The dead began their explorations with broken arms, legs, and backs, walking and sometimes crawling through the snow.
Chapter 18: Horse Stew and Sex
The Golden Arches, a monument to the world that had once been, when a man with a hunger could drive five miles in a car that ran on gas, pull up to an electric speaker, order a burger, and have some pimple-faced high school kid hand him a bag full of food. Would the kids remember that? Would D.J. and Hope remember when you used to be able to order something called a Happy Meal?
Shit, would they even remember what the word 'happy' meant? Izzy doubted all counts.
The sign on the highway said they were in North Plains. All he saw was a gas station, a McDonalds, and a couple of small restaurants. The houses of North Plains were are all situated down the road in a direction that they weren't headed.
He took a deep breath. The sun was out again. The snow wasn't as deep anymore. It had been melting steadily for the last few days, and the temperature hung in the forties. It wasn't warm by any stretch of the imagination, but it was warmer. He would still be grateful to sit next to the fire at night, but it was going to be a different kind of night. According to the map Tejada had taken from the gas station, there were no places for them to hole up. Tonight, they would be "roughing it." Allen was not looking forward to that process. He had never been a big fan of camping, even though his old man had taken him out quite often as a youth. He liked the fishing, the occasional hunting, but waking up cold in the morning had always been painful, and this was during the summer. He didn't want to know how a night sleeping outside in the winter was going to feel, but he was going to experience it anyway. There was no getting around it.
The dead were thin here. The survivors had room to breathe. This wouldn't all be so bad if this was how many there were at any one time. Maybe the beach would be a good thing. Or maybe they should hole up right here, take their time.
He began to wonder about the future, about his place in it. Ever since they had decided to leave the Burnside Bridge and follow the survivors that left before them, he had seemed to have a purpose. It was all they could focus on, putting one foot in front of the other in order to get to a destination. Now that the destination seemed attainable, he was forced to ask himself the question, "What came next?"
What would he do when he could settle down—when he could live in one spot and not have to worry about dying on some forgotten road? He used to write poetry, scrawling in notebooks about all sorts of things, drinking, women, the state of the world. But ever since the world had gone to shit, he found his well of motivation had completely dried up. It was hard to write when you were concerned about your life.
He turned around and laughed as the little boy hucked snowballs at Rudy. The big man and the child laughed quiet laughs, not making too much noise as they bent down, scooped up a handful of snow, shaped it into a ball, and threw it at each other. It was a fine interlude between walking and slaying the dead.
Allen noticed that the little girl didn't take part in all the fun. She stood off to the side, nervously looking left and right, scanning the area for Annies. Amanda stood close by her. Amanda never left her side now, and the little girl stuck with her at all times. There was some damage there in Allen's mind. Where D.J. seemed to be a normal kid, robust, energetic, and pleased with everything that he saw, Hope was the complete opposite. She was sullen and serious, far more serious than a girl her age should be. As he watched, the little girl coughed into a gloved fist and scanned the horizon.
Now, there was a person that could use a lesson in appreciating the finer things in life. And just like that, he found it. He found a drop of inspiration in his dried-up well. A story. A story of the way it was before, and the way it still could be. The ideas whirled in his head, and for a few minutes, he only existed halfway in the real world. The rest of him was somewhere else, conjuring up a tale for the girl, something that would help her cope with reality, something that would give little Hope a little hope.
They began walking at Tejada's signal, their message left clearly on the side of the gas station in red paint. "Headed west on highway 26 – Hope and D.J." Allen began to cobble together a tale. He would tell it to the little girl around the campfire.
He watched as the little girl latched onto Amanda's hand and trudged purposefully through the melting snow, coughing into her glove.
****
Amanda had to admit that things were better out here, away from the city, away from the tombs of the dead. The air was cleaner out here. The stench of death was not so present. Even in the frigid air of their long, cold winter, you could still smell the dead. It wasn't as bad
