WILLA, стр. 23
He talked about going on supply runs, discussed what we needed to do in the fields and when we should start planting seeds for next year, but he only reluctantly let us go to the old well to draw water for drinking and baths about every two days or so.
The most important thing we were low on was ammunition. When we spotted a creature that looked as if it might break through our barrier, we were supposed to let Uncle Jamie know, and he’d go out with a katana he’d bought for one of his boys during their Benny Imura phase. The weapon had hung on Kris’ wall in a locked display case until the day of the outbreak.
While Uncle Jamie had been to the north of the house, beheading a few straggling zombies, Chase had been in the cow field dousing the bodies. He’d asked one time before, shortly after the cellar incident, why we didn’t burn the dead, and Uncle Jamie had explained, but we should’ve known then that my uncle’s answer hadn’t satisfied Chase.
Uncle Jamie had gotten back to the house in time to see Sam, Kaylie, and I run out the front door with our “bugout bags,” as he’d called them, on our backs and dragging his and Chases’ behind us. We hadn’t known then precisely what had happened. We only knew that we’d smelled smoke and gotten out of the house. By the time Uncle Jamie had figured out what Chase had done, the fire had reached the Grandma’s family home.
To my surprise, Uncle Jamie didn’t scream or lash out at Chase in any way. He just took a look at the flaming field, turned, and walked away. He retrieved his bag from Sam and started down the long driveway that led away from Grandma’s house without telling us to go with him. The four of us followed in silence.
Uncle Jamie didn’t say a word until we reached the driveway of the next farm over. The Jenson’s hadn’t farmed their land in a few years. They’d been looking to sell, but they’d had a large family. If they’d done like grandma had and gathered their family, Uncle Jamie wasn’t going to be welcome at the house.
To his surprise, no one was at the main house or any of the barns. The Jensen’s, for whatever reason, had decided to wait out the zombie-apocalypse somewhere else.
“We can’t stay here long,” Uncle Jamie said, “but it’ll do us for a few days.”
No one argued, complained, or said a word. We knew, whether we wanted to admit it or not, that from then on out or, at least until the zombie apocalypse was over, that we were nomads.
During supper that night, Chase tried to explain—tried to apologize, but Uncle Jamie wouldn’t hear any of it.
I could see the resignation in the older man’s eyes. We’d attempted and failed miserably at riding out the end of the world. With people like cousin Jace or my mom, for that matter, in our family, there was no way we’d have been able to no matter how hard we tried. Mom wasn’t a terrible person or anything, but she hadn’t been prepared for the life in which we found ourselves. Few people were. And no one, not even the most diehard zombie fans, had ever truly believed that we’d see an actual outbreak.
Even those who planned for the apocalypse, who stockpiled weapons and food, couldn’t be mentally prepared for what happened. You can train all day every day, but until one of those things comes running at you, you never know how you’ll react. Even worse was having one of those creatures be someone you knew, someone you loved, someone you’d given birth to, or someone who knew you more intimately than anyone else on the planet. Having to kill that person, even though logically you knew they weren’t a person anymore, does something to you. It breaks you apart in ways you could never imagine.
Once you start breaking, sometimes you can’t stop until you are nothing but dust.
We’d keep moving, keep looking for a safer place. Until the last of those creatures was dead, nowhere was safe, nowhere was permanent, and nowhere would be home.
16.
We stayed at the Jenson’s farmhouse for about a week before moving on to our next destination. We might have stayed longer had the couple had a cellar full of food storages, but Mrs. Jenson wasn’t a canner like Grandma, nor did she buy in bulk like Uncle Jamie’s wife.
My uncles had moved quickly in those first few hours after the news of the outbreak aired. They hadn’t stopped to wonder if the stories were true, as I had, nor had they gone into a catatonic state like my mother. The second the first story aired, they were packing.
The two men weren’t preppers or those people who were waiting for the end of the world, but they were planners. Throughout their life, the two had made plans for all kinds of different disaster scenarios: earthquake, tornado, and war, to name a few. My mom had laughed at them when she heard them talking. I’d been thankful for their preparedness on that first day and every day since. Yeah, most of us still died, but we’d lived longer than plenty of other people, and only a few of us had turned into one of those creatures.
The Jenson’s had very little in the way of food and other necessities at their house, suggesting they hadn’t been home when it all went down, which wasn’t a surprise, considering Grandma thought they might be looking for a place out west to be near their kids.
On the day we left the Jenson’s house, we’d loaded ourselves down with as much of their stuff as was reasonable to carry before departing. Our packs couldn’t be too