Chapter 08: Without masks

Chapter 08: Without masks

I saw the fear in her face at some moments and then I understood her loneliness.

It is the first time she tells her story, stuck in her throat. Her eyes sparkle when she talks about her friend. I drink another sip of the precious water, starting to empathize with her, as if a bridge arose from our misfortune. Soon she smiles again.

“Don't ask me how long I've been here 'cause I'm not sure. Two weeks, maybe.”

“And how you have been kept yourself?” I ask, without understanding how she manages to preserve the good humor and enigmatic smile.

“I have fed of the food my team brought, of what I found in the stands and the snack carts in front of the gymnasium. Is in the end, but there's plenty of water.”

“You didn't want to find a better shelter?”

“Remember that I am not from here? I would end up getting lost. I even tried to walk through the nearest blocks, but I gave up.”

“Stay in this place forever doesn't work. Sometime the food will end. Look at those empty packages.”

“And what you have done to survive?” she ask, sarcastically.

“That's not important right now. The key is to take what is useful and go away.”

“Who says I'm going with you?”

“Nobody. I said I'll take whatever that can help and I'm going away. You do whatever you like.”

Leaving the room, I start to roll the bags in the bleachers. Daniela comes after me and watches me intently.

“What you looking for?”

“Anything that has some utility.”

“Hmm. Look what I found,” she says, picking something on the floor. “A nail. It is useful for nailing things.”

I stare at her with an unfriendly face while she laughs at her own joke.

“I'll make you laugh.”

“I think it unlikely, since you're not coming with me.”

“Who says?”

Rolling my eyes, I go rummaging among the dry stains and traces of the recent carnage. My pessimistic theories are confirmed when I can't find anything useful in the inspection. The most lethal weapon that I can find is a broken nail file. Maybe I can sanding any of them to death. Okay, it was not funny.

I decide to stay the night in the gym. Went dark before I realized it.

Daniela uses some lifted benches to close the passage. She lend me two sleeping mats where I can rest more comfortably, something that I don't for a long time.

“Catch.”

Ready to turn away and try to sleep, Daniela surprises me with a piece of bread. My normal attitude would be refuse and not get involved too much with an unknown, but the snoring in my stomach is louder than pride.

“It's kinda hard, but you can use water.”

“I know.”

It would be comical if it were not tragic. Me, dipping a piece of crusty bread in water, sitting on a dusty mattress inside a bathroom with a no inviting smell, talking to a complete stranger. Where will I have lost my true self?

“Yummy?” she asks, grimacing.

“I've had better,” I sigh. Actually I have eaten much better, but for a long time. As I remember, the best I've had in recent days were the remains of the banana in my backpack.

“You came alone here? I mean, what about your family?”

The memory hurts inside, creating a knot in my throat. My family.

“As far as I'm on my own.”

The respect comes in the form of silence. Slowly I chew the wet bread, keeping the firm stance. No melodramas.

“When it started, where were you?”

“Leaving work.”

“What do you think?”

“About?” I ask through clenched teeth. I'm not very patient with conversations.

“All this.” She points toward the narrow opening at the top window. It would be better keep it closed, but the night is hot enough to stay sealed in this cubicle. Since the lights remain off there is no problem, even that we don't feel the slightest vestige of a breeze. “About those crazy wandering out there, trying to kill us. It came from somewhere, for some reason.”

“Oh.” I drink another sip. Already went through this same conversation into my head several times and never got to any conclusion. “No idea.”

“Aren't you curious?” she asks, visibly surprised before my disinterest.

“What good would know where it came from? It would help if we knew how to stop it, agree?”

“Knowing the cause could help us.”

“Help us?”

“The combat this... I don't know, disease.”

“Baby, I'm not a fighter. I'm just trying to stay alive, okay? My responsibility is to myself.”

“You really have a lot to learn.”

Daniela seems to get bored of arguing and settles down on the mats, holding her hair in a ponytail.

“Do you mind?” she asks, preparing to take off her blouse.

“Feel free.” I lean back my head on the tile, looking up. Through the small passage I can see the black night veil. The heat is so much that I would not surprise if the sun covered the moon right now.

I feel the moment arriving once again. The feeling of loneliness, abandonment. The same one that always kills me, usually at night. I did not even have time to say goodbye to my parents. Have not had time to think of a logical explanation for all this crap. It's not like I expected a truck equipped with loudspeakers announcing “Extra! Extra! The city will be attacked by zombies” while unemployed doing odd jobs distribute pamphlets bloodstained with photos of the smiling cannibals, but gee! It happened so fast and no one gave a damn. At no time was advertised on TV or radio anything about it, at least in the short time they still functioned. It is a feeling of complete desertion. Like to have been left behind, thrown to moths in a wasteland, a bunch of trashy rednecks. At the mercy of your own chance.

“Like it?”

Daniela's voice takes me out of the trance. If the reverie had not been so intense I could swear that I was sleeping seated.

Shirtless, I see her lying just wearing her bra. The body, although slim due to the forced diet, keeps the curves well delineated by cut muscles. The sport must have helped. A mischievous smile says something else.

“I've seen better.”

I don't wait for a reply, educated or not, and I lie uncomfortable. It's hard to close the eyes in a new place. Outside, the huddled seats can slow them down, but will not prevent them from entering. Like I said, my responsibility is to survive.

“Do you think they think?”

Gosh! She won't shut up?

“What now?”

“Do you think they know what they do? I mean, I noticed that they attack us soon as see us, but do they know they are attacking us?”

“There are more questions than answers. I don't know if they think. I don't know if they are alive. I certainly don't know if they will return to being the same they were. I know nothing. I just know I need to rest to get up early tomorrow.”

“What's your plan once you leave here?”

“Go to the fishing store.”

“Want to fish?” A low giggle.

“There is the most likely place to find weapons. I'll need them to get out of town.”

“What about the police station? Would not be easier to find weapons there?”

For a full minute I cannot answer. The police station. The most obvious place to be safe, to get help, to find weapons. The place where I had that horrible experience.

“I've already been there.”

“I see.” Luckily, realizing that there is a reason underneath the silence, she does not prolong the topic. “About this fishing shop. Don't you think that it may have already been looted?”

“Nope. People here are stupid. Complicated. They are not practical. The few smartest surely escaped or tried to. Besides, there are not many who have knowledge on handling firearms. I can see these people defending themselves with brooms and buckets. Pathetic. Hopefully I'll find enough to get out of this damn town.”

“And where do we go?”

“We?”

“Are you really going to leave me here alone?” Her feigned sorrow face annoys me.

“Let us say it would be better for you. I already found some survivors. Do ya see me now with any of them?”

“You didn't found me before, Tiago. Accept it or not, I did fine so far. I'm not stupid like the others. And I'm not asking for a personal hero, dammit, just a guide. If at least I knew the city, you can bet I'd be long gone. And I'm going with you. Free will still exists, right? The right to go and come?”

“But not the right to irk me.”

She laughs again. Absence of patience entertains her? Then she'll die laughing if it depends on me.

“I won't get in your way, I promise. You may think not, but help is always welcome. Even if it is for me to be eaten by them while you escapes.”

After the joke she hit three times in the air, making knock knock knock.

“That would be a big help,” I answer, ignoring her joke. “Actually it is the more likely to happen. Like I said, I do not attract a lot of luck to my companions.”

“I'd rather risk it than stay another day stuck in here.”

Standing up, she takes a red pen and a large piece of crumpled paper in a locker.

“Come on, show me how to get there.”

“What?”

“Make a map of how to get to the store. If you die, I at least have a chance.”

I stare at her big brown eyes. There is a mixture of anxiety and fun. It is better not contradict. If it is my lucky night, maybe she tries to risk on her own and disappear from my life. It would not be so bad.

I grab the stuff and start to scribble a map that leads from the gym to the fishing shop, explaining step by step with little patience. Sweat slips from my fingers, passing through the pen and staining the paper.

After finishing it, I turn away again. We do not exchange many words, despite she tries to learn more about my life. The mood does not leave her; and too much good mood is something that bothers me.

I never liked the guts of very friendly people. To me this is a sign of falsehood, a mask to disguise the true character. I like to speak my mind and do what I want without caring about the way they will look at me. Never went to play the good Samaritan with whom I do not like. Except when I have some interest. A friend, Roger, used to say I was very selfish and only thought of myself, the cause of nobody stand me for long. I had fun when he said that.