CHAPTER 14

Escape

Kate knew that backing up and turning around would be tricky for her, especially as she felt the eyes of people at the doorway locked on her.

There had been no one wishing them “good luck,” just a silent line of people glaring at them as they walked out.

“Steady, Kate,” she heard her mother say.

And while driving here, running away from the Mountain Inn hadn’t seemed hard, driving in the night, everyone so scared, her mother hardly able to walk now…

This… was different.

Everyone watching while we sneak away.

Bright sunshine hit the windshield, the eyes of the people on her as if waiting for her to hit something, to do something that would make them rush over, stop them.

Take our guns, take the little food they were given, take the car…

Steady, she thought.

Her hands grabbed the steering wheel as if it might fly out of hands.

Kate looked up to the rearview mirror. She knew that kids near her age took weeks, even months… learning how to do things like this.

Her mother had turned around to look at the fence just behind them.

“Okay. Close enough,” her mom said.

Kate took her foot off the gas pedal and—too quickly—braked.

Even at such a slow speed, the sharp braking made the car rock.

Then her mother turned and looked right at her.

“Now, just turn the wheel before you move. Way to the right. Might be enough room for you to pull out, pull away. If not—”

“I know…” Kate said, hearing how her voice sounded strange, strained, as if her mother’s words were annoying her. “…I might have to back up again.”

With all those eyes on her.

She turned the wheel as hard as she could. And when it wouldn’t go anymore to the right, she took a breath. Foot on the brake, and now with what she hoped was the gentlest of touches, just pressing lightly, the car moved forward, with both her and her mother looking to see if they would clear the building, then the way out, off the hospital grounds, finally clear.

“Think you’re okay, Kate,” her mom said.

But to Kate… it looked like the left front corner of this car would hit the brick wall of the hospital building.

She shook her head. “It’s going to hit, Mom. I better back up. I…”

Then her mother reached over and put a hand on Kate’s left hand, locked on the steering wheel.

“You’re okay. It’s hard to gauge distance, things that come with practice. You’ll clear it.”

And then, as if her mother’s words made it true, she kept applying the smallest amount of gas, the car lumbering into its turn.

Where—amazingly—it did clear the building.

Straighten out, she told herself.

Her mother pulled her hand away, Kate again in control.

She eased the car to the gate, now fully up and electrified again.

On the side: piles of Can Head bodies that had been cleared from the entrance, their bodies, a grisly heap of blood and bone.

Like something from a blender, she thought.

She forced herself to focus on looking straight ahead.

Until they reached the gate. Another shift from the accelerator to the brake.

The gate not moving, not opening.

“Come on, come on,” she heard her mother say.

Kate was tempted to look back at the hospital entrance, a place where Can Head bodies mixed with the people who fought last night and didn’t make it.

From the back, she heard Simon’s voice.

“Mom, they’re not going to let us out.”

Kate wanted to tell Simon, Shut up. Just shut up. They have to let us out; they will let us out. Please…

Silence. Then over the rumble of the car’s engine, the whirring sound of a motor, and the gate slowly grinding opening.

That opening gate, such a welcome sight when they came to the hospital only days ago.

Now, the one thing between them and escape.

Because that’s what this was Kate knew—an escape.

The only question, What are we escaping to?

And when the gate was fully open, Kate looked at her mother.

A nod.

And filling her lungs with air, the tension unbearable, she gave enough gas to the car so that it lumbered out of the parking area, through the gate that she knew would quickly—and forever—close behind them.

Out to the road.

To whatever lay ahead.

Whatever lay ahead, she thought. And what would that be?

But for now, she concentrated on the task at hand, the now so-much-simpler task of driving the car slowly on the road, no sharp turns needed, nice and steady.

Never relaxing, hands still locked on, while nobody said anything.

*

Simon pressed the button to lower his window.

The car heater seemed to blast all its musty hot air right at him.

But as soon as he did, his mother turned back to him.

“Simon… best keep the window up.”

“It’s so hot, Mom. I can’t even breathe.”

As soon as he said the words he felt guilty.

He constantly told himself, got to be nice to Mom. After everything that’s happened to her.

And Kate too.

Kate! She had saved him.

He nodded. “Okay.”

“I’ll turn down the heat,” his mom said.

And Simon hit the button and the back window went up.

And when his mother turned back to the windshield, he looked out at this town they were driving through.

Thinking, Is everyone gone? Everyone that was left either inside that hospital place, all those grim-faced people? And the others turned into Can heads? I hate Can heads.

He realized something then. That the hate he felt was something so strong, so powerful… that just having that thought, he felt his body tense, fists balled.

Thinking… how much he wanted to shoot them.

After all they’d done to him. His dad, gone; his family running away.

And finally what was the most terrible thought.

There was a time when Can Heads didn’t exist. And that time was gone, gone forever.

And then a question that he doubted he could tell anyone, certainly not his mom, not his sister: Was this to be his life now? All the years ahead. This?

He looked at the handgun on the seat beside him.

His mom no longer asked for the guns, the bullets to be put away.

Not anymore.

Simon knowing that he could never be far from his gun.

And then as he went back to looking at the street outside, passing one house that looked in perfect shape, then another burned, a blackened wreck after some crazy attack.

That the three of them in this car were—for now—all they had. All that was left of their family.

His whole world was in this beat-up car that wasn’t even theirs.

The houses flew by outside, and trashed, burned out cars as well, while Simon kept thinking these things.