
Dustin didn’t add anything else and just sat, petrified about what they were considering.
Michael’s hand went to the latch of the window. He held it for a moment, and then flung it open. It was like a window into pitch blackness.
There was no banging. There was nothing to see inside the black square.
Michael moved a bit closer, trying to look into the window.
“Hello? Mom?”
An arm and a crazed face came thrusting through the window at the same time.
The hand was reaching about frantically and the face of the mother of those boys was trying to squeeze through the miniscule opening. Her eyes were so white that her pupils and iris couldn’t be seen. Her mouth screamed and grunted and bit the air, seemingly all at the same time.
The crazed hand finally found Dustin’s head of hair. He was trying to push himself as far away as he could.
The arm started to reel him in like a fish at the of a line. Dustin screamed. Michael raised a hand, ready to strike but found that he was unable to do so.
The door to the van opened and their father reached in, pried her hands from Dustin’s head and pushed her back in the window, slamming it shut.
“What the hell were you guys doing?”
Neither said anything.
“I know you miss her but I warned you. Don’t do that again!”
They drove in silence the rest of the way. The boys didn’t speak, knowing that they had erred and might reanimate their father’s now slumbering anger. Jess said nothing out of shame. If he hadn’t stopped for that drink the moment might’ve been avoided.
Be strong for them
, he thought.
***
The lighthouse had its own parking lot, although significantly smaller than the one at the grocery store. There was only one vehicle present; a white pickup truck with the city’s logo emblazoned on the side, declaring:
Prepare to be Amazed.
Beyond, there was a simple black iron gate at the entrance to the wooden bridge that crossed people to the island. The dark waters, although barely deeper than a full-grown man was tall, moved at a quick speed and looked dangerous enough to sweep away anyone who happened to fall into it. Short, sharp waves licked the air below the berth of the bridge, but there didn’t seem to be anything odd about what Jess saw – it was exactly as it had always been, only now devoid of the summer’s light, temperatures and accompanying tourists.
The others were hesitant to cross the bridge, including Michael who stared down at it as though it wouldn’t hold his weight. The dog was especially worried and its front legs seemed to shake a little as it was forced out onto the wooden planks. Jess again took the lead, persuading them to cross in twos before heading back alone for a second heaping of groceries from the van. There was a padlock on the door of the lighthouse that was thick but old and covered with rust. Jess found an axe in a red-painted metal box attached to the wall, presumably in place for emergencies. He brought it down once and the lock just swung around in place. He brought it down a second time and the thing seemed to move. A third time knocked it right off the hinges of the door. The lock lay on the ground, still intact and still locked but no longer fastened to the door.
“Now you know why we’re so well behaved,” Michael said to the old couple.
There was dormant electricity to be found within the lighthouse. It was a euphoric find for all of them. Discovered with the flick of a single switch, the place was seemingly powered by some independent source on the island. A good-sized fridge and freezer were inside the staff kitchen and the old couple went about happily tossing the rotting remains from inside and filling it up with the food they had brought.
Jess turned and made one more trip back to the van. There were two upright bodies moving towards the bridge. A man and a woman, clothes torn, bodies bloodied – at first Jess waited, wanting to see what they were going to do.