“I’d like to speak to you, if you don’t mind.”
“Certainly,” he said, although he was anything but, and stood. I caught Justin eyeing me warily as we walked outside to the parking lot. I stopped a few feet away from my truck so Kelly could hear the conversation from her open window.
“The kids seem to like you,” I said. “Do you have any of your own?” The major’s face darkened.
“Nieces and nephews,” he replied. “I was in love a couple of times, but it never worked out.” His brow furrowed more for a moment, and then the moment was gone.
“Your kids call Kelly their mommy,” he said with a smile. “It says a lot about her.”
“Yes it does,” I agreed. There was a momentary pause while the two of us stared at each other.
“What do you want to talk about, Zach?”
“I’ve been thinking about what you said.” The major continued staring, waiting. “About you wanting to expose yourself.”
“Yes,” he chuckled. “I’ve been trying to work up the nerve. Perhaps, soon,” he said quietly.
“You can’t do it,” I declared. An eyebrow arched. “I know you’ve thought about it and have talked yourself into believing it’s something that has to be done, but I’m telling you it’s the wrong thing to do and very shortsighted.”
“Well, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re actually concerned about my welfare.”
“Yeah, in a manner of speaking.” I paused for a moment searching for the right words.
“I don’t know if I will ever forgive you for what you did. But, your skills are valued, and therefore that makes you a valued member of this community.”
“And if I weren’t a doctor?” he asked. I started not to answer and turned toward my truck, but stopped.
“I didn’t like being a test subject. Setting up a means to have you exposed would make you a test subject, and to encourage you to do so would make me a hypocrite, right?” I got in the truck and drove away while Grant stood there. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw him still staring at us as we drove out of sight.
Chapter 21 – Journal Entry: April 1st, 3 A.Z.
The month of March has been a mixed bag of good and not so good. On March 13
th
, we had four new arrivals: Major Sarah Fowkes, lately of the USAF, Kate and Kyra Redbank (sisters), a ten-year-old kid named Sam Hunter, and a goofy but lovable yellow lab named Callahan. Sarah met Fred back when he went to find his daughter. They had become an item for a short time before Fred came back home. Apparently, ole Fred made quite an impression on her because two years later she came looking for him. She met the two sisters and Sammy by happenstance on I-40 somewhere in Oklahoma. They were stranded and she rescued them.
It’s too bad Fred’s gone; they could have picked up where they left off.
On the 17
th
, everybody met at the school for a pot luck supper. It went pretty well, nobody was shot, even though there was a close call when the Garcia family arrived. Jorge and Maria have a father, Josue, and Maria has a little boy named Jose. Their house had burned down and they were effectively homeless, but we’ve gotten them residence in a house not far from us. They seem to be doing pretty good. Jorge's father is somewhat of a jack-of-all trades and very handy.
Let me address the status of the three Marines who brought my children back. Justin and Ruth, that would be Gunnery Sergeant Smithson and Lance Corporal Bullington, have given me the impression that they are good people. Kelly thinks so as well. They are currently living in the little house at the radio tower and seem to be making a go of it. In addition, they worked with Kelly and me for four straight days planting crops and tending to the livestock.
Major Grant Parsons is a different story. I don’t torment him or say anything insulting to him anymore, but I'm not sure I can ever forgive him. As long as he stays away from my kids, I suppose that is all I can ask for. Oh, that man did something totally nuts when he was still at the CDC. He injected himself with a test serum. He’s still alive, so maybe those people were on to something. It’s too bad they’re all dead.
I thought long and hard about what he’d done. He was willing to use himself as a guinea pig, not knowing what could possibly happen to him. So, after the pot luck supper, I pulled him aside and told him that he was a valued member of our community and it was not a good idea to expose himself. He was surprised that I said it, to say the least. Yesterday, he told me he was in fact related to the Parsons who had owned the farm. He grew up in east Tennessee and apparently, Old Man Parsons was his uncle. I told him I didn’t give a shit.
Food: It’s not where I’d like it to be. We lost too many of our cows this past winter and bad weather had all but eradicated our winter wheat crop. This will hurt us over the coming year. Also, our gardening was meant to feed only a few people. But now, those numbers have increased. The result is our inventory has shrunk much faster than I have anticipated. Suffice it to say, nobody around here is going to get fat. If we have another long cold winter like this past one, we’re going to be hurting.
Zombies: We encountered a horde of about twenty of them one day when we were scavenging in the south Nashville area. It’s the same neighborhood I’d been working through for the past few months and I’d never seen that many together before. We dispatched them quickly, but I have to report, those things are continuing to show more signs of evolvement. After much thought and discussion on the matter, I’ve decided to divide them into three distinct categories:
Speaking of important things in life, I must now write about my children. They’re doing great and growing like weeds. They are healthy, a handful, and a complete joy. Rick, my first real father-figure, never had any kids and said more than once he had never wanted any. Now that I’m a dad, it seems strange he felt that way. I love my kids and wouldn’t trade anything in the world for them.
As for myself, I’m doing okay. I have my kids and I have Kelly. I love them all dearly. It seems kind of odd that I’ve been in love three times now and I’m only nineteen. I’m sure the docs would just love to sit me down for some therapy sessions to analyze that - among other things.
That isn’t going to happen, but if it did, I know exactly what I’d say. I’d say Macie was my first love. Pure adoration, puppy love. I literally ached when I thought of her. After her was Julie, my first true soulmate. I remember the first time she and I met, how we disliked each other at first, and how we later fell in love. Our relationship was a little unconventional by pre-apocalyptic standards (eh, the thing I had with her and Macie at the same time), but it somehow worked for us. Things were a little rocky toward the end, but I have no doubt we would’ve worked it out, had she lived.
What can I say about Kelly? I’ve thought about it a lot. The best way I can explain it is she has been my saving grace, my rock, my friend. She is like the first warm day of spring after a cold and turbulent winter. I, love her deeply, count myself lucky, and pray that I never lose her.
The sound of an insistent horn honking interrupted our breakfast.
“I’ll check it out,” I told them. I picked Macie up off of my lap and handed her off to Kelly, grabbed a rifle and made my way toward the gate. I recognized Jorge’s SUV immediately and broke into a run. Something had to be wrong for Jorge to be making so much damned noise.
“Jose is missing, man,” Jorge said breathlessly. “Have you seen him?” I looked at the two men. Both of them were visibly upset, even Josue, who I’d never seen out of sorts.
“What happened? I mean, no, we haven’t seen him, do you know what happened?”
“When we got up this morning he wasn’t in bed. The back door was standing open.” He wiped the sweat off of his brow. “We’ve looked all over. This is bad, man, this is bad.”
“Maria is, what is the word?” Josue asked his son. “Hysterical?” Jorge nodded his head vigorously.
“Yeah, man, she’s about to go loco. She’s back at the house.”
“Okay, let me think,” I said. I took a deep breath to clear my brain.
“Okay,” I said again after a moment. “Josue, take the SUV and go grab Sarah. Tell her what’s going on and that Jorge and I will be out searching east of the farm. She’ll know what to do. I’ll have Kelly contact Justin and they’ll join in.” I pointed at Jorge.
“Can you ride a horse?”
“Yeah, man, why?”
“While they’re searching in vehicles, we’re going to search on horseback. If he’s hurt or stuck somewhere, we’ll be able to hear him crying out.” Jorge seemed a little confused by this.
“We won’t be able to cover as much ground,” he lamented. I explained my logic.
“We’ll have your father and the others searching in vehicles. We have to have someone going slow and be able to hear sounds you wouldn’t be able to hear over the autos’ noises.”
“Yeah, okay, it makes sense.” I hurried back to the house, told Kelly what was going on, and then rushed to the barn. Jorge followed. He tried to help me saddle the horses, but I waved him off.
“You better let me do it. You’re a stranger to them and they might try to kick you.” He nodded and I got them saddled quickly.
“How long has he been gone?” I asked as I watched him get into the saddle. He looked at his wrist, realized he hadn’t put his watch on, and looked over at mine.
“About two hours now.” I frowned.
“When was the last time any of you actually put eyes on him?” I asked. He looked at me ruefully.
“Maria put him to bed about seven or eight. Last night.” I caught myself from letting out an expletive or two and pointed.
“Alright, the first thing we should do is check our traps.” Jorge’s face paled when he realized what I was suggesting, but he nodded and we headed out.
We kept the horses at a fast walk, even though Sate was dying for a good long run. Jorge rode Hank surprisingly well, and under any other circumstances I would have good naturedly challenged him to a race.
It took another two hours before we spotted anything. The back of their property sloped down to a small creek which was a tributary to Mill Creek. It was where we had set multiple traps.
“Look,” Jorge whispered excitedly as he reigned up and pointed toward the far bank.
“Look, man,” he repeated as I stared at what he was pointing at. It was an amazing sight, almost surreal.
“Well, that’s something you don’t see every day,” I said and spurred Sate ahead, which was short sighted. When we got about twenty feet away, the big horse stopped suddenly and whinnied in alarm. I held the reigns tightly and rubbed his neck to keep him from bolting. “Easy, boy,” I cooed as I backed him away.
“That’s a snake,” Jorge exclaimed. “A big snake.”
He was right. Lying on the opposite bank of the creek was a snake. A very large snake.
“It looks like a Burmese python,” I said, mostly to myself. I didn’t say out loud the other thing I was thinking.
“It must be fifteen feet long, man.” I had to agree with Jorge’s estimation, and it also had a considerable bulge in its torso.
“Why is it so fat?” he asked.
“I’d say it’s eaten something recently that didn’t agree with it, that’s why it’s having trouble moving.”
“Shit, man,” Jorge said, and then realization dawned on him. “You don’t think it got Jose, do you?” The tone in which he asked was like he thought I was pulling a prank on him. I wasn’t sure how to answer.
“We need to kill it,” I finally said.
We dismounted and tethered the horses to a tree several feet away. Sate didn’t like it and tried to bite me, but I was wise to his temperament by now. When we got close to the big snake, he flicked his tongue at our presence but was simply too engorged to make an escape. Instead, he hissed angrily in an effort to frighten us.
“Let me, man,” Jorge said nervously and readied his compound bow. Taking careful aim, he shot it just behind the left eye. The snake jerked with a couple of spasms and then remained still.
“What now?” he asked quietly. I answered by pulling my knife out of my pocket and locking the blade open. Jorge’s eyes widened.
“It’s got to be done,” I said. I saw Jorge shaking now, but he didn’t object when I waded the creek and approached the snake. I found a broken tree limb that was a couple of feet long and used it to poke it in the head several times to make sure it was truly dead before rolling it on its side.My knife was razor sharp and sliced open the snake’s underside with little effort. Jorge gasped when the contents oozed out.
“Dios mio!” he wailed as he fell to his knees and suddenly began puking. In the mass of gore and ooze was the body of little Jose.
He was dressed only in his underwear and was almost unrecognizable, the snake’s digestive acids had already began breaking down the tissue. As I squatted, looking at the remains, his eyes opened and he let out an infantile snarl. I stumbled back and fell into the shallow creek. Jose shakily reloaded his crossbow and put a bolt into his nephew’s head.
I got my ass out of the creek and walked over beside him. Tears were falling in buckets down his cheeks. I got my canteen off of my pommel and handed it to him. He rinsed his mouth out and then took several swallows.
“How did he become infected, man?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” There were many possibilities of how he became infected before being eaten by that damned snake and I had no idea which one was the correct answer.
“I wonder where it came from.”
“Well, Burmese Pythons aren’t indigenous to the area.” Jorge glanced at me. “They’re not from around here. It might have been someone’s pet or it might have come from the zoo. I don’t know.” We stood there in silence for several minutes. I was about to suggest a course of action when Jorge started talking.
“When we left Mexico, we lived in Louisiana for a month before we came to Tennessee. That was the first time I saw an alligator. They scared the shit out of me.”
“They’re definitely scary looking.”
“I bet those sons of bitches are eating better than ever these days. They love to eat dead stuff.” I nodded my head in agreement.
“We tried to go back to our old house the other day,” he said. “We had Jose with us. There were zombies everywhere. We hightailed back here and told each other how we did a good job of protecting the little man.”
“Yeah.” I paused a moment. “Where’s Jose’s father?”
“He disappeared shortly after he was born.”
“That was sometime around when it started, right?” He nodded.
“About a month before. Jose was born in October.”
“He might have gotten killed or something.”
“Yeah, maybe.” It didn’t seem like something he wanted to talk about, so I remained quiet. We sat there for several minutes while Jorge sobbed. When he got most of it out of his system, he turned to me.
“I want you to do me a favor, Zach.”
“You name it.”
“I want you to leave me alone with my nephew. Go find my father and tell him, but don’t tell him where we’re at. I don’t want him to see his Nieto like this.”
“Okay.”
“And don’t tell Maria. He and I have to do that. I’ll clean him up and bring him home. Tell that to my father, he’ll understand.” He started sobbing again. I nodded and left without a word.