Z Children (Book 2): The Surge (28 page)

But
Dad had given me something else.

With
unsure fingers, I pulled the flash bang out of the loops in the belt. I heard
Dad’s voice. Knew what to do. Pulling the pin, I held the lever firmly down so
it wouldn’t go off until I needed it. Dad had told me the minimum information
needed, but if this was going to be anything like the movies, then I knew
there’d be a loud concussion. What I didn’t know is if it would have any effect
on the Z’s.

Backing
slowly out of the church, my shoe moving out of a ray of sun that had just
encroached on my shadowy spot, I tried to be careful. Tried.

I
hadn’t moved in a straight line and I’d backed right into the offering box
outside the sanctuary doors. The sound it made as it crashed against the mosaic
brick floor in the foyer was ear-splitting. The glass of the clear box atop the
dark wood post shattered into a million pieces, each shard catching light and
further bringing my presence into crystal clarity. Envelopes seemed to float up
into the air and hover about me. Coins rolled across the floor, one
particularly evil quarter making its way between the pews and towards the bride
in all her used-to-be-ivory glory.

Everything
was suspended in time as I took in the irreparable way I’d shattered the
protective seal that had so-far kept me unnoticed by the now-snarling Z kids
and adults.

The
duo of ringers were still hanging from the ropes, forcing the bells into
motion. They were the only ones still preoccupied with their tasks prior to my
accident.

All
other occupants of the church were staring at me. The bride is the one I could
not look away from, though. Her blood-spattered face was full of fascination;
the hint of a smile touched her mouth, like I had just been caught red-handed
crashing her wedding. But then the expression was gone, the humor was gone, the
human was gone.

And
any silence I’d experienced since leaving the
Nancy-Grace
was forgotten
in the absolute void-filling and nightmare-inducing sensation of dozens of
predatory screams and snarls filling the space of the church, which was designed
with such deliberate architectural acoustics that every nook and cranny was engulfed
in a tsunami of sound.

I
pissed myself out of fear as I tumbled out of the main doors to the soundtrack
of fury and hunger. Halfway down the stairs, I twisted at the waist and tossed
the grenade up and into the foyer.

 Running
as fast as my legs would carry me, I heard the blast as I was nearly across the
street. The screams of the hunt transformed into screams of agony and I got
grim satisfaction that the monsters were affected by the concussive bang.

My
heart raced as I dodged the corpses and tried to get some distance between
myself and the unholy church. As I rounded the second corner, hoping to get
back to the arts and crafts shop to hide before they caught up with me, I
chanced a glance back and saw that they were already hot on my trail. The stun
grenade had bought me a little time, a little distance, but my footsteps
faltered as I was hit with the hard truth that it wasn’t enough. I’d never been
a fast runner.

Maybe
that’s the key here. Think like a human kid would, outsmart them that way.
A
fort. I needed a fort.

Taking
the first alley I came upon, I forgot last night’s safe haven and started
looking for a new place to bunker down.

Nothing.

Another
road. Another alley.

A car,
but locked.

Crossing
another road. Into another alley.

The
sights around me became a blur. I took so many turns that it was very possible
that I’d run in big squares, retracing my steps and increasing my chances of
running into a Z kid.

I
couldn’t stop though. The snarls and bestial cries were always too close for
comfort.

The
inconstant early morning light had nearly transformed to steady late morning
rays by the time I saw it. My feet were aching, the holster belt had chafed my
body to the point of rawness, but there it was. It amazed me that I hadn’t seen
one before now. They should be all over a city this size to collect waste.

A
proper fort. One that would keep the bastards from smelling my fear and sweat
and the urine drying on my pants. It was the shortest alley I’d run through,
behind a Chinese restaurant—the logo still glowing neon over the ‘employees only’
sign on the back door.

Without
looking behind and praying that one of them hadn’t come out of nowhere and seen
me run into the alley, I quickly lifted the plastic lid of a huge brown
Dumpster. It took me two jumps to swing my short leg over and a grunt pushed
out of my body as I gracelessly fell inside to land among filth. The lid
bounced once as I stood and pulled it back over to cover the opening. The darkness
I was engulfed in wasn’t total; brown-hued light snuck in at the seams where
the lid did not perfectly meet the metal of the container. Still, my eyes had
to adjust to see anything in detail and they took their time after being out in
the bright light for so long.

Not
being able to see clearly increased my anxiety. I did my best to take a deep
breath and calm my nerves but the smell was so overpowering that I almost
puked. Bile built at the back of my throat twice and then receding back into my
stomach. A third time and I knew I couldn’t fight it any longer. Fighting to
get to my knees, I grabbed my hair into a quick ball at the base of my neck so
I could save it from any wild-flying throw up.

“Please
don’t get sick. It smells bad enough in here,” the voice was a quiet plea, deep
and throaty.

Instantly,
the need to vomit was gone. Fear roiled inside of me, despite the calm nature
of the speaker. I couldn’t see the outline of a person now that my eyes were
getting used to the dimness. But I couldn’t see very well—who it was, what they
looked like, what they might be carrying weapon-wise, if their expression said
friend or foe.

I un-holstered
the weapon quickly and held it out in front of me with shaky hands. “Don’t
move. Don’t fucking move. I’ve had a really, really bad day. Really bad. I
don’t want to hurt you, but I will.” My voice shook worse than my hands.

“You’ve
had a bad day.” It wasn’t a question. A statement, full of some emotional
heaviness that I did not understand.

“Yes.
A really fucking bad day.” But the initial flash of fear and defensiveness was
already cooling.

“I
don’t care if you kill me.” And when he said the word kill, I knew he meant it.
And even further, I knew he wanted to die.

“I
don’t want to hurt you.” The acid was fully gone from my voice. I knew I had
nothing to fear from whoever was in the Dumpster with me. They sounded so…
broken. I lowered the Colt to sit against my thighs. I wasn’t dumb enough to
holster it until I was sure. “I’m just scared.”

He
didn’t respond.

“Who
are you?” I repositioned myself so I was sitting on top of all the trash, my
back against the interior steel wall of the Dumpster.

“Andre.”

“Susan.”

Snarls
too near our sanctuary forced us into silence. We seemed to sit that way for
hours, backs against the wall, eyes adjusted enough to see each other in some
detail. He was handsome. Honey-skinned with black-brown hair, clothed in a suit
jacket and light-hued shirt. A proper outfit that begged for a proper tie, but
I saw none. He closed his eyes after some time, his head tilted backwards. I
continued to study him. His shallow breathing was companionship enough to quiet
my fear and racing heart.

When
there were no sounds outside the Dumpster for quite some time, I spoke again.
“How did you survive what happened here? It’s…God, it’s a graveyard out there.”
A hoarseness had creeped into my voice after sitting quiet so long. The gun was
still against my legs, my fingers still loosely gripped it.

“I
didn’t survive. Not really.” Andre kept his eyes closed as he spoke. Looking at
his face, I realized that I hadn’t seen anything yet. Not real horror, not like
this man.

“We
escaped from Texas. It wasn’t as bad there, at least not when we left.”

“We?”
He seemed to perk up a bit at that—the knowledge that I was a ‘we’, that more
humans had survived.

“My
kids and my father. We have a—” I was about to say ‘boat’, but I stopped
myself. I didn’t know him well enough, not yet. “…safe place. We just need some
supplies.”

Andre
frowned. “I don’t think there is such a thing as a safe place now.”

I
didn’t like him saying that. The boat had to be safe. My children were on it.
“It is safe.” I bit off the words, but my curtness didn’t faze him, so I moved
on. Asked another question, got us away from my kids and safety. “How long have
you been in here?”

“Since
it started. I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Time doesn’t matter.”

“Since
it started? Jesus…there’s got to be a better place than this.” I shifted the
gun against my legs. I hadn’t used it yet, not once, but I still felt reassured
by its presence.

“It
doesn’t matter. I just sleep here. It doesn’t matter.” Andre’s voice was
beginning to crumble at the edges.

“But
there are other places surely, cleaner places.”
Think of something else to
talk about, Susan. You don’t want this guy to have a mental breakdown on you.

“This
is close to her. It’s fine. I don’t matter.” His voice was really gone now, a
weak ripple of sound in the air.

“Her?”
I couldn’t help myself, my curiosity. There was a connection forming in my
head, a dark and unsavory one, and I needed to draw the line from dot to dot
fully.

“My
wife.” He ran his left hand through his hair and I saw a band there. “We’ve just
been married, you see. She was breathtaking. I wasn’t sure about her using her
mother’s dress, but the way they altered it was perfect. And the little cap
with the veil over her eyes. And the yellow garter…” He was a tattered thing, almost
less human in this moment than the monsters. “I never got to take it off. We
didn’t make it to that part. Or the cake…” Tears were rolling down his cheeks
now, great large drops of the deepest sorrow I’d ever seen. “My wife. We’ve
just been married. Don’t you see?”

Andre’s
eyes met mine and they pierced me. “Yes, I see, Andre. She was beautiful.”

I knew
that his bride stood in a church not too far from where we sat. I had run
forever, taking different roads and alleyways, and yet I’d ended up near where
I’d started next to a man who had witnessed the best day of his life turn into
the worst.

“She
is beautiful.” He covered his face then and his shoulders shook.

I put
the gun away, back into its holster, and I listened to Andre cry, empathy
wetting my own eyes.

When I
no longer heard Andre’s muffled sobs, the light was gone and my fort was pitch
black inside. “Andre?”

When
he didn’t answer, I wondered if he was asleep.

“Andre?”
I repeated, slightly louder.

“Hmmm?”
He sounded drowsy.

“I
need to find food and water. Medicine for my dad.”

“There’s
a drugstore.”

I
waited, hoping he’d add to the three words he’d spoken. When he didn’t, I had
to fight back frustration. I understood he’d been through a tragedy. But it
wasn’t yesterday or even the day before that. I wasn’t asking for much, just a
little information and then he could go back to grieving. I felt for him, I
truly did, but I wanted to get back to my children. If the Z’s were gathered in
the church again, nighttime might be a good time to get the hell back to the
boat.

“Get
out, go left, take your first left. You’ll see the Rx sign. By the time the
Korean owners died there was no one left to loot it. Plenty there.” His voice
was deadpan, like I was getting instructions from an automated phone service.
Deadpan like he had switched from sadness to emotional emptiness.

 Standing,
I lifted the lid up a few inches. The alleyway was lit only by the restaurant
neon. Opening the lid more, I swung my right leg over, then hesitated. Closing
the lid and dropping back down into the Dumpster, I crawled closer to where
Andre was sitting. I had to feel my way in the darkness. When I felt the toe of
his dress shoe, I spoke. “Come with me.”

“My
wife is here.”

“Honey,
your wife is dead.”

Silence.

So
much silence.

I
stood again. I didn’t have time to waste, not on someone who was resigned to
dying.

I was
nearly out of the alley when I heard a soft thud behind me. I whirled, thinking
it was one of the demons. That would be my luck—one would lie in wait hoping
I’d show up. But it was Andre. He said nothing as he walked towards me and then
past me, leading the way to the pharmacy.

When
we found ourselves at the door to the store, Andre finally spoke. “Don’t expect
to find any chips in here. I’ve basically lived off their supply since they
died.” It seemed odd, him telling me about what he’d eaten, but then I realized
it was a sign that he too hadn’t lost all desire to live.

If you
eat, then you are not ready to die. Not yet.

ANDRE HERO

The groom

Devil
dogs were scratching at the space around me.

My
mind was still reeling, struggling to understand what had happened.

Everything
was wrong.

She
was gone. I was alive.

Everything
was wrong.

Closing
my eyes tightly, I tried to shut out the horrors that unsettled me.

But
nothing would block out the shrieks, the jaw-snapping, the growls.

I was
in hell.

“Are
you okay?”
The voice came to me as if through a filter, as if the speaker
was under water. Or I was under water. The words were just foggy, nonsensical.
Of course
I was okay
, but everyone else…

I looked
up, saw her face, the dark hair. For a moment, I thought it was Consuela. But
it wasn’t. It wasn’t.

“No.”

It was
a whimper, not manly at all, but it was the only thing I could say, the only
utterance I could manage, before everything went black.

***

Earlier that day

I was
so damn nervous. More nervous than I’d expected to be.

“Your
tie still isn’t straight.” My brother once again adjusted my tie. I resented a
little that he looked better in his tux than I did. I was the groom after all.
“And relax or you’re going to have to change your shirt before we get this show
on the road.”

“I
can’t help it, Josh. My whole damn body’s shaking.” As if to prove my point, my
right hand shuddered and I dropped the unlit cigar I was holding. My dad had
come in waving a bunch, acting over the moon that his eldest son was finally
getting married and he might have more grandbabies soon—as if Josh’s three kids
weren’t enough. Dad was just way more sentimental than Mom, always talking
about how he missed too much when we were kids and he was always working.

“Good
thing that wasn’t lit.” Josh bent down, grabbed the cigar and placed it in his
own pocket. He went to hand it back to me, but I waved him off. “You know I
don’t smoke. Just take it for me and I’ll tell him it was the best cigar of my
life.”

“You
ready?”

Music
had begun in the sanctuary. Discordant at first, but then it mellowed into a
beautiful sound. A piano was joined by a violin. And then a voice began to
sing. It was time.

“No…”
I full-body shook, trying to calm my body and bring a little air beneath the
tux jacket. Josh was right, I was sweating. I jumped when the door to the small
Sunday school room we were standing in opened a crack.

“Andy?”
a sweet voice floated into the room. “Andy, are you still in there?”

Moving
to the door like my life depended on it, I wrapped my right fingers around the
thick wooden width; my left hand gripped the knob. I wanted to swing the door
fully open, see her face and know everything was going to be beautiful. We were
going to be beautiful together. And the baby she carried—the one that no one
knew about but us—was going to be the most beautiful thing of all.

Her
fingers came up to lie against my own. Just touching her skin relaxed me.

“Andy,
I love you.”

“I
love you too. More than anything.”

And
then her fingers left. The door reclosed. And I missed her instantly.

***

I’d
waited my whole life to marry her. Consuela Elaina Alderez—the proverbial
girl-next-door. Beauty and brains. She’d been so popular in grade school that she’d
barely noticed that I existed at all. She’d never been mean, just oblivious to
me.

College
had changed everything. By a happy chance, we’d both attended Tulane
University. She was at the business school preparing herself to take over her
family’s thriving floral shop, and I was floundering my way through an AutoCad
course and seriously debating a major change to film studies. I’d always loved
architecture, but once I got into the classes required and I was surrounded by
supposedly like-minded people, I realized that maybe loving something doesn’t
always make you happy in the end as a career.

I was
lost, confused, wondering what to do with my entire life.

Then
I’d bumped into Consuela outside Financial Aid. She hadn’t remembered me at
first, but when I started reminding her—the boy who sat behind her nearly every
class, the doodler, the loner who liked old buildings, the four-eyes with the
dimples—she’d smiled like her entire world had brightened. The expression had
been blinding, intoxicating. I’d walked her to her dorm that day and we saw
each other several times over the next few weeks in between classes for a quick
hello.

Then
we had our first real date.

A
long-established cafeteria-style Southern joint that served breakfast all day.
It wasn’t expensive, it wasn’t fancy, and it was a terrible choice for a first
date. But I hadn’t had much money back then. I couldn’t treat her the way she
deserved. She hadn’t cared though. She had smiled, thanked me for paying, let
me push her chair in for her in the crowded eating area. We’d barely touched
our food. We talked. Really talked. Our food went cold, my ham-and-cheese
omelet becoming a cold, unyielding lump, and her jambalaya turning a sickly
greyish-brown. And we didn’t care.

Our
second date, we’d talked all night over coffee and stale donuts. We’d greeted
the sunrise with bleary eyes and filled hearts. And the rest was, as they say,
history.

I’d
known in high school that I was going to marry Consuela. I’d just known it,
deep inside my body like some pre-established destiny living within my very
cells.

Sometimes
Consuela teased me about getting too poetic. That it wasn’t manly. Secretly, I
knew she liked it—that I wasn’t afraid of my soft side, that my heart
permanently lived in a little pocket on my sleeve. Once, she’d said I was brave
for being so vulnerable. I didn’t think so, but she did. And that was all that
mattered.

The
night I’d found the guts to propose was the two-year anniversary of our chance
meeting.

We
were into our junior year. I’d changed majors—Community Health Sciences, which
surprised my entire family, surprised even myself. Being with Consuela, though,
it changed me to the core. I found myself wanting to be a better man, a better
person, to give back to a world that had given me so much. I’d never wanted for
anything, not a day in my life. Her family had a lot to do with my change in
perspective. They’d come to this country, earned everything they had through
hard work. And it hadn’t been easy. Many people had been cruel over the years,
resented their immigrant success.

Yet
they’d persevered. I wanted to help other immigrants find the dream. So I was
on track to finish my undergrad and head straight into my Masters in Social
Work with a certification in Global Social Work.

If
you’d told me as a young man that I’d find myself on the road I was on now, I’d
never have believed you—not getting the girl or putting my life to good use.
But here I was. The Geek had gotten the girl.

The
ring in my pocket felt heavy that night, heavier than it had at any point in
the past month I’d carried it. It was her grandmother’s, one of the only
sentimental things Consuela’s mother had brought with her from Central America.

Consuela
was as beautiful as ever the night I’d asked. Different. Changed. But as beautiful
as ever. I’d made a few of her mom’s specialties (with her mom’s help over the
phone). Tamales, cabbage and corn salad, and
arroz con leche
. I’d burnt
the tamales and the
arroz con leche
was runny. But the cabbage and corn
salad had been spot-on.

“It’s
really good, Andy. So sweet. When did you become a kitchen master?”

She’d
choked out the compliment between bites of charred tamale.

“If
you like that, you’re going to love dessert. Instead of overcooking and going
for that dark brown-black look, I undercooked it so it’s still a little crunchy
and soupy,”
I’d mocked taking away her plate, even though she was only
half-finished.

“Don’t
you take my plate away! I’m eating this delicious food that my hot boyfriend
made.”

“Is
he sexier than me?”
I dropped my hand, went back to playing with my own
tamale instead of eating it. It’s pretty bad when you won’t even eat your own
food.

“We
should seriously open a restaurant. We can call it OVERcooking. You know,
people come there to eat when they are just over cooking at home, but then it
can also stand for your habit of overcooking.”
She’d said it
straight-faced, totally serious, which made it vastly funnier.

“Have
I ever told you how clever you are?”
I’d said it sarcastically, my mouth
stretching into a slight smile.

She
smiled back, a soft change to her expression. God. She’d been so damn
beautiful.

We’d
finished dinner. Moved to the threadbare couch next to the non-functioning
fireplace in our first bug-infested apartment inconveniently far from campus. I
remember how she’d fiddled with a strand of hair that was loose. It kept
falling forward and was just long enough that it blocked her right eye.

Her
hair had been short then, cropped into a stylish pixie which was a far cry from
her lifelong style of elbow-length locks that curled beautifully. She
frequently would pin the short bangs back with a flower hair barrette. It was
becoming on her, not childish or out-of-style. When she donned one of her
floral barrettes—sometimes daisies, sometimes roses—I’d know she was reminding
herself why she was working so hard. She was the only child of Pedro and
Estella Alderez. They were counting on her to take over the business. The night
I asked her to be my wife, she was wearing a new flower in her hair. A calla
lily. I had pulled it out softly, played with the small piece of metal and
resin flower, and then set it gently on the coffee table.

I’d
never questioned her resolve to take over the flower shop. I wanted her to be
happy. Happy forever. So, that night, the little lily staring at me from the
beaten-up table in our shabby social room, I’d asked her if obligation was the
only reason she following in her parents’ footsteps. If making floral arrangements
and balancing checkbooks and writing condolence cards was going to make her
happy for the rest of her life.

She’d
laughed at me.

I
loved her laugh. It always started out small and hesitant, but then built into
a thunder roll that was nearly deafening yet obscenely delightful to me.

“Yes.
I guess in part I’m only doing it because of my parents. My papa especially,
but Andy…”
(That’s what she called me. I didn’t like nicknames from other
people, but when she said the endearing shortening of Andre, I didn’t mind at
all…even though Andre was already short on its own)
“…my parents came to the
states to give me a better life. They built that shop from pennies and blood
and sweat. I’m proud to keep it alive. It’s not just obligation or responsibility,
it’s a legacy.”

And
then she’d laughed again.

“Watch
out, I’ll be like one of your beloved superheroes. Just call me ‘Miss
Flora-tastic, champion of all things in bloom!”

Something
inside of me came to life when she called herself a ‘Miss’…maybe it was just my
courage. I’d never been the brave sort. Not really.

“I
like Mrs. Flora-tastic better. Gives it a more mature…ring.”

She’d
sort of stared at me a moment, the memory of laughter completely gone from her
face.
“We’re still in school, Andy.”
We’d talked about marriage before,
of course we had, and she’d been clear on what she wanted. After college, after
she got established in the business, after we were comfortable and could fully
and easily support any children we had. But I could wait. The two years since
we reconnected had been the best years of my life, yet, they’d also been an eternity
of being close to my soulmate, close to everything that made my life good. I
wanted it to be written in stone. Permanent. Forever.

“I
know. But we don’t have to get married right now. We can have a long
engagement, the longest in history if that makes you more comfortable. I just…I
just want to know that it’s you and me. That we’re going all the way.”

“And
you need a ring to know that? You can’t just trust that I’m not going to leave
you…that I love you and that won’t change?”

Her
words had hit me in the gut with such weight that I found it hard to breathe.
Of course I trusted her. I knew she wouldn’t leave me. We loved each other.
Still, in the conventional parts of my psyche, a little voice that mandated
love, marriage, and children, was screaming at me to pull the ring box out of
my pocket and make her choose.

But
then, I’d lose her. I knew that.

“You’re
right.”
 I couldn’t help slumping a little then, my body relaxing into the
realization that it wasn’t the right time.
“I won’t apologize for wanting to
marry you, for wanting to put a ring on your finger so the whole world knows
that you are mine, but you’re right. I do trust you and everything else is just
an idea of what should be done. Maybe all that’s not right for us.”

“That’s
all I wanted to know.”
Her smile had been different then, full and wide and
openhearted.
“So where is it then?”

“What?”
I’d been confused, unsure.

“The
ring.”

“But
I thought you just said that—”

She’d
cut me off, placing her left index finger across my lips.
“I just wanted to
know that the ring wasn’t something it shouldn’t be, that it wasn’t some way of
branding me, of branding us. That you didn’t need me to wear the ring so you’d
trust that this was real. I believe you, that you want to marry me and that
this isn’t about possession or something stupid like that.”