Elixir (Red Plague #1) (Red Plague Trilogy) (13 page)

I had been lots of things six weeks ago—daughter, sister, student, songwriter. Now I was just a teenager with a limp and a sad song stuck in my head.

“I haven’t been able to write a new song since the plague hit,” I blurted out.

Ben shifted from one foot to the other.

“Before 212R I wrote everyday and played my guitar like it was attached to my chest. But now…” I scrubbed the sole of my cross trainer over the asphalt. “The last one I composed, in March or April I guess, was sad too, and I don’t like sad songs.”

The familiar melody flitted through my mind. I hummed a little, the fingers of my left hand curling into chords on the neck of an invisible guitar. “It’s dark, and you’re not home,” I sang softly.

Ben was a kind audience. He didn’t frown or shake his head. He didn’t react at all. So I sang a little more.

“Why do you have to go? If I asked you to stay, would you stay?” I shrugged. “I told you it was depressing. I wish I could write something silly or funny or romantic, but all I hear anymore are elegies.”

Ben watched me, his face blank. Was it possible he understood everything? That he knew what he wanted to say, he just couldn’t make his mouth form the syllables?

“Ben?” I inched nearer. “If you can hear me, raise your hand.” I held my breath, waiting,
waiting
for him to move his hand for me, to prove he was different from all the other voiceless, violent Reds.

But he didn’t.

“Ben,” I tried again. “Why are you following me?”

“Mmm,” he moaned, his gaze traversing my face as if memorizing every curve and valley. “Mmmrr.”

A chill arced up my spine and tiptoed across my neck. I was in an abandoned parking lot, in the dark, with a Red. All my dad’s warnings echoed in my ears.

Ben was fast and strong. He’d taken out three zombies in moments and come away with hardly a scratch. If he’d wanted to, he could’ve been on me and tearing into my abdomen before I had a chance to scream for help. Not that Pollard could do much. By the time he found me I’d be dead from shock and blood loss.

An image of Ben hunched over my lifeless body flashed through my mind, as clear as if it had already happened. He had blood on his chin and up both arms to the elbows…

“I’m going back inside,” I announced in a shaky voice. “Good night.” I rushed toward the truck stop, only glancing over my shoulder when I’d passed the automobile barricade. Ben had his face buried in the squirrel’s belly as he devoured its internal organs.

I didn’t see Pollard in the shadows until I ran straight into him.

“You have a pet,” he growled.

Chapter Eleven

I stuttered to a stop, my heart thrumming in fear.

Pollard had put his handgun back on his belt, and my skin prickled as if I stood too close to a fire.

He steadied me, but I jerked out of his hold. I couldn’t be near a firearm while so much adrenalin ricocheted through me.

“Congratulations,” he barked. “You’ve turned a human being into a German shepherd. I can put a leash on him for you, if you want. Did you ever see
The Walking Dead
?”

Very funny
. “He’s not a pet, and he’s not dead.”

“He might as well be. Everything that made him human got corrupted when he was infected.” Pollard stared hard, forcing me to look away. “He’s dangerous. And he’ll kill you first chance he gets. Don’t ever go near him again.”

I bristled at his tone. I was not a little child. I’d been in charge of myself for the past two weeks, and truthfully a lot longer than that. I did not appreciate him ordering me around.

“It’s none of your business,” I snapped.

“Is that what happened to my squirrel? You gave it to
him
? Like he needs any help killing and feeding.”

I tried to push past him into the dining room, but he blocked me.

“Do you know him?” Pollard asked again. “Yes or no?”

“No.” It was possible we went to high school together, but I didn’t remember him. Maybe he’d been a friend of my brother’s. Or at least near enough to Mason to collect my note.

“I don’t recognize him,” I said.

“Then he’s hunting you.”

I glanced at Ben. He was done with the squirrel and had returned to staring at me, hands at his sides.

“He didn’t hurt me,” I said. “I don’t think he will.”

“I don’t care if he can copy words onto asphalt. A monkey can do the same thing.”

I wasn’t sure about that.

“You have a gun, don’t you?” He gestured to the handgun on his hip, as if I hadn’t noticed it. “I have an extra one. If you ever get near him again you better have protection.”

There was no way—not even a chance—that I’d carry a gun. I could barely look at them.

I touched the grip of my short sword. “I’ll be okay.”

Pollard laughed. “With that butter knife? Where did you get it anyway?” Without asking, he pulled it from my belt and examined it. The sword was ridiculously small in his large hands.

“It was my dad’s. He was a big
Lord of the Rings
fan. It’s a replica of Sting.”

“The sword the hobbit used?” He looked a little more impressed. “Does it glow?”

“Only around orcs.” I smiled, but it felt strange, like I was out of practice. “I’m kidding,” I added when it seemed as if Pollard might believe me.

“It’s sharp,” he said, “but it won’t help against a zombie. They’re too fast and too strong. Especially that one.” He bobbed his head in Ben’s direction. “You need a gun.”

“No.” I finally pushed past him. As far as I was concerned the conversation was over. “Good night.”

It didn’t matter what Pollard said, Ben was different than other Reds. I didn’t know how, yet, but he was. If my dad had been there, he would’ve had all kinds of theories about adaptations and strains, and I hated that he wasn’t there to examine Ben. If he’d been there, he would’ve known what was going on. The best I could do was observe and make semi-educated guesses.

If he stuck around long enough for me to study properly.

The thought of Ben disappearing during the night, maybe joining a pack and migrating to a larger city, caused an uncomfortable anxiety in my chest. I didn’t want him to leave. Not yet. I wasn’t finished with him.

I tripped over an empty soda bottle on my way across the room, but not even that or Pollard’s and my hushed argument in the entryway had woken the others. They snored on, oblivious. But I was done pretending I could join them.

Sleeping out in the open surrounded by these people I’d just met had been a ruse. I could never rest comfortably on a bench in the dining room no matter how many pillows and blankets they offered me. It was too open, and the others were too close.

I considered the janitor’s closet, but it stank of cleansers. I wasn’t sure I could sleep in there without suffering a migraine.

In the kitchen, though, I found a walk-in freezer. It was a little bigger than my panic room, about sixty square feet compared to my fifty-square-foot remodeled pantry, but it reminded me a lot of home. Someone had stripped it of all edible material leaving empty shelves and barren crates ringing the perimeter. It smelled faintly of rotted food, but it was manageable.

I missed the familiar shapes of the stacks of canned goods, boxes of crackers, and powdered eggs, plus the bins of toiletries and kitchenware back home. There was no guitar in the corner. And my comfy little cot covered in thick blankets was long gone, but I liked it.

Without asking, I dragged bedding into the walk-in and made a nice little pallet in the center of the room. Beside my bed on the floor I arranged my backpack and sword.

“This is your bedroom, then?” Pollard stood in the doorway with a lit lantern in his hand.

“Yes.” I didn’t want to explain. He’d told me to make myself at home and I had.

“It’ll get really dark with the door closed.”

“I don’t mind.” Since the electricity had gone off I’d had to adjust to the dark. It didn’t affect me the way it once had. “Good night.”

He lingered another few awkward moments, but finally he answered, “Good night,” and slipped back into the dining room with the others.

I paused on the threshold, listening.

“Where’s Maya?” Hunny asked.

“She’s making a bed in the kitchen. Why aren’t you asleep?” Pollard responded.

“I’m scared. Can I sleep with Maya?”

“No,” Pollard said. “She needs her space. Apparently.”

“Can I sleep with you?”

“No,” he said, sounding suddenly ten times more exhausted than he had a moment ago. “Get back to sleep. You don’t want to be tired tomorrow.”

I waited until I was sure no one was coming to find me and then I closed the door to the freezer, locking myself into the dark. Alone.

Chapter Twelve

“We don’t need that much water.”

“We’ll die if we run out. What we don’t need is more cookies.”

Voices drifted through the walk-in freezer’s metal walls and pushed the final remnants of a lilting and sad country song from my dreams. I rubbed at my eyes. I hadn’t slept well at all, tossing and turning and suffering two separate nightmares about Ben. In one, I’d discovered him shot and bloody and dead by the gas pumps. In the other he’d attacked me with all the force and ferocity of a wild animal. Twice, I’d woken anxious and jumpy.

It turned out the walk-in was not a close substitute for my panic room at home. I missed the comforts and security I’d taken for granted.

By the time I found the source of the argument, Pollard, Simone, and Russell were all wrestling over a box of chocolate chip cookies, two gallons of water at their feet. No one seemed concerned that Hunny was stuffing handfuls of Tootsie Rolls into her pants pockets. The little sneak just couldn’t help herself.

And I was seriously reconsidering letting any of them in on my plan. They looked and sounded like a whole lot of trouble.

“Good morning,” I grumbled, swinging my backpack at my side. “Is there enough water to wash up?”

The walk-in hadn’t only been pitch black at night, but it had held all the warm air within its insulated walls. I’d sweated out any fluids I’d managed to drink yesterday and was now in serious need of a bath.

Simone’s expression softened and she opened her mouth to answer, but Pollard spoke first. “Of course. Come on. I’ll show you the bathrooms.” He grabbed a jug of water off the floor and led the way into the dark hallway. “Do you need soap or a toothbrush? It’s all here.”

“Actually, anything you can find would be great.” I didn’t even have a comb.

Pollard brought me a ladies’ toiletry kit in a zippered pouch off the shelf. It was like Christmas morning. I was that excited to see a toothbrush and toothpaste. Hygiene had gotten a lot tougher recently. I’d been able to continue brushing my teeth because it required such a small amount of water. But actual showers? Those weren’t so easy to accomplish.

And forget about doing laundry. I’d begun wearing an outfit for a couple days in a row and then sealing it into a trash bag rather than waste buckets of water cleaning the clothes. So, getting a bath, even a modified one, was a special treat.

He set his lantern on the sink and shadows writhed across the walls and ceiling.

“Thanks,” I said, suddenly shy. “I’ll be out in a while.”

I shut the door on him and unpacked my precious things and an empty canteen from my backpack. I flipped pages in my song diary, hastily scrawled lyrics flashing by in a rush. Everything from the first song I ever wrote, a love song called “A Night Out,” to the last song I wrote before the red plague.

I cradled the iPad for a moment, remembering what life had been like the last time I turned it on and enjoyed its contents. I flipped open the cover, but it didn’t power on. It hadn’t been charged in weeks. Inside its tiny parts lay so many things I cared about. Bands and music videos I loved, photographs, texts… Not that it did me any good.

I snapped the cover closed. It, along with its wall charger and ear buds, went back into the very bottom of my pack. Then I piled the canteen on top of it.

I’d learned a long time ago how to do an okay job of bathing with very little water. I stripped to my socks and scrubbed the small, soapy scrap of cloth over my body. Old skin and dried sweat sloughed off, and I felt a thousand percent better immediately. Then I washed the soap off with a clean, wet washcloth.

My hair, though, required more finesse. I bent over the sink, flipped my dark, glossy hair up over my face, and wet it with water from the jug. I lathered up with the shampoo and then rinsed it clean. The same with the conditioner.

During the first few days after my dad didn’t come home I’d wasted a lot of water bathing my entire body. Another rookie mistake.

I’d learned to wash up with no more than a couple quarts and a washcloth.

I emerged twenty minutes later from the truck stop bathroom fresh and clear-headed.

While Russell continued to argue over supplies, I pulled Hunny onto my lap.

“I’m going to brush your hair,” I pronounced with confidence, producing a small brush I’d gotten out of the convenience store.

She squirmed like a wet eel. “No.”

I held on tight. “You have to. It’s a bird’s nest.”

“No!” She kicked me in the left shin. Hard. “It hurts!”

“Okay, okay.” I squeezed her around the middle to get her attention and felt every one of her ribs like piano keys through her shirt. “Let’s make a deal.”

She ceased squirming. “What kind of deal?”

“You let me brush your hair and I’ll let you do something you want.” Bribery had always worked with my brother.

“Like what?” She shifted around until she sat comfortably on my lap, but I kept my arms around her in case she bolted.

“What do you want? Let’s negotiate.”

“I want to go to a toy store.”

The only one I knew of was near my house, but in the opposite direction we were traveling. We’d have to find another one along the way. But that wasn’t too big a problem. After Hunny’s thieving incident I wanted to get her something she could call her own. Something she didn’t have to steal and hide under her shirt.