This Would Be Paradise (Book 1)-A Zombie Novel

Chapter 32

*Disclaimer: Possibly contains disturbing content*

Her face was paler than I had ever seen it, she was probably in shock. I ran to her.

"Oh god, oh god," I started to panic.

I tried to lift up her right hand to see how bad it was, but as soon as I did, blood started to spurt anew. It looked bad; out of my realm bad. It was deeper than any cut I had ever gotten. That fucking, splintering fence must have sliced her arm open when she fell.

"Let's get inside." I had to really focus to keep the panic out of my voice.

"Am...am I goin' to be ok?" Chloe's eyes were glassy.

"Of course." I had no way of knowing that.

We left a bloody trail all the way to the door. My hand slipped on the sliding door handle from all the blood that coated it; I had to wipe it off on my already ruined pants. This was too much blood for an adult, let alone a small child. I flung open the door and sat her down on a kitchen chair. I started to pull open all the drawers searching for a towel. After I tried all of them, I finally opened the right one.

I forced Chloe's hand away and shoved the sunflower print tea towel on the bleeding wound.

"It hurts!" Chloe screamed and I had never felt so powerless.

She started to kick out her legs and I had to jump to the side to avoid them. Blood was staining the towel at an alarming rate.

"I know it hurts Chloe, but you have to push on this as hard as possible ok? I'm going to run upstairs and grab something."

I ran off before she could protest. I flew up the stairs and into the little boy's room. He had to own a belt that I could use as a tourniquet. I threw open and rummaged through his dresser, clothes flying everywhere. I found a faux leather one that would work, so I ran back down the stairs in a flurry.

Chloe was now screaming and crying, the initial shock having worn off. She was like a banshee; her pain was palpable.

"Make it stop!" Her face was now red from all the screaming.

She needed to stop yelling, we already had all those infected in the alley. No doubt they were banging and pushing on the fence trying to get in.

"I'm going to tie this around your arm ok? It will help stop the blood so I can treat it."

I looped my arm under hers and latched the belt, tightening it just past the elbow.

"OW!" She flailed, but I tugged it as tight as it could go.

"I know it hurts Chloe, but this will stop the bleeding," I pleaded with her.

She weakly pushed and scratched at me, trying to get me to release the belt. But even as she was doing that, I could see that the blood flow was slowing when I lifted the tea towel.

"See it's working," I pointed out. "Now I need you to be really brave right now and hold this belt."

I realized she had more strength than most adults would, when she grabbed the end of the belt I was pulling on and started to tug.

"Good. We need disinfectant."

I ran to the living room where the stuff we grabbed from the medicine cabinet was. There was a brown bottle of peroxide that I needed. Chloe was going to hate this even more. I made a mess of our bags as I rooted through them to grab the bottle. Once I got back to the kitchen, I took out the gauze we pilfered from the general store.

All this was going to do was disinfect the wound. It was deep enough that she needed stitches and there was no way I could administer them to a flailing child.