Biohazard

19

“It’ll be dark in an hour,” I said, as we paused to reload our weapons, hiding out in a trashed pharmacy.

Carl looked around the devastated city. “So we better find somewhere to lay low for the night.”

“Shit, shit, shit,” Gremlin said. “I thought we were going to be out of here. Somewhere else. Fuck.”

Using the U.S. Army medical pack I’d gotten from Sean, I attended to Texas Slim’s spear wound. It was a nasty looking gash across his ribs, but hardly fatal. I disinfected it, closed it with a couple butterfly bandages, taped a sterile battlefield dressing over it, and gave him a shot of antibiotics just to be safe. He’d be sore for a few days but nothing more.

Janie was off looting through the store. She was gone quite awhile. When she got back there was a funny look in her eyes.

“Where you been?” I said.

“Just looking around,” she told me. She was lying and I knew it. But I wouldn’t realize how big of a lie it was until much, much later.

“Why don’t we keep going…we have guns,” Mickey said. “Within an hour, I think, we can be at the garage with the Jeep. Why wait until tomorrow?”

Texas Slim grinned. “Because when it gets dark, child, out come the oogies and the boogies and the things that go bump in the night.”

“Let’s risk it,” she said. “We get that Jeep we can be out of Gary in twenty minutes.”

“Why don’t you just do us all a favor and shut up?” Janie said.

“Take it easy, Janie,” I told her.

Her eyes were not just blue at that moment but glacial. “Jesus Christ, Nash. She’s been with us a few hours and she’s calling the shots? Who the hell asked for her advice anyway?”

Mickey shrugged. “I was just saying.”

“Oh, shut up.”

They stood there, staring at each other while I was getting annoyed and Texas Slim and Carl were silently amused and Gremlin was practically in heat. “Hey,” he said. “Just like Roller Derby. We’re gonna have us a cat fight. Out come the claws! Fur is gonna fly!”

“Why don’t you go fuck yourself?” Mickey told him.

“No, I wasn’t thinking about fucking myself. I was thinking about fucking somebody else.”

I got in there then. God knows I’d had enough of that fucking idiot by then. I shoved Gremlin and put him on his ass. “Knock it the hell off. What did I tell you about that shit?” I had a sudden desire to throw him another beating. The only time that asshole took a break from whining and complaining was to start panting over one of the girls. “Keep it in your fucking pants. Christ.”

I turned and saw that Mickey was smiling at me like I’d come to her rescue and I also saw that Janie was steaming. The green-eyed monster was out of its cage.

“Let’s all just settle down here, okay?” I said to them. “We’re not going to accomplish anything like this.”

Gremlin got up, brushing dust off himself. His face was still bruised from the last time we’d tangled. He touched his fingertips to a purple welt under his eye that was slowly fading. “Sure, Nash. I got ya. We got to keep our new girl nice and fresh, eh?” He winked. “Our friend don’t want damaged goods, do he?”

“Here we go again,” Carl said.

“What the hell is he talking about?” Mickey wanted to know.

Texas Slim hooked her by the arm and led her away. “Nothing to worry about, my dear. You see, many years ago, Gremlin’s mother took a large healthy shit and fell quite in love with one of the turds she saw in the bowl. So she nursed it and fed it and brought it up and the result of that you see standing over there.”

Carl burst out laughing.

We all did…except for Janie and Gremlin himself.

Sighing, I led them outside.

It was about that time that I noticed we had an audience. At first, I went for my gun…but then lowered it. There was a man standing not fifteen feet away on the sidewalk. He was naked except for an outrageous cranberry bathrobe that was hanging open, his business on full display. His fingernails and toenails were both painted purple.

“Boy howdy,” Texas said to him. “Join the party?”

The guy just stared at us. He had a brilliant, fluffy head of trailing blonde locks. He also had a beard that was more white than gray.

Texas Slim had no fear of crazy people. He went over to the guy and tied his bathrobe shut for him. “The ladies, you understand,” he said, pressing a hand to his wound.

The guy had a phonebook under his arm. He pointed down the street and said, “They came in silver buses. I saw ‘em. They had orange suits on. They took Reverend Bob and threw him in the bus. I saw it happen. I saw lots of things happen. I wrote all down in my book here.” He showed us the phonebook, shrugged. “I ate my dog because I was hungry.”

Carl laughed in his throat and turned away. “Who’s the fucking Gomer?”

“Pay no attention to Carl,” Texas Slim said. “He hasn’t had a serious romantic encounter since his dear mother passed.”

“Kiss my ass,” Carl said.

Bathrobe wandered away down the street. Texas called to him, but he kept going.

“Want me to grab him?” Carl whispered.

“Why?”

“You know why. It’s almost time.”

“Let him go. I’m tired of this shit.”

I started walking again, Mickey at my side.

“Where are we going?” Janie said.

“To find that Jeep.”

“Tonight?”

“Why not?”

She just shook her head and Mickey grinned. We walked in silence, Texas Slim and Carl out front with their guns keeping an eye on things. I was thinking about everything and trying hard not to. We trudged on, getting closer to the river. In the distance I could see the mills and refineries Gary was famous for. A few birds circled in the sky and sand blew over the roads in a fine spray. We went over a grassy hill, crossed railroad tracks, cut through some wilted thickets and then before us, stretching in all directions, a great blackened pit.

It was full of bodies.