Asher crouches, tightening his grasp on the baseball bat.

“Did you hear it too?” he whispers over his shoulder.

“Yeah, it sounded like it was coming from the left up ahead,” Wendy whispers back, her hand resting on the pistol in her side holster.

Asher takes quiet steps forward through the fallen leaves and sticks, his green eyes searching through the trees for a sign of movement. He counts to thirty, hairs prickling up the back of his neck and his heart thumping. A bead of sweat slides down his temple.

“It must have just been a rabbit or a squirrel,” he says, standing and running his fingers through his messy brown hair in relief. There is a snap behind him, and he turns, his body going rigid. He wraps both hands around the bat and pulls it close.

“It can’t be one of them, can it?” Wendy asks.

“I don’t know. I think it’s hiding. It’s just as cautious as we are, and they don’t hide.”

A scream reverberates through the woods. A large shape darts out from a tree and disappears into the foliage.

“There it goes!” Asher says.

Wendy hushes him.

“What do we do?” Asher asks.

“Did you get a good look at it? I couldn’t make it out.”

“No, it was too fast, but it was hiding. I don’t think it’s one of them.”

“We need to get out of here. If it was one of them, there could be others. And if it wasn’t, something screamed. Something nearby. Let’s go.”

They cut a slow and steady path in the opposite direction of the scream. Asher keeps watch to their left and behind them while Wendy watches the right and takes the lead. They stop for a break after an hour passes without any other disturbances. Wendy leans against a tree and pulls a water bottle from her belt, a relic of her marathon training, and takes a sip before handing it over.

“Thanks.” Asher squirts the warm water into the back of his throat.

“We should be thanking the screamer back there—they might have just saved us from having to protect ourselves.” Wendy takes the bottle back and clips it onto the belt.

Asher pulls a protein bar from his pocket and snaps it in half, devouring his portion. The bar helps dull the hunger in his stomach but isn’t enough to add meat to his bones, which are starting to show through his skin. He believes they are nearing the highway; the trees are more spread out, and light easily filters through the branches. He asks Wendy what she wants to do. She glances up, her bright-blue eyes reflecting the patches of sky showing through the treetops, and takes a moment to chew her half of the bar. She says they need to continue to the highway to gauge their location. The afternoon is creeping into evening, and they need to find a place to camp before nightfall. Nodding, Asher crumples the wrapper and tosses it. He has been following Wendy’s lead for two weeks, ever since they finally abandoned the university.

Each time he has asked her questions about their destination, she’s refused to answer. He has stopped asking now—without having any family left or anywhere else to go, and having let go of his best friend days after the outbreak—it doesn’t much matter where she takes him. He owes her his life, and he clings to her.

“Hold up,” Asher says, dropping to retie his shoelaces. Wendy keeps walking, her eyes darting from the right to up ahead. Just as he pulls the laces tight, Asher spots a man lurching from a thicket of trees toward Wendy’s left. Jumping to his feet, Asher yells, “Watch out!”

Wendy spins and comes face-to-face with a blood-covered middle-aged man, his teeth bared. He lets loose a guttural howl, and he closes his hands around her throat, lifting her off the ground. Kicking, she feels her foot connect with his knee with a crunch. His fingers loosen, and she pulls herself free as he wobbles and loses his balance. Both Wendy and the man crash. Rolling away, Wendy pushes herself to her hands and knees, but he grabs her foot as she tries to stand, causing her to crash onto her face.

Asher reaches the struggling pair, raises the bat, and brings it down with all the force he can muster. It connects with the man’s head in a thump. Asher hits him again, sending out a spray of blood as the body goes limp. Wendy jerks her foot away from him and brushes the dirt and leaves off her front as she gets to her feet, panting.

“I’m so sorry,” Asher says, the color gone from his face. “I thought you heard me when I stopped to tie my shoe. I should have been more alert, surveyed the area better before I stopped—”

“It’s fine. I’m okay. Let’s just not let it happen again. I should have listened to you better.”

“Let me see your neck—did he get you?”

Wendy pulls her hair up from her neck, turning her head from side to side. Asher leans in close and inspects it, but there aren’t any scratches.

“It’ll probably be sore, but it’s not scratched. I don’t see any blood.”

She lets her long blonde hair fall around her shoulders.

“Thank you for bashing his skull in,” Wendy says. She grabs her bag and hefts it onto her back. They check their shoelaces and continue.

It only takes a few minutes to reach the tree line and emerge from the woods at the bottom of a steep slope. The air is still and silent as they begin their ascent, slipping and sliding on the grass while trying to maintain a foothold, the undernourished muscles in their legs straining from exhaustion. Asher reaches the guardrail first and grabs it before offering Wendy his other hand to pull her up and over the top onto the asphalt.

The highway is a graveyard of cars and trucks and buses in all conditions. They are packed closely together. A thin layer of dust and pollen covers them. Several have doors hanging open or shattered windows. Many have been crashed into one another, while others appear pristine, as if waiting to be purchased and driven off the lot.

Asher shields his eyes from the sun reflecting off the cars and surveys their surroundings. Vultures circle above, a common sight these days; two swoop down fifty yards away. They squabble over some kind of remains. Aside from the birds, there is no other movement.

“Which direction do you want to go?” he asks.

“This way.” Wendy begins walking into the sun along the side of the road. Asher looks to the east, the downtown Orlando skyline visible over the horizon, but he follows Wendy west. He suspects she has a specific destination in mind.

“That guy looked fresh, right? How fresh?”

“I don’t know, maybe a day or two? The blood was dried, but I don’t know that it was his. And he was strong, human strong.”

“At least we’re going the opposite direction he came from,” Asher says.

“Let’s check the cars for supplies.” Wendy makes a sudden turn from the shoulder into the maze of vehicles. She tries the driver’s side handle on a truck and laughs. “Gotta make sure nobody breaks into your car when the world goes to shit.” None of the other doors open, and she moves on to the next car.

A little further down the road, Asher looks through the windows of cars, gagging when he checks the backseat of one. The opposite window is smashed; a mixture of glass and dried blood covers the body of a young man. His face is forever twisted in a scream, and a large chunk is missing from his neck. Asher turns away, bumping into Wendy.

“What is it?” Wendy asks, looking over his shoulder into the car.

“It just caught me off guard,” Asher says, lifting the handle of another car. The door creaks open.

“Yeah, well, it’s not something I think either of us expected to get used to. Anything good in there?”

A small cooler is wedged behind the driver’s seat. Asher climbs into the passenger seat and waves Wendy over. He lifts the cooler free. The lid pops off, and a few cans of soda and a couple of moldy sandwiches spill out. Wendy gets in the backseat, throws the sandwiches onto the floor, and hands a couple of the sodas to Asher.

“Jackpot,” Asher says, popping one of the cans open. Wendy follows suit and they tap the cans together before each takes a long draw. Asher lets out a loud burp, sending both of them into fits of laughter before Wendy lets out an even louder burp.

“I don’t even drink soda,” Wendy says.

“But it’s like the forbidden fruit now,” Asher replies “The idea of never having a soda again makes it irresistible.”

The sky darkens, and raindrops pitter-patter against the windshield and roof.

“We can wait it out,” Wendy says. Asher slings his backpack into the driver’s seat and closes the passenger door just as the rain picks up. Within seconds, they can’t see beyond the windows.

“April showers . . .” Asher trails off as thunder rumbles. “At least if anything was tracking our scent, the storm should wash it away. I can keep watch—get some rest while you can.”

“Thanks,” Wendy says, pulling off her own backpack and placing it on the seat as a pillow. Asher stares out the windshield, waiting to hear Wendy’s breath even out as she settles into a slumber. He roots through the items in his bag and finds a small yellow notebook. His pen is nearly dry. He licks the end, trying to get it flowing again. Asher scribbles in the notebook, poised and ready to wake Wendy if needed, but her screams never come. Today, only the waking world is a nightmare.

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