Address one issue at a time. You can’t load gasoline, pick up food, AND kill fifteen zombies all at once.

Well, we have a problem,” Dave said after we had repeated the car-moving excitement a few times and made it all of five miles up the freeway.

I couldn’t help but snort out laughter from the back seat. “Just one?”

“One more,” he conceded with a glance toward me in the mirror. He looked nervous and my brow wrinkled in suspicion.

“What is it?”

He hesitated before he blurted out. “It looks like we’re pretty low on gas.”

I leaned forward and stared at the gauge over his shoulder. He was right, the needle was under a quarter of a tank. I glared at him. I knew he could feel it, even if he refused to look at me anymore.

I clenched my teeth.

“I thought you told me yesterday morning that you would fill it up before you picked me up at work to go to therapy,” I said, trying really hard to keep my tone even but failing.

This was another of those bullshit things he did that drove me crazy.

“Yeah. I did,” he admitted, his tone way softer than mine. “But I forgot.”

“You forgot,” I repeated as I flopped back in the seat and folded my arms. “Great.”

He was silent, but in the rearview mirror I could see his dark brown eyes boring into me. They were apologizing, but also sending me a message that he didn’t need any additional punishment from me.

I sighed. “Look, I know you were busy yesterday,” I finally said. “And how were we to know this would happen? I’m sure you would have stopped if you’d realized a zombie outbreak was on its way.”

“I would have done a lot of things if I’d known that.” He nodded. “But you only asked me to do one thing and I fucked up. Sorry.”

“There’s a Gas Guzzler right off exit 165,” Amanda offered helpfully. “It’s kind of busy most days, but I bet we can get in and out quickly.”

Dave sighed. “Well, it’s not that we think there will be a line, Mandy. It’s more a zombie issue.”

Her smile fell. “Oh. Right. I guess they could be roaming around there. A gas station is where Jack got bitten by that homeless guy.”

I shut my eyes. She still didn’t totally get this situation.

“Well, we’re armed and we’ll just have to be careful,” I said, swallowing hard.

Dealing with the freeway zombies was scary enough. I was trying not to think about surface streets where more of the horde would be roaming free.

Dave nodded as he worked his way to the exit ramp, got off and turned toward the Capital Hill area of the city. It was actually one of my favorite places in Seattle. There were a couple of universities up there and a lot of houses, stores and restaurants, plus the aforementioned Gas Guzzler which was right off the highway. We pulled up to a gas pump and Dave cut the engine.

It was quiet, but by this time we’d started recognizing the difference between quiet and too quiet.

“Okay, here’s the plan,” Dave whispered before any of us even unbuckled our seat belts. “I’ll get out and start pumping the gas. You guys will have to cover me as best you can because I won’t be able to watch my own back. Once we’re done, we’ll lock the car and go into the convenience store and get anything we can from the shelves.”

Amanda nodded and so did I. With a brief look between the three of us, we each opened our door and stepped out with weapons drawn.

It’s a weird thing to be in a city that is, essentially, dead.

Undead. Whatever.

I hadn’t realized just how accustomed I’d become to the rush of cars on the freeway, the honk of horns, the chatter of people on the street, even the whine of airplanes up above.

Now there was an eerie silence that seemed as loud as any freight train. I shivered even in the warm summer air but forced myself to pay attention as Dave popped the gas tank door and moved around to start pumping fuel into our car.

I faced the front of the vehicle and Amanda took the back. Any movement was suspect, any sound made us lift our guns. But somehow, some way, we managed to keep from drawing attention from the infected the entire time Dave was gassing up. Finally he pulled the pump away and capped the tank.

He looked around. “I don’t like this.”

I nodded. “Maybe we should just go. Not try for supplies.”

He stared at me. “Earlier all you wanted to do was search.”

“That was then,” I said. “This is now. Our task is to get to Longview and as slow as we’re driving right now it could take the whole day to get past the airport, let alone to safety.”

Dave moved toward me. “You’re scared.” I edged away, but he caught my shoulders. “We’re all scared. But we’re here now and we should look.”

I looked toward the store. For some reason Dave was right, I was freaked the fuck out. More than I had allowed myself to be since this mess started. Maybe it was because the store was an unknown. A zombie standing three feet in front of me was starting to become commonplace. But I was scared about what I’d find in a convenience store.

“Come on,” Amanda said with a bright smile. “Maybe we can find some antibiotic cream for the cut on my arm.”

I sighed. I couldn’t deny that request. We hadn’t had many first aid supplies back at our apartment and certainly they hadn’t either. It was only smart to keep all of us healthy as best we could and that meant preventing infection.

“Okay,” I said quietly. I grabbed a handful of ammo and stuck it in my pocket before I locked the car and followed Dave and Amanda.

The automatic doors were still working, which was a bad thing. There wasn’t anyone in the store, which meant that whoever had been working at the time of the outbreak hadn’t had the wherewithal to lock up the store.

We peered in as the door slid open. As it shut in our faces, I nodded. “Okay, it looks pretty clear.”

When the door opened a second time, Dave stepped into the store with us behind him. It wasn’t the biggest convenience store in existence. Probably three hundred square feet at the most, with six or seven low aisles of food. Coolers lined the back walls. Although the store had been unmanned for at least some amount of time, it hadn’t been as cleaned out as I would have suspected.

In some way that made me nervous. No looting meant there weren’t many humans left to loot.

Dave motioned toward the back of the store and I nodded, realizing he wanted us to clear the store from back to front. Amanda was less aware of pretty much anything around her, so instead of following us, she roamed away toward the aisle with cupcakes and candy.

Dave opened his mouth like he was going to call her back, but then he shut it and just moved forward. I angled myself to the other side of the room and did the same. I reached the back wall and looked for a moment at the cooler in front of me.

Beer.

Fuck that sounded good. Even though it was barely eight-thirty in the morning. But zombieism breeds alcoholism. It’s true. Look it up.

I managed to get it together, though, and watching David out of the corner of my eye, I moved along the length of the store, checking each corner and every cooler (hey, you never know, wouldn’t it suck to reach in for a Coke and come out with a zombie gnawing your hand off?).

When we reached the front, we walked toward each other and met near the front door.

“It’s so quiet. How can there be no zombies here?” I whispered.

He shook his head. “I don’t know. But let’s take it while we can get it.”

He popped behind the counter and grabbed for plastic bags, which he handed out to us.

“Okay, ladies, let’s shop,” he said with false brightness. “Non-perishables, medical supplies, liquids if we can carry them are our priorities. If you’re hungry right now, feel free to grab some perishables that you’ll eat in the next few hours.”

He stared at the walls of cigarettes and to my surprise he started pulling boxes off the walls.

“Um, are we taking up smoking?” I asked as I shoveled armfuls of beef jerky and chips into my bags. “I thought you were so against it, I mean the shit you gave me when I was trying to quit last year…”

He arched a brow. “They might be worth something to trade later.”

I stared at him. “David, that’s prison movies, not zombie movies.”

He didn’t answer, but came around the counter and dumped some candy bars into his cigarette bag.

“I have medical stuff,” Amanda said, bring out a bag brimming with those materials. She’d picked pretty well as far as I could see. She had different sized Band-Aids, creams and even some painkillers. I’m not sure I would have stocked up so thoroughly from the selection in the gas station.

“All right then, let’s go,” Dave said, motioning us out the door.

“I’ll drive if you want,” I offered as the automatic door slid open.

“Yeah, that might… be… good…”

Dave trailed off and his bag hit the ground. So did mine. Even Amanda couldn’t dumb her way out of this one. If the zombies hadn’t been in the store, there was no shortage of them waiting outside. A group of maybe fifteen of them stood in a semi-circle in the area behind our car. And they were all staring directly at us.