Chapter Text
Photo credit here.
***
Present Day
So, a few things I need to get out of the way before you ask just what the hell I’m doing. One—My name is Henry ‘Monty’ Montague. My best friend and boyfriend’s name is Percy Newton. We’ve been traveling together for eleven months, trying to reach my sister, Felicity, in the Edinburgh Safe Zone.
So far so good? Great. Now for the tricky part.
I’m human. Completely and totally normal. Your average homo sapien. Percy, on the other hand, is what we call a Dead Head—a zombie. Yes, the kind that eats raw flesh. No, he was not a zombie when we started our journey. I’ve been feeding him rabbits ever since he turned because for some godforsaken reason, the end of the world as we know it has created some sort of rabbit heaven-on-earth. They’re everywhere. No, this is not important, I just thought I’d share. Save the rest of your questions for later, please.
Where was I? Oh, right. Zombie Percy. Zombie Percy versus the fence, take fourteen. Here we go.
I lower the rabbit in my hands toward the ground, or, more specifically, toward the hole I’ve cut through the containment fence of the Safe Zone, which is near the ground. “Here, zombie zombie,” I call, wriggling it enticingly.
This, if you’re wondering, is where you ask me just what the hell I’m doing. And I respond—it makes sense in context. There aren’t many ways to get a zombie to the other side of a chain link fence. It’s either under, through, or over, and zombies can’t climb—no dexterity in the fingers—so under or through were my best bets. Under, unfortunately, would have required me to dig a Percy-sized tunnel, which I’m not about to do, so through it is. One hole in the fence later—much easier than digging, thank you very much—and I am now trying to entice Zombie Percy through with the temptation of treats. Hence the rabbit.
See, I told you it made sense.
“C’mere! C’mere, big guy!” I say. Percy huffs through the improvised muzzle over his face—the result of one too many nips at me instead of the rabbits—as if to say that this isn’t going to work. Which, if you’re wondering, I know. I am well aware that this isn’t going to work. If it hasn’t worked the previous thirteen times, then the chances of it working now, the fourteenth time, are slim to none. The problem is that I’m out of ideas. Just completely wiped clean. It’s been a long day, and—understandably, I think—I’ve reached the limit of my measly little human brain. This is my last resort. Aside from knocking Percy over and dragging him through, that is.
One last try. Just… one last try. “Come on, Percy, you can do it!” I say, wriggling the rabbit again. “Bend your knees, Perce!”
For a moment, it looks like Percy is contemplating the instructions. He blinks slowly, head tilting to the side. His blank white eyes stare. I hold my breath, waiting to see if he’ll manage to do this time what he’s failed at thirteen times so far… and just bend… his goddamn… knees…
…But no, he does not. Instead he bends at the waist, reaching for the rabbit.
I toss it to him with a grunt, running both hands down my face. I am so tired and we are so close I just—I want to scream.
But I can’t. I can’t do that. I adjust the duct-tape jacket and the fingerless gloves I have on for protection, take a deep breath, and grit my teeth.
“Alright, big guy,” I say, as Percy tears the rabbit apart with his fingernails. I adjust the violin on my back to scoot back over to the other side of the fence. Once there, I pull down the muzzle so he doesn’t smear rabbit gore all over his face. Not that he’s a particularly neat eater in general, but it usually helps if he has access to his mouth. I wait until he’s nearly finished the rabbit before I wipe his face off a bit—avoiding the teeth that snap at my fingers—and pull the muzzle back into place.
I then waste no time giving him a good, hard shove.
He and the backpack he’s wearing hit the ground like a sack of potatoes. I wince, guilty. I hate manhandling Percy. But it must be done—if we’re to get to my sister we need to get to the other side of this fence, and they’re not about to let my darling Percy in through the front gate.
I feel the guilt, tag it for later, set it aside, and then go about grabbing Percy by the ankles, dragging him through the hole in the fence.
***
It wasn’t always like this. I know, I know, way to state the obvious, Monty. But I feel like I have to. You just… you don’t understand the scope of this story. Not yet.
Percy and I have been friends since we were babies. I was the first child born to Henri the Senior, an event that happened May of 20XX. Three months later, Percy was to be born, halfway around the world. His mother died in childbirth, and his father was to die soon after, though I don’t know why or how. It seems like something I should know, in hindsight, but I can’t ask Zombie Percy for the answer so it’ll have to wait.
In any case, by Christmas Eve Baby Percy had been delivered to his next living kin—his aunt and uncle, who lived, incredibly enough, just next door to the Montague Manor House. On Christmas day mass, we were both trussed up in holiday onesies and placed side by side in the baby play pen in the hopes that we’d entertain each other for long enough that the adults could eat their crackers and drink their wine or whatever it is that good Christian men and women do on Christmas day.
It was the start of something beautiful. Years of friendship began in that play pen that day. Eighteen years of friendship, in fact. From Christmas day 20XX to my eighteenth birthday this year we lived like kings, running amok as we pleased with everything we could ever hope to ask for, answering to no one but each other at the end of the day.
Until my eighteenth birthday. That, if you’re wondering, is when the world as we knew it came to an end.
***
Eleven Months Ago
“Keep up, Monty.”
“I would, if you’d just let—me—breathe—for a second!”
Percy came to a short stop at the crest of the hill, waiting impatiently for my valiant attempts to climb the last few feet. After a few misses, I managed to wedge my sneakers in the rock and pull myself up, successfully summiting the veritable mountain of dirt. I then promptly sank into a crouch, wheezing. Walking from London to Edinburgh was all well and good when you were planning it out, but the actual deed required a lot more cardio than my heart was made to handle. I had never been so out of breath in my life. Except, of course, during high school PE classes.
“Come on,” Percy said, after a stretch of time that could barely constitute a proper break. “We need to get to the town by nightfall.”
“I know,” I said, raising a hand. “You’ve only told me this twelve times today.”
Percy rolled his eyes, clapping his palm to mine. He hauled me to my feet with one tug of his long arms, after which I nearly overbalanced and went head over heels down the other side of the hill. Percy, instead of asking if I was alright or showing any sign of caring about my current condition, began hiking downward without another word.
I grunted, following along, my dead-tired eyes locked on the violin that was strapped to his backpack. I was, in case anyone was curious, very sore. Also off balance. It had been two days since the London Safe Zone shut down for good and I was, suffice to say, unaccustomed to the weight of the thirty pound backpack I’d been saddled with, let alone to hiking around for ten hours a day with said backpack.
The good news—we reached the town by nightfall. The bad news—I could swear my blisters were getting blisters. Percy, ever immune to the fatigues of man, kept going even after we began to pass buildings suitable for temporary habitation, forcing me to limp along behind him as he went.
“How far are you intending to go?” I asked finally, wincing.
Percy glanced back. “Just to the pharmacy. The map said it was a few blocks down. Can you make it that far?”
I wanted to say no. I wanted to collapse where I was standing. But when Percy asked a question and his eyes got that hopeful shine to them I couldn’t just break his heart. I blew air out between my lips, forcing my sweaty bangs to stand up straight for a moment. “Yeah, fine, but we stay there for the night,” I said. And then, on the tail of that, “Why the pharmacy, though?”
Percy was silent for a long moment. His silence would normally mean that he was listening for Dead Heads, but the lift of his shoulders told me he was actually thinking, and hard, about how to answer my question.
Finally, he sighed, slowing down to match my pace instead of walking ahead of me for the first time today. “I have to… tell you something,” he said.
“Christ, don’t sound so put out by the thought of talking to me. I’m a great conversationalist,” I said, partly because he was making me nervous and partly because we’d been walking in silence all day and now, on the edge of nightfall, when the zombies—who, need I remind everyone, were attracted to sound—liked to come out… now he wanted to talk?
He bit his lip, looking over at me. “This is serious,” he said. “I need you to… not be you for a second.”
Which, okay, rude. I’m very good with serious conversations. I own at serious conversations. I opened my mouth to say exactly that, only to find his hand—fingerless glove and all—already over my lips.
“I’m not joking around,” he said.
I huffed. Fine, if that was how he wanted to do this. I’d give him exactly what he wanted. To the letter, in fact—we’d see how much he liked me when I said nothing at all!
He tentatively withdrew his hand, allowing me to mime zipping my lips shut and throwing out the key. “Right,” he said. He fiddled with the strap of his backpack for a moment. “This is going to come as something of a surprise to you, but I… I’m sick. I’ve been sick since I was a baby. My mother had HIV and she passed it on to me when I was born. I take medication to keep the virus under control, but I’m running out. I won’t… I just… it might get bad. If I don’t find more meds, I mean. It might… it might kill me. So… there you go.”
I didn’t realize I was gaping until Percy’s fingers gently pressed against my chin, shutting my mouth.
“So… that’s that,” he said, turning away from me.
That certainly was not that. My head was swirling, a thousand questions starting to beat against the back of my throat. I knew if I opened my mouth one or more would get out so I kept it clamped shut, hoping that would deter them. If I swallowed them down maybe I would digest them and we would no longer have to forage in the houses we passed for canned food.
The good news was that focusing so hard on staying silent made me forget just a little how much my body actually hurt. We walked the final blocks to the pharmacy and I didn’t need to stop once. Then we were there and Percy was pulling a slip of paper from his pocket, handing it to me.
“I’m looking for anything that says antiretroviral. Or anything off that list,” he said, already heading toward the back to jump the counter into the prescription area. It had clearly been raided already, bottles knocked off the shelves and onto the floor, but Percy paid no mind. He just pulled out his flashlight and set to work searching.
I, meanwhile, was staring at the list. The questions were getting so aggressive inside me that I couldn’t help it when one or three slipped out. “Abacavir? Lamivudine, zido…uh… zidovudine…? What even are these?”
“They’re HIV meds.”
“Right,” I said, finally putting the pieces together. Call me slow but sometimes it takes me a while to work things out. Percy’s back was to me, but I could see how his shoulders had tensed. He was so, so uncomfortable and I was clearly not helping.
In for a penny in for a pound, though. I couldn’t stay quiet forever. And call me stupid, call me reckless, but I had something that might just take his mind off of the whole… sickness… thing.
“You know, if we’re confessing things, I have something you should know as well,” I said. I licked my lips, looking away from him.
“What is it?” he asked, and I didn’t think I was imagining the dread in his voice. He didn’t turn to me and I didn’t turn to him. We continued looking for the medications side by side.
“Nothing bad. Nothing, uh… like yours,” I said, and laughed a nervous laugh. “I just… like you a lot.”
“We’re best friends,” Percy said, still with that undercurrent of dread, and I could swear he was being thick on purpose.
“Not like that, numbskull,” I said, and now the laughter sounded more like I was choking. “I mean, like… I like you, Percy.”
“Oh?”
He sounded guarded, which I guessed I’d earned. I was notorious for sleeping around, finding warm bodies to fill my bed. I wasn’t the kind of person who stayed the morning after.
Percy, though… Percy was different. All the others were paltry substitutes for Percy. I’d always loved Percy. And there was something about this place, this pharmacy at the edge of civilization, that made me realize that I didn’t have the luxury of keeping that to myself anymore.
So I told him so. I told him about realizing for the very first time that he was actually handsome, how it hit me like a train all at once. How I’d watched him for years, paralyzed, waiting to see any indication if he liked boys, if he could like… me. How sometimes when I was alone with my hand I pretended that he was there, with his soft, sweet voice. How guilty I felt afterward, unsure if he could ever feel that way about me. And then I waited for his response, waited until…
“…You mean it. You really… really mean it.”
“I do,” I said. I was still facing away, the beam of my own flashlight quivering over a shelf that I wasn’t really seeing. My heart was beating so hard, so fast in my chest that I thought it might explode if I had to endure another moment of silence.
And then… and then he laughed, and turned me around, and I was suddenly against his chest.
“I like you, too,” he said, holding me tight, and that was that.
At least… I could pretend it was. And that, friends, was the beginning of my downfall.
***