CHAPTER 1
Frozen.
Completely and utterly freaking frozen.
One second the woman had been speaking. She had, in fact, been half way through the nice of have a nice day. Her mouth was still forming the ni of nice, the syllable was the last sound she’d uttered before she’d completely stopped moving. Her face had not gone slack, her hand had not dropped to her side, she had not fallen to the ground but simply become freaking frozeninto this strange mannequin-like thing standing behind the counter. She stared unerringly at me, but it seemed as if she no longer saw me as I watched her unblinking, vacant brown eyes. Her eyes had never left me but I was certain she no longer saw anything anymore. I kept waiting for her to come back to life, to finish her sentence, to hand me my change, but as the seconds ticked into minutes I slowly began to realize that she was not going to move. Slowly began to realize that she was not playing some sort of sick, demented trick on me.
She had in fact suddenly, instantaneously,been struck completely immobile.
It was the oddest, most unnerving thing I had ever seen and all I could do was gape at her. I continued to stand there, not because I wanted to, no one in their right mind would wantto keep standing there, but simply because I was shocked into immobility. I was not struck suddenly inert like the woman across from me, but I was entirely immobile with shock and horror as I gazed at her. I finally managed to close my mouth. Not because I was recovering from the astonishment that still gripped me so tightly, but because a little bit of drool had started to form at the corners of my mouth, and my jaw actually hurt from gawking at her for so long.
Though I managed to make the small movement of closing my mouth, I could not make any others. I could not drop the arm that was extended across the counter. I could not close the open hand still waiting in expectation of mychange clasped within the woman’s hand. I had absolutely no intention of touching the woman in order to retrieve it either.
I didn’t care how scarce money was nowadays, I was nottouching her. And I would have to touch her if I was going to get it back. I would actually have to pry open her clasped fingers in order to retrieve what was mine, because it was becoming painfully obvious that the woman was not going to move again.
I shuddered in horror at the thought. I didn’t know what that hand felt like, it was probably still warm because she had only frozen minutes ago, but in my mind it was cold and clammy. Even though she was still on her feet, even though I didn’t know if she really wasdead, in my mind her hand would feel as cold and clammy as a corpse’s.
A small spasm jerked through my extended arm, causing it to jump slightly. It wasn’t the aching pain in my stiff arm that finally caused me to pull it back, but the fact that the small twitch had almost caused me to touchher. The thought was utterly repulsive to me. My arm fell limply back to my side, my mouth parted slightly again.
For the first time in awhile, I blinked. Then, I closed my watering eyes, squeezing them tight as I prayed silently that everything would be normal when I opened them once more. It was not.
Slowly I raised my hand and waved it in front of her unblinking, unseeing eyes. There was no response. I thought that perhaps I should hit her, maybe pinch her, but that brought me back to the having to touch her aspect. Throw something at her? I glanced at the gum stacked before the counter. It was a soft projectile but hard enough that it would get someone’s attention. Maybe it would wake her up, but I didn’t think it would work, and I couldn’t bring myself to heave something at the defenseless woman.
I took a small step back, swallowing heavily as I looked slowly around the store. Though it had not been crowded, it was suddenly easy to pick out every person amongst the racks of souvenir clothes (clothes that didn’t sell much anymore, at least not to tourists as we had few of those now) and candy counters. Mainly because none of them were moving too. I doubted throwing something at them would work either.
It was eerily quiet within the store. I didn’t hear any movement on the street outside either. Driving had been banned a month ago (I now realized why), but I didn’t even hear the hum of bicycle tires or the thumping footsteps and chatter of people. The soft murmur of conversations had vanished. The street sounded just as dead as the store now appeared. The hum of the store’s air conditioner was frighteningly loud in the unnerving hush.
I turned slowly toward the door. The blinds were drawn over the window, blocking out the bright summer sunlight. It was impossible to see if the rest of the world had been as affected as the store. I wanted to believe that it hadn’t, that this store was an isolated incident, but I knew it wasn’t. A cold chill, that had nothing to do with the ac unit, raced down my spine. The hairs on my neck and arms stood on end, the room swam and blurred violently before me as fear threatened to choke me.
The store was cool, I was sweating profusely. I could barely breathe; I was going to throw up. Nausea coiled through me, it burned its way up my throat. I could taste it, feel it, and yet I was somehow able to keep it down. This was the weirdest, creepiest, most terrifyingthing I had experienced in years, but I could not throw up in this store. The act of doing so somehow seemed even more wrong and degrading than the situation surrounding me now.
I was hyperventilating though. I knew that. I couldn’t breathe and yet the more I gasped for air, the less I was able to get into my lungs. I needed fresh air, I needed outof this store. My bag was still on the counter, but I didn’t want to grasp hold of it. I was sure my mom would forgive me for not bringing the milk home.
My mom!
My heart hammered painfully, my chest compressed tightly. Nausea swelled swiftly through me again. I managed to take a stumbling, awkward step back. Was my mom like these people? Was she one of themnow, or was she like me? Was there anyoneelse like me? Was I the onlyone? And why was I still able to move while they couldn’t? What the hell had happened to them, would it happen to me?
That thought caused fresh terror to pulse through me. My adrenaline was kicking so fiercely that I was shaking from the effects of it. I glanced over the people again. They remained frozen. Not a one of them had moved in the past five minutes. I hadn’t even seen them take a breath, but they had to be breathing, didn’t they? Were they dead? Would they ever move again?
The questions rolled rapidly through my mind, making me dizzy with panic and confusion. They kept slamming through me, but I didn’t have answers to any of them. I couldn’t even begin to fathom the answers to any of them. Though I did not want to go anywhere near the woman again, I knew I had to grab that bag. If my mom wasn’t like this, then I suddenly hadto deliver that milk to her. And if she was…
I shut the thought down; it was too much to handle right now. This situation was awful enough without adding to it. Darting forward, I snagged hold of the bag and ripped it off the counter. The rustle of the plastic set my teeth on edge. It was far too loud in the eerie silence that suddenly enshrouded the earth. I ground my jaw, fighting back a scream of terror as I took a swift step back. The woman remained unmoving, her hand still extended with my change. Her warm brown eyes didn’t even flicker as I waved a hand slowly in front of her face. I wanted to check to see if she was still breathing, if she had a pulse, but try as I might I could notbring myself to touch her. I was ashamed of my cowardice but the thought was completely revolting.