‘
Guts,’ he said simply.
‘
Eh?’
‘
Guts. In the radiator. Compacted bone, caked blood. Rancid. I had to work it out with a stick, but there’s still loads in there. It smells like the worst barbecue you’ve ever been to.’
‘
Plus there’s a ton of food in the back,’ Jay said. ‘What my folks gave to me and what we took from Lou’s mum’s house.’ He stopped, and looked at Lou, who tightened her grip on my hand. I looked into her beautiful eyes – forget-me-not blue today - her face puffy with tears. I remembered what she’d told me one argument; about how men always want to fix things, but that’s not necessarily what a woman wants to hear from a shoulder she’s crying on. I decided not to tell her that it didn’t mean her mum was dead, so instead I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed her tightly, making farting noises with each squeeze until eventually I could hear muffled, sob-staggered giggling coming from within my clothes. Al said that they’d been heartened on the way up by the sight of the blazing pyre David and I had built, and assumed I was still alive and kicking. I explained about David’s plan for the quick lime.
‘
I don’t think we’ve been introduced. Well, not properly, anyway.’ David was grinning, his hand outstretched.
‘
I’m Al, pleased to meet you. Have you been treated well?’ Jay collapsed into a fit of giggles, rolling around on the floor. Soon they were all introduced, and it felt good again. My stomach eased, and I hugged Lou even tighter.
‘
What on fuck are you doing with those horses?’ Jay asked when he’d caught his breath.
‘
They just turned up on the night that… you left.’ I explained. ‘We used them to pick up the rucksacks the next day.’
‘
Really?’ Al was impressed.
‘
Yeah, I’ve put all the supplies we haven’t used yet in your tent Jay.’ I showed them the water collector and offered to show them the pyre.
‘
What’s that for again?’ Jay asked.
‘
Quick lime,’ said David, ‘it’s to decompose the corpses quicker.’
‘
I see you’ve cleaned the place up.’ Jay said, waving his arms behind him.
‘
Yeah, we threw them all over the side,’ I explained.
‘
Where did they all go? The live ones I mean.’ Lou snivelled. This was the first time she’d spoken to me since she slapped me.
‘
I don’t know baby. The wind’s changed, but I’m sure the rain had something to do with it too. None of them are alive though.’ I stopped trying to fix her opinion on the effects of the illness. The fierce heat from the trench greeted us.
‘
There’s still thousands of them, but the ones we saw on the way up here were all really spread out.’ Al said, absently poking at the white-hot embers with a long stick. ‘There were no real groups of them. They’re slower too, I’m sure.’
‘
I thought that – they’ve stopped climbing up the slope too. We only see one or two up here now, it’s like they’re running out of steam.’ I said.
‘
Yeah, up here maybe – but town is still chock-f.’ Jay was pissing in a bush, yelling over his shoulder. It felt good that Jay was pissing in a bush, and Al was setting light to stuff, and Lou was holding my hand. I gazed south, over the trees onto the coast. Worthing was not burning any more, yet a slate-grey curtain of smoke still sat above the twisted wreckage of the town. Lou and I left the warm chatter of the others and walked slowly, arm-in-arm, until we were back at the camp. We kissed, long and slow, before holding each other tight as Lou buried her snotty nose into my beard. How did her hair still smell so sweet? Lou spoke first.
‘
I was glad when they decided to come back. I missed you. I haven’t got my wedding ring,’ she started sobbing again.
‘
Nor have I baby, I… lost it.’
‘
What?’ she looked hurt, even though she’d practically chucked hers away and called me a very bad word, but I bit my lip. I didn’t know; maybe I’d chucked mine away too.
‘
I woke up and I didn’t have it on my finger. I don’t know how, no-one nicked it that’s for sure. There are a lot of things about that night I haven’t worked out yet.’ I said, staring into the fire.
‘
What are we going to do?’ I knew what she meant, and it wasn’t the breakdown of society. Those rings meant a lot. We’d not even been married a year, but even after living under the same roof for the previous seven years and just shagging once in a while for a further three years before that, it felt horrible without them. We’d always insisted it would be just a piece of paper – we didn’t need it, but we felt it was the way to make our relationship official before we started a family of our own. We were wrong – it made such an awesome difference. Even simply by the act of me proposing, we laughed more, she felt safer and more secure, and the sex was like we’d just met that night, wild and electric.
When we were finally married fourteen months later, it was like we were living a whole new life. We were enjoying ourselves so much the plans for a new family got put on the back-burner and we’d decided to get a puppy. You know, so Lou could cuddle something small and warm in the meantime. It led to a few accusations of my bollocks not working properly, but being ginger-haired and therefore branded a ‘Jaffa’ since my first day at school I could draw upon years of imaginative playground banter to counter any verbal attack within nanoseconds.
‘
I’ll get us new rings,’ I said hopefully. I was sure there were lots of jeweller’s shops still left unplundered. I knew, though, that at least Lou’s was somewhere up here, on top of Cissbury Ring. I was poking at the fire with a stick, when Lou let out a delighted ‘Ooh!’ and pulled from the pocket of Jay’s coat a red carton of UHT milk.
‘
I forgot about the cow juice! Shall I put the kettle on?’ she beamed triumphantly.
A light drizzle had drifted over the camp, possibly due to our height above sea level; it might well have been the base of a low-flying cloud. Either way it clung to my clothes and made me shiver. I built the fire up, and soon it was crackling away, but the woodpile was getting dangerously low. I could hear voices approaching above the whistling of the kettle, and the smell of damp wood smoke caught deliciously in the back of my throat. The horses murmured to each other, and soon the others were around us, licking their lips at the sight of the seven mugs laid out on the ground and firing banter into the dank air.
‘
The quick lime’s nearly done,’ David said to me.
‘
Yeah, we still don’t know if we got it hot enough,’ I said, not wanting to spoil anyone’s fun.
‘
True. That’s the downside of not having broadband any more.’ He chuckled.
‘
Oh, yeah, I wonder what’s happened to the Internet?’ Al said.
‘
S’probably still there. I suppose if bits of it have still got power that would all still be up and running.’ Jay pondered.
‘
I don’t know enough about it,’ I admitted, ‘I thought it was powered by voodoo.’
It was only after Lou and I had finished off the teas to everyone’s specifications that we realised we’d made one for Vaughan too. Heavy silence. I broke it by telling them all about the grave David and I had built to bury Vaughan’s T-shirt. Al wanted to see it, so we took our mugs to the mound of rocks and the little cross. I gave him a bit of a back-slapping hug, and he sniffed into his steamy tea. He was carrying Vaughan’s cup of tea with him too, and he set it down at the head-end. I stood with him for a bit, and pretty soon everyone else was gathered around. No-one said anything. No-one needed to. He’d saved us all. When we started to make our way back to the camp, I walked next to Al. I still wasn’t sure if I’d done the right thing by making the grave, and I didn’t know how such a concrete reminder of it, after all Al had seen in the last week, would sit with him. It soon became clear though.
‘
Thanks for doing that chum,’ he said, the tears forced dry once more.
‘
Well, it was David’s idea really.’ I was being honest. ‘I hadn’t thought about it, but I suppose it makes sense.’
‘
I like it. It’s like we’ve got him up here still. With us, not with them.’
‘
He won’t be one of them, chum.’ I said. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘
Tired. Very tired,’ he replied
‘
Oh, you’ve got some house-guests by the way - the Goths.’ I did a zombie walk to illustrate. ‘Jay’s tent was full, and I didn’t think you’d mind. They don’t have a tent of their own, plus I didn’t actually know if you’d be coming back.’
‘
No, I’m sorry about that. It seemed like a good idea, and Lou was upset.’ Al turned to me. ‘You asked me to protect her when you weren’t around. It really didn’t feel like you were around that night. I’m glad you’re back,’ he said.
I fell quiet.
‘
So how many of us are there?’ he asked. ‘Six? But we’ve got tents for five. Halfords is down in the business park. I’m sure they sell – sold - tents.’
‘
Yep, that’s true. But how about we build them something?’ I suggested. ‘It’d show them they were both welcome.’
‘
I like that. We will. We should build a shelter for all the stores too. Got any ideas?’ Al asked me.
‘
I’m sure there’s something in one of the survival books I’ve got. It’s pretty simple with this many of us I should think. It’s not like we’re short of water or anything.’
‘
Or wood,’ Al shrugged. ‘You can suggest it to them. It’ll keep everyone occupied too.’
[day 0008]
The next day we began to build what would become the first permanent structure on top of Cissbury Ring for a long, long time. We started out by prepping the small chainsaw, filling it with petrol from a can Al had relieved from Jay’s garage. It worked after a few pulls, so we set about finding some suitable wood. We weren’t eager to take any of the old trees down – they were too thick and gnarly anyway. After consulting the
SAS Survival Handbook
I saw that we should be looking for young trees, like those in a coppice, long and tall with no branches until the whippy ones right at the tip. I jotted down some plans, and realised the few young trees up here would never be enough to build what I had in mind. I wanted any buildings we put up to be substantial – I felt Dawn and David deserved to feel at home up here, and I didn’t want them living in a pig shed. It would be good practice to build a shelter for the Goths.
‘
We could build the stores under the same roof – if you guys are up for that?’ I suggested. The Goths nodded agreement. We did have a lot of stuff between all of us, and there were still more edible supplies in Al’s car. All of our tents were crammed full of all the bits we’d managed to salvage so far.
I seemed to have been nominated as foreman by default, so I suggested we started with the thicket at the northern, car park end of the site.
‘
The one you walk up from the back of the Ring. There’s a load of young trees there. It’s covered and it’s on a slope.’ Al thumbed his agreement, thrilled to be doing something constructive. ‘Dawn, can you and David make something safe for the horses to use with the chain over there? We’ll get them to tow the logs up here if you think they can.’
‘
Possibly,’ Dawn rubbed her chin. ‘It usually takes quite a while to train a horse to haul stuff. They get freaked out pretty easily.’
‘
We’ll take it nice and slow. There’s a hand drill in my dad’s toolkit.’ Al said. ‘We can drill a hole at each end of the poles and thread the chain through.’
‘
I like it. Jay - I know you’ve got a bit of a hangover, but you’re on security. Lou and I will help you out; we are at your service. Tool us up. Al - you’ll be felling trees with the chainsaw and drilling the holes. David - when we’re down there, all you have to concern yourself with is making sure none of us get brained by a tree. That’s it. Oh, and Dawn - you’ll be on the horses and will probably have the best view, so keep in touch with Jay as a lookout. We won’t take the radios, it will be too noisy with the saw and we should all be pretty close to each other anyway.’ I took a breath. I was relishing the prospect of getting something done. We all hurried to get what we needed. The prospect of working in the damp grey air, which breezed cool on our necks, was especially appealing after the heat of recent days. I scanned from the horizon down to the path below us, and counted no more than a hundred freaks as far as I could see. They were spread out, but nonetheless we had to keep on our toes. I offered Jay the binoculars, but he pulled out a pair of his own – they were lighter than my old ones and more powerful too.
Jay helped us wrap our legs in gaffer tape and cut lengths of drainpipe for our forearms. The three of us on defensive duties also wore chemical gauntlets, and lightweight clear plastic safety goggles. We all made our way towards the back of the Ring, and the slope down to the woods, after Dawn and David had sorted out the tow chain. She’d lashed two of the horses together and neatly linked each end of the chain to the back edge of each mule’s head-gear. The chain clanked as it trailed behind us, Al and I leading the party into the woods, with the Goths on horseback and Lou and Jay walking backwards downhill. ‘It helps,’ I heard Lou explaining to Jay, and I laughed.
Al worked fast, David whistling low and loud before each tree came down. The hounds soon worked it out, although Floyd had a couple of lucky escapes. The logs were rolled into place alongside each other and Al knelt to drill through the base of each one as David held them steady. Jay, Lou and I were spaced out, walking around the perimeter of the work as we moved from tree to tree. We’d stop each time we heard the whistle, and either watched the tree fall or ran out of the way. Jay had the axe as a backup in case the chainsaw failed, and would hack away at the leafy ends of the logs whenever his circular route let him. We were all listening for any warning from Dawn, who had my binoculars and sat astride one of the horses keeping watch, calming the animals when the chainsaw started its rattling drone. She only yelled once, as a corpse appeared, dragging his feet through the leaves and stumbling up the slope. Jay had already spotted him and felled him quickly, then rolled the headless body downhill with his foot. It had been impossible to tell how old he was. His face seemed blackened as if burnt, but his limbs were all there and his clothes were intact. I only guessed he was a he.