Zombie Waltz (Book 2) Page 8

  Fantastic

  I run through the hall and down the stairs. I am near the bottom before Islowto look around. The quad is quiet. Irace backbythe cafeteria and the first island of locker rows we crossed. I finallyreach the multitude of bus doors. I hit the jam bar on the same one I entered through. As soon as the door opens, I’m struck with the blinding bright white of the intense sun. I walk forward into it, blinded for a few steps. I stand just out from under the awning outside the doors and blink, rubbing both fists in my eyes. When the glare fades, I can see that the scene is pretty much as I left it.

  The caddy is pulled up and parked haphazardly by the curb. Faith is in the backseatof the car. She looks alone in there from here but Iknow she has Kevin laid across the bench. Jason sits on the blacktop of the bus lane with his back leaned up against the right front tire and Kim and Nick sit on the hood. Kim hasChris’s black 9mm Beretta in her hands and Nick has Faith’s shotgun hung at his side. It stirs some bother in me to see him holding Faith’s gun, but it passes. Nick and Kim nod at me and when she looks up and sees that I have come back, Faith gets out of the car.

  “Where’s Chris?” She asks.

  “I left him to babysit. I think we found a nice place that will work for Kevin. It is a science lab some kids cleaned up and fortified a little.”

  “Babysit? What do you mean?” Kim asks.

  “We found a few kids holed up in there. There’s no time to explain. How is he?” I ask Faith, nodding toward the car.

  “He’s not good. It is hard to tell where the bullet is but it must have missedhis liver and stomach.” She answers, turningback toward the car.

  “How do you know that?” I ask. “He is still alive. We will need to bring everything in there and carry him too.”

  “I can do that.” I say.

  “I can help carry him if you want. I am feeling a little stronger.” Nick says, but then he nearly doubles over choking and gagging as if the words were hard to say.

  “No. It’s upstairs. You’re going to have a hard-enough time getting yourself up there. Kim can help you. You two know where it is, right? In the science hall about half way down.

  “Yes.” Kim says. Nick stands upright again and nods.

  “Good. You might as well head that way. Give Faith back her shotgun so we all have some cover-fire. I will get Chris and come back for the bags once the rest of you are safe up there. Two of those kids can come help us with the bags too. It should be okay.” I march around the car and Faith makes room after sliding Kevin gently to the edge of the seat. He leans upagainst the doorframe hung up by the suspended seatbelt; eyes closed and mouth open slightly, his face is ghostly pale.

  Itake him under his arms and lift. He moans as if I am hurting him terribly but doesn’t open his eyes. I cradle him against my chest and turn, using my knee to shut the car door. Kim has Nick around the waist and the two are walking under the awning ahead of us with Jason right behind them. Faith holds her shotgun again and looks back at me from just in front of the hood of the caddy.

  I walk briskly for the rest of the way, but Faith instructs me to take it very easy when we get to the stairs. I do, and by the time we are back at the classroom door, everyone else has gone inside already. “Hey.” I say, turning and looking at Faith. She has wide eyes and is walking with a slight crouch. She looks back at me with her head first and then her eyes.

  “What?” She smiles for a moment and then it fades and her face looks stern and drained of color. “What is it?”

  “They have a gun.” I whisper. “A revolver’s sitting on the desk.”

  “So?”

  “I just wanted you to know.”

  “I’m sure most people that are still alive today have guns, Dead Boy.” She says, smiling fully and walks ahead of me into the classroom.

  I follow and find them all standing in a circle with the 3 roleplayers. Kim and Nick talk with the others as if they already know them. I would be more surprised if they didn’t. When I first walk in, it is like I am the teacher and I have just stepped into my unruly class at the bell. Talking ceases. All eyes are on me and the little boy I cradle in my arms.

  There are eight white topped tables with cabinets beneath them between us and the teacher’s desk. Faith’s eyes sweep across the room, “This will work.” She says. She points to one of the lab tables in the middle of the room. “Lay him over there.” I cross past the others and gently lay Kevin on the bare hard countertop of the table.

  Kevin’s color is awful. He’s pale and his skin is cold. On his dark blue shirt, it looks like juice or Kool-Aid or something has been poured straight down the front. The wet dark patch soaked in blood has a single tinyhole in the center of it; right in the middle of his belly. He looks dead. I can’t tell if he’s even breathing. I feel the group around me staring and look up. Ian and Phillip are right across from me looking down at Kevin.

  “What happened to him?” Ian asks, pushing his glasses up on his nose.

  “A man shot him.” I say, looking back down at Kevin’s face.

  Despite the lack of color and the tightlysealed eyes and mouth, he is a cute little boy. His smile was big and bright; I can’t stand the thought that I may not see it again. I turn from him. Faith is beside me, leaning over him and delicately lifting his shirt to look at his belly. The cold air against it must have irritated him because he moans. His small voice is not one that is accustomed to articulating pain. It comes out like a cough with no sound. I look back at his face and he has opened his big brown eyes. He has the most amazinglythick and long eye-lashes. Thiskid could grow up to be a real ladies man; if he gets to grow up.

  “Are you guys sure you shouldn’t take him to a hospital?” Ian asks.

  I suppress the urge to laugh. “He got shot at the hospital.”

  “Well what areyou going to do? Helooks badman.” Ian continues. I look down at Kevin and then at Ian again in time to see him push his glasses up again.

  Faith interrupts, “Les, I need all those bags out of the car. I am going to have to operate.”

  “I can go with you to get the stuff.” Chris offers. He had been leaning, along with Nick and Kim, against a bench sat into the far wall in front of one of the room’s three big picture windows.

  “No, Chris. You should find your way to the roof. Come back and tell us if you see anything or anyone.” Chris nods a single tight flinch of his head and turns on his heels without further reply. He walks brisklyout of the room without a backward glance. Iturn back to Faith andthe others. “Do you two mind helping me bring our supplies up here?” I ask, looking at Ian and Phillip.

  Both reply at once. Ian says, “Sure I can help.” Phillip nods. We turn to go and Faith says, “Wait.” She walks up to us, “We have another problem. Kevin is bleeding internally.”

  “What?” I turn back to her.

  “I think the bullet is in his intestine. If that is the case I am going to have to do an exploratory laparoscopy to find it.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that he has lost quite a lot of blood, and he will lose more. We will need blood for a transfusion or I won’t be able to operate. And I don’t know his blood type.” She says with some finality, putting her hands on her hips.

  “It’s okay.” I shake my head at her and squeeze my eyes shut. I can’t believe Iam goingto saythis. “Ican give him blood. I’m O negative.” “Really, are you serious? That’s perfect.”

  “They always harassed me to give whenever I could.” I say.

  “All emergency patients are given O negative until their blood type is determined. You should be able to give him the blood we need.” She turns back to Kevin and looks down, “…which is good because we probably will need a lot of it.”

  Fantastic.

  I turn to Ian and Phillip, “Can you guys come help me?” Then I look back over at Kim, Nick and Jason, “Kim can you come with us? Bring your gun so you can cover us.” She snaps out of her shaken gaze, nods and lets herself down from
the counter. The three of them follow me to the classroom door. I open it and hold a flat hand face up letting them go out in front of me.

  Looking back at Faith, I smile, “Sit tight here. We will be right back.” I walk through the door before Faith can answer, but doubt she would. She’s already leaning over Kevin again. Gretchen stares at me the whole-time, scowling. Probably doesn’t like this or me, not one bit.

  The boys and I follow Kim down the hall. She holds her gun out in front of her and walks quickly. It seems to ease her mind to hold it. It takes little time to get down the stairs and across the quadto the bus doors, but before Kim can push one open I say, “Wait up.” She, Ian and Phillip stop and look at me as Ipass them and put myhand on the door’scrossbar. “Let me go first.” I say. Kim steps back and holds her pistol up in both hands next to her face and nods.

  I push the door open and look out.

  Surgery

  Grabbingthe bags out of the car goesoff without a hitch. In a flash, we arrive back upstairs in the science lab. I burst through the doors, toting the greensuitcase, veryaware that it still holds that gun. Kim follows with Ian and Phillip. We deposit the medical supplies by the table Kevin lies on and Faith practically jumps into the first duffel. When she stands holding a white plastic sheet she asks if I can lift Kevin. I do while Kim and Faith stretch the plastic sheets over the lab tabletop. I lay Kevin back down on the sheets as gently as possible.

  A tray is produced from one of the black duffel bags and is sat by Kevin’s legs. Faith starts to lay out all kinds of sharp scalpels and other scary lookingmedical instruments that Icouldn’t even begin to name, and I walk away to the windows. The sun’s high in the clear sky.

  Faith also packed a stand that looks like tent poles when she takes it from the duffel. She pulls out empty plastic bags; the kind that blood would fill and hangs one of the empty ones up.

  Iwatch her rip open a small half white/half clear plastic baggyand a hypodermic syringe spills out. My stomach was already knotting and I begin to feel light headed so I excuse myself to the hallway.

  Only moments later, the door opens and Faith emerges alone. She carries one of the empty plastic bags hooked up to a long yellow rubber hose coiledin herhand. She also holds a fat pen-lookingplastic thing with a large needle protruding from the end. I look right at the needle and immediately realize I shouldn’t have. Its end is as hollow as a gun barrel but pointed on one side and tapered away. In Faith’s other hand, she holds a long piece of thick flat black rubber that looks like an oversized rubber band. “Are you ready? The faster we get this over with, the faster you can come back out here and…well so you don’t have to watch me…operate.”

  “Have you ever done something like this before?”

  “Of course, I have…assisted.”

  “What will you do?”

  “I need to have the blood ready. Kim has agreed to monitor his blood pressure and other vital signs for me. Even when we have machines to do that, we have extra assistants in surgerylike this to watch…basically to watch our backs.”

  “You will do fine. I know you will.”

  She lets out a breath and smiles, but it fades quickly. “I sat up a chair near the door so you can sit and look at the wall while I…” She smiles again and then as if she can’t help herself adds, “you know…drain out all of your blood.”

  “Not cool.” I say, chuckling lightly as I follow her back into the classroom. There is a small wooden chair right by the door as promised. It faces the wall just on the other side of the door and it reminds me of my mother sitting me in the corner when I was little. There is another chair facing the first with a small stand next to it where there are more empty plastic bags and little white and clear pouches, containing those vile needles.

  Our friends stand in a semi-circle around the lab table that Kevin lies on. Theyall staresilentlyat me with longfaces. The shades have been drawn in here so it is much brighter and both Ian and Nick hold long thick black flashlights. Iwonder how Idid not notice Faith packingall this stuff in that basement at the hospital. I even helped her grab a lot of it and carried two of the bags myself, but had little clue of what we were grabbing.

  Kim holds a plastic device made of a long tube with a plastic pillow-looking orb on one end and on the other is what looks like one of those face-masks from an airplane. I nod at the crowd but no one returns it.

  It seems like everyone but me will be assisting. They all look very intent on their jobs. I sit and stare at the wall. Faith takes my arm, and wraps the band around it. I look away at the door. She thumps my arm in the crease and I feel the pinch and sting of the inserted needle. Once it is in my arm, I steal a glance.

  I shouldn’t have looked. I watch the almost clear tube fill with the dark red blood that pumps out of my arm, beginning to fill the bag. I start to feel a little queasy and look away. It’s over sooner than I expect. Faith holds my elbow and helps me into the hall to sit down across from the door.

  And here I sit. I don’t feel woozy anymore but I also don’t have the desire to rise. Some noises come from the room. Mostly just talking that I can’t make out. It sounds mostly like Faith talking but occasionally I hear a lower voice. After the sun sets, I’m certain the surgery will be over soon. And yet, the hours pass by.

  Chris returns from the roof, but I must not look like I want to talk because he only says “Hi.” and continues into the classroom. I get up and cautiously follow him in. It’s still bright in here despite the lack of electricity or sunlight. Faith has candles lit all around the room.

  Not long after he enters the classroom, Chris leaves holding a lit candle. I follow him again. He sets it on the dish of a dry water fountain not far down the hall and then returns to me, standing outside the lab doorway. “Figured we could use some light out here.”

  “Thanks.” I say. The light from the candle does not fill the hall but it is better than the perfect dark that was out here before. He returns to the room and then comes out again with his rifle over his back.

  “Haven’t seen much yet. A few straggling zombies and a guy running across the parking lot, but that’s all.”

  “Thanks for keeping a look out. Are you going to find a place to sleep?”

  “Nah. I am going back up there. I like it up there. I like being able to see.” Chris turns from me when he is finished and walks away down the hall.

  I don’t say anything else. I sit back down and lean up against the lockers. I don’t want to sleep but my body has different plans.

  I wake to a jolt. I hear a soft word from the classroom but nothing else. I want to see how everything is going but I am afraid to at the same time. I don’t have to worry on it long though. The door opens and Kim comes into the hall. “Hey…” Isaywith a thick voice.“Is everythingokay?” I ask.

  She looks down at me. Her eyes are red and heavy looking. The candle Chris brought is now burnt almost all the way out. I wonder how long Faith has been in there working on Kevin. I wish I could be beside her, but I know I can’t.

  “Can you come in and give blood again?” She starts to cry.

  I am drowsy but I try to stand as quick as possible and stumble. “Hey, don’t be upset.” I say, folding the girl into my arms. “What’s going on?”

  “Kevin…she is still operating…it has been so long…I am afraid the sun will come up.”

  “Faith’s going to get him all fixed up. Try not to worry. How is Nick?” I ask, letting her go. She dries a tear from her cheek.

  “He’s fine…just real worried. He has offered to go out and look for more supplies. I think he just wants to get out of there. He is very withdrawn.” She pauses, “He won’t even look at Jason or me.”

  “He’s probably just really messed up right now. He’ll come around.” I say. “Let’s get in there so Faith can stab me again.” I smile and follow her back into the room. In many ways, it is the same. I am not sure where they found them, but Faith has two big mirrors sitting on chairs on both sides of her. There ar
e a lot of candles burning and the whole room smells like wax.

  Sitting alone in the hallway, I had imagined everyone covered with Kevin’s blood; six hands stuck in his abdomen screaming to each other. It is much calmer than that. Faith’s bent over him and when she looks up at me, I can see there is blood on both of her arms and down the front of her scrubs. She winks at me quickly and goes straight back to work.

  Kim goes back to Kevin’s side and begins to pump a black bauble on the end of a tube with a pressuregauge. A black pillow wrapped around Kevin’s arm inflates. Kim stops pumping and holds up a watch in her hand next to the gauge and studies both. She whispers something to Faith and she nods. Gretchen sits in her chair next to Faith holding her tray of instruments. Ian is standing byKevin’s head holding the breathing device with the plastic balloon and face mask methodically squeezing. A pile of rags sits bythe table that were white but noware mostlypink.Mystomach turns and I must sit.

  The chairs remain sat up by the door. I expect Faith to come and take the blood so I am surprised when it is the other boy, Phillip, who brings the needle and tubes. “Uh…do you know what you’re doing?” I ask him.

  “No.”

  I sigh. Jason is lying on the bench by the window. Nick is next to him and both are silent. I watch the little boy sleep while Phillip draws my blood. It seems like it takes forever. I can feel my heart rate increase and start to develop an itch on my nose.

  As soon as Phillip pulls the needle out and covers the puncture wound with a cotton ball, I stand and turn to bolt from the room. I grab the door handle but stop and close myeyes. It feels like an electrical wave rolls through my body. As I stumble, I feel strong hands grab me. I look back and Phillip has my shoulders and is guiding me over to the wall. He helps me slide down and I collapse.

  Chapter 3: They call me Dead Boy Teacher’s Pet

  When I wake, the hallway is filled with dull light. Sunshine pours through all the windows. I jump up, startled and unsure of where I am or how long I have been here. The door to the science lab where we found the three kids playing that weird game is propped open.