Empty Bodies: A Post-Apocalyptic Tale of Dystopian Survival (Book 1) by Bohannon Zach

Author:Bohannon, Zach [Bohannon, Zach]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Zellwood Press
Published: 2015-01-31T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

JESSICA

Jessica gasped as the panic awoke her.

“Help! Help!”

She stood, leaving her makeshift bed of cheap gas station blankets behind, and ran to the storage room at the back of the building, behind the counter. When the door swung open, Jessica saw Melissa straddling Walt as he convulsed. His eyes were white, rolled into the back of his head, and his hips thrusted with aggressive succession.

His lips were moving, and Jessica squinted and turned her ear toward him, listening close to him mumbling something almost illegible.

“Get out,” he said, under faint breaths.

Then, he ceased convulsing and his chest stopped rising.

Melissa looked up at Jessica with a blushed face, covered in tears.

“Please help! God, please help him!”

The only thing Jessica knew to do was to try CPR—a skill she’d been required to learn when she took the job at the hotel. She urged Melissa out of the way and put her head to Walt’s chest, hearing a faint pulse. Her hands moved to his chest and she clasped them right above his sternum and began to perform compressions. After a series of pumps, she leaned down and breathed fresh air into his mouth, feeling his cold lips against hers and the coarse hair in his beard gone stiff.

Again, he mumbled something, and the volume was so faint, she wouldn’t have had heard what he was saying if she hadn’t been performing mouth to mouth.

“Get out of my head.”

“What?” Jessica asked.

“Out.” Walt closed his eyes.

Jessica repeated the steps two more times before Walt stopped moving entirely.

Her head lay against his chest and she heard nothing. The faded drum in his chest had stopped marching.

Melissa looked back and forth between her husband and Jessica.

For five more minutes, Jessica performed CPR. When all the color had flushed from his face and the beat in his heart hadn’t returned, Jessica resigned.

Leaving tears on his shirt, she looked up to the still man’s wife and shook her head.

Melissa cried out and let her entire body crumble to the ground.

Shoulders slumped, Jessica sat back onto her feet and wept for the man who’d saved her life and had now died because of it. She hardly knew the Kesslers, but such a debt could never be repaid, least of all now.

She stayed on her knees, watching Melissa clutch the cold hand of the man she loved, screams echoing through the small room.

***

Outside, the day hinted at more rain. Fog peeked over the mountains and the sun lay still, hidden behind a cluster of clouds. It wasn’t as cold as it had been the previous evening, and even with rain, Jessica knew she could drive them safely down the rest of the mountain. But for now, allowing Melissa time alone with the cold body of her dead husband seemed important, so Jessica waited outside. She sat just inside the sliding door of the van nursing an orange sports drink. Every few seconds, she found herself looking down at the cell phone in her hand to see if there was a signal.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.