The bleeding had all but stopped, so Kingsley grabbed a roll of duct tape they had in the duffel bag and asked Emma to tear pieces off for him so he could stick the gauze patch over the wound.
As he finished it up by wrapping Eric’s abdomen with a roll of bandage from the duffel, Emma said, “Leena might be able to help. She and Dave are at Brian’s house near Stanway – you remember the one?” Kingsley nodded as he tied the bandage. “At least I think that’s where they are; Leena said she would call me but my phone got smashed.”
He recalled finding her broken phone earlier that day in her house, and the absurdity of the past twenty-four hours – the past three days, even – hit him all of a sudden.
A lot had happened. Not just to him, but to Emma as well. How had she ended up here? He had so many questions, so many things he wanted to tell her, so many apologies he wanted to make. But those could wait.
That was when Kingsley remembered that they had left Terry waiting in the public toilets just down the road.
“Okay.” He brushed as much of the powder and sand as he could from Eric’s clothes and hair, and used a rag to wipe it off his face. “We’ll take the van to Brian’s house, but there’s something I have to do first. After I move the bodies,” he added morbidly, getting up and heading back out front.
A gust of cool wind stung the gash under his left breast as he emerged from the house. Luckily, the pocket knife hadn’t sliced deep and there was only a trickle of blood, the skin around it swelling.
Maybe it was the adrenaline wearing off, but suddenly Kingsley found room for the grief prying at his mind and he collapsed to his knees in front of the bodies of his friends and cried.
It took him about five minutes to pick himself back up, still shaking, a tight ache in his throat.
He stared at the trees, the sky, the hollow houses – anything but the body in his arms – as he carried each of them into the house behind the van and laid them on the floor just inside. Then he covered them with a sheet of tarp he’d liberated from a stack of materials outside. It gave him flashbacks of covering James’ body in a similar fashion with a bedsheet, and he wondered if this was what would happen to all of them – no funeral, no time to say goodbye. It disgusted him that he couldn’t give his friends the burials they deserved. All he could do was keep them in his thoughts forever, never stop mourning.
*
Unable to press on the gas pedal without splinters of pain shooting through her knee, Emma couldn’t drive. And neither could Eric, weak as he was.
So it was down to Kingsley.
The public toilets were less than a minute away in the van, Kingsley pulling up next to the grassy strip outside. He helped Emma out of the passenger side and left Eric in the middle seat to rest. Propping the door open with the duffel bag so they could monitor the van, they crept inside.
The first thing he noticed was the door of the last cubicle in the row hanging ajar. Neither man nor dog in sight.
Then he picked up on the low growl coming from the cubicle. His heart raced as he called out, “Terry?”
“What are you doing?” Emma whispered, unable to mask the anxiety in her voice.
“He’s in here.” As Kingsley approached the cubicle, the growl turned into a whine. He peered into the small space to see Archie and Terry sitting together on the floor. Terry’s cheek lay on the toilet seat and he was completely still.
A puff of wind nudged the cubicle door, Kingsley catching it before it closed. Terry lifted his head abruptly, and it occurred to Kingsley that they might have walked in just as the man was turning.
But then a groan slipped out from between Terry’s cracked lips, the human sound allaying Kingsley’s fears.
Archie licked his owner’s face and the man lifted a bony hand to stroke his dog before regarding his visitors. He managed a pained smile when he saw Emma.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, the suffering clear in his demeanour. He tried to answer her but was then racked by a coughing fit.
“He was bitten while helping us fight a crowd of snappers,” Kingsley explained. “I met him on the street, said he was looking for a woman who’d saved his life. And from his description, I knew it was you. I was on my way to find you when Mark sidetracked us.”
Emma knelt in front of Terry. “I’m so sorry this happened to you,” she said.
Terry's voice came out no louder than a whisper. “Did you find your sister?”
“Not yet. We’re getting there.”
“Sorry… I couldn’t help.”
She held his hand. “You helped me when I had a panic attack in the shop. You calmed me down. I shouldn’t have left you while you were sleeping, I was just scared. If there’s anything I can do…”
Terry scratched Archie behind his ear and she looked at the rottweiler.
“Take care of him for me,” Terry said. “And… and don’t let me turn into one of them, please.”
“Sure. My sister loves dogs.” Emma hoped her reassuring smile didn’t look as weary as it felt.
The dog didn’t want to leave it’s master’s side, so Terry grabbed hold of the empty toilet roll dispenser and hoisted himself to his feet. Digging into his backpack, he came out with a lead, which he clipped onto Archie’s navy blue collar so he could walk the dog with slow, dragging steps out to the van.
“God, I’m dizzy,” he said as he trod outside.
Kingsley opened the passenger door and Terry stopped in front of it, bending down to place one last kiss on his dog’s head.
