They ate before he showered and shaved.
Thirty-five minutes later, he walked into the bedroom in clean briefs. The hot shower felt so good he’d stood under the water much longer than usual.
She was asleep in one of the full-sized beds with Smokey lying beside her, so he crawled under the covers in the other bed.
When J.R. woke six hours later, Sam sat fully dressed watching her. He turned away when she threw off the covers and sauntered to the bathroom while inviting him to ogle. Smokey again tried to squirm through the doorway but was rudely ejected. Sam was still impressed by what he'd glimpsed earlier. She was hot. Damned hot. He grinned; first time he ever wanted to kiss and fondle a football player. While she dressed, he stood outside while Smokey cocked his leg and sprinkled the neglected planting area. A maid was in the room next to theirs, and her stainless steel cart sat beside the doorway.
In twenty minutes, they crossed borders into Montana. At Route 13, they turned south and crossed the Missouri River. Sam remarked, “The Big Muddy is clear and narrow near its northern origin. I saw it once near St. Louis and saw how it got the title Big Muddy. I sure wouldn’t eat fish caught in that murky filth.”
Sam thought of how life might play out after the zombie onslaught eased a bit. If JR stuck around and they continued to grow on each other, the two of them could become a couple. A couple to be reckoned with. She was feisty and a bit rebellious, but he liked her attitude overall. The thought of having a wimpy, whiney woman didn’t appeal to him in the least; she certainly wasn’t that. In the dangerous life he saw ahead, a tough woman who could adapt to the new daily rigors of existence would be a huge asset. Anyone less would be a constant worry; they would be more like a feeble dependent than a capable mate sharing the hard work and responsibilities ahead. They would each need a capable person watching their back, and he had learned either could fulfill that support role.
Sam’s musings were interrupted by JR, “My two older sisters were enrolled at Louisiana State University. Both were highly intelligent. Much more so than me. Crystal was twenty-four. She had a nursing degree and was finishing advanced studies to be a Nurse Practitioner. She would have been like a junior doctor and earned almost as much as a doctor. Mavis was twenty-two and studied Internet Technology Security. She planned to enroll in an advanced degree course and hoped to work for the FBI or the CIA. She was extremely focused and driven as to her future goals. My youngest sister Carol was a junior in high school. She was a brain too. Wanted to be a mechanical engineer; she talked a lot about becoming an architectural design engineer. I was the dummy in the family. Just wanted to be a tomboy, drink a little beer, play football, dance, and have fun. It’s ironic that I’m still alive and they’re all dead. At least I assume that, since I couldn’t contact the older two. So where do I go from here? What’s my future going to be? That unknown scares the hell out of me.”
Sam was pensive and thought at length before he spoke. “The way this thing is turning out, my Business Admin and Management degree would have been useless. In weeks there will be no worthwhile businesses to manage. The same for your brainy sisters. With my dad gone a lot, I learned to be independent and self-sufficient around the house. I made decisions most people my age weren’t expected or allowed to make. Those are the skills that are important now and will be used daily if we survive. The same goes for you. Most girls your age are wimpy, act brainless, and are highly dependent. You have skills and mindsets that are unusual for a girl, but they’re worth more in this new world than high dollar degrees in careers that don’t even exist from here on. Your sister who studied medicine was the only one who had knowledge that would be applicable now. Very soon we’ll be back to the ways of the homesteaders who came west in wagon trains. It’s going to be a hard and dangerous life but simple and rewarding.
“I read somewhere online recently there were likely about one million law enforcement personnel of all branches total in the US. Add in the military stationed here and reserve personnel and I bet it's still under three million people. Pit them against about three hundred twenty million civilians being turned into zombies daily and I don't believe they have a chance in hell of winning. They were unprepared and too far behind the zombie influx from the beginning."
JR. was solemn. "I pray you're wrong or our future looks very bleak."
“Or if we get far enough out of sight, we might struggle through it. I think that’s our best shot at surviving. And no one knows the future of the zombies either. Will they roam the world in huge numbers preying on humans forever until we’re wiped out, or will they someday just start to disappear? We’ll have to wait and see what happens and adjust our lives to that.”
JR nodded with a dismal expression as she scratched Smokey behind his ears.
Sam drove a total of four hours before stopping for fuel at Sand Spring, Montana. The pumps stood outside the general store attached to the Post Office. The owner said he’d checked the fuel tanks for water that morning, and the diesel tank was about forty percent full. No fresh produce or meat was available and very little other food items were on the shelves. They gathered much of
