The Long Fall of Night: The Long Fall of Night Book 1 (43 page)

“Yeah, I do,” Elliot said, holding onto his forearms. Ash walked backward into the water, making sure the current at their chosen location, around a curve from their camp but not so far Elliot couldn’t make the trip back, wasn’t so strong it would be difficult for them to take care of business. “Ohhh, cold!”

Ash chuckled, then mirrored Elliot as the water hit his balls, and they crawled away from the shock to lodge firmly inside his pelvis. Or his throat, he wasn’t sure which. “Brace yourself, it’s a bit nippy.”

The water reached Ash’s ribs. He had his shave kit slung around his neck with a piece of nylon rope, and he pulled out the non-toxic gel soap they’d gotten from a camp store. It smelled like the natural mint with which it was infused, and he resisted the urge to smear it on Elliot and take him into his arms to inhale deeply. Instead, he grabbed Elliot’s hand, turning it palm up to squirt a dollop in it, gesturing to Elliot’s wild curls.

“But my hair’s not wet yet,” Elliot said, amused.

“Dunk your head, then,” Ash teased, taking a fortifying breath and following his own advice, extending his arm to hold the shave kit above water level. Jesus, it was cold.

Elliot followed suit, and beneath the water, hands found Ash’s hips and pulled him closer. If there had been any length left to his shrunken dick, he’d have popped wood as the unbidden thought of Elliot going down on him under the water rose. But when the hands slipped, Ash hauled Elliot up by his biceps. The guy was weak with fatigue from his seizure, and Ash’s mind was in the gutter.

“Need help?”

“Need more soap,” Elliot said, holding his hand out again.

They washed with little fanfare after that, Ash behaving himself except to steady Elliot as the effort sapped his energy. When they were clean, Ash held up a small can of shave cream and raised a brow.

“I can do it for you if you want. Might make you feel human again.”

Elliot ran his fingertips into the trimmed beard Ash had grown, the scratchy sound loud in the stillness. “Does mine make me look as hot as yours does you?”

Ash smiled but pulled Elliot’s hand gently away. “It is hot, and sweaty, and itchy. If it weren’t such a pain in the ass to do, I’d shave it off right now.”

Elliot’s smile faded, and he gestured to his own more-than-stubble. “Yeah, if you want to, knock yourself out.”

Ash may not have been in the mood for flirting, but he didn’t want to give Elliot the wrong idea, either, especially after his fuck up in Ohio. So he kissed him quick but hard, then concentrated on readying the shaving supplies. Lathering Elliot’s face, Ash looked him in the eyes and smiled.

“Feeling any better now that you’re clean?”

“Yeah.” Elliot exhaled, looking out over the lake as Ash turned his face side to side to smooth on the cream. “Makes you really appreciate the way we had it, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Ash said, putting a new blade on his razor. “I kind of like this back to our roots stuff. I don’t know how I’d adapt to living this way all the time, but it’s temporary. You’ll get a hot shower before you know it,” he promised. “Frankly, I want a Coke with ice.” He wiped at his chin, getting a smear of shave cream in his scruff. “See? I’m drooling.”

The scrape of the razor on Elliot’s skin was the only sound for several minutes, and the wind kicked up locks of their hair, drying it a little wild. There was no mistaking the intimacy of the moment, especially when Elliot watched him instead of their surroundings. Ash concentrated on what he was doing, but the scrutiny got to be too much to bear.

“What?”

“You’re so difficult to read sometimes,” Elliot admitted, speaking through clamped teeth so as not to move his jaw beneath Ash’s razor swipes. “I wish I knew what you were thinking.”

Ash splashed the razor in the water and continued along Elliot’s jaw, tilting his head back to get the curve of his chin. “Mostly I hope I can get us there safely. Trying to keep my head on straight. Trying to make things easier for everyone else.”

“Who’s making it easier for you?”

Ash looked at him, warmth blossoming in his chest like a firework, sharp and majestic. “You just make sure you don’t have any more mental earthquakes, and that’ll make it easier for me.”

“You don’t have to take me on, too, Ash. I can take care of myself.”

“Except see, you’re not entirely correct there. You go down for a couple days after these. Hell, just getting clean is kind of wiping you out. Circles around your eyes, unsteady on your feet. You have to rest—and that doesn’t make you weak, before you go arguing with me,” he said when Elliot looked ready to protest. “If we were at home, and you had a couch to lie on and takeout a phone call away, yeah, you’d be just fine. Out here, someone has to help you, make sure you get water and food, and there’s no Maytag refrigerator in the next tent with a pizza and a gallon of milk. It’s okay, Elliot. We have to hunt for ourselves, too. It’s not a big deal making sure we have enough for you, and Riley’s gotten really freakin’ good at snares. But if you were out here alone? You’d be in bad shape, buddy.”

Elliot closed his eyes and breathed through flared nostrils. Ash wasn’t sure if he was angry or fighting for composure over tears. Either one would be understandable. Elliot had told him many nights while they lay side by side and held hands how frustrated and helpless his epilepsy made him feel, how he hated people thinking he was fragile. Ash had only kissed his knuckles and said no, Elliot was stronger than a lot of people, and having a condition didn’t make him weak. He’d repeat it until Elliot believed it, which would probably be never.

“I don’t want to be a burden.”

“Elliot, how well do you think I’d handle leading all these people to safety if I didn’t have someone to talk to at night?”

“Except you don’t talk to me. We talk about stupid shit like
Ren and Stimpy
marathons and how pissed you are you probably won’t get to see how
Game of Thrones
ends.”

“You think that stuff doesn’t matter?” Ash asked, tilting Elliot’s face up to shave his neck, taking particular care around his prominent Adam’s apple. “That stuff matters more now, because it’s gone. Sure, when we get to Seattle, I can go buy George R.R. Martin’s books, but he’s not done with the series, and I highly doubt his publisher’s biggest concern is the next print run. Do you know how happy I am they got the Harry Potter movies finished in time for this?”

“See? This is what I mean. I don’t know how you feel about all this, other than your pop culture woes. Are you scared? Are you pissed? Are you going through caffeine withdrawals? What do you think life will be like when we get to Seattle? Will you want…?”

Ash concentrated on getting around the other side of Elliot’s jaw before he answered. “Yes, I’m scared. Riley’s generation is probably going to have to clean up our fucking mess, and that makes me ragey because they didn’t mess it up. I’m also pissed because we’ve had to make some difficult decisions while here, and we wouldn’t have if it weren’t for some dickhead terrorist thinking they could fuck with hundreds of millions of lives. I never got hooked on coffee, so no caffeine problems, but like I said, I miss Coke. And ice. Life in Seattle will be different than we’re used to. Rationing, more difficulty with the food supply than we’ve ever faced, and forget trusting anybody. What is our government doing with all this? But your last question, something tells me that’s the one you want answered most.”

Elliot remained silent until Ash finished, and they rinsed off the leftover bits of shave cream. They’d always looked to Ash like the confetti left over after making paper snowflakes with scissors in grade school.

“Good thing you’re going back to lie down in the tent. The smell of this stuff would scare off any game we wanted to hunt.” Elliot chuckled distantly, and Ash eyed him. “I won’t laugh at whatever you wanted to ask, you know.”

“I know,” Elliot acknowledged. “Just have to decide if I have the guts for the answer.”

“Fair enough.” They moved toward the shore, but before the water dropped below their hips, Ash halted him and threaded his arms around Elliot’s waist. He kissed him, his fingers caressing smooth jaw and cheek, and he stopped before it could get too heated. Elliot needed his rest. “Let’s get you back to camp.”

They were on the bank dressing when Elliot near-whispered, “Will you want me to stay with you when we get to Seattle?”

Ash looked at him, startled. “You have comfortable accommodations with your parents. I would have thought you’d be more inclined to go with them.”

“If they respected me half as much as you do, I would,” Elliot answered, not looking at him as he pulled on his shoes.

“Then I want you to stay.” He could tell that wasn’t quite the answer Elliot wanted, but he wouldn’t keep the man with him if he could get better health care with his folks, who had access to doctors Ash could only dream of. Best Ash could promise was a bumpy-ass boat ride to the mainland from Marvin’s bunker and whichever doctor would see them, probably at some free clinic. Maybe Elliot wanted Ash to say he needed him, but he wasn’t about to put himself over Elliot’s medical requirements.

Without another word, they walked back to camp, Elliot leaning heavily on Ash as his sapped energy became more apparent. They were in sight of the tents when a gunshot rang out. Ash hit the ground and pulled Elliot down with him, half covering him as he yanked his gun from the back of his pants. They were exposed in the middle of a trail, and he couldn’t see anything moving to indicate where the shot had originated.

Aaron and Brian, looking like they’d gone out for some early fishing, scrambled into camp from the other direction. Brian dropped the poles, his pistol pointed skyward. Aaron bore one of the rifles. They scanned the area, and upon seeing nothing, moved to the trees to watch for anyone approaching. Ash patted Elliot’s hip to get him to scoot into some brush along the trail and then tiptoed to the nearest tree.

Charlotte stuck her head out of her tent, but Ash hissed and frantically waved her back in. She didn’t have to be told twice, leaving the tent door flapping in the breeze. That left Jason and Tim unaccounted for.

Ash was reasonably sure Jason hadn’t gotten up and walked away, so he searched for Tim’s tall frame amongst the trees. The sound of a zipper breaking the silence got his attention. Tim crawled from his tent, coughing, his eyes streaming. He had the other Colt. He stood, shoulders slumped, gun hand limp and careless.

“Tim, get down!” Ash whispered, eyes trained on the trees for movement. But there was none, other than a slight breeze.

“He made me.” Tim’s words wavered, and he wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “Fucker made me.” He staggered then and sat as though his legs no longer had the strength to carry him. When his shoulders began to shake, Ash stepped out from his hiding place, keeping an eye on their surroundings and nodding to where Aaron and Brian hid, whirling his finger to indicate they needed to cover him.

He approached Tim with caution. The man was clearly distraught, and an armed man in such turmoil was a danger to any and everything in his view. Ash tucked away his gun and showed his hands to indicate he meant no harm.

“What do you mean, buddy?” he asked when he was close enough to crouch just outside of Tim’s reach. “Who made you do what?”

“Jason,” Tim wailed, his lips twisted in a grimace. “He made me shoot him.” In a display of self-loathing, he lifted his gun hand, limp at the wrist, and waved it as though it was obvious what he’d done, and he wanted to cut off the hand that had dared betray him.

“Jason’s been shot?” Ash demanded.

“He’s dead,” Tim sobbed, lowering his chin to his chest.

Ash waved Aaron out of hiding, pointing frantically to Tim and Jason’s shared tent. Aaron went, leaving the rifle on the picnic table as he passed. Brian stepped out as well, his gun still in hand but pointed down. Elliot stumbled into view and sat at the edge of the clearing. His eyes were hooded, and he breathed heavily, but he looked determined, as though saying he wasn’t leaving Ash alone with Tim.

“But you said he made you shoot him.”

Tears slid down Tim’s face and snot dripped from the tip of his elfin nose. It was then Ash noticed his eyes were swollen as though he’d been crying for longer than a few minutes.

“He did. He woke up hours ago and was talking crazy. Said he was being chased and a bear had chewed off his foot. That kind of made sense, so I figured he was having a nightmare.” The explanation was given amid stutters and shuddering gasps, but as he talked, Tim seemed to calm. Ash sat patiently, afraid of Tim flying into a rage if he spoke too much. “I tried to wake him up, but he was already awake, babbling about birds dive-bombing his head and people after us we needed to kill.”

“How long did this go on?” Aaron asked, emerging from checking on Jason. He met Ash’s eyes grimly and shook his head, then nodded at Tim’s gun. Jason was dead.

“Hours. I was terrified.”

“Why didn’t you come get me?” Aaron crouched on Tim’s other side.

“I tried!” Tim shouted, face scrunched in so much pain. “He wouldn’t let me leave, and I called your name but you didn’t come, and he wouldn’t let me keep calling. Put his hand over my mouth and wouldn’t let me go until I promised to shut up.”

“Did he say he saw odd things?”

“I think the birds dive-bombing his head were pretty fucking odd. There were no birds in our tent,” Tim snapped viciously.

“Hallucinating,” Aaron mouthed to Ash over Tim’s head.

Who, Tim or Jason? Is it still going on now?
Ash pointed to Tim and his watch to ask the question without speaking. Aaron shook his head and pointed to the tent.

“He finally went back to sleep, but he was so hot, and any time I moved, he woke up and grabbed me, keeping me from leaving. I didn’t want to shout again because he needed the sleep, and—” His chin quivered, and his lips morphed into a horrific grimace, the tears coming anew. “He woke up just now and was making sense. Said he knew he was dying, and that he was ready to go. Made me promise not to let him go crazy like that again. He remembered the birds.”

Ash crab-walked to Tim’s side and rubbed his back, trying to soothe him. “Was he still feverish?”