Among the Living (33 page)

“Hey, don’t worry, I got your back. I’ll be standing above you with guns blazing. None of those fucking things will get near you.”

“Les, I know we haven’t been together long, and I know I can be a bitch, but do you love me?”

The question is just about the last thing he expected to hear from her. They have fun together. Sure, she has a knockout body and is willing to do just about anything he asks. She isn’t a prude even though it took him a couple of weeks of persistence to get her panties off. In the end, it was worth it. After that first night, they were as busy as horny hamsters on X.

The first night, he peeled off her clothes like he was unwrapping a Christmas present. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, and because she was so fucking hot, he barely lasted an embarrassing thirty seconds. Afterwards he slipped a Viagra down his throat and dry swallowed it. He spent fifteen minutes with his head between her legs in an attempt to show her he wasn’t complete shit in bed. After that, he was ready to go, several times. If she was impressed, she didn’t say so, but after that night, she sort of set up home base and stayed with him. That was compliment enough.

She did a little coke with him but stuck mainly to pot and booze when they partied, which was just about every day. He always let her have access to his stash, and she never took advantage of it. She had a job in town, but it was assisting a paralegal and it didn’t pay well, nor did she do it full time. Still, it was money in her pocket, and whatever else she needed, he was happy to provide.

They may die today when they attempt their escape, and if that’s going to happen, well, he wants to go out in style. He sees himself taking a dozen of them with him as they tear him apart. Sure, there will be pain, but if it comes to that, he will cap his girl and then himself. So where’s the harm?

“Yeah, babe, of course I love you.”

She beams a big smile at him, rolls over and climbs on his lap.

“Too bad we can’t squeeze one in.”

“Sweetie, I’m too fucking freaked out by those things downstairs to even get it up right now.”

She looks down at his body and draws little circles on his chest, which is mostly bare of hair, going a bit to flab and pale as milk.

“I bet I could change your mind if I put my mind, or should I say my mouth, to it.”

Lester grins, but instead of thinking with his dick, for once in his life he does something smart and slips his hands around her slim waist and eases her off. She lies next to him and kisses him on the cheek.

Lester stretches and grabs the knotted sheets they have bound together and wraps them up like a big weird rope. He also has the rope he found in John’s house, but it doesn’t seem thick enough for her to hold onto while he shimmies down it.

“I’m gonna get set up. Come out in a few minutes and we’ll put this crazy plan in action.”

“Okay,” she says as she sits up.

He hauls the bag and rope to the window. Then he takes the sheets out the window and into the blazing sun. The bodies in the front yard and street number at least fifteen, and when he steps out and the deaders see him, they go a little bit crazy, moaning and reaching for him even though they are at least a dozen feet away. He could sit up here and drill the things all day if he wanted to. If he had enough ammo, he could clean the entire street. That might not be enough, though, unless this crazy disease is only affecting this part of Seattle. Lester has doubts about that. He has been hearing distant gunshots for most of the day.

A small circular air vent sits on the house near the top of the roof. He secures the rope to it and then rigs up a sling so he can thread the sheets into it and cinch the nylon stuff tight. He makes knot after knot in the rope until he is certain it will take a crack team of Eagle Scouts to undo the mess. He tugs on the rope and sheets as hard as he can, over and over, just to make certain.

Angela joins him on the roof a minute later and walks to the edge. She will have to be near one of the shortest parts, and if the deaders have half a brain among them, they will probably be able to reach up and pull her down when she drops over the edge. In fact, to those things, she will probably look like a juicy worm dangling from a hook.

“Damn, babe, you are pretty fucking brave to do this.”

“I don’t feel brave. I feel like crapping my pants.”

“That makes two of us.”

They smile and laugh at the little joke as Lester hauls the rest of the gear onto the roof.

* * *

The noonday sun has given way to a couple of clouds, so it’s not such an oven, but the humidity is high, which makes them almost as miserable. From here, Lester has a perfect view down Cole Avenue, but it is empty of people and there hasn’t been an Army truck in a day. He wipes sweat off his brow, then wipes his hand on his pants. From this side, he can see a section of downtown Seattle, but his view is partially blocked by trees. A few helicopters hover around the city. That can’t be good news.

He leans over the other side of the fence and shouts, “Over here, asshole, come one, come all! Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, and see the great Lester and Angela disappearing trick. Come on. OVER HERE!”

The deaders look around for the voice and follow in his general direction. He takes the Glock from the waistband of his pants and aims at one. He has a clear shot of the top of the bald guy’s head, can’t miss. Instead he drills the guy in the shoulder so he is able to get up once the bullet’s impact knocks him on his ass.

“Over here!” he yells again and shoots another one for good measure. Too bad he doesn’t have any firecrackers. That would get them good and riled up. Some of the deaders are coming to investigate the noise as he hoped they would.

“Ready, babe?”

“Yep!”

He dashes across the roof, feet more sure of the gritty surface. He sits down next to Angela and leans over the edge of the roof. There are no deaders there now.

“Okay, babe, it’s all you.”

“Great.”

She slides her legs over the edge of the roof, and Lester holds on to her arm. She has the rope wrapped around one wrist just in case, but he worries that it will snap if she slips. He helps her shimmy her hips over the edge so just her upper body is on the roof. She slides down a little more and then glances down with giant eyes, but there are still no deaders.

She drops a little farther, arms holding on to Lester and the rope. She is trembling, or maybe it is him. He can’t stand to lose her like this if she slips. His words earlier, that he loved her—maybe he meant them. He has never loved anyone before, but he is pretty fucking sure it isn’t rocket science. You have feelings for someone, they either go away or stay, and his are right where they started a few months ago. Can he imagine his life without her? Sure, but he doesn’t want to, and maybe that is the whole idea.

She dangles free, and her hands slip down to grasp the edge of the roof where the tiles meet the edge of the fence. He has to lean all the way forward but has a bright idea.

“Hold on, babe. Let me get in a better position. Hold on to the rope like your life depends on it.”

“My life does fucking depend on it!” she shoots back as she grasps the rope to her chest, one forearm bent to hold her on the rooftop. Lester drops to his front, chest flat and stretches out his legs, then spreads them so he has more surface area. His body weight is focused on his left foot, but he uses it like a rudder to steady his body. He can’t see over the roof, however, so he sidles forward.

He grabs her arms as she swings free, focuses on her face to show her everything is okay. Lester has good peripheral vision. He can see a pretty wide area around the side of his head, but he doesn’t panic when he gets in position. He doesn’t glance over in dread. He focuses on her face as if she is the only thing in the world, as if he can’t see the pair of deaders that have taken interest in her.

“Just slide down a bit. I got you, babe.”

“Okay.” And her straining arms slip down. He holds her tighter than he probably needs to. He can still see the shapes moving toward her from the corner of his eye, but he resists the urge to scream at her to hurry the fuck up!

“Okay, now just reach out with your leg, a little farther, the top of the fence is ... just … right—THERE! Good job, babe!”

She dangles at the end of his reach, one leg on the fence, one leg swinging free. She kicks the other leg back, catches her foot hard and then slips off the fence. Lester is pulled toward the edge of the roof as she swings, her momentum carrying her toward the house. Her foot slams into it with a vicious bang.

“Ow! Shit!” she yells.

She scrambles around and gets her foot on the fence again, and Lester risks a look down. The pair of deaders are staring up at her, but they don’t reach for her. Thank God those things are stupid. Then one of them stretches a hand upward but fails to brush her foot.

She swings the other foot over, and this time she ends up with both feet on the top of the fence. Now Lester sees one crack in the plan. When he lets go, she will have to fall either forward or backwards over the fence. Right now she is stretched tight, but bent over slightly at the waist. Just as he realizes the predicament, she looks down and lets out a scream.

“Oh shit! Pull me back up!”

“Angela, we may not have another shot. I’m going to push you, and I want you to try and roll backwards and fall off the fence. I know you can do it, babe, just be brave!”

“You be fucking brave! Pull me up!”

Lester ignores her plea.

“Please, just try it, baby. Please! I love you!”

“I don’t care! Pull me back up!”

“Babe, just do it! We may not have another chance. Please!”

She starts to say something else, to argue, but she risks another look at the deader that is reaching toward her and seems to make up her mind. The man only has one arm, and he is having a terrible time using it. He reaches up but can’t seem to find her leg.

“Goddammit!” she screams. “Push me!” and Lester does. He shoves as hard as he can from his precarious position, which doesn’t leave a lot of wiggle room. No chance for a do-over. If this doesn’t work, she is going to die. He looks down, and another of the things has joined the party, so three of them are in on the plan.

Angie seems to have enough momentum. There is a split second where it seems she is about to fall, but she sticks her butt back and leans away from his push. Gravity does the rest of the work as she tumbles back off the fence and out of view. There is a loud cry of pain and what he hopes isn’t the sound of bones snapping. He can’t see her and has a terrible feeling of panic.

“Ouch!” she calls back just as he comes to his feet and is trying to look over the edge of the fence.

“You okay, babe?”

“I am not fucking okay. My ass is going to be bruised for a week!” He breathes a sigh of relief and gathers up the rope and cloth. He tosses them over the edge and is greeted by another loud “Oww!”

“A little warning!”

“Sorry, these things are making me nervous. But you did it! I am so proud of you, babe, you saved our asses.”

“At the expense of my own,” she says, but she still sounds upset.

The rope and cloth go taut. He can tell right away that there is a problem. The sheets that seemed so long when they were knotting them together aren’t quite long enough. He will have to trust the rope.

“Pull that rope tight, babe!”

“Hold your goddamn horses.”

He tries to be patient, but he wants to get to her as soon as possible. She has no weapon, no way to defend herself if he doesn’t make it over the fence. He wishes there were more time so he could have her run onto the neighbor’s roof and then tie the rope to something over there. Then he could ‘Indiana’ it across the gap. Just call me Dr. Jones.

Speaking of drugs, he should have gotten more of his stash, something to bargain with. Maybe he can come back later and retrieve some of it. Come back with a fucking army and take back the neighborhood. Not that he knows many people here. He doesn’t really have friends, just acquaintances who stick around his house for a few minutes to be polite when they pick up an eighth of weed or a dozen hits of ecstasy. In fact, with the exception of Ronnie, who is dead in his front yard, he can’t think of many ‘friends’ who would go out of their way to offer him water if he were parched and dying in the desert.

The rope goes taut, and he realizes what a stupid idea this was. How the hell is he going to shinny down that line, reach the top of the fence, and then get down without falling on Angela? If he lands on her, she may just take the keys and leave his sorry ass behind. Angela’s stock has seriously increased over the last day. Not only is it the best sex ever, not only is she beautiful, she puts up with his shit and she is a zombie slayer extraordinaire. He ought to marry her.

“You ready for me?”

“Yes, just hurry up so we can get out of here, babe. I want to get on the road and back to the real world.”

Lester wonders if civilization will still be there when they arrive. Is this really a good idea? Maybe they should lock themselves up in John’s house, nail everything shut and then sit it out. He knows the house has food and running water, and they must have some booze stashed somewhere.