Brian Keene - Dead Sea

“Okay” Malik said. “I just wondered. The two of you are friends. I wasn’t sure if that meant you were boyfriends, too.”

“Gay men can be friends with other guys, Malik. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re ‘together.’ I like Mitch, but not that way. He’s a good guy, and he’s helped us out quite a bit. We would have never gotten away from the dogs if it hadn’t been for him.”

“1 like him, too,” Malik said, closing his Walking Dead comic. I’d been right about that. He’d read it several times every night since I’d given it to him. “Both of you.”

Tasha looked up from a picture she was drawing with some pens and pencils that Carol had given to her.

“Malik never knew our dad.”

“I did too.”

“No, you didn’t. You said you can’t remember him.”

“I do… a little bit. I think. Sometimes…”

I sat down on the rack next to him. “It’s okay if you don’t. I don’t remember my father. He left when I was still a baby.”

“Really? Our dad did the same thing. Momma said he was no good.”

I chuckled. “My mother used to say the same thing about mine. I used to worry, when I was your age. Thought that maybe I was somehow weaker or dumber than the other guys in my class, because I didn’t have a father to teach me stuff the way they did. But you know what? Some of them would have been better off without their fathers around. Some of their dads were drunks or abusive or just ignored them. And you know what else? I was better off without my dad. From everything I’ve heard he would have been a lousy role model.”

“What’s a role model?” Malik asked.

“Someone you look up to,” Tasha told him. “Like how you look up to Lamar and Mitch.”

Malik twitched uncomfortably, clearly embarrassed that his older sister had revealed that. I wasn’t sure what to say, and before I could respond, the hatch opened and Mitch walked into the compartment. Apparently, he’d had a good night with the cards. He grinned from ear to ear. He shut the hatch behind him and started to speak, but then looked at the three of us.

“What’s going on? What did I miss?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Why?”

“Because the way the three of you got quiet, it looks like you were talking about me.”

I grinned. “You’re paranoid. Malik and I were just talking about what it’s like for a boy to grow up without a dad.”

“Probably better off sometimes.” Mitch sat down on the rack across from us. “My old man was a real jerk. He didn’t beat me or abuse me, nothing like that, but he was never there. He was always working, and if he wasn’t at work, then he was at the bar with his union buddies. Never had time for us. My folks got divorced when I was ten. I liked my stepfather a lot more than I did my real dad. He was there, at least.”

“What happened to them?” I asked.

He shrugged. “My real dad died of prostate cancer about ten years ago. He was one of these guys that never liked going to the doctor. Usually, you can survive prostate cancer if they catch it in time, and it moves so slowly that diagnosing and treating it are pretty easy to do. But he was a real bull-headed son of a bitch. He didn’t go to the doctor until it was too late. My stepdad and my mom retired in Arizona. I talked to them about a week before Hamelin’s Revenge. Now… I don’t know.”

Malik sighed. “Shit. I’d just be happy to have a dad at all.”

“Well,” Mitch said, “here’s something I’ve learned over time, Malik. A family isn’t just a mom, dad, brother, and sister. It can be any combination of those. And sometimes, the people don’t even have to be related. Hell, you could say we’ve got our own. little family right here. Me, you, Tasha, and Lamar. We’ve been through a lot in the last week, but we’ve stuck together and looked out for each other, right? That’s what families do.”

Mitch punched him playfully on the shoulder and Malik giggled.

“So if we’re a family,” Tasha said with a smile, “then which one of you is the mother?”

Mitch and Malik looked at me, both of them grinning. I cut them off with a laugh.

“Don’t even say it or I’ll kick both your butts.”

Mitch stood up. “Hold that thought. I’m gonna go take a leak and brush my teeth.”

He opened the hatch and stepped halfway out into the passageway. He stopped suddenly. We heard Mitch say, “Joan, what’s wrong?”

And then he screamed and we were a family no more.

Mitch stumbled back into the berthing compartment. His forearm gushed blood from a large, ragged hole. The wound was alarmingly deep. I could see tendons inside the hole. His free hand fumbled with his hip holster, trying to free his pistol. The shock must have prevented him from doing so, because his fingers slid away. Joan lurched through the hatchway chewing the missing piece of Mitch’s arm. She was obviously dead. The left side of her face and neck had been gnawed off. The bites still bled, so she hadn’t been dead for long. Her hands and face were smeared scarlet.

With an angry yell, Mitch spun and delivered a kick to Joan’s ribcage. More blood jetted from his arm. We heard Joan’s ribs snap, yet in death, she was unaffected. The blow knocked her backward. Grunting, she slammed into the passageway’s far bulkhead and slumped to the floor. Then her broken form stumbled slowly to her feet again, licking Mitch’s blood from her lips.

“Shut the hatch,” Mitch shouted. He held his forearm just below the wound and squeezed, trying to stop the flow of blood.

I slammed the hatch shut just as Joan reached for the doorway. I heard her fingernails screeching on the other side of the steel. Then she started pounding. I turned back to Mitch. He was crouched in the corner, staring at his arm in shock. Tasha grabbed a pillowcase and approached him with it.

“Here, Mitch. Let me stop the bleeding.”

“No,” he gasped. “Just hand me the pillowcase and then stay back. Don’t get my blood on you. And watch out where I’ve already bled on the floor. Don’t go near it.”

“But you need help. You need—”

“I need you to listen, girl.”

Flinching, Tasha took a faltering step backward.

“I’m sorry,” Mitch apologized. “I don’t mean to be harsh, Tasha, but I’m already infected and I don’t want you getting it, too.”

From out in the passageway, I heard Carol call out. Her voice was muffled, but alarmed.

“What’s going on? Did someone scream?”

“Carol,” I shouted through the closed hatch. “Stay in your compartment. Joan’s a zombie!”

“What?”

“She’s right outside our door. Just keep your hatch closed.”

I took a step forward, making a wide berth around the half-dollar sized drops of Mitch’s blood.

“Mitch, it might not be too late. We could…”

The look he gave me froze the words in my throat.

“You’ve seen it happen, Lamar. So have I. Too many times. Infection is instantaneous. It doesn’t matter if we cut my arm off or burn the wound or pour a gallon of fucking bleach on it. We both know what’s going to happen.”

Tasha began to cry. A second later, Malik joined her. The muffled pounding continued outside.

“Goddamn it.” I punched the locker in frustration. “God fucking damn it.”

“Yeah,” Mitch said, wrapping the pillowcase around his arm like a tourniquet. “Believe me, I feel the same way. But that ain’t gonna help us right now, Lamar. Hold it together for the kids. We need to come up with a plan.”

“We’re supposed to be safe,” Tasha whimpered. “You guys promised. You said we’d be safe on the ship. You said the zombies couldn’t get us!”

“Yeah.” Malik wiped his runny nose on his shirt sleeve. “How did they get onboard?”