The Infected Page 21

  I woke up to my alarm at 6am (and the comforting sound of rain on the corrugated iron roof of the deserted factory). I had a quick scrub down, brushed my teeth and made myself some cold coffee – it’s odd how accustomed to something you get over time – and got ready for another day of driving.

  I opened the large metal sliding doors of the warehouse with a loud and deafening screech – again, my mind had been playing tricks on me and had considered the worst – an army of the infected waiting silently for me to present myself to them as I opened the doors, yet all that confronted me was more rain and a sense of excitement – I have never really been one for travelling, preferring to fly whenever possible, and when, if needing to drive, coercing someone else to get behind the driver’s seat. Yet today I was ready… possibly because Lil, my amazing and beautiful girlfrie… sorry, fiancé… would be my destination, and maybe, just maybe because I was enjoying driving and being out. After all those months inside my ‘wee’ little townhouse I could now go wherever the hell I wanted (after taking into account that there may be some of the infected in the way though) and I was enjoying the freedom much as I would imagine someone recently let out of prison would. I climbed into the car, put on my iPod which I charged overnight, and hit the road.

  The day was pretty uneventful – the usual detours, u-turns and backtracking were done – apart from meeting my first ‘travellers’ on route. Jayson and Marie were a young couple, maybe just a bit younger than me, and we met on the highway as I backtracked to the next off ramp due to a serious backlog of cars – maybe thirty or forty stranded on the highway. I was thinking to myself that a motorbike would make things so much easier when it came to obstacles like that when I saw one coming towards me. “Yip, if I had a motorbike like them, I would be halfway to Bloemfontein by now,” I thought. Only when the bike got closer and started to slow and the two people on the bike waved did I realise what was actually going on. This wasn’t some hallucination – they were real living people (or the infected who had learned how to ride a motorbike, but somehow I doubted it). I snapped back to reality and slammed on the brakes as I sped past them, their heads snapping behind them in bewilderment, probably thinking, hey, what the hell is that guy’s problem? I screeched to a stop, feeling like a getaway driver in one of those action movies where the car almost slides sideways to a halt.

  I got out just as they turned around and headed back to me – I had already noticed that there were two of them on the bike but only really comprehended it then as they approached me again. As they pulled up next to my car and climbed off, taking their helmets off simultaneously, I reconsidered – I wouldn’t want to be on a bike in these circumstances… firstly, your stuff – although these two people wore back packs (I still wasn’t able to tell the sexes at this point when they were in full bike gear), the amount of stuff I had in the car would never fit on a bike. Secondly, I would feel way too vulnerable to attack just sitting on the back of a bike. My deliberations were cut short as they placed their helmets on the red leather seat of the red and white bike. There was a guy and a girl, and surprisingly, it had been the girl who had been driving. She was gorgeous… Okay, now I am totally in love with Lily, and seeing her in pictures still takes my breath away (I would constantly visit her Facebook page to browse through the photos of her when I was stuck back in my townhouse). But this girl was… well, hot wasn’t really the right word – it just seems too crass – stunning? Beautiful? I don’t know. And it wasn’t like I wanted to take her, throw her in my car and screw her right there and then, I just wanted to… look at her… I guess.

  She shook her hair, curly blonde shoulder length hair now freed from the helmet, and I just stared. It was like a television ad for shampoo or something. She then smiled at me and I melted. I felt someone grabbing my hand and shaking it, vaguely hearing a voice, but I was still transfixed on hair, deep, dark green eyes, supple, cherry red lips, luminescent white teeth and smooth, flawless skin. Again reality came swimming back and the lucidity in the world hit me – I now couldn’t just hear a voice, I could understand it – “…to meet someone else on the road. Great car, man! Hey, are you also heading to Bloem? Oh, I’m Jayson by the way, with a ‘Y’. J-a-y-s-o-n. And that’s Marie, my girlfriend.” It was the voice of a tall, handsome guy, maybe half to a quarter of a foot taller than me and with mousey brown hair with blonde tips, the look of peroxided hair which has almost grown out. He was still holding my hand and I could feel the moisture from his recently removed glove between my fingers.

  I collected my thoughts but could still not take my eyes of Marie, no matter how hard I tried. “Hey, I’m Sam. And yip, heading for Bloemfontein too!” I said with perhaps too much enthusiasm. Marie reached out her hand as Jayson let go of mine – I reached for hers, not desperate to touch her, but wanting too. I then remembered my hand – shit, it would be sopping wet, but not from me, from Jayson – she would think that I was a chronic sweater. What a loser… And the rain was too slight to blame for a sodden hand. All this happened in a split second, and before I knew it, I had ducked out of the hand shake and was hugging her. She smelt great, even though she smelt a bit of sweat. I didn’t linger too long, and for good measure, I turned around and hugged Jayson too. “I haven’t seen anyone on the road in days,” I said, hoping that that would explain the hugs.

  Marie and Jayson, both 22, are Durban born and bred, but both now lived in Randburg. They had been stuck in a couple of places for the last few months – Cresta Shopping Centre ended much the same as Johan and Owen’s stay at Eastgate and they eventually left there because the outside world seemed a much safer bet. After that they spent a month in a camper van until they crashed it trying to escape from the infected and then they spent a couple of weeks underground in the basement car park of an office block off the William Nicol off ramp with seven other people. “We eventually had to get out of there because we were going mad – we needed to see the sun!” sang Marie. “Luckily for us, when we decided to leave, the first thing that we saw when we ‘emerged’, other than damn bright sun,” laughed Jayson, “Was a motor bike dealer across the road. Marie used to do motocross as a child, so we thought, hey man, why not?”

  We shared some food and a cold drink as we chatted, sheltered from the rain in the Audi. I was still obsessed with Marie and laughed too loud at her jokes and held her gaze for too long when our eyes met. But she was gracious throughout and I could tell that she was used to reluctantly being the centre of attention. Jayson also seemed okay with it, but, I guess he had to be used to it by now. I don’t mean to brag – well, actually I do – but a lot of men would stare at Lil when we were out, even if we were together and holding hands or were arm in arm, they would still stare. At first it pissed me off and I wanted to confront them or just tell them to stop staring, but after a while, I realised that I was the lucky one – she was in my arms and would be in my bed that night.

  After a good hour of chatting – and sporadic scanning of the surroundings for any signs of the infected – Marie said that they should be on their way. Hearing that left me with such a horrible feeling – like when you go on holiday when you are young and have the best time ever, and then have to spend six hours in the car on the way back home and have to go back to school the next day. The feeling that you have when you reminisce about those great times, knowing that shit times are just around the corner, was probably the closest way to describe how I felt just then.

  We exchanged some books and I gave them both a hug in the falling rain – “Sorry that you can’t go the way we are going,” said Jayson as he hopped onto the back of the bike and slid his arms around Marie’s waist. “Don’t worry – I’ll see you guys there. Be safe!”

  As they pulled off and a fine spray of water settled on my nose from the back tire, I thought of something. “Hey! Marie! Jayson! Wait up!” I shouted. Nothing. Luckily Marie looked in her rear view mirror and saw me waving my arms at them before they disappeared between the maze of cars. She turned the bike around
and came back. “All okay?” she asked as she lifted her visor, and deep inside I was disappointed that she didn’t take her helmet off and shake her hair again. “Just give me a second,” I said as I dived into the car for a pen. I grabbed one of my books, Irvine Welsh’s Maribou Stork Nightmares, which I am just over halfway through, and ripped out the blank back page and quickly wrote on it. “Here,” I said as I handed it to Marie after folding it up to protect it from the rain. “Please give this to my girlfriend Lily Fontaine – I am sure that she is there in Bloemfontein. If you could ask around for her I would really appreciate it.” She smiled and nodded before tucking the piece of paper with Lily’s name on the outside into her top leather pocket. Then they were off and I watched the bike weaving between the static cars until I couldn’t see them anymore, just listening to the faint roar of the engine and the pitter patter of the rain on the roof of the R8.

  So I headed back the way that I had just come to find an alternate route, basically the story of my journey so far. I am well fed and, believe it or not, having a good time – just me, the open road (on the odd occasion) and my music.

  But I better go as the battery is looking like it might bomb out soon – I am caught in a quandary as I want some sun to quickly boost the battery but I also want the rain to continue to keep the infected at bay!

  Be careful, look after yourselves wherever you may be, and I will do the same.

  Take care.

  Sam W

  11:48pm, September 20

  Hi – two quick things you need to know:

  1) It has stopped raining.

  2) I am fine though, thank you for asking.

  I am in a small town outside of Kroonstad – well, town is a stretch – it’s probably more like a village to be honest, and the sun broke through the clouds this morning. I guess that I can’t be too upset – I was hoping for a good spell of rain, and to rain for a week almost non-stop was beyond my wildest dreams. But now I have to face the fact that if they see me, and when I say they I obviously mean the infected, I’ll be an open invitation to attack. I fortunately have not had to use any of my ammunition yet, but I have a strong feeling that I am going to be using a lot of it in the coming days.

  Okay, but before I get into that, let me fill you in on the last couple of days (no sign of Marie or Jayson, although she has been in two of my dreams lately, and no… not those kinds of dreams). After one hectic detour around Vereeniging which took almost the rest of the day, I discovered that the more rural roads and those outside of the towns are a lot easier to negotiate. Sounds good, doesn’t it? Yeah, I thought so to… On those open roads I got the Audi up to past the 150 kilometre per hour mark in places, but when there was an obstruction, such as the one which I encountered which saw a jackknifed truck, almost fully burned out, surrounded by battered cars, almost fully burned out too, then I was in the shit. Sure, if I didn’t have such a low profile car as the Audi R8, I could have driven ‘around’ the catastrophic crash, on the bumpy, sodden ground and carried on on my merry way, but I don’t, so I couldn’t… If there had been a useable car there that could have got me around, say a 4x4 or a double cab bakkie, then maybe I would have toyed with the idea of swapping cars. (But to be honest, I am really attached to this car! How materialistic is that in this current climate? But hey, I keep on visualising myself pulling up to Bloemfontein at some big gates, honking the horn and driving into the safe haven in a sports car – all the kids would gather round whooping with glee as I revved the engine, and then I’d see Lil… she would be beautiful. She’d come running towards me as I climbed out of the car and I’d go down on one knee to eventually propose in the right way… Okay, yes, I have thought about this once or twice). So that’s the hassle with these rural roads – if there is an obstruction, you have to travel back a hell of a distance to come across the next road or off ramp and can lose a couple of hours, or in the worst scenarios, a day’s worth of travel time.

  It was on one of these ‘retours’ as I have come to call them that I came across one of the most mind-boggling things that I have ever seen… from a distance I thought it was one of the infected who had gotten over their fear of the rain and was walking towards me in the middle of the road, but as I got closer, I noticed something – this thing, this person, was walking normally – no lumbering strides, no shuffling along – it was a purposeful walk. Oh, and they had an AK47 too.

  I slowed down and reached for my gun – I approached the person at around 30 kilometres per hour, and as I did so I lowered the window and raised the gun. He – I could now see that it was a man, a monster of a black man with muscles in places that I never even knew existed – smiled an infectious smile and raised his hand to greet me. I quickly withdrew my pistol back into the car in the vain hope that he had not seen it, and felt slightly embarrassed by the size of my gun compared to the size of the AK47 hanging from around his shoulders (they do always say that black men are more gifted in the size department, don’t they?)

  “Eita,” he beamed, his pristine white teeth glowing despite the dullness of the day. I turned off the car and got out, still astounded by the sight of this man standing before me. “Um… hi,” I said, unsure how to start the conversation. “Do you need a lift somewhere?” I asked. “Nah, man,” came the quick reply. “I’m sharp.” And the smile remained. “Are you sure?” I urged, “I can make space in my car, it will be no problem.” “Sweet ride,” he said as he admired the car, his voice a weird combination of a South African Will Smith and James Earl Jones, “But I’m fine.” I didn’t know what to say. “But you’re out here in the open with… with… them. And you have no protection.” “Ah – but I have this,” he said, nodding towards the AK47. “I have this to help.” I was getting slightly exasperated. “But it won’t rain forever – they’ll come after you soon enough and you can’t have enough ammo to kill them all – fuck, the whole world is full of them.” My voice had gotten higher as I spoke, even though I was trying to stay calm. “Chillax man,” he said in that powerful yet soothing voice of his. Chillax I thought? Chillax? What the hell is that? Then it hit me – chill and relax. I laughed. So did he.

  We both leaned against the car in the drizzle and he told me his story. His name was Mphethi and he was a father of three – ‘was’ being the significant word. When this all happened, his wife and three kids – two daughters and a son – were killed right in front of him by a gang of the infected. He managed to fight some of them off, but it was to no avail – he said that more and more of them kept coming and coming until he eventually had to flee to save himself. “It was too late anyways,” he reflected, unable to look me in the eye. “I could see that it was already too late for my family.”

  He spent the next couple of weeks bouncing around between family and friends, trying to deal with the grief of losing his wife and children as well as dealing with the chaos of a world turned upside down. “I had some close calls… very close calls,” he recalled, “But I had to keep on moving, you know, man? I couldn’t stay still. It was hectic.” He went on to relay a story of how he beat three of them to death, leaving nothing but three bloodied pulps behind (if you think that I am being too graphic you should have heard his version of the story). And now, for the past two weeks, Mphethi has been walking… yes, WALKING, to Bloemfontein. “I have lost my beautiful wife, I have lost my three amazing children… I’ll never see them again. Ever. I don’t have anything to live for really.” (And at this stage he raised his voice to a frightening shout). “If they want to come and get me, I am here! They can see me – they know I have killed a lot of them so far.” (And then back to normal). “Let them come. If they get me, well, so be it, man.”

  We shared some food and I tried to convince him to jump in with me and I could at the very least take him to get a car of his own. But it was to no avail. “Sorry man, this is what I am doing. Great to meet you and good luck. If the Lord desires, then we shall meet up again in Bloemfontein.” And that was it – he flung his AK47 back over his s
houlder and started walking, raising his left hand in a sort of salute as he trudged down the street with all his life’s belongings in a rucksack. All I could do was shrug, say a quick prayer for him and carry on looking for another route to Bloem.

  Other than that it’s just been hitting the road daily, and now, trying to avoid the infected. So far this little town seems okay and I reckon I’ll have a decent enough sleep tonight, before braving the world again tomorrow. I am in a converted barn/workshop thing in the middle of town and haven’t seen any of the infected for miles. Maybe they are starting to thin out, as Lil had mentioned, the further away that you get from the main centres.