The Undead World (Book 2): The Apocalypse Survivors (21 page)

Chapter 21

Jillybean

South of Philadelphia

In the morning while Ram snored, Jillybean went into mouse-mode and crept over to the restaurant next to the drycleaners. There she used the bathroom. Her stomach felt much better, but she still suffered from diarrhea.

Better out than in
, Ipes told her when she came out weak and shaking. He had asked to be left in the main room to keep watch, though she knew that wasn't why he wanted to stay on the counter, he didn't want to get the smell on him.

"I guess," she answered, holding her belly. "I could use some chips and some water. Do you think it's safe to drink out of them puddles?"

The zebra looked outside where everything was damp. The rain had moved on leaving a cold, wet morning behind.
Out of those puddles, and maybe, but why chance it. Mister Ram can help you out. Have him boil some water. That's supposed to make it clean
.

"But it'll be hot."

Ipes snorted—a loud noise with his big nose.
It'll cool and besides look right there
.

He pointed with a flat hoof at a wooden box. It was turned on its side, stuck between the counter and a bench. Jillybean found that it was almost permanently stuck
there. It took all of her might to free it, but it was worth the effort.

"Is that...?"

Yes, it's tea
, Ipes said, filling in the word that she could only picture in her mind.
And look, they have mandarin orange. Your favorite
.

Taking the box and the zebra she hurried back to where Ram slept. She paused with her hand out to him. Was it alright
to wake him up? The sun was up, didn't that mean he should be as well?

Early to bed, early to rise, t
hat's what your daddy always said
, Ipes remarked.
And besides the tea looks really good. We could even add some fortune cookie to it to make it sweeter.

The idea was a good one and again she put her hand out. Then she remembered how her mom used to like to sleep in, especially when she had been sick
—and Mister Ram had been sick.

You were sick and you are up
, Ipes noted.

Jillybean refused to answer him. As always he was being greedy for cookies. Instead she waited patiently...as patiently as a six-year-old could, which meant her attention wandered and Ram woke to find her playing with Ipes.

She was on him immediately. "Can you make me this? I found it in the asia place. It's tea."

His eyes had barely begun to focus. "Huh?"

"Tea is something you drink," she explained holding up one of the packets. "You have to put it in really hot water for a little while. I'd do it but I don't know how to make fire. Ipes says you have to rub sticks together but I think he's trying to be a jokester again. So can we?"

Ram squinted at the tea for a moment and then yawned.

He looks like a bear when he does that
, Ipes said. He then held his nose.
And smells like one!

"Stop being naughty to Mister Ram or you won't get any tea, and you can't have cookies without tea. Everyone knows that is the way of things." When Ram went from sleepy to confused, Jillybean explained: "Ipes was being bad. He can be very naughty sometimes."

"I think he's pretty smart," Ram said. "And you are too, Jillybean. How old are you?"

"Six and three quarters, probably. I don't know if another year went by. Did it? It's real hard to know what day it is anymore."

Ram stood and stretched, looking tall as a giant to the little girl. After popping his back he said, "It is after the New Year, but that doesn't mean you got a year older. It depends on when you were born. What's your birthday?"

Jillybean bit her lip and then stared up at the ceiling. "
Uhh," she said, tapping her foot. The date wasn't coming to her and for some reason she found it annoying. "Ipes?" she whispered. "When is it?"

Before the zebra could answer, Ram shot her a look with a raised eyebrow and then turned away to the steel wash tub, pretending he hadn’t heard the question. After the bonfire from the night before, the tub was mostly black, however along one side it sported a rainbow sheen of oil.

"It doesn't really matter when it is," Ram said before picking up a hunk of the lacquered table and snapping it in two. “We can make up a day if you want.”

"I know when it is," she said defensively. "It's just..."

It’s in May
, Ipes told her.
Remember last year we had a picnic? Mommy picked us up from kindergarten and she said that thing about May showers bringing all the flowers
.

The memory came back to her in a rush. The park was warm and sunny; there had been gifts and food that she couldn’t remember. Daddy tried to teach her to throw a Frisbee, but she couldn’t make it go straight. It would wing off to the right, every time, where it would immediately go spinning away on the ground. Once a happy dog had chased it and she had chased after the dog and daddy had chased her.

Mommy stayed with the food and sang under her breath. She never sung out loud except when she was alone and so Jillybean only caught snippets as she ran past; it was a love song and it made Jilly want to stop and listen, but she never did. Eventually she tired of the Frisbee and the dog left to be with its owners. At Daddy’s suggestion they walked along a river and picked flowers, making a straggly bouquet that her mommy exclaimed over.

“
They’re beautiful, Jillybean, just like you
.” They hugged until Jilly couldn’t breathe and then her mommy recited: “
April showers bring May flowers.
”

“My birthday is in May,” she told Ram in a small voice. “I’m a May flower. On the seventh, I think. Is that nearly now?”

The man snapped another board, sending splinters flying. “Almost. You’ll be seven on the seventh. You know seven is a lucky number?”

“It is?” she asked before consulting a higher power than either Ram or Ipes: the fortune that she had scraped out of the cookie from the night before. She had liked the saying on it and so had laid it out to keep it from being crushed. Now she flipped the little rectangle of paper over where there were numbers printed.

“You’re right!” she exclaimed. “There’s a seven right here. Hey, Mister Ram, what is a lucky number? What’s it do for you? Does it help you win at cards? I heard that once.” As she spoke, her curiosity over the magic of creating fires had her edging close to the wash tub where Ram was now kneeling as if in supplication. He wasn’t rubbing sticks together like she thought he would. Instead, he had built a small teepee out of chunks of wood and was using a lighter to set some paper ablaze within it.

He blew gently on the flames and stuck out a hand to her. “That’s close enough. You don’t want to ruin that fancy dress. Have you seen yourself in the light? There’s a mirror. Go take a look while I get this going.”

Immediately the idea of fire and lucky numbers left her as completely as if they had never been. Jillybean hurried to the mirror and stared at herself until it seemed as if an unfelt wind began to turn her left and right. The “wind” lifted her knee-length dress slightly with each turn. And then it spun her about completely and the dress flared higher.

She didn’t even notice that Ram had created his fire until he came to stand behind her in the mirror. Around a smile he said, “You’re very pretty.” This caused her to go red and the twirling ceased. Ram nodded as if this was normal or proper and said, “I’m going to get a kettle from next door. Can’t have tea without a kettle, right? While I’m gone, you should go into the front room. I just don’t like the idea of you so close to the fire when I’m not around.”

Obediently she started for the front, but he stopped her without effort. “Don’t forget these,” said, holding up her sneakers. “There’s broken glass all over the place in there.”

It was with reluctance that she took them. They had once been a pretty silver accented by the
Nike swoosh and laced in bright pink; now they were mostly grey with mud stains. Also, each was split at the toe where her feet were slowly erupting out of them.

What really bothered her, however, was that they didn’t match her dress.
It's why she had kicked them off in order to twirl. “Can you get me some new shoes, too, if they have any. White would be good.”

“Shoes?” he asked. By the look in his eyes, Jillybean could tell that fashion was
a foreign concept to the man. “I don’t know if we have time,” he added.

Jillybean was long experienced at working a father figure around her little finger. She toed a button and put her head down. “I guess. It’s only
these are too small for me. My foots stick right out the front.” Here, she held up the shoes and pointed at the holes: Exhibit A. “They really hurt and give me blisters, see.” Now she put a foot up to display: Exhibit B. This exhibit wasn't too convincing since there wasn’t any evidence of blistering. Undeterred she went on, “The water must have washed them away. And asides my old shoes don’t go with my dress, which I might as well not even wear, even though it’s pretty.”

Ram scratched his head; her arguments had clearly failed. It was then that Ipes helped out. He whispered,
Please, you meant to say
.

She was quick. “
Pleeease, Mister Ram?”

“Fine. I’ll check out a few of those houses up the road. Remember, I can’t guarantee anything.”

“Thank you. Thank you. Try to get them without heels. You know what heels are, right? They make you tall, only I can’t walk in them and my mom doesn’t think a little girl should wear them. I won’t look like a lady and I’ll break my ankles. That’s what she says.” Here she paused only long enough to draw in a big breath. Ram held up one of his brown hands to keep her from going on.

“Stop your singing, Little Bird,” he said. “I told you I would try. Now stay away from the fire and keep an eye out for stiffs.”

She wondered at the word:
stiffs
.

He means monste
rs, Ipes informed her.
As if you need any advice dealing with monsters
.

“Yeah, I can deal with the monsters,” Jillybean said to her friend as she watched Ram slip away. They were in the fro
nt room standing at the broken window. “Unless it’s little kid monsters like at that school.” The thought of them, of their greedy mouths and tiny, pointed teeth gave her the shivers.

Ipes was watching
the man as well.
What’s he up to? Look at him. Look at him go from car to car like that.

Jillybean shook her head in wonder. “He is going tall.”

And he has the nerve to tell us to watch out for monsters!
Ipes cried. He crossed his arms in indignation, while his tale bristled like a pipe cleaner.
It’s almost as if he's on parade out there. You know what his problem is?

The little girl shrugged. “No, but he is getting me new shoes. So maybe we shouldn’t be so mean.”

Ipes ignored her.
His problem is that he still thinks like a man. Like he’s still at the top of the food chain. He stalks like a lion when he should be scampering like a squirrel. After yesterday it should be obvious that he is now the prey and not a predator
.

“Maybe,” Jillybean replied. She was quite smitten with Ram and couldn’t imagine saying anything negative about him.

If Ipes had eyebrows they would have come smashing down in a glare. Instead he wrinkled his big nose a bit and asked,
Maybe?
in a high voice.
Maybe nothing. He’s barely watching his flanks. And did you see how he crossed that intersection? I could have…

A rock went skittering across the asphalt of the parking lot, freezing Jillybean in place. It was
for a split second only and then she slunk behind a fake plant that was a few feet from the front door. There she filtered the sound of the rock through her mind, fixing it with a likely origin. It wasn’t from a monster; there would be moans drifting on the quiet morning air. It wasn’t from an animal either. The largest mammal left in Philadelphia was the raccoon and they never sent stones skittering; they were much too careful.

That meant the rock had been kicked by a human.

More sounds: breathing from at least two people. They were mouth breathers, trying and failing to be quiet. Someone crunched glass underfoot, only to be shushed by another. Jillybean’s mind now had a firm picture of their number: three, of which at least one was male.

Against the counter across from her, a shadow bobbed and then almost above her a face appeared in the window. The person was black and a man. He had a patchy beard that went halfway down his neck and nostrils that were wide and very deep.

Was he a good guy or a bad guy? Ram had told her of an ongoing war in Philadelphia—was this man apart of it? And if so was he like Trey who had turned out not to be so bad?

With the limited information she possessed, she decided to ere on the side of caution. For her caution was a serious thing and she might have been made of stone for all she moved.