As soon as they were inside the little dealership showroom, out of both earshot and eyesight of the other two, Ellis felt his heart start to thump in his chest again. He wasn't sure if he should apologize now or let Coach have his 'word' as he had requested first. He stared at the linoleum floor with uncertainty, letting the soles of his boots scuff across it absently. The football player was across the room; he'd found a goodly sized cardboard box and was pillaging the snack machine which he had broken open with the butt of his shotgun. Mostly it was chips and candy bars that were left, nothing of any real substance that would provide them the nutrition they needed, but it would keep them from outright starving; they hadn't had a proper supper the last couple nights. Ellis' belly gave a rumble at the thought.

"Could'ya help me with this, boy?" Coach asked, hooking his thumb at the soda machine beside him.

Ellis stepped up to it, giving it a once-over. "Yeah, I reckon," he said, pulling the brim of his hat down. He unhitched his machete and thrust it into the plastic covering towards the top, using his arm strength to muscle it to the corner, cutting a long jagged line in the sheet. He yanked the weapon loose and then switched directions to make a cut from top to bottom. Before long he had slashed a square, and he peeled the plastic away, exposing the mechanism and the many bottles of beverages inside.

"Good work," Coach nodded, starting to load them into the box. "I figure, if we got somethin' to haul with, we oughta damn well use it. Don't you agree?"

The mechanic gave a nod and stepped back. They'd been traveling light, but with the car they could actually keep a backlog of items. He watched the older man stack the plastic bottles of water and cola, working quickly and with a purpose. Ellis wrung the back of his neck, wondering when and if Coach was actually going to talk to him about whatever it was he wanted privacy for…

The football player finished and seemed to pause, still stooped over, giving a large exhale. Apparently he wasn't much looking forward to their conversation either from the way he was stalling. Slowly, he rose and placed his arm over the mechanic's shoulders suddenly, causing Ellis to nearly jump in surprised response. It was a friendly gesture, though, almost fatherly; as if the older man was huddling up with him to discuss a play out on the field.

"Ellis, boy, neither of the other two put you up to this, did they?" he inquired.

The southerner tipped his head to the side, then quickly shook it. "No, sir. I didn't even know Ro' wanted tuh go. Or Nick… 'til last night anyway," he scratched his forearm.

"So Nick brought it up?" the older man followed up, sounding suspicious.

Ellis scrunched his nose up. "No," he immediately denied the claim, then thought about it, trying to recall. "Well, shit, I guess he did, but he was jus' tryin' tuh make a point."

The thick black eyebrows came together in the middle. "What point was that?"

"That I should follow mah instincts. Trust myself. Least, I think tha' was what he was gettin' at…" he chuckled nervously. It felt a little… weird to be telling Coach about the conversations he and Nick shared in the middle of the night. They were… private, almost.

Coach nodded beside him; Ellis could feel his form bob against his whole side with the gesture. "Alright," he said, letting him go.

"Is… is that it…?" Ellis blinked, feeling a little let down by the short exchange, watching as the man leaned down and hefted up the snack-filled box, lumbering toward the door. He'd been expecting… well, shoot, he hadn't known what to expect, but he'd figured it would have been more of a discussion than a couple of questions about their fellow survivors.

"I just wanted to make sure you wanted to go 'cause you wanted to go," Coach said, glancing back at him.

"Well… yeah, a'course…" Ellis got out, slightly befuddled at the concern; the football player turned again. He nipped his lower lip gently, knowing he would get away if he didn't stop him. "Coach, man, I wanted tuh say…"

His footsteps halted and the big brown eyes met his gaze slowly, but questioningly.

"M'real sorry 'bout what I said back there. In the tower," he fessed up quickly. "Ya been an inspiration tuh e'ery single one'a us, an' I lost sight of that, jus' cuz ya turned me down. I shouldn't'a snapped." Ellis swallowed and hung his head, hoping the man could forgive him.

Coach chuckled and shook his head, the liquid in the box sloshing with the motion. "Boy…" he let out in a large sigh, "there's probably something you should know."

Ellis shuffled his feet. "What's that?"

The football player walked around him, finding a table to set the box down on and pulling up a nearby chair. He sat down in it and Ellis joined him, sensing he ought to, a dialogue finally opened up between them. His bright blue eyes settled on the older man, waiting patiently for his response.

"When this damn thing hit," Coach began, "my wife and I were at Freedom High." Ellis' ears practically perked up on his head at this tiny tidbit; Coach hadn't ever gone and mentioned he was married! Shoot, that opened up so many other questions, like how long they had been married, if they had kids... Ellis had to fight to keep his tongue in check. The older man went on, "I coached for the football team, she taught Economics to the freshmen. Third period the alert went out over the sound system about a student bitin' another one, about security takin' down the youngin' with a taser." He shook his head regrettably. "Lockdowns went on over the entire school, evacuation started a couple periods later. Buses got jam-packed with kids leavin' for 'internments' without their folks even bein' notified."

Ellis' nose wrinkled with distaste.

"But they were in immediate danger. They'd been 'exposed'. An' when there weren't enough buses left, more came in from all over to take 'em away, haul 'em off to God knows where." The older man's gaze was far-away, regret swimming in his brown pools; he slowly drew the emblem he'd removed from his polo from a pocket, studying it in the meat of his palm. "The principal ran off, along with a large portion of the staff, but some'a us stayed. Leanor and I helped as much as we could, tryin' to make sure they were all accounted for, that no one got left behind. Didn't think about where they might be goin', so long as they were 'safe'." His face had pulled into a hard stare again, focused on the tabletop as he squeezed the patch tight.

Ellis wasn't sure why he was being told this, but he did know the older man needed his support and sympathy. He reached across the table and squeezed his large shoulder. "Don't beat'cher self up, man, you was doin' what'chu could." Honestly, his actions sounded truly admirable.

Coach chuckled again, turning away from him. "I helped all them kids to their deaths," he delivered deadpan.

The mechanic swallowed roughly. "Ya don't know that," he argued, though the pile-up of bodies stacked in the airplane hangar burned in his memory as he said it, and no doubt Coach's as well. He kept speaking to fill the void. "If ya hadn't've, well, shit, all'a 'em might'a been infected. They'd be zombies by now. An', ya didn't know, how could'ja have? Hell, tuh the best'a yer knowledge, you was doin' right."

The man was impassive, unaffected by his words.

And then it dawned on him very suddenly that if Coach and his wife had been both helping that day and she wasn't with him now… that only left a couple options. He swallowed roughly. "Coach… what happened to yer wife?"

"The students weren't the only ones I let go on them buses," he murmured lowly. "I told Leanor to get on the second to last bus without me. I was gonna round up the stragglers, meet with her on the other side, when we got to it," he explained. His face was pained and angry, twisted with revulsion and anger. "But there weren't no 'last bus'. Damn thing never came. Hers was it." Silence stretched out between them.

"Ya… ya don't have any idea where she is…" Ellis whispered, realizing he and the older man were in the same plight all along and he hadn't even known. A new wave of guilt coursed through him and he was about to open his mouth and apologize a second time when Coach spoke again.

"I know where she is."

The mechanic froze up at that. "Ya… ya do?" he asked incredulously, the questions spewing out of his mouth. "How? Where?"

Coach repositioned himself in his chair, giving a grunt. "Well, it took me a damn long time to make the walk back to our house, seein' as someone gone and stole Betsy, but when I got there she'd left me a few messages on the answerin' machine."

Ellis leaned forward. "And? What'd they say?"

"Well at first she was en route to Jacksonville," the older man rumbled as he divulged the story, "bein' as it was the next biggest evac center in the southeast, an' part of the reason I was hopin' it might still be open when we got there." There was a pause. "But she got re-routed towards New Orleans when the station got over-crowded. Damn good thing she didn't make it, otherwise I'm sure they would'a taken her cell away from her."

"So… she is in New Orleans?" Ellis ventured.

The big man's jaw shook from side to side. "Tallahassee. Her sister lives down there, with her husband and two kids." He chuckled softly. "From what I heard, she made quite a scene by stoppin' the bus, somethin' about tellin' the driver it was 'her funeral an' she could go if she wanted to'. Girl always had a way with words."

Ellis' brow furrowed, trying to picture where in the country Tallahassee was, when suddenly it came to him– it was about in the middle of Florida, right along their route, and about halfway between Savannah and New Orleans. And then he further realized that Coach's steadfast determination in making haste to their destination all this time might not have been as entirely selfless as it had originally seemed.

Ellis drummed his fingers on the table, but he couldn't keep from asking, he had to ask. He looked the older man straight in the eyes. "When we get there… to Tallahassee…" he led in, taking a deep breath, "were you plannin' to jus' leave us? Split off an' make us go the rest'a the way ourselves…?"

Coach leaned out over the table, staring at his own gloved hands. He inhaled and let it back out. "Leave is a strong word, boy…"

"So, yes," Ellis finished for him.

The older man didn't deny it, shutting his eyes.

The mechanic gave a flabbergasted chuckle, feeling a little hurt, even injured having learned this. Should he have even apologized for what he had said it the tower? All this time had they been following someone who was determined to get them to safety, or just someone who needed bodyguards to get him close to his own destination? If Coach had been upfront with them from the beginning, it would be a different matter, but Ellis couldn't help but feel used and a little deceived.

"Listen, Ellis, I've grown attached to ya," he said, putting a gloved hand upon his shoulder and squeezing it firmly, "all of ya. Even Nick. But my family needs me, you of all people gotta understand that, boy."

He felt his heart practically stop in his chest. But there it was, that old saying, blood was thicker than water.

"She's waitin' for me, along with my little niece an' nephew," Coach said, a slight waver of emotion to his voice. "The last message she sent before her phone battery went dead said she had found 'em and was waitin' for me before goin' on."

Ellis squeezed his eyes shut. He wanted to yell at the man again. Yell at him for being such a hypocrite, telling he and Rochelle to forget their families when he was clearly thinking of his own. Wanted to yell at him for planning to abandon the three of them and not even warning them it was going to happen until now!

His body tingled with anger, but he thought of his Pa, how he would have handled the situation. He knew that his Pa would have been the bigger man, calmed down, seen it from Coach's eyes, and let it go.

It was his chance to do the same.

Ellis straightened up, standing from his seat. He spoke his next words with sincerity. "I hope ya kin join 'em, Coach, I really do. We're all gonna miss ya when ya go. But thank you fer tellin' me."

The football player sat unmoving, distrustful. "Don't be tellin' the others, okay, youngin'?"

"Naw," Ellis shook his head, "I won't. S'your responsibility tuh let 'em know. Even if it ain't more than five minutes ahead'a time." He readjusted his hat firmly, taking the situation into his own hands. "Let's get goin'." He swept the box of supplies up in his arms and made for the showroom door, leaving the oldest survivor in his wake.