“Out of here? Rochester? And where? Where are we going? I’ve seen zombie movies. I have. Once you get bit, or scratched, you become one.”

“That’s movies. We don’t know that’s what’s going on. Not for sure.” I didn’t even believe me. I still felt good saying it. That there was a chance. A way out.

“The city is infested, Chase. They’re everywhere.”

Not the expressways, I thought. By talking, she’d kept my mind sort of off the task of driving. I hadn’t noticed the other cars, until now. These might all be people who had no idea what was happening. Maybe coming home from work, or a movie, or from out of town.

And they don’t have their radio on.

No one listens to a radio anymore. Commercials suck. No. They Blue-tooth their phones, or IPods, or pay for commercial-free satellite service. They’re not hearing local news. They have no idea what they were headed toward.

Or they do. And they’re not headed home, but. . . west.

“Mexico.”

“Mexico, what?”

“It’s where we’re headed.”

“We’re going to drive to Mexico? Why in the hell are we going there?”

She must not have heard the broadcast back when we first left the 911 parking lot. “They don’t have the vaccination there. No one is sick.”

“Chase, look out!”

Three people stood in our lane, headlights freezing them in place. Like deer. I punched a fist onto the steering wheel. The horn blared.

I swerved.

A car in the center lane swerved. I heard its horn.

I missed the three people standing on the expressway. Fishtailed. I pulled on and spun the wheel, trying to correct the spin, to no avail. A tire blew—a loud pop and we crossed the center and far left lane into the median, the tires biting into the wet grass like teeth into flesh.

Smoke billowed from under the hood.

Shit.

I checked the rearview mirror. I must have banged my head. The bridge of my nose and just above my right eyebrow bled. “You okay, Allison? Alley?”

She sat back in the seat, looked asleep, if not for what resembled hair coloring washed off her scalp, dripping into her eyes . . .

“Alley? Alley?” I didn’t want to shake her. A small emergency medical bag was in the trunk. I climbed out of the car. Legs shook. I kept a hand on the roof, slid it along to steady myself as I made my way to the rear. If I didn’t have a concussion, I’d almost guarantee Allison did.

I could not see the creatures that caused the accident. They must have ambled off somewhere. Into the woods along the right lane? It didn’t matter. They were gone. For now.

I retrieved the red bag and hurried around to the passenger side. Pulled open Alley’s door. Her eyes were open. She stared straight ahead.

“Allison?” Folded hands in her lap did not move. “Alley?”

I unzipped the bag. Set it on the grass.

Something burned. Close. No mistaking the grainy scents of a house fire or fires. Everything crisping at once. Not just clapboard, but furniture, clothing. Plastics and carpeting. I looked up, around. It was too dark to see much, but could imagine billowing black clouds all around me, like smoke pillars holding up the sky.

“Allison?” I tried, again, put my hands on hers. Her head turned. She faced me. Her face streaked crimson in the yellow dome light. It was blood from the cut on her head. I shuddered just the same. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”

Chapter Nine

I heard sirens before I saw the fast approaching police car. I squeezed Allison’s hand before I let go and stood up. Starting across the grass toward the road with both arms raised, I attempted to flag the officer down. “Hey,” I shouted. “Hey!”

It was R.P.D. The car slowed. The lights flashed, siren blared. Thank, God. I almost laughed. The expressway was well lit. Lampposts every so many feet on both sides of East and West bound traffic.

Things had gone out of control in the last hour. Seemed longer. Couldn’t have been though. Just so much happening. The sight of a police car, responding to someone in need, that was reassuring. I felt it. Things were going to go back to normal. Whatever all of … this was, it was over. Ending.

It’s what I thought. It’s how I felt. The smile had to show it.

But the cop? He didn’t stop. He slowed. Sure. He maneuvered his vehicle close to where I was on the grass. His windows up. Blood spilled from what looked like a bite wound on his cheek. We made eye contact. I saw him see me. I know I did, before his head faced front, eyes on the road, and before his foot must have stamped down hard on the accelerator. The engine whined in protest, but surged forward regardless. Instinctively, my middle finger sprang up, the fist shot forward. I am sure I called him an asshole, too. An asshole, or shithead or something. Right now, I can’t recall anything, anything other than the fact that the squad car’s siren must have acted like a fucking mating call.

Two of those things came out of the woods. They weren’t slow. No dragging feet, and lifeless limp arms like you see in zombie movies. Each of them looked alert. Crazed and ready to launch an attack.

I backed up a step. Another. The two approached the expressway. The shoulder.

I turned, ran for the car and as I reached the trunk, I heard brakes squealing. Something tha-thumped. I spun around. One of the two creatures was behind a stopped car. Not moving. Head smashed. The vehicle’s front windshield shattered.

The woman driving didn’t keep going. While I’d been mad at the cop for fleeing, I prayed this woman didn’t do something stupid. Prayers rarely get answered.

The car door opened. She jumped out of the car. “He came out of nowhere,” she said. “Out of nowhere!”

“Get back in your car,” I shouted. “Lady! Get back in your car!”

She stared at me like I spoke in tongues. Like my words made no sense to her. She was so desperate to plead her case, she turned instead to the monster’s companion. “He ran right in front of me,” I heard her saying.

I stood there. None of this really made sense. Nothing seemed real. It all just kept unfolding. Unraveling. The second thing just ran at her. It just darted into the road, around the front of the car, and tackled her.

The thunk had to be her head hitting the pavement.

“Chase.”

It pulled me away. Allison’s voice. Thankfully, I only saw the thing lower its head, mouth open, teeth bared – and I looked away before it bit into her face. “Alley,” I said, “we have to get out of here.”

The tire iron was in the trunk. Best thing I could think of as a weapon. For now. I removed it. It felt heavy in my hand, solid, it should suffice. It would have to. I didn’t feel like using it to change a flat tire. I didn’t like the idea of being out in the open, exposed. One of the three creatures was down and out. The other feasting on the motorist. Where was the third? Still in the woods?

I did a three-sixty of the area. There were more cars just stopped, crashed, or simply abandoned on and alongside the road. Don’t think I noticed it before. Not all of them. I’d been preoccupied with getting the hell away from 911. With getting Alley and myself to somewhere safe. With saving my ...

I dug a hand into my pocket. My phone. I had missed calls. A ton of texts. It had been on silent. Because of work. Even though getting to my kids was the goal, there hadn’t been a second to call them. Not a fucking second.

There wasn’t now. No time at all. We weren’t safe here.

These things were so hungry. Just biting the shit out of people. Fucking zombies. I could hardly believe it. So much easier to refuse to believe it. The creature devouring the now dead woman proved otherwise. Proved beyond a reasonable doubt.

This shit was real. It was happening. We were in the middle of a zombie fucking apocalypse.