Chapter 7
Marianne continued to walk until she came upon a body. She had been somewhat in a daze since she had left her home. She still couldn't believe that her mother was dead. More than that, she couldn't believe all of the damage that she had seen outside. It was all weighing heavily on her. But this body was more than she could handle.
"Darren," she whispered to the corpse.
Darren worked at the pharmacy. She would go in there to get her mother's prescriptions every week. She didn't know much about him. Though, over the years, she had developed a bit of a crush on him. She would never have acted on it
.
Oh no, she wasn't ready for that
.
She wasn't brave enough. She liked to talking to him. And once or twice she even tried flirting with him. But she didn't know if he noticed.
She stared down at his face. Most of it was still intact. It was his chest and arms that had been torn apart. His nice pharmacist's smock was covered in filth. There was a big hole in his chest. It looked to her as though someone had torn everything out of him. Which maybe they had. Regardless, it wasn't what she wanted to see. She wanted to see his face. She wanted to look a
t
hi
m
.
He was a good looking guy. Or had been. He had dark features. A strong build. Now he was dead.
She bent down beside him to get a better look. Something about him seemed different than the other people she had come across. He looked
…
peaceful.
"You didn't change, did you?" she said to the corpse. "You didn't become one of them." She knew that in her heart. His face didn't have the features of all of the other people she had seen. Nothing like her mother
.
Those angry black eye
s
.
She reached out her hand and ran it down his cheek. It felt soft. She pressed her fingers into his skin.
If only he had survived.
She wished that her thoughts stopped at that first one, but they didn't. They started to spiral.
They could have found each othe
r.
She could have told him how she felt. Maybe he would have felt the same way. It was possible. Not likely. But possible. He had laughed at her jokes. He had even said that she looked nice on occasion. It was definitely possible.
She pulled her hand away. Her fingerprints were left on his face in his blood.
"This isn't fair," she said.
She stood up and looked down the street. There were more bodies. More destruction.
She turned to look at the pharmacy. The door was open.
Without any hesitation, she knew what she had to do.
She'd go into the pharmacy and get a bunch of pills. She could die with the rest of them. An overdose. It was the only thing that made sense.
She looked back down at Darren. He seemed to be smiling at her, telling her that it was okay. She knew that that wasn't the case. He wasn't thinking anything. But still, it was nice for her to think that she had his support.
She stepped over the body and walked into the store.
The store was quiet. And it was dark. The curtains had been drawn. They were usually open
.
Unless Darren had been trying to hide from what was going on outside.
Then why would he have opened the door
?
she wondered
.
Why would he have gone out?
She didn't know.
She walked further into the store and glanced around. It wasn't messy. She didn't think that anyone else had been in here.
So why would he have gone out?
She shook her head. There was no point in thinking about that. She'd never know the answer.
Marianne made her way toward the back to where the pills were
.
In the back, where it was dark
.
She walked down the aisle. Slowly.
It wasn't because she was worried about being attacked. Death didn't bother her; especially since she was planning to do it to herself. If one of thos
e
thing
s
came along, it would only make it that much easier for her.
She was walking slowly because this was how she always walked in this store. She never wanted Darren to know that she was heavy. Sure, he could see it on her. She wasn't the thinnest thing around. But she didn't want him t
o
hea
r
her coming. Like an elephant.
It was silly, really. She knew that. She wouldn't have made much noise while she walked. At least not enough for Darren to notice. But she had worried about it, anyway. Now, when it didn't even matter, it still played on her mind.
She came upon the medicines. There were pain medications, allergy medications, cold medications. Everything and anything. Yet what she really wanted were the things in the back. The pills behind the counter. The strong stuff.
She made her way to the counter. There was a little step she needed to go up to get behind it. She searched for the pills.
She came across several tiny drawers of them all lined up against the wall. She didn't know the names of the pills that she should take. She figured that it wouldn't matter. Too much of anything would do.
She grabbed a few and threw them into a little bag. Then she took some more.
She wasn't sure why she didn't swallow them right away. She supposed that she didn't want to die in the pharmacy. In the back. In the dark. She wanted to go outside, where there was light.
Marianne took her bag of pills and walked out of the store. Her steps were just as quiet on the way out. This time she wasn't going to worry about it. If that was how she wanted to walk to her death, then that's how she was going to do it.
She came upon the entrance and could see Darren again, lying out there. She approached him and looked down at his handsome face. She sat on the curb beside him.
"I don't know if you're married," she said. "And I apologize if you are. But I'm going to do this right here, so we can be together."
She reached out and grabbed his hand.
What she felt wasn't love. It was comfort. She knew that it was strange. But everything now was strange. She was too far past that to care.
With her other hand, she placed the bag of pills on the sidewalk and reached into her purse. She pulled out a bottle of water. She had gotten it from a store on her way here. She had to let go of Darren's hand to twist the cap it open.
"Cheers," she said, lifting the bottle to the corpse. She took a quick sip, then placed the bottle onto the ground. "Okay. No point waiting."
She grabbed the bag of pills and poured them into her palm. A few fell onto the sidewalk. It didn't matter. There were more than enough here to do what she wanted.
She looked down at them. Little blue, pink, white, yellow pills. All different shapes and sizes.
Just take 'em all at onc
e
, she thought.
She raised her hand up to her mouth, telling herself that this would be for the best. It had to be. There was nothing else for her out here
.
Nothing.
She pressed the pills against her lips. She stuck out her tongue. The tip of it licked the edges of a few of them.
It'll be quick. It'll be for best.
The pills tasted bitter, but that didn't stop her. She kept her tongue on them, like a kid licking ice cream.
She looked back down at Darren. She looked down the street in the direction where her dead mother lay.
It made sense. That was all there was to i
t
.
Yet she didn't swallow the pills. She couldn't. She didn't know why, but she wasn't ready. Not at the moment.
She placed them back into the bag.
"I'm sorry," she said to Darren. She knew that he didn't care what she did. If anything, she was apologizing to herself. But for almost taking them or not, she didn't know.
Chapter 8
As soon as Julie opened the door, Scooter rushed into the room. He didn't like being out in the hallway. Not where he couldn't see anything.
Julie shut the door behind him and locked it.
At least he knew they were safe for the time being.
Scooter let out a deep breath, feeling better. He looked around the room.
It wasn't easy to see much because Julie was the one with the flashlight and she wasn't shining it around. She still had it directed straight at him.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
Scooter turned to face her, the light blinding him again.
"Can you shoot that somewhere else?"
Julie looked down. She hadn't noticed that she had been flashing it in his face. "I'm sorry." She lowered the flashlight. Its ray cast a small circle on the floor.
"How about we sit down first?" Scooter said. He needed a rest.
"Sure. Come over here. There's a few chairs." Julie pointed the flashlight toward the end of the room.
"This is one of the staff lounges," he said, knowing immediately where they were. It was like a small cafeteria. One with vending machines. He had often eaten here.
He walked over to a table and went to place Emily down. She wouldn't let go of her grip on him, so he decided not to bother. He sat onto a chair with the little girl on his lap.
Julie came up and sat down in front of him. She placed the flashlight on the table and it started to roll around. It lit the room as it did. Scooter took a quick look. There weren't any dead bodies in here, as far as he could see. There wasn't even any blood. Which was strange seeing as how this was the staff lounge.
Julie reached out and grabbed the flashlight to stop it from spinning. She placed it so that it was shinning in between her and Scooter. They could see each other clearly now.
"What are you doing here?" she asked again.
"We were trying to get out of here when the lights went out. I wasn't really sure where we were."
"Who i
s
w
e
?" Julie looked at the little girl.
"This is Emily," Scooter said. "I found her in one of the elevators."
"Was she alone?"
Scooter shook his head rapidly. He didn't want to bring up the little girl's father. He couldn't handle the idea of it.
Julie understood his meaning and nodded. She looked back at the little girl, compassion in her eyes. She reached out and touched the back of the girl's head. Emily didn't seem to notice anything that was going on around her.
"Do you know what happened?" Julie asked next.
"With what?" He thought that maybe Julie was asking again about the little girl's father..
.
and after he had just told her he didn't want to talk about it!
"Wit
h
wha
t
? With outside. Wit
h
the
m
. What's happening?"
"Oh," he said. "I'm not sure. All I know is that people started attacking each other. They started kill..." His words trailed off.
Again, Julie understood that he didn't want to talk about this in front of the little girl.
"It's okay," she said. "We can talk about it later. Right now we should get...Emily, was it?...something to drink and eat. How about it, Emily? Would you like something?"
The little girl didn't respond.
Scooter didn't know much about shock, but he was sure that she must be experiencing it. Surely, she needed something to eat.
"Let's get something," he whispered in her ear. "Okay?"
The little girl moved her head a little. He could feel the wetness of her tears brush against his skin. She managed to say 'okay' before she pressed her face back into his neck.
"What do you have to eat?" Scooter asked.
Julie grabbed a bag of chips and a can of pop that had been left on the table.
"Is this it?"
She nodded her head.
"That's not going to be enough."
Julie lowered her eyes. "It was all I had money for."
"I've got some money," Scooter said.
"But now the power is out."
That's right
,
Scooter thought
.
There's no more electricity. The machines wouldn't work.
"Maybe we could break into them somehow," Julie continued.
Scooter looked over at the vending machines. He could barely make them out in the dark. He knew that they wouldn't have the best food, though they had to be better than nothing.
The problem was that he didn't know how to break into them. He said as much to Julie.
"We could smash the glass," she suggested.
Scooter almost laughed out loud. Not in a good way. It bordered on rude, condescending. "Smash the glass? That'll make too much noise. Thos
e
thing
s
will come."
"The door is locked. They can't get in."
Scooter looked back over at the door. As with the vending machines, it was difficult to see as well. But he knew that she was right.
"I'll try it," he said.
He stood up and walked over to the machine. Julie came with him and took Emily when he handed the little girl to her. Emily didn't want to let go, but Scooter told her that she had to. He was going to try to get them some food and couldn't do it with her hanging onto him.
"I'll be fast," he told the little girl. "Don't worry."
Emily wrapped her arms around Julie. Then Scooter took a closer look at the machines.
"Smash the glass?" he asked again. "You think that's going to work?"
"We might as well try."
Yeah, they might as well try.
Scooter grabbed a chair and stood with it in front of the machine. He wished that he had his axe, but he couldn't remember what he had done with it. He figured he must have left it at the elevator.
The chair will do fine.
"Point the light over here and stand back."
Julie did as she was told.
Scooter took a few steps back. Then a couple more.
"Here goes nothing!"
He rushed forward and threw the chair at the glass. It flew through the air and smashed against the machine.
The glass didn't break.
The chair came bounding back and crashed into Scooter's shins.
"Fuck!" he screamed. Pain ripped through his legs and he nearly fell. "Fuckin' shit, fuck!"
He looked over and saw the Julie and the little girl staring at him. Both of their eyes were wide open. He knew that he shouldn't have sworn in front of the little girl, but he couldn't help it.
"Sorry," he said after a moment. The word sounded strange coming out of his mouth. He wasn't one to apologize for things; even if he was in the wrong.
He walked back up to the vending machine.
"I don't think I'm going to be able to break it," he said. "It's not glass. It's some kind of plastic."
"Are you sure?" Julie wasn't trying to argue. She simply didn't want to give up.
"I'll try again."
Julie kept her flashlight pointed at the machine and Scooter picked up the chair once more. He positioned himself in front of the machine and readied himself. He took a few deep breaths. Then he charged.
As he threw the chair, he screamed. As it came back to him, he screamed again.
"FUCK!"
It narrowly missed him.
This time, he didn't think about the little girl. Instead he felt a surge of anger run through him. He felt panic and fear. Hopelessness too. He ran over and picked up the chair. With all of his strength, he slammed it against the vending machine window. Over and over again, he hit the plastic, trying to break it. The sound reverberated through out the room. As did his screaming.
"FUUUUCCCCKKKK!!!"
He dropped the chair only when he realized he wasn't going to be able to break into the machine. He had barely even caused it a dent.
The chair clanged against the floor. Then all was silent. Except for crying.
It was Emily. He had frightened her with the sound, with his actions. He rushed over to her and pulled her from Julie's arms.
"I'm sorry," he said. He placed his hand behind the little girl's head and started rocking her back and forth. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
He really needed t
o
get a grip.