Ben Bedard - The World Without Crows

He opened the closet, but there were only clothes, shoes, and bags of knitting yarn. Eric went to the second bedroom to search when he heard a whoop of triumph downstairs. Feeling relieved, he walked down the steps. He stopped halfway down the steps.

Brad was in the living room with John and both of them were studying a shotgun. Its dark metal was long and brutal looking and the stock was made of a dark wood. It looked brand new.

“This is a nice gun,” said Brad happily. He turned it in his hands. His evil mood seemed completely dissipated.

“Did you find any shells with it?” asked John.

Brad shook his head. “They must be here somewhere.” He looked up at Eric who was standing on the steps, overlooking them. “Were there any shells upstairs?”

Eric shrugged. “I haven’t seen any,” he said. “But I’ve only checked one room.”

“What the hell have you been doing, jerking off?” asked Brad. Holding his new gun, he bounded up the steps. “We’ve searched the whole downstairs!” He said this as he went past Eric in a rush. Embarrassed, Eric followed behind him. Brad continued, happily, as they walked through the upstairs hallway. “I swear, man, you live in a dream world or something. We could search this whole house before you even decided where to start. You’re too fucking slow, man, you’ve got to hurry it up.” Brad rolled his eyes at him and opened the second bedroom door.

The cracked Zombie was on him before Eric had a chance to yell.

The Zombie screeched as it leapt upon Brad. Eric stumbled back in fear, but then threw himself forward, trying to push the Zombie away. The smell of it was nauseating. Eric felt his fingers sink into numb flesh when he pushed at it. It was nearly on top of Brad, screeching and gurgling, black spittle dripping from its mouth. As Eric shoved at it, he watched the Zombie’s mouth open. It sunk its teeth into Brad’s shoulder. Brad’s eyes flew open in terror.

“Get her off me! Get her off!” He screamed. Eric grabbed at her hair and tugged, but the hair only peeled away part of her scalp. Brad pushed at her but she was clamped tightly to him. Suddenly John Martin pushed by Eric and, tugging the Zombie free of Brad, he hurled her against the door frame. The Zombie’s head crunched against the wood, and it fell to the floor, and then rolled to the side, and was motionless. Black liquid poured from the back of her head.

The Zombie was an old woman. She was shorter than Eric, old and thin as a bird. There were only a few long strands of hair over her burning red scalp. Her eyes had long ago melted into a black gel and her lips were shrunken so that her teeth were long and bared in a snarl.

Brad stood hunched over in the hallway, holding his hand to his shoulder where he bled. John Martin went to him, but Brad snarled and turned away.

“I’m all right,” he said. “I’m all right. Just look for shells.” Then he turned away and shot down the stairs.

“Help him,” John Martin said to Eric, who nodded and followed.

All the way down the stairs, he shook his hand absently, without know why. Only when he reached the bottom did he realize the old woman’s hair was snarled around his fingers. He wretched and gagged as he furiously wiped the hair off on the couch, leaving smears of dark blood.

The room was orderly no more.

Brad was in the kitchen over the sink. The running water, supplied by a well, still worked. He was splashing water on the wound.

“Don’t!” Eric said. “We have to boil that water first!”

Brad whirled around. “Do you think that fucking matters! She bit me, you asshole! Does it really fucking matter!”

“Of course it does!” Eric cried. “Don’t wash it with something that could be poison!” He rummaged through the drawers and found towels neatly folded. He took one out and grabbing Brad’s hand, tugged it free of the wound, and placed the towel on it. “Hold it there!”

Brad did as he was told. “I think I need to sit down,” he said. The towel was turning red. He started to sit on the kitchen floor. Eric held him up.

“Just put your head down. Put your head down over the sink.” It was what his mother told him when he felt sick. Put your head down.

“Oh fuck, she bit me,” Brad said. He made a pathetic sobbing sound and then kicked the cabinet under the sink, splitting a wooden door in two.

Eric threw open some cupboards. Above the fridge, he found what he was looking for. He unscrewed the bottle of gin and poured it over Brad’s shoulder. Brad screeched in pain. His whole body, shuddered, and Eric saw his knees go weak. Eric held him up as he slumped. Then he took off the dish towel. Two large gashes gaped there for a moment before the blood welled up and poured over his freckled skin.

Eric doused the next towel in gin and put it on Brad’s shoulder. Brad yowled and sobbed.

“How bad is it?” he asked.

“Not too bad,” Eric said.

“How bad? Really? How bad?”

“You’ll be all right!”

“Oh god,” Brad sobbed. “How bad is it? How bad?” He viciously kicked the cupboard.

John Martin came in then, holding the shotgun. He took Brad by the arm, and Eric, following, took the bottle of gin with him. Brad had difficulty walking, so John Martin half-carried him out of the house.

“Oh god,” Brad sobbed. “It’s bad, isn’t it? It hurts. Where’s Sarah?” This new question seemed to consume him all the way back. He repeated her name all the way home. “Sarah, Sarah, Sarah.”

By the time they reached the camp, the sun had set, and the sky was dark, steel blue. When they placed Brad by the fire and he clutched Sarah’s hand, he finally stopped talking. He just lay there silently by the fire as Sarah cried with his head on her lap. Darkness settled upon them like a gently falling snow.

Brad’s eyes started to bleed at about midnight that night. His head burned hot in Sarah’s lap. His red hair clung in wet curls to his forehead. Eric overheard John Martin tell Sergio and Lucia that he had never seen the Vaca B work so fast. “Maybe it’s changing,” he said. Eric cast his eyes toward them sadly. John Martin quieted and smiled apologetically. They had broken into their original groups, and avoided each other.

Birdie sat closer to Eric than usual, her arms around his waist and her head buried in his side, under his arm. She hadn’t said much or cried.

Sarah, however, was constantly weeping. She held Brad’s head in her lap and administered water to him.

The next day, the sun rose brilliant in the sky. When Brad woke, he was pale and quiet. After breakfast, Eric said to Sarah they should wash the wound and think about sewing it up as best they could. But when they took away the cloth, the wound was dark and oozed a white puss. It looked like a wound that had been festering for weeks. Eric hurriedly replaced the cloth, and then walked away, feeling dizzy. He went far into the woods and then fought to keep from losing his meal. In the end, he wretched up half of his stomach over the trunk of a tree.

Brad insisted on moving. They labored slowly over the fields, taking turns helping Brad. Blood now filled his eyes. Brad said nothing to them, moving north. When they came to a long lake, Brad waved them down. He could go no further. They made camp by the water while Sarah held Brad. His breath rasped and rattled. All that long afternoon, they waited, boiled water, cooked food, and sat silently by the edge of the water.

As night came on, Sarah asked Eric to help bring Brad to the lake’s edge. He said he wanted to look at the water. Eric was shocked at how light he was, and how much heat his body radiated. When he put Brad down, he was ashamed at being relieved to leave them there alone. Being so close to the Vaca B again was horrible. Sarah held Brad in her arms, holding his head so he could see the water, turning fiery red in the summer sunset.