chapter one
frankly, I'd rather be dead. The kind of dead that makes you stay in one place, there for eternity, your flesh turning to dust, bones bleaching in the sun. The world was simple when death was a place of rest, your soul leaving for another world and your body left to rot in the ground.
…
We were alone, the four of us, gone adventuring to one of our families cabins in the mountains of Washington state, it was late summer and boredom had set in. We thought how nice it would be to be able to be alone, an epic slumber party before we graduated next year, we had saved and planned days away from summer jobs and strangely our parents had agreed to drop us at at the closest cabin, about a mile from the highway, and only forty-five minutes from our town.
Sarah's Dad dropped us off, with maps, phone numbers and contingency plans for every case of emergency.
Three days later, we were hungover and exhausted waiting for Mr Elden, Sarah's dad to pick us up. After almost three days of swimming and drinking smuggled vodka with whatever we could conjure up, all of us feeling pretty under the weather and were keen to get home to our own beds and some alone time, we loved each other but after almost 72 hours together we were looking for some quiet.
"What the hell?" An hour after he was due, and having been waiting a good half an hour before he had told us he would be here, Sarah, who's cabin we were staying at, was pissed. She was always hot-headed, and of course was the first to start complaining. All of us were feeling miserable and I was glad of the extra time to try and flush out the effects of last nights alcohol with water and a nap on my rucksack, the grass was soft and the breeze was welcome, bringing crisp air to my nose that seemed to be way more sensitive in this state and the summer smells were helpful to calming my rolling stomach.
It was strange though, him being late. He was never, ever late. He had been out reliable chauffeur all through our high school years and not once were we late too school.
It was entirely plausible that he was just off time, it happens sometimes, and eventually, as another half hour went by, we all started to speak up, reassuring each other that all was well, and it was just a one-off.
"Maybe the battery died, that happened to my mom once. It took an hour for her to find someone to get it started again." Leah was always the voice of reason. we stopped talking after that, all of us starting to become a little uneasy but no-one wanting to continue to voice the growing concern.
It was quiet. once I realised it I actually found it hard to rest. I was so used to noises, either if birds or light traffic in town. There was nothing, the ambience of life had stopped.
"Hey, does anyone notice how quiet it is?"
It silenced further still, as the four of us strained to hear anything. It was eerie. That was when my almost indifference to the strange behaviour of Sarah's dad, started to become an unease that settled in my already queasy stomach.
"I think we should go back to the cabin." It was Leah who spoke. Sarah groaned. Muttering under her breath, she rose, grabbing her bags and the rest of us followed.
"Shouldn't we wait, I'm sure he won't be much longer." Lauren was usually the loudest of us but after last night she was the most hungover. It was the first time she had said anything since we arrived and the roadsidee.
I felt uneasy, the silence around us making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. As we walked down the beaten path back toward the cabin, I tried to quell the feeling and make myself think on other things but no matter how I tried I couldn't shake the feeling that something was seriously wrong.
We reached the cabin, dumping out things in the living room and all of us branching out to find couches and beds to sleep off the effects of lasts night.
It was dark when I woke, for a few seconds I'm home, before the window opposite with the faint light from the moon illuminates the trees outside so different from my bedroom window.
It's eerily quiet, the sounds of the forest outside no longer a comforting chatter in the background, instead it was dead silent. There was no sign of Sarah's dad, and at the realisation that we were still here, with no way of contacting anyone.
"Leah…Leah wake up!" She was sleeping beside Lauren who I'd rather not wake beforeI could talk to Leah, with her level head she was probably going to be the most reliable in this situation.
She jerked up blinking rapidly until her eyes focused in the dark room. "What time is it?" She flung off the covers and stepped toward the window pulling back the curtains to look outside.
"I have no idea, I can't find my phone."
"How late is it?" She goes about answering her own question, flicking open her old flip phone, the light glaringly bright the large back digits displaying eight forty five.
I watch, her eyebrows pull together as she thinks, her trademark look. " He said we could walk to the village, down the other side of the mountain. We should go in the morning, if he still hasn't shown up."
The next morning we all hiked down the mountain, it took is about 40 minutes, we knew we would have access to a phone and emergency supplies if we needed.
It was apparent something horrible had happened within minutes of arriving. one of the main windows of the old gas station had been smashed, the lights still on, cars parked haphazardly in front was what first drew our attention, the doors open and some were even left running.
I remember the feeling of fear, it sunk into my stomach like a heavy weight, My eyes darted about, my fingers trembled and I suddenly found it hard to keep walking.
…
The body was still twitching. The sickly blue tinge to the skin was so inhuman, and yet, the body, a woman, clothes in average jeans and pink shirt, her hair still up in a bun although now it was matted with what looked like blood but much darker almost black, one side of her skull dented from the number of hits it took with the pole I still held.
Lauren was vomiting. I wasn't far off. It moved again, almost lunching toward me, I reacted, hurling the pole into its head with all my strength my body still fuelled with adrenaline.
The next few minutes are a blur, I wondered over to lauren, dropping the pole, my hands shaking, my eyes never leaving the now still body of the woman lying on the ground at our feet. I thought It was going to hug her, Lauren who i had liked but wasn't my favourite, still now, here, she was real, normal and I needed it, the reassurance that not all was different in the few hours since we had left the cabin.
Instead, she bent over, her back curling violently as she again gave up the contents of her stomach. I helped her through it, my hands glad of something to do as they rubbed her back.
I could only continue staring at the body, the skin blue with dark veins, lips almost black eyes a strange milky colour. Her hair was brilliant red.
"Bella!?"
"Leah!" I stepped away from lauren, who straightened and pulled at my hand. I looked toward the sound of leaks voice. She held overfilled plastic bags in her hands.
"What the fuck!" She didn't ever swear, but now it seemed more fitting then ever.
WHAT. THE. FUCK. I kept repeating it in my head. Leah and Sarah stood beside us, looking down at the body. "I don't know what it is" I surprised myself when I spoke, I sounded nothing like me. I was like a Monotone, a robot.
"Are there more?" IT was Sarah who spoke, her voice quite like mine. We had all tuned off, Leah still held her bags, filled with bread and snacks, the plastic stitching under the weight.
" I have no idea."
We didn't stick around, we searched the local grocers, much like the gas station it was smashed and many of the shelves were empty. We took what we could find. It was strange, looking back. We all assumed, without speaking, we knew, and we seemed to all come to the same conclusion.
…
We debated vigorously whether or not to walk back to forks. It would take us a few hours, I wasn't keen. After having faced the woman at the service station I was still shaken, and rationality agued that I would be safer here, alone.
I however was out numbered. The argument was that we needed to find our families and while I feared walking into a town with a much bigger population I also wanted very much to find my parents.
We left the next day. We walked silent, still dazed. We had Ideas, mostly the same thing. We had seen movies that strangely played out almost the same circumstances, towns left empty but for strange beings, infected. Fact is, we still had no idea how far it had spread. We weren't of the illusion though that our small town was untouched, Sarah's dad had yet to turn up.
….