Alex couldn’t get his last question out.
Is there anybody else?
For a while, Alex tried to help David with his plans, but he found he had nothing to offer. His mind was a mess. He just wanted to sit and think. To figure out what was going on and what he would do next. He headed to the bedroom, but when he looked in, he saw Nicole talking to a pile of mats. He didn’t pass judgment on the girl, but decided to not involve himself.
David told him none of the other doors were open, but he still tried all of them, hoping to find a space of his own. Each door that didn’t open created new disappointment, as if behind the door lay some solution to the problem; or that somehow his dad and sister had been hiding in there all along, waiting for him. And they were okay.
But there was nothing behind the doors. He knew that. Maybe more office supplies. Maybe stuff that they could use. Nothing that he actually wanted—needed—to find.
He entered the room they had climbed into through the window. Shadow lifted her head and turned to him. Her tongue rolled out of her mouth, panting. Dog smiles, Alex thought. She was glad to see him. “I’m glad to see you too, girl,” he said as she approached him. She sat in front of him and he patted her on the head as he passed into the room.
“How did you get out of there?” He’d been thinking about it regularly since they had been reunited. “Did you give them the slip? Did you fight them off? Was there no one left alive?” He laughed, bitterly. “Did you—” He stopped, feeling ill. For the briefest of moments, he had forgotten what had happened. Who he was talking about. Not a crazed, cartoon villain. Not a murderous maniac. It was Mark. His friend. Who was likely dead. He crumpled to the ground and pulled his dog close to him, sobbing into her fur. It didn’t matter how she had gotten away. She’d followed him. She always did.
NICOLE
Nicole talked to Ryan as much as she could until he rolled over in his mat-fort and fell asleep. For all she knew, he might have been just lying there staring at the wall a few inches from his face. She could see that he was breathing, so she was fine with either option. She left him to check on David and Alex. As much as she wanted to say she didn’t care, she had a responsibility as the oldest to take care of those around her. David was making noise in his workshop, so he was fine.
She found Alex in the room where she had left him, staring out the window in the direction of the former Colby Elementary, now just a bit of smoke floating over the colourful autumn leaves. If he had stuck his head out, he would have seen what she just had from another window: the beginning of a beautiful sunset, the leaves made more vibrant in the dying light; the sky a lovely pinkish-orange; the lingering smoke from the fire giving the air all around the building a sense of warmth.
Sunlight danced in the puddles and in the little brook that flowed by.
All of this was just outside the window to the right. Despite everything, the world had the same beauty that it did the week before or year before. Every autumn day that either of them could remember.
But she knew that wasn’t what Alex was looking at. He saw only the same things she had seen for the past two nights as she looked out the same window. Those things—the deadies or whatever he wanted to call them—were out there, gathering. If they bothered to look up, they would see him. They didn’t. They just wandered, making their awful, sloppy moaning sounds.
Poor kid, she found herself thinking as she watched him and his dog. He has no clue what is happening out there.
She turned away to find something to do, to keep her mind off the fact that she didn’t have a clue either. Plus, the smoke reminded her of what had happened. Of how she had screwed everything up. Of how—
“Why won’t they go away?”
She looked back at Alex. He was still looking out the window. She doubted he had turned to see her at all. He may even have been talking to himself, but she answered. “I dunno, kid,” she sighed. “They just suck, I guess.”
Alex nodded. “Yeah.”
The dog lay down with a heavy sigh at Alex’s feet, looking at her. She knew just as much as they did.
“Anyway,” Nicole continued, now that the conversation had started, “we should probably eat something soon. When’s the last time you ate?”
“I dunno.”
“Okay, well, now’s probably a good time then.” She turned again to leave, but stopped. “I’m Nicole, by the way.”
“Yeah, I know. David told me.” He still didn’t turn away from the window.
“Well,” she could think of nothing more to say. “All right then.” She turned to leave again. This time, she heard steps behind her.
“Nicole?” Alex stood just a few feet from her. “Thanks.”
She stared at him, taken back by the sincerity of that one word. Eventually, she nodded. “No problem. Now let’s get something to eat, all right?”
Alex simply nodded and followed her.
After introducing Alex to Ryan—who seemed afraid of the new boy—they all ate peanut butter sandwiches using a jar from one of Nicole’s survival packs.
ALEX
After sunset, since there was very little to do in the dark, the four new residents of the community centre went to bed. Alex stared at the book David was reading by flashlight—he couldn’t tell what it said from across the room, but the cover showed a big hand with a thumb out and a weird green blob creature.
Alex wished he had taken his Simon, or even the dead electronic Yahtzee game
