White Ash on Bone: A Zombie Novel (7 page)

"Only now,” Rex said. “When I was younger I had more the look of a trouble maker. I guess it’s the reason the first time I took my wife out, my future father-in-law didn’t like the look on my face.   Before he let us leave on our date, he took me up stairs, where he kept his loaded shotgun. He wore the serious look back then.” 

"Oh, I still see the trouble, but I can also see you’re all business tonight.  What are you here for?" she said. 

"I’m here for a job interview," Rex said. 

"You must be here to see my Uncle Carmine, he’s the manager here. Look, here he comes, I’ll introduce you.  By the way my name is Maize," she said. 

He smiled and offered his own name, "My name is Rex, and it’s a pleasure."

###

Rex looked into the rearview mirror of his Chrysler Sebring convertible and thought, "I’m one serious looking guy." It's the kind of half-serious, half-jest comment anyone makes while talking to them self in the car.  His dark hair and eyes matched a manly looking "Leonidas" beard.  The beard was a feature his wife held judgment on until it grew in, and then it was all the rage.

Recently, Rex quit his job working with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to seek a more profitable job in the private sector.  Working with national security left zero room for error. He had to be right 100 percent of the time, doing his job, while the terrorists had to get it right just once for disaster. It sickened Rex to watch the politicians and public forget what a mean world we lived in.  Terrorists could not be dissuaded from their fanatical goals, they could only be killed.  He served his time hunting them in, but he felt really glad to put it behind him.

He headed home back to Butler after his interview.  He had applied to be the head at the security department of the Casino. The interview went well, thanks to the girl at the bar.
Uncle Carmine
had offered Rex the job on the spot.  Now he needed to decide if he wanted to put up with horrendous snow that Erie got every year.  Better save it for later.  The wife is going to want a say in this, Rex thought.

With the two-hour drive home nearly completed, Rex relaxed and watched the lines of Interstate 79 rhythmically roll past his convertible.  His iPod played from a selection of Johnny Cash.

Rex and his wife recently moved back to Pennsylvania from living in D.C. and had temporally moved in with his wife’s parents.  The in-laws owned a spacious brick home back a long tree-covered private lane.  It's the kind of house with white pillars in the front and a swimming pool in the back yard.  As Cash sang out ballads to Rex, he thought about finishing off the long drive with a good soak in the hot tub sitting on his in-laws back porch.

He pulled out his cell-phone to call Ginger and to tell her to pick up some steaks, but then decided not to and threw the phone down on the seat beside him.  The Grove City exit was coming up, and he wanted to take some back roads home.  During their college years, Rex and Ginger attended Grove City College; it was a very conservative and close knit Christian school.  Students there often left campus to seek out more adult extracurricular activities that were frowned upon by the school. Taking some of those back roads would stir up some fond memories that the couple shared.

The pavement underneath the convertible changed from Interstate, to State Route, and then to rural back roads.  The sun splashed its final rays of light on Rex and darkness filled its place.

Cash continued to sing out fateful lyrics. Rex reminisced at several wonderful years of romance and marriage with Ginger.  Transitioning from old memories he thought about the weekend ahead with his wife and family.  He felt his foot become a little heavier on the pedal thinking about his wife's strawberry blonde hair, dark eyes, and warm embrace.  Yes, he thought, it should be a good weekend.

Several miles away from his in-laws home, he saw the flashing lights of two police cruisers on either side of the road. He could barely make out the reflection of plastic orange barricades blocking the road.  "It’s awful early at night for a sobriety checkpoint," Rex said to himself.  The checkpoint stood off in the distance; his turn came well before that.  For the last few miles, Cash sang out, "
When the Man Comes Round.
"  He tapped his fingers to the music on the steering wheel. 

Entering the private drive and rounding the bend, Rex viewed the home alive with light.  In the garage sat his mother-in-law's convertible, the trunk was left open.  Rex slowed down getting ready to stop, while at the same time, he flipped the switch to bring his convertible top back into place.  Both the car and its top came to rest at the same time.  The engine died on command.  Rex grabbed his duffle bag and headed into the house.

Walking past his mother in-law’s car, he noticed several grocery bags still in the trunk and the door into the house gaped open.  He entered the house and felt an invisible hand touch his back. 

When something felt wrong to Rex, he always described the sensation as an unwanted hand about to lightly press its self against his skin.  The lights, open doors, and grocery bags played a disturbing contrast to the absolute silence of the house.  His senses sharpened, and he looked for anything else out of order as he closed the door behind him.  Across the hallway and past the kitchen, he could see randomly generated light from the plasma screen television likely muted in the living room.   

Rex relaxed at the normality of this, and he eased his way to the living room with his duffle bag in hand.  He would hopefully greet his wife and her family relaxing there.  Rex rounded the corner to find the television muted on a shopping channel; the room was empty. The sliding glass door to the back porch stood wide open.  This is officially getting weird, he thought.  He dropped his bag and briefly poked his head out the back door to find the porch and pool lit up, but no one was around.  Rex called into the home, "Hello."  No one answered.  All the facts pointed to danger, but for one, his wife's absent car from the driveway. 

He reached for his cell-phone to call Ginger and remembered throwing the phone into the passenger seat of the car.  I guess I’ll just get in the hot tub and wait, Rex thought.  He grabbed his shorts from his bag and decided to change in the living room; after all, it was clear no one was around.  Out on the back porch, he pulled back the hot-tub cover and felt the warm water rise up to meet his eager muscles.  He sat on the side of the tub about to swing himself over the edge and into the water, but it didn’t feel right.  That damn invisible hand applied its touch to his senses.  He felt exposed, vulnerable.  Perhaps it’s because I’m only in my shorts, Rex thought.  He looked around annoyed at the darkness beyond the backlights. Anyone could be watching from beyond his vision, while he sat exposed, lit up like a Christmas tree.  Rex battled with his instincts of danger and his logic that said he is over reacting. His wife's family could be this careless leaving the house open at times. 

“Fuck it,” he said.  He went back inside to his bag and removed his sidearm. He pictured Ginger making fun of him for having his gun sitting by the side of the hot tub when they got home.  He smiled, "They’ll never know, if I throw a towel over the gun."  

Rex slid into the warm water half relaxing and half vigilant.  He waited in silence as
When the Man Comes Round
echoed in his head.

Seconds accumulated into minutes.  The warmth soaked into his muscles. Cash faded away.  Rex slid deeper into the hot water. He sunk down up to his chin. It felt like a warm blanket.  His eyes closed.  He listened to his rhythmic breathing and steady wind coming from the northwest.  The wind seemed to deliver an occasional popping noise of someone setting off illegal fireworks far in the distance.  There was nothing new with that.  He dozed off.

He stood at the altar in the Grove City College Chapel. The name never did the stone building justice with its vaulted arches, stained glass windows, pipe organ and stone floor. He thought of it as a cathedral and was elated that Ginger wanted to marry him there.  Rex waited at the altar for Ginger with his family and friends watching.  The pipe organ called the bride down the aisle, and he watched her with adoration.  She did not make eye contact with him, but remained fixated directly ahead of herself.  Ginger carefully made her way up the steps to the altar. She was directly level with Rex when she turned to him. She amazed Rex.  Ginger was also swept up in emotion and she directed all the love in the world at him though her eyes.  The two shared a moment of complete contentment and love. He knew he would never be alone.

The hand returned.  It told Rex he was no longer alone.  He opened his eyes to see the shape of a man 100 feet away perfectly silhouetted by a light directly behind him.  The man was looking into the window of the house. He turned, dismissing the house, and stumbled closer to Rex.  The man wore an orange Cincinnati Bengals T-shirt.  Rex knew he hadn’t been spotted yet.  The man continued to stumble as if he were drunk or wounded. 

What the hell is wrong with this guy, Rex wondered. He was about to ask the guy.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw another man barely 10 feet away coming directly at him with outstretched arms and hands curled like talons. 

"Hey!" Rex screamed. He rushed out of the hot-tub angling for his gun. The water splashed, displaced by the violent motion. He reached the weapon, but the attacker was upon him.  There was no time to issue a warning or even level the weapon at the guy. 

Rex pivoted to his right and spun. The bottom end of the weapon crashed down on the attacker. 

The attacker’s hand shifted the placement of the blow. It glanced off the man's jaw clearly breaking it and sending teeth flying. 

The man was unfazed at the blow and kept pushing his weight on Rex.  He pushed in on him as if to try and bite him. Rex shoved back and scrambled for space.  His back connected with the brick exterior of the home ending any hopes of evasion. 

Light from inside the house revealed the glazed eyes of the attacker. 

Rex managed to level the weapon at point-blank range. He squeezed the trigger multiple times and explosions in rapid succession emptied the clip.  The attacker was knocked back and down on the ground. As soon as the motion was arrested, the man rose again. 

The man in the Bengals T-shirt was a lot closer now.  He headed directly at Rex.

React or die, Rex thought.  He dropped his gun and charged his first attacker grabbing the man's head in both hands.  He drove him back with all his strength toward a brick column that held up the porch overhang.  He drove the man's head into the corner of the brick column and heard the skull crack like an egg. 

In the heat of the moment, Rex continued to smash the head until the form crumpled to the ground dead or dying. 

"Bengals", tried to grab Rex, but his body was still slippery from the water.  Rex retreated backwards to the sliding glass door and slammed it closed on the new attacker.

Rex knew this would buy him only a little time. Despite the adrenaline rush, the air-conditioning inside the house chilled his dripping wet skin.  The man outside began to pound on the glass. 

Two more ambling forms arrived in the yard and made their way to join "Bengals" effort to break into the house.  Rex saw his gun lying on the ground outside.  Its ammo depleted and out of reach, the gun was useless for the moment.

Rex raced up stairs to his father-in-law’s closet.  Leaning against the wall rested the shotgun; there was a box of shells at its base.  He took a moment to try and familiarize himself with the weapon, but he heard the glass door give out. 

He slid four shells into the magazine then loaded one into the chamber with the satisfying and hallmark sound shotguns make when pumped.  He waited at the top of the steps for the nightmare to come to him. 

A woman in a bra and jeans rounded the stairway below Rex. Her left arm hung limp and bloody, but she didn’t seem to mind.  Her body looked covered in blood, but it appeared she was not actively bleeding. She looked like she had died several hours ago, but for the fact that she was coming up the steps.  Rex worried the woman would shrug off the blast from the shotgun.  His first attacker had shaken off a full clip of .45 caliber rounds. 

Rex leveled the shotgun at the woman, a perfect angle to her head.  He squeezed, and nothing happened. "Shit!" he said.  His fingers found the safety near the trigger guard in a fraction of a moment; he didn’t waste any time to pull the trigger. 

The blast caught the woman full in the face.  Her body went flying down the stairs. She didn’t get up. 

Headshots seem to work, Rex thought.  He pumped another shell into the magazine not knowing how many more of these things would follow. 

The other two were attracted to the chaos on the stairs and rounded the bend in the hallway with "Bengals" bringing up the rear. 

Rex forced himself to remain calm and let them come to him. 

He allowed them to get halfway up the stairs before two blasts from the shotgun dispatched into the first man; it sent both the man and "Bengals" back down the steps.

"Bengals" looked up the steps at Rex with lifeless eyes and opened his mouth revealing blood-stained-teeth.  "Bengals" began to rise and struggle over the inert bodies of its fallen compatriots. 

Rex pulled the trigger once more and hot flaming shot erupted from the weapon and blew apart "Bengal’s" head.  The body crumpled over backwards down the stairs. 

Reloading his weapon, he took a moment to take stock of the situation.  His mind traced back to the police blockade, the abandoned house, and the girl with the zombie tattoo. "Oh shit," Rex thought.  He moved over to the bedroom window and stuck his head outside.  There was no longer any trace of wind.  What he thought was fireworks were now clearly sporadic gunfire; it came from every direction.  Rex's mouth fell open to form the word "zombies."