“Look.”
I turned my head in the direction she pointed and fought back the vomit.
The woman who owned the grocery store, Jane, was laying on top of her dead husband. At first I hadn’t seen her move, but then her head popped up. In her mouth hung what was left of her husband’s eye and a chunk of his flesh. Blood ran down her chin, landing on the ground. Mixing in with the white foam they all excreted, a pink blob of seafoam-looking-mess circled his head. She swallowed it after chewing the eye in half and dove in for more.
Her skin dripped off her arms where the boils had opened. Raw meat and muscle were exposed, but instead of healthy tissue, it was turning a greyish brown. It looked like meat that had been sitting out too long. Not moldy yet, but definitely not safe to eat.
She bent down and grabbed another chunk of her husband. When she came up to tear it off him, I noticed she was eating her own arm. Because that area had been infected and was already opened up and rotting, it didn’t take much for her to break the part she wanted free from the rest of her.
The part I still hadn’t understood was why they couldn’t feel the pain of eating themselves. Did that virus dull the senses to the point they felt nothing? If that was the case, it didn’t make sense to me that they screamed out in pain still at that stage of the disease. It wasn’t until after they stopped the cannibalism that the screaming stopped. The virus still seemed to eat at their bodies making the skin, muscle, and fat look like meat that had done through a grinder. Charred black skin circled around the open wounds spreading as the virus spread.
“Can we go, please?” Cammy begged. I heard her fight back the tears and for a moment, I felt the need to protect her.
“Yes, we can go.”
“Jake, is that going to happen to us? If this is airborne, we already have it, right? How long before it kills us or turns us into that?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure. This happened so fast. Six days ago, we thought there was a spike in a flu bug. Five days ago, a memo was put out by the CDC. It doesn’t sound like they even know what it is or how to stop it. All we can do is keep fighting it and stay away from people who are infected.”
“That seems kinda lame.”
“I know, but it’s all I have right now. Marissa was fine a few hours ago and as far as I know, Matt never had it, and look at them. I’m not sure any of us stand a chance against this thing.”
“We have to.” She said it so soft I wasn’t sure it was meant for me to hear.
Not wanting to draw her attention to it, I kept my mouth shut as I watched a woman dragging herself across a driveway. Half her face had been consumed by the virus and the bone was all that was left. Her nose was nothing more than the empty cavity where the cartilage used to be. Patches of hair were ripped from her skull and in her left hand, she still carried strands of it.
The flesh on her fingers that was holding the long, brown locks of her hair peeled away from the bone like a carrot being used for garnish. Bone was exposed where the flesh and meat had been removed with the boils.
She stopped moving and looked at me. Our eyes locked, and I got ready to floor the car. I wasn’t sure how fast she could move; some seemed slower and others had accelerated speed. What I did know was I wasn’t putting Cammy in danger that she didn’t need to be in.
The woman didn’t move though. Instead, she began to rake her hands over her body tearing at the parts that were infected. She ran her hands over them again and again. Deep thick lines of crimson formed before the pus spilled out. She scraped at it with the hand missing the skin and when she had a nice glob of it, I watched in horror as she ate it. Smiling as it slid down her throat, I turned away when she went in for another handful.
“It smells out here,” Cammy said trying to cover her nose.
“I know. It was starting to get that way at the hospital too. You can try to breathe through your mouth. It might help a little. Hopefully, once we get farther out of town it won’t be so bad.”
“What if it’s worse? What if animals can get it too?”
She didn’t know about the cat, and I hadn’t had time to tell her after she was attacked and then I was. I had to shake my head to clear the sight of the poor thing choking on itself out of my mind.
“There was a cat at the hospital in the room I was in when you got there. He had it and was doing the same things the people are.”
“What about dogs? Can they get it?” As frantic as she sounded at the thought of it, I assumed she was worried about the shepherd she had.
“I don’t know. Until I found the cat, I didn’t know anything outside of us could get it. It has been the only one I have seen, so you know as much as I do.”
She let one stray tear fall before wiping her face, straightening up in the seat, and clearing her throat. She used to do the same thing when kids would pick on her when she was little. Cammy was tough as shit and I loved that about her.
Looking at her from the corner of my eye, I saw how grown up she had become and was sad I never thought of her as more than the kid my nana watched. I was older than her, but only by five years. That was nothing now that we were adults. I felt like I had let her down and I wasn’t sure how to even protect her from this thing I didn’t even understand.
“Look out!” she screamed bringing my attention to what she was pointing at.
There was a body in the middle of the road, and I was lined up and going too fast to avoid it.
Thud.
The car ran over the corpse and dragged it along until it stopped.
“Are you okay?” I asked her.
“Yes.” She was shaking but didn’t look hurt.
“Stay here,” I ordered her.
“Don’t go out there, and stop pointing your finger at me.” She swatted my hand to get it out of her face and I waved her off.
“I have to make sure it didn’t do damage to the car. I will be right back.”
“Jake,” I heard her say as I shut the door behind me.
Looking at the front of the car, there was a small dent on the fender from the body being hit and half of it flinging up. Blood splattered the grill and tires, but nothing looked damaged. Making sure my gloves were good, I grabbed on to the legs of the man and started to drag him from under the car. I slipped and fell backwards, landing hard when one of his legs came off in my hand.
I turned to the side and threw up as I let go of the leg. The virus had spread so far into him that parts were falling off at the bone.
I heard a noise behind me and when I looked up, I saw another man moving closer to where we were.
“Please help,” he begged as he limped closer. “Please.”
Even from as far away as he was, I could see the sores covering his body. Parts of his face were missing, leaving holes like swiss cheese, and a tooth flew out with his last call for help. Scrambling to get up, I ran back to the car. Opening the door to cries from Cammy to hurry, I shut and locked the door before putting the old Buick into drive and going.
As a doctor, it was hard to not help the man, but there was nothing I could do but try to save Cammy and myself.
CHAPTER SIX
One of the best things about living in a small town was the countryside. It didn’t take long for Jake to leave the main streets, and the people littered on the asphalt, in exchange for more trees, gravel driveways, and less people. Less people meant less bodies. It meant less nightmare fuel. I wasn’t having to see people ripping at their own flesh everywhere I turned. For possibly an hour or so, I had been able to clear my vision of virus-stricken neighbors and random bystanders whose dripping flesh I would never forget.
“This place is just a shithole, Jake. Do you think the CDC or the government has a safe space anywhere? Surely, there’s something, right?”