Day Ten
The bike rumbled as it pulled to a stop. A big lumbering figure swung his leg off the bike, walked away from the bike and removed his sunglasses. It was a grey day, and he rubbed his large hands together, and turned his head back to the bike.
“Hey, Seren!” he called out, his deep voice vibrating against his throat. The small figure walked up towards him, hood up, and he could barely see her face. She stood beside him, and looked out together. They had been travelling for at least 2 days, driving off the main roads and on the old country ones. It eventually left them near patches of farming land, and besides a couple of livestock still roaming around, it seemed deserted. They pulled to the side of the rough dirt road, and the two of them overlooked downward hill, with a tiny cottage sitting in the middle of this large field.
He pointed with his thumb towards the house, a playful grin spreading on his face.
“Wanna go raid it?”
Seren pushed past him, hurdled herself over the metal gate and made her way down through the long grass towards the house. Cohen chuckled as he followed her and held his chainsaw up, guarded it with his life.
The cottage up close was very cute. Rose vines circled the rim of the door, giving it a sense of homeliness. Cohen managed to catch up to Seren before she opened the door. He stopped her, and strode in front of her.
“Step aside,” he commanded mockingly. “I’ll do the man’s job.”
She didn’t argue back. Cohen had only known this girl for a couple of days and he already knew she wasn’t the talking type, or argued. He was a tiny bit afraid of her, though he would never admit it, because she was the scary silent type. Serious, deadly and actually had an idea of she was doing in this disaster of a world. Cohen on the other hand was playful; a flirt; cracked jokes whenever the opportunity represented himself, and never took things seriously. But being with this chick made him double-guess himself, and he often felt childish and immature when in her presence.
He stepped forward, and Seren stepped to the side. He gently turned the door handle, and let the door open on its own. It creaked as is swung open, and he popped his head inside.
“What the hell?”
He motioned Seren to follow him, and she did.
The first thing she saw in the middle of the room was a dead cow.
It just lay there on its side, its body half skinned off, and smelt of fresh meat. Cohen raised the chainsaw, held it like a double handed sword, and a defenceless Seren lagged behind him. They inspected the cow, circling it. He told her to wait as he went to check the kitchen. Seren took the opportunity to really take a good look inside. The house was more like a shack, a large shack. The main entrance was the living room, the bedroom and the dining room in one. She saw the double bed, perfectly made, like someone woke up out of that bed that morning. The cow took up most of the room, a TV set knocked over on the floor, and the sofa pushed up against the wall.
Someone has been here, she thought. Very recently.
There was a shout from the kitchen. Seren jumped over the cow towards the kitchen door when Cohen came running out. The two collided on impact and fell, and she got up first, pulling him up.
He panted as his hand was being pulled. “There… is…”
Seren hurdled over the cow and bolted her way through the main entrance, only to hear another shout from Cohen. She turned back, and saw that he had tripped over the cow, face-planting on its underbelly. She sighed as she ran back in to assist. But she stopped as she saw the figure standing over him.
The figure was a tall woman, hand on her hip. She had mid-length bottle blonde hair, skinny frame, but a voluptuous figure, nearly falling out of her tight red singlet. She wore an unbuttoned plaid shirt, and tight jeans. A cigarette poked out of the side of her red lips, and Seren saw the smoke puff out from between her lips as she exhaled. This was not the first thing that Seren saw though.
It was the shotgun the woman held by her side.
She sighed, a puff of smoke escaping from her lips as she did.
“What do we have here?” her voice was deep for a woman, shifed her focus from the man on her cow and the short hooded figure in front of her. Cohen moaned as he tried to pull himself off the cow, but the woman trapped him with her heeled boot on his back.
“Uh, uh, uh,” she teased. She raised the shotgun and pointed it at Seren. “Not so fast.”
Seren didn’t raise her arms up in surrender. She remained motionless as she watched the barrel of the gun raised to meet her face. The woman smirked, her eyes focused down the barrel.
“Well? Explain yourselves! What are you doing on my property?”
Click. She heard the safety being switched off.
“Wait!” Cohen shouted as he struggled to remove the woman’s foot from his back. “We can explain!”
The woman looked down at him. “Oh really? Can you now?” she asked sweetly.
“Yes!” he screamed. “Now, please get off me!”
The woman peered back at Seren and held her gaze. She sighed again.
“Well, all righty then.” She said as she removed her foot from his back. She lowered the shotgun, as Cohen stumbled back up.
He coughed as he rubbed his back. “Jesus lady, that was a bit harsh.”
She shrugged. “Can’t trust anyone nowadays. Which brings me back to my first question. Why are you on my property?” Her head turned to Seren. “And I don’t care who you think you are.Take your hood off, I want to see the face of the person I’m talking to.”
Seren raised her hand and pulled down the hood, her hair falling out as she did. The woman did a bit of a double take when she saw her face.
She murmured something that neither of the two picked up and stepped around the cow.
The woman grabbed both of their faces, inspecting them as Cohen grumbled in surprise, and Seren turning her eyes away as she did. She released their faces, and then released another sigh.
“Would you like to stay for dinner?”
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The woman’s name was Mathilda, twenty-eight years old, and the three of them ate around the little table positioned where the cow used to be. Cohen eating with a knife and fork the seasoned beef steak Mathilda cooked, and saw her eyes narrowed as she saw Seren shovelling food down like it was water, tearing it with her knife and eating with her fingers. Cohen stopped eating and the two of them stared at her in disbelief, as she was ripping away the steak with her teeth. It took her a while to notice the stares, and she stopped in mid chew, fingers covered in grease.
“God, you eat like an animal,” Cohen commented, and Mathilda kicked him from underneath the table.
“Manners!” she warned him, and she smiled nervously at Seren. “When was the last time you’ve eaten properly, sweetie?”
Seren wiped the grease around her mouth with her arm. “Not recently,” she replied. “And it’s Seren.”
Mathilda nodded, “Right all right. When specifically did you last eat?”
“Four days ago.”
“What?!” Cohen blurted out. “Two days ago, you were carrying heaps of tinned food!”
“That was the day I found the largest haul,” her eyes narrowed at him. “The food I did find days earlier was expired, and you ate all the tins on the road.”
Cohen shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Mathilda slapped him behind the head.
“Hey!” he cried out.
“How inconsiderate,” Mathilda muttered, and then her smile became warm. “You eat as much as you like, Seren. Old Petunia was generous tonight.”
“Petunia?” Cohen asked, his hand rubbing the back of his head.
“The cow,” said Seren, who continued to tear away at her meal.
“Ah.”
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Mathilda offered for them to stay the night.
“There are more chances of surviving this God awful apocalypse if you have a good night’s rest,” she had said, dragging a mattress from under the double bed.
“Apocalypse?” Cohen asked as he took off his shoes.
Mathilda swept her arm around the room. “Take a good look ‘round. There are no police on the streets, dead people wandering around and no one is stopping them from spreading. The world has turned to shambles, so I think this is counts as an apocalypse.”
“What about the safe zones?”
“Safe zones?” Mathilda sounded genuinely surprised. “What safe zones?”
“You didn’t hear about it?”
Mathilda sat down at the edge of her bed. “No, I haven’t.”
Cohen explained to her about Humvees of army and police officials that roamed the city streets, while Seren pulled her hoody off, chucking it into the corner. She walked over to the window and was about to sit down on the chair, when a hand touched her shoulder.
She looked up and Mathilda’s face was smiling at her. “You need to rest. I’ll keep watch for the night. Cohen will take over later.”
“Why me?” Cohen whined, and Mathilda shushed him. “You were in the army, weren’t you?” she snapped at him. “You should be used to staying up at nights.”
He grumbled as he climbed onto the mattress. Seren got up and grabbed a blanket, and curled herself onto the floor.
“You can use my bed, you know?” Mathilda suggested gently, but Seren shook her head. She heard her sigh, and then quietly whisper to herself.
“C’mon you buggers, you better not show up tonight.”