“They’re vampires,” said Ben
“There’s no such thing,” shouted Cora back to him.
“There is too.”
“Na-ah mum said.”
She smiled to herself. They were good kids, she was glad she had them, even though their future was uncertain. She put the gun back in the bag, zipped it up and was about to push it back under the bed when the engine abruptly cut out and the laughing stopped.
She paused with the bag still in her hand. She could hear Dennis’s voice but couldn’t make out what he was saying. He might have been talking to the children but she didn’t think so.
Hannah crept out of the bedroom into the corridor that ran past the bathroom and through it into the living room. The door was closed but she could hear Dennis talking now.
“…no room for anymore,” he said.
She stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked up as if she might be able to see though the blue metal doors. Her heart was fluttering. She was now sure that he wasn’t speaking to the kids but then who was he talking to? They hadn’t seen a single person since boarding the boat. Just vam… the creatures. The last time she’d checked they had been passing through part of the country that had been sparsely populated even before the world had ended.
Dennis was quiet, presumably whoever he had been speaking to was speaking back.
“Two kids … don’t have any space,” he said.
Whoever he was talking to seemed to want to come aboard but of course he wouldn’t let them. She waited for the engine to be switched back on, for them to start moving again but neither happened. She wondered what had got him to stop in the first place.
She felt the boat rock as if someone had jumped on or off. She waited but she couldn’t hear any more talking and after a time the motion stopped. She thought about going back into the bedroom to get a gun but she’d read somewhere that you were more likely to kill a member of your own family than anyone else with a gun. So instead she continued to wait.
Five, maybe ten minutes later the door opened and Ben looked down. She was relieved to see that he was okay and almost told him so, but then he held a finger to his lips and she was quiet.
She waited at the bottom of the steps while Ben came inside followed closely by Cora. Their father did not come down which wasn’t unusual. Someone had to steer the boat so it was rare for all of them to be in the same place at the same time.
“What’s going on?” she said. Her heart was fluttering like it was Christmas morning and she was eight years old.
“Dad’s gone ashore,” said Ben.
She frowned, couldn’t understand what she was being told. “Why?” she said at last.
“There was a man who wanted to come with us,” said Ben. “Dad said no.”
“So why did he go ashore?” she said.
“The man said he had a boat but it didn’t work. He asked dad if he would take a look.”
“And he said ‘yes’?” she said. She couldn’t believe Dennis could be so irresponsible. What if something happened to him? What would she and the kids do?
Ben nodded. Cora stood by his side, she looked guilty, as if this was her fault.
“Can you see them?”
Ben shook his head.
She sighed. “Okay, do you know which direction they went?”
He nodded.
She thought about going back into the bedroom and getting a gun but she wasn’t even sure if she was going to go after him. What good could she really do? Either he would be okay or he wouldn’t, if she went after him and the man intended to hurt, or even kill, him she would just end up suffering the same. Then what would happen to the kids?
They would be all alone. They knew how to drive the boat but they didn’t know where they were going. If they lasted a night they would be lucky. No, it was better that she kept herself alive and leave Dennis to whatever fait awaited him. She was on the verge of making up her mind to lock up the boat and move on when she heard him call her.
She looked at the kids but they just shrugged. They had no more idea what was going on than she did. “Wait here,” she said.
Hannah climbed the steps. She didn’t think his voice had betrayed any sense of fear but she was feeling plenty of it herself. At the top she could see Dennis sanding on the grassy bank with a man beside him. He wasn’t an old man but he had long white hair and a big white curly beard. She could understand why Dennis had trusted him; he looked just like Santa Claus, right down to the belly full of jelly and excepting the different clothes. The man standing next to Dennis was wearing brown and green camouflage combats and a green t-shirt.
Dennis was smiling which was good. The man beside him was holding a dark green hat in his hands, nervously twisting it back and forth. There was a gap of about five metres to the bank so the boat must have drifted away since he’d crossed.
“Who’s that?” she said, still not convinced that she shouldn’t run back in and get a gun.
“This is Mr Shorehill,” said Dennis.
The man leaned over and whispered something in his ear.
“Frank,” said Dennis. “He says you should call him Frank.”
She raised a hand, unsure how to react. This felt strange. Frank Shorehill was the first person she had seen, other than her own family, in more than three weeks. She couldn’t tell whether he was friendly or not.
“Bring the boat over Hann,” he said.
She examined him for some secret cue that he didn’t want her to bring the boat to shore but if he was giving one it was too subtle for her to detect. She turned the key and the diesel motor groaned into action, chugging away beneath her.
Dennis had always parked the boat at night so she was not used to the delicate movements required to get it to shore. After several unsuccessful attempts Ben and Cora appeared on deck and threw the front and rear ropes to shore so Dennis and Frank could help pull the boat in.
Cautiously she stepped off the boat onto the shore. A yellow rubble path was mostly hidden by long grass.
Frank offered her his hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you dear.”
She put his age at about fifty but he might have been younger. These had been tough times and she was sure she wasn’t the only one who looked a few years older than she actually was.
“Frank wants to come with us,” said Dennis. He was practically jumping up and down on the spot and she realised that he was excited.
“We don’t have room,” she said, not unkindly.
She was not overjoyed at the idea that Dennis had invited a complete stranger to join them. Maybe he was excited but how much could you really learn about someone in fifteen minutes. He might have been a murderer for all they knew. “Sorry Mr Shorehill.”
“Frank, please,” he said, “and space won’t be a problem. I have my own boat.”
His voice was soft and his accent well-to-do not to murder them all.
“You should see it,” said Dennis, “it’s something else.”
She ignored him and continued to look at Frank, he didn’t wilt or budge under her hardest stare. “If you have a boat,” she said, “why do you need us?”
He shrugged and for the first time she thought his true character might be coming out. His cheeks reddened. “Its been a long time since I’ve had any company,” he said. “My dear wife, she…” he turned away.
Hannah didn’t need to hear the rest. He’d lost his wife to the creatures. The vampires, as the kids called them, although the term worried her. Films, television and books had softened the image of vampires and these creatures were anything but soft. She worried that calling them vampires made them seem less threatening.
“I’m sorry,” said Frank, pressing his fingers into his eyes. “It’s still difficult to talk about.”