Autumn Read online

  Ray grabbed his jacket and the torch, and after overcoming a final moment of uncertainty and self-doubt, strained to re-open the heavy bunker door. He groaned with effort but it wouldn’t budge and, for just a second, he panicked at the thought he might never get out. Another hefty shove and it began to shift. Relieved, he cautiously slipped outside.

  It was quiet out there. And cold. And dark.

  Slowly, step by nervous step, Ray moved away from the bunker entrance and began the long climb back up the twisting concrete ramp to the surface. Suddenly there was movement ahead which stopped him in his tracks: a single figure tripping through the shadows. He wanted to call out but nerves got the better of him and he couldn’t bring himself to make any noise. It didn’t matter anyway. It was obvious even from a distance that this person was in the same desperate condition as the body he’d left down in the shelter. It moved in the same awkward, uncoordinated way as Shelly Bright and it failed to react when he approached, even when he crossed its path and stood directly in its line of vision.

  As Ray neared the surface, the number of bodies around him increased. There were numerous corpses still lying where they’d fallen, but many more were dragging themselves silently through the early evening gloom. In the strangest way he was slightly relieved because everything he’d thought he’d seen on Tuesday morning had actually happened. He hadn’t imagined it. He walked past the security guard’s hut and peered in through the window where what remained of Dan Potts scrambled around on the floor pathetically, trying desperately to get up but unable to cope with the confined space.

  The civic square in front of the council house was a grim sight. The sun was just disappearing below the horizon, drenching the scene in warm orange light and casting long, dragging shadows. It had recently been raining and the sunlight made the ground glisten and shine. Ray counted sixteen bodies traipsing across the block-paving in various directions. Their awkwardness was vaguely comical. One of the stupid things nearest to him lost its footing and tumbled down a short stone staircase. Its clumsy, barely coordinated movements made him chuckle nervously to himself. His laughter, although quiet, sounded disproportionately loud and made him feel exposed. Now that the silence had been broken, however, he finally felt brave enough to call out.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, his wavering voice at little more than normal speaking volume. Nothing. ‘Hello, is anyone there?’ Still nothing. ‘Hello...’

  Ray took a few more hesitant steps (avoiding the crumpled remains of a foul-smelling, rain-soaked corpse), then turned back on himself to look out across the landscape of Taychester. He’d lived there all his life but he’d never seen it like this before. It was an alien and cold place, unexpectedly dark. The electricity must have failed at some point because not a single pinprick of electric light interrupted the blackness. No street lamps. No light coming from inside any of the hundreds of buildings he could see. Feeling prone, the councillor turned and walked back down to where he’d left his car.

  He waited for a moment longer before setting off. Perhaps he should go back up to his office and see if there was anyone else around? Had any of his colleagues survived? He knew he couldn’t risk it. He couldn’t afford to get caught up in any unnecessary council business when he had so many issues of his own to sort out.

  The sound of the engine was uncomfortably loud but Ray felt safe behind the wheel. He pulled out of the car park and began the drive home. He clipped the hip of a random body which lurched into his path unexpectedly. He slammed on his brakes and reversed back to try and help the bedraggled figure which had collapsed in an undignified heap at the roadside. He watched in disbelief as, without any flicker of emotion, it picked itself up off the ground and limped away, oblivious.

  #

  The house was just as he’d left it on Tuesday.

  Ray pulled up on the drive. He paused before going into the house, needing to compose himself before he faced whatever was on the other side of the front door. He looked back over his shoulder around the quiet cul-de-sac where he and Marcia had lived for the last eleven years. It looked pretty much the same as it always had done, and yet everything felt uncomfortably different. This Thursday evening had the stillness and silence of early Sunday morning. No one was around. Nothing moved. Nothing, that was, apart from Malcolm Worsley, his opposite neighbour. Worsley was dead, his corpse trapped in his front garden, hemmed in by the ornate shrubs and privet hedges he’d so lovingly tended for years.

  The house was deathly quiet inside. ‘Marcia?’ he called out hopefully. ‘Marcia, are you here?’

  She should have been in. She hadn’t been planning to go out on Tuesday morning as far as he was aware. He walked further down the hall. He instinctively took off his coat and shoes (otherwise she’d moan at him again), then stopped himself. It was as cold inside the house as it was out on the street.

  ‘Marcia?’

  He checked the living room, dining room and kitchen and found them all empty, just as he’d left them. He then climbed the stairs, knowing his wife would most probably still have been in bed when it had happened, whatever it was. Christ, he hoped she was all right. But he knew she would have answered him by now. Ray prepared himself for the worst as he reached the landing. He could see into the bedroom. The duvet lay in a heap at the side of the bed, but Marcia wasn’t there. The bed was empty.

  The carpet was sodden. Water had seeped out under the bathroom door and had spread along virtually the entire length of the landing. It was obvious now where Marcia was. Ray walked up to the bathroom, his feet squelching, and knocked on the door.

  ‘Marcia? Marcia, it’s me, love. I’m home…’

  He tried the handle, but it was locked. He pushed and shoved at it to little effect before taking five or six splashing, sliding steps back down the landing, then running back at full pelt and shoulder-charging his way into the bathroom. The lock was weak and gave way instantly with Ray’s considerable weight slamming into it. He pushed the door open fully (sending a low wave of water rippling back across the tiled bathroom floor) and there, in front of him, stood what remained of his wife. Completely naked and completely unaware, she walked blindly towards him. He grabbed hold of her arms and held her wrists tight so she couldn’t move. Her eyes were dark and vacant and she felt ice-cold to the touch, her skin like wet rubber. He let her go then pressed himself back against the wall and watched in heartbroken silence as she lurched past, oblivious. She staggered the length of the landing and then crashed into the door of the spare bedroom.

  Ray managed to drape a dressing gown over his wife’s shoulders then shut her in the third bedroom. He walked around the house methodically, locking and bolting every window and door.

  #

  Thursday night turned into Friday morning as he busied himself around his home. The flood in the bathroom (Marcia had been running a bath when she’d died) had caused massive damage both upstairs and in the kitchen directly below. The cold water made the house smell of must, or perhaps that was just the stench of his decaying wife? Ray wasn’t sure. At least she’d left him with a bath full of water, he thought. That might prove useful.

  Very occasionally, and only for the briefest of moments each time, Ray allowed himself to think about what had happened to the rest of the world. Had this happened everywhere? Despite his chosen vocation, thinking about other people was not something that came naturally to him and soon enough he’d concluded that his most sensible course of action was to continue to focus on his own safety, to sit tight and wait for help. Despite the fact that the electricity was off and the pressure in the taps was becoming increasingly weak, his house remained relatively comfortable and safe. There was a shop just around the corner where he could get food and drink supplies, and he still had the car if he needed to go any further afield. It made sense to stay at home. What use would he be to anyone else, anyway? One man to help hundreds, possibly even thousands? It would be far more sensible for him to concentrate on looking after himself. That was, after all, what
he was best at.

  #

  A strange sense of normality gradually overcame Ray. Apart from making one hurried trip to the shop to fetch food early on Friday morning, he remained locked in his home from daybreak ’til dusk. He checked on Marcia a couple of times but there was no obvious change in her condition. He managed to get a loose dress over her head and shoulders, and eventually moved her to the garage to limit the noise her endless staggering around upstairs was making. She was constantly crashing into thing but he didn’t as get annoyed as he had with Shelly Bright. Marcia couldn’t help it.

  With little else to do to occupy his time, Ray tried to make good the water damage to his home, but it was difficult to do anything without any power. He was actually relieved the electricity supply was off. It was safer that way. The light fitting in the kitchen was full of water from the overflowing bath. He’d drained as much of it off as he could. By the time the power comes back on, he decided, it’ll probably have dried out. He’d have to get someone to come out and look at the damage later. No doubt they’d charge a fortune…

  On Friday evening Ray sat at his desk in the alcove in the dining room at the front of the house. He read books by candlelight until his eyelids began to droop. It was good to keep occupied and distracted. It was a relief to have something positive to do for a while. He was finding it increasingly difficult to deal with the silence and solitude of his dead world. After searching in the attic for a while he found an ancient-looking battery powered cassette player and used it to play a tape of loud classical music to drown out the quiet.

  At a quarter to two on Saturday morning, Malcolm Worsley’s corpse finally escaped from his garden across the road and staggered over to Ray’s house. Worsley slammed against the window next to where Ray was sitting reading. Startled, he leapt up, his heart pounding. He quickly regained his composure when he realised it was only Malcolm and he watched as his dead neighbour pressed his disfigured face against the window, leaving behind a greasy smear. As he watched, Malcolm lifted a rotting hand and slapped it down on the glass. Strange, thought Ray as he watched the wizened shell of his dead friend hitting the glass again and again. It didn’t bother him unduly. In fact he felt quite sorry for Malcolm. The windows were double-glazed and that muffled each bang to little more than a dull thud. Tired, Ray turned up the volume on his cassette player and carried it upstairs with him to bed.

  #

  Saturday morning. Day five.

  Ray had slept well. It would have been wrong to say he was happy with his situation but, all things considered, it could have been much, much worse. Regardless of what had happened to everyone else, he remained relatively safe and he was fairly warm and well protected. For a while he lay in bed and didn’t move, staring up at the ceiling and thinking about how everything had changed since this time last week.

  What was he going to do today? He really needed to start thinking about getting more supplies in. He’d noticed earlier in the week that decorators had been working in one of the houses down the road when all this had started last Tuesday morning, and their van was still outside. Perhaps he could borrow it and drive around to the local supermarket? If he spent a little time today filling the van with absolutely everything he’d need, it would save him having to go out again for maybe as long as a couple of weeks. By then he was sure that his situation would have improved. It couldn’t get any worse, could it? In a couple of week’s time, he decided, the other people who had survived like him would start to coordinate themselves and get things organised.

  Ray got up, wincing at the sudden drop in temperature when he swung his legs out from under the covers. Without the central heating working the house was icy cold. He tiptoed to the toilet (stepping gingerly over the still damp landing carpet) and relieved himself in the plastic bucket he’d been having to use since the cistern had dried up. Once a day he carried it down to the bottom of the garden and emptied the contents over his roses. That felt better, he thought as he shook himself dry and walked back to the bedroom to get dressed.

  He was half-dressed and halfway down the stairs when he noticed how dark it was. Feeling slightly uneasy, but not overly concerned, he continued down.

  He saw them at the front door first. Visible only as shifting shapes through the frosted glass, he could see the heads and shoulders of at least four corpses, maybe more. Unusual, he thought as he continued down, zipping up his trousers and tightening his belt. As it was every morning, his next port of call was the kitchen. Still half asleep, he walked barefoot across the cold, tiled floor and fetched himself some breakfast cereal from the cupboard next to the sink. The cupboard door slammed shut (the hinges were loose and needed tightening) and the sound echoed through the empty house like a gunshot. Ray cringed, then frowned. He could hear Marcia moving around in the garage. Was it just coincidence, or had his wife just reacted to noise for the first time since she’d died? He was about to go and see her when he caught sight of something in the dining room. Like the rest of the ground floor of the house this morning, that room also seemed darker than usual. He put his head around the door, then immediately pulled it back again. Bodies… loads of them. Fighting to stay calm, he peered through the narrow gap between the door and the frame and saw that the entire width of the wide bay window at the front of the house was packed tight with dead flesh. He could see countless ghastly faces pressed up against the glass, scouring the room with their dry, clouded eyes. Why were they here? What did they want? Ray couldn’t understand what was happening. None of the creatures had shown the slightest interest in him before, so why now? Were these somehow different to all the other bodies he’d so far seen? His mind wandered back to what had happened just before he’d gone to bed. Malcolm Worsley. That was it, that bugger Worsley had brought them here. He must have tipped them off that he was from the council. Did they think he’d be able to help them? Before he’d died Worsley had asked Ray to do favours for him on more than one occasion – everything from rushing through a planning application for an extension to his house to trying to get a parking fine overturned. Ray had no reason to think he would have changed his ways now just because he’d died. He peered through the gap again. There he was, the sly bugger, his dead face pressed hard against the window, letting everyone know where Ray was, wrongly assuming that he was the man who could (and would) help them.

  His fragile confidence rattled, Ray felt uneasy. He ran back upstairs and peered out of the window in the spare room. Bloody hell, there were loads of them out there. A huge, ragged crowd of decomposing figures had gathered in front of his property. The nearest few corpses had been rammed up against the front of the house by the relentless pressure of countless others behind, and the whole mass had spilled out into the middle of the road. His car – his escape route – had been surrounded, swallowed up by the dead hordes.

  The nervous councillor considered his suddenly limited options. Watching from behind the curtains, he saw more of the dark, shuffling shapes dragging themselves along the street towards his house. Individually they seemed weak and irrelevant and he had no reason to believe that they would do him any harm, but what could they do in these numbers? He never thought that his constituents would resort to mob rule to try and get action from the council. They’d never shown any interest before. He began to regret the day he’d stood for election.

  Ray crept around to the back of the house and sat down on the edge of his bed. I’ll stay here and keep out of sight for a while, he thought. Maybe they’ll get tired waiting and go somewhere else.

  #

  By mid-afternoon the ever-growing crowd of bodies had filled the entire length of the street. They were hammering against the windows and door, and the sound could most probably be heard for miles around. Ray had finally plucked up enough courage to go back down and had quickly come to the conclusion that, as it looked likely he’d be staying in the house longer than he’d originally expected, his supplies were far from sufficient. He only had enough food for a few more meals. Sitting we
ll out of sight in the kitchen with his throat dry and his stomach rumbling, he came to the crushing realisation that because of the bloody public outside, his situation was now nowhere near as comfortable or safe as he’d originally thought. Dejected, he got up, walked across the room and went out to the garage to see Marcia. Maybe her condition would have improved today? Perhaps she’d be able to offer her husband some long-overdue support at this increasingly difficult time. No such luck. His dead wife was still crashing tirelessly around the room. Her dress was torn and she was naked again. Bloody hell, she looked awful: grossly overweight, body swollen in all the wrong places, unexpectedly limp-breasted… and to top it all, her skin had turned a dirty shade of blue-green. He wished she’d just stay still. As long as she was making this much noise, the people of Taychester would know there was someone in the house and would continue to beat a slow, but very definite, path to his door. Perhaps if he went in there and found a way of keeping her quiet? Christ, what was he thinking? He’d never been able to keep Marcia quiet while she was alive, how the hell was he going to do it now?

  Maybe he needed to get away and lie low for a while? But how was he going to get out and where was he supposed to go? He anxiously glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already gone two. In a few hours time the light would start to fade. He could either sit tight for another night or make his move today. He thought about the size of the crowd on the street. If there were hundreds of them out there now, how many more would there be tomorrow? Or the day after that, or the day after that? There was no way he alone could help so many people. More to the point, he didn’t want to. As their councillor he had a public duty to serve them but, as he had for most of his life in public office, he decided to turn his back on that responsibility and run.