Free It'll Come Back... by Lisa Richardson

this.’
    ‘We can’t get through that lot. There’re too many, we’ll–’
    ‘Louie,’ Kate placed her free hand on the boy’s arm. She could feel his body trembling, ‘it’s okay. We’ll find a way round.’
    Kate took another peek around the side of the awning before turning to face Louie. ‘If we’re quiet we can creep across and down the next left turning. We’ll still be heading in the right direction for your place.’
    ‘I can’t,’ said Louie. ‘I just…’
    ‘You can do it. Just take it slowly and stay quiet, okay? They’ll never even know we’re there.’
    ‘I just want to go home.’
    ‘And we’re going to get you there. I promise. Come on, Louie. We have to keep moving forward, there’s no way back and nothing to go back to. Forwards, okay?’
    Louie nodded.
    ‘Good boy. Come on.’
    Kate edged out first and Louie followed her. They each placed one foot in front of the other as though walking a tightrope with no net, though instead of a lethal fall beneath them, they faced being eaten alive by monsters. When they ducked inside a doorway on the other side of the street, Kate realised she had been holding her breath. She emptied her lungs slowly while she stood with her back bent forwards and her hands on her knees – the only way she could keep her trembling legs steady. She took a deep breath and straightened herself up. They’d made it across the street, but they still had to make it passed three shops before they could turn left.
    With Louie following her, Kate edged her way out of the doorway and, keeping close to the shop front, she crept forwards.
    We’re going to make it , thought Kate as they edged along further. We’re going to make it . We’re going to – THUMP! – Kate screamed as a body hit the pavement just to the right of them. Whoever it was must have fallen from the window of the building to their left.
    ‘Fuck!’ Kate glanced up to see around fifteen to twenty sets of dead eyes snap in her and Louie’s direction.
    The two Dead closest to Kate and Louie began lumbering towards them, both slow and stiff like their limbs had elastic bands, wound too tight, inside them. They were overtaken by five faster Dead, their agility and speed not far off that of living breathing people, suggesting that they’d not long turned.
    ‘SHIIIIT!’ said Louie.
    Kate realised they wouldn’t get to the left turning before they were cut off, so she grasped Louie’s elbow and pulled him back across the street, the way they had just come from.
    ‘Up there!’ she said, pointing to a side street.
    They emerged outside the Cathedral entrance and did a left, down another side street, trying as much as possible to keep heading in the general direction of Louie’s house. Kate could hear banging coming from up ahead, growing louder. As they turned a corner, she flung out her arm to stop Louie and they ducked into the doorway of a café.
    Up ahead, Kate saw a mini ice cream van, the type usually surrounded by tourist at this time of year in Canterbury. Three Dead slammed their fists against the van’s glass windows that would usually be open so that fancy and over-priced ice creams could be handed down to its customers.
    ‘There’s someone in there,’ whispered Kate.
    ‘How’d you know that?’
    ‘Because why else would those dead things be banging on the windows?’
    ‘Because they’re dead and stupid?’
    ‘We have to help.’
    ‘No way. We don’t even know if there is anyone in there and even if there is, so what?’
    ‘So what? So what ? What do you mean, “so what”?’
    ‘I mean, we don’t know them – why risk our lives for them?’
    ‘Do you really regard human life so low? I didn’t know you a few hours ago but that hasn’t stopped me from saving your skinny little hipster arse!’
    ‘I know, but–’
    ‘ But nothing. There are only three… shit…’ At the sound of dragging feet, Kate glanced back the way they’d just come to see the Dead they’d