Dying Time by Daniel Clarke Page A

cookies, a bag of white sugar, and a large bag of peppermint candies they would be out of food soon. Since the water stopped running six days ago they’d been surviving off of bottled water. There was a half filled, five litre jug sitting on the counter before her. There were plenty of drink mixes in the cupboard but they weren’t any good, except as a treat. 
    She wished a radio station, or news station was still on the air. She hadn’t gotten a signal in the last twelve days. The electricity worked though, so the kids had all the movies they could stand. But Rebecca wanted to know if help was coming.
     
    She laid down on the kitchen floor, using her jacket as a pillow and tried to sleep.
     
    **
    She woke up to darkness. Her eyes felt like sandpaper as she blinked. Looking at the clock she realized she had slept for four hours. A new record.  She laid her head back down willing herself to sleep. When she closed her eyes though, the faces of the children sleeping next door surrounded her, with hollow cheeks and sunken eyes they moaned like the zombies outside. She opened her eyes. 
     
    Ricky and Todd, the two boys she sent into the unknown, sat in front of her. Todd was licking his hand.  No his hand wasn’t there. He was licking a bloody stump. His skin was grey like a zombie. he just looked at her, and took a bite of his own flesh.
     
    Rebecca bite her lip to stifle a scream, and looked at Ricky.  His face was bloody as if someone had been beating him. She could barely see his eyes beneath the bruises. “They hurt me, Miss Anthony,” he slurred.  Blood welled out of his mouth, his teeth were broken.
     
    She screamed.
     
    **
    “ Miss Anthony, wake up!” someone screamed at her. Hands grabbed her shaking her hard. “Wake up please! You’re scaring us!”
     
    Rebecca swung out blindly, in terror. Her arm hit something, children cried out in pain. She woke up and looked around. All the children were in the kitchen around her, Angela and Michael were on the floor rubbing their heads crying. The rest were scrambling away in fear.
     
    Rebecca reached out to the two children she had hit. Embracing them she said, “I’m so sorry. I was having a bad dream.  I didn’t mean to knock you down,” the sobbing slowed down, but didn’t stop. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You did a good job of waking me up. I’m sorry.”
     
    The younger children came up and hugged her. “Its all right,” one of them said  “We forgive you,” a little boy whispered in her ear. 
     
    They sat like that for a long while. The children cried into her shirt and hugged each other, letting all of the pain, loneliness and fear they had suffered for the last two weeks out of their systems. Finally Rebecca looked at the clock. It was still five hours till dawn.
     
    “ Its time for everyone to go back to bed,” she told them in a strict voice. “We have lots to do tomorrow.”
     
    They slowly filed out of the kitchen back into the play room. She watched from the doorway until they were all laying down. Closing the door she went, and closed the blinds to the window that overlooked the play room beside the fridge.
     
    Turning on the light she looked at herself in a small mirror. She looked terrible. Her eyes were black from lack of sleep, almost like someone had punched her.  The blouse she was wearing was soaked with tears and snot from the crying children.  She went to the cupboard and pulled out a spare t-shirt she always brought to work. It was nearly as dirty as the blouse, but at least it was dry.
     
    Hanging the blouse over the cupboard door she thought about what to do. There was barely any food left. The water might be stretched for another two weeks, if everyone only had a single small glass a day. The problem was Rebecca didn’t think she would last that long. Maybe if someone was there to help her she could handle it. But for all she knew they were the last living people left.  She wasn’t sleeping at