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wife of over two decades. Now I would have to contend with them, and I didn’t feel anything but shame.
    I lashed out with a side kick that swept my neighbor off his legs and onto his back. He was less than two feet away, and I just flowed into the move. Then I was past him, and I would have administered several punches to the face, but I was once again leery of the blood. What would happen if that stuff got in my mouth or into a wound? Would that be enough to kill and change me into one of them?
    Landing like that would have taken the breath away from a normal man and made him think twice about getting up, but old Edwards must have been feeling lucky, because he rolled over to get up again. I kicked him hard under the chin, like his head was a soccer ball. He flopped over and didn’t move for a moment.
    She was getting closer, and I didn’t want to hurt her. I dashed behind her, snatched the back of her shirt, and dragged her toward their house. She went under protest, trying to spin and snap at me the entire time. I shoved her inside so that she landed face first on the floor, and I slammed the door shut. I doubted she was smart enough to figure out how to get out. She seemed to have the motor skills of a toddler.
    Edward was another problem altogether. He was getting back up again, and I didn’t think I could maneuver him inside the house while she was trying to get out.
    I walked up to his form as it came up on all fours, threw my leg up high in the air, and then came down with the back of my shoe to his neck in a downward axe kick. I felt something snap beneath the blow, and then he fell to the ground, lifeless and still.
    I panted for a moment, leaned over, and gasped for air. Then I turned from his body and threw up everything in my stomach.
    That was two. Two people dead at my hand, and the day wasn’t even over yet. Devon stood on the patio and watched me come up on shaky legs. His eyes met mine, and I could only read a sort of horror that made me want to turn away in shame. I felt terrible that he had to watch it, almost as much as I felt bad about killing the two that day.
    “That is why you need to get out of Dodge, my man,” I said and went inside to pack. “And my offer still stands. Just get Lisa, all the food in the house that is non-perishable, and meet me in front of your house in fifteen minutes.”
    “I just can’t leave it all behind. I need to think, to think and to process,” he whispered, almost to himself, then turned and walked away.
     
    * * *
     
    Three pairs of jeans, that’s all I allowed myself. I took down some trusty flannel shirts from a box in the closet and jammed those into the pack as well. Then I added socks, underwear, the basics for survival and keeping warm. I had a pair of thermal underwear as well, which I slipped into a side pouch.
    The box of MREs was stuffed in the extra room, the one we were going to make into a child’s room. Now it was filled with all of my accumulated junk. It looked just the way it had when we moved in, cluttered with boxes, but now there was a layer of dust on top of them because I had not been in the room in months.
    I took the boxes and moved them to the front of the house. Gunshots popped some distance away. There were just a few a while ago, but now they were coming more rapidly. I thought of Devon and his wife crammed in their home, and for a moment, I considered inviting them to the cabin again.
    I didn’t. He had made his decision to stay after all we had seen a few minutes ago. I didn’t have the supplies to become more convincing.
    What good would they be if we had to survive? He had no survival skills, and I doubted he even camped. He and his wife were the type to stay in and watch a movie on the weekend rather than go into the woods and pretend they were outdoorsy. They would get in the way, and that was how I made my cold decision to leave them. Stupid common sense.
    I had a big hunting knife—the kind of Rambo blade that had a