Free The China Pandemic by A R Shaw Page B

them from becoming feral like the rest. He burned their bodies right along with their owners. Since he owned this place now, he wanted it to look nice. He wanted it to look like it was back in the old days, just as his daddy remembered it.
    From sun-up to sundown, he worked to put things back in order. He’d even gone through all the homes and stripped the beds, washing sheets and blankets, vacuuming mattresses and flipping them before making them up again. In the same manner, he went from room to room tossing belongings, cleaning and renewing each home, so they could accommodate citizens once he approved of them.
    His daddy hadn’t been one for charity so Campos wasn’t either, especially those last two who’d roamed into town. He offered them work, but no lazy asses were ever allowed in his town. He knew his daddy would not approve of them.
    The one thing that troubled Campos since the virus struck and the groceries began to run out, so too did his medicine. He broke into the pharmacy lockup, but couldn’t find any of the bottles labeled Trilafon under T, like on his bottle. The good thing about not having the meds meant that his face didn’t twitch so much. So maybe he didn’t need them after all.
    It was when things were real quiet and when he wasn’t so busy, he could hear the voices coming for him again. That’s why he kept really busy all the time, from morning to night. Mowing the lawns, cleaning the houses, power spraying the old blood off the sidewalks, the endless amount of work meant he could keep the voices away.
    His daddy would be real mad that he wasn’t taking his medicine but if he could see how nice the town was now, he might not mind. Just in case Daddy was keeping an eye on him from the beyond, he’d stay busy as hell. Campos really hoped his daddy wasn’t one of the voices talking in there. That scared the hell out of him more than anything else. “Please no,” he whimpered, because even the very idea made him shake. He’d have to search some more to find them pills, he thought. He’d checked all the houses already because surely someone else took the same drugs.
    He’d have to check out the apartment building across the way soon. He hadn’t made his way over there yet, and contemplated burning the whole thing down to the ground, because of what happened there once.
    One day, he’d found a live one there. He heard her screaming as she ran from a feral dog. He’d run over there and shot the damn thing, and then she invited him into her apartment to thank him. He thought at first, she would make a nice citizen but as he got to know her, he soon realized she wouldn’t. Daddy would call her sort the whoring kind, just like his own momma. She wore those short skirts and tank tops, not nice lady dresses like Mrs. Walker, who had lived next door. Too bad she passed away.
    He tried to tell her she could not stay for free, but she called him names and no one could do that anymore. He told her she had to leave at once, but that only made her turn ugly. Then she called him a “psycho” and “crazy ass bastard.” After that, he remembered grabbing her by the arm, intent on walking her out of there like a gentleman, but she started screaming and hitting him on the chest. Then she took him by surprise and grabbed his manhood through his denim jeans, squeezing, instantly hardening him. He pushed her against the wall but then he remembered Daddy said never to let anyone touch him there. So, he grabbed her around the throat, and then he blacked out a little.
    The next thing he knew, she sat, leaning against the blood-splattered wall, with her head off, nearly hacked from her neck. Then he found his bloody hatchet in his own left hand with her blood dripping from his clasped knuckles, staining the white carpet below.
    He cried then, not for the girl but for himself. Now he knew for sure the voices were back. He hadn’t planned to kill her. In fact, he didn’t even remember doing it. He’d never