A good day writing. That extra hour really made a difference today. I was able to 'sleep in' and then have a nice amount of time to get some more words down on paper.
An excerpt:
-8-
It’s simpler than he thought to find
Marie. Once he finds the church (Moon’s church, they called it), which is only
a few blocks away from that house of weirdness, it’s easy to get to the Tower, which is an old hotel. The streets are
quiet and empty, the back of his neck prickles constantly as he creeps along
the street. Empty cars, trash, corpses. The same things he’s been seeing since
he entered the city. And the smell—he’s looking forward to fresh air, that’s
for sure.
After seeing all those people?rotters? pouring
out of the church, Jeremiah’s in no mood to dally, and he gets as far away from
that place as he can, Gabriel’s words about Moon and that he can control the
dead make him even more jumpy. The sooner he gets his ammunition and gets out
of this hell hole the better.
He approaches the hotel slowly,
calmly. As eager as he is to get out from in the open, he knows that haste will
only cause him to make mistakes, mistakes he can’t afford to make. This place
is huge, at least twenty stories. No glass remains in the windows that he can
see, the blackness like blind eyes. Carefully, fingers tight on his pistol, he
enters the Tower.
Dead, stale air seasoned with sewage
greets him, and it’s a moment until his eyes adjust to the low light. Broken
tiles and glass crunch beneath his boots, too loud in the stillness. Sweat
trickles down his face. This is a perfect place for rotters, too many places to
hide. As if hearing his thoughts, a
figure lurches out of the shadows, broken face snarling, grey hands
outstretched, ready to grab and tear. One shot and the thing goes down, face
gone and that nasty, rotten smell filling the air. Jeremiah’s head whips around
as he looks for more, where there’s one zombie, there’s ten more, and it’s only
a matter of time, a few seconds, before they converge.
Cursing himself for wasting a
bullet, Jeremiah hurries to the stairs and yanks it open. Fresh, cool air
washes over his face, startling him. Fresh air? Puzzled, he moves into the
stairwell, letting the door shut behind him. This place is getting to him, he’s
making stupid mistakes, like shooting that rotter instead of using the knife.
Now he can hear them, milling around behind the door.
Suddenly the stairwell is flooded
with light, sending shards of pain into his eyes. He flings up his arm,
startled.
The ratcheting of a shotgun, loud in
the enclosed space, makes him freeze.
“Don’t move.” The voice is female
and strong, accompanied by cold metal jammed into his gut. “Who the
hell—Jeremiah? Is it really you?”
“Hello, Marie.” He finally opens his
eyes and smiles.
“Well, I’ll be damned. This is
pretty much unbelievable.” Dropping the
shotgun, she shakes her head, a grudging smile on her face. It leaves quickly
and the shotgun comes back up.
“What are you doing here? Are you
alone? What do you want, Jeremiah?” Her blue eyes are hard, as hard as they
were the last time he saw her, hard to hide the hurt, he knows this, knows he’s
responsible.
“I’m alone,” he says, taking off his
hat and rubbing his tired head. “I just want some place to crash for a bit, and
I need some supplies. Ammunition. Food and water, if you have it.”
“You know I do, or else you wouldn’t
be here.” Turning on her heel, she descends the stairs, leaving him to follow,
or not.
She’s thinner than the last time he
saw her, of course, her blonde hair cut to her ears, the way she holds the
shotgun practiced and easy. He’ll have to step easy now, watch what he says.
At the bottom of the stairs she
waits for him, mouth an impatient line.
“I wish you hadn’t riled up the
rotters, Jeremiah. I would have thought you’d know better.”
“Will they be able to break down the
door?” He stays close behind her as they
trot down the hallway, finally stopping outside the boiler room.
“Eventually,” she says, unlocking
the door and holding it open for him.
It’s amazing, what she’s done to
this place. The walls are lined with boxes and cans, bedding and so much stuff
that for a second he’s in awe. In one corner is a double bed, neatly made, with
a bookcase beside it. There’s also a camp stove and jugs of water. She’s been
here a long time, he thinks.
“Marie, you’re amazing.”
“Ha!” She locks the door, sliding
bolts, lowering a bar, before turning to face him. “I’ve always been amazing,
Jeremiah,” she says, hands on her hips. “Why has it taken you so long to
realize it?”
He slides his pack off to the cement
floor, an unfamiliar smile tugging at his lips. How long since he actually
smiled?
“I waited, you know,” she says, her
voice soft. “The whole place was going to hell, people fleeing, and what did I
do? I waited. It was almost too late by the time I realized you weren’t coming
for me, that we really weren’t that epic love story I thought we were.”
“Marie, I—”
“Don’t. Don’t say it. I know you had
to take care of your family, but it would have been nice to have been on your
mind, too.”
“You were. When it happened, you
were the first person I thought of, Marie. I swear it.”
She stares at him. “Where’s your
wife, Jeremiah? And your son? Did you save them?”
“I—I tried.” He drops his head.
“Aiden was at school. He—I got there too late.”
Jeremiah grits his teeth, remembering the way his wife had screamed when
they finally reached the elementary school. The building had taken a direct
hit, instantly reducing the brick building to nothing more than rubble.
“And your wife?” Her implacable
questions stir up the pain, the guilt again.
“She refused to leave.” It’s all he
can say, the only words he can force past the stone in his throat.
“Refused leave with you. I can
understand that, after she found out about us.” Marie nods. “You tried to
persuade her to leave, using your logic, but you didn’t count on a mother’s
heart. What was she doing, digging in the rubble? That’s what I would have
done, no matter how hopeless. Not you, though. You couldn’t handle the guilt of
being too late to save your son, and so you left your wife. What happened to
her, Jeremiah? Is she still alive? Did you go back for her? What did you do?”
He says nothing, black shame making
him tremble. He’s forgotten this about her, the way she could see right through
to the ugly part of him and make him hate himself.
“You went back when the guilt
finally became too much, and you found her, right?”
Jeremiah shakes his head, speaking
with effort through stiff lips. “No, I didn’t find her. There were no—living
people there. Not anymore.” His fingers
caress the butt of his pistol, the pistol that’s become a part of him, the
strongest part. The only part.
“You always were late to the party,
Jeremiah.” The mocking tone cuts to the quick, and in two strides he’s in her
face, grabbing her arms, his voice shaking with suppressed rage.
“You don’t know what you’re talking
about. You have no idea what it was like for me, knowing I’d failed my son, and
then having to put a bullet in my wife’s brain to stop her from eating me. You
didn’t have to do that.”
“No, I didn’t,” she spits, trying to
twist out of his grip, but he only tightens his fingers, digging into her
flesh. “I was too busy trying to stay alive, trying to believe what my lover
had told me, that he’d come back for me and we’d get out of there together.”
Her eyes shoot sparks at him. “But you didn’t come. I waited and waited, until
the rotters were at the door, until it was too late, after everyone but me was
left. You forgot about me, Jeremiah.”
The rage leaks out of him then,
because she’s right. He’d been so consumed with pain and guilt about his wife
and son, that any thought he had of her blew right out of his head.
His hands drop and the takes a step
back, but she throws herself against him and takes his face in her hands.
“But I don’t care,” she whispers,
her face so close to his. “I don’t care, because you’re here now, and now is
all that matters.”
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