They stepped back and Drew lit the gas-soaked comforter on fire. With tears in his eyes Bart watched from a chair on the porch. He wasn’t able to stand on his wounded leg any longer. He was seeping blood through all of his bandages after doing his part to repel the assault. The neighbors waved to them sadly. LeBron noted the man was wearing the pistol on his hip that they’d traded for with him. When the fire had burned down, they all returned to the house. Bart set them to repairs and building the house back stronger than before.
Drew went to each of the upstairs windows to cut out firing holes. He wasn’t going to be stuck staring out of tiny holes again with no way to fight back. Downstairs LeBron and Yue were adding two by fours across the windows to strengthen the plywood. They’d completely sealed off the front door so that the only downstairs entry point now was the backdoor. When Drew finished upstairs, he was going to put in some firing slots downstairs as well.
Before Bart passed out, he’d ordered them to turn the place into a fortress. He didn’t want to see any more of his family die. They’d taken that order to heart and started working on building a fortress to protect that which their mom had gladly given her life for. As worn out as they all were the manual labor was welcomed to keep their minds occupied. Idle hands were the devils playthings after all.
Chapter 14: The Surge
They worked late into the night fortifying the house. They did everything that they could think of to give them an advantage against another assault. To sit down and relax was to think of their moms pale face looking up at them from inside the pink flower covered comforter. There were still caches of supplies from the drug store that were sitting around the house in unorganized piles. There were still plenty of items that needed to be carried up the stairs. The more tedious the work the better. Whatever it took to get their minds off the fact that they’d just wrapped their mom’s body up in a blanket and set it on fire in the backyard.
Drew accidentally fell asleep as the sun came up. The large holes they’d cut into the plywood allowed enough light in that they could finally see inside the house. Drew had sat down on the couch in the loft to rest his eyes for a second. His exhausted body had taken control leaving him passed out in a sitting position. Yue and LeBron found him that way a few minutes later. LeBron was rocking back and forth he was so tired. Yue was seeing double as she strained to keep her eyelids open. It felt like each eyelid had tiny weights strapped to the lashes.
“One of us has to sleep and one of us has to keep watch.” Yue slurred through her fatigue. She couldn’t remember ever being this tired. She was emotionally and physically spent.
“Go to sleep. I think we have some Ritalin in the drug pile downstairs. I definitely saw some caffeine pills. I’ll Breaking Bad my way through the next few hours then wake up one of you to take my spot.” LeBron said. It struck Yue that she really must be next door to a fugue state. She couldn’t find any flaw in the obviously flawed plan her little brother had just outlined. She sat on the couch next to Drew then lay down lifting her feet up into his lap.
“Wake me up if you start falling asleep. Somebody has to be awake all the time.” She said with her eyes already closed as she drifted off.
LeBron picked up one of the blankets they kept in the loft and threw it over his snoozing siblings. His eyes filled up with tears remembering how he’d thrown a blanket over his moms body the day before. He couldn’t even contemplate what he’d do if he had to throw one over his sister or brother next. Thinking about family members in mortal danger reminded him he needed to go downstairs to check on his dad.
Bart was spread out on the big sectional below. They’d pumped him full of painkillers and antibiotics after their moms impromptu funeral. The mixture they’d concocted must’ve done the trick. He hadn’t moved from the spot they’d left him passed out in. It was a bit alarming how little he’d moved. LeBron reached over and held his hand over his dad’s mouth to make sure he was still breathing. Having confirmed his dad was still alive LeBron went over to the kitchen and began digging through the diet pills and vitamins looking for something to help him stay awake.
He found a big bottle of Ritalin next to a pile of packets of Walgreen branded caffeine pills. The kind long-haul truckers always grabbed a few of whenever they were checking out. Hoping the pills worked he gulped down a few of them with sips of warm Mountain Dew. He then proceeded to drag his drained body around to each window and peer out into the early dawn. The medicine must’ve worked because he was still making the same rounds four hours later when his dad asked him if he’d gotten any sleep yet.
“Not yet. Letting Yue and Drew nap it up until I can’t keep going anymore.” LeBron rattled off before walking quickly to the next window. He was covered in sweat. Living in Florida without power sucked. If this whole apocalypse thing was going to last much longer,
