The Last Christmas Read online

  THE LAST CHRISTMAS

  by

  Jacqueline Druga

  The Last Christmas

  By Jacqueline Druga

  Copyright 2013 by Jacqueline Druga

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any person or persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover photo by © Vedmochka - Fotolia.com

  Thank you so much for me Christmas dream team for pulling through on this one. Jhanelle, Bonnie and Laura. I can’t thank you three enough for the high speed team effort to get this out.

  The Last Christmas

  1. Dying

  2. Baby, It’s Cold Outside

  3. The Last Day

  1.

  The Last Christmas: Dying

  Her eyes said she was hungry, but my wife, Melissa, would never complain. She wouldn’t tell me she didn’t have enough to eat. She and I were always the last to eat. The kids were first. I know they were hungry too.

  I felt guilty taking the last spoonful of the potted meat. But that was the only thing I had consumed all day. We were at the end. The last can. It toppled from my hand, clanking to the floor in my helpless defeat.

  I was failing my family.

  We wouldn’t make it much longer.

  Days, weeks, I knew this. Melissa knew this. The kids, well, they were kids. They knew what they were told. And at four- and six years old, we told them very little.

  We were fortunate, in a sense, for a lot of things. The location of our home was perfect; at the onset, we had an ample supply of food and a source to get more nearby. We had a fireplace in the basement family room to keep us warm; and most importantly, we had each other.

  When hundreds of millions lost their families, I managed to keep mine.

  We were together.

  But how much longer would that be the case? I had to do something, and even if I did, would it make a difference?

  The local source for supplies had been wiped clean, by us and other people who hid for their safety. To get more, I’d have to venture farther out.

  Because we stayed in the cellar with the fireplace for warmth, I hardly could tell if it was day or night. I looked at my watch, it was evening. I’d venture out the next day. But the time wasn’t what got to me. It was the date.

  December 23rd.

  The next day was Christmas Eve, and that fueled my determination even more.

  I had to do it. Melissa and I always made Christmas special, and this year would not be an exception.

  I get out there, get something. My gut told me we weren’t going to be around much longer, not through the winter. So I was going to make it the best Christmas yet.

  Because I truly believed, that as a family, it would be our last Christmas together … ever.

  <><><><>

  Daddy, is Santa bringing me that toy?

  Daddy, how will Santa find us?

  Kids didn’t know. Mine certainly didn’t.

  Carly had just turned four when it all started, and Jeff was six. Their biggest worry was why they couldn’t go to school.

  As I said, we were fortunate. We lived on a little stretch of road just beyond the city and right before the next town. A dead area, no pun intended. We actually were far away enough from the mayhem when it started that it was a neighbor who told me not to go anywhere, to hunker down and stay put.

  At first that was the thought on all of our minds.

  I guess in actuality it was longer than four months ago, closer to a year. In fact it was just after Christmas when we first heard about it.

  The Venice Flu started in, well, Venice. It pretty much locked down the city. An ordinary flu turned bad. It wasn’t like the flu cases in the movies, where people just dropped dead. People were sick for a while, days and weeks passed before they succumbed. Raging fever, cold symptoms. That was stage one. Early on, everyone made it through stage one. Well, almost everyone, a small, very small percentage, like the ordinary flu, passed away.

  Then just as Venice thought it was finished, a second wave of the flu hit. Those who had it the first time had immunity. And you know, because it was a hard flu, but not deadly, people didn’t fear it. They should have.

  It mutated. Suddenly, after stage one, the victims felt better for a few days. A misleading remission. Then the cold symptoms grew out of control and the raging fever caused internal bleeding. By the time stage two of the flu had been discovered, stage one had spread across Italy.

  Stage three began, the inability of the body to retain any hydration. Basically, they bled out and dried out before death.

  The entire process took no less than a week. Imagine hundreds of millions of people suffering with not enough hands to care for them.

  It was a fraction of the population that caught it the first wave. Ten percent. But the second wave was like the Spanish Flu, it toppled sixty percent of the population. No one caught it. They all died.

  Leaving Italy barren.

  That was the Venice Flu in Italy and a few surrounding countries.

  Somewhere, somehow, it mutated again.

  The sixty percent infected became eighty, and it had a kill rate of one hundred percent.

  It had a rise rate of fifty percent.

  Half the people who died from the Venice Flu reanimated. The first reanimation occurred in London.

  The family was gathered around the recently deceased, and he sat up and bit the neck of his wife.

  It was all over the Internet.

  In the United States, we felt infallible. Really, we did. We’d read daily about it striking here and there, but not in the U.S.. It was reminiscent, people said, of the days of SARS.

  I paid attention to the flu. Reading headlines about the millions dead, and the violence ‘over there’ brought on by the undead, as they were called, was frightening. But we went on living our lives, living normally.

  Then on August 15th, eight months after it started in Italy, the first case was reported in New York, and then another in Virginia.

  It was here. It landed.

  Stage one.

  It spread like wildfire and the last day I left my house for a while, was on September 1st. That was to go to the store. Panic buying hadn’t begun yet. I was a few days ahead of it. Plus, I lived in a rural area.

  Schools never opened, and my plan was to stay in until the flu ran its course. Not even to go outside.

  It was in the air, so we had to avoid it.

  I wasn’t a “prepper”. I wasn’t a survivalist. I was a father and a husband with a will to protect my family. I was driven to do so.

  At the end of September, that was the last we heard anything on the news. The dead were rising. They were spreading out, looking for victims, looking for anyone alive.

  Suddenly I was struck with fear. Were we too close to a town or city? If those things that roamed in killer packs were out and about, how long would it be until they reached our home?

  I had managed to keep my family together.

  To me, it was time to go.

  I knew there had to be people around us who were sick, and how long would it be before they rose? Heck, without cars or airplanes, sound travels. The violent coughing carried through the dead air.

  They were close, they had to be. We had supplies, they were dwindling, but that was fine. We’d get more. Safety was foremost.

  I packed the supplies I needed and had just put my family in the van, when I saw my neighbor, Gene.

  “Mark, what are you doing?” he asked. No wait, he had raced from his house with a baseball bat. “Mark!”

  “Leaving, running for the hills, I suppose. I
’m thinking somewhere way out there.”

  “My God, Mark. You’re taking them in the van and you have no idea where you’re going or how long you’ll be driving?”

  “What choice do I have?”

  “You’re insane. Your choice is to hunker down. Stay safe. Don’t leave. Don’t get in the van.”

  “Come with us, Gene.”

  Gene shook his head. “No. Why would you do this?”

  “This is my family, I need to protect them. How much longer will we be safe from those things that are killing people?”

  “The undead, the zombies,” Gene said, “they won’t last forever. It’s dead flesh. It won’t last forever. Just hunker down.”

  I had no intention of following Gene’s advice, until I saw them.

  Two sauntered down from the yard of the house across from me, and four more came down the street.

  Gene saw them. His eyes shifted and he backed up. “I won’t stay out here and die out here. Godspeed.”

  I needed Godspeed, because I discovered at that moment, some were fast. The ones coming down the street were soon followed by a running pack. The pack split, and four of them pursued Gene.

  He swung out his bat like a baseball pro and fled into his home.

  I jumped in the van, and then they pursued us.

  My family screamed. They were obviously terrified, I didn’t blame them.

  “It’s okay, I have this.”

  But I didn’t. Soon those things forgot about pursuing Gene and encompassed our van. I slammed it in reverse, knocking over the group that pounded to get in.

  I made it out of the driveway but they kept coming.

  I drove, and it wasn’t until I was a quarter mile down the road that I realized I was a pied piper. Every walking dead homed in on us.

  So I slowed down. Slow enough for them to keep up, but fast enough that they couldn’t catch us. Once I hit Pierce Road, which was a about a quarter mile from my house, I turned.

  I led them pretty far and then I returned home.

  Only this time, I pulled into the garage.

  I knew I was there to stay. Like Gene said, hunker down. Wait it out.

  Problem was, how long could I wait?

  Supplies were dwindling; I had to feed my family.

  <><><><>

  My first plan was to establish a safe environment for us all. They weren’t happy at all when we got back, and I knew they were scared. I was scared. But I explained to Melissa that it was for the best.

  The next few days were spent boarding up the windows, rationing supplies and foraging the empty houses nearby for food, medical supplies, and stuff to burn when the weather grew cold.

  Most of those things moved slowly. Some were quick, but those ones that were fast were motivated by something and easily stumbled. You just had to be ready to swing.

  I ventured to TJ’s Market, down the road, without incident. The first time I went, my heart pounded, but I didn’t run into any. It was a quick trip there and back.

  We weren’t eating as much as we should have; the kids were pale from lack of nutrition. I saw my neighbor Gene, just one more time before he died.

  Yeah … he died.

  But he did so helping me get food.

  I’ll always remember him, because without his help that fateful day I would have been a goner. My family wouldn’t have made it.

  I owe him.

  That was early November, when we took the last from the shelves, when we ventured out into the mobs of those things.

  But I had another reason to go out again.

  It was Christmas.

  We were already in the basement and I made the decision to get them. The Christmas decorations, or at the very least least some of them. Carly held her doll and Jeff was leafing through a book when I brought them out. Their eyes lit up. I guess they thought I forgot. I almost did.

  I strung up the lights around the fireplace and set up the tree.

  There was just a tad of gas in the generator, and I planned on using it to fire up the lights on Christmas day.

  There was a feeling about everything, a sad one, that the end was coming.

  I needed to make it special. They looked at me as if I were strange when I passed out those goofy Santa hats and made them wear them.

  Well, the kids liked them.

  Melissa held out her hand to me. I knew she was holding back crying.

  “I have to go,” I told her. “I have to. I have to do this. I’ll be back. I promise.”

  She didn’t want to let me go when I said my goodbye, neither did the kids, and it was tough.

  I plugged the lights into the extension cord and carried it with me to the garage. Before leaving, I looked back at them. “When I’m back, I’ll plug this in.”

  Then I left, running the extension cord under the door and pulling it closed. I placed the plug end by the generator.

  I would be lying if I said I wasn’t scared leaving them. I was. I was petrified. But we hadn’t had an incident of those things trying to get in since early on. I had barricaded the stairwell door, and there were no windows in the family room. It was safe.

  After quietly opening the garage by hand, I grabbed the duffle bag that I always took for supplies and got in the van.

  My heart beat so strongly. I worried for them. What if I didn’t come back? There was a half a box of stale crackers remaining. I envisioned my family waiting for those lights to come on. Waiting for the signal that I was home.

  No. No. Those lights would go on.

  I would make it back.

  Wearing my own Santa hat, I pulled out from the garage, looked, saw none of those things, closed the garage door and then backed from the driveway.

  I knew I was no less than a red flag with that Santa hat on my head, but I had a mission, one I would complete.

  <><><><>

  There was one of those Dollar Marts three miles away in Chester. It was off of Old Mill Run Road, and it was rarely busy because few people knew it was there.

  I was banking on that place for food. Hoping against hope, that people thought of grocery stores, pharmacies and such, instead of a Dollar Mart.

  They had aisles of food as I recalled.

  I passed a few of those things as I drove on the snow-covered roads. My only weapon was a baseball bat. But somehow, I wondered if I would even need it.

  The weather and time had taken their toll, those things moved even slowly, almost dragging. Some crawled aimlessly.

  I didn’t see any that ran.

  They lacked enthusiasm when they saw me. Not even trying for the van.

  I felt relieved, even more so, when I saw a mob of them around what looked like a dead deer. The deer died recently; I could see the steam rising up from the carcass as they pulled at its insides.

  The mob paid no attention to me.

  I wondered how they got that deer.

  My bald tires slid a few times on the road, but I made it to the Dollar Mart. The front doors were smashed, open and the store was dark. I pulled right up to the entrance, grabbed my flashlight, bag, and bat, shut off the van, and stepped out.

  I was going to be fast, run in, run out.

  A few of those things were down the road, and I knew I had about twenty minutes before they made it. That was, unless there was one in the store.

  I didn’t see any, when I looked.

  Get in. Get out.

  But then I saw a bin of dollar toys when I walked in. The cheap ones. But who cared.

  A turn of my beam of light lit the far wall and the loads of cheap toys there.

  How perfect that I would not only return how with food, but with gifts, as well.

  Christmas.

  I slid the bag from my shoulder, opened it and placed some toys in there. Just grabbing from the bin. I’d sort it out later. For sure, cheap toys or not, they’d breed a smile from the kids.

  I shouldered the bag, and headed to where I knew there were food aisles.

  A few steps into
my walk, I heard a crunching sound.

  It was close.

  A foot stepping on something.

  One of those things were in the store.

  I raised my bat.

  Click.

  My eyes widened.

  “Say something,” the woman’s voice spoke from behind me. I felt the gun against my head. Or at least I assumed it was the metal of a gun.

  “Um, don’t shoot?”

  She exhaled. “Oh my God,” she said excitedly. “A person.”

  I turned around and before I could look at her, she threw her arms around my neck and hugged me as if she knew me.

  “Oh my God,” she repeated.

  “It’s okay,” I told her. “It’s okay.”

  She stepped back. She was young, maybe twenty. Tears had caused streaks across her dirty face. She just stared at me.

  Then just as she emotionally laughed in relief, she collapsed. She dropped to the floor.

  <><><><>

  I figured it was a number of things that caused the young woman to faint. She had a backpack stuffed with supplies and a gun. A true villain would have taken her things and left her.

  But I was alive and those of us who were alive had to look after one another.

  I carried her and her things to the van, then after securing her, I went back inside for food.

  The shelves were pretty bare. A few cans of food, crackers, and cookies. Water. She probably had grabbed a ton of stuff. I took what was edible and drinkable, then a few more items.

  Those things hadn’t made it to the store yet.

  Before leaving, I wanted to make sure she was all right. Did I need to take her somewhere, help her? In the back of the van, I used baby wipes to clean off her face, and the coolness of the cloths brought her to.

  She thanked me again.

  “Jenny,” she said of her name. “You are?”

  “Mark.”

  “I can’t believe I ran into someone alive.”

  “Are you alone?” I asked her.

  She nodded and sobbed.

  “Where are you from?”

  “Glenn Falls.”