“Really? You’d let me go with you?”
“I insist.”
Her neck pops as she jerks her chin over one shoulder, back at the house.
“They won’t let me go. They’ll never allow it.”
“Go up to your room and get your things. Make sure you’ve got something comfortable and warm to wear.”
“But—” I can see she’s still worried about the men.
“I’ll take care of it.”
We go inside together, and in the abrupt shelter we luxuriate for a moment. It feels good not to be rained on. Then we nod and she inches up the stairs while I make for the kitchen.
As far as kitchens go—and I’ve known few—this one is lean. Not an efficient leanness, but the too-thinness of a woman who fights to maintain an unnatural weight. The room has sag; I can see where things should go if one had the inclination to decorate or a love for cooking. It yearns to be filled with a family.
Only one man is present: Lisa’s uncle. His skin is filled to capacity and oozes over the chair’s borders. It’s a sturdy piece of furniture probably many generations old. The wood is dark from time, and the seat is some kind of thick wicker with a honeyed sheen. The chair has seven empty siblings.
The big guy glances up, scans me for weaknesses he can exploit. My breath catches as I pull my shoulders back and push my chin forward, trying to look as strong as my body will allow. He finds nothing he can take without considerable effort and goes back to chewing on the bread I made two days ago after I picked the weevils from the pantry’s ample flour supply. Crumbs fly from his mouth, spraying the table with damp flecks that will harden and stick if they’re not wiped down soon. Neither Lisa nor I will be here to do it. These men will be wallowing in their own filth in no time.
“Lisa’s coming with me.”
He grunts, swallows, fixes his beady eyes on me. Raisins pressed deep into dough.
“She stays.”
“It wasn’t a question.”
His bulk gathers like an impending storm as he heaves himself from the chair.
“We’re her family.”
This can’t go anyplace good. A cold spot the size of a quarter forms on the back of my neck and spreads until I’m chilled all over. What was I thinking? He’s bigger than me. Morbidly obese and slow, true, but large enough that if he gets me on the ground, I’m screwed.
We stare each other down. If we were dogs, someone would be betting on him, impressed by his sheer size.
A sharp shriek tears the artificial calm. Upstairs. Lisa. For a second I tune out, my attention latching onto the strange silence that always follows a scream.
The fat man lunges for me. Lisa is in trouble, but right now I am, too.
I feint left, dive right. He’s like a crash test vehicle hitting the wall, plaster dust forming a white halo around his body. It takes him a moment to recover. He shakes his head to clear the pain fog, then comes at me again.
Again I manage to dodge him. Now we’re staring each other down across the width of the table. Just a few feet between us. No weapons in sight. Lisa is a tidy housekeeper, and though this isn’t her home, just one they stumbled across the same way I did, everything is in its place.
Another scream. This one drifts like dandelion fluff.
Inside my chest, my heart hurls itself at its bone prison. It knows her father is up there with her and it knows what’s happening.
“I’m going to her,” I say. “And if you try and stop me, you’re a dead man.”
He laughs. His jowls wobble and shudder.
“When he’s done fucking her, we’re going to take turns fucking you, bitch.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t try sooner.”
He holds up both palms. “What can I say, love? We like lamb, not mutton.”
It’s my turn to laugh, only mine is bitter and dry.
“What, bitch? What’s so fucking funny? Share the joke.”
I inch down the table toward the open doorway. On the other side of this wall there’s an umbrella stand. What’s in there is useless for keeping a body dry, but the pointed end could still easily put out an eye.
“Did I ever tell you what I did for a living before all this?”
He grunts. Follows me down the table until we’re both at the blunted edge.
“Some kind of lab rat.”
I nod. Something like that. “I’ve done a lot of lifting, so I’m pretty strong for a skinny woman. What have you done besides shift gears in your truck and swing a glass of Guinness?” There’s less strength in my body now than there was before the world ended, but my survival instincts have brought me this far. I make a break for it but I miscalculate: his reach is longer than mine. His arm snaps out. Fat grasping fingers coil themselves around my ponytail. He jerks me backwards and pulls me against him until his gut is a stuffed IHOP pancake bulging against my back. A triangle forms around my neck and tightens. Chest, humerus, ulna.
Usually when I long for the past, I dream of meals in chain restaurants where they serve the exact same dish every time. I dream of how it feels to be dry, or how my skin tingled when I stood too long in a too-hot shower. But now? High heels. Stilettos. With a four-inch metal rod keeping the heels straight and true. Because my captor has socked feet and it would take nothing to drive my fashionable weapon right between his metatarsals.
I’m wearing boots with a thick sole made for walking, but he’s six-foot-something and I have to exaggerate to see five-five, which means my heels aren’t going to do much besides grind his toes. It’s not enough.
“I win,” he says.
Maybe he’s right, but the game isn’t over yet. There’s more than just me at stake.
“When was the last time you saw your own dick?” My voice thickens as the arm tightens at my throat. He’s pulling me closer and higher. My heels are rising off the ground. There’s a whisper of rubber against tile as my feet flail to seek stability. “Can you hold it to piss or do you sit like a woman?”
“Fuck you.”
“Please. Fat guys like you can’t get a hard-on.”
Dark spots obscure my vision. It’s morning but my daylight is fading fast. Lisa is sobbing now between the screams.
There’s more strength in him than first appears. Adipose overlays significant muscle mass; the perfect camouflage. My toes leave the ground.
Everything that follows happens in an instant.
My chin drops and I sink my teeth into his forearm. The enamel slices through the tissue and scrapes bone. I draw my knees up so when he drops me and lets out a roar that comes all the way from his scrotum, my weight falls like the sparkly ball on New Year’s Eve and my boots crush his feet. A gasp shoots from my throat as I fall forward onto my knees. Impact pains set my shins on fire. My opponent recovers long enough to deliver a swift kick to my backside with his damaged foot. Warm copper with a hint of iron floods my mouth. I scramble to my feet, dart sideways, arm held protectively over my stomach.
Without a thought in my head besides survival, I reach for a chair. It’s lighter than its mellowed wood would suggest. Or maybe not. In times of need, the human body can conduct amazing feats. I know this because
White bone gleams through the skin as I lock my hands into place on the chair’s back. He’s English, which means he understands little about my national sport. This chair is my bat and his face is the ball. Baseball on steroids.
He comes for me and I swing. There’s a sharp crack as his face shatters. Wet droplets of blood splatter my shirt and face: a mosquito’s wet dream. Broken teeth crumble from his sagging mouth, and he falls. He is a mountain of flesh conquered by a woman holding a chair. The wood slips from my hands as I stagger into the hall and mount the stairs.
