The Infected (Book 3): Nightfall by Joseph Zuko

old
warped record it was skipping over grooves of time.
    Karen wasn’t ready to
answer the question. The bite of chicken tasted sour in her mouth now. She
choked it down and searched for the right way to tell her children that their
Ganny was lying dead in the backyard. She didn’t want to start crying again. She
had already filled her quota for crying today. She was sick of it. Her poor
tear ducts had been squeezed dry and were on strike. They refused to produce
anymore tears until their demands had been met and they had an excellent union
rep so it was going to take a while to come to terms.  
    Leon saw Karen struggling
to find the right words. He decided to lend a helping hand, “She’s gone.” Their
four heads snapped in his direction and now he was on the spot. “I mean, she
has stepped out and will be gone for a long time.” He hoped that would be
enough and he stared down into his soup.
    Valerie thought about what
he said for a moment, “But where did she go? She was just back there,” she said
as she pointed out into the yard. She was still out there, just on the other
side of the blinds. Her body getting colder by the second.
    Karen thought quickly,
“Baby, eat up and I promise I will tell you all about it when it’s bedtime.
Okay?” Karen and the tear ducts had come to an agreement. She would give them
most of the day off, but when the sun set and it was time for bed she was
allowed to cry herself to sleep.
    Deal? Karen pleaded.
    Deal. The tear ducts conceded.
     
    Troy set his sandwich
down, “My stomach feels upset.”
    Leon’s eyes lit up, “I
read about this in the medical handbook. Okay, he might feel nauseous and
that’s normal. It also said he could be fine in a few hours or a couple days.
It said everyone was different and it would be difficult to say how long it
would take for him to heal.” He paused for a moment to internally thumb through
his files. Okay, he found the next section. “We need to keep him alert, but try
not to make him think too much or do too many activities for the next few days.
Oh, and we need to keep ice on it for about twenty minutes at a time.” Leon
searched the far corners of his mind to see if there was any other tidbits of
info he needed to tell her, but that was it.
    Troy leaned back in his
chair and rubbed his stomach. “I think I’m going to be sick.” He stood up from
the table and raced to the bathroom.
    “He’ll be fine. Book said
it’s normal,” Leon said as he scooped the last of his dinner into his mouth.
    Karen had also just
finished and in the nick of time. The nasty sounds coming from Troy in the
bathroom would have made it impossible to finish her meal.
    “Once we get the windows
blocked up, then what?” Leon asked as he set his dirty dishes in the sink. He
tried his best to ignore the vomiting going on less than twenty-feet away.
    “I don’t know. We have
food and water. We need you to get another ride. Other than that I really don’t
know,” Karen stood up, joined him in the kitchen and dropped her dishes off in
the sink too.
    “Well I’m sure I can find
us a hot set of wheels. Most of these houses had a truck or car out front,”
Leon beamed with pride. He loved that his skills were so handy in this new
crazy world.
    “Maybe you could show me
how to get a car going? Just in case.”
    No one had ever asked Leon
to train them. He was the master and now he had an apprentice. The idea excited
him. “No problem. If we clear a spot in the garage we could pull a car in there
and I could show you the basics.” Leon really lit up about this new idea. Some
alone time with Karen. Just the two of them in the front seat of a car. It
would be like they were in high school and on a date. Except that they would be
in a garage with the world falling apart outside. He would show her what wires
to cross under the steering column instead of trying to touch her sweet
boobies. Plus her children from her current marriage would be there and