Days of Love and Blood

all be gone soon. Don’t feel bad for them, Ivy. They aren’t who they used to be. All they want to do is murder. You can’t feel sympathy for them. If you saw your mom or dad being ripped to shreds by a mob of the infected, you’d feel differently. If you saw what I saw…” I trailed off.
    “I’m sorry. I know I would.”
    Hopefully she would never see anything as painful as what I witnessed because if she did, Ivy would turn into the same monster that I’d become. Killing homicidals would no longer be the dark duty that she feared, but a welcomed hobby.

    I arrived at the Fielding’s with Ronan and Cassie, taking my mother’s station wagon instead of the big camper. Ronan ran off with the other children and Cassie sat down on a log outside of Johnson’s tent. He was the young man who always partnered with Cooper but I remembered Jayde telling me that Cassie lingered around him, and Johnson never seemed to mind.
    “I don’t know if the solar panels are going to be enough,” said Brigham as we were seated around Ivy’s kitchen table with Solomon, Ivy and Cooper. My black leather pants stuck to the wooden seat in the heat, refusing to let me shift position.
    “I know, I was thinking about that.”
    “You have windmills at your farm,” said Solomon.
    “Maybe we could build one here?” I suggested. “Is anyone here an engineer or anything? ”
    “We have two people who might be able to help, actually. We went around asking.”
    “I’ll do what I can to help, but I’m afraid my usefulness is limited to raids. I’m not much good with building or even basic repair. I grew up on a farm and I don’t even know how that works.”
    “Born city girl,” said Ivy.
    “They added to the list of things we need to get,” said Cooper.
    “Do we have anyone to go with us?” I asked, happy to turn my attention toward Cooper.
    “Johnson and Tasha are on board.”
    “That should be enough. Are we ready to go? I’m itching to pick up that Plexiglas I left behind.”
    I left with Cooper in his truck while Johnson and Tasha followed behind. I briefly wondered if Cassie would be alright without her only friend, Johnson. But Ronan was there and she seemed to like him. She stopped looking like a frightened deer when Ronan was around. She lightened up, just like Cooper. Maybe it was a Ronan-thing.
    It took us six hours to locate everything on the list. We used a book of AAA maps and an old tattered phonebook to find potential items. The yellow book contained only a remnant of businesses who still depended on traditional print media rather than going mainstream on the internet.
    We filled both trucks with tankless hot water heaters, piping, giant packages of solar panels, wiring, tools, lumber, cement mix, wind turbine kits and blades, the kind of light bulbs that last for years and a number of other things that I would never know how to use. We also managed to pick up the Plexiglas that I had left at the home improvement store.
    Cooper and I barely spoke to each other during the trip, but it felt comfortable. A few times he would look over as if he was about to say something but when I met his eyes, he would stop and face the road again, biting his nails while he drove. I found myself looking at him several times. His arms were strong and his demeanor was confident but he wasn’t overpowering, at least when he wasn’t being an asshole. I wanted to know what happened to him. I wanted to know who he was before the virus. The fact that he didn’t outright divulge that information made me trust him. I can’t explain why.
    We only encountered two slow homicidals along the way, right before our last stop. As we were checking out the small town hardware store, they emerged from a building across the street and would have surprised us if it hadn’t been for their dragging bats and hideous screams. I struck one while Cooper shot the other. The gunshot made me nervous. It would draw attention. I still couldn’t get him to use a sword.
    Johnson seemed rattled from the confrontation. Exhaustion will do that to you. It brings the nightmares to life while you’re still awake.
    Our last stop was at a water filtration warehouse. The only item we hadn’t been able to find was charcoal for the filtration systems. When we were inside, something shifted and slid to the ground behind the double doors in the back. Johnson reluctantly went outside to cover the back of the building while Cooper and I approached the back doors.