'They're gonna smell.' Mike said.
Dora shrugged. 'Better out there then around the pool. Could we bring them out front?'
'Uh. There are more out there. They just kept coming. I cleared a path, but there were lots of them. Maybe we can wait until tomorrow, maybe they will go away?'
'Fine.' Dora said with resignation in her voice, 'We drag em back here and put a cap in any of them that are still alive. At least they are easy to kill.'
'I don't know Dora. Out in front. Well I missed one. Took two shots at him, he moved like…well, like us. Fast, he ran away when I started firing. None of the others ran away, they just came forward no matter what.'
Dora looked at Mike, trying to figure out if he was putting them on, she decided he wasn't and said, 'That's…not good.'
'No.' he answered.
Chapter 14
Moving the bodies back to the back fence took them almost an hour and a half. They had killed thirty seven zombies in the back yard. Mike said he had probably killed that many in the front too, and when the women looked out the front windows there were still dozens of them wandering around in the street and on the front lawn. After the noise stopped they did begin to disperse, but not quickly. Some of them looked at the house in a way that made Dora uneasy.
In the back Dora got her garden hose out and washed all the blood and gore off of the patio and away from the pool. She turned the pools filtration system on manually and let it run while they checked the jerky and made dinner. The sun was near setting by the time they had dinner ready and were gathered around the picnic table to eat outside. They kept their conversation low and the television was muted, but on, providing a flickering light as the natural light faded.
'Do you think they are attracted to light?' asked Paige.
'We better not risk it. I think we should stay upstairs, we can tape paper or foil to the windows, to black them out completely, then barricade the hallway at the top of the stairs. I still don't think I am going to get a good night's sleep.' said Dora.
'We still have electricity, that is a good sign right?' asked Mike.
'Probably, I mean if they are attracted to light maybe they will gather under the street lights?' said Paige.
'We should be so lucky!' said Dora.
'We were lucky.' Mike said, raising his wine glass in a toast, 'to us, new best friends.'
The women clinked glasses with him and then drained the few ounces of wine out of them. Dora had opened a bottle of wine, some ice wine from an Iowa winery, as she expected, both of her young guests liked it well enough. She had told them they would only split the one bottle, which shouldn't be enough to do any of them any harm. She was surprised that she was feeling buzzed by the end of the meal.
The three of them cleaned up the dishes in silence and Dora shut off the patio television and came inside. She locked the door and braced a chair in front of it, wedged under the handle. They had already done the same thing to the front door and even to the door leading to the garage and basement. In the kitchen Dora gathered up her tin foil and some paper bags and the three of them headed upstairs with some duct tape from Roger's stash.
In the dying light from the master bedroom they looked outside at the street below, there were still a couple dozen zombies milling about out there. Dora sighed heavily and then put the foil over the window, Mike and Paige taped the ends up and then went down both edges, sealing the room against all light emissions. There were three windows in the master bedroom, two facing the street and one facing the side of the house. They sealed them all and even did the small window in the master bathroom. The three of them spent some time looking up at the sky light that provided extra light in the bathroom, but none of them could figure out a way to block it off; eventually they all conceded it probably didn't matter as it faced almost straight up and slanted towards the back of the house.
'We can open that you know.' said Dora referring to the sky light. 'Then we could get the ladder from the garage and get up onto the roof.'
'How about tomorrow? I was up at five today to make my shift, I am dead tired.' said Mike.
'Yeah tomorrow. Let's move the bed out of the other bedroom and set it up across the top of the stairs, then we can get some sleep.' said Dora, the other two agreed and Paige was yawning by the time they found themselves back in the master bedroom.
'There's only one bed.' Mike said.
'It's a king, it'll hold us.' said Dora.
'Uh, I dunno..' began Mike.
'What? Still afraid of us women folk? We don't bite. Hard.' teased Dora.
Mike's face took on a tone of uncertainty, his eyes shifted back and forth from Dora to Paige, taking in their bodies, until Dora let out a laugh. 'Relax sweet pea, Paige here has convinced me to take the high ground. Not to sleep with anyone just because my worthless piece of shit husband did so.'
'Don't you still love him anyway?' asked Paige.
Dora thought for a moment, Paige was not asking to poke fun at her, but earnestly trying to figure out how Dora felt.
'Paige…' she began, 'Paige, in one day I have found out my husband was cheating on me with my old best friend, I've fought off a horde of zombies who just wanted to eat me and I've made the new best friends I have ever had in the world. Do I love Roger? I guess, underneath it all I do. But right now I am very, very angry with him and I really do not think I will ever forgive him. You know how many affairs I had when I was with him?' Dora paused as both of them shook their heads, she could see them mentally guessing numbers, 'None, not one. I had opportunities too, but I never crossed that line. I thought about it, but I never would have. Paige, you stopped me from thinking of Mike as a piece of meat to get back at Roger with, that's good because that is all it would have been. I am emotionally drained right now, some sex would be an awesome tension reliever, but I think, maybe, it would be best if we just sleep tonight.' She waited until they digested that then could not help but add, 'The bed is big enough for all of us, the only rule I have is we all sleep nude.'
Paige laughed, Mike looked perplexed, so she said, 'She is joking Mike. Still you better sleep on the floor.'
'Okay, fine. Can we still get downstairs? Roger the bastard has a camping mattress in the garage, right where he kept the paint ball stuff. I don't think he ever even used it.' said Dora.
The three of them pulled the barricade out of the way and made one more trip downstairs to get the mattress. They also used the opportunity to check on the drying beef and to make sure there were no more zombies in the back yard. It was all clear and after ten minutes they were upstairs making Mike a place to sleep along one wall. Sitting on the bed and floor with flashlights, Dora held the light up to her face and in a spooky voice said, 'Now we shall tell scary stories that keep us up all night. Who wants to go first?'
The other two laughed and shut off their lights, leaving only Dora's lit up. She stifled a yawn with one hand and pouted out, 'Party poopers!'
'Dude.' began Mike, 'We were up at, like, dawn. I am crashing.' Mike let out a yawn of his own and pulled a blanket up over his head. They had taken all the bedding and pillows off of the barricade mattress so he looked pretty comfortable in his 'Mike Nest'.
'Alright, to sleep we go.' Dora stood up from the foot of the bed and made sure the stout wooden door was locked, then got the chair from her vanity and propped the back of it under the handle before returning to bed with Paige. Dora thought she would fall asleep instantly, however the events of the day kept replaying in her head over and over. Paige's soft snores reminded her of Roger, on the floor Mike moaned in his sleep, eventually the
