CHAPTER 11: A CLOSE CALL
Getting to Safe Zone F was anything but simple now that I had no one left to lead the way. Growing up, I relied too much on other people, never needing to use my own head. However, I wasn’t a child anymore. I was sixteen years old and should’ve paid closer attention to the news bulletins and the emergency broadcasts. Maybe if I had, I would’ve known which direction to go.
While I hoped Hunter had been right about the path merging with the previous road again, Emily distracted me with her innocent chatter.
I was too preoccupied to think far ahead in time. Calculating and planning how to get to the Safe Zone was out of the question. The plan, so far, was to follow the path we were on in the hopes of finding more people at the end of it. Assuming the majority of the people knew where they were going, and the fact I didn’t even know whether we were supposed to head North or South, following the throng of humans went without saying.
“Keara!” Emily pulled her hand free of mine, and ran off to the side of the road.
In a panic, I held on to both heavy backpacks and waddled after her. “What is it, Emily?”
She looked up as I came to a halt next to her, hastily grasping one of her tiny hands with mine. Big tears strolled down Emily’s face, dangling at her nose and chin, before they created dark, wet stains in the fabric of her dirty dress.
“Is she dead?”
Dead bodies meant contamination, and we couldn’t risk tempting fate by stumbling upon dead, decaying, infected bodies. I cursed out loud, too anxious to even realize I did it. I scanned our immediate surroundings, but didn’t spot any dead bodies. Perhaps Emily had meant her mom, and the thought of her family was the cause of the little girl’s tears. I doubted it would do her any good if I were to explain what her family was going through.
Emily sniffed next to me, wiping her nose clean on her arm. “Is she wearing a collar?”
“Huh? Is she what?”
“The cat, do you think she has a name tag?”
I followed Emily’s gaze, something I should’ve done straight away. Slightly hidden from view, behind a bush of weeds, I saw the tail of a cat sticking out.
“Oh,” I let out in surprise, barely able to hide my smile. Emily didn’t need to know that I considered the cat’s death a good thing. I’d rather have to face a dead cat than a person.
The thought of touching the dead animal gave me the creeps, but if Emily wanted to know whether it wore a nametag, I would check that for her. After all, the poor girl was sobbing over a cat she didn’t even know.
Crouching down next to the cat, I felt for a collar at the neck.
“There isn’t a name tag,” I told Emily when she hunkered down next to me.
“Can we call her Lola, then?”
“Lola? That’s a nice name.”
“Let’s just place Lola somewhere safe, alright?”
I picked the cat up, making my stomach twist and turn at the feel of that stiff body, and carried her to a small wooden fence, a little offside the road. Gently, I laid the cat down, covering her with a blanket of grass as Emily picked a handful of dandelions. Still sniffing, she placed them on Lola, silently saying goodbye.
And that’s how, for the second time that day, I hid a dead body at the side of a road, causing me to remember how only mere hours ago, I had done the same thing for Hunter in the hope he’d find peace – wherever he was now.
It pained me to leave behind yet another thing that belonged to Hunter, but I couldn’t keep carrying both backpacks, they slowed me down too much. That’s why, before we left again once Emily had said her final goodbyes to Lola the cat, I had stuffed most of Hunter’s belongings in my backpack. While doing so, I got rid of the things of my own of which I thought I wouldn’t need them anymore, therefore making my backpack less heavy to carry around.
The longer we walked, and thus the closer we got to our Safe Zone, the more soldiers appeared at the side of the road. They were paired up and just watched all the people walk by. I couldn’t quite decide whether their presence made me feel safer or not. I had this constant fear that one of these soldiers would think I was contaminated, and planned on making sure I wasn’t able to go to the Safe Zone anymore. I wasn’t contaminated, definitely not, but I was terrified a soldier would be mistaken and take care of me for no grounded reason at all.
One soldier always stood guard, whereas the other one seemed to mingle in with all of us, the people who were on their way to the Safe Zones. It was when I had seen one soldier coming out of his small tent that afternoon, that I found out they had plenty of food and water inside. And water was something Emily and I could use. Shortly after we had left that morning, I noticed we only had two small water bottles left and we wouldn’t get very far with those.
At first I wasn’t quite sure what to do, and that’s why I thought about what Jason or Hunter would’ve done in my place. ‘Let’s steal water from other people,’ that’s what Hunter would’ve suggested if he were here. But, as I considered that option, I could hear Jason’s voice inside my head as well. ‘That’s plain right stupid. What if they’re contaminated but don’t know yet?’
As Emily and I continued to walk, I kept throwing possible ideas back and forth in my head, mentally discussing them with Hunter and Jason as they filled me in on all the pros and cons - until I came up with the most perfect idea. These soldiers along the side of the road couldn’t be contaminated, or so I assumed, and they had plenty of water in their tents, so all we had to do was find a way to sneak inside one of those tents.
My whole plan seemed rather impossible and stupid at first, but the more I thought about it, the more sense it made, however I wasn’t going to be able to do it on my own. That’s why I explained to Emily how we had to borrow some of those soldiers their water because otherwise we would run out. I also told her that soldiers were nice people too, only doing their jobs, but they wouldn’t want us to have their water. When she asked if nobody else had some water for us, I added Jason’s argument about how we could only be sure about the soldiers when it came to who was and wasn’t contaminated. It was pretty obvious they wouldn’t put infected people at the sides of the road, or at least that was the whole idea my plan was based upon.
“Alright, you know what to do?” I checked one last time, making sure that Emily knew the plan by heart so nothing good go wrong. I waited for her to nod and then we parted ways. As I made my way towards the side of the road, I glanced behind; Emily wasn’t looking in my direction, which was a good thing. Our plan wouldn’t work if they figured out we belonged together.
The adrenaline rushed through my entire body as I got closer and closer to the soldiers. We had waited at the side of the road for a while now, just to make sure they were with two and not three. I could only imagine what would happen when another soldier appeared out of nowhere and caught us stealing his things. It was at the moment when the two soldiers started talking, and thus stood a little closer to each other than before, that I realized it was our best chance to make our move.
From the sidelines I watched as Emily approached the tough looking soldier, the one farthest away from where I stood. Her shoulders were shaking and she seemed to wipe her nose clean several times. I was going to have to congratulate her for being so good at acting because if I hadn’t known this was all a set up, I would’ve definitely fallen for her helpless crying little girl act – just like the soldier did.
“Are you alright?” I could hear the soldier ask a little weary as he glanced around to see if Emily was all by herself. Only just in time did I remember to look the other way, I didn’t want to attract his attention by staring at them, giving our plan away before we even had the chance to accomplish anything.
I pretended to be a random, other person on the road, not interested at all in what was happening with the little girl. My eyes stayed focused on the road ahead, nonetheless, I continued to pay attention to Emily out of the corners of my eyes, ensuring myself that she was alright and that everything else was going according to plan.
Soon enough, the soldier that was trying to comfort Emily motioned for the other one, the one who stood closest to me and their tent, to go to them. That’s the moment I fastened my pace and didn’t stop until I reached the tent. I glanced over my shoulder, making sure no one was paying any attention to me, and then I double checked Emily and the two soldiers who still were trying to comfort her, yet, they both kept a safe distance from her by not getting closer than about two meters.
Taking in a deep breath, I bent down and started to undo the zipper of the tent as carefully as I could, afraid that it would make too much sound and alarm the soldiers. Even though it probably was quite obvious what I was trying to do, I still fiddled at the laces of my left shoe. If the worst came to the worst, I would be able to use tying my shoe as an excuse for hovering in front of their tent.
One last time, I made sure Emily was alright, and then I slipped inside the small tent, hastily looking for their provisions, wanting to get out of there as soon as possible. Luckily for me, the tent wasn’t big at all, something that made it much easier for me to find the box with water and food. As fast and as careful as I could, I put the water bottles in my back pack. And while I was at it, I thought the soldiers wouldn’t mind if I took a few of their crackers and some bread that I found as well. Needless to say that the tent probably contained a lot more useful things, like flashlights for example, but I didn’t want to push my luck any further than I already had by stealing from soldiers.
Ready to leave again now that my backpack was stuffed with food and drinks, making it quite heavy, I peeked outside through the opening of the zipper, making sure the coast was clear for me to sneak out again.
I was pretty relieved that my plan had worked out perfectly so far, but that relief turned into fright when I noticed one of the soldiers turn around, heading towards the tent. As long as that soldier walked in my direction, I was trapped inside, not able to get out unnoticed. There was no way for me to let Emily know what to do either, leaving me no other options but to sit back while trying to stay out of sight pray for some miracle to happen.
As I waited, terrified of what would happen, I could hear the soldier get closer and closer. Because the sun was located behind him, his body formed a shadow on the thin fabric of the tent. The shadow grew bigger and bigger as the man approached the tent, a tent that held me captivated.
“What?” I heard a deep voice say outside, and by the way it sounded, it was clear that the person who had spoken stood just outside the tent.
My heart skipped a beat, or worse, it felt as though it had stopped beating all together as I realized he had seen me. I was sure I was busted, and now things would get ugly for me. What exactly was about to happen, I had no idea, but I knew it would be bad. The worst part of it all? It was my own fault, after all, who in their right mind even considered sneaking into tents of soldiers, let alone actually doing it and stealing their food?
And then, much to my surprise and relief, the shadow began to shrink again as the soldier on the other side began to walk away. As careful as I could, I peeked through the zipper, and indeed, the soldier was on his way back towards Emily. Although that was more than I could’ve hoped for, and I should have been thankful for whatever had caused him to go back, I still choked on my breath when I found out for myself.
There was a tall guy standing next to Emily, some black-haired guy that I had never seen before. He had his arm casually around her shoulders and was talking to the one soldier that stood with them, while he made these weird movements with his free hand. It wasn’t exactly clear to me what he was doing, but I didn’t have the time to think about it any further, I had to get out of that tent to go get Emily safe again. If that guy was contaminated and passed the disease onto Emily, I would never be able to forgive myself, knowing it was my entire fault that I wasn’t there to keep that guy at a safe distance from her.
Determined to get Emily safe as fast as I could, I opened the zipper of the tent again, a little less careful then before. When I was halfway out of the tent, my eyes still strongly focused on the two soldiers, Emily and the stranger, that I stopped mid in my tracks.
The guy met my eyes, and it’s only then that I understood what he had been doing with his hand. He was motioning for me to get going, to hurry up. This confused me so much that my mouth dropped open, literally. Soundlessly, he mouthed the word ‘go’ before quickly paying attention to the soldiers again. A little puzzled as to why this stranger was helping me get away, I decided to simply take advantage of it for now and keep the questions later.
I didn’t bother closing the tent again, not feeling like wasting more time than I already had, and as soon as I made it outside, I speed-walked for a couple of meters before I called out in surprise, just like Emily and I had agreed to do.
“Emily? There you are!”
The moment Emily heard my voice, she ran straight to me, leaving the two soldiers and the stranger behind. She threw herself at me and gave me a tight hug, as though she hadn’t seen me in ages.
“They believed me,” she whispered breathlessly in my ear as I hugged her back.
“Of course they did, you were amazing!” I replied in a quiet voice, praising her, which caused her to chuckle a little.
“I am sorry,” I apologized to the soldiers once Emily had let go of me. “I wasn’t paying attention for only a split second and lost sight of her, I’ve been looking everywhere. Thanks for looking after my little sister. Really, I wouldn’t have survived it if anything bad happened to her.”
“Don’t mention it,” replied the youngest-looking soldier. “Just, try to be a little more careful from now on. You never know who the people around you are and if you can trust them.”
That last remark caused my eyes to wander off to the stranger that had helped us out. He didn’t look like the kind of person who was out to get us, but like the soldier had said, you couldn’t trust anyone these days. By stealing from them, I was the living proof of that.
“Alright,” I said while taking Emily’s hand in mine. “I think we better get going now. Thanks again.”
Feeling extremely uneasy standing there in front of those soldiers, I didn’t hesitate when I turned around, tagging Emily along as I began to walk. I left the stranger behind, convinced that he was old enough to take care of himself.
No matter how determined I was to keep a steady pace and make it to our Safe Zone as soon as possible, my shoulders hurt because of the weight of all the water in my backpack. When I had been putting it all in, I hadn’t really thought about the fact that I would have to carry all of it. Sure, the more we drank the less heavy my backpack would become, but until then I’d have to suffer.
The lack of sleep didn’t really help. My muscles still ached from having spent too much time in the same position that night, not to mention how the cold hadn’t done me any good either. With Emily at my one hand, and the many liters of water I carried on my back, we followed the rest of the people on the street. Though, we had only walked for a few hundred meters when I had to ask Emily to stop.
“This just weighs too much,” I complained painfully as I put the bag on the ground. “It is not going to work like this.”
If only I hadn’t gotten rid of Hunter’s backpack earlier that day, at least then I would have been able to move some of the water bottles in that bag to carry in my free hand, dividing some of the weight so I wouldn’t have to carry everything on my back anymore.
“I can help you carry all of it,” Emily suggested.
With a smile that I really tried to hold back, I looked at her small backpack, and then I thought, ‘Why not?’ It wasn’t because her backpack was so ridiculously small and pink that I would keep Emily from feeling as though she was helping me out.
“Thank you!” I sighed, trying to sound relieved as ever. “Why don’t you open your backpack and let me put some of the water bottles in it. That would be such a big help.”
With a big smile, she held her little pink bag open as I managed to put no more than two small bottles in it and a little pack of crackers.
“Are you sure you’ll be able to carry all of this?”
She nodded eagerly, and then with a proud smile on her face, we began to walk again – but not for long.
“That was close,” the unfamiliar guy sighed as he caught up with us, oblivious to the fact that I was trying to get rid of him.
I took hold of Emily’s hand and fastened my pace, but to no avail, he didn’t appear to be having any difficulties keeping up with us.
“And you are?” I wanted to know, coming to an abrupt halt while subtly moving myself in front of Emily, hiding her from his view.
“I’m the one who saved your ass back there,” he replied smugly. He probably expected me to laugh or joke about it, because he continued to look at me expectantly, but I didn’t feel like becoming best buddies with this stranger. He must’ve noticed this though, because his smile faded after a few moments of silence, and then he answered me more seriously.
“Christophe, that’s my name.”
“I’m not going to shake your hand,” I snorted when he held out his hand, making me raise my eyebrow in disbelief. The past few days I had done many reckless and stupid things, but shaking hands with a stranger wasn’t going to be one of them. For all I knew, he could be contaminated and I wasn’t going to risk my life only so he could feel better about himself.
Even though he looked rather healthy - no rashes, no scratches, and no unhealthy pale skin - I still wasn’t going to take any chances, not this time. When he saw me eyeing his hand as though it had grown a second thumb, he dropped it again and muttered something that sounded a lot like “Yeah, right, forgot about that.”
“Well, Christophe, I have no idea why you helped us out back there, but Emily and I have to keep going. If you don’t mind, then we’re going to leave now.” That being said, I turned around, reached for Emily’s hand once more and began to walk again, not looking back to see if he was still following us or not.
“You know,” he said from behind us, loud enough for me to hear, “a thank you would’ve been nice.”
Despite the fact that I didn’t feel like paying any more attention to him than I unfortunately already had, I was forced to stop walking when Emily did.
“Thank you!” she smiled so friendly at him that I couldn’t just simply ignore Christophe after that. That’s why, like a good well-mannered girl, I turned around to face him and tried not to send him any life-threatening stares.
“You’re very welcome,” he smiled just as friendly back at Emily, but I couldn’t force the corners of my lips to go up, not even the slightest bit.
“Why did you help us out?” I wondered, still not able to understand why he’d do that. “We could’ve been infected.”
“You aren’t infected, right? So it doesn’t really matter now anymore? Does it?” he replied, not answering my question at all.
“Why?” I asked again, only in a more pressing way this time.
“Does there really have to be a reason?” he wondered nonchalantly. “I passed by, noticed you could use some help so I kept Hilly and Billy busy while you got away.”
“Hilly and Billy?” I snorted, not able to hold back my laughter. It didn’t really help that Emily found this highly amusing as well and joined me with her cute giggles.
Christophe looked at us as though we had lost our marbles, but I noticed a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as well.
“He’s funny,” stated Emily, and then she looked at me expectantly. “Can he come, Keara?”
What was I supposed to say to that? No? I couldn’t do that, so once again I gave in because I couldn’t say no to Emily, not when she looked up at me with those big blue eyes of hers and that tiny mouth pouting ever so slightly as she waited for my answer.
Not that my answer really mattered, I soon came to realize. Because after all, we were out on the streets and if Christophe wanted to follow us, there was nothing I could do to keep him from doing so. As if I would ever be able to outrun him with Emily, not just that, he seemed like the kind of guy that would last longer than me, even when I didn’t have Emily to tag along, he probably would still outrun me if he carried Emily on his back and all of our backpacks in his hands.
“Sure,” I shrugged a little unsure, and then I faced Christophe. “But only if you keep your distance.”
“Do you still think I’m sick? Do I look like one of those contaminated people to you?” he asked perplexed, pointing at himself as he spoke.
“It’s not about what I think or don’t think. The only thing that matters is that you can proof that you’re not carrying the contamination. Until that moment, I need you to promise that you’ll keep your distance.”