Life After Death (#1)

Chapter Ten

Max and Joey made it back to the house with no further dramas, both sinking into the comfortable sofas and sitting in silence for a good while. They had laughed it off but in truth it had been a horrific ordeal and both were still recovering from it. Max knew that he had been terrified throughout, and although Joey would never admit it, he suspected he had been too.

"Thanks for that back there by the way," Joey said with more conviction than anything Max had heard from him since they met.

"No problem mate, just returning the favour," Max smiled.

"I mean obviously I had it covered, but it was nice for you to get some glory for once," Joey teased; both men laughed.

"Hey, you never explained to me why you saved me the other night; you could have died. We both should have died really," Max thought aloud.

"Simple. You needed saving, man," Joey expounded.

"And that's enough?" Max questioned.

"For me, yes, without a doubt. Every single time. My parents raised me to believe that every life is as important as my own, and I agree. Everyone is worth saving, don't you think?" Joey asked.

"I've got to say man, if it was the other way round, I can't be sure I would have done the same thing," Max said with a touch of guilt.

"Well you did today didn't you? I lost my head out there and you waded in after me without a second's thought for your own life. How is that any different?" Joey argued.

"Because you're not a complete stranger. I knew for a fact you were worth saving. You had no idea what kind of person I was," Max maintained.

"True," Joey admitted. "If I'm honest, I was praying that you'd be a cute blonde," he joked.

Max smiled at Joey and both men broke out into a chuckle, before resuming the silence they had sat in before.

"Really? Every life is worth saving?" Max asked, not able to get over this idea.

"Well obviously there's extremes, I wouldn't be busting a gut to save Hitler or anything but yeah, that's just how I was raised. Been donating my blood as much as I can ever since I was eighteen. AB negative; not a lot of donors out there so I'd like to think I saved a few lives," Joey said proudly.

"AB negative? No way! Me too!" Max laughed.

Max and Joey shared a disbelieving laugh, before falling silent, thinking, and both came to the same sudden realisation.

"You don't think...?" Max started.

"Did you get a vaccination?" Joey asked from the edge of his seat.

"Yeah, I'm guessing you did too?" Max responded.

"Yes..." Joey said, the cogs clearly turning in his head.

"So you reckon that orange serum only worked on a tiny percentage of the population, and the rest...turned?" Max enquired.

"0.5% of the population, that's what the doctors always told me when I donated," Joey thought aloud.

"So 99.5% of the world is dead or dying," Max gasped, realising that it was so much worse than he thought.

"That explains why neither of us has found any other survivors until now," Joey agreed.

They sank into another state of silence, coming to terms with this sudden piece of news. After a few minutes, Joey broke the muteness.

"You ready to tell me who John is?" Joey probed, careful not to evoke any kind of anger from Max.

"He was my brother," Max muttered. "He is my brother," he said more firmly.

Joey nodded, understanding what Max meant.

"I'm sorry," he said simply, met by a nod from Max that they both knew meant thank you.

"You actually remind me of him a bit," Max sniggered, thinking back over his childhood growing up with John.

Like Joey he had always been the immature one, constantly joking around.

"Oh, really? Was he black too?" Joey asked, returning them again to a sense of laughter that was becoming common between the two friends.

"I know it sounds awful, but it's kind of a good thing he's gone. Don't get me wrong, I miss him so much, but this isn't a world that anybody should have to live in," Max blurted out.

Joey fell silent and after a few seconds with no reply, Max looked up to see that his friend's mind was clearly elsewhere. He realised that now would be a good time to ask about his family.

"What about you, I'm guessing you didn't grow up here alone," Max probed as delicately as he could.

Joey sighed.

"My parents both died about five years ago, way before any of this. That was when I moved into this place, didn't want to see the family home sold to anyone else, ya know? I moved in here with my girlfriend at the time, T-Tara," Joey stuttered, barely able to make it past her name.

Max could see that Joey was fighting back the tears, and remained quiet without prying further. Joey needed to tell him this in his own time.

"About three years ago, Tara got pregnant. We hadn't been trying, but we were over the moon anyway, don't doubt that! Our little baby wasn't an accident, he was a gift! He was born nine months and seven days later, five pounds, six ounces. God he was beautiful. They were the happiest two years of my life," He continued, clearly welling up, giving up attempting to hide it.

Max reached across, and gave a warm, friendly pat to Joey's thigh, letting him know he was there for him.

"What happened to them Joey?" he asked, fighting off the tears behind his own eyes.

"Tara got infected early on. She must have been one of the first. I got her the vaccine but...obviously it wouldn't have worked. Our baby...little Ben...he just couldn't hang on. He wasn't strong enough, he was a fucking child; he didn't deserve this shit-heap of a world!" Joey cried, tears streaming down his face as he bawled into his hands.

Max moved across to the other sofa and put his hand on Joey's shoulder. No words were spoken, because Max knew no words could help. He just sat there, a constant reminder that Joey was no longer alone.

Joey sniffed and wiped away the water from his eyes.

"What about you man, no family? There must have been someone apart from your brother surely?" Joey asked, maybe trying to take the pressure off himself.

"My parents died years ago, John was the only family I ever had really. Not that I spent enough time with him in his last years. Not enough," Max admitted shamefully.

"No wife? Kids?" Joey asked.

"No, nothing like that. I had a girlfriend years back, we started planning our lives together after she got pregnant. I even had a ring," Max said, scoffing at the last part.

"She...well she lost the baby after 3 months and we could barely look at each other after that. The reminder was just too much, it clouded over any kind of love we ever had for each other," he carried on, growing quieter.

"And after that, I never really got close to anyone again. I guess I never will now," he laughed; not because he found it funny, but because it was the sudden realisation that maybe he had wasted his life; only figuring out now that it was too late.

"I'm glad I saved you Max. I don't think I could have taken the loneliness, the pure isolation, a second longer," Joey confessed.

Max undid his bag and rustled through it until he found two, slightly cold cans of beer he had managed to salvage from one of the houses earlier.

"Well then...to friendship," he toasted, passing a can over to Joey.

Max felt as if he knew Joey now, and he definitely trusted him. Behind all the jokes and bravado, he was the same as Max. Damaged. He had lost people too, and they definitely both needed each other right now.

"Friendship," Joey repeated back, as they clunked the cans together and took a swig, returning once again to silence.