Aftertime Read online

  Advance Praise for

  AFTERTIME

  “From H.G. Wells to Max Brooks to Cormac McCarthy, the End Times have always belonged to the boys. Littlefield’s Aftertime gives an explosive voice to the other half of the planet’s population: this is the apocalypse battled head-on by a heroine who not only kicks ass, but is driven by an instinct that only a woman can know. Cass Dollar fights like a girl—you’ve been warned. And did I mention the darkly comic flesh-eating zombies and the downright lyrical prose? Aftertime is a whole new kind of fierce.”

  —Laura Benedict, author of Isabella Moon

  “Sexy, chilling and hypnotically readable, Littlefield’s apocalyptic dreamscape will stay with you long after you’ve put this book down.”

  —Alexandra Sokoloff, author of Book of Shadows

  “Wildly original, guaranteed to give you nightmares and allow you some small measure of hope for mankind, Sophie Littlefield’s Aftertime is a new generation of post-apocalyptic fiction: a unique journey into a horrifying world of zombies, zealots and avarice that examines the strength of one woman, the joy of acceptance and the power of love. A must read.”

  —J.T. Ellison, author of So Close the Hand of Death

  Praise for Sophie Littlefield

  “One of the brightest new mystery writers in the business.”

  —The Huffington Post

  “Littlefield is an excellent writer.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “Littlefield’s narrative voice braids humor, empathy and pathos in a demolition derby of action and violence.”

  —The Biting Edge

  A BAD DAY FOR SORRY

  RT Book Reviews Reviewer’s Choice Award

  San Francisco Chronicle bestseller • IMBA bestseller

  Edgar Award nominee • Anthony Award winner

  McCavity Award nominee • Barry Award nominee

  A Guerilla Girls on Tour Best Book of 2009

  “[A]nother of the year’s best debuts, a standout mystery distinguished by its charming protagonist and her compelling voice. We don’t get many characters like Stella in mystery fiction, but we should.”

  —Chicago Sun-Times

  “Crime fiction hasn’t seen a character as scrappy, mean and incredibly appealing as Stella in a long time. A-”

  —Entertainment Weekly

  “Markedly original…

  The story’s compelling, the dialogue perfect—and Stella is one of the most memorable characters of this summer or any other.”

  —Richmond Times-Dispatch

  “Sophie Littlefield shows considerable skills for delving into the depths of her characters and complex plotting as she disarms the reader.… [She] keeps the plot churning with realistic action that doesn’t let up.”

  —South Florida Sun-Sentinel

  “First-timer Littlefield creates characters with just the right quirks to charm.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “Humor and heart.”

  —Boston Globe

  A BAD DAY FOR PRETTY

  “Delicious.”

  —People magazine

  “Cements Littlefield’s bona fides as a fine storyteller and writer.”

  —Richmond Times-Dispatch

  “Rollicking… Delivers on the promise of her debut, A Bad Day for Sorry. Littlefield wields humor like a whip, but never lets it dilute the whodunit. A force to be reckoned with, Stella is a welcome addition to the world of unorthodox female crime fighters.”

  —Publishers Weekly, starred review

  “I don’t know about you, but mysteries that make me laugh go right into the book bag…. The humor is decidedly morbid in Sophie Littlefield’s down-home mysteries about a female vigilante who extends a helping (if occasionally bloody) hand to battered women in rural Missouri.”

  —The New York Times

  “The author’s eloquent yet unpretentious prose is like gossip with a sassy friend. Littlefield paints detailed scenes with witty similes that illuminate the characters and setting.”

  —Vox magazine, the Columbia Missourian

  “A Bad Day for Pretty firmly establishes [Littlefield] as a new brand of writer…. It’s a joy when a new writer holds your attention from beginning to end. It’s a treat when she has something so new to say.”

  —Crimespree Magazine

  “Sophie’s been blasting her way through Badass Town, racking up Edgar, Anthony, Macavity and Barry Award nominations faster than you can pump a shotgun.”

  —PopCultureNerd.com

  “A sisterhood book. Sprinkled with murder, lust, love, broken hearts and fresh bread.… A fun, smart and quick read.”

  —Viva la Feminista

  “Just as compelling and addictive as her debut…. You’ll race through the pages of this book and then be sorry to leave Stella and her cohorts behind.”

  —RT Book Reviews, 41/2 stars

  AFTERTIME

  SOPHIE LITTLEFIELD

  For M, with love and regret

  There you are and always will be

  In your pretty coat

  Skating lazy eights on the frozen pond of my heart

  Contents

  Chapter 01

  Chapter 02

  Chapter 03

  Chapter 04

  Chapter 05

  Chapter 06

  Chapter 07

  Chapter 08

  Chapter 09

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  01

  THAT IT WAS SUMMER WAS NOT IN DOUBT. The nights were much too short and the days too long. Something about the color of the sky said August to Cass. Maybe the blue was bluer. Hadn’t autumn signaled itself that way Before, a gradual intensifying of colors as summer trailed into September?

  Once, Cass would have been able to tell from the wildflowers growing in the foothills where she ran. In August petals fell from the wild orange poppies, the stonecrop darkened to purplish brown, and butterweed puffs drifted in lazy breezes. Deer grew bold, drinking from the creek that ran along the road. The earth dried and cracked, and lizards and beetles stared out from their hiding places among the weeds.

  But that was two lives ago, so far back that it was like a story that had once been told to Cass, a story maybe whispered by a lover as she drifted off to sleep after one too many Jack and Cokes, ephemeral and hazy at the edges. She might not believe it at all, except for Ruthie. Ruthie had loved the way butterweed silk floated in the air when she blew on the puffs.

  Ruthie, who she couldn’t see or touch or hold in her arms. Ruthie, who screamed when the social workers dragged her away, her legs kicking desperately at nothing. Mim and Byrn wouldn’t even look at Cass as she collapsed to the dirty floor of the trailer and wished she was dead.

  Ruthie had been two.

  Cass pushed herself to go faster, her strides long and sure up over a gentle rise in the road. She was barely out of breath. This was nothing, less than nothing
. She dug her hard, sharp nails into the calluses of her thumbs. Hard, harder, hardest. The skin there was built up against her abuse and refused to bleed. To break it she would need something sharper than her nail. Teeth might work, but Cass would not use her teeth. It was enough to use her nails until the pain found an opening into her mind. The pain was enough.

  She had covered a lot of ground this moon-bright night. Now it was almost dawn, the light from the rising sun creeping up over the black-blue forest skeletons, a crescent aura of orange glow in the sky. When the first slice of sun was visible she’d leave the road and melt into what was left of the trees. There was cover to be found—some of the native shrubs had survived. Greasewood and creosote still grew neck high in some places.

  And it was easy to spot them. You saw them before they saw you, and then you hid, and you prayed. If they saw you at all, if they came close enough to smell you, you were worse than dead.

  Cass stayed to the edge of the cracked pavement of what had been Highway 161, weaving around the occasional abandoned car, forcing herself not to look inside. You never knew what you would see. Often nothing, but…it was just better not to look. Chunks of the asphalt had been pushed aside by squat kaysev plants that had managed to root in the cracks. Past the shoulder great drifts of it grew, the dark glossy leaves hiding clusters of pods. The plants were smooth-stemmed without burrs or thorns. Walking among them was not difficult. But walking on pavement allowed Cass, now and then—and never when she was trying—to let her mind go back to another time…and when she was really lucky, to pretend all the way back two lifetimes ago.

  Taking Ruthie, barely walking, down the sidewalk to the 7-Eleven, buying her a blue raspberry Slurpee, because Ruthie loved to stick out her blue tongue and look at herself in the mirror. Cutting across the school parking lot on the way home, jumping over the yellow lines, lifting Ruthie’s slight body and swinging her, laughing, through the air.

  Yes, pavement was nice. Cass had good shoes, though she didn’t remember where she got them. They seemed like they might have been men’s shoes, plain brown lace-up walking shoes, but they fit her feet. A small man, then. How she’d got the shoes from him…it didn’t bear thinking about. The shoes were good, they were comfortable and hadn’t given her blisters or sores despite the many days of walking.

  A movement caught her eye, off in the spiky remains of the woods. Cass stopped abruptly and scanned the tree skeletons and shrubs. A flash of white, was it? Or was it only the way the light was rising in the sky, reflected off…what, though? There were only the bare trunks of the dead cypress and pine trees, a stand of dead manzanita, the low thick growth of kaysev, a few of the boulder formations that dotted the Sierra Foothills.

  Snap

  Cass whipped her head around and saw the flash again, a fast-moving blur of fabric and oh God it was white, a slip of a little dark-haired girl in a dirty white shirt who was sprinting toward her at a speed that Cass could not imagine anyone moving, Cass who had run thousands of desperate blacktop miles one life ago, trying to erase everything, running until her legs ached and her lungs felt like tearing paper and her mind was almost but never quite empty.

  But even Cass had never run like this girl.

  She was twelve or thirteen. Maybe even fourteen, it was hard to tell now. Before, the fourteen-year-olds looked like twenty-year-olds, with their push-up bras and eyeliner. But hardly anyone dressed like that anymore.

  The girl held the blade the way they taught the kids now, firmly in front of her where it would have the best chance of slicing through a Beater’s flesh. Because that’s what she thought Cass was, a Beater, and the thought hit Cass in the gut and nearly knocked her over with revulsion. Her hands went to her hairline where the hair was just growing back in, soft tufts, an inch at most. She knew how her arms looked, covered with scabs, almost worse now that they were healing, the patches of flesh falling away as the healthy skin pushed to the surface. But that was nothing compared to the ruin of her back.

  She hadn’t been able to clean herself in days, and she knew she carried the smell. The long hair on the back of her head, the hair she hadn’t pulled out, was knotted and tangled. Her nails were blackened and broken. Real Beaters usually had no nails left, but how could the girl be expected to notice a detail like that?

  In the second or two it took the girl to cross the last dozen yards of scrubby land, Cass considered standing firm, wrists out, chin up, giving her an easy target. They were taught well; any child over the age of five could find the jugular, the femoral, the carotid, the ulnar. They practiced on dummies rigged from dolls and clothes stuffed with straw. Sometimes, they practiced on the dead.

  At the last minute Cass stepped out of the way.

  She didn’t know why. It would have been easier, so much easier, to welcome the blade, to let it find its path to her vital core and feel the blessed release of her blood, still hot and red despite everything, bubbling over the slice in her flesh, falling to the hardened earth. Maybe her blood would help the land heal faster. Maybe on the spot where her blood fell, one of the plants from Before would return. A delicate mountain bluebell; they had been her favorite, the tiny blossoms shading from pale sky blue to deep lilac.

  But Cass stepped out of the way.

  Damn her soul.

  Three times now it had refused to die, when death would have been so much easier.

  Cass watched almost impassively as her foot shot forward, nimbly, her stance steady and her balance near perfect. The girl’s eyes went wide. She tripped, and in the last moment, when the blade flew from her hand and she lurched toward Cass, the terror in her eyes was enough to break Cass’s heart, if only she still had one to break.

  02

  EVERYONE REMEMBERED THE FIRST TIME THEY saw a Beater. Usually, it was more than one, because even in the early days they gathered in packs, three or four or more of them prowling the edges of town.

  Cass saw hers in the QikGo.

  Cass worked in the QikGo until the end. Where else would she go? She couldn’t leave Silva, not without Ruthie. But as the world fell apart—as famine crippled Africa and South Asia, as one G8 capital after another fell to panic and riots in the wake of random airbursts, as China went dark and Australia mined its shores—Mim and Byrn held on all the tighter to their granddaughter. Cass had no detailed plan, only to wait until there were no more police, no sheriffs, no social workers, no one willing to come when Mim and Byrn called them to block Cass from seeing her daughter or even setting foot on their property.

  When that day came, she would go to their house and she would take Ruthie back. By force if she had to. It would hurt, to see the anger and contempt on her mother’s face, but no more than it had hurt her that Mim refused to acknowledge how far Cass had come, how hard she had worked to be worthy of Ruthie. The ninety-days chip she kept on her key chain. The two-year medallion she’d earned before her single relapse. The job she’d held through it all—maybe managing a convenience store wasn’t the most impressive career in the world, but at least she was helping people in small ways every day rather than fleecing them out of their money, the way Byrn did with his questionable investment strategies. But she and her mother saw things through very different lenses.

  It would not hurt Cass to see her stepfather, who was finally weaker than she was, his ex-linebacker frame now old and frail compared to her own body, which she had made lean and hard with her relentless running. She anticipated the look of powerlessness on Byrn’s face as she took away the only thing he could hurt her with. She looked forward even more to the moment when he knew he had lost. She would never forgive him, but maybe once she got Ruthie back, she could start forgetting.

  That time was almost upon them. Cell phone service had started to go in the last few days and the landlines hadn’t worked for a week. Televisions had been broadcasting static since the government’s last official communication deputizing power and water workers; that had been such a spectacular failure, skirmishes breaking out in the fe
w remaining places there had been peace before, that the rumor was the government had shut down all the media on purpose. Some said it was the Russian hackers. Now they said the power was out over in Angel’s Camp, and every gas station in town had been looted except for Bill’s Shell, where Bill and his two sons-in-law were taking shifts with a brace of hunting rifles.

  Who was going to care about the fate of one little girl now?

  Two days earlier Cass had stopped taking money from customers unless it was offered. Some people seemed to find comfort in clinging to routines from what was quickly becoming “Before”—and if people reached for their wallets then Cass made change. People took strange things. There were those who had come early on for the toilet paper and aspirin and bottled water—and all the alcohol, to Cass’s relief. Now people wandered the aisles aimlessly and took random items that would do them no good anymore. A pre-paid calling card, a map.

  Meddlin, her boss, hadn’t made an appearance for a few days. The QikGo, Cass figured, was all hers. No matter. She didn’t care about Meddlin. The others, the fragile web of workers who staffed the other shifts, had been gone since the media went silent.