Christy twitched slightly under her blankets. She was in the back of the SUV, faking sleep while the others drove. She wasn’t supposed to be awake. She cheeked the pills that they gave her so that she would sleep. Christy had been absolutely hysterical by the end of the whole ordeal. That had been her baby. Her little girl. She had been… Been… 

Christy squeezed her eyes shut as hard as she could. There was too much going going through her head right now. Mostly pictures that she couldn’t shake. Denny had been on a spike outside of the town, her little Dora the Explorer pajamas on, blood and gore caught in her teeth, and she had been… Wriggling. 

“I know you’re still awake Christy,” the old man in the front seat said softly. “It will all be okay. Bad memories that will fade with time. It always does. It is going to hurt for a while. A long while. I have hurts that still haven’t stopped.”

“Daddy, that was my little girl…”

“I know baby. I know.”

“Why did you make me leave her? We should have taken her down, made her better. What if there is a cure where we are going?”

“A cure for being dead?” Christy’s father asked. It came out far harsher than he had meant for it to, but it was a true enough statement. There was no cure for being dead and there was no way to fix people once they turned. The only hope there was for anyone would be a vaccine to prevent the turning in the first place. Maybe something to take that would keep someone from turning, like the vampires in that Ethan Hawke movie where they turned into weird underground dwellers without blood. 

Christy was silent after that question and her father could feel the ice cold anger in that silence.
“Christy, you know what I meant and you know I am right, no matter how much it hurts to hear.” 

She stayed quiet. 

“Christy, don’t give me that silence shit.”

There was a soft snore from the back. The medicine she cheeked must have dissolved enough to put her to sleep. Or she was just that exhausted. 

He pulled over, pulling the metal shades he had welded over the windows and he leaned his seat back. 

***

Morning peeked through one of the tiny viewing holes and directly into his eyes. He tossed an arm over his eyes. About that time, the sound of something bumping into the side of the car and a gentle rock woke him with a start. He looked out the peep hole on his side and saw a small heard of the dead shuffling their way past the car. He slowly pulled away from the window and leaned back down. He reached behind him and gently touched Christy’s head.
“I know,” her voice, barely a whisper floated out from under the blankets.

They were trapped until the herd passed, and the heards could get very large.