Free The Remnants of Yesterday by Anthony M. Strong

won’t talk about it any more.”
    “Good.” She looked pale.
    ”I’m sorry.” I met her gaze.
    Clay looked down at the ground, ashamed. “Yeah. What he said.”
    “Thank you.” Clara downed the last of her beer and pushed the bottle into the dirt. “Well, I don’t know about the rest of you, but I just want today to be over with. I think I’m going to find somewhere to lay my head and put it behind me.”
     

 
    22
     
     
    I SLEPT FITFULLY, drifting in and out of consciousness. Our accommodations were better than the previous night, but just barely. Clara pulled one of the bales of hay to the back of the barn and spread it on the floor, creating a mattress of sorts, then put her pack under head as a makeshift pillow. This seemed like a good idea, so both Emily and myself followed suit, all three of us sharing the same space. Clay opted to sleep near the barn door, his shotgun resting in one arm. I wasn’t sure if he was afraid of zombies, as he called them, or if he thought we might incapacitate him while he slept and steal his meager possessions.
    Normally a beer would relax me enough to fall asleep easily, but not tonight. It was hardly surprising after what I had witnessed in the last twenty-four hours. Judging from Emily’s unsettled tossing and turning, she was suffering from a similar affliction. Clara fell into a deep sleep almost immediately, which I envied.
    Eventually my body won the fight with my mind and I fell asleep. I dreamed I was back on the highway, walking among the burned and wrecked vehicles, trucks with their contents spilled across the blacktop, cars crumpled and scorched. There were more bodies here now, and they refused to die despite horrendous injuries. I recoiled, backing away as they dragged themselves closer, broken limbs trailing behind, useless and grotesque. But it was their faces that scared me most, for I knew all of them. My brother and his wife, my parents, both of whom died years before, Clara and Emily, along with most of the other people I had known during my 26 years on the planet. Each hideous creature bore a recognizable face.
    There was something else too, something that scared me more than the slowly approaching figures. A blackness hovered behind the crawling corpses. More than a shadow, but less than a shape, it felt threatening and dangerous. I watched as it swept past the disfigured bodies and advanced toward me, features shrouded in dark obscurity. I tried to turn and run, but my feet refused to move. Panic rose from the pit of my stomach and as the blackness reached for me, I began to scream.

 
    23
     
     
    I JOLTED AWAKE, my heart pounding in my chest. My head was spinning, and my stomach felt like it had been kicked. All the stress and activity of the last 24 hours must have affected me more than I realized.
    It was still dark.
    Clara rolled over beside me and mumbled something unintelligible. For a moment I thought she might wake up, but she settled back down. On my left, Emily was curled up with her back to me, her knees drawn almost to her chest.
    Once the dizziness receded, I rose, careful not to disturb them, took a bottle of water, and then slipped outside past Clay, who still cradled the shotgun. His loud, rhythmic snores spoke to the fact that he was clearly not adept at guarding the door. He also hadn’t bothered to barricade it, or wedge it closed. Had a horde of Crazies descended upon us while we slept, we would have found out as they were ripping us limb from limb. Not a pleasant thought.
    It was cool outside. A slight breeze stirred the air, carrying with it the scent of fresh cut hay from the fields behind the barn. The farmhouse still smoldered, the fire’s ashes glowing red in the darkness. With no electric lights to compete with, the sky was alive with stars, the wide band of the Milky Way slashing across the heavens like a celestial river.
    I twisted the top off the water and took a long drink, gulping down the water. As I did so, my