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Carly went over to the window to peek out at Biker Guy. Still there. Yesterday, she had gathered all of her courage and gone down to the lobby door again, but he had met her there with another Hello, and she’d panicked and darted back upstairs.
He was looking up at her window. He waved and reached down beside his bucket to pick up something that looked like a large white sheet of poster board. He held it up, and she could see the words he’d painted on it in black: PLEASE DON’T BE AFRAID. I WON’T HURT YOU.
He dropped the top poster to reveal another beneath it: I JUST WANT TO TALK TO YOU.
Carly thought that was highly unlikely. Whatever this guy wants, it isn’t just a scintillating conversation.
He held up another sign: I’M REALLY A NICE GUY. HONEST.
Yeah, like he’d tell me if he wasn’t.
He grinned as he held up the last board: SURRENDER, DOROTHY.
Carly had to giggle, but it faded as she realized it was the first time she’d laughed since the Crisis. She retreated and let the curtain drop. Indecision gnawed at her. She had to get food, and that meant confronting Biker Guy, whether she liked it or not.
She decided to wait until the middle of the night, when he’d hopefully be asleep and wouldn’t see her leave the safety of her building.
Carly slept during the afternoon and evening, setting her wind-up alarm clock for after midnight when it would be dark. Well, as dark as it ever got in Juneau during summer, anyway. She sat up, and Sam, who slept at the foot of her bed, thumped his tail against the mattress. She could see the question in his eyes. Out?
“No,” she replied. “I can’t take you with me.” He was around three months old, knee-high with big, clumsy paws. He was still vulnerable, and it tore at her heart to think of someone hurting him. She told him to stay and went into her closet to change into dark clothing. She took her large canvas shopping bag, the steak knife, and her dad’s nine iron. As the old saying goes, God hates a coward, she reminded herself.
Carly patted her pocket to make sure she had her keys and then shut the apartment door behind herself. She crept down the stairs and approached the lobby door. Biker Guy was nowhere in sight. His fire had burned down to red embers. She took a deep breath and pushed the lobby door open a crack. She waited, looking around the dark and silent street. No movement, no sounds. Carly pushed the door open wide enough to allow her to slip through. She froze again, but nothing happened. So she set off down the street, walking as quickly as stealth would allow, with the nine iron over her shoulder like a soldier carrying a rifle.
The grocery store wasn’t far, but then again, nothing in Juneau was very far from anything else. Carly gagged at the smell of rotten meat, spoiled produce, and sour milk. The stink hadn’t dissipated at all since her last visit over a week ago, before Biker Guy had trapped her in her apartment building.
Her lantern was by the door where she’d left it. Carly picked it up and turned it on before she put it into the child seat of an empty cart, along with a fresh pack of batteries in case the lamp began to dim. Being in the dark in there was a terrifying thought.
Carly went to the dog food first and heaved the largest bag of puppy food they had into the cart. There was still plenty of that left, though the selection of human food left was slim. Troy Cramer had shown video footage of grocery stores all over the country cleaned out by shoppers or looters at the height of the Crisis.
Carly didn’t take time to make selections based on her preferences. She grabbed whatever cans were still on the shelf and dumped them into the cart. She’d been back in the stockroom on a previous visit. It was empty except for a few cases of bottled water.
A dark feeling of unease was stirring within her. What was she going to do once it was all gone? She doubted if what was left would last until the end of the summer. But surely things will be back to normal by then.
There was a gas station up the street. She wondered if she should check it to see if there were more groceries there, but it made her feel uneasy since she was already breaking quarantine to come here and the gas station was even further away. And after that’s gone, then what? Carly didn’t know. She’d expected the Crisis to be over by now and for things to be getting back to normal, and she wasn’t prepared for the world to be out of order for the long term.
She swallowed back a gasp when she heard something—a foot crunching down on the spilled rice that she had seen in the next aisle. She realized then she had left her golf club by the door when she picked up the lantern. She pulled the knife out of her pocket, her hand shaking.
Another step and a small sound, like a moan or a sigh.
Time to go. Carly pushed her cart toward the front of the store. Before now, she’d been diligent about writing down the UPC codes of the products she took and always left a check to cover the cost, but not today.
“Mother?” She recognized the voice of Merle Campton, who owned the automobile service garage. His mother had been dead for years. “Mother?”
Carly knew better than to answer. She hurried past the darkened dairy cases.
“Mother!” Merle’s boots clomped on the tile as he ran after her.
Her cart hit an unseen obstacle, and the jolt knocked the knife out of her hand. Carly looked around for it, but it must have skidded under a shelf as she saw no sign of—
“Mother!” Merle appeared at the end of her aisle and ran toward her.
“No, please, Merle, it’s Carly Daniels! Carly!”
Merle’s eyes glittered with eagerness. He ran toward her with his arms outstretched. Carly backed away, her own arms stretched out to ward him off. Her foot tangled around an empty rack of potato chips, and she fell with a short scream of surprise.
Merle’s face was the brilliant red of the Infected, and sweat beaded on his forehead. He was grinning merrily as he bent over to grab her. But the grin disappeared when Biker Guy swung the nine iron into the back of Merle’s head. Merle fell like a sack of potatoes onto his side, out cold.
“Important safety tip,” Biker Guy said, “weapons only work if you keep them with you.”
