“What’d you take?” Bart asked sitting up to look at LeBron with concern.
“Caffeine pills and Ritalin.” LeBron answered suddenly worried he was going to get into trouble for doing drugs. He wondered where the paranoia was coming from. This was obviously an acceptable time to do a little experimentation.
“Ok. Well try not to get hooked. They’re not going to be making any more of those anytime soon. How’s your brother and sister?” Bart asked disregarding the drug cocktail LeBron had whipped up to stay awake. It’d obviously served its purpose. LeBron thought of pointing out that they had a super-sized bucket of Ritalin on the counter but decided to keep that to himself.
“They’re both asleep on the couch upstairs. We worked all night on the house. We were all trying to get our minds off what happened to mom.” LeBron said the last part quietly. Bart nodded along.
“I’m not going to lie. It’s going to be hard for me to get past what happened yesterday. When I think of all the times she asked if we could just leave and go to a shelter. She never felt safe here. I don’t think this new reality we’re headed for is a world she’d have wanted to be a part of anyway. It’s going to get a lot uglier and your mom had a beautiful soul.” Bart said. His eyes were misty and far away. LeBron headed up the stairs to continue his rounds and give his dad time to pull himself together. He didn’t think he’d be able to take watching his dad cry without ending up bawling himself.
LeBron made sure to spend a little extra time upstairs. He found himself standing in the hallway looking over the bannister at the family photos lined up on the wall. LeBron, Drew and Bart all unanimously despised the two times a year picture day came around. Nancy had always gotten the coupons for the JC Penny’s photo studio for Christmas and Easter photos. She always used them. They’d all have to wear the same color shirt and ensure they’d had their hair cut recently.
They all loathed having to dress up and pose for the endless pictures then stand around waiting forever for Nancy and Yue to pick out the best ones. They all kept their mouths shut and just wandered around the furniture section of the store like lost puppies though. They smiled and bore it because their mom really didn’t ask for very much. She sacrificed and did everything for them with a smile. She held them all individually to a very high standard and made sure they were each doing the best for themselves. She always put herself second. It didn’t surprise LeBron at all that she hadn’t hesitated to step up and put her on life on the line to defend them.
Smiling at the memories of the behind the scenes of the portraits he walked back downstairs. He peeked around the wall to make sure his dad had been able to get control of himself. He’d rather walk crotch first into a cactus naked than walk in on his dad crying. Seeing that everything looked ok he walked on down to continue his rounds.
“Everything ok upstairs?” Bart asked.
“All good in the hood.” LeBron joked. He’d actually thought of going by his middle name a few times. He just didn’t know how to get people to flip from calling him LeBron to calling him Charles. He resented being a black kid named LeBron when he had almost zero interest in sports. It was especially awkward that he sucked at basketball. Drew was always teasing him about it. He struggled a lot with his identity. Passed around in the foster system he’d never really felt like he fit in anywhere until the Russel’s had adopted him.
Bart quizzed him on what all improvements they’d made to the house. He nodded at the fact they’d cut in the wider holes to see and shoot out of while also reinforcing the plywood with the two by fours. The investment in buying all the wood Drew could get in his truck on his original Home Depot run seemed to be paying off. LeBron asked his dad if he thought the cops or anybody else would bother them again.
“I doubt it. We rocked those guys back on their heels pretty hard. I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple of the bastards didn’t make it. The neighbors saw what happened when five fully armed and trained men tried to bust in here. They’d be stupid to think they could do any better. What I’m worried about is what you said yesterday. About the infected already showing up in Jacksonville?” Bart finished with a questioning look at his youngest son. He was ridiculously proud of how smart LeBron was. They were going to need to leverage that high IQ to have any hope at survival.
“The ones on the videos aren’t even the main ones to worry about. They’re just the ones in the surge phase. The ones who really spread this are the crawlers. The ones in the surge phase, they call them surgers on the internet, are pretty easy to take out if you’re ready for them. The ones that make it to the next phase are the ones to really worry about. They call them crawlerz with a ‘z’. They’re as strong as the surgers, but they only move around at night. They’re the ones really spreading this. They’re creepy. Most of the videos of them are from like surveillance cams and video doorbells and stuff like that. They come at night and they come hard.” LeBron finished answering his dad. He was shuddering at the thought of having to test their makeshift carpentry against the monsters he’d watched on the internet.
“All we can do is prep and pray at this point.” Bart said.
