Page 24 of Dyana
Amid their protests, he turned and went back to his office. I felt triumphant, but I didn’t dare show it as everyone turned to leave and stopped when they noticed me in the back. Instead, I put on my best wounded look and ran from the sanctuary. I ran into the night, planning to go for a walk and let everyone calm down before I returned, but a voice and small feet chasing after me stopped me.
“Dyana! Don’t go!” Amber yelled. I turned in time for the girl to barrel into me and tightly wrap her arms around my waist. “Please don’t go. I’m sorry everyone is so mean, but we need you here,” she sobbed.
I ran my hands through her hair soothingly. “I’m not going anywhere, Amber,” I assured her. “I just thought it would be best to make myself scarce for a little while. And what are you doing chasing after me in the dark? You know it isn’t safe to be out here at night.”
“I know, but—“
“No buts,” I interjected. I hugged Amber, pulled her off me, and nudged her toward the church. “Get back inside. I promise you that I’m not going anywhere.” I thought back to Drew wanting to throw me out because I made his wife uncomfortable. The preacher was a solid first step, but I needed more people in my corner. “I’ll make sure of it,” I murmured as a plan began to form.
A few days later, everything was set. I had convinced Pastor Jeff that I needed zombies for my trainees to practice on. After he mulled it over, he agreed. I had then suggested sending Drew with me since he was one of the ones most comfortable with a gun. I smiled warmly at the unhappy man as I climbed into the cab of his truck. He wasn’t thrilled with the assignment. I glanced back at the horse trailer we towed as we pulled away from the church.
“I feel like we got off on the wrong foot,” I stated. “I come in peace.” Drew scoffed, and I waited for him to say something, but that was the only reply I received. Still, I pushed on with small talk as we drove toward the nearby town. The plan was to get him to warm up to me and then seduce him. Given what I knew about his wife, that she was a bitch, I felt confident that attitude wasn’t only reserved for me. I was living with a bunch of sex-starved men again, only this time, I got to decide who I did and didn’t sleep with.
I talked Drew’s ear off. If he wouldn’t converse with me, then I would take the opportunity to tell him everything there was to know about me, except my affair with the preacher. That wasn’t anyone’s business but ours. When the town came into view, Drew suddenly slammed on the brakes, causing the trailer behind us to rattle.
“Do you ever shut the fuck up?”
I stared at him with my mouth open in shock. “Did you just curse? I haven’t heard anyone curse since I got here!” Drew blushed, his pink ears poking out from beneath his curly brown hair. It was a surprisingly adorable look on the older man.
“I can curse if I want to,” he argued.
“I know. I just didn’t know that you knew how,” I teased. The ghost of a smile flitted across Drew’s face, and I wanted to cheer. I was making progress.
“For example,” Drew continued, “this plan of yours is fucking stupid.”
I gasped in mock outrage. “Cursing and name-calling! Maybe I am the devil.”
“Oh, you’re something alright,” he mumbled. “Seriously, though. Why are we doing this?”
“Because practicing the movements to take down a zombie and taking down a zombie are two different things. You need to be able to practice on real zombies; that way, when you come face to face with one, you don’t freeze and forget what to do,” I replied.
“As much as I hate to admit it, that makes sense.”
“Of course it does,” I replied. “We need to find a good spot to place the trailer to herd the zombies into it.”
“I think I have an idea.” Drew drove through town and pulled behind the grocery store. He backed into the loading dock but stopped several feet from the ramp. “So the grocery store has been overrun with zombies almost from the start. There’s food in there still, but getting to it in the past has been too risky because we haven’t had the proper weapons. The way I see it, we open the trailer doors and back them up to the door, and then when we open the bay door, they’ll go right in. Kills two birds with one stone. You get your zombies, and the store becomes less dangerous.”
“That’s a good idea.”
“Of course it is,” he replied just as flippantly as I had earlier. “Go get the doors open and back me up the ramp.”
I hopped out of the truck and did as he asked, arranging the doors as he backed down the ramp so that they were pressed against the walls just enough so that the zombies couldn’t push them open and escape out the sides. “Now what?” I asked when Drew got out of the truck.
“Now we open the door,” he replied.
“And how do we do that exactly? There’s no power.”
“You’ll have to sneak through the store and crank the door open. When you get it open, run into the trailer. I’ll have the side door open for you, and as soon as you’re out, I’ll slam it shut,” Drew replied.
Motherfucker. And here I thought we were starting to get along. “I’m gonna do what, now?”
“What’s wrong, Xena? Can’t put your money where your mouth is? You’re running around acting like you’re Bunny the Zombie Slayer; show me how it’s done. Show me how valuable you are to us,” Drew challenged.
So this was his solution to getting rid of me. I’ll show him. I returned to the truck and pulled a hoodie and a leather jacket from my backpack. I never went anywhere without some supplies, just in case things went south and I needed to make a quick escape. I couldn’t do anything about my bare legs since I was wearing shorts, but covering my upper body would be enough. I didn’t plan on wading through a pool of zombies. I grabbed two of my larger knives, reached across the seat, pulled the keys from the ignition, and pocketed them.
“Where do you think you’re going with my keys?” Drew asked.
“They’re coming with me. Consider it insurance so that you aren’t gone when I open that door. If I die, you’re walking home,” I replied as I walked away to find a way inside. If Drew wanted to test me, that would be fine. I’d pass his test with flying colors and then fuck him into submission. As I rounded the corner, I noticed one of the emergency exit doors hanging ajar. I gently tapped it to see if there were any zombies nearby. When none came flying through the door, I quickly pulled it open and darted inside.
