Mark Tufo - 'Til Death Do Us Part

“Full tank, too,” she said proudly.

“This was really the second best car in the complex?” I asked, hoping against hope.

“By miles,” she said.

Hercules walked next to me. He lifted his leg and proceeded to piss a small river coming off the small car’s front tire and past my shoes.

“He doesn’t much like that car,” she told me. “I think it had more to do with the old owner. She always yelled at him.”

“No, I think it has to do with the car,” I said as I patted him on his head.

“Come on, let’s get you some guns.” I hoped this was going to cheer me up. We headed back towards her home. She pulled a small key ring out of her pocket. “These are yours now.”

“Thank you.” And I meant it. The car might have been uglier than bloated, blue, bull balls, but it was ours, and if it was a necessary evil that got me back to my family that much quicker, then I would suffer through it. I just hoped I didn’t run into anyone I knew along the way.

She opened the lid up to a good-sized plastic bin more commonly used to house gardening equipment. There were a good ten or twelve guns in there with a decent amount of ammo. Most of it looked to be of the .22 caliber variety.

“You keep these out here?” I asked her. She nodded. “What if something happens?”

“The Lord will provide.”

“Mirabelle, there’s nothing wrong with your faith, but remember…he helps those that help themselves. There’s a lot wrong with the world today and we can’t afford to lose more good folks to the oncoming evil.” I didn’t seem to be winning her over with my argument. “Okay, wait new tactic. You said the Lord would provide, right?”

She nodded again.

“Well didn’t he provide these then?”

“I’m not sure that’s what that proverb pertains to.”

“Listen, Mirabelle, I’m not going to tell you how to live your lives, you both look like you’ve made it through better than I have so far. You just need to know that the evil that walks this earth is not merely relegated to zombies. And crap-filled diapers aren’t going to stop them, more than likely it will alert them to the fact that someone is around.”

“I’ll think about it,” she said. “I’m just not a fan of guns.”

“Fair enough. I’m going to take two…a rifle and a pistol.”

“What about your friend?”

“He’s much better off without one. I’m afraid he would think it was a squirt gun and blow his lips off trying to get a drink of water.”

Mirabelle laughed.

There was a 7.62 caliber semi-automatic that looked Chinese built; I really wanted to take that one as it was by far the best thing in that box, but I kept digging. I ended up with a twelve-gauge shotgun from the Depression Era. It was a single-shot breech load and well taken care of, but unless we were taking on slow deer, it was not the optimal weapon of choice. I added to that a nine-inch barreled .32 caliber revolver. I’d never even heard of the manufacturer. All I could think was that someone had watched Dirty Harry with Clint Eastwood and wanted to own the same gun. That same person then went down to the local gun store, and when they realized how much a .44 magnum cost, they opted out for the lesser imitation model.

There was a box of twenty-five rounds for the shottie, and maybe thirty-five to forty rounds for the .32. I thanked Mirabelle profusely, she waved my gestures away.

“It’s the least we could do,” she said.

“I really hope you take me up on my offer,” I told her as I held her door open. Hercules scooted in after her. I looked out once for any signs of danger and closed the door after me when I didn’t notice anything.

Luke and John were in the midst of some epic laughing and hadn’t realized we had returned. Probably didn’t even know we had ever left.

“You want to see the spare bedroom?” Mirabelle asked. “You look like you’re asleep on your feet.”

“I’d love to,” I said as I followed her down the narrow corridor.

“Can I ask you something?” she asked as she led me into the small room dominated by a queen-sized bed that looked like a small slice of heaven just now.

“Sure.” I hoped she would make it quick.

“Do you want take a shower first?” She looked me up and down and then over to her clean bedding.

There I was, I had a myriad of scrapes that had dried blood on them, and some remnants of animal lard that were caked with dirt. “That’d probably be for the best,” I told her as I looked longingly at the bed. “Is that what you wanted to ask me? Don’t get me wrong I’m surprised you let us in at all now that I’m thinking about it.”

“Luke let you in,” she answered.

“Well I guess there’s that.”

“What’s with the hat?”

Where do I go with that? Do I tell her that I can talk to vampires with it off? Maybe after the shower and eight hours of sleep.

“John wanted me to wear it. He gets very agitated if I take it off, and since we’re traveling together I figured it was best to appease him.”

I might have bought some time with that, but I figured her next question was going to be why John wanted the hats on in the first place. I didn’t have answers that would make us sound sane or not completely mollify her. “I’m going to take that shower now.”

Her eyes still held a question, but she let it drop as she led me to the small bathroom with the shower enclosure. I stripped down, making sure the hat stayed on. I cut a ridiculous figure with that piece of tin foil on my head. My facial hair, eyebrow and hair (from what I could see) were beginning to fill in quicker than I would have expected. Was it only three days since I’d lost my best friend? My body was as hard as it had ever been in the Marines, and it was in direct contrast to the quiver of my chin and lips as anguish flooded my system. I was just now realizing I had yet to grieve my loss. I wailed as silently as was possible; my mirror image cried with me as I placed my hand against the cool glass surface.

“You alright?” Mirabelle asked with concern outside the door.

“I’m...I’m sorry,” I said as I wiped the offending moisture from my face.

“I have your shower,” she told me.

I had no idea what she meant. I moved to the side so that when I opened the door she couldn’t see my bare ass. I didn’t want to wrap a towel around myself and get the thing encrusted before I even had the chance to use it. Mirabelle handed me a solar shower bag usually reserved for campers or folks holding onto existence during a zombie apocalypse.

“There’s a hook in the shower where you hang it from,” she said, looking down at the industrial carpeting. “If you toss your clothes out here, I’ll get them as clean as I can.”

“You don’t need to do that.”

“I know…you alright?” she asked again, bringing her eyes up.

“I...I just lost someone dear to me recently, I’m sorry.”

“No need to be. Are you going to shower with that on?” she asked pointing to my hat.

“No,” I assured her, although I didn’t take it off. I bent over and grabbed my clothing, thankful that I was about to wash off. If I looked half as bad as my clothes, I thought I might be sick.

Mirabelle looked reluctant to touch them as well. “Umm, there’s a lot of clothes around these trailers. What size do you wear?”

I gave her rough dimensions. I wasn’t really sure anymore, especially after all the weight I had lost. Seemed kind of ironic that I had lost pounds in the physical realm and gained them all back in the spiritual in the form of pain.

“Time heals all wounds,” Mirabelle told me, obviously seeing the hurt I was in.

Normally I would tend to agree with that phrase, but the zombies had a way of repeatedly opening fresh wounds and never allowing the last one to completely heal up. I nodded my head at the right moment and let her believe her platitude.