by Stephens, L.
The voice startled him, but a familiar feeling in his chest made him stand to attention.
“Come on, girl!” the voice called again. “Come here!”
Not needing another invitation, he bounded across the park to meet his new lover, his new owner. He didn’t even slow down before he began sliding on the dirt with his belly free and clear and ready for love. Her hand wasted no time in rubbing him just where he wanted, making sure every inch of his belly was loved.
“Aren’t you just the sweetest thing!?” the sweet-smelling girl cooed as she rubbed his belly.
CHAPTER 64: NEW BEGINNINGS
Jill had woken up with the hangover of all hangovers. It took her thirty minutes just to sit up and face the world, and that world was the inside of a playground slide. She knew where she was and how she had gotten there. Jill had a rare gift slash curse of remembering every fucking thing she did when she was drunk, and it seemed last night was especially seared into her mind. Her cheeks felt like they had been coated in mud, and with every blink she could feel the hatchet job her sobbing had done on her makeup. The tears had created streams of eyeliner and eyelash thickener that had become dry creek beds on her cheeks, making them akin to the African plains during a brutal drought. Usually she would forego her beauty routine to do the most important things in her life, like see how many likes she got on Instagram or how many direct messages she got from men offering her cash, sex, dick pics and love, but this morning she was hungover, in a kid’s slide, in public, and she needed to get her life in fucking order.
The compact that Jill got from her purse did her exactly zero favors, other than showing her how much of a hot mess she was of course. The light that activated when she opened it enhanced what she saw, and through the dried makeup, she could see the lines of age starting to show on her face. The lines were like peeled paint on an old clapboard house, sucking away all the beauty that there once was. Jill didn’t break down at this. She was way stronger than that. She kept a stiff upper lip as she began her process of taking away the makeup, stripping away the chips, clearing the road for the new layers of war paint that she would have to add to start her new life, alone and unguarded. The whole process kept her mind free, free from thinking about how sick she felt, how bad a position she was in right now, and, most importantly, it kept her from thinking about him—the fucking asshole who didn’t deserve a nanosecond of her time. Even though she didn’t want to think about him, she was. She was starting to build a hate pyramid, reasons why he didn’t deserve her and how above him she already was and how last night was mutual because everyone got what they wanted. By the time Jill had applied her new coat of armor, she was content. She looked good, and she had worked out all her issues with the asshole. She was now ready to take on the day and see where and who it took her to.
Her phone was like her favorite part of the meal, the dessert. She loved to save it up till last and see all the love that had come to it since she had last checked it. The more love she received, the more energy would run through her. It was her addiction, and she was jonesing right now. She was getting excited. The hit she was going to get was going to be epic. It would be like she had found a connection with an uncut supply straight from the manufacturer, the words “single life” combined with a hashtag was the golden gateway. Her hand reached into her purse with surgeon-like precision, being overly careful not to awaken the screen. She wanted it to light up right in front of her face. She wanted all the love she had gotten while she was asleep to mainline straight through her eyes and into her soul. She expected text messages, missed calls, an Instagram like count, direct message notifications; she expected the whole world to be wanting a piece of her and willing to pay any price to get it.
With the phone inches from her face, she placed her finger on the button at the bottom of the screen and closed her eyes. She wanted to open them to a glorious sight, like a new dawn on the horizon. She pressed the button and could see the light from her phone through her eyelids. Warmth and love was waiting for her, all she needed to do was open her eyes and bathe in it. As she slowly opened her eyes, the phone’s screen came into focus.
“Huh,” Jill whispered.
Jill frantically ran her finger up and down the screen. All the notifications she had been expecting weren’t there. There were just a few of the usual messages and the Instagram like count, but it was tiny in comparison to what she normally got, and this was supposedly a red letter post. There was only one missed call, and that was from her mom, which didn’t mean shit because it didn’t increase her social status, so she ignored it. Jill unlocked the phone, and the small amount of love she had received disappeared. She hit the Instagram app icon, hoping that there had been a mistake, and she breathed out in relief when the app didn’t load. She could see it wasn’t her phone or the reception, as she had full bars and she knew her prepaid sim card was unlimited. Either way, she definitely didn’t want to check any further. She was happy to blame it on a malfunction rather than a lack of interest. It was time to go home. It was time to start her new life, single and carefree, where every direct message and like notification was a new opportunity waiting to happen. She decided she’d reward her followers with an extra sexy photo after she got back to the motel and got into a shower. It would be something provocative, something that would really get some attention.
Jill was about to call a taxi when she heard something that snapped her out of her daydream. It reminded her how vulnerable her current situation was. The dog’s barks that she could hear were close, and that meant one thing. Someone was in the park with her, and God forbid her embarrassment if someone actually saw her coming out of the slide. She exited as casually as she could, for a grown woman coming out of a kid’s slide wearing clothes more suited to a nightclub than a playground. Luckily for her, there was no around as she had assumed. All there was, was a small dog barking incessantly. Dollar symbols flashed in her eyes as Jill looked around the park. The lonely dog looked like a real expensive pedigree, one that could command a real expensive reward.
“Come here, girl” Jill called in her best come hither voice. “Come on!”
The dog stopped barking immediately and looked in her direction, quizzically.
“Come on, girl!” Jill called again. “Come here!”
Before Jill had even finished calling her, the dog started running towards her. Its leash dragging behind it was a telltale sign it was lost, and its purebred look definitely meant a big reward. The dog slid to her feet offering up its belly, and Jill obliged with furious petting of its aforementioned.
“Aren’t you just the sweetest thing!?” Jill said, and she meant it.
The dog’s legs kicked the air with glee as Jill rubbed its belly more until it rolled over and started humping her ankle with reckless abandon, and Jill realized pretty quickly it wasn’t a female.
“Gross!” Jill said as she stepped away from the dog.
The dog came for her again, but Jill grabbed him by the collar, holding him back while he humped the air, trying to get at her ankle. The words “Benjamin Van Holstrum” were elegantly stitched in the leather with a phone number underneath, and she knew she was on to a winner. She just had to play it right. Like all fine things she needed to create a must-have quality about the dog, so she swiftly grabbed the leash, taking ownership of it, and the dog growled in protest, but within seconds, it was bounding in front of Jill on her way down the street.
CHAPTER 65: EGGS & BAKEY
The yapping of a distant dog woke Daryl from his surprisingly deep and, even more unsettling, restful sleep. He lay there for a moment trying to ignore the morning light before he sat bolt upright like he had slept in and was late for work.
“Goddamnit!” Daryl whispered to himself as he rubbed the back of his head. “I’m still in this fucking nightmare.”
Electricity ran through his body as his hand found the small knot that rose out of his skull. He pulled off the ski mask and grimaced as the threads stuck to the dry bl
ood of his wound. In the early morning light, it was deemed out of style, so he discarded it. Daylight brought all kinds of drama to a large black man wearing a ski mask rolled into a beanie, carrying a gun and an envelope stuffed with ten-grand in cash. He didn’t want to look too on brand, given the shitty luck that was raining down on him. Using his best Web M.D. logic, he kept pressing the impact zone on his skull, believing that if he could touch it without too much pain, it wasn’t going to kill him. He felt hungover, even though he hadn’t had a drink in over a week. He assumed it was a side effect of the concussion and hoped a nice coffee with some eggs and bacon followed by rolling around in thirty thousand dollars would fix him right up.
Flashes of the previous night rushed through his mind, taking away the upbeat feeling that had been gathering steam. There was a sense of regret that had come to the surface. He had been so close to getting the job done, and he could have done it all by himself, but as usual he over thought it. More memories of the night before began to surface. There was so much danger and blood and running and police and Ray and Ray on fire. It was like a shitty eighties movie. Daryl frantically pat himself down, looking for his gun, and breathed a sigh of relief when he found it, still safe and sound in his waistband. He was finally done with this shit. He just wanted to go home and forget all this ugliness, but he needed to see Jake first and punch him squarely in the face. He pulled out his phone, and unsurprisingly text messages from Jake filled his notification screen, and Daryl didn’t even check the messages. He just went straight to his contacts and called him.
“This mother fucker!” Daryl said as he put the phone to his ear. “He dead.”
The phone seemed to ring for a couple minutes, and he expected that it would go to voicemail before the muffled sounds of a repeating drum in a wind tunnel came through from the other side. Daryl looked at the phone to make sure he had in fact connected with Jake’s number, and sure enough the screen displayed his name and the seconds counting up.
“Jake,” Daryl said stiffly into the phone.
A deep whoosh came from the phone, and Daryl stood up raising his phone to God above, thinking that may help him get better reception. He brought the phone back to his ear, but the whooshing and distorted drum were still there.
“Jake! Come on, man!” Daryl spat into the phone. “Where are you?”
“Running!” Jake’s distant voice replied almost immediately.
“Jake?” Daryl yelled. “What did you say?”
“Running! I’m running!” Jake said between pants before the phone went dead.
“Jake, Jake!” Daryl yelled into the phone.
Daryl looked at the phone and, seeing the call had ended, started shaking it.
“Damnit,” Daryl said under his breath. “You’re double dead now, mother fucker!”
He looked off into the distance, trying to get his bearings, before going back to the phone and pressing Jake’s name in the recent call list. The phone rang again as Daryl paced around the rooftop until the ringing suddenly stopped and the phone came to life.
“Hey!” Jake said brightly.
“About fucking time, man!” Daryl hissed. “Where—”
“You’ve reached Jake, and he’s busy now with the zombie apocalypse,” Jake interrupted continuing his light-hearted tone. “Just so you know, I’m probably dead, so don’t come to my funeral, cause I’m gonna fucking eat you if you do!”
A loud beep sounded in Daryl’s ear.
“Jake, call me fucking back,” Daryl said, walking to the edge of the roof. “I’m not in the mood for any more of your fucking jokes!”
Daryl ended the phone call and sat down on the roof with his feet dangling over the edge.
“I can’t believe this guy,” Daryl said to himself as he began to ease himself down. “This asshole is gonna get me killed.”
He hung from the roof by his hands and then let himself drop the couple of feet to the ground. He tried to ignore the rush of blood that went to his head as he landed. Dying of the side effects from blunt force trauma was at the bottom of his to-do list. As he was straightening up, he saw a pair of raggedy shoes connected to a pair of torn pants, and his eyes followed the legs up till he found himself face to face with a vagrant. The shoes were covered in blood, but Daryl knew they were a pair of Adidas Stan Smith’s in the all-white slash all-blood colorway.
“What the fuck you want?” Daryl hissed.
The zombie growled and bared its teeth, reaching for him, but Daryl was already taking a step sideways away from him. If Daryl wasn’t pissed already, he was now, and this was the last thing he needed, some asshole trying to fuck with him. The vagrant was short and looked like Kevin Hart. He was clearly no match for Daryl, which annoyed him even more if that was possible. He looked around the park to see if anyone was in the vicinity and, most importantly, witnessing what was about to happen.
“Alright, if that’s the way you want to play it,” Daryl said as he took the gun from his waistband. He racked the slide of the gun and aimed it squarely at Zombie Kevin Hart’s forehead, but that didn’t stop him. He kept coming for Daryl. The end of the gun was the only thing stopping him from coming closer.
“I’m not the guy you want to fuck with right now, Kev,” Daryl said, twisting the gun.
He looked around the park one more time and saw no one was around, but he still decided, even though L.A. didn’t need another mentally-challenged homeless person, he wasn’t going to kill him. Zombie Kevin Hart reached for Daryl’s hand, and his head came apart before the sound of the gun firing filled the air. Daryl took a shocked step back as the body dropped to the ground in a bloody pile. A small stream of smoke came from the barrel, and regret washed over Daryl. He had never killed someone before, and he couldn’t understand why he had even entertained the idea in the first place. It was dumb. He was home free, and there was barely anything connecting him to the truck heist. There was no need to add a homicide to the list. Daryl heard a growl and looked up, there were ten zombies ten feet away, just standing there looking at him, but these ones looked in a lot worse shape than Zombie Kevin Hart, and suddenly the previous night’s events combined with what Jake had said in his voice message started to make sense.
“What the fuck is going on here?” Daryl said to the group. “Y’all okay?”
The gang of zombies began lumbering towards him.
“Now come on, guys,” Daryl said while he backed away, still pointing his gun at them. “I don’t want no beef.”
His movement excited them, and they sped up as they released growls of blood lust, and Daryl didn’t hesitate, shooting the closest zombie in the chest, but the bullet didn’t even slow him down. He just kept staggering forward.
“What the fuck?” Daryl said before inserting another three bullets into his chest to similar effect.
Daryl took the hint. It was finally clear that getting home and eating a nice plate of bacon and eggs was not going to be as easy as he thought. He turned and began sprinting away from them.
CHAPTER 66: BACKSEAT DRIVER
They were driving through the zombie filled streets, and it was a fucking disaster zone, but Ryan couldn’t believe his luck. Not only was former teen sweetheart Sarah Dale driving him around, he also had the porn star Lynne Van Wylde packed in the back with him. Her daughter was there too, but still, it was like total kismet. They both were in the twilights of their careers, and Ryan ran a high-end celebrity escort service. Lynne was just a novelty, a little bonus to have on the books, but Sarah would be the star attraction. There would be a bunch of perverted nouveau riche startup kids wanting to act out their fantasies and bang Giselle from Sunshine High. Ryan guessed she wasn’t with dirty David Reynolds anymore, which was pretty unsurprising seeing as he had less standards than himself.
Their dumbass plan had been to head straight to the army blockade that was only a couple blocks away and hope that the asshole guy that had lured the zombies away would meet them there. He had tried to persuade them that it was
not a good idea but they had ignored him as usual. Standard dumb bitches, doing dumb shit, and Ryan sitting back, waiting for it all to crumble around them. With Lynne in the middle of the back seat, inertia pushed Ryan into her as Sarah gunned the car around a corner, and it was more than enough time for him to take hold of her midriff until the car straightened up.
“Get off me you creep!” Lynne hissed.
She shrugged him off, stopping him from leaning on her and trying to work his hands up to her tits. He let go, but he knew there would be more time for that later.
“Calm down. It’s not my fault!” Ryan said, putting on his seat belt. “She’s driving like a lunatic up there.”
Sarah looked back over her shoulder at him and gave the standard “what the fuck?” hand gesture you would give to some ass hat who had randomly stopped in the middle of the street.
“Didn’t you say there was an army road blockade around here?” Sarah called back to Lynne.
“I thought it was right here!” Lynne said, craning her head around. “I don’t think we passed it.”
Ryan looked out the window, trying to gather his bearings. As they went through an intersection, he saw the asshole they were looking for running with a horde of zombies close behind him a block over. He looked to Sarah and then to Lynne to see if they had noticed him too, but they hadn’t, and Ryan weighed up his options for the briefest of moments.
“Where are we going?” Ryan asked, leaning forward. “This isn't the right way.”
“What are you talking about?” Sarah said, turning another corner. “We have to double back and go get Jake!”
“I got to go to my office!” Ryan said, tugging on Sarah’s shoulder.
“Don’t fucking touch me, guy!” Sarah yelled, joining the shrug off Ryan brigade. “Who the fuck, are you, anyway?”
“Who the hell are any of you?” Lynne said.
