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  Eric crawled out of the insulation refuge and moved toward the attic opening. He used his fingernails to pick up the attic cover, because it sat almost flush with the ceiling, but got a good grip on it and slowly removed it. After he had it picked up he began to twist his body to put it off to the side, but Drew took it from him.

  The closet was empty, and he did not see anything in the room from the angle he was looking. From this angle hanging upside down the only thing he could see was the big bubbly black shoes from one of the characters on the wall.

  He lowered his head down from the attic and then something caught his eye in the closet just below him. It was out of the usual, but he could not place it, and then grey smoky eyes opened and it locked onto him.

  The ghoul slowly moved toward him and began to let out a groan. Two hands slowly reached up toward his head. The zombie was standing perfectly still in the closet and managed to stand in such a way that he was camouflaged by the hanging clothes. Eric reached back for the cover, but as soon as he pulled his head into the attic Drew was already securing it.

  “Back through the house is not an option.” Drew announced to Naomi and Samantha. “How many do you think stayed around the house last night?”

  Eric crawled on his hands and knees and tried to keep his left foot from touching anything. Just the natural swing of his foot being suspended sent bolts of pain through his body. Light filled the attic when Eric lifted the loose piece of roof and they all shielded their eyes. Immediately following the insulting light was a wave of frigid cold air that made them shiver.

  It took a few seconds, but Eric was eventually able to stand and look at what awaited them outside. The top of the roof was covered in a thin evenly layered blanket of ice. He looked down at what remained of the hoard. Hundreds of undead lay on the grass in the same position as if they were standing. There was a ghoul every few feet from the house laying either face down or up, and the further from them the more spaced out they were. There were a few that were standing, but they were holding or leaning onto the side of the house. Eric was able to see the ones directly under him holding onto the siding had the same blanket of ice on them as the roof had on it.

  He pulled the rope from his back pack and tied one end onto the same back pack. Lowering it down he bounced it off one, then another of the standing zombies. He excitedly turned and said, “We’re getting out of here.”

  The bag bounced on their heads, but none moved or even flinched. The ones outside froze due to the rain and cold, but the ones inside were not exposed to the same environment. The undead inside the houses were almost frozen and that is why the ghoul in the closet moved so slowly. Eric tied his best knot around one of the rafters. Not very confident in his knot tying abilities he agreed to go first only after he pulled on it with everything he could muster.

  He stood up and heaved his left leg over the wall carefully and straddled it. The siding of the house had a thin layer of ice covering it. Eric rubbed his leg on the siding trying to get a grip on it and figured he was going to have to slide down the rope. He threw his right leg over and pain shot through his bleeding foot as he put the smallest amount of weight on it, causing him to spin on the slippery siding.

  He grabbed hold of the rope tightly, but was spinning and falling fast. His body hit the ghoul he had bounced his bag off of, breaking his fall. The noise he made flailing on the aluminum siding was incredible and it echoed down the quiet street. Eric shrugged his shoulders in angst knowing if there were any undead, not frozen, on the street they would soon be here. He looked up to the roof and saw Sam, Drew and Naomi looking down at him. Eric could tell by the look of concern on their faces that he was too loud.

  Eric pressed a flat hand to them telling them to hold on and then hobbled to the front of the house. He looked down both sides of the street watching to see if any undead were leaving the houses or making their way toward them, but none showed. He limped back, nudged the zombie that broke his fall, which was now laying face first into the frozen grass and after getting no response he waved for the rest to come down.

  Chapter 19

  Beauty is not skin deep

  The trip to the farm was excruciating for Eric and Naomi both. Naomi’s back and neck was beginning to bother her after beginning to heal and Eric’s foot was throbbing. He knew if he did not get some peroxide or something to clean it out, it would surely get infected. Most of the trip up to the farm was back roads and they past very few houses and the ones they did pass were many yards away from the main road.

  These roads they traveled were quiet. Eric remembered these back roads were populated by people riding horseback or a random pickup truck riding through kicking up stone and dust, but a lot had changed in the three years he was away. These back roads were now paved with black top along with stop signs at each intersection and yellow lines marking two distinct lanes. The closer he got to his old farm, the less familiar it looked. More houses were built and they were moving closer to the road to make room for bigger houses behind them.

  Eric believed they were just going to walk right up to his old farm, but now they darted between unkempt bushes and over grown tuffs of grass, to avoid being seen from anything moving within the dark houses. They finally made it to his farm and an iron fence with the warning “DO NOT ENTER” plastered to it, greeted them. Beyond the fence directly in front of them was a new white horse stable that was just as large as the houses they had past and to the right on top of a hill was the farm house his boss lived in, or at least used to.

  The house was exactly how he remembered it; very tall and slender with a very steep roof and a chimney that topped the tallest peak of the roof. The house had always reminded him of the typical haunted house you would see on any creepy cartoon. The thing that caught Eric’s eye were the new huge single family houses built just beyond it. They were, so close Eric believed they may actually be on his old boss’s property.

  Drew pressed on the gate and it was locked, but no do not enter sign was going to stop them. They have not stopped at the hundreds of other warning signs they had past. The only thing that made this warning sign different was Eric knew everyone out here owned a few guns and more than likely would not hesitate to fire off a few at some strangers trespassing through their property. Worse if some strangers were mistaken for a ghoul trespassing on their property, then they wouldn’t even think about whether to shoot or not.

  They dipped through the fence and walked up the dirt driveway that led to the new stable. “I thought we were going to the house?” Sam asked.

  “There’s a way to get to the house back here. No one ever drives up that driveway. If we did, if my old boss is home, he would get real suspicious.”

  “What’s your old boss’s name?” Naomi was tired of him referring to him as his old boss.

  “Rick.” Eric imagined the horses that would graze in the fields as they crested the top of the hill that the stable was on. “He’s a great guy. I guarantee when he sees me he’s going to say something like, How’s it going hawse or something like that. I guarantee it.”

  They were in the main ranch area and directly across from the stable is a large classic looking red barn that Eric informed the group was used to store hay and another one across from that where Rick kept his farm equipment such as his tractors, Bob Cats and hay bailing equipment. Eric walked toward the stable and was about to go in. The white stable had two large doors that swung open to allow the horses to come in and out and directly next to the large double doors was a smaller door that looked like it may lead to an office. “He would more than likely be out here if he were going to be anywhere.” He was excited to see his old boss again and had seemed to forget what was going on everywhere else in the world and as he grabbed the large door handle to the double door, a shuffling was heard from inside.

  He let go of the handle as if it were on fire. Naomi grabbed hold of him and shushed quietly with her creased lips. She shook her head no, and they walked backward together. This put
Eric back in sneak mode and they made their way around the large farming equipment and toward the creepy house.

  They walked up the three dry rotted stairs that led to a rundown front porch to an open matching front door. The paint had disappeared from years of being bleached by the sun. Naomi handed Eric the pistol, “You can go ahead.”

  Rick had, had company. The company may not have been wanted, but someone or something had come through the house. They entered the front living room that was not much different than the houses they had gone into before. No scent of undead, but the house was completely ransacked. The people that came through here had even flipped the couches over. A stair case led up stairs directly to the left of the front door. Eric gave the three a hand signal to stay here and watch the steps while he cleared the rest of the house. The kitchen was completely empty. Rick was a bachelor farmer, so did not have much as far as stored food, and would always take him to the local bar/tavern to get some dinner or lunch after a hard day’s work, so not having food in the house did not come to a surprise to Eric, but he was beginning to get nervous of what remains of Rick may actually be left in the stable.

  The first floor was clear and Eric began to hobble up the stairs to clear that as well. The house was completely empty of everything. The upstairs windows were smashed out and not even a shred of clothing existed in any of the cabinets or drawers.

  He came downstairs defeated. “I think we may want to look at moving to one of the other houses. It is going to get awfully cold here tonight.”

  “Where do you think your boss could be?” Sam asked Eric.

  “He might be in the stable?” Drew answered for him and Eric nodded in agreement to his response.

  “Someone came through this house already taking basically everything they would need or want. I can probably guess it was someone from one of those new houses.” Eric responded.

  “Do you think we should go to one of them?” Naomi’s voice was asking, but in reality she was mentioning their next action.

  “I don’t really see what other choice we have. We can’t stay here; it’s going to get cold as hell. We need to go somewhere we can at least close a window.” Eric said as he began to walk out of the house.

  There was a house at the end of what Eric believed to be Rick’s property. It was a large house with bright, white, brand new siding that shined from the noon sun. As they walked up the long newly paved drive way, they were able to make out a body lying in the door way. They saw two bare feet and a pair of blue jeans caked with dried mud and blood hanging half way out of the house.

  Eric pulled the pistol and hobbled up the steps to the door. He pushed the light green door open and glanced at the wooden plaque that hung from a green wreath under the door’s window that read, welcome. The smell of rotten flesh smacked him in the face like a wave as he pushed the door open the rest of the way. The formerly undead ghoul was laying face down and the back of its head was blown open from what could have only been created from a large shell from a shotgun. Inside the living room was another ghoul laying on the ground in the same condition as the one in the doorway. In the corner of the room is what looks to be scattered innards and body parts that were chewed off the body of the defender of the house. Strewn across the living room amongst scattered and smeared blood trails, are green shot gun shells that came from a pair of blood drenched blue jeans. Eric looked behind him as he stepped farther into the house and black blood splatter from multiple shots to several undead speckled all four walls opposite from the dried red blood pool and a black shot gun lay in the blood of the user. Then he turned to the curtains and pulled them to get more light and then proceeded through the rest of the house.

  Drew stepped on the corpse after Eric walked deeper into the carnage releasing pent up decomposing gas that sat in its stomach since it had turned. The girls gagged from the added putrid smell and backed away from the house as Drew quietly laughed and ran into the living room carefully trying not to step on any dried ghoul parts scattered on the bloodied carpet.

  “Get your fucking ass out here and take that with you.” Pointing down at the rotting zombie, Naomi whispered as loud as she could, so only they would hear, but make her point of being upset.

  He stepped on the ghoul again expelling the rest of the gas and he began to laugh even harder until the smell hit him. When he experienced what they had smelled his face turned red and he gagged as he ran from the house and rolled on the snow covered grass of the front lawn. Then it was the girls turn to laugh at him.

  Drew and Sam were pulling the undead from the door jamb when Eric came out. “Well if we can deal with the smell, I think we may have found home for a while.”

  Naomi looked at him dumbfounded not knowing really how to respond. She had thought about where they were going to stay, but never imagined living in a farm house in Maryland. She kind of had thoughts of going back to her home in South Carolina. The winter chill roared over her and she was not pleased about staying, but Maryland did have its benefits, especially in the winter.

  “The guy who lived here has a huge stock of canned foods. He or she, or whatever that was,” Eric pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. The girls had not looked inside, so they did not know exactly what he was talking about, due to the gas cloud Drew released, but thousands of pictures of twisted corpses popped into their minds. “must have raided all the houses around here because he has all kinds of stuff in the kitchen. Look this is probably the best place we could possibly be right now. Food to last us through the rest of the winter and an underground spring feeds the farm, so water is not an issue. There’s a fire place to cook it and heat up the water,” A thought popped into his head. “You could take a warm bath.”

  That was the winning statement. Naomi and Sam both were ready to pack it up and set up camp. “Drew can help me pull this carpet up and that should eliminate the smell.” Eric said and Drew appeared not to have a problem with it.

  **********

  Within a few minutes Drew had pulled the other zombie out onto the front lawn and began collecting the shot gun shells. Eric had told the ladies how to find the well and had begun to make a fire in the fire place so they could heat up some water and take a bath. The thought of staying here was beginning to sound better, with each uneventful passing moment to all of them.

  Naomi and Sam walked across the overgrown dead brown grass and onto the dirt road that passed Rick’s house and toward the barn and stables. Just as Eric had described next to the white stable was a pipe wrapped with black pipe insulation and a red pump spigot. Naomi was the first to grab it and pulled up on the handle. She got excited when the sound of running water could be heard flowing up the pipe. Sam was more focused on what was moving inside the white stable.

  She walked over toward it and the sun was beginning to rest over the trees and created a long shadow of her body that climbed the length of the building. Something was moving inside the stable and she could not help, but look inside. There could be horses in there, after all it was a horse stable.

  The windows on the double doors were too high and she could not get a clear view of the inside. There are windows on the sides of the barn, but a good distance away from Naomi. Sam began to make her way toward the first one, but her mother called her back because she was wandering off too far and this caused something to stir inside the building. There was no growl or moan, just the sound of shuffling, as if someone or something was dragging their feet or something in gravel.

  The office door had a long vertical narrow window over the door handle and she cupped her hands around her face, blocking the sun’s glare on the glass. The office was a mess, but not because someone had destroyed it. It was a mess because whoever was in charge of the office had poor organizational skills. Stacks of paper lay on the desk haphazardly, and a brown leather saddle leaned on a chair in front of the desk. The office had a door with a large window on it on it that led to the stable. Sam stared at that window hoping to see a large beautiful horse walk pa
st, but none did. She squinted her eyes to get a clearer look as the sun squeezed through the cracks of her fingers, when she saw something move past the window only further away in the shadow of the setting sun. It looked like a girl, a girl about her age and height. She could not make out much, but she saw golden blond hair that was kept in braids that ran down her back. “Mom I think there is a girl in here.”

  “There might be, but we aren’t going to find out today.” Naomi said as she pushed the lever down stopping the flow of water and replaced the bucket with the second one. “You have to carry one of these buckets, so don’t think about going anywhere.”

  “I know, but she’s not like any of the other ones.” She ran back to her mother.

  “Eric will come with us tomorrow, but it is getting late and if it is, one of them, he’ll kill it.” Naomi wanted nothing to do with killing any zombies especially if she was going to be the one that provoked it. “They’ll be frozen in the morning. Less risk.”

  They carried the two buckets back to the house and for the first time in months ran a warm wet wash cloth over their skin. Eric agreed he would find a hose tomorrow and they would run it from the spigot to the house. Since the hose would be down hill anyway the water should have no problem getting to them. They would just have to shut it off when they were done filling up the buckets, so the hose did not freeze. Tomorrow they would take their first warm bath.

  **********

  Removing the covers, cold immediately replaced their warm layer of comfort. Eric and Naomi laid close together, but the pain in Eric’s foot throbbed with each beat of his heart.

  “Did you see any antibiotics or peroxide or something in the stable when you were in there last night?” Eric said nursing his foot.