The sky had become overcast, casting a pall over theirwhole group. Five houses lay before them. "Which one should we checkout?" Katie asked.
"Not that fucking house," Clara said as shepointed out the multiple bloodstains on the door and the windows.
"Agreed," Lou said. "Let's stay away fromthe ones with stairs, too. The last thing I want is one of those things fallingdown on us."
The memory of Joan's incident in the parking garage wasfresh in all their heads. It made sense. That left two houses, both plain,nondescript, ranch-style homes, just the type you'd find in the suburbs.Well-built wooden fences surrounded each house. The grass had grown-knee high,but the walkways were still clear enough, despite the occasional overgrown weedhere and there.
Katie was drawn to the yellow house. It's simplicityspoke to her. It seemed like an elderly couple's house, and that meant lesschance of children. "Let's do that one," Katie said.
The others shrugged. A house was a house to them. Theywalked up to the front door, and Katie held her gun ready. How many bullets didshe have? Two or three? The odds of finding weapons in the house were slim, andthe odds of finding the right ammunition for her gun were slimmer, but shewould keep her eyes out.
"Alright, this is how we're gonna do it," Loubegan. "We're gonna open the door. Give it a few minutes, and then we'regoing to go in there and check every room out. I don't want one of those thingssneaking up on us when we're not looking. Once the house is clear, we block themain door and take a breather."
"Man, I hope there's some damn food in there. I'mstarving," Mort said.
"Dibs on smokes," Clara said.
"Why do you get dibs on smokes?" Mort asked.
"Cuz I called dibs. That's how it works."
"Shit," was all he said.
Then Lou kicked the front door open. The wood splinteredaway from the lock, and they stood in silence. Birds chirped, seeminglyunaffected by the death and decay that was all around them. A cricket or someother bug hummed in the grass to their right, a buzzing sound that made Katienervous. Maybe they had some wine, she thought absently.
They stood back away from the door, waiting for whateverhorrors were inside to come pouring out. But there was nothing. Well, notnothing entirely. The one thing that did come out was the smell of rot anddecay. Something was dead in there, but whether that something was still movingaround, that was the question.
"Alright, let's do this," Lou said.
Katie let the men take the lead. Her gun was a lastresort, as it would only draw more of the dead. They were tired, their nerveswere all frayed, and their stomachs were all running on empty.
The interior of the house was dark. All the windows hadbeen closed up, the shades drawn, the curtains pulled closed. The smell insidewas awful. It was a dead smell, pungent, revolting. Katie was glad to see thatthe house had an old person's touch, tacky wallpaper, a coat rack with jacketsthat the elderly would wear.
To her right, a galley-style kitchen led to a smalldining room with a plain wooden table. A couple bowls sat on the table, and anauseous smell came from that direction. She knew the smell of spoiled milkwell, as the only person in her house who could actually drink milk, it oftenwent to waste. She walked through the kitchen, eyeing all the familiarimplements, a wooden block full of knives, a coffee pot, stained from years ofuse, and a microwave that seemed as old as the house itself.
In the dining room, she stared down at the bowls. Theremains of corn flakes, long gone to rot sat swimming in curdled milk. Sheturned left and saw the living room. It was spacious, an old-style TV,gargantuan and completely pointless, sat in the corner on a oak stand. Asliding glass door led to the backyard, but there would be plenty of time forthat later.
She moved to sit on the couch in the living room. It wasnothing fancy, but it had that homey, lived-in feel that called to her. Sheplopped down in the couch and sank into it. She suddenly felt sleepy, when acry from the other room caused her to get to her feet.
She heard the sounds of struggling as she walked throughthe living room to a hallway that led to the west side of the house. Katieignored the pictures on the walls, their smiling faces a mockery of the currentstate of the world. She didn't want to see them. She didn't want to think aboutwhat had become of those faces. She passed a couple of bedrooms, and thenturned right, moving through a side room. She saw the others standing in the doorwayto the back room of the house, perhaps the master bedroom. Their backs crowdedout the sight of what was in there, and though she didn't really want to see,she felt compelled to look. She shouldered her way past Joan and Clara, whoboth had their hands to their faces.
On the floor, an elderly couple lay, their putrefiedbodies spilling blood from their heads. Mort stood over them, breathing heavy.A bottle of pills sat upon the nightstand, and that was all that Katie neededto see. Without speaking, they all backed out of the room and closed the doorbehind them like parents who had just checked on their sleeping children anddidn't want to wake them in the process of exiting.
Their mood was somber, but the place was safe.
"Alright, let's see what we got here," Lousaid. They didn't need to be told twice.
"There's still the garage," Mort said.
"We better check it out," Lou said. They walkedswiftly through the house and paused at a door in the dining
