Afternoon Read online

  We should be safe, Steve thought, but realized a moment later that his thought was idiotic. No one was safe in a world like this, where evil waited around every corner waited to pounce and infect them without mercy. He reached down to ensure his gun was still in the holster at his side as Jamie parked the driver’s side door alongside the front of the building and disengaged the vehicle.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  Steve nodded.

  They exited through the driver’s side and stole into the building.

  Steve drew the machete from the sheath at his left side and followed Jamie through the pharmacy, careful not to step on the remnants of prescription medication bottles or even larger pills that had been lost from their capsules before they could be safely secured. Snow crunched under his feet—hardened from time and the safety of four walls—but it made such insignificant sound he felt it wouldn’t draw any attention.

  “Hand me the duffel,” Jamie said.

  Steve passed it over and turned to guard his fellow man as Jamie approached the pharmacy. Given that Erik had already squeezed through the small opening beneath the protective glass and had unlocked the door, Jamie was able to slide in easily and without much complication—which was lucky considering that neither of them would’ve been able to fit between the gap Erik’s lithe frame had managed to slide through. While waiting, Steve heard the sound of papers scattering, of things being moved, of something falling over and then the curse that followed.

  “Careful,” Steve cautioned.

  Though there wasn’t anywhere for a corpse to hide in here, it wouldn’t be hard for one to wander in after hearing the sound.

  “Got it,” Jamie said.

  “Let’s go,” Steve replied. “It’s freezing.”

  A hand fell on Steve’s shoulder. He would’ve spun and swung his machete had he not realized it was Jamie. “Hear that?” the man asked.

  Steve waited. Though it was nearly indistinguishable beneath the soft wind, the sound of footsteps could be heard—slow, ambling, as if they belonged to a person lost and without a clue to their location.

  Dead, Steve then thought. Wandering.

  Nodding, Steve took a few steps forward, gripped the machete with both hands, and armed it over his shoulder like a baseball bat.

  The corpse—whose sex was unrecognizable considering the decay it had endured—turned and entered the pharmacy.

  Steve dispatched it immediately with a single swing of his blade.

  “The weather is preserving them,” Jamie said as the corpse fell and they exited the pharmacy. “Fuck Idaho and its brutal winters.”

  “Any warmer and these things’d be nothing more than skin and bones,” Steve said. “If that.”

  Jamie opened the door and allowed Steve to slide in first before joining him inside the truck’s cab. Once secured inside—doors locked, key settled into the ignition—Jamie withdrew from the duffel a thick paperback that simply read The Pill Book. “It’ll be some work,” he said, “but there’s a section that details the most-prescribed medications in the country at the time of its publication.”

  “Which was?”

  “Just last year,” Jamie replied. Steve sighed and Jamie nodded before continuing by saying, “This’ll also let us know what all the other medications Erik was able to scrounge up will do. If… yannow… he—”

  Steve set a hand on the man’s arm. “You don’t have to say it,” he said.

  Jamie nodded. “Let’s get home,” he said, “and get Erik some help.”

  *

  Rose heard them before she actually saw them. Poised in her second-floor bedroom in the house she, Steve and Desmond shared, she looked out the window to find the truck ambling down the road, its reddened figure covered in the fresh coating of snow that was now falling from above.

  “Is that them?” a voice said from the threshold.

  She turned to find Desmond standing in the open doorway. “Yeah,” she said. “It is.”

  He hurried into the other room to grab his coat before she followed him down the stairs.

  Outside, the bitter cold warped around her body, threatening to pierce through the fabric of her long-sleeved shirt to get at her skin. She ignored the uncomfortable idea that even the weather was predatory in this new and strange state before she, with Desmond’s help, pulled the door open to allow the returning men access into their isolated compound.

  Once the truck had cleared the gate, they secured it with little more than grunts. “Were you followed?” she asked as she turned to view the men.

  “One zombie,” Jamie said. “At the pharmacy.”

  “Which I took care of with my machete,” Steve clarified.

  “That doesn’t mean the others weren’t still around,” Rose said, crossing her arms under her breasts. She shook a bit of snow off her lengthening hair and sighed when she realized just how dangerous of a predicament they were in. “We need to not go out for a few days, if we can help it.”

  “I know.”

  “I take it you found the pill book?”

  Steve lifted a thick paperback into view.

  “Steve’s already been going through it,” Jamie said, “to try and see if anything pops out when we head into the house.”

  “Do you need any help?”

  “If you’d be willing.”

  “No use hanging around inside when I could be of use.”

  *

  Dakota worked with Rose, Desmond, Jamie and Steve to sort through and catalog the various medications that had been procured in their last trip to the pharmacy. From antibiotics, to antibacterials, to mental health medications, blood pressure tablets, prescription pain pills and more, they sorted through over two-dozen medications and eventually found something generic enough to where Jamie felt comfortable giving it to Erik.

  “It’s the most common drug they give people for infections,” Jamie said. “So… it should work.”

  “Does it say anything about interacting with his migraines?” Rose asked.

  Steve lifted the book and pushed a pair of eyeglasses also procured from the pharmacy up his nose. “Not that I can see,” he said. “Common side affects include nausea, vomiting, dizziness—”

  “Which isn’t a headache,” Desmond added.

  Steve nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “So… I’d say this, Jamie. It says once a day until the prescription runs out.”

  “Does it say how long it’s prescribed for?”

  “No. It doesn’t.”

  “Shit.”

  “Let’s think about this for a second,” Rose said, “before we start going into defeatist mode. How long do we normally take prescription antibiotics for? What? Two weeks?” She waited for tentative and cautious nods before proceeding. “I say we double that to a month, given what’s happened to him.”

  “All right,” Dakota said. “Let’s sort the pills out.”

  They separated a total of thirty pills—more than half of the supply they’d been able to come up with—into a plastic baggie and passed it over to Jamie, who immediately took them and stood. “Just make him stay in bed,” Dakota said. “At least then his body will recover quicker.”

  “We need to get him to eat and drink more,” Rose added.

  “The fucker was always stubborn as hell when he got sick,” Jamie laughed. He turned to face Steve and gave him a firm nod as he lifted his head. “Thank you for going with me, Steve.”

  “I’ve got your back, bud. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m going to go and convince him that we’ve figured out what kind of medication to give him based off a book we found in the pharmacy,” Jamie said. “Wish me luck.”

  Everyone did without question.

  As Jamie climbed the stairs, bottled water and baggie of pills in hand, Dakota sighed and turned his attention toward Steve. “You ever get that old radio working yet?” he asked.

  “Not yet,” Steve said. “Still trying to fuck with it some.”

  “Do you need any help?” Rose aske
d. “I was studying electronics and architecture up in Liverpool. I might be able to tell what’s wrong with it.

  “Be my guest. I’m not getting anywhere with it.”

  “Shall we return to the house then?”

  With a nod, Steve stood with Desmond and Rose and began to make his way toward the door. “I trust you’ll take care of putting all this stuff away?” he asked, turning to face Dakota.

  “Yeah,” Dakota said with a nod. “I will. Don’t worry.”

  With that, the three exited the home and walked into the brutal chill of winter.

  After taking a deep breath, Dakota reached for the largest of the three packs of baggies and began to mark and then deposit the medications into them.

  That little book—still sitting on the living room end table—was worth its weight in gold.

  If it helped Erik get better, Jamie and Steve’s trip would’ve been worth it.

  If not…

  Dakota closed his eyes.

  He refused to think about that.

  Dakota found Jamie lounging on the bed in the room they shared in his childhood home. Content, it seemed, in the reality between sleep and wake, he only stirred once Dakota settled down on the bed beside him and set a hand on his shoulder. “Erik doing ok?” he asked.

  “He took the medication without question,” Jamie replied. “Asked who I was, where we were, if the Chamarro kids had come back in from the beach yet.”

  “He thinks you’re in Guam?”

  “He’s pretty out of it, but he trusted me enough to take it without question. I didn’t even have to explain how we figured out what to give him.”

  “So he’s desperate than.”

  “Or so far out of it that he doesn’t care,” Jamie chuckled. “Either way, he’s medicated, so… we’ll see how the next few days fare.”

  “If he were going to die,” Dakota offered, “I think he would’ve already done so by now.”

  “I know. But I can’t help but wonder, you know? If this is just something he caught while out in the cold or if it’s from… well… you know.”

  Dakota nodded. The fact that Jamie refused to acknowledge the reality of the situation was somewhat disturbing, but Dakota couldn’t particularly blame him. Erik was his best friend—his childhood buddy whom he’d grown up, gone to school and then enlisted in the army with. Hell—they’d even been deployed together, so to think that he’d have a hard time accepting that his friend could possibly die wasn’t a far stretch of the imagination.

  Spreading out alongside his partner, Dakota settled against Jamie’s chest and closed his eyes when his boyfriend set an arm around his shoulder. “I would’ve gone out with Steve,” he said. “You know that.”

  “I know.”

  “You can’t keep expecting everyone to let you do everything yourself.”

  “I know.”

  “Especially if Erik…” Dakota paused. “Gets worse.”

  “Again: I know.”

  Dakota splayed a hand across Jamie’s stomach and sighed as the taut muscles beneath tightened, then loosened with the ebb and flow of his breath. “You should sleep,” he said.

  “I know,” Jamie said. “I just… can’t. It’s like… I keep expecting something to happen. I can’t let my guard down.”

  “Is that from the military?”

  “PTSD thing, I think.”

  “Steve’s talked about it before some,” Dakota replied. “Said he has trouble falling asleep sometimes. Nightmares. Daydreams. Loud noises trigger him and he’s immediately back in the Middle East.”

  “I didn’t see a lot of armed combat,” Jamie said. “At least, not until… well… all this shit happened. I imagine the entire population of the world has PTSD at this point.”

  “If they’ve gone through what he have? Of course.” Dakota sat up and wrapped his arms around himself. “I’m just saying, Jamie. We’re here for you. Me, Rose, Steve—even Kevin is.”

  “Kevin’s still suffering,” Jamie replied. “I don’t expect anything from him. At least not now.”

  “But he’s still there if you need something. Sometimes a stranger is the easiest person to talk to. Takes the pressure away from being honest, you know?”

  “I’d rather talk to you than someone I barely know.”

  Dakota leaned down and pressed a kiss to Jamie’s lips. “Thank you,” he said. “That means a lot to me.”

  “I know it does. That’s why I said it.”

  Knowing that Jamie would not settle unless he was nearby, Dakota lay down, draped an arm across the older man’s chest and stomach, and closed his eyes.

  Soon, their breaths ran in sync.

  Maybe now, Dakota thought, as he began to fade from the waking realms of the world, they would sleep.

  *

  Rose was adjusting the receiving dial on the radio when a crack of static filtered through.

  “You hear that?” Steve asked.

  She nodded. Though she hadn’t thought it had just been her imagination, it was sometimes hard to distinguish what was real and what was just wishful thinking at times. “Yeah,” she finally said as she returned the dial to its former position, nodding as the crack of static returned and filtered through the room like white noise in the night. “There we go.”

  “Do you have a pen and paper nearby?”

  She gestured him toward it—unable, or at least unwilling, to move from her place at the radio, less she lose the exact frequency she was on.

  “AM or FM?”

  “FM.”

  Steve wrote this down as Rose remained deathly still. When he finished, she pulled her hand away from the radio and grimaced as the static faded from the air.

  “That was something,” she said, making sure to stress the word to get her point across. “We’ve been fucking with this thing for two hours and that’s the first signal we’ve come across.”

  “But it’s just static,” Steve replied. “It’s likely that whoever—or whatever—used to be on that side of the radio is gone.”

  “It doesn’t change the fact that it’s still occasionally broadcasting.”

  She knew better than to be a pessimist. At this rate, if there was any chance of them contacting people—especially people who might be able to provide them more ample shelter and supplies—there was no point in ignoring what could undoubtedly be a sign from above. While she didn’t believe in God much, dumb luck didn’t happen very often, and whenever it did, it definitely wasn’t something like this.”

  “Should we try and communicate?” Steve asked. “Or should we wait for Erik?”

  “Erik’s going to be laid up for who knows how long,” Rose said. “I say we try and communicate.”

  “And say what?”

  “Say that we’re a group of survivors in the middle of southeastern Idaho—that we don’t know where we are, but that we think we’re somewhere between Rigby and Idaho Falls.”

  “We lie?”

  “To keep ourselves safe? Yes. We do.” Rose reached toward the radio, but stopped before she could take hold of the transmitter that would broadcast not only their persons, but the knowledge that there were still survivors alive in this part of the world. “Maybe,” she started, “this should be discussed first.”

  “With Jamie?” Steve asked, then waited for Rose to nod before shaking his head. “He’s so worked up with how Erik’s doing that there’s no point in trying to ask him. He’ll just say, Later, or tell us to wait until Erik’s awake so he can run communications. I’d say we give it a go—now, while it still appears as though someone is listening in our on frequency.”

  “All right,” Rose said, swallowing. She took the transmitter in her hand and waited for a nod from Steve before she pressed down on the call tone. “This is Rose Daniels,” she said. “Coming in from southeastern Idaho. Repeat: this is Rose Daniels, coming in from southeastern Idaho. Please respond if you hear this. Over.”

  Static answered, but not the kind she expected. Rather, it sounded as though
someone was attempting to respond, but couldn’t.

  “Hello?” Rose asked again. “This is Rose Daniels. If you were just trying to speak, we heard you. Over.”

  “—over,” a woman’s voice came in.

  Rose and Steve turned to look at each other.

  “—Rosalita… from the University of Boise, Idaho,” the voice replied. “Do you read. Over?”

  “We heard you, Rosalita,” Rose replied. “This is Rose Daniels, over.”

  “Dear God,” the woman on the other end of the line replied. “We’ve been transmitting for weeks. We didn’t think anyone was alive beyond us. Over.”

  “They probably just don’t have access to a working radio,” Rose replied. “You said you were at the university of Boise? Over.”

  “We are,” she replied. “My name is Doctor Rosalita Hernandez. I used to work in the biology department before the outbreak occurred. Over.”

  Steve grabbed the receiver from Rose before she even had the chance to respond. “You said you worked at the biology department?” Steve asked.

  Doctor Hernandez likely waited for an ‘over,’ but when none came, she responded by saying, “Yes. I did—and still do, conducting research on the plague. Over.”

  “Do you know if scratches from the infected are able to transfer the infection? Over.”

  “Absolutely,” the woman replied. “Any contract with the infected that involves diseased or infected tissue that breaks the skin can result in the transmission of the virus, which ultimately results in death. Why do you ask? Over.”

  “Because we have someone here who was scratched five days ago and still hasn’t died. Over.”

  No response came.

  “Doctor Hernandez?” Steve replied. “Did you hear me? Over.”

  “Please. Give me a moment to confer with my colleagues. Over.”

  Silence filled the line for several tense minutes, leading Rose to believe that Doctor Hernandez may, in fact, might not even be who she was saying at all. When she returned, however, and the transmission picked up more than just the sound of her voice in the background, a flicker of hope fluttered about Rose’s heart.

  “Please repeat everything you just told me,” she said, “and provide explicit details on the manner of the scratch, where it is located on the body, what symptoms have occurred and what state the patient is currently in. Over.”