Last of the Living

6

6STUART

THURSDAY 28 MAY – 5:50am

This is the hardest thing I ’ ve ever had to do; the toughest decision I ’ ve ever had to make. I knew it was coming – I was ready for it – but that didn ’ t make it any easier to do. It ’ s time to seal us in. I just hope I ’ m not too late.

I sat up all night watching the news, watching the world continue to fall to pieces, and watching dumb f*****g substitute politicians spinning the same old bullshit about how things would soon be brought under control, and that lessons would be learned and so on. All just empty words, empty promises. No substance. No facts. Just a smokescreen: a way of hiding the truth because everyone ’ s finally beginning to realise the truth here is going to be f*****g awful.

And then, about half an hour ago, the crisis outside got a lot closer to home. The sickness has reached our development. It was the family diagonally opposite, the ones with all the dogs in one of the smaller houses. I sat in the baby ’ s room upstairs and watched from the window, one eye on Hannah, the other across the street. f**k, I could taste their fear even from a distance. They ’ re never coming home. I could tell from the way they bundled a few bags and their kid and the dogs into the back of their car and drove them away that they were evacuating. They ’ re as good as dead.

And so will we be if I don ’ t do this.

It hurts.

As I make my way around the house, trying not to wake the others while I check all the locks and cover the windows, I can ’ t help thinking about our extended family and all the other people I ’ d love to help. Mum and Dad, Gabby ’ s folks, Phil and his family, Sandy and her kids... the list goes on and on but I know I have to focus all my efforts on the five people in this house, and I have to believe the others will be doing the same thing, wherever they are. Dad ’ ll be okay, I ’ m sure of that, and Phil should be all right too if he gets his head out of his arse in time. I sent him a message last night, but he hasn ’ t replied.

I keep telling myself they ’ ll all look after their own the same way I ’ m looking after mine. When I feel any doubt, guilt or remorse, I just turn it around. I ask myself, who else is going to look after Gabby and the kids? And the answer ’ s simple. There ’ s no one. It ’ s all down to me.

I bolt and padlock all the doors. I keep all the keys locked away apart from one set that I ’ ll carry with me. As soon as the others are awake I ’ ll tell them what ’ s happening. The kids will be scared but they ’ ll soon realise that what we ’ re shutting ourselves away from is far more frightening than anything else.

#

Gabby gets it. She stays in bed, Sally lying next to her, Hannah alongside in her crib. She looks beat. For a second I ’ m worried it might be the sickness, but I know it ’ s not. She had all her jabs and I kept her from those friends who might have been exposed. She ’ s barely seen anyone this last couple of weeks, and that was the right thing to do. She ’ s just tired now, emotionally drained. We both are, but I make myself keep going.

Nathan ’ s a different kettle of fish. He doesn ’ t have a problem with not going to school, but when I tell him he can ’ t go and visit his girlfriend half a mile away, he gets nasty. They ’ re just kids. It ’ s his first crush, nothing serious. ‘ You ’ re not going anywhere, ’ I tell him. Bloody kid ’ s at the front door with his jacket and trainers on, trying to force the padlock. ‘ Do you know what ’ s happening out there? ’

‘ No, ’ he says. ‘ You ’ ve stopped us watching the TV, remember? You unplugged the satellite. I can ’ t watch s**t. ’

‘ Don ’ t use that kind of language with me, son. ’

He kicks the door again, and mumbles something under his breath about me being f*****g stupid or something similar. I let it go. He ’ s scared. He ’ s upset. We both are. We all are.

I need to make him understand. I ’ d planned to leave it a while longer, but we ’ ll have no front door left at this rate. ‘ How much do you know, Nathan? ’

‘ Not enough. Like I said, you censored the TV and I can ’ t get anything online. Half my friends have stopped answering my texts. ’

‘ There ’ s every possibility your friends are dead. ’

He stops fighting for a second and just looks at me. He laughs, then sneers, then turns back and starts booting the bottom of the door again. I pull him away, he shrugs me off. ‘ Leave me alone, ’ he says, doing what he can to not let me see the tears.

‘ Listen, son, I know it ’ s never cool to do what your dad says, but this is one occasion you really need to. ’

‘ But I need to go and see Jen. I need to know she ’ s okay. ’

It ’ s just puppy love. He ’ ll get over her. I don ’ t care what happens to anyone else, but I humour him just the same. ‘ We have to believe that her family are doing the same as us, and if they do, in a few weeks ’ time, I ’ m sure you ’ ll be able to see her again. ’

‘ I ’ m not waiting a few weeks. I ’ m going now. She ’ s only just down the road. I ’ ll be back in an hour or so. I just need to know she ’ s all right... ’

‘ It ’ s not happening. ’

‘ But, Dad... ’

‘ Listen to me, son, and listen very, very carefully. The disease that ’ s doing all the damage out there is highly contagious and —’

‘ I ’ ll stay away from everyone else. I ’ ll run there and I ’ ll run back. Jen ’ s brother ’ s cool with me going and I —’

‘ Her brother? Where are her parents? ’

‘ Her dad moved out a couple of years back. ’

‘ And her mother? ’

He pauses before answering, and the hesitation speaks volumes. ‘ She ’ s sick, ’ he eventually admits. ‘ She ’ s in the hospital. I have to go and see Jen, Dad. She needs me... ’

‘ You have to understand just how serious this is now, Nathan. ’

He stops fighting and slumps back against the wall, barely managing to suppress his anger. ‘ I know, but —’

‘ I ’ m not sure you do. You see, I can ’ t let you go anywhere, Nathan, because if you leave this house, I won ’ t be able to let you back in again. ’ I can see that my words have shocked him. He looks at me, then looks away again. ‘ That ’ s not an idle threat, son, it ’ s a fact. If one of us gets sick, we all get sick, and I can ’ t let that happen. ’

‘ She ’ s only round the corner... ’

‘ No. ’

His head drops. He finally lets go of the door handle. I put my arm around his shoulder and take him into the lounge. He sits on the sofa, deflated – beat, and I plug the satellite back in to show him what ’ s happening out there.

‘ You need to see this, son, ’ I tell him. ‘ You need to understand. ’

The first thing I see on the TV takes me by surprise. It hits us both hard. At some point during the last few hours, the BBC has disappeared. What we ’ re seeing now is some kind of emergency broadcast, as terrifying as it is clich é d. Just a list of instructions on a loop, dos and don ’ ts, ten times more don ’ ts than dos . My mouth ’ s gone dry, and Nathan ’ s just staring at the screen. ‘ Is this for real? ’ he asks. I clear my throat and try to answer.

‘ Yeah, it ’ s for real. You understand now, Nath? Look, I recorded a few news bulletins because I thought this might happen. I want you to see some of the things I ’ ve been seeing. ’

‘ Why didn ’ t you just leave the TV plugged in and let me see them anyway? ’

‘ Because I care, that ’ s why. Because I wanted to make this as easy as I could. If we do the right thing here, son, we ’ ll get through this. You, me, Sally, Hannah and Mum... we ’ ll be okay. ’

I show him some clips from Manchester last night that I recorded. ‘ Why did you save this stuff? ’ he asks.

‘ So that we don ’ t forget. It ’ s important. We need to remember why we ’ re having to do this. ’

He just stares at the screen, open mouthed. I ’ m not stupid, I know he ’ s probably seen some of this on his phone, but these are the edited highlights, for want of a better word.

I show him some stuff on the laptop. I swear I could have written the script for this next clip weeks ago. It ’ s a report from outside a supermarket. Cut to inside, and the camera pans along empty shelves, then swings over to one corner of the strangely echoing store where people are fighting over the little food which remains. ‘ Have you looked in the garage recently? ’ I ask him.

‘ Tried to a couple of days back, ’ he answers. ‘ Couldn ’ t get in. Too much stuff. ’

‘ You see all those gaps on the shelves on the screen? That food ’ s here. I saw this coming, Nath. I ’ ve got enough for all of us, and it ’ ll last for a couple of months if we ’ re smart and ration ourselves properly. ’

‘ Rations? ’

‘ It ’ s got to be done. I ’ m not saying it ’ s going to be easy, but I don ’ t see we have any other option. But if we can get through this, we ’ ll get through anything. ’

On screen now is a camp that sprung up the day before yesterday. It ’ s somewhere just outside London, I think, thrown together to cope with hospital overspill. ‘ Looks like Afghanistan, ’ he says.

‘ You ’ re thinking of Syria, son. ’

‘ Same difference. ’

‘ Not really. ’

It ’ s pointless arguing about geography at a time like this, so I let it go and let him watch. He ’ s right, though, this looks like the kind of thing we used to see on the TV news, endless reports from the war-torn Middle East. But this is somewhere in the Home Counties.

‘ Remember when we went camping a couple of years back and we stayed on that farm near all the wind turbines? ’

‘ I remember. ’

‘ This is just down the road from there. ’

His silence speaks volumes.

This next clip makes me go cold every time I see it. I must have watched it a hundred times since I found it yesterday morning. It ’ s like something out of a horror movie. It ’ s an abandoned factory, I think, a massive concrete space in between a number of obviously derelict buildings, endless empty windows and doors. It ’ s a morgue now, a disposal site. The entire space – and it must be a hundred metres square – is filled with dead bodies in bags, all laid out in lines. The camera operator is filming from on high. Smoke drifts, and the cameraman shifts focus to find the source. There ’ s a bonfire. A f*****g huge bonfire with searing orange flames. The dirtiest black smoke I ’ ve ever seen billows up. They change position and zoom in tight, the picture getting shakier the closer they get, pixelating and going in and out of focus. And then, in amongst the flames, there are faces. Fingers. Arms and legs. Hair curling up and burning away. Skin being peeled. Black holes where eyes used to be.

Nathan doesn ’ t say anything. What ’ s left to say?

Final recording.

‘ This is why we can ’ t go out, son. This is what it ’ s like out there now. ’

The centre of London in chaos, footage taken from a helicopter circling overhead. Uncontrolled panic in the streets. A handful of soldiers try to maintain order, but they ’ re fighting a losing battle. There are bodies everywhere, lives ended without warning, people ’ s last moments spent in utter terror, face down in the stinking gutters. Buildings burning, fire spreading. Some still run for cover, but few reach their destinations. The entire world is dying.

And throughout it all, snaking through the c*****e, hunting out those frightened few who remain somehow untouched, are the infected. Their movements are chillingly alien: staccato and unpredictable, stop then start, watch then attack. Unexpected jerks and sudden changes in direction, dead but for the germ which drives them on.