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“Most of them,” I said. He didn’t ask what happened to the others or how many didn’t make it. These days any bloody fool could write the script for those kinds of conversations.
Abdul nodded. “Glad the rest got out. Did they make it to Asheville?”
I shrugged. “God only knows. I haven’t been there myself. Keep meaning to, but . . . ”
He cut me a look. “But why not?”
We sat for a moment. The birds were singing in the trees now and sunlight slanted gently through the branches. It was as lovely as this kind of thing could be. It wasn’t that tragic, shocked stillness but rather a quieter blanket of subtle noises. Bees and flies, birds, the rustle of squirrels chasing each other through the leaves.
“My family was waiting for me in Robinwood,” I said. “I found ashes and bones, but . . . ”
“Ah,” he said, nodding.
We watched the bees. A doe stepped out of the woods forty yards away, moving with such delicacy that it made me want to cry. She looked around, saw us, watched for a long time, then moved farther into the sunlight. A pair of fawns followed on spindly legs. They couldn’t have been more than a month old. Alive, despite all the hungry people and hungry things in the woods. I caught Abdul nodding at that, too. It was an affirmation of a kind. We were both going to die; him today, me sometime after . . . but the world was going to go on. It would be quiet and lush and beautiful when we were gone. Eventually even the hungry dead would starve and waste and turn to mulch. Life would continue, and after a few hundred years the forests would have reclaimed every inch of paved ground, turning cities into gardens. I knew that Abdul was thinking something along those lines, too. There was a strange peacefulness in his eyes. Acceptance, perhaps.
Abdul was already looking bad. His color had shifted from a healthy olive to a gray-green and greasy sweat ran down his cheeks. He shivered and sitting that close I could feel the heat of the fever that was igniting beneath his skin.
Damn.
After a while he began speaking quietly, telling me his story. And I think he did that because it matters that someone knows your story once you’re gone. We all want to be remembered, as if being forgotten meant that our wandering souls might not be as immortal as we hope. Dez Fox told me that she spoke aloud the name of every zombie she killed, even if she had to pick their pockets afterward. A ritual of our shared humanity, as important—or perhaps more important—than anything I’ve ever heard said in church.
As I thought that, I heard the word “church” spoken aloud, and it snapped me out of my reverie.
I said, “Wait . . . what? What was it you just said?”
He paused, half-smiling. “I must be a riveting storyteller, Joe. You were miles away.”
“I’m here now. What did you say about a church?”
“Huh? Oh . . . no, I was talking about the old guy. The one who was gathering up the survivors.”
“Go back and tell me that part again,” I insisted. “What old guy?”
“Just an old guy. Maybe ex-military or something, because people I know who met him said he was tough as nails. Like a general. Giving smart orders, seeing to details.” Abdul wiped sweat from his eyes, looked at it and wiped it on his shirt. “I never met him, but I heard he was working through this whole area, looking for anyone left alive, giving them food and shelter, and teaching them how to be out here, you know?”
I nodded. “And . . . ?”
“And for a while I thought it was one of those stories,” said Abdul. “People grab at stuff like that because they want to know someone is out here who has his act together. Someone with a plan. Well, this guy, if he’s real, is like that. That’s one of the reasons my team came out here. We were hoping to hook up with him, see who he was, combine forces and like that.”
“But you said his name . . . ”
“Yeah, sure. They call him Old Man Church.”
I felt my whole body tense and my heart wanted to jump out of my mouth. “What does he look like?”
“What’s he look like?” Abdul thought that was a funny question. “I don’t know. Old, I guess. I never saw him. All I know is that a couple of travelers who said they met him talked about his gloves. He wears black gloves. Not work gloves or bike gloves, but silk. At least that’s what I was told.”
I closed my eyes. “Jesus fucking Christ,” I breathed.
“Why? What’s wrong? Do you know this guy?”
I took a long time answering because I wanted everything he said to be real, and I was afraid of breaking the spell.
“I think maybe I used to work for him,” I said.
“Old Man Church?”
“We called him Mister Church. Or sometimes the Deacon,” I said. “If it’s him . . . if it’s really him . . . then I have to find him.”
