cars in the street, not a great fit, but the thing drives. Anyway you know we went to the store to get you clothing, nice boxers by the way, we also managed to get to Steve’s apartment and back yesterday afternoon too. The roads are shitty, all filled with broken down cars, almost impassible. I still do not have radio or phone contact with the station, but get this Max, there is a radio station up and running. They guy has been going on for help for quite awhile and he is still on, so we know, or we think anyway that he is not a zombie, yet. There have been a few ‘good old boys’ who have rushed the building, but, wait, you’ll hear.”
Stewart turned to a radio that was sitting on the reception area counter and turned it on. She adjusted the volume slightly until Max could hear a voice, saying, “This is a recorded message, as of last night I was alive and well, but I need to get some sleep, hidden away as best I can be. I am locked in my station and need help, I am not a zombie, but you have to be careful; some of the zombies have learned to talk and act like living people. I am hoping that some group of people can break in and get me out of here or help me defend the building. The address is…” and the voice gave an address of a building out in Aurora.
“Good! Word is getting out at least!” Max shifted around uncomfortably in his boxers. Stewart looked at him and said, “Hey we have power, why don’t you go get dressed and I will make us some coffee? Don’t turn on any lights though, use this,” she handed him a small keychain light, “we think they are attracted to light and I don’t need Michael and Whitney getting overran.”
Max readily agreed and quickly went to get dressed, he found a cup of water next to his clothing and note with a small envelope on top of his clothes. The note read, “For pain, take 1–2 pills as needed up to 8 pills a day. Addictive, don’t abuse them!” Max thought his pain was of the ‘two pill’ variety and opening the envelope he found about thirty caplets inside, he quickly swallowed two of them with the water and gingerly pulled on some pants and a shirt. He attempted to pull on some socks, but just could not do the bending required to do so. Instead he saw that someone had set out some closed black crocs next to his old shoes, he slid these onto his feet and walked back out to the coffee that Stewart had since brewed.
“That smells good! I want the biggest cup you have! Anything to go with it?”
Stewart turned and gestured towards the reception counter, where Max saw she had set a package of jumbo muffins. He suddenly realized how hungry he was. A little girl came out from the hallway and Max tensed up, until he saw she was yawning and trying to shake off sleep, something that did not go well with his image of a zombie child.
She saw Max and he was able to watch her go through the exact same phase as he did, apparently he passed the ‘Not a Zombie’ recognition pattern in her brain as she did not even bring her bat up into a defensive posture, just smiled a little smile at him and helped herself to a muffin.
“Hi Jane!” she said. Leaving Max wondering who the hell she was talking to, then he remembered Stewart’s first name was Jane.
“Hiya Kiddo! Get any sleep?” replied Stewart.
“Yeah, woke up when they were fighting again though, anything to drink?”
“Sure we have coffee or there is milk or Sunny D in the fridge.”
“Coffee?! Blech!” said the child making a disgusted face then turning to go back around to wherever the fridge was.
“Hey” Stewart called after her, “Bring the cream out for us, would ya?”
“Sure thing.” The girl called over her shoulder.
“That’s Lauren, she is Whitney's sister, the girl keeping watch out front. Here.” said Stewart handing Max a small white foam coffee cup.
Max raised his eyebrows at the cup, “That is as large as you have? I would hate to see the small size.” Taking a sip though he was surprised at how good the coffee was.
Lauren returned with a cup of orange drink and a carton of heavy cream, handing it to Stewart she turned to Max sticking out her hand, “Hi I am Lauren.”
Max shook her hand and said, “I am Max, pleased to meet you.”
Formal she replied, “Likewise Max. Are you going to be okay?”
“Yeah, I think so, the doc has me all fixed anyway. Are you okay?”
“Me? Nothing happened to me! I am fine.” replied Lauren, who then turned towards her muffin and juice with the hunger of the youth at breakfast.
Stewart laughed. “Yeah she’s fine Max. So you up to moving today? We have a plan, while we were moving around yesterday, I think we can get to your place this morning, to gather up your wife and kids.”
Max looked at her a second then nodded and said, “Hold that thought, Stewart.” He went rushing back to his ‘room’ and grabbed his phone off the charger, he saw that there had been three unanswered calls from home, nervously he dialed his wife’s cell phone number. “C’mon! C’mon!”
After six rings he was shunted to her voice mail, he hung up counted to fifteen and dialed again. Six more rings, nothing, he went out to the waiting room where Stewart was…waiting.
“No answer Stewart, no answer.”
“You don’t know what that means Max, hell they could still be asleep, right? It doesn’t matter though we are heading that way anyway, that is what we agreed on, right?” said Stewart.
Max tried his phone again. No answer. “Shit. Yeah, I am ready to go as soon as we can all get together and go.”
Lauren looked at Max with sad eyes and moved over and gave him a small hug, whispering, “It’ll be okay.” Before moving back to whatever room she came from in the clinic.
“What does that mean? ‘All get together’, it is just the original foursome Max, the others are not coming with us.”
“What? What do you mean? Of course they have to come with us. They are only kids, plus the Doc and nurse Beth, strength in numbers, right?”
“No Max, they want to stay here, the clinic has few windows and the ones it has are very high up on the walls, plus only two outside doors and the back door is steel, they have some medical supplies and more at the pharmacy across the street and they are not too far from two convenience stores and a grocery store, not to mention the clothing stores we got our new duds from. Hell there is even a warehouse store about eight blocks away. They want to stay and we cannot force them to come along with us. Plus another two straggled in last night, a man and a woman, there is room here for about thirty or forty people. We were thinking we might come back here after getting your family today.”
“Here? But I thought, well I thought, I don’t know what I thought, head to the mountains maybe? Or just away, when you mentioned the radio station maybe we would go there. Are you sure we can get through to my house today, you said this morning, but you also said the roads are a mess so how do we get to my house?”
“Well yesterday we stopped in at Starbucks to do a little ‘shopping’ and Tom tried out his laptop, the wireless was still up and we googled your house to get a map so we could plan, he took a screen shot of it and we noticed the light rail line, they have a stop about three blocks from here and there is a line that runs nine blocks away from your house in Arvada, we checked it out and we can drive the car on the rails, slow, but we can do it and I bet it is clear the whole way, even going twenty mph we should be there in less than two hours, right?”
“Whoa, I guess I have to revise my feelings about Tom making such a big deal about getting his laptop. You sure got a lot done while I was out.”
“Yeah, you seem to hold us back Max.” Stewart said with mild sarcasm in her voice, “Seriously if you had been awake you would have had to deal with all of our usual bickering when it comes to making a decision. The only flaw in the plan, so far as I can see, is will we have to take two vehicles when we come back?”
Max smiled, knowing Stewart was trying to put the best light on the situation, “When can we leave?”
Whitney’s voice called into the reception area, “Stewart we got a couple of guys coming in, they look alive, but have guns, you wanna help us here?”
“Coming!” Stewart drew her pistol from her belt and moved towards the doorway, followed closely by Max. They saw two men making their way towards the clinic.
The first man was a big Caucasian and wore a faded denim jacket, blue jeans fresh and crisp from a store shelf somewhere and ‘shit’ kicker cowboy boots that looked about as old as his jacket. He worn a red bandanna around his neck and carried a backpack and what looked like a shotgun in his hands. A baseball bat was strapped to the backpack with the tip of the bat resting in one of the water bottle holders of the pack. He was followed by a jumpy, smaller man of Hispanic descent, he too carried a shotgun and a similar backpack set up. His white long
