The Sleeper
Michael Summers would soon die. Of this Dez had little doubt. He possessed no medical background, no diagnostic expertise, but he knew when something was dying. Michael reminded him of everything and everyone he’d ever hoped would get better but didn’t. A lilac tree Dez was foolhardy enough to replant from his front yard to his back. Bandit, a childhood pet, the cat living to the respectable age of fifteen, then failing, the last few days of her life lived out in the back room of his grandma’s house, her kidneys slowly shutting down and her breathing growing more labored. The worst had been his aunt, who’d gradually succumbed to vascular dementia, a condition so insidious the words still sent a chill down Dez’s spine. A smart, vibrant woman, she’d declined over a period of two years, first forgetting basic facts and words, eventually losing even the ability to feed herself.
Yes, Dez had seen death before. And he knew that Michael Summers was in serious danger.
“It has to be Buck Creek,” Iris argued. The three of them were sitting around the burled table of the farmhouse kitchen. Triangulated with Dez and Iris, Levi folded his arms, but would not make eye contact with either of them. Dez had never seen the kid act so stubborn before.
Iris glanced at Dez, who put his hands up in bewilderment. “Levi?” she said. “Will you at least explain why you’re so against the idea?”
He shook his head, not looking up.
Iris smacked the table, making Dez jump. “He’s dying, dammit. You said there was a pharmacy in Buck Creek—”
“Was, Iris,” Levi said. “Was. It was raided shortly after the Four Winds.”
“That’s not what you said,” Dez pointed out. “You said it got looted in the beginning, but no one’s been there since because of the vampires.”
Levi looked up. “Exactly.” In the meager late-morning light, he looked more than ever like Tom Holland, the kid who’d played Spider-Man before the world went to hell.
“I’m tired of this shit,” Iris said, getting up. “We need medicine, there’s medicine at the pharmacy.”
“You don’t know that,” Levi said.
“Hey, kid?” Iris answered. “Look at me.”
When he didn’t, she cupped his chin and angled it toward her face. Levi resisted a little, but when Iris got like this, resistance was futile.
She said, “We won’t know anything until we go.”
“I’m not going,” Levi said. “And neither should you.”
“Hell, we’ve stayed there already,” Iris said. “The night after the Four Winds Bar, we stayed on the edge of Buck Creek. Why is it all of a sudden so much more dangerous?”
Dez studied him. “What happened to the plucky young man who survived on his own these last two years?”
Levi’s expression was pained. “It’s different now.”
“That’s right,” Iris said. “It’s different now. Because our friend is dying and he needs our help. It’s different now because our only hope is medicine, and the closest place that might have it is the pharmacy in Buck Creek.”
She let go of Levi’s face, but this time he kept looking at her. “We’ve been safe here. Almost a month. Why risk that for something that’s not a sure thing?”
Iris had begun moving toward the kitchen counter, but now she spun on him. “We’re not staying here. Get that through your skull. Dez and I have people we’ve gotta find. The only reason we haven’t left already is Michael.” She frowned. “Don’t you want him to get well?”
Levi uttered a breathless grunt. “Of course. He’s my friend too.”
Dez leaned back in his chair. “I get it. After scuttling around all this time, going from place to place, you finally feel safe.”
“We are safe,” Levi said. “And who says Michael won’t get better?”
“Every day he’s worse,” Iris persisted. “When’s the last time he kept anything down?”
Levi didn’t answer.
Dez said, “We’ll go. Iris and I.”
“It’s suicide,” Levi answered.
Iris looked like she was about to shout Levi down, but Dez cut in. “And that’s why you’re going to give us as many details as you can. We’ll use the atlas—”
“That’s just the state of Indiana,” Levi argued. “It won’t show you anything about the town.”
“It’s better than nothing,” Dez said. “You can show us where to enter, places to avoid—”
“The whole town is a place to avoid,” Levi said. Iris flapped her hands dismissively at Levi, but he went on. “I’ve told you. We’re on the brink of Blood Country—”
“Stop calling it that,” Iris muttered.
“Everything south and east of us is vampire territory. It’s dangerous enough without wandering directly onto their land.”
“It’s not their land,” Iris snapped. “There is no ownership, not anymore.”
Levi sat forward, his face animated. “They laid claim to the entire town. Within the first couple weeks.”
Dez nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe that’ll work to our advantage.”
Levi stared at him. “How could that possibly work to our advantage?”
But Iris was moving back toward the table. “Vampires don’t need medicine, do they?”
“Of course not,” Levi said sullenly.
“So they’d have no need of a pharmacy,” she continued. “And since everybody else is terrified of them—”
“As they should be.”
“—they’ve likely stayed away from the town.”
Dez mulled it over. “Makes sense.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Levi said, but Dez could hear his resolve weakening.
Dez got up, went to the hallway, where an ancient rolltop desk reposed under a window that opened to the meandering country lane. As always, the lane was empty, the trees in the distance surrendering their leaves to the punishing November winds.
Dez snatched a pencil and a spiral-bound notebook and returned to the table. Placing the pencil and notebook before Levi, he said, “Show us.”
Levi made no move to pick up the pencil, so Iris plucked it from the table and wedged it between his fingers. “Show us,” she commanded.
Levi sighed. “This is a horrible idea.”
“It’s the only idea,” she answered.
“If we want to save Michael,” Dez added.
Levi nibbled his lip, then began to sketch. “Here’s the side of town nearest us. You can’t enter that way because it’s wide open. No cover at all.” He drew a cylindrical object. “Where you want to go in is over here, beside the grain elevator. Even in daylight, you’ll be able to sneak up to the edge of town here….”
* * *
When they’d finished, Levi excused himself and went out. For someone so afraid of the small town eight miles to the east, he sure did enjoy walking the farmhouse property. It was like he believed this place possessed some talismanic ability to keep the monsters at bay. Dez hoped it wouldn’t get him killed.
He poured himself a glass of water from the pitcher, swigged deeply, and set the glass aside, knowing his thirst was a product of fear. Yes, they had to chance a daylight journey to the pharmacy to find medicine for Michael. Vampires preferred nighttime but could move about during the day. No bursting into flames or crumpling into an ash heap. Just light sensitivity and, from what he could gather, some discomfort. There’d be no sunlight indoors, however. The pharmacy, if they made it there, would be steeped in gloom.
And all of this – the hiding, the scratched-out existence, the constant fear – was necessary because of the Bastards from Baltimore.
Dez clutched the counter edge and tried not to think about the rogue scientists, those fiends from Four Winds Aerospace and Johns Hopkins University who’d unlocked the secrets of human DNA and had, through their mastery of epidemiology and astrophysics, unleashed a plague that had obliterated nearly all of humankind, the earth now a horrorscape of monsters and bloodshed and fear. They’d detonated their bombs near the six largest airports in the U.S., and the travelers, not knowing they were carriers of the virus, spread mankind’s doom to all corners of the world. Within two months nearly every person on earth had transformed into a monster or been killed by one. Dez’s own father. His brother.
His son.
A door creaked from the other room. Throat burning, he finished his water, washed his glass, dried it, and returned it to the cabinet. Iris had trained them well. Everyone did his own dishes, everyone cooked for himself. Unless someone – usually Levi – volunteered to cook for the group. Not wanting to poison his friends, Dez seldom volunteered.
He made his way to Michael’s room, where he found Iris sitting on the bed, the back of her hand on Michael’s forehead. She was frowning.
“Not good?” Dez asked.
“Sweltering,” she said. “We have to go today.”
Dez glanced at the window. “It’s almost noon. Maybe we should wait.”
“It could rain tomorrow. Or snow,” Iris said. “Or he could die tonight.” Dez winced, but Iris plowed on. “He can’t hear us. I don’t think he’s had a clue what’s going on for a couple days. If he can’t eat, can’t take fluids….”
“I get it,” Dez said. “I think maybe Levi spooked me.”
She peered down at Michael, and so did Dez. Their friend was Black, with a beard and sideburns he kept better-groomed than Dez did his own. But in the days since he’d gotten sick, the sideburns had grown unruly, the chin hair unaccustomedly long. A subtle thing, but a reminder that Michael was deteriorating. Dez glanced at the bedroom window, at the whorls of hoarfrost there, and shivered. If only the farmhouse were warmer…if only their friend hadn’t gotten sick….
Iris caressed Michael’s forehead, rose. As they were going out, Dez noticed how much Michael, who was ordinarily voluble and charismatic, resembled a corpse at a wake. His arms weren’t folded over his chest, thank God, but with the near stillness of his body and the slow wasting away that rendered his cheekbones and brows more pronounced, he looked very much like a dead man.
They had to go.
Dez followed Iris upstairs, not because he needed anything – all his gear was in the mudroom in case they had to make a quick escape – but because she gave him strength. Whether she was less frightened than he was or merely better at feigning courage, Iris always seemed to be in control. When he came through the bedroom door, she was grasping the bottom of her t-shirt and drawing it up. She paused and looked at him.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
He went over, sat on the edge of the bed, and unholstered his Ruger. He knew it was loaded and shoot-ready, but double-checking it would give him something to do while Iris changed clothes.
The familiar warmth spread through his body at the sounds of her shirt and sweatpants slithering to the floor. Maybe because they frequently slept in the same bed, they often got dressed together. Despite the fact that he was powerfully attracted to Iris, he prided himself on not sneaking glances at her. A low bar, maybe, and not something for which he should congratulate himself, but he knew many men who’d spy on a beautiful woman like Iris every chance they got. Especially when they’d been abstinent for more than eight months.
Dez slid out the magazine, collected the .22 rounds in his palm. From the corner of his eye he saw Iris reach back for her bra clasp. Hastily, he began reloading the rounds.
“We taking the bikes?” she asked.
“Definitely,” he said.
They didn’t ride the ten-speeds often because traveling down the middle of the road made you an easy target. But today was a special situation. Haste mattered more than stealth. Dez would rather risk being seen by a cannibal in the daylight than being caught by a vampire at dusk. The cannibals were repugnant, ferocious. But the vampires?
Dez shivered hard enough to drop a round.
“Careful over there,” Iris called. He guessed she was wiggling into her sports bra, but didn’t attempt visual confirmation.
Bending to retrieve the bullet, he said, “Levi’s route takes us through the town center.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“Should we go a different way?”
“You can look now,” she said.
He turned and found her in her underwear and bra, both royal blue. His mouth went dry. She crossed to the dresser, her back to him, and opened a drawer. Dez watched, a bit lightheaded.
Susan! his conscience rejoined. Remember Susan!
It was enough to peel his eyes away from Iris’s extraordinary behind and return his attention to the Ruger.
“If Levi says it’s the safest path,” she said, “we have to trust him. He’d never put us in danger.”
He’s putting us in danger by attempting to make this our permanent home, Dez thought.
He slid round after round into the magazine. Ten in all. Plus twenty more in his hip pocket. After the battle in the Four Winds Bar, he never wanted to run out of ammo again.
Iris’s voice was musing. “So after we get the medicine…after Michael recovers…we go, right?”
“We go,” he agreed, though the pronouncement brought on a different species of worry. They had only the vaguest of clues where his girlfriend, Susan, and Iris’s daughter, Cassidy, had been taken, so the prospect of pursuing them didn’t imbue him with confidence. Though he hated himself for it, the notion of leaving made him understand Levi all too well. The farmhouse felt safe. The weeks they’d spent here before Michael’s health deteriorated were tranquil. Of course, tranquility was relative. Even the past month had been plagued by mind-splitting fear and creeping paranoia, but at least no one had tried to murder them, and that was a marked improvement.
Iris’s voice was nearly inaudible. “Do you think they’re still alive?”
“Yes,” he said, but the reply was automatic and carried little conviction, even to his own ears.
She went on. “And if we find Susan but not Cassidy….”
“We keep going. Same if we find Cassidy first. We keep going until we both have our people back.”
They’d gone over it many times, and though Dez knew he’d continue on with Susan by his side in their mission to find Iris’s daughter, he wondered if Iris would do the same if they found Cassidy first. Because the situations were not analogous. Susan, he assumed, would want to help Iris find her daughter. Iris, on the other hand, would be dragging a just-saved five-year-old into more peril. Would she actually take her little girl on a rescue mission? Would Dez even want her to? No, he decided. He wouldn’t. But there was no point in debating it now. Their chances of finding either person were negligible.
Iris eased down on the bed beside him. She was fully clothed, her blue undergarments sheathed in her accustomed blue shirt, black jacket, and black jeans.
“Is it going to be weird when you find Susan?” she asked.
No point pretending he didn’t understand. “Probably.”
“Why?” she asked.
Dez flushed. She’d trapped him! He waited, hoping she’d let him off the hook, but she remained silent, and he knew he’d have to respond.
He finished loading the mag and popped it into the Ruger. “You and I are good together,” he said. “That’s bound to show when we’re around Susan. She’s not stupid.”
A corner of Iris’s mouth lifted. “Think she’ll start something?”
“I don’t think she’ll fight you. It wouldn’t do her much good. She’s not exactly…you.”
Iris smiled.
“I’ve never had women fight over me before,” he said.
She patted his back. “And I doubt you ever will.”
“Ouch.”
“Let’s go, dumbass.” Iris moved toward the door. “I’ll find Levi, tell him we’re going. You fix your makeup or whatever it is you spend all that time in the bathroom doing.”
Dez saluted her with a middle finger.