Muffled static, like sandpaper across my eardrum, scratches and crawls up my spine one aching vertebrae at a time. It seems to go on and on, labored breaths of uncertainty and panic, commotion and dissonance molest the receiver. It hasn’t even dawned on me that I haven’t taken a breath until my lungs begin to burn with fire.
“Hello,” the weary voice slips into my ear, heavy and full of fatigue. I recognize it like a ghost, an echo from the past.
“Emma, honey?”
“John, you’re okay,” she pauses,“...alive?” Her voice is like a warm hug. A distant embrace held apart by so much death and malevolence.
“Emma are you safe? The Clarks? You’re with them?”
“John...”
“Mr. Clark is a strong, resourceful man. He knows how to survive.”
“John?”
“You are in good hands with him, he will keep you safe.”
“John! They’re dead.”
Little beads of sweat, filthy and brown, cool and wet sting my forehead. I collapse against the corner of the phone booth like a prizefighter taking a pummeling against the ropes. I'm lost in the muttle. I stare at Joe pacing the parking lot. He looks like he’s aged years in the past week. His white shirt smattered with tiny crimson rorschach's, his Beatles mop twisting in the warm Atlantic breeze. A far different kid now than the one I met spinning tales beyond his years and serving me Dark and Stormies on the last living day of our lives. We fled Carolina Beach and made it as far as Wilmington, NC before the hoards pushed us northeast towards the coastal town of Hampstead. With our backs against the ocean we soon will have to face the enclave of dead.
Word spread that Camp Lejeune, the Marine Base, was a refuge, others said the it was the source of the outbreak, plague, pestilence, whatever. The only thing we know is that everyday it’s getting worse and it seems to be sprawling in every direction. The things, the horror we've witnessed imprint themselves in black bloody globs, staining our sleep with gore and bits of flesh, lingering the way vomit does in the back of your throat.
"John? Are you there?" Emma says.
I hear her, but I don't. I can't make the connecting. Joe is kicking a rock across the parking lot. I see a twenty something kid, transformed, evolving into something no one thought he could be, not even himself. The fact is, we no longer exist! All we knew, all we thought about us, as people has changed. A simple singularity connects us all now, the will to survive. The how, the why is a greater enegima than it ever was before. Purpose be damned. A hero made in one split second of a decision or casualty a half a second too long.
"John? Say something."
"Are you safe?" I stammer.
"Yes. John what is going on? Where are you?"
"North Carolina. Was attending a conference when it all began."
"I'm scared."
“Me too. Do you have a...I mean, how are you protecting yourself?”
I already know I must reveal my secret, expose her to my shame.
“There’s a bat, I keep in my car, but I panicked. I’ve been hiding in your basement for days.”
I must tell her. I don’t want to but it’s the only way to keep her safe.
“Emma, don’t go outside. I need you to listen to me. I need you to go to the attic. In the corner, there’s an old trunk. Inside is a small wooden box. I need you to get it. Can you do that?”
“Yes, I can.”
I hear her steps on the hardwood. With each one the static rises and crackles a little more. The signal is fading, along with the chance of disconnect growing and separation hovering on permanences. I have to do what I can to keep her safe.
“Emma? You need to set the phone down. We can’t lose the connection!”
“Okay, John.”
I can almost feel her set the phone down with care, like putting a sleeping baby in their crib. Her steps slowly recess and fade away. The attic door squeaks on rusty springs as she pulls the chain and lowers it to the floor. I hear her first step and then she’s gone.
At the top of the attic stairs, our christmas tree, ornaments and tinsel of christmas past, frozen in a time when love breathed a deeper breath within those four walls. Next to it, a bookcase, surrounded by draping and worn out insulation, a makeshift eulogy of a life past and forgotten strun amongst the shelves. Pictures of Emma, age five and up, until there were no more. Pictures of Sabrina and I, when things were...not perfect, but not weary as they soon would become. A collection of memories, more illusion than actual remains now. The trunk in the corner was my grandfather's, a WWI relic. Inside, wrapped in Emma’s favorite blanket is small wooden box finished and stained with a secret. It will feel heavy in her hands and the weight will shift inside when she moves it. She will try to open it but it is locked, the last line of defense and protection against myself.
Joe has wandered a little further down the road, a little too far for my comfort. The Shell station yielded nothing more than a few bottles of water, Red Bulls and potato chips and this landline. A populous on the edge of uncertainty will strip everything in sight for a chance at survival. A luxury I suppose of being at the beginning of the end in a familiar place and surroundings. I am not. I am out of my element. I am thankful for Joe. Lords knows I wouldn’t have survived this long without him. The sound of footsteps make their way back to my ears in between crunches of static. As Emma picks up the phone Joe’s disappears just out of my view and my nerves begin to rise.
“I have it John, but it’s locked.”
“I know honey. I need you to go into the kitchen now. The reception should reach.”
Just then a loud thump pounds against my ear. Through many miles of telephone wire, I know exactly what the sound was and where it emanated from. Again it hits the front door with force and I hear the wood in the door frame split. Emma screams, helpless my blood turns cold.
I don’t know if it’s a looter or a “Z”, either way they are coming through my door.
“Emma, in the kitchen drawer, the one by the stove, are a set of keys to unlock the box.” Another bang against the door and the glass cracks.
“You have to hurry. Whatever is trying to get in, is gonna get in. You have to accept that baby."
"John I'm scared."
"I know honey but you have to focus. Get the keys and lock yourself in the bathroom."
My own wits shatter before me as Joe comes running into view. The shotgun bounces heavy on his back and against his head. He's waving frantically and the intensity of his eyes glow even in the daylight. The stretch wiggles it's way up my nose before I even catch eye of the oppressors. We are being hunted. My attempt to keep my Emma safe has now put Joe and me in direct danger. Joe struggles to retrieve the keys to the Impala from his pocket mid stride. We don’t dare try and make a stand and fight. In my haste to stop we didn’t make a thorough sweep of the area. There’s no telling how many there might be wandering, waiting for us to screw up. The knot in my stomach grows and it feels like it might burst right out and onto the dusty phone booth floor.
“I have the keys. There are so many. Which one is it?” Emma squeals in agony. I am painfully aware that I have no time to explain or answer her question. That my time is running out and that I must leave. That this is possibly the last time I will ever hear her voice. That I must leave her to her own, abandon her again.
“Emma honey, I must go. I’m in danger. I love you so much. Never forget that. Hide and keep yourself safe. I am coming to you. I will come for you.”
“John, wait...I don't know which one. There has to be over a hundred keys!”
Joe is screaming.
Emma is crying.
Z’s are quickly approaching.
My head is caught in the toil.
“Emma, I am sorry honey. I love you. I cannot tell you which one. I don’t know, but one will open it, I promise. I am coming for you.”
There is no more time. I cannot bring myself to hang the phone up. It seems too final. I let the receiver fall and it bangs against the glass. Joe revs the engine as I spin around the front of the hood. I am cut off from the passenger door by one of them. A mailman, perhaps in his fifties and recently bitten, a Freshy. He snarls and is quick, not like the others approaching behind him. He bites the air with ferocity and lunges at me. I kick at him, exposing a limb to the fray and a possible bite. I kick again, knocking him off balance enough that he staggers back and falls into another. I grab the door handle as Joe is already pressing the accelerator. The gas station begins to slowly disappear behind us and I catch the phone booth in the side mirror. The receiver still swaying back and forth. Uncertainty on the other end.
“I will come for you,” I mumble to myself, “I will come for you.”
