Corn, Cows, and the Apocalypse (Part 1) Read online

“Excuse me?” I hadn’t really been listening, since the skillet wasn’t voluntarily releasing its dinner residue, but I probably would have asked it anyway.

  “I don’t mind being hated. I don’t mind you being scared of me so far as it suits your training, but I don’t want to be a monster to you.” He stepped away from the counter, and I turned to see what his strategy was. I must have been wearing twenty layers of dumbfounded on my face, but he seemed to be oblivious to it. “When you’re ready.”

  “What? What do you want me to do?”

  “Just come to me, so I can offer you a different picture of me. One without violence.” I must have stepped back, because my butt started to feel wet from the sink overflow. “Please.” He said lowering his head. He wasn’t badgering me with an apology, because he knew I would never accept it. He was however, offering a redo. He wanted to change how I saw him. “I’m still cuffed. I won’t take advantage. I just want one kiss.”

  Hearing the word kiss made my whole body flare hot. It wasn’t even sexual or angry heat. It was like someone had called me to give a speech in my underwear. I shook my head, but just the thought of kissing made me wet my lips. I smacked my washcloth on the counter and walked off.

  I was half way through the living room before a thought occurred to me. Maybe I needed to kiss him too. Once again the thought wasn’t based on any sexual desire I had for him. At this point, my emotions toward him were being stored in a mental filing cabinet in reverse chronological order of experiences. I did feel threatened by him though. If I ignored how I felt, it would just put me on edge. That might help me train, but it would also make me worry myself into restless sleep, and gastritis provoking mealtimes.

  Garrett didn’t want me to view him as a rapist bastard because he found the label offensive to his honorable nature. I didn’t want to view him that way, because it would make the next few weeks or months intolerable.

  After my pause in thought and step, I returned to the kitchen and found him still standing in the center of the kitchen waiting for his kiss. He didn’t smile when I returned, which was good. He just watched me fidget and inch toward him like he might suddenly jump me again.

  When I was right in front of him, he leaned in for a kiss and I pulled away. I wasn’t even sure why I did. Somehow in my cycle of prudishness I forgot how to just let someone kiss me. I chuckled and apologized. I looked at him to see if I had annoyed him again, but he was patiently waiting for my kiss.

  My eyes watered and I shook my head. “I’m sorry.” I apologized again laughing at my confusing reaction to what should have been a simple kiss. “I can do this.” His brow dove deep and he tilted his head to look me over. “It’s not you.” I said feeling more tears coming on. “Geez, I can’t believe I’m getting this worked up. Okay, just kiss me.” I turned back to him, but by now he was showing concern for my sudden blubbering. “Just do it. I understand your purpose.” I moved toward him to kiss him, but this time he pulled away.

  “Would you feel comfortable un-cuffing me?” I nodded and pulled out the key. Once he was free, I wiped my eyes and sniffled a few times so I wasn’t the most disgusting lip partner. He put his hands on his hips and watched me prepare. “That long, huh?” He asked and I offered him a mumbled curse.

  He came at me painfully slow, and put his hand around my back. He drew me forward, and I closed my eyes. I dutifully tipped up my head and parted my lips. His lips pressed against my forehead instead. For a moment, I felt rejected again, but his arms drew me in closer pressing me to his chest.

  I was too tired to fight, too exhausted to delve into the strangeness of being held by a man that I hated five minutes ago, and would hate again tomorrow. I just relaxed against his chest and felt the warmth of his body. He smelled like the leather of his motorcycle jacket.

  At what point I started sniffling out stuttered sobs I don’t know, but he continued to hold me while I did. I apologized a few more times for my theatrics, but he just pat my back when I did.

  When I finally pulled away from him, he pulled my matted hair away from my face and poured me a glass of water. After I guzzled it down, I waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. “Do you still want your kiss?” I asked.

  He smiled, or at least he almost smiled. “I think we’ve at least dismantled a few assumptions about my character by now. That ought to get us through the bulk of our uncomfortable silences.” He stalked passed me, but paused just outside of my peripheral. “Unless you still want one.”

  I wanted to look at him. I imagined that his expression might have been less pleading this time, and more hopeful. I didn’t look though. Bottom line was, he was a man, and I was a woman, we were bound to wind up in bed at some point. It certainly didn’t have to be tonight. There was always time to explore my ever changing opinion of his character and my emotions that went with it.

  -So It Begins-

  There’s always a starting point to every story. The story of my training with Garrett should have started two weeks ago, but it didn’t. I hadn’t realized that he didn’t believe in me anymore than I believed in myself. His efforts to groom my fighting skills had thus far been perfunctory. It was a torpid attempt to induce the use of my natural survival skills: kick, punch, bite, run. After the kitchen incident, he started to see my underlying skill—albeit unrefined—at thinking on my feet. That was when Garrett decided to start training me for real.

  When I came downstairs and found the couch empty, it wasn’t a surprise to me. Garrett was an early riser and rarely out slept me. He had taken to the couch instead of one of the rooms upstairs that I offered. His excuse was that without a nightly rotation on watch he needed to be our first line of defense against the grim, but I think he just wanted to keep me from sneaking off in the middle of the night.

  I did however find the lack of breakfast odd. He wasn’t much of a housekeeper, but either out of graciousness or expediting progress he had taken to making breakfast for us. Since I didn’t see him or smell spam frying, I B-lined to the back-front door of the living room to make sure he wasn’t battling a trespassing grim outside.

  I reached for the door knob but it was gone. Lock or unlock it made no difference, the hardware within kept the door shut. Aside from the gaping hole that offered free admission to bugs, I assumed that it was an attempt at securing the house since we were without a proper night watch.

  I headed back to the kitchen to the side door, but the knob was off there too. It took a lot to really scare me, especially these days, but the thought of being trapped in a confined space was ranking on my “pee your pants” level. “Garrett?” I said quietly hoping that he was going to jump out and attack soon, so I could fold like a weak chair and disappoint his efforts.

  I heard movement in the laundry/storage room off the living room. The room had nothing to be frightened of, except that it led to the basement, the place where the deceased resident was stored.

  The former elderly man should have been subdued by my holy water, but the process did require fairly regular updates to prevent emergence. It was the downside to keeping the bodies in the home, but it was just an unwritten rule that if we took a house, we had to protect the residents from changing. It seemed noble, past tense included.

  I decided, with the little bravery that I had, to go check it out. I was confident the resident should be secure, and I assumed that Garrett was just planning a sneak attack.

  As I rounded the corner to the little room I discovered that I was right and wrong. The resident of the house was still securely padlocked in the basement. The crystalized man before me was a completely different grim.

  The one thing difficult to agree on when it comes to the grim is how to deal with them. Many people argue that as the bodies of the risen, they should simply be avoided and left alone. These are the people that usually stay held up in their homes 23 hours a day, living on whatever creature happens to wander into their traps. These are also the people, that despite their misgivings to harming the grim, will free
ly shoot living trespassers like they’re part of a carnival game. Damn hicks.

  August and the others took to killing grim like a sport. The only rule, the grim must be animated. They consider it a low blow to dismantle a body that hasn’t tried to hurt anybody. It is a strange morality, especially since all crystalline dead have the potential to become grim, but once again, in a world without social taboos, we start to develop our own moralities. Humans are ingrained with the desire to be restricted. Without it…Lord of the Freaking Flies.

  Which brings me back to the growling, glaring, human-wearing demon standing before me. My sympathies for the consecrated body he inhabited went right out the window the minute he exposed his teeth. The fine pointed jagged dentition in his mouth was handcrafted. It told me this demon was particularly maniacal. It also told me that it had full control over the faculties of this body.

  Screaming would have been an appropriate response, but in situations where legs are far more vital than voice boxes, you tend to forget that part.

  I ran from the room just missing whatever was thrown after me. I rounded the corner with only three thoughts: knife, screwdriver, and bedroom. To break that down for you, I offered myself three options to survive. The first of course was to fight, yeah right. The second was to find a screwdriver and twist the remaining hardware in the door in order to escape—not enough time. The third option was to run up to my bedroom and hide behind a locked door.

  In truth I wanted to go hide. Two weeks ago, and maybe even one day ago I might still have done that, but I already knew the only weapons I had up there were toxic hairsprays and girdles. If they hadn’t killed women this far in, they weren’t likely to kill a grim.

  My hair snagged on something as I changed directions at the last second to the kitchen. The pain was easily ignored. I didn’t bother turning to see how close he was. I was already moving at impossible speed: “mach holy shit.”

  I reached the chopping block and found only one large butchers knife in it. Garrett had wisely removed the remaining knives so that the grim didn’t follow my lead and grab one also. I flung the block behind me hanging onto the knife as it unsheathed. Rounding the island I grabbed the skillet drying by the sink.

  There was no guarantee of anything at this point, but I knew my speed wouldn’t hold out, and frankly without getting trapped in smaller rooms upstairs, I needed to turn around and face the grim truth. Literally.

  I whipped the skillet behind me as I turned. The pan made impact with the grim chipping part of his face. My retreat slowed and he reached to grab me. I jumped out of his reach and stabbed his vulnerable hand. Though he didn’t feel any pain, he did take the slightest inventory of his now missing finger.

  I squatted low and fast—kicked out his knee. He stumbled and I stood using the momentum of my rise to jump up. I careened the skillet at his head and landed a satisfying fracture. I toppled onto to him as he went down to the floor, and I stabbed him repeatedly until his arms had crumbled away and his growl had quieted.

  I panted over my kill with only a minor amount of satisfaction. A slow clap brought my attention back to the room. Garrett had come back in and was standing over me like a proud teacher. His mouth wasn’t smiling, but he’s eyes were.

  I dove at him, neglecting the knife, but gripping the skillet firmly. He must have expected the lunge, because he caught my arms and hastened my descent to the floor. He didn’t attack, but he did ready himself for another attack from me. “You’re not ready to fight me.” He said flatly when I gripped my skillet again.

  “I hate you.” I said tossing the skillet aside.

  He relaxed his stance and offered me a hand up. “That’s okay.”

  I took the proffered hand out of some sense of truce, and he pulled me up. I started to walk away, but he didn’t let go of my arm. I expected to see a coy smile on his face. Something indicating that he wasn’t quite ready to let go of my hand.

  A few too many romance novel scenes later and I was twisted up in his arms with one of the missing kitchen knives at my throat. “You didn’t think it would be that easy, did you?” He murmured in my ear. Apparently breakfast wasn’t just postponed, but cancelled.

  -The Middle-

  A month later, I should have been getting better, but I wasn’t. Garrett insisted that I was, but he was still beating me hand over fist, and that was quite literally. I was covered in bruises, and slashes. I was the poster child for abused women: beaten to a bloody pulp and still going back for more.

  I wanted to do well more than ever, for myself, but I still couldn’t beat him. My sword fighting was laughable, and even Garrett admitted that we were probably wasting our time trying to force skill where there wasn’t talent. My running speed had improved as well as my jumping, but no matter how fast I was, I still couldn’t beat him in hand to hand combat.

  I flew back feeling the full impact of his fist on my eye. It was amazing how much that hurt. I was certain several times that my eye was going to explode like a water balloon, but it didn’t. The swelling would go down. The black eyes would fade, although they were usually quickly replaced.

  Normally—in regards to my recent new normal—I would have gotten right back up and went after him, but this time I just stayed down. We had been sparring for an hour working our way up to real hits as a way to build endurance to pain. Basically we were beating the crap out of each other. Naturally, I was losing.

  “Get up.” I could tell he was already angry. He was getting more temperamental every day. I assumed he was as frustrated with my progress as I was, but I wasn’t sure what he thought his anger was going to do about it. He was already hitting me daily, what more could he threaten me with. “Get up!”

  I opened one eye, since the other was already swelling shut. He was panting. At least he had to exert some effort. I shook my head at him and he ground his teeth huffing his derision like a big-nosed bull.

  He kicked my leg. It hurt, but not enough to offer him the satisfaction of winning. When I mouthed “fuck you” at him, I could almost see the steam coming out of his ears.

  He knelt down beside me and grabbed me by my shirt. I wasn’t surprised that he had the strength to pull my torso off the ground, but I was impressed that my cotton shirt didn’t rip in his grip. “That’s a great idea. Maybe since you’re just going to lie on your back I can get a little use out of you.”

  He tried to look me over luridly, but his eyes too quickly came back to rest on mine. It was just a threat. He might have wanted to do just that, but from what I had gleaned of his closed mouth personality over the last six weeks, he was bashful when it came to sex.

  More than a few nights I had fallen asleep on the couch with him, and each time he delivered me to my bedroom without any attempt to do more. I had even gotten brave enough to walk around the house in my towel after my shower, but he didn’t take the bait. Although, for the most part I still hated him, I was starved for attention. Even the potential of having sex was better than nothing at all.

  I smiled up at him. “As long as I don’t have to move, you do whatever you need to.”

  His face contorted into three or four confused and menacing expressions, before he settled into interest. His eyes flickered over mine, trying to read me. Was I just being a smart ass, or did I really not mind if he had me? He couldn’t read me so he looked over my body.

  He was evaluating me. Seeing how much he wanted to have me. Was it worth throwing out the whole days schedule just to satisfy his needs? Adding to that, was it worth potentially disrupting days and weeks after that if he wanted more?

  I hated to interrupt the questions lining up on his face to be answered. I probably needed and wanted sex even more than him, but I also needed and wanted to win one freaking battle. I wasn’t an egotist, but I was definitely a feminist, so for the remainder of female kind, I wanted to beat him.

  The rock I had been slowly wiggling loose just beside him was a decent handful. When I got my grip on it I rapped his skull with it being
careful not to hit the temple. I punched him with the other hand, and kicked him back. I got another good hit with the rock after I straddled him, which made his eyes lull back. Just for good measure I punched him in the stomach. When it was clear he was knocked out, I did a long victory lap around the yard before checking on him.

  -The Humbled and the Proud-

  “What up my bitch?” I chimed as Garrett walked into the kitchen with my homemade bandage around his head. He had been out for several hours, and I was really starting to worry, but instead of fretting, I just cranked up Jimmy the Card’s pre-supper request hour. I had already called in several requests in honor of my low blow win, but so far Jimmy wasn’t playing anything he didn’t want to play, which was often the case with him. His radio, his rules.

  Garrett perked an eyebrow at my rap stimulated dialogue. I just laughed at him, and continued to make another round of tuna helper. “How’s your eye?”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle at the endearing way he asked. I had black eyes nearly every other day since we started, and he never asked about them. “Swelling nicely. If you’re planning another attack, I would advise coming from my right, since I have virtually no peripheral vision. What about you? Are you going to live?”

  I looked him over. Concussions were dangerous, since doctors were few and far. Since he was talking and walking, that was a good thing. “Headache, but no more than I’ve had before. I should live.”

  “So, I don’t have to feel guilty about bragging my success over the airwaves.” I said offering a little shoulder dance.

  “I’d be disappointed if you didn’t.” He said. “You did well. Perhaps not the traditional gentlemen’s method of fighting, but clearly grim aren’t gentleman.” I shook my head in agreement, before adding my tuna to the skillet. “Can I help you with anything?” He asked.

  I raised my eyebrows at him. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard those words spoken in this kitchen.”