Loose Ends: A Zombie Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

either. They are probably full of wilted plants by now.”
    “No,” Chef said, “there would be a terrarium effect going on for a while, but they’ll need to be tended soon. Man, we walked right past them dumping bodies and didn’t even think about them.”
    “What do we do first?” Short Order asked.
    Doc said, “We can’t keep up everything. The fuel operations kept the generators going. Do we want power and refrigeration back? I miss it.”
    “Food has to be a priority,” Chef said. “We should check on the animals first.”
    “Water is kind of important too,” Doc said.
    “We haven’t used up much with just the four of us showering,” Short Order said.
    Doc said, “The tanks and wells have to be tended. We may have to give up hauling it to the roof for heated showers and just focus on drinking water and cleaning. It may be whores’ baths from here on out.”
    “We’ll start with checking on the animals and the water supply in the morning. If time permits, we’ll check the greenhouses after that. We’ll make a decision about what we save and what we let go,” Chef decided.
    “Instead of the funeral or after it?” Doc asked.
    No one spoke for a while.
    Chef said, “We’ll say a few things on the roof after a dry breakfast and then we’ll deal with food and water.”
    “Are we burning the bodies, or letting them rot?” Doc asked.
    They are too close to the buildings, I thought.
    I also started to wonder if there was anything in the other buildings that might prove to be a fire hazard. I didn’t know where to begin.
    “We’ll discuss what’s next after we deal with food and water,” Chef said.
    “God, I’m going to miss eggs, if the chickens are dead,” Short Order said.
    “We still have canned food, if everything is lost,” Doc said, “And the preserves.”
    “We should get the weapons out of the other buildings too,” Short Order said.
    Chef nodded, “Funeral, food, and water tomorrow. We’ll prioritize the rest after that.”
    We all moved into the panic room together the night before the funeral.

     
    ***
    The next day we choked down oatmeal and went to the roof. Everyone looked at Chef and he looked down from their gaze.
    Doc finally said, “Do we want to count this as a moment of silence? I mean the part before I started talking, that is.”
    “No, we should say something,” Chef said.
    There was another awkward moment of silence. Finally, Chef cleared his throat.
    He said, “Oh, hell, there were so many people in this place that were so much better at this than we are. We just cooked the food. They hunted it, raised it, and did everything else that held this place together. Now they’re … all gone.”
    There was more silence.
    Chef spoke again, “God, I’m tired of saying goodbye to people without really saying goodbye.”
    “You don’t have to try to make it right,” Short Order said. “What you’ve said is good enough of a goodbye for now.”
    “Until when?” Chef asked.
    “Until we’ve had time to grieve,” Doc said awkwardly.
    “We don’t grieve,” Chef said. “We never have. We hint at the hell we all went through before we got here, but then we get busy with cooking. We cooked the night everyone died. No, that’s not right. We hid in closets for a couple days after everyone died or was taken and then we came out and cooked fancy dinners for ourselves.”
    I looked down and started moving the gravel on the roof with my toe. I wondered why they put gravel on the roof.
    Doc said, “There’s nothing good down this train of thought. Do we want to break down and start dying of survivor’s guilt when we need to be getting our shit together in a serious way?”
    “We’ve been through this before and we made the decision to survive. That’s how we all made it here, Chef,” Short Order said.
    “Did we really decide it or did we just keep doing it, Shaw?” Chef asked.
    Doc answered, “David, you can tear yourself up into a million little pieces