Ben Bedard - The World Without Flags

Sam Jackman was one of the few people here that is (or was) truly lazy. He didn’t do anything. He was always complaining about his back or his constant headaches, but he was always first to sit down at the Lodge for meal time. He was always first with his opinions too, and liked to give them sitting back in his chair with his legs crossed, looking over at us from this position like we were fortunate to listen to his wisdom. He was also lecherous and handy and all of us girls knew to keep away from him. Most of us ignored him. Despite all the evidence, Sam seemed to be convinced he was the greatest thing ever to happen to the Homestead.

Now he’s standing in the corner of the quarantine house, his mouth hung open. Sometimes a little white worm rolls off his tongue and falls wriggling to the floor. He bangs his forehead against the wood sometimes, not hard though. Like he’s knocking. His eyes are black with knots of white worms in the corners.

We’re meeting in the Lodge. We’ve come to talk about what to do with them, the ones who are on duty.

I want to say that it’s a careful discussion, but it’s not. We’re beyond exhaustion. Our hearts don’t do anything but pump blood anymore. I don’t feel a damn thing. I haven’t since I saw Crypt get shot. I don’t think anyone else has either. It’s me, Franky, Norman, and Crystal who make the decision. Franky leads Sam and Rhonda out to where we’re going to burn them. They walk wherever we lead them, shuffling oddly. They don’t resist. When they get to the wood pile, they just stand, swaying slightly. Crystal shoots Rhonda first, pressing the gun in the back of her skull for a second before pulling the trigger. Crystal sobs as Rhonda collapses at her feet. Sam doesn’t move, just stares dumbly into the distance, his mouth hung open stupidly. Norman shoots him once in the back of the skull. Then they drag them onto the pyre and I walk forward with a burning length of wood from the stove. I push it into the seasoned wood and it starts to burn. I get the awful thought that we are wasting a lot of good wood and will have to pay for it next winter before I realize what I’m thinking. I cringe at my callousness and step back as the flames begin to set their red teeth into the wood.

As the flames crackle and grow and begin to consume Sam’s corpse, I realize I have no idea how many have died and how many have survived. I stand there dumbly trying to work out the terrible math. But I can’t focus. I’m looking at my hands. They’re dirty. They’re filthy. I look back into the fire and see the fire begin to burn Sam’s hair. Worms come boiling out of his mouth and nose as if trying to flee the flames. Instead they shrink and twist as they combust. My stomach turns. I turn away from the fire and start to walk home. I feel so exhausted, I feel like I too am shuffling forward like they were, hardly alive.

It’s not until I’m fully immersed in the scalding water of the tub that I wonder where Eric has gone. The days have become so filled with horror, I don’t remember when I’ve seen him last. It’s strange he wasn’t there to help us with Rhonda and Sam. I have the sudden certainty that he wouldn’t have let us kill them . He would’ve told us to be patient. And we wouldn’t have done what we did. It’s the first time I realize that what we did might have been wrong. A pang of guilt is replaced with a gut-wrenching need to see Eric, to talk to him, to ask him to forgive me. I lift myself out of the tub and grab a towel. I need to tell him what we did. I need him to tell me it’s all right, that he understands. I throw on some of my last clean clothes and then climb the ladder to the loft.

I smell him before I see him. A horrible, dark, rotten stench of death I have become too familiar with.

Eric is shivering in his bed, his eyes dark with blood.

Something changes in me. I grow solid inside when I see the Worm has Eric. I feel like a hard, furious crystal. I want to scream looking down at him. I want to die. I feel so many desperate desires rage through me that I fear I’m losing my mind. I shake my head.

“Think, Birdie,” I tell myself out loud. Think.

They’ll kill him if they find him like this. If he doesn’t die, if he doesn’t crack violently, he’ll still die, just like Rhonda and Sam. He’ll get put in quarantine and even if the Worm doesn’t kill him, they will. If they find him, he’s dead. I have to move him.

The sun has just vanished, leaving a blueberry sky. The fire consuming the bodies of Sam and Rhonda is still burning, lighting up the quarantine houses where a few of us are still waiting to die. Whoever is there will be inside, watching the sick ones, fighting to stay awake. The rest will be at home, sleeping or trying to choke down some food. They won’t notice us. Somehow I get Eric to his feet. I even get him a few rungs down the ladder before he falls down to the floor. I wince when he hear him hit the floor and hope he hasn’t broken anything. When I drop down to him, I check him over carefully. Luckily, he seems fine.

Yes, I think, they won’t notice us, but if they do. If they do. I look around. I stand up Eric who moans and leans against the wall, trembling. I throw a thick winter coat over him. Then I get a hat and put it down over his ears and eyes. I try not to look at the blood that smears on the hat. I’m thankful that Eric must have been too sick to take off his pants or his boots before he collapsed in his bed. If people see him from a distance, he could pass as healthy. Maybe.

Now think, Birdie.

Think.

“Come on, Eric,” I tell him. “Come on, follow me.”

I take him by the hand and give him a pull toward the door. Eric groans but follows me a few staggering steps. I open the door and look around. No one. I look toward the trees down the hill and to the northwest. It’s far. It seems like miles of open field to the dark tree line. Anyone could see us. I move to support Eric as best I can. I feel his hot, feverish breath against my neck and close my eyes against the revulsion and try not to think of the worms.

I get him out the door. He half walks, half drags himself forward, using me as support. I never realized how heavy he was. We’re both groaning now as we move toward the woods. I stop for a second to catch my breath and look back. I move my right hand to my knife and it’s there and I feel better. Then I see a shadowy figure move and I pull Eric down to the ground, which isn’t hard. He just collapses like a bag of meat. I watch the figure approaching our cabin. I see that it’s Franky. I close my eyes and hope that he didn’t see us. I can’t let him take Eric. I can’t let that happen. They’ll kill him. I know it in my heart. They’ll shoot him right in the back of the head like they did the others. Like we did. I can’t let them to do that to Eric. I won’t. I move my hand to my knife.

But Franky stops halfway to our house. He just stops and stands there. I think I know what’s happening. Franky’s like me. He’s had time to think about what we did with Rhonda and Sam and he doesn’t feel good about it. He wants to talk to Eric, just like I did. He wants to be told we did the right thing. I watch him standing there, thinking. Maybe he’s tired. Maybe he thinks we’re tired. Maybe he won’t bother us. My heart is beating and my hand is clenching the knife handle. Everything depends on what he decides to do right now.

Franky lurches forward toward the house at a big stride and my heart falls. When he finds out no one is there, there’ll be questions. Maybe he’ll smell the Worm in our cabin. Maybe he’ll come out and hunt for us. He’ll find us easy enough. I can’t let Eric die. That is not going to happen while I still breathe. It’s the way it has to be, like the decision was made in my bones. It’s a decision made without words or thought. Every part of me vibrates with the knowledge that while I live, nothing happens to Eric and no one touches him. No one.