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JENNA
“Was I hallucinating, or did I hear Carter say that you shit yourself at a few ultras?” I slump down at the kitchen table late the next afternoon, reaching for a bottle of water to combat the hangover headache hammering at my temples.
Everyone else sits at the table in an equal state of discomfort, water bottles clutched in hands. Kate passes out Tylenol. She alone looks un-phased by the long night of drinking and strip poker.
“Mom thought it would be a good idea to have Indian curry before one of her races.” Carter throws the Tylenol into his mouth and chugs down half a bottle of water.
“I’m pretty sure we should save the Tylenol for real illnesses,” Johnny says. His sideburns stick out at a severe horizontal angle from his face, giving him the appearance of having stuck his finger in a light socket.
“Your first round of sleep deprivation training is a legit reason for Tylenol,” Kate replies, patting his shoulder.
“How come you aren’t hung over?” Eric asks Kate.
“I stopped drinking while everyone still had their clothes on.”
“Sucks for you,” Lila says. “I can’t imagine seeing these losers naked without my drunk glasses.”
“While you all recover, I need to go to the library,” Kate says. “We have a few hours before sunset. Alvarez asked me to find books on farming and canning. His people are having trouble getting their seeds to germinate.”
“I’ll go with you,” Carter says.
“Me, too,” I add. Some fresh air might help dispel the headache.
“You sure?” Kate asks. “The library isn’t far.”
“Very sure,” Carter replies, throwing me a look of thanks. “Maybe we can find stuff on hydroponics while we’re there. If we can move solar panels to Creekside, maybe we can turn the first floor into a garden. There’s too much rain in Arcata to grow a decent vegetable garden outside.”
He isn’t wrong. It rains nine months out of the year in Arcata.
Kate’s brows lift in approval. “That’s a good idea. We can’t rely on scavenged food forever.”
Johnny perks up. “A field trip? Count me in. I just finished writing about our trip to Trading Post. It’s practically a novel by itself. Villains, monsters, kidnapping, suspense—I’m telling you, the story has it all.”
I roll my eyes. “I’m glad our near-death experience gave you something to write about.”
“Think of it this way,” Johnny replies. “You are officially immortalized.”
Carter snorts. “Yeah, in your notebook.”
“Don’t knock the notebook,” Johnny replies, unruffled.
Carter, Kate, Johnny, and I exit Creekside, leaving the others behind to nurse their hangovers.
“How’s your Thrive book coming along?” Kate asks Johnny.
“Still working on it,” he replies. “I’m a multitasker. The other night I talked to some people in Canada. They’ve been living in the family tree house for weeks. One of the guys spent an hour telling me all the different ways you can poop and pee when living in a tree house.”
Before the outbreak, this topic of conversation would have grossed me out. Now, as we make our way onto a campus littered with decomposing bodies, I find myself curious. “There’s more than one or two ways to go to the bathroom in a tree house?”
“He described exactly fourteen different ways to defecate off the side of the platform.”
“Good thing you wrote it all down,” Carter replies drily. “It could come in handy if we get stuck in Creekside for some reason.”
Kate stops, raising a hand to signal silence. We all stop talking, clustering behind her. I study our surroundings, a feeling of unease stealing over me. We’d been chatting like stupid college kids instead of paying attention. Stupid, stupid.
“What is it?” Carter whispers.
Kate shakes her head. “Just a feeling. Come on. No more conversation until we get back to Creekside.”
No one argues. We move deeper into campus. There are some undead wandering around, usually in clumps of three or four. We dispatch any within our direct path and leave the rest.
When we pass the Depot, I shudder at the sight of the soldier impaled to the tree. A vulture sits on his head, pecking at the dead man’s eyes. It’s a gruesome sight. I wish we’d taken the body down the last time we were here. I consider doing it now, but Kate hustles us by the Depot before I can make up my mind. The dead soldier is left behind with his carrion companion.
We reach the library. The building is a two-story mass of gray cement with big pillars in the front. The glass windows and automated front doors are all shattered. We stop in front of the building, scanning the immediate interior. Six corpses litter the front entryway.
“There’s a good chance we’ll run into zombies inside,” Kate says. “We need to stay together and watch one another’s backs. No splitting up. Agreed?”
I don’t relish the idea of wandering around the stacks alone. “Agreed.”
“Agreed,” Carter and Johnny say.
We draw our weapons. My spear is in my right hand, the knife Kate got me at Trading Post in my left.
Inside the wide entryway, past the check-out desk, is a wide staircase that leads to the second floor.
“Let’s see if the vending machines are still intact,” Carter says.
“I wouldn’t mind some food myself, especially if we’re going to be here a while,” I say. “Searching through all the books to find the stuff we need on hydroponic gardening and preserving food could take forever without the electronic catalogue.”
“They’re by the bathrooms,” Johnny says. “This way.”
We all look to Kate. It occurs to me we’re waiting for her approval. Somewhere along the way, she’s become our collective mom.
“Vending machines,” she agrees.
The first-floor vending machine has already been raided, the Plexiglas smashed. Several bodies lay nearby in a pool of dried blood.
“No go,” Johnny says. “Let’s try upstairs.”
We climb the stairs in a tight knot, all of us scanning with our weapons out. I hear a few moans, telling me there are zombies upstairs. Luckily, it doesn’t sound like too many.
We creep up the last few steps and pause, listening.
“Doesn’t sound like more than a few,” Carter whispers. “We should go see where they are.”
The rest of us nod in agreement.
At first, all we see are rows of tall bookshelves and study cubicles. The moan sounds again, drawing our attention to the left side of the room. Creeping forward, we find three zombies, each of them in a different row.
“We should get rid of them,” Kate says. “Clear out this floor.”
Sticking together, we move into each of the aisles. Kate takes the lead on the killing, using her screwdriver to dispatch the undead while the rest of us cover her. It doesn’t take long to eliminate them.
“Vending machine,” Johnny says when we finish. “I’d kill for a bag of Cheetos.”
“Glad the zombies didn’t ruin your appetite,” Carter replies.
“Admit it,” Johnny says. “You’d kill for a bag a Cheetos, too.”
Carter lets out a long, mock sigh. “Yeah, okay. You got me. I’d kill for Cheetos.”
“You’ll both have to fight me for them,” Kate says.
We head toward the back of the building where the restrooms are. As we draw closer, a stench reaches my nose. It’s not the general scent of rot and decay I’m used to. It smells like ...
“It smells like piss and shit,” Kate says.
“Took the words out of my mouth,” I murmur.
“Maybe the bathrooms are backed up,” Carter suggests.
We emerge from a long aisle of books and stop short. In front of us are two dead girls.
“Um, guys?” I lower my voice to a soft whisper. “These girls weren’t killed long ago. And I think they were people when they died, not zombies.”
If someone had told me six months ago that I’d become adept at discerning the age of a corpse, I’d have written them off as weird. Now I’ve seen so many dead that my mind quickly registers the details of these: The blood is reddish brown, not the blackish-red that flows from a zombie. The fact that there’s still a reddish hue to it means it hasn’t been exposed to oxygen for weeks and weeks. There are no discernable bite wounds on either of the bodies. The bodies themselves are already encrusted with maggots, but the rot and decay isn’t that far along.
“Someone hurt them.” Kate crouches beside the dead girls, eyes blazing as she inspects them.
At first, I don’t see what she sees. Then I see the blood on the inside of their thighs. The torn panties matted in the thick pool of blood. The deep tears in their abdomens.
This violence wasn’t from zombies.
The source of the shit and piss aroma becomes apparent. Someone defecated on the bodies of the girls. No way to know if that was done before or after they were killed.
Carter toes at something in the blood. A key fob. “They were from College Creek dorm. Those are the only dorms on campus with fobs instead of regular keys.”
We look at each other. I know we’re all thinking of the guys we met in the Depot from College Creek.
“I didn’t like those guys,” Carter says. “I knew they were bad news.”
It’s impossible to imagine hurting another human being the way these girls have been hurt. But for some reason, it’s not a stretch to imagine those guys inflicting this kind of pain.
Kate rises. “We need to go to College Creek.”
“Is that a good idea?” Johnny asks. He takes several steps back when she glares. “I mean, it’s probably good story fodder, but is it safe? If those guys are the ones who did this—”
“If those guys are the ones who hurt these girls, we need to know,” Kate says. “There could be others who need our help. We have to check it out and put a stop to it.”
It’s the right thing to do. I know it on a deep, humanitarian level. But all I want to do is look for books. I want to read about farming, and hydroponics, and preserving food. I don’t want to head into the part of campus hit hardest by the plague to look for boys I’d just as soon never see again.
“It’s getting late,” Carter says. “Look, Mom, I get it. If people need help, we should help. But we shouldn’t get stuck on the other side of campus after dark.”
Kate hesitates. I see the fire burning behind her eyes, the anger over the dead girls. It’s as scary as it is inspiring.
“Tomorrow,” she says, voice clipped. “Let’s find the books we need and get out of here.”