All That I See - 02 (10 page)

“This is Mr. Parks,” Sara said, pa
tting the man on the chest. “He’s the shop teacher
over at
Clayfield High
. I used to be in his class
.”

He extended his hand.

“Ben Parks,” he said.

I shook his hand
, “Nice to meet you.”

He was
in his
mid to late 30s
, broad, with
a
thoughtful face and a new
, but heavy
, beard. He
kind o
f reminded me of a bear.

Sara
touched his whiskers.
“When did you grow
all
this?”

“During the apocalypse,”
he said, matter-of-factly
then smiled.

He turned to his companion.

“This is R
on
Meyer
,” he said.

Ron was shorter and wiry
with dark hair
and
sharp features
. He had
a
laid-
ba
ck, easy-going way
about him.

“Ron and I have been friends forever,”
Ben
Parks said,
keeping his eyes on me
like he was
sizing me up.

I shook Ron’s hand and looked
out at
the other SUV.
I could see the dark shape of a person behind the wheel and the shape of a child in the passenger seat, but because of the shadows on the windshield I couldn’t make out their features.

“Don’t worry,” Ron said. “They’re friendly.”

“We’ve
been watching
this place for a while,” Ben said. “We knew someo
ne was living here, but we didn’t know
who or how many. Then we noticed it had been abandoned about a week ago.
Was it you here before
?”

“Yeah,”
Sara
said. “We came back a couple of days ago.”

“We were just on our way back from a food run,
” he continued, “
and I notice
d
the ne
w vehicles, so I had Ron pull in
. If I had known it was you,
Sara,
I would have stopped by sooner, but…well, it’
s not always the safest thing to do.”

“How many of you?” I asked.

“
Five
,” Ron said. “Molly Anderson and her little boy, Adam, are in the other truck
. Mr. McAllister is back at the house; he
’s
an
old dude
and doesn’t get around
too good
. There were
seven
of us originally, but…” his voice trailed off, and he looked away.

“
I’m sorry,” Sara said.

There was an uncomfortable s
ilence the
n
Sara spoke up again.
“I would invite you in for something to eat, but we just finished off the last of our food. We’re going to make a food run ourselves in the morning.”

“
Oh,” Ben said, looking
to Ron as if to consult him
. “I think we could leave you a little something. We had some good luck today. We were able to fill both trucks from one house.”

“Yeah,” Ron chuckled. “They must have been one of those couponers or something.” He looked at Ben and shrugged. “Sure, we can let you have some food to get you by for a day or two.”

“I couldn’t--“ I started, but Ben
stopped me.

“Judging by that bandage on your head, you need to take it easy anyway.”

I figured that was his roundabout way of asking what happened to me. I reached up and touched the bandage.

“We had some trouble with looters,” I said. “They were from out-of-town.”

Ben looked concerned then glanced over
at Sara.

Sara gave them a short version of the story.

“Are they still around?” Ron asked
.

“Dunno,” Sara
shrugged
.

Ben looked back at the other SUV then to the sky.

“The sun is going down,” he said. “We should go
before Mr. McAllister gets worried about us
. Ron
,
let’s get them some groceries before it gets dark.”

We followed them out to the rear of their truck and Ben opened the back hatch. It was stacked to the ceiling with food and toilet paper.

“I don’t know how you feel about it, but you’re welcome to come in with us,” he said. “We’ve got
a
fairl
y
safe
place a few miles
from here
.
We haven’t se
en
one of those things
out that way since
Thursday.
We’d be glad to have you.
”

He handed Sara out a case of chicken flavored ramen soup.

“We need to stay here,” Sara said. “Some friends were supposed to return yesterday, and they haven’t yet.”

“
Oh, s
o it’s not just the two of you?” Ben asked,
sounding kind of relieved.
He gave m
e a box of Corn Chex,
a large can of mixed vegetables
, and some packets of powdered milk
.

“It’s a long story,” I said.

Ben lo
oked at me, but I couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

“We
ll,” he said, closing the hatch,
“I look forward to hearing it. We’ll probably be by to check on you in
a couple of days if that’s okay.
”

“
That would be great,” Sara said
then she looked around at us and blushed. “Um, Mr. Parks, this is kind of embarrassing, but you wouldn’t happen to have any pads or tampons in your truck, would you?
Those men stole all of our supplies.
”

Ben looked out at the other SUV, “Yeah, I think I s
aw Molly put some in. I suppose
I should giv
e you some toilet paper, too.
”

“Did you…start?” I asked Sara
, hesitantly
. Ben shot me a look, but didn’t say anything.

“Not yet,” she said. “But I’d like to be prepared.”

“
Did you notice
an increase in zombie activity when Molly was on her period?” I asked.
I felt awkward saying it, but I thought it needed to be asked.

Ron made a f
ace
then looked out at
the other truck
. “We don’t ask her about stuff like that.”

“Oh,” I said. “It’s just that we thought there might be
a correlation
. It’s just a theory.”

Ben stared at me expressionless then looked over at Sara.

“If you think something like that might happen, the two of you should come with us,” he said
. “Our place is more secure than
this one.”

“We really need to stay here and wait for Nicholas and Judy,” Sara said.

Ben opened the back of the truck and dug around until he found a box of tampons. He put it and two rolls of toilet paper on t
op of the case of ramen noodles that Sara was holding.

“As soon as things settle down, we’re heading west,” Ron said. “We found a boat, and we’re crossing the river. You’re welcome to come with us if you want.”

Sara and I looked at each other but neither of us
accepted the invitation
. We’d already discussed whether or not we should leave the area, and we were on the same page.

“Okay,”
Ben
said. “
If you need anything just drive that way until you get to the stop sign. Make a right and we’re the first house on the left. It’s a green mailbox with
the number seventy-one on it.
Mr. McAllister came looking for us the last time
and almost got himself killed
, so we better get going .
You two stay safe, and we’ll see you soon.”

We waved
as the two trucks backed out of the driveway. They pulled out into the road and headed
east
.

We were both asleep before eight o’clock that night. Because of my recent injuries and illness, I was more tired than usual. I ended up sleeping a couple of hours past sunrise.
As expected, Sara was already up when I stumbled into the kitchen. We hadn’t had any coffee since our run-in with Wheeler’s group.

“Good morning,” she said. “Are you hungry?”

I nodded.

“I mixed up some of that milk for the cereal,” she said.

I nodded again, still half asleep.

“I started my period this morning,” she said
, almost in a whisper
.

I looked up at her.

“Do you think we should leave?” she said
with a worried expression
.

I poured cereal into my bowl, “We should definitely be ready to leave.”

“How do you feel?”

“Better than yesterday,” I said, pouring in the milk.

“I thought I’d go out and put out some chicken feed from the moving van,” she said. “Maybe we can get them closer so we can catch them.
Maybe
we can take them with us if we do have to move.”

I nodded again, my mouth full.
She
picked up her rifle
and
went out of the room.
I heard the front door open then
the sound of
her footsteps on the long wooden porch.

I felt rough. The bone in my left
arm still hurt, and there was a nasty bruise between my elbow and wrist. My head hurt, too, but mostly when I touched it
. I did need to take it easy, but we had so much to do.
I looked over to the kitchen counter where we’d put our seed flats. Five of the little seedlings had recovered overnight after getting some water. We’d need to put them in a warmer place if we wanted the other seeds to germinate. The garden would need to be planted soon, and we still didn’t have enough seeds. We needed to be out every day looking for additional seeds. It didn’t matter how I felt; these things couldn’t wait for me to get better.

I finished up my cereal and went outside. Sara was sitting inside the back of the moving van with her legs hanging out. The AR-15 was across her lap, and she was tossing out small amounts of scratch feed to the two hen
s
.

“
Chick chick
,” she said. “Here
,
chick chick chick.”

I walked along the porch. The chickens saw me coming and ran a short distance away. Sara looked up at me. I sat next to her as she
stuck her hand in the feed bag and pulled
out another handful.

“Here
,
chick chick
.”

“
We really ne
ed to go out and look for seeds,” I said.
“
We should be ready to plant in a week or two.”

“Do you feel up to it?
” she asked, keeping her eyes on the hens.
“
Here chick chick.”

“We’re out of alcohol, too.” I said. “We can leave a note for the Somervilles—tell them to stay here until we get back.”

She quietly tossed out some more scratch, and the chickens cautiously made their way back toward us.

Finally she said, “I don’t want to risk your safety. Maybe I should hole up somewhere until—“

“No,” I said, putting my hand on her leg. “We’re in this together.”

She smiled wanly, but didn’t look at me.

“Here
,
chick chick.”

I put my arm around her, and she leaned against me.

“
We should take Mr. Parks up on his offer,” she said. “It would be better if there were more of us.”

“Are you wanting to leave with them?” I asked, concerned.

She shook her head, “No. I don’t think so. I mean, it might be nice to see new places one day, but I don’t think we’d find things to be any different than they are here. It might be more dangerous in other places. I just thought we could stay together for a while. Maybe they could help us with some of the things we have planned before they decide to leave. Who knows, maybe they’ll decide to stay.”

“They seemed nice,
”
I said. “I don’t see any harm in going in with them for a while.”