Red Hill

Chapter Five

Scarlet

THE LAST RAYS OF SUN unceremoniously fell behind the horizon. Shaking with fear, I slowly stepped out of the Jeep. My tennis shoes, still a little wet from the morning rain, sunk into thick mud. Clutching the tire iron to my chest, I took a step into the woods. The night was quiet—so quiet that every movement I made seemed like a boom echoing through the trees.

Every sound made my body freeze. Could they see in the dark? Did they rely on smell like an animal? Only when I thought of my girls waiting for me did I find enough courage to take another step.

About an hour later, a dragging noise startled me enough to make me cling to a tree. I hugged it to me and closed my eyes, trying to listen for danger over the pounding in my heart and gasping breath.

Just when I thought I might hyperventilate, my eyes popped open wide to try to pull in enough light to penetrate the darkness. Something darker than the dark and about as tall as a man crossed from one tree to another, only twenty yards or so from me. I closed my eyes tight one last time, and then broke into a sprint, refusing to stop until I slipped in the culvert beside the main highway in and out of town.

My knees hit hard, and then my stomach, chest, and face shortly after. Face and palms down in the mud, I quickly tuned in to the sounds around me, and then flipped over, searching in a panic for whatever was hunting me.

My chest heaved as my lungs tried to keep up with the constant adrenaline pumping through my body. A scream welled up in my chest, but recognition choked back the noise. Drawing anyone’s attention—alive or dead—could end my rescue mission before it started.

A man walked toward me, his arms out, trying to wave away the scream he could see was about to echo throughout the east side of Anderson.

The fear in his dark eyes was highlighted by the amount of white surrounding them. “Ssssh! I’m not going to hurt you!” he said in a loud whisper.

He slid in next to me, his clothes and skin already soiled with mud, spattered in some places, saturated in others. He looked like he’d been crawling on his belly through the woods for days.

I pressed my lips together to stifle a yelp, my entire body shaking involuntarily.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said again, panting. He didn’t need the mud. His skin was dark enough to keep him hidden, even if he was well over six feet tall. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m just trying to get into town. Same as you.”

I nodded, unable to form a proper response.

“My name’s Tobin. You . . . you okay?”

I took a deep breath, trying to settle my nerves. “Scarlet.”

Tobin took a quick scan of our surroundings. “Are you from Anderson?”

“I used to be.”

Tobin nodded. “You got family in there, don’t you?”

“My little girls,” I said, feeling salty tears fill my eyes. For the first time since I’d left the Jeep, I felt cold. My body hadn’t stopped shaking, and I was already exhausted.

Tobin pressed his lips together. “My sister and her kids live here. She ain’t got nobody.”

The knowledge that I wasn’t totally alone gave me enough strength to focus on my plan. I pointed across the highway to another patch of woods. “Across the road is a valley that runs alongside the river. There’s an old bridge maybe three blocks south of here.”

Tobin frowned. “There are soldiers at every entrance, and they’re walking the streets. Anderson is some type of military state now.”

“The governor is in there somewhere. He was visiting today. My daughters were supposed to meet him.”

Tobin shook his head. “That explains it, then. I’m not sure whether I should be glad or sick to my stomach. I mean . . . who gives a shit about his title when the whole world is going to hell, right?”

I laughed once without humor. “It’s a good time to throw his rank around. At least he’s not crawling through the mud.”

Tobin offered a small smile. “We better get going. They could do another sweep of the woods soon.”

“Another?”

Tobin looked at his mud-covered front and then back at me. “A word of advice: If you see a dead person walking, run the other way. If you see a soldier, hide. They were shooting the bodies lying in the road earlier. Just making sure, I guess.”

Tobin waited as I darted across the highway. My legs seemed to be moving in slow motion, but before I knew it, I was across the lit four lanes and hidden once again on the other side. A few seconds later, Tobin joined me.

I had never felt so much comfort from being around a complete stranger. That was just one more thing you didn’t learn from the zombie movies.

Keeping to the overgrown foliage around the river, Tobin and I trudged through the mud to the looming Blackwell Street Bridge. An army truck passed over slowly, and we had to leap under the steel and asphalt to escape the spotlight they were shining on the river. I held my hands over my mouth. A body was floating facedown on the surface of the water, not two feet from where Tobin and I had walked just moments before. Shots rang out, the body convulsed as it was showered with bullets, and then the truck moved on, the spotlight parallel to its path.

Tobin reached out and touched my arm. “It’s okay. They’re gone. I need to take a piss, and then we’ll keep going.”

His words struck me as odd. I had to wait and take stock of my bodily functions, to figure out if I even had to take a bathroom break. All of a sudden, my bladder felt like it was going to burst, and it was all I could do to get my scrub pants untied and my panties around my ankles fast enough to keep from urinating all over myself.

Tobin met me at the edge of the water. It was dark, and it didn’t seem like a good idea to swim, but we couldn’t risk taking the bridge across, either.

“Did you think this far ahead?” Tobin asked, staring at the flowing river. The rain earlier had made the current stronger, and the water level higher.

“Not really, but we can’t get caught on that bridge. They’ll take one look at us and know we snuck in. They’ll shoot us on sight.”

“Agreed. You used to live here. What do you think we should do?”

“We can either try to find a shallower place downstream, try to cross here, or use the rope swing on the other side of the bridge.”

“The rope swing?” Tobin said, dubious.

“There’s been one on that tree over there as long as I can remember. They keep one there for the kids that live around here.”

Tobin stared at me blankly.

I shrugged. “The city pool is on the other side of town.”

Tobin blinked. “What kind of backward redneck village did my sister move to?”

Nathan

“LYLE SHOT A COP, DADDY.”

“I saw that,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

“What’s happening?” Zoe said. “Why is everyone fighting?”

“Some of the people are sick,” I said, turning on the police radio. “I think.”

Reports were coming in that the virus had affected all counties. After a while, the dispatcher stopped talking, so I turned up the car radio. Thirty-two of the forty-eight contiguous states reported casualties and illness. The East Coast reported that those who had chosen not to receive the flu vaccination were not showing symptoms as quickly as those who had. Some reports said that those who had had the flu shot didn’t necessarily need to get bitten or attacked before they caught the virus. They would reanimate no matter how they died. I glanced over at Zoe. She had an egg allergy like I did. People with egg allergies were advised against the shot unless they stayed under the supervision of a doctor post-inoculation. Even though my allergy wasn’t severe, Aubrey and I decided the benefit didn’t outweigh the risk, for me or for Zoe. Well, I did . . . Aubrey left the decision to me. I let a small sigh of relief escape my lips. If I only did one thing right, I’m glad it was that.

All roads proved to be an obstacle course. If I wasn’t jerking the wheel to the left, I was yanking it to the right, dodging people, other cars, and general debris left behind by the pandemonium. Aubrey used to always bitch about my driving, but we were almost out of town, and I’d yet to crash into anything. Even if it were a small miracle, even she couldn’t complain about my driving skills now.

Zoe pointed ahead. We were on one of the few roads out of town that I thought would still be open. It was paved, but just a few miles ahead it would turn to dirt. Halfway between was a railroad crossing. A train was visible a little less than a half-mile away, and soon the lights would blink red, and the crossing rails would lower. There were cars behind me, and God knows what else. We couldn’t get caught behind that train. The sedan’s nearly bald tires wouldn’t be able to forge through the wheat fields between us and the next road.

I pressed on the gas.

“Daddy, slow down!”

“I can’t, Zoe. We can’t wait for the train.” I reached over and yanked up her seatbelt to be sure it was tight, and then I put both hands on the wheel. The crossing rails began their descent. The horn of the train wailed, drawn out and sad. I used to think that sound was romantic. Now it was what was keeping me from getting my daughter to someplace safe.

My foot ground against the gas pedal, slamming it to the floor.

“Daddy, no!”

The first crossing rail just grazed the paint on the top of the car, but we took the second rail out, easily snapping it in half. Zoe flipped around, covering her mouth. I looked in the rearview mirror. The wine-colored Lincoln Town Car behind us must have had the same idea, but was a second too slow. The train clipped its back bumper and sent it into a spin. The front end of the car whipped around, crashing into the train a few times before it was spit out a bit farther down into the wheat field. If they weren’t badly hurt, they were going to have to walk.

“We should go back!”

I shook my head. “We’re going to Uncle Skeeter and Aunt Jill’s.” Skeeter McGee was Aubrey’s little brother. Aubrey’s obvious disdain for me made Skeeter like me that much more. They lived in a tiny two-bedroom dump of a house just on this side of Fairview. The town was small. Small enough not to have to worry about a herd of the undead surrounding us.

Zoe’s lips turned up in the tiniest hint of a grin. Skeeter and Jill hadn’t been married but a couple of years, and had no children. Skeeter was in love with Zoe like she was his own, and Jill was just as crazy about her.

One more reason to make a beeline for Fairview was that Skeeter was a hunting enthusiast, and had several pistols and hunting rifles with plenty of ammo. It would be the perfect place to hole up and wait out the end of the world.

The two-lane road didn’t have the congestion I expected. A few times I had to steer around a two- or three-car pileup, most likely from the initial panic and worried drivers not paying attention, but for the most part the cars on the road were driving along at moderate speeds. Zoe pointed out her window when we arrived at Old Creek Bridge. A man was bent over, vomiting next to his ’76 Buick LeSabre while his wife touched his back. Her expression was more than worry or fear; the residual lines on her face were deepened by resignation.

“Is he one of the sick people, Daddy?” Zoe asked as we drove slowly past them.

The woman looked up, hopelessness in her eyes, and then she helped her husband to the passenger side of their car.

“I don’t know, baby.”

“Maybe we should stop and help them.”

“I don’t think we can,” I said, pulling my cell phone from my pocket. I tried to dial Skeeter’s number to warn him we were coming, but all I heard was a busy signal. Of course the phone lines would be down.

We caught up to a short line of cars, one after another slowing as we approached and passed Kellyville. Not a single person could be seen. I didn’t dare hope for the same in Fairview. As we approached the outskirts of town, it seemed quiet. At first, I thought maybe we were faster than the sickness, but then the car in front slammed on its brakes as a woman ran across the road screaming, followed by a man covered in blood, much of it concentrated around his mouth. The woman had the most beautiful brunette hair I’d ever seen flowing behind her. She was running so fast, her hair was waving behind her head like a flag. Tires squealed against the asphalt, and a car in front led a frantic escape through town. The other vehicles chased it. I wasn’t sure if any of them had meant to come here, but they definitely weren’t going to stay.

I glanced over at Zoe. “There are sick people here, Zoe. When I say so, I want you to unbuckle your seat belt and I’m going to carry you inside.”

Zoe nodded. She blinked a few times. I could tell she was nervous, but not because she was afraid to die. She wanted to make sure she did what I asked of her, and did it correctly. Zoe was always particular about procedures, especially when they were spoken and not just implied. Rules were formed very carefully in our house. They were something we couldn’t take back. If there was an exception, we didn’t enlighten Zoe, because she didn’t understand the concept of an exception to the rule, and if we tried to explain it to her, she would get upset.

“Zoe?”

“Yes, Daddy?”

“It’s time to unbuckle your seatbelt.”

Zoe did as she was told as I made the first right and then pulled into Skeeter’s driveway. Once the car came to a stop, I shoved the gear into park and pulled Zoe over to my side, and we ran quickly but quietly to Skeeter’s back door. No one ever came to their front door, and if they did, Skeeter knew they were either a salesman or a cop, and Skeeter answered the door for neither.

I pounded on the storm door with the side of my fist, still holding Zoe by the waist with my other arm. The barrel of Jill’s .22 became visible, as it pulled the curtain away just enough for her to get a good look at my face.

“It’s us,” I said, glancing behind me.

The lock clicked open and the doorknob turned, and then Jill opened the door wide, waving quickly for us to come in.

I set Zoe down. Her glitter sneakers slapped against the green-and-yellow diamond-patterned linoleum of the kitchen. I took a deep breath, trying to blow out all of the anxiety I’d just built up while attempting to get Zoe out of the car and inside the house alive, while Jill locked the door behind us and set her rifle down.

Jill slammed into me, wrapping her arms around my torso and squeezing so tight I was glad I’d taken a good breath beforehand.

“Oh my God, Nate! I’m so glad you came!” She let go of me and then bent down to hug Zoe. “Hi, sweet pea! Are you okay?” Zoe dipped her chin once, and Jill looked up to me, fear in her eyes. “Where’s Aubrey?” When I didn’t answer, she stood up and peeked out the window. She turned back to me. “Nate! Where is she?”

“She left me.”

“What? When?”

I shrugged, unsure of what expression matched the conversation. “Today.” Any other time I would have felt justified telling my sister-in-law the news, but at that moment I just felt stupid. With everything else going on, the end of my marriage seemed trivial.

Jill’s almond-shaped eyes bounced between Zoe and me. Aubrey leaving wasn’t exactly a surprise. She’d been depressed and unhappy for a long time. No matter what I tried or how many times I asked her to go to counseling—together or just her alone—Aubrey was no longer the woman I married, and we were all waiting for the woman who took her place to finally say she didn’t belong in that life. We all pretended it would get better, but the unspoken truth is always louder than the stories we tell.

Still, for Jill any expression but a smile seemed out of place. She was a beautiful woman. Watching her clean a buck or a catfish with that porcelain skin and those long, delicate fingers had always been surreal to me. The fact that she could shoot a gun and bait a hook made her perfect for Skeeter, and he loved her as much as any man could love a woman. They’d been dating since high school, and neither seemed to mind that they’d never experienced anyone or anything else. Anywhere but Fairview, Jill would have never ended up with Skeeter, but here, in the middle of the middle, even with his blossoming beer gut and unkempt beard, Skeeter McGee only needed country-boy charm, working man’s muscles, and a decent job to score the magnificence that was Jill.

Speaking of Skeeter . . . “Where is he?” I asked.

Jill put her hand up to the side of her face. “He left about half an hour ago. He went down the street to Barb’s and Ms. Kay’s to see if they needed help. They’re getting old and their husbands have been gone for years. He shovels their driveways every winter, and fixes things when they need fixin’. He worries about them. With hell breaking loose outside, he wanted to try to bring them back here where he could take care of them.” Jill unconsciously reached for Zoe’s hand, the thought of the monsters outside reflecting in her eyes.

“Did he take a gun?”

Jill nodded. “His thirty aught six.”

“He’ll come back.”