Marion turned the deadbolt home, locked the handle, and sank into her chair. She reached down to her side and pulled up a bottle of Ancient Age. Her favorite bourbon.
Still watching the window, she twisted off the cap and poured some into her red plastic cup. She knew the pour by heart, never breaking her stare from the real show outside: the people drifting down her road.
Where were they going? The bend led only to a dead end, yet she’d never seen a single one come back. Never back to town. Honestly, she didn’t care, so long as they kept to their side of the property line. Still, what good was it, hiding behind the thin glass of her window?
The cable was always out, but the bourbon and diet coke never ran dry. It was enough entertainment, puzzling over the silent parade outside. Her hand shook as she slid a cigarette from the pack, clenched it between her teeth, and struck a match. It trembled as she placed it between her teeth, and struck the match. She drew in deep, snuffed the match with a wave, and let it fall into the ashtray. Her eyes never left the window.
What are they doing? There’s nowhere to go.
She sipped her drink, then lifted the binoculars her son had once bought her. They’d been meant for the deer out back, but she’d dragged her chair to face the road instead. More action there.
At first she thought they were homeless, settling in the woods, but they never left. Surely they’d need to go back to town. Unless they weren’t meant to come back.
The town had been pushing the homeless out, but these walkers seemed too well dressed for that. Maybe something was happening in the woods she didn’t know about. She’d heard whispers of a new development. There had been some talk of a new development going in.
She took another sip and chuckled to herself. Only 11 a.m. Maybe too early for such entertainment. She set the bottle back on the floor and flicked on the tv. What do ya, know. The Cable was working again. Fuzzy, but better than nothing.
She flipped through channels. Reruns. All reruns. Comforting in their way. She let the old shows wash over her, little windows into what life used to be. “The good old days,” they called it. But lately, even nostalgia wasn’t enough. The shows couldn’t hold her the way the people on the road did. Something new, something strange.
That hadn’t come along in a long time.
*****
The next morning, she waited for a gap in the people walking to rush up to her mail box. Being near them made her anxious. What if they guessed she was alone and decided to come inside? They were probably harmless, but she wasn’t gonna risk it.
On the way back, she noticed brown patches near the road where their feet had trampled her lawn. She wasn’t one to fuss, but she paid good money to Tom from the hardware store. They didn’t need to be messing up his hard work.
She glanced down the road. People were coming. She hurried back as fast as her stiff hips would allow. A small smile tugged at her lips. Silly, really. Running from people walking on the street?
Back inside, safe behind her deadbolt, she glanced at the clock. 8am. She sank into her chair and reached down by her side for the bottle.
To hell with it.
She hauled the bottle up and splashed a taste into her coffee and snatched up the binoculars again.
This time there were more of them, shuffling along as if it were the most natural thing in the world. She spotted a handsome one. Someone her granddaughter might have called cute, though the girl hardly visited these days. And she sure as hell wasn’t about to go out there and talk to him—
Wait– was he walking on her grass? This was why she couldn’t have a damn thing. Her retirement money was thinning, every dollar stretched as far as it could go, and she wasn’t about to see it trampled. She wasn’t about to spend money on lawncare while this joker just walked all over it.
She yanked the window open and poked her head out.
“Hey! Bozo. Off my lawn! Stay on the road, where you belong – taxes didn’t pay for my property!”
For a heartbeat, they all froze. Five of them. Perfectly still. Like statues.
“Oh, hell,” she muttered, regret turning in her gut.
Marion yanked her head back into the window, slammed closed the blinds, and poured another drink with her trembling hand.
*****
“Where are they?” she muttered, peering at the empty road over a bowl of oatmeal.
She hadn’t seen anyone since she closed the blinds. She’d sat there all morning, eyes on the road, waiting for something—anything—to happen. But it was like they had stopped all together. Surely, yelling out the window hadn’t… no.
She took another quick trip up to the mail box to get a look up and down the road. She opened the box.
Empty.
Pretending to look deeper, she stole glances left and right. How silly. She was afraid they might “see” her, but the damn road was empty.
Back inside, she flipped on the tv, lit a smoke, and sipped her cocktail with a trembling cigarette between her fingers. Waving the smoke out of her face, she thought she saw something in the corner of her eye, but it was just a bird at the tree line.
“Oh well,” she said, flipping through the channels. She found the same shows she always watched and killed the day lost in her old routine of channel surfing and mixing cocktails. After making herself a grilled cheese, she slouched back with her feet up, and drifted off into a nap in Harry's favorite chair.
She awoke to bright light in her eyes. Opening them slowly, she realized it was the motion light outside. She sat up, groggy, her head still thick from sleep. It was already night time. She must have poured more than she realized.
Odd, she thought, looking at the light outside. Most of the animals around here weren’t big enough to trip it. Even the stray cats had been tuned out—the light set only to catch larger shapes.
She got up and quickly closed the blinds. She peeked out the window, trying to see if anything was out there, but it was still. A few seconds later, the light went off, and she sighed.
She was headed to her bedroom when a loud knock came at her front door just feet away. She stumbled back into a potted plant, nearly toppling it, but caught it just in time.
“One second,” she said.
Why did I do that? Now they know I’m here.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Each knock louder than the last.
Moving as quietly as her old body could handle, she tried to peek out the window. The motion light was off, and she couldn’t see the door from that angle.
Knock.
She abandoned the window, hurried down the hall, slammed her bedroom door, and locked it before crawling into bed.
“Someone knocking on your door?”
“Yes, yes. Please, it's late, and I’m alone. I’m just an old lady.”
“Understood. We’ll send someone right away ma’am.”
“Thank you. Thank you so much,” she whispered, curling under the covers with shaky relief.
Harry would have taken care of this already, she thought, trying to settle herself down.
*****
Either the police never came, or she’d slept through their arrival, and their leaving. She woke the next morning still buried under the covers. Sunlight poured in, and she felt foolish. It must have been a dream. She’d been confused before. Usually when she forgot her meds.
Grocery day, she thought.
She climbed into her car and drove off for groceries. While going down the bread aisle, she saw someone she didn’t want to see. She turned back and slipped down another aisle, away from her “friend”, Stephanie. That one was a little too full of herself. The lord looked down on the prideful.
As she was checking out, she heard people talking about the new subdivision going in at the end of her road. She hadn’t heard a word about that. Maybe that’s where the walkers had been headed all along.
When she got home, once again, there was no one on the road. Wherever they’d been going, they must have arrived. She was a little disappointed, but it was for the best. She had better things to occupy herself with.
She unpacked the groceries, slapped together a pimento cheese sandwich, and called it a night.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
That was the back door. Someone's at the back door trying to get in.
She reached for the phone to call the police – it was in the other room. She couldn’t make herself leave the bed.
By sunrise she was wrecked. She tugged on her robe and hurried to fetch the phone. She called the police. Her arthritic hands were barely able to press the buttons.
“Whats your emergency?”
“Please, I need help. People are harassing me all night. Knocking on my door.”
“Ma’am calm down,” said the dispatcher. “We’ll send the officer back out. We need you to answer when he knocks this time, okay?”
“You already sent someone?”
“Yes, ma’am. The first time you called.”
“Oh my,” she whispered, head swimming. “I must sound ridiculous. I’ve worked myself up.”
“It’s okay, ma’am. It's a slow day. Mike said he’d swing back by… number 12 Carcosa Way.
The blood seemed to drain out of her all at once.
“No, I'm at 13. 13 Carcosa Way.”
“Mike will be out there shortly, ma’am. Sit tight.
******
When he arrived, Mike walked her slowly around the property, scanning for anything out of place. He was polite, offering his arm for her to steady herself. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had treated her like a lady.
“No signs of forced entry. Nothing missing,” Mike said, matter-of-fact..
I know,” she admitted, flushing. “It’s just… I’m here alone. It gets scary sometimes.”
“Yes, ma’am. You did the right thing by calling us. Do you have any one else on the property?”
“No—well, yes. My lawn guy comes every few weeks. Keeps the yard neat. Does good work, if you’re looking for someone.”
Mike grinned. “No, ma’am. My wife would have my head if I didn’t mow my own lawn.
“You’re a nice young man,” she said.
“I only ask because there are footprints here. Fresh ones.”
Before leaving, Mike gave her his personal number and promised to swing by during his shift to keep an eye on things. When she asked about the people walking the road, if anyone else had seen them, he only frowned. He had no idea what she meant.
Back inside, she locked the knob and the deadbolt, then sank heavily into her chair.
*****
She was halfway through a rerun when the motion light blinked on again. She sprang to the window, but the yard was empty. She was lowering herself back into her chair when a knock came at the door. She froze.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
The motion light went off.
She snatched up her phone and tried officer Mike, her shaky fingers barely able to press the buttons.
Straight to voicemail.
“Oh no,” she whispered as another knock came from the back door.
Now there were two.
She dialed 911 but the line was busy.
She crouched low in her kitchen. The only spot between her and the front door.
Just as her eyes began to sag, a faint tapping came from the window above her head
Tap. Tap. Tap.
She craned upward to peek, when the front door thundered with another knock.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
The back door joined in, pounding in rhythm. She was about to bolt into the night when it stopped. Silence.
She stayed frozen in place until the first light of morning. When she got up, she noticed something was wrong in her house. It took her a moment to see it.
Her furniture had been shifted, just slightly out of place.
They’d been inside? No… impossible.
She got up and went outside. Somehow, that felt safer than staying there. At the mailbox, she froze. The trail of muddy footprints veered off the road now, cutting straight through her yard, and vanishing into the woods.
She hadn’t seen anyone walking. This must have been some foul prank for yelling at them… but why would they torment her so?
Tears pooled up in her eyes, thinking about how cruel they were being to her. All she wanted was a tidy lawn, some peace, to be left alone. Was that asking too much?
She stormed back into the house, and locked the door. With all her strength, she pulled her chair in front of the door and collapsed into it
They wouldn’t be going through that door anymore.
After catching her breath, she got up and started cleaning up around the house. She stacked dining chairs against the back door as a barricade, then busied herself scrubbing the kitchen, trying to erase the thought of them inside.
She went to her deceased husband's side of the bed and found his little .38 snub nose. She loaded it with the four bullets she had, and made sure it was ready. If the police couldn’t help, she would.
She still tried to call Mike, anyway. But once again, his phone was off. She poured herself a large drink and sat down against the door. She used the remote to turn on the tv and started watching her reruns.
*****
With the doors barricaded, she crawled into bed,a flashlight at her side and the .38 within reach. Sleep came quicker than she expected. She’d never admit it, but the gun gave her a small, false comfort.
As she drifted off to sleep,a voice whispered directly into her ear.
“Marion.”
Her eyes shot open, as she fumbled for the gun and the flash light, but nothing. The room was empty. She felt its breath on her ear, warm and impossibly real. She grabbed for her phone, but there was no service. That had never happened. She was just outside the city.
She fumbled to restart it but a knock at the bedroom door startled her into dropping it. She held up the gun, and tried to fire, but her hands shook, too weak to pull the hammer back. She hurled it instead. It struck the door with a heavy thud, then clattered uselessly to the floor.
The knob twisted, the latch clicked, and the door crept open.
She went rigid, paralyzed with terror.
But when the door swung wide, the hall beyond was empty.
“Mike? Is that you? I’ve got a…” Her eyes flicked to the pistol on the floor. “…a gun.”
She slid off the bed and crawled towards the pistol. She kept her eyes on the doorway, expecting someone, or something, to emerge at any moment. She was inches away when movement rippled in the corner. A massive shadow shifted, turning toward her.
Panic seized her. She bolted from the room, leaving the gun behind.
She tore down the hallway.
The front door was standing wide open.
No time to think, she ran bare foot out the door and into the yard, and stopped dead. The walkers were now standing in her yard, staring into the forest.
As one, their heads turned toward her. She spun, frantic.
No escape.
She tried to scream, but only a strangled screech tore from her throat, thin air clawing past terrified lungs. They closed in, circling, until the woods were her only escape. She fled—and they followed, as the forest swallowed her whole.
Inside, the night was thick. Like the forest had been waiting for her to leave the safety of her house. It didn’t chase her. It took her.
