The Plague of Blood

Ch 6 - The Little Grave

The afternoon sun was slanting in through the windows and the house was quiet and still.

"I'm worried about Benjy," Erica Aldred whispered to her husband, Mark. She was lying next to him in bed, curled on her side. She watched the shifting patterns of sunlight on the wall. "He hasn't spoken since... you know. And he hasn't been able to keep any food down." The three-year-old was asleep now, exhausted from his illness.

Erica turned her head into the pillow and coughed violently. When she raised her head there was only a small amount of blood on the white pillowcase. Normally she would have been worried about it staining, but recently she hadn't been able to bring herself to care about things like that. She lay her head back down. She was still weak from two days of fever and vomiting and blood.

Her t-shirt felt wet in the front, and she grimaced. Her breasts were painfully heavy and leaking milk.

Her husband's hair was golden in the sunlight. She'd always loved his hair. It was one of the first things she had noticed about him when they were in university together. That and his easy, friendly smile. She laid her hand gently on his arm. It was cold.

"I wish I could stay here with you," Erica whispered. There was no reply.

She got out of bed, moving slowly, and went into the backyard. There was an empty plot of dirt near the flowerbed where Mark had been planning to start a winter garden. It took her a long time to dig a hole in the soft earth because she had to keep stopping to rest and catch her breath. When she was finished, the hole was several feet deep and longer than she was tall. Her arms were shaking with exertion, and there was a sheen of sweat on her forehead although the afternoon was cool.

Erica went to the master bedroom and spread a clean bed sheet over the carpet next to the bed. With some effort she managed to wrestle her husband's limp body off the mattress and onto the sheet. He was lighter in death than he had been in life, as he had lost a great deal of blood in his last days. The skin on his face was sunken in and spotted with red freckles where his blood vessels had burst in the end. She dragged the sheet carefully out into the backyard and laid his body in the hole. She sat in the dirt for a moment to rest, brushing Mark's hair out of his face where it had been disheveled in the move.

"I'm sorry I can't give you a proper burial, Mark. I hope you understand." She bent down to kiss his forehead. His body was already cold. Erica felt a numb sort of calm that she knew was shock. A distant part of her realized that this was the most horrific thing she'd experienced in her life, but she felt it remotely, as if watching it happen to someone else.

She went inside to the nursery where the baby was in his crib, still and silent as if sleeping. She picked him up and held him to her, rocking back and forth. His little chin had a crust of dried blood where he'd vomited.

"Theo, sweet baby," she whispered to him. Her breasts ached. Mark had already been delirious when Theo died. That was a small comfort, that Mark hadn't known. She Theo carried him outside and tucked him into the grave next to her husband's body, curling Mark's arm around him. She kissed the baby's forehead.

"Goodbye, sweetheart. I love you."

She touched her husband's cheek and kissed his mouth, then spread the bed sheet over them, tucking it in at the edges as if she were tucking them into bed for a nap. She used the shovel to cover the hole in the garden until it was a long row of humped up earth. Her rational mind knew she would have to grieve sometime, but right now was not the time.

In the bedroom at the end of the hall her three-year-old son was sitting in his bed, sucking his thumb. He didn't look up when she came into the room.

"Benjy, we have to go to Auntie Trish's house." He was still wearing the pajamas he'd been sick in. There was dried brown blood and vomit all down the front. She got a pair of shorts and a t-shirt out of his dresser. He made no move to get up, so she lifted him from the bed and stripped him out of his pajamas. He had wet himself again, although he'd been potty-trained for a year.

"That's alright, love. We'll just put a clean pair of underpants on." He stood unresponsive and let himself be dressed. When she was finished, she picked him up and settled him on her hip, noticing that he was lighter than normal.

Erica set him down at the front door to put her own shoes on. It was a nice June day, but she felt cold. She put on a light jumper.

Outside, she turned around and locked the front door, though it occurred to her that she needn't, any more. The thought frightened her.

The stroller was there by the door, but there were two seats, one for Theo, one for Benjy. She took the bicycle instead, buckling the unresponsive toddler into the child seat in the back. It was only a few blocks down the street to her sister's house.

There were many cars parked or crashed in the streets, and none at all that were driving. Some of the cars had bodies in them. Erica did not see any people, although several times she saw movement at the corner of her eye. When she turned her head there was never anything there. Stray dogs nosed at rubbish cans but stayed away from her as she pedaled on the sidewalk.

When Erica knocked on the door to her sister's house her niece Felicity met her at the door. Felicity was eight and strongly resembled her mother. She had a large kitchen knife grasped firmly in one hand, which she lowered when she recognized her aunt.

"Aunt Erica." Felicity's face was grave. "Come in. I think Georgie's arm is broken."

She led Erica into the sitting room. George, who was five, was sitting on the couch. His pudgy face was white with pain and he was supporting his left wrist with his other arm. He looked up at Erica with frightened eyes. She put Benjy on the couch next to him and squatted down to look at his wrist.

"What happened?" Erica asked.

"I was trying to get a can of beans down from the top of the pantry and I fell off the counter." There were tear tracks on his dirty face. "Do I have to go to the doctor?"

I don't know if there are any doctors left, Erica thought to herself. "No," she said to him. "It's just a sprain. We can wrap it up with bandage tape. Where are your Mum and Dad?"

Felicity looked at George, who was wiping his nose on his shirt, and leaned forward to whisper in Erica's ear.

"They're dead but I haven't told Georgie."

Erica nodded, filed that information away with the rest of the horror she'd have to process later, and went to get the bandage tape.