Foamers by Justin Kassab Page B

miles for someone you loved?” She hurried after him.
    “No.”
    “Then why do you like the song?” she asked, catching up.
    “Cause I would walk five hundred miles, and then walk five hundred more.”
    “Are you often in love?” she asked, watching his face for any read she could find.
    “ And I would walk five hundred more —” he belted out.
    “ And I would walk five hundred more —” she rolled her eyes and sang along.
    “ Just to be the man who walked a thousand miles ,” X continued, then collapsed onto
his knees. He slumped with his arms hanging to his side and stared ahead with glassy
eyes.
    The cold water had worn him down, the chilly night had weakened him, the lack of
sleep had left him without recovery, and the march had broken what little strength
he had left. He had pushed himself to the max, but it wasn’t enough.
    He didn’t want to delay Ashton’s return to Kade. Kade was the only person X didn’t
want to let down. The two of them went back practically to their births. X had been
raised by a single mom, and was often looked after by Kade’s parents when she was
at work.
    X had never bonded with Damian or Ashton, but Kade was the closest thing he had to
a brother. There was nothing that he wouldn’t do for the Zerris family, and Kade
had proved on more than one occasion that their relationship was a two-way street.
Kade had even crossed Mick to keep X from going to jail.
    Though X wasn’t a keen believer in Kade’s Shenanigans plan, he owed Kade too much
to not help him. He didn’t care if Kade was right or wrong, this was a matter of
loyalty.
    Ashton rushed back and knelt beside him, placing her hand on his shoulder. His head
drifted to the side as the fog crept into his mind. He was exhausted, his muscles
were shot, and his body didn’t want to move.
    “Catchy?” he asked, referring to the song.
    “You must not be in love right now. That was hardly a thousand miles.”
    “Five hundred and then five hundred more.”
    She smiled, reassuring him. “We’ll make camp here.”
    X nodded. At some point he had to listen to his body and rest.
    * * *
    Tiny held a sheet of wood, which had once been the back of a dresser, against the
frame of a second-floor window. “Do you really think that’ll keep someone out?” she
asked Grace.
    The group had finished searching the dorm rooms. In all six floors, they had found
no one truly alive. They had found ten dead bodies and the one foamer that Kade had
peppered with the shotgun. They all split into separate jobs to make the dorm livable
and fortified.
    Grace, free from the handcuffs while she was working, drilled a metal screw through
the wood and into the frame. “We’re on the second floor. Not likely anyone will get
this far, and even if they do get through, the stairs will be knocked out. Don’t
worry, I’ll wall up the first floor.”
    Grace moved around Tiny as she inserted screws every foot around the perimeter of
the window.
    “I didn’t get a chance to thank you.” Tiny paused, not used to the words forming
on her tongue. “So, thanks for saving my life.”
    Biting down on her lip, Grace steadied the screw and drilled it home. “It was the
right thing to do.”
    “I know it’s rough right now. Mick is taking Lucas’s death a lot harder than I thought
he would. Once he has some time to recover, you’ll see he isn’t so bad,” Tiny said.
    She and Grace stood back, looking at the flimsy piece of wood barricading the window.
    “Thanks … What’s your real name?” Grace asked.
    Tiny rapped a knuckle against the wood. “My father gave me my last name, my mother
gave me my first name, Kade gave me my real name. It’s Tiny.”
    “Let me guess: you had trouble fitting in, and he took you under his wing?”
    “Making a long story short.” The long story was that she had been so much of a tomboy
that the girls didn’t accept her, but she acted so manly the guys didn’t know how
to treat her. She lied to herself that she