“Then you’ll leave?”
“Not until nightfall. It’s not safe to go anywhere during the daytime.”
She was surprised to see him nod. “You’re right. I guess we’ll just have to put up with each other until then.” Getting off the bed, he peeled the dirty shirt off his body and dropped it to the floor.
She blushed and looked away. But not before she caught a glimpse of toned muscles and yellowish bruises on his abdomen.
“I’m going to find a new shirt,” he said, and she could hear the amusement in his voice. “Then I’m going to get something to eat.” He began to walk away, his bare feet slapping on the tiled flooring. “You’re welcome to join me. I promise I’ll wear something a little less revealing.”
A dozen retorts came to her mind, but every single one was too lame to repeat. After he turned the corner, she picked up her pillow and threw it in his direction. Not exactly the world’s greatest comeback, but it made her feel a little better.
She took the handheld receiver from her bag and turned it on. She put her mouth up to the speaker and then paused. What was she supposed to say? She’d talked to Joy briefly last night once they made it home safe and she’d promised she’d call again in the morning to give an update. Sure, Daniel was feeling better and that was something to report, but she didn’t know where to go from there. It was her responsibility to bring him back, but he seemed intent on staying behind. It was odd.
“Anyone there?” she said into the tiny receiver. She felt stupid. Wasn’t there something else she was supposed to say, like “over” or “ten-four” when talking into these things?
There was a pause and then a click. “Aries?”
“Hey, Jack.”
“Wow, the reception is amazing. No background noise or anything. Are you still at the store?”
“Yep. I’m pretty much here till nightfall. How’s everyone doing? Nothing bad happen?”
“No, things are great here. Everyone changed their clothes and ate some food. They’re all in good spirits. Even Colin. How’s the guy? Better?”
“Yeah. His fever’s gone.”
“Brilliant. I’m looking forward to meeting him. We’ll see you later tonight, right?”
“Yep.” She didn’t exactly know why she lied, mostly because the truth was too complicated to discuss through a little plastic box. They’d just have to get the whole story once she got back.
And who knew? Maybe Daniel would change his mind. It was a long ways till the sun went down.
She went looking for him and found him in the toy department. He’d put on a fresh shirt, a black top that fit snugly. He’d also changed his jeans. His feet were still bare. The makeshift bandage on his head was gone and his hair was wet. He’d taken the time to clean himself up.
“You look good,” she said, immediately regretting the words when he gave her a sideways glance, one eyebrow raised, and a crooked grin. “I mean, even less sick. Better than last night.”
He laughed.
That’s it. She’d had enough. She was done talking. If she kept her mouth shut, she’d stop putting her foot in it.
“You’re looking a little stiff yourself,” he said. “What did you do to your leg? You’re moving as if you’ve forgotten how to use your knees.”
“Just a scrape,” she said. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
Actually her leg hurt even more than it had last night. When she took the tumble she’d somehow managed to pull all the muscles in her inner thigh, and the long wound was making it difficult to walk. Every time her skin stretched she wanted to scream, but there was no way she’d ever admit it. Especially to him.
“You don’t strike me as the princess type.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Daniel smiled. “It means that I’d still go out of my way to rescue you, but you’d probably smack me across the head and try to slay the dragon yourself.”
“Let’s not forget who rescued who last night.”
“If you want to call it that, sure. So as a reward, I’ve got a gift for you,” Daniel said. She realized he was holding something behind his back.
“What?”
“Something that’ll make our day a little more bearable,” he said, bringing the item out for her inspection. Monopoly. World Edition.
She laughed. “I’m gonna kick your ass.”
“You’re on. But I get to be the car.”
Unwrapping the plastic, they spread the game out over one of the display tables back in the housewares department. They played three games, two of which she won. They raided the junk-food aisle and brought back bags of potato chips, cheese-flavored popcorn, and cans of iced tea.
Several times she tried questioning him about whether he knew more about what was happening. He seemed to know so much, but he refused to answer or he quickly changed the topic. Eventually she stopped asking.
“I think I’ve officially had enough Monopoly to last a lifetime,” she said after the last game. She checked her watch. Six thirty. She stood up and walked to the edge of the main aisle. From across the store she could see the large entrance doors. Outside the sky was beginning to darken.
“Days are getting shorter,” Daniel said.
“It’s gonna be a cold winter,” she agreed. “Especially with no heat or power. We should have gone south.”
She was joking, but as usual he didn’t get it.
“You never would have made it.”
“Aren’t you ever optimistic about anything?” She crossed her arms over her chest. Funny how just talking about the weather could make one cooler.
“Nope.”
Earlier she’d taken a cardigan off the rack that she liked, dark forest green with brown wooden buttons and a hood. Daniel picked it up off her chair and handed it to her. She pulled it around her back, but her arm got tangled up in the sleeve. Reaching over, he touched her arm as he helped. Continued to hold her as he looked down into her eyes.
“You’ve got to go soon,” he said.
“Come with me.”
“No.”
She yanked her arm away from him. “What is wrong with you?”
But he wasn’t paying any attention. Instead, he stared over her head, his eyes focused on the main entrance, a taut look on his face.
“Did you hear that?”
She instantly stiffened. “What?”
Ignoring her, he brushed past her and into the main aisle. She followed just behind him, moving closer to the front of the store. Daniel knelt down behind a laundry-detergent display and she joined him.
Outside, the parking lot looked empty. But it was dark and there were a lot of shadows. She couldn’t really see anything.
“They’re out there,” he whispered.
“What? Where? I can’t see them.”
“I feel them.”
Glass shattered. Something bounced across the floor, coming to a full stop twenty feet away from them. A rock.
Daniel turned and grabbed her arm. He began walking quickly toward the back of the store and the loading docks. Earlier she’d packed up her backpack and left it in the bay along with her new bicycle.
“Aries,” he said as he dragged her along. “Listen to me. You’ve got to listen. I need you to leave. Get out while you can.”
“I can’t leave you. Come with me.”
He shook his head. “You don’t understand. They’re here for me. Not you. Just me.”
“You’re right. I don’t understand.” She tried to yank her arm away from him, but he was too strong. “Stop it. You’re hurting me.”
He ignored her protests all the way to the loading docks. Pushing a flashlight into her hands, he checked through the peephole in the door before unlocking it. She waited stupidly while he pushed her bike out into the back lane. She tried to listen for sounds coming from the store, signs that the insane people had made their way in, but she couldn’t hear anything.
Once Daniel finished checking outside, he came back for her. Grabbing
her arm again, he literally dragged her out into the lane.
“I’m not leaving you here,” she said. Tears formed in her eyes. She couldn’t do it. There was nothing he could say that would make her go away. She wouldn’t leave him to die. Enough people had died already. She wouldn’t allow another.
“It’s okay,” he said. Pulling her toward him, he drew his arms around her, hugging her tightly. Whispered in her ear. “I’ll be fine. You’re going to have to trust me on this.”
“No.” She tried to untangle herself from his grasp. He was just too strong.
“Aries.” When she didn’t respond, he grabbed hold of her chin and forced her to look at him. “I’m going to tell you something important and I don’t want you to forget, okay?”
She nodded, choking back a sob.
“They’re not all bad. Remember this. Some of them still feel the light. I’ll be fine. I promise. And I’m not going to break that promise either. When this is over I’ll find you.”
“We’re on Alexander Street. It’s the only building with the roof caved in. You can’t miss it.”
He sighed. “I told you not to tell me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I have to leave now. Let me go.”
She did.
He didn’t say another word. Instead he ran up the stairs toward the store and disappeared into the darkness of the receiving bay. The door closed behind him and she was alone.
When her paralysis broke, she took the stairs two at a time and grabbed the handle. But the door was locked.
She didn’t know what to do. Everything had happened too quickly. Sitting down on the steps, she tried to weigh her options. She couldn’t get in from the back. It would be suicidal to go around to the front.
He’d won. He’d gotten his way. Now she had no choice but to leave. She’d have to believe him.
Red-hot anger pulsated through her body. Jumping to her feet, she grabbed her backpack and pulled it over her shoulders. Fine. If that’s the way he wanted it, then let him go. She was through playing his game. If he’d rather get himself killed than be with her, well, she wasn’t going to fight him.
By the time she reached the apartment, the butterflies were still rioting inside her stomach. The fear of the unknown. Daniel. The monsters disguised as people.
How could she prepare for a war she knew she couldn’t win?
NOTHING
We forget how truly fragile we are.
Skin. We do so much to it. Burn it. Tattoo it. Rub chemicals into its surface. Sometimes we scrape it, pierce it, poke holes through its softness.
Skin holds us together. It keeps the blood inside. Without it, we die.
When the knife slashed through her skin, she gave a look to suggest she couldn’t believe I’d hurt her. Such surprise. Shock. She would die. The blood rushed past her skin, no longer trapped inside her flesh, and pooled onto the floor beneath her toes.
She thought she’d live forever.
“You need to have thicker skin,” I told her. Famous last words. Spoken to me in my former life by someone I once loved.
Thicker skin.
But in reality I needed a stronger brain.
I have three scars aligning my body. They are a diary of sorts, chronicling my life according to the things I’ve done. The things that have been done to me.
1. A round scar the size of a quarter on the middle of my right palm. At the age of five my father punished me by pouring boiling water onto my skin. Forced me to hold out my hand and poured the water straight from the kettle once it boiled. It was for my own good. I’d been bad.
2. A large scar on my knee from falling off my bicycle. I was seven. I had stolen something trivial and the grocer came after me. Of course I got caught. I had my finger broken as punishment, and he refused to take me to the hospital. My skin still wasn’t thick enough.
3. A thin line along my wrist from where I tried to let the blood come out.
I’m not proud of the things I’ve done. Or of the things I know I will do in the future. We became evil because we deserved it, not because we lived our lives as saints. The darkness cannot go where the light holds warmth. Sometimes it is easier to embrace the pain than fight against the fire. Free will isn’t always about choice; often weakness plays the game.
If you heard all about my childhood, you’d refuse to lay the blame on my side. You’d say I was a victim. Not guilty. But the voices know better. They still saw fit to judge me. To claim my soul.
I want to stop. I want someone to help me.
Help me, before I kill her.
MICHAEL
“It’s cold,” Clementine said.
They’d stopped for a lunch of canned spaghetti and dried fruit, stuff they found in an outlet store a few days earlier. A rest stop next to a lake, one of the many dozen tourist attractions spread across the Rocky Mountains.
“It’s going to snow,” he said.
“How do you know?”
“It smells like snow.”
Clementine sniffed the air and gave him a confused look.
He’d forgotten that she’d never traveled through the mountains before. She was from the prairies, a place where everything was wide-open. So different from his upbringing in the valley, where lakes and trees were just another part of the boring scenery and the winters were cold and uncomfortable.
“I guess it’s one of those things you get good at noticing,” he said. “I can’t explain it, but you can always tell the way snow smells out here. I dunno.”
“We’re not dressed for snow,” she said, and he realized she was right.
They wore jean jackets and hoodies. No winter coats or gloves or scarves or even boots. Why didn’t he think about it when they passed their last outlet store?
Because other things were on his mind. The thought that haunted him the most was of the mother and her small son. Had it hurt? He hoped the Baggers had shown mercy and killed the child quickly. Why hadn’t he done something to try to save them?
Besides, September had been hotter than hot. Yeah, sure, it was October now, but it was still warm. Or it had been. Yet he should have thought about how unpredictable mountain weather could be.
“Let’s get going,” he said. Jumping down off the table, he picked up his backpack and slung it over his shoulder. “If we keep at it, we should be able to find a cabin or something to spend the night. There’s lots of places around here. We just have to find them.”
“Okay.”
“Having a bit of snow might be a good thing, too. If we’re lucky it’ll send the Baggers south. It’s gonna be a cold one without electricity.”
“Seattle will be warmer,” she said. “Heath said it just rains there.”
The first flakes hit them as they stepped out onto the road. Just a few tumbling lazily down from the darkened clouds above.
“See,” he said. “Can I call them or what?”
“It’s beautiful,” she said, her head tilted upward. “I love the first snowfall of the season. I always liked to take a walk in the fields and just stare up at the clouds. It’s almost as if the entire sky is dancing just for me.”
Michael hated snow, but he didn’t tell her that. It meant shoveling and frozen faces, hibernating in the basement and playing video games until he grew bored to death. Winter always made him want to curl up and sleep. Mom used to joke that he was part bear. He’d been planning on going to university in California or Arizona, someplace he knew would be hot all year long.
The snow melted at first when it hit the pavement, but after thirty minutes or so, a fine film of white began to cover the surface. Large flakes dominated the sky, falling faster and harder with each new footstep. Michael grew worried but tried not to show it. He didn’t want to frighten her, but the world around them appeared to be getting ready for an all-out blizzard. A strong wind blew up behind them, pressing against their clothes, trying to rip the hair right off their heads. The sun was fully gone. Not even three in the afternoon, but the wood
s were dark. The snow blocked everything else out.
They needed to find shelter.
“How is this even possible?” she yelled over the howling wind. He could hear her teeth chattering in between words. “It was sunny and warm this morning.”
“I’ve seen worse,” he shouted back.
“Really? You could actually see it? I can’t even see the road in front of us.”
It was true. Visibility had completely gone down the toilet.
“Just keep your eyes peeled for turnoffs,” he said. “There’s gotta be something around here. I grew up in this area. There are hundreds of cabins nearby.”
All right, it was a bit of a lie. He’d lived farther south where dozens of ski hills dominated the terrain. Right now he didn’t have the foggiest idea where they really were. For all he knew they could have gone too far north and crossed the border into Canada. He’d been going around in circles a lot lately, not paying attention to where the road led. With the group, their main priority had been to find food. But alone, well, no matter how much he traveled, he couldn’t seem to get far enough away.
But he didn’t mention a word of this to her. The last thing in the world he wanted to do was scare her more than she already was.
He hadn’t wanted to scare the others, either. Look where that got them.
The blizzard continued, and it wasn’t long before they were up to their ankles in the white powder. The sun disappeared completely and nightfall took over. The wind howled at their backs. Michael’s face started to hurt and his toes grew alarmingly numb. Clementine didn’t complain, but he could tell she was suffering as much as him. She pulled her jacket tightly around her neck with both hands, trying to keep the snow from falling down her shirt. Her cheeks and forehead were bright red and her blond hair whipped uncontrollably around her head.
They trudged along.
If they didn’t find shelter soon they would freeze to death. It struck Michael as ironic. This seemed like the wrong way to die considering the circumstances.