A Little More Dead

A Little More Dead

by

 
Sean Thomas Fisher

Copyright © 2015 by Sean Thomas Fisher

Cover design by Creative
Paramita

All
rights reserved. No part of this book
may be reproduced,
scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission
.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are
the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events,
or locales is entirely coincidental.

Chapter
One

DAY SIX

A high-pitched scream went off in the
distance like a noon whistle, slicing through the falling snow outside. On cue,
they stopped chewing, wide eyes silently meeting for confirmation they weren’t
hearing things. The lone candle in the middle of the living room flickered
against the fear in their eyes. No one moved because out there under the
moonlight, the frigid temps weren’t the only thing that could turn you to ice.

“That sounded closer,” Dan whispered, ears
nearly poking through his stocking cap.

“No it didn’t,” Paul lied, glancing at
Matt and Mike and brushing his hand against the nine-millimeter strapped to his
right thigh. Just to make sure it was still there.
A new tick
for the new world.

Dan’s wide eyes flicked to the two boys,
Adam’s apple bobbing. “Probably just the echo that sounded closer.”

Paul returned to his so-called dinner,
staying as low to the stained carpeting as possible. The sporadic shrieks
seemed more like warnings than anything else, like those
things
were fucking with them.
Ready or not..
. From what
Paul witnessed back in Des Moines, those things didn’t care about anything
except satisfying that goddamn sweet tooth. Whatever the reason, the cries of
pain were enough to give a guy goose bumps if Old Man Winter hadn’t beaten them
to the punch. The snow-covered farmhouse was cold and drafty, caught in the
clutches of Iowa’s snowiest winter in ninety-nine years.

Polar vortex.

Of course.

At least that’s what the weather man said
just before every station switched to wall-to-wall coverage of the world wide
outbreaks. Paul took his gloves off and blew into his hands before rubbing them
together. They would have to get to warmer weather and fast because if those
things outside didn’t get them, the freezing temps would.

Sophia leaned in closer. “I told you I
had a bad feeling about this place.”

Paul cringed. He was positive they would
be okay this far out in the middle of nowhere, at least for one damn night. Was
everyone dead? Jesus Christ, it must be worse than they thought. He started to
tell her they would get through this mess but four years of marriage made him
take another bite of his partially frozen Hostess Fruit Pie instead. At this
point, it didn’t matter who was right or wrong. They
were
screwed
now and there was no going back. Ghostly plumes rolled from his
nostrils as he ate with his mouth closed, staring blankly at a stack of dusty
board games on the bottom shelf of a bookcase against the wall. Even through
the dim candlelight, he knew Scrabble, Connect Four, and Monopoly when he saw
them. He snorted, breath rushing from him like a bronco. Nobody ever won at Monopoly
because nobody ever stuck around long enough to finish and he wondered if this
would be any different.

“Do you think they can get in here?” Carla
hugged her boys, scanning the many windows through wild eyes.

Dan followed her jumpy gaze. “We’ve got
it sealed up tight.”

A silence as deep as the snowfall
outside settled around them, pressing against the walls. They exchanged nervous
glances through hollowed out faces, their expressions changing in the
flickering light. It had been a long six days – and don’t forget about the
three painful days of building news coverage before that. There were plenty of
recorded attacks on YouTube before the power went out but Anderson Cooper was
the first to go down on live television. Paul would never forget it. Why that
man thought he could roam the streets with only the protection of an overweight
camera man, Paul would never know. This
wasn't some fucked
up revolution in Egypt. Regardless, that’s when the public started taking
things seriously, but by then it was too late.

Paul’s bloodshot eyes gravitated to the family
portrait above the fireplace. A man with a brown mustache and big glasses sat on
a stool, posing next to his wife, and a young boy and girl – all dressed in
their Sunday best from the eighties. Their eyes followed Paul wherever he went
in the room, watching his every move like the home intruder he was. He exhaled
a slow breath, wondering where they went. Wondering where everyone went because
maybe they could go there too.

“Mom, are they
gonna
to eat us?” Mike asked, pulling his Iowa Hawkeyes stocking cap down over his
ears.

Carla rubbed the back of his heavy ski
coat, the look on her face defying her words. “No sweetie, they’re not going to
eat us.
You
are the one who needs to be
eating.”

“I don’t
wanna
die!” Matt turned on the water works and plunked his face into his mom’s down
coat.

“Peanut, will you stop? No one is going
to die.”

Paul and Dan looked at each other, jaws
slowly grinding their dinner.

After getting her minivan stuck on a
snowy rural route road a few hours ago, Carla couldn’t have been any luckier to
have Paul’s Grand Cherokee come upon them before the infected did.
Luckier than winning the lottery.
Now, here in the darkness
where they couldn’t see the shame pulling on his face, Paul felt guilty
thinking about how much easier this would be without them. Carla was out of
shape and Matt and Mike were so damn young and afraid and Paul didn’t blame
them but silence was golden in this world. Shit!

“Matt, they have guns,” Mike bravely
reminded his younger brother.

“That’s right,” Carla replied, struggling
to hang onto a heavy smile.

Paul looked away. The poor woman was
scared shitless. They all were and it worried him to no end. They were just
normal everyday people and
normal everyday
people
could never be ready for something like this. A week and a half ago,
Paul took his wife to the best restaurant in town for Valentine’s Day. Now they
were sucking on frozen apple pies in some rundown farmhouse, ready to kill the
next motherfucker who walked through the front door. And if they were lucky,
they wouldn’t shoot each other in the process.

“Matt, we won’t let anything happen to
you.” Sophia gave the kid a warm smile that melted Paul’s heart. Even in this
world, her compassion knows no bounds.

Matt pulled his wet face from his mom’s
coat and sniffled. “You promise?”

“I promise,” Sophia replied, squeezing Paul’s
hand. “We’ll be playing volleyball on the beach in no time.”

“I’ll teach you guys how to surf.” Dan
shifted on the carpet and bit into his cherry pie.
“Just as
soon as I learn first.”

Carla raised her brow. “See, sweetie?”

Matt studied Sophia for a moment with a
mixed look on his little red face. Hesitantly, he stuffed another stale graham
cracker into his mouth and crunched down. “Can we go fishing?” he asked,
spitting a piece of cracker onto the carpet.

Sophia’s green eyes glittered in the
candlelight. “You sure can.”

“Can we get boogie boards?” Mike asked.

“Of course.”

Matt stopped chewing. “Can we have
guns?”

Sophia opened her mouth, eyebrows
drawing together.

“No, you cannot have a gun,” Carla
answered, bailing her out.

They grew quiet again, a current of
tension running through the old creaky house. Paul was dead tired but it would,
more than likely, be another long night of tossing and turning. He’d probably
bagged less than fifteen hours of sleep since this shit-storm blew up and
fatigue led to mistakes and mistakes led to death’s door.

Dan leaned over and whispered in Paul’s
ear. “Dude, I have to poop so bad right now it hurts.”

Paul furrowed his brow.
“Again?”

“My IBS is
flarin
up
somethin
fierce.”

“Then go.”

Dan pulled his cap off and ran a hand through
his tangled yellow curls. “Both toilets are overflowing with frozen
turds
.”

“Go in the snow.”

“Are you insane? I’m not going out there.”
Dan did a double take, noticing Matt and Mike staring at him with their mouths
gaping. “Do you mind? This is a grown up conversation.”

Both kids replied with weak shrugs and
went back to barely eating as another guttural scream pierced the night, this
time definitely closer. Paul blew out the candle, plunging them into a moonlit darkness
that smelled like lilacs.

“I told you,” Sophia whispered.

“They’ll never know we’re here if we’re
quiet.”

“I’m just saying
,
we have kids to think about now, Paul.”

He tipped his head back and blew a
stream of visible air to the ceiling. In the old world, they couldn’t have kids
no matter how many doctors they saw but in this one they did and it was the
last thing they needed. Right now, they just needed to eat, sleep and shut the
hell up. His eyes migrated to the family portrait and Paul found himself
wondering what they did immediately after the Sears photo shoot. Did they go
out to eat? Did they see a movie? Or did they just go home and piss the rest of
the day away watching standard-definition TV and playing Monopoly? He shook his
head, knowing he’d never get used to hiding out in a different house like this
every night. Not with their rotating smells and furniture and pictures of the
people who used to live there, a continual reminder of the way things used to
be and the way they’d never be again. Shit, Paul had a hard enough time sleeping
in a hotel room let alone in this ice box. At least in a hotel room nobody came
pounding on your door at three in the morning unless it was security and oh
sweet Jesus what he’d give to see some security now. They hadn’t seen a single
cop or National Guardsman in over three days. Three days! It was numbing how
fast things were changing. Six days in and they were already on their own.

Sophia shivered against him beneath the
musty smelling blanket and tried to hide it. Two weeks ago, she managed a vintage
boutique. Today, she walked with a pink gun on her hip at all times. Two weeks
ago, she blew a gasket if a spider showed its hairy face in the bathroom. Today,
she had three kills and counting.

The backdoor opened in the kitchen with
a slow rusty creak, drawing their startled eyes. The cold wind slipped inside
as Paul set his pie down on the coffee table and grabbed the twelve-gauge lying
next to him on the floor without looking. Rising coolly to their feet, Paul and
Dan slid shotguns into their shoulders in an eerie choreographed symmetry.

“I thought you locked it after you
grabbed the water from the truck.”

Dan tightened his grip on the Browning.
“I did,” he replied, following Paul into the kitchen.

Paul stepped onto the cracked linoleum
and studied the open door with the wind blowing in his face. Free of intruders (and
wet footprints), he rushed across the room and locked the door before turning
back to Dan. “Obviously, you didn’t.”

Dan lowered his weapon. “I’m telling you
I did.”

“Then how did the wind just blow it
open?”

“Paul, you think I’m forgetting to lock
the fucking door with all of the shit going on out there? I sleep with a
shotgun now!”

A dull thud drew their eyes to the
ceiling.

“Holy shit, someone’s upstairs.”

“No, they’re not.”

“You just heard that.” Dan held up a
hand and cocked his head to the side. “There it was again.”

“That’s impossible. We checked every
square inch.”

“No one could’ve gotten past us,” Dan
said, tucking the shotgun into his shoulder.

Carla screamed when someone pounded on
the front door, making Dan jump so bad Paul was certain he would accidentally
shoot him. The candle whisked through Paul’s mind as he pushed past his best friend
and stormed into the living room. The front door rattled with each bruising wallop,
vibrating the pictures hanging on the walls. Carla hugged her boys on the floor
in front of the couch and spoke in a cold whisper. “They found us.”

Paul glanced back into the kitchen – the
backdoor still shut and locked. He jerked his chin to the front door and Dan
nodded before quietly crossing the room. Only six days in and they already had
a new language, one without words. In this world, words could only get in the
way.

The hammering stopped.

They stared at the front door, their
shallow breaths the only sound in the room.

Dan stepped through a stripe of
moonlight and peered out the peephole. “I only see one but he’s a big
one
,” he whispered.

“Perfect,” Sophia muttered, standing
next to Paul with her pink nine-millimeter pointed at the floor.

Another bone shattering blow to the door
made Dan flinch so bad it was almost funny.

Almost.

Paul took aim with the Mossberg. “Open
it.”

Carla pulled her boys closer.