Read The Peeling: Book 1 (Jeremy's Choice) for Free Online Page B

then he would just sit with her awhile and hope that, somewhere,
someplace, she was still with him.  But when he opened the door, he saw
that the mercy of death had not yet visited his wife.
    Carol
lay on the bed, looking more like a puddle than a human being.  Her skin
clung to her now only in patches and in many places her bones were showing clearly. 
But her eyes…her eyes were still flawless.  Beautiful.
    He sat
down on the bed and went to touch her, but then realised there was nowhere he
could do so without causing her pain.  “I love you, Carol.  I wanted
to tell you that one more time.”
    It was
an obvious effort for Carol to form words, but she seemed eager to do so all
the same.  “I…love…you…too.”
    “I
wish I had more time with you.  I wish there was time to make it all
okay.  I’m going to miss you every minute till the time I join you. 
I just hope that when I get there, you’ll be waiting for me.  If not,
though…I’d understand.”
    Carol’s
eyes flickered as if fighting away sleep – or death.  Jeremy wasn’t sure
if she’d heard the words he’d just spoken, but he hoped so.  Eventually
she came back to him and managed to speak again.  “Please, Jerry…please…”
    “What,
sweetheart?  What do you want?”  But she didn’t need to answer. 
He knew what she was asking for.  Release.   He nodded, felt tears well
up behind his eyes.  “Okay,” he finally said.
    Jeremy
leant forward and kissed his wife’s forehead.  His lips came away moist
and sticky, but he did not care.  Trying to be as gentle as possible, he
pulled loose one of the pillows beneath his wife’s head.  Her eyes stared
at him intently and he knew that if she could, she would have been
smiling.  By doing what he was about to do, Jeremy could show his wife the
kindness in death that he could not give her in life.
    Jeremy
put the pillow to his wife’s face and pressed down.  It took only a minute
for her to die.
    ***
    Jeremy sat with Carol for
almost a full hour before he left her.  He knew that once he exited the
bedroom, she would truly be gone forever.  Part of him had also been
curious to see whether her body would continue to rot away after death. 
It had not.  If he’d obeyed her requests earlier then her body would have
been more intact as it was lying here now.  It was just one more regret to
add to his list.
    Downstairs,
Kara had gone missing.  The television was still switched on and, if he
wasn’t mistaken, the volume had been increased.  Sarah and Tom were still
reporting and there was an urgency about them now that he’d never seen
before.  He looked around the living room, but found only shadows.
    “It
has now been categorically proven,” Sarah said on the television, “that the
virus is passed on through carriers.  While only fifty-percent of those
exposed to the infection become symptomatic, it has been discovered that the
other fifty-percent are not immune as originally thought.  The seemingly
unaffected are in fact passing on the virus by becoming highly-infectious
carriers.  While half of the population is dying, it is the other half
that is infecting them.  It is for this reason that a nationwide
quarantine is now in effect.  Healthy or infected – all will be restrained
if found outside their homes at any times.  Lethal force will be used if
necessary.  Through isolation, it is hoped that the infection will reach a
saturation point and that none-symptomatic sufferers will remain healthy. 
There is still hope for us, Great Britain, but we must stay calm, and we must
stay indoors.  Never Stop Newsis now the official channel for the
British Government alongside the BBC, so please leave your television on at all
times for further updates.  We will be interspersing our regular newsfeed
with episodes of Friends, The Simpsons, and Only Fools and
Horses , so sit back and enjoy as that’s coming up next.”
    “You
did this.”
    Jeremy
turned his head away