by Gill, Bonnie
"One news anchor said the whole epidemic started with rats in Los Angeles and Boston. Maybe that's what she meant?" I'm still thinking about that one. I hope she doesn’t mean the neighborhood has a rodent problem.
I place a pair of jeans with elastic around the waist, two different shirts, and underwear outside the bathroom door. Her dirty clothes lay in a pile next to them. I can almost see wafts of odor streaming from them like the character in the Peanuts comics. I grab a doily, using it to pick up her clothes and toss them into the washer with extra soap.
"Let's take care of the lady in two-oh-five." Dean heads out the door and leads the way back to our neighbor with the wrist bite.
Sure enough, she's a gabbie. This time we draw her outside before Dean shoots her. You never know when we'll need supplies or a different shelter. We don't want zombie brains all over the fruit loops.
On our way back, I tell Dean about Joey and Vinny.
"We could use the help keeping everyone here safe," he says.
"I invited them to stay, but they're waiting on their mothers to arrive from Arkansas," I tell him.
"Really? Do they think they'll actually make it?" he asks.
"Yes. They were quite sure of it. Anyway, Star says both of the guys were in the military, and going by the way they held their weapons, I believe her. I gave them a radio." I should have done more to entice them to stay.
"We should take a road trip and hit the Army surplus store to see if we can grab more supplies," Dean says.
"Do you think it's safe?"
"Nope. But it'll probably never be safe." Dean checks the magazine in his gun as if it just dawned on him to do so.
"How many other people are still here?" I ask.
"None. I saw them all leave while you were sleeping."
I don’t know whether to be happy or sad about that news. "Let me send up a drone before we head out." Last Christmas, Star bought me this super cool drone with a live video feed as a gift. I'll be able to check the neighborhood for gabbies before we leave.
"Good idea." He turns in time to see Helga coming out of Betty's a couple of houses over.
She's wearing a pink shirt with ruffles on it. Her red hair is still a knotted mess, but at least it's clean. She has on a purple skirt. Oh, and she's wearing hiking boots. She grins at me, displaying green, leafy stuff stuck in her teeth. "I don't know if I like you." She raises her finger and points at me while raising her eyebrows up and down.
"Ditto," I say.
"Be very careful. I can place a spell on you." She lets out a wicked witch cackle.
Great. Just what I need.
8
Star, Daria, Mrs. Garcia, and Helga stand around the prehistoric computer in my living room. The internet is still up, and they're emailing everyone they can think of to see if they're still alive. Mrs. Garcia and Daria haven't had any responses. The emergency radio is broadcasting safe zones in the area. So far, there's five within ten miles of us.
I pull out my drone and set it up. It's connected to my tablet and my phone. We decide to use the tablet this time because its screen is bigger. The drone is about twelve inches in diameter, has four propellers on top, and has a five-mile range. The surplus store is only about two miles away. So, we should be okay. There are about three hours of light left. If we check out the area and everything is clear, we'll head out right away. I send the drone up in the air.
Dean is looking over my shoulder. "Take it up a little higher."
I fly up and over our neighborhood, above the main road in our little town. Several gabbies stroll down the street as if it's a summer day, and they're leisurely shopping. I snap out of the fantasy and into reality when one trips over something in the road. He falls, and two other zombies rush over to him. Instead of helping him, they pounce on him, pulling strips of skin and muscle from his torso. His abdomen is torn open, and ribbons of entrails hang from their mouths and fingers.
I wince. “Oh, ick. It's like watching a horror movie.” Thank goodness the video feed is in black and white. Color would've been ten times worse.
I fly over to several stores. Some of the windows are broken, and food, appliances, and tampons are scattered on the street. Too bad, us women will need every tampon we can find for the future. I hate to think about when the supply runs out. About fifteen zombies shamble around in the road. A few are missing various parts of their body. I pull back and fly around the area looking for any living human beings, but I don't see any. "There are plenty of gabbies but no humans," I say to Dean.
"Good. I'd hate to have to deal with more than one enemy at a time." Dean is loading rounds into a magazine. He snaps it into his pistol. He has a look on his face that shows he means business, and he's not messing around.
"Do you think the other survivors are hostel already? It's only been a couple of days." Human nature always blows my mind. I wouldn't put it past people to lose it, but I want to hold onto some hope.
"Let's assume the worst and be cautious.” He loads another magazine and shoves it into his pocket.
I fly the drone back over the surplus store. Everything looks the same. "When we go, we go with with silencers so we don't bring attention to ourselves if we do need to shoot something." I hit the buttons for the drone to return home.
"You have silencers?" he asks.
"Yes. Several." I leave it at that. No time to spill my guts on the Seth story. The drone lands, and I place it back into the specially designed case.
We pack up my truck with a rifle and pistol for each of us. I hand him a silencer that fits his weapon.
"You've been hiding all your fun toys from me. You drive, I'll keep a lookout," Dean says.
"We're going to need more ammo soon. If we use fifty to a hundred rounds a day, we're going to burn through our reserves fast." I start the truck.
"You're right. I've only stocked a thousand rounds." He scratches his head. "I never thought I'd need more." That's what prepping is all about. Being prepared for when stuff actually happens. Ammunition is one of the most important things to stockpile, along with food and your bug-out bag.
"And you call yourself a prepper," I tease.
"We can pick some up at the gun shop,” he says.
The gabbies on the road are wandering around, sniffing the air. “This is the part I don't get. How on earth can they smell us? And how can they walk if they're dead? This whole zombie stuff boggles my mind,” I say.
Dean shrugs.
I look in my rearview mirror. They’re following us. “We have about ten on our tail so far. I hope they lose interest."
Dean swivels in his seat to look out the back window. "Let's go a few blocks over and take them out."
I head over to an industrial area. Several gabbies are stuck inside a fenced parking lot. I pull over next to it.
We get out and keep the open door between us and the undead.
"If it gets to be too many, we'll leave," Dean says.
I nod. There's no way I'm going to jeopardize my safety. That's plain stupid.
The first few limp and shuffle around the corner.
I line up my first shot and hit a female zombie wearing a tracksuit in the forehead. Her head snaps to the back, and she pivots to the right before she goes down. "Yes!" I pump my fist in the air.
Dean shoots me a look. "Really?"
"Hey, you have to take the victories when you can, even if they’re small." I line up another shot. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a male gabbie in a business suit with shoulder pads go down. "He totally deserved that just for his fashion choice. Shoulder pads are so eighties."
"You're enjoying yourself a little too much." Dean fires at another. The granny zombie's chest blossoms a red flower. She staggers but keeps coming at us.
I shoot her in the side of the head, and her ear goes flying. She finally tumbles down.
We take out all the gabbies with one or two shots each.
"Ready?" I ask Dean.
He furrows his brow. "Does it bother y
ou? Shooting all these people?"
"Of course. I have to think of them as monsters. They're not human anymore. I don't know if I can shoot a gabbie child though." Thank goodness most of the zombies have been taking care of that for us. It seems they prey on the weak and slower ones of their herds.
Dean carries a heaviness in his eyes, the weight of sorrow and regrets. I've never seen him rattled, but this shakes him to the core.
We get back into the truck.
"To the surplus store." I start the truck and put it in drive. We make it there in record time because the streets are deserted. The main street feels like a ghost town. I wouldn't be surprised to see tumbleweeds blowing across the road.
"It seems kind of eerie." Dean says, scanning the streets.
"No doubt." I pull into a spot in front of the store. A gabbie wearing a nightshirt and one slipper staggers over to us. Dean stabs her in the eye and she drops. I open the door to the store. Inside, the shelves have been almost picked clean. "Someone beat us here." It's disappointing. They took almost every useful thing. The only stuff left are patches, keychains, and stuff like that. "Let's try the back. Maybe they didn't hit the backstock."
I wait by the door to the storeroom for Dean to catch up to me. I twist the handle and fling open the door.
A gabbie in fatigues comes barreling out, full speed ahead.
I shoot at him but miss. He swivels his head and looks straight at me. It's Barry Thornberg. I used to fix his Hummer at the shop. One time, he brought it in for new brakes and gave me a twenty-dollar tip. He's a super nice guy. Or at least, he was. He had a son and a daughter in grade school, and his wife was a hair stylist. My head does a little spinny thing right as he lunges for me. I see his dirty, crusty nails heading for my face.
Dean shoots Barry right between the eyes. Barry falls to the ground, his fingers still moving.
"Thank you."
Inside the storeroom are three boxes of MREs, a couple of backpacks, and some glow sticks. We pack them up.
"Do you want to check Lock and Load while we're out?" I don’t want to make another trip. The more time we spend out of the community, the more vulnerable we are.
"I was going to suggest that," Dean says.
We load up the truck and drive to the small gun shop with a shooting range about three blocks away. Several SUVs and trucks are lined up in front of it, and the parking lot is full.
"What in the heck?" Something is stuck to a few of the hoods. I lean in closer to the windshield to get a better view. The idiots have attached zombie heads to their trucks like hood ornaments. It's totally gross. One has maggots crawling out of its nose. Outside they have several heads mounted on stakes.
"Drive away fast," Dean says.
He doesn’t need to say anything else. I push the pedal down, almost to the floor. While we pass, I notice a guy standing next to the building with an AR-15.
"There are two men on the roof," Dean says.
"I saw. I don't think those are friendlies. Let's take the long way home. No sense in leading them right to our little sanctuary.”
"Good idea." Dean swivels his head back and forth, keeping watch for a tail.
I think about the zombie heads on their hoods. "Who does that? What kind of sick, crazy whackos do that?" I have bile stuck in my throat. Seriously, this is mind-boggling.
"As I said, everyone's morals are compromised when civilization collapses." Dean keeps watch out the back window as I drive.
We’re a few blocks away from home when I see two little girls standing in the road. As I slow down, I notice they’re wearing light blue dresses and have big bows on top of their heads. The closer I get, the more my nerves fray.
They have dark circles around their eyes and blood dripping from their mouths. I have flashbacks to a horror movie I watched years ago.
"Run them over," Dean says without hesitation.
My heart races faster than a stock car on race day. I clench the steering wheel tighter.
"Run. Them. Over," Dean says again, only he enunciates each word.
My knuckles are white as I grip even harder on the steering wheel. I accelerate a little more.
"Hit them!" Dean yells.
I swerve at the last minute. We run over the curb and onto the sidewalk. I swear my heart is beating so fast it’s going to break my ribs and fly out of my chest.
"What are you doing?" Dean asks.
"I can't run them over. They're children." I'm breathing as if I just lifted a six-hundred-pound engine by myself.
"They're zombies. And they're creepy as f..."
"Don't." I hold up my hand. "I know. I'm going to have nightmares for at least the next week." I look back to where they were standing. They're gone. "Where the heck did they go?" I turn my head, looking back and forth, but I don't see them.
"Now that's spooky. It's like they disappeared." Dean's face is pale.
"I'm getting out of here." I press the pedal.
We drive down several side streets. No other vehicles are on the road. We pass a few groups of twenty or more gabbies.
It's dusk by the time we park my truck next to my mobile home.
"Are we going to tell everyone what we saw?" I ask.
"It won't do any good keeping them in the dark." Dean slings the backpacks we found over his shoulder.
I carry in a box of MREs.
The first thing I notice is the smell. The awesome scent of Mrs. Garcia's homemade enchiladas. I can taste the chilies and spicy red sauce already. "Something smells good." I step into the kitchen.
A young man with wavy black hair and big brown eyes greets me. "Hello, Raven." He wraps his arms around me for a giant hug.
"I'm so glad you’re okay," I say to Ben. Ben is Mrs. Garcia's grandson. He turned twenty a couple of months ago. He stops by about once a month to see his grandmother. I look around but don't see his parents.
He must realize what I’m doing and says, "I haven't heard from them.”
It feels like an engine block drops on my chest. "I'm so sorry." I glance up at Mrs. Garcia.
Her eyes are red-rimmed, but she has a smile on her face. "Ben drove up from Chicago."
"How was the trip?" I ask.
"A nightmare." He turns as if to say he doesn't want to talk about it.
I ignore the hint. "Are the roads blocked?"
He turns back to me. "All the main highways are blocked and some side streets. I drove through the night to get here. Gabbies are everywhere. The two cars that followed me didn't make it. I was lucky because I drive a Mini. I could squeeze through where other cars couldn't. Three of my friends where attacked and died before I even left school."
"I'm so sorry. I'm glad you're okay." Now I feel like crap for making him relive it.
Star, Daria, and Helga join us.
"I'm calling a meeting in two hours. That'll give us enough time to eat and have our funeral service. Do you think you can get the two Italian stallions here by then?"
Star and Daria give me a puzzled look.
"Joey and Vinny," I clarify.
"I can't call him. The phones are down," Star says as she folds her arms across her chest.
"Use the hand-held radio," I say. Right now, my patience is paper-thin. With everything that has happened today, I don't need sister sass.
"I'll do it," Daria says. She strolls out of the room.
"What's going on?" Mrs. Garcia asks.
"I'll explain everything when we’re all together."
9
We eat our delicious enchiladas and head outside. We stand around Dorothy's, Edith's, and Betty's grave. Helga places Mrs. Garcia's colored stones around the mound. Everyone has tears streaming from their eyes. Mrs. Garcia talks about all the good times they'd shared.
We go inside, and Star arranges the chocolate chip cookies she had baked on a platter.
Vinny and Joey knock on the door. I let them inside.
Everyone is now packed inside my living room.
Star, Daria, and
Helga sit on the couch. Mrs. Garcia and Ben are on the love seat. Joey and Vinny are perched on chairs from the kitchen like two gargoyles waiting to pounce. They look ready for anything, including gabbies. Dean and I lean against the wall.
Mrs. Garcia serves coffee and the homemade chocolate chip cookies.
"Circumstances have changed. We need a plan," I say.
"I thought we were going to hang here until the power goes off." Star shoots a glance at Dean.
"We're going to have to leave earlier. We have some neighbors who might cause some trouble," Dean says.
We tell everyone about the group at Lock and Load and their zombie trophies. We leave the creepy little girls out of the story for now. If we're lucky, their gabbie family will take care of them.
"We have to assume they know how to use their weapons. They'll have plenty of ammo. A whole store full, in fact." I pace back and forth across the room. I hate that we are having to alter our plans. There's no telling if we're going from bad to worse or even if we are serving ourselves up to the crazies.
"They sound insane. Why would someone mount gabbie heads on the hood of their cars?" Star asks.
"They're trying to intimidate us," Joey says. He keeps looking at Star with puppy dog eyes. I swear I can see imaginary hearts swirling around his head. I kind of feel sorry for the guy. My sister is beautiful, smart, and compassionate. She also has a strict rule about lying. If he wasn't lying, I can understand why she wouldn’t want a hitwoman as a mother-in-law. Star could find herself on the woman's kill list if they ever broke up.
Vinny matches his cousin in gear but keeps glancing at Daria. His brown eyes are the same as Joey's except there's even more mischief lurking behind those long lashes.
"Someone will keep watch around the clock. We should have two people. We don't know how dangerous these guys are. Sooner or later, we're going to cross paths," Dean says.
"Joey, is there any way you two can stay here and leave your moms a note or something? We have too many people to move into one house."
"We can stay one night here and then move everyone over by us tomorrow. The houses on our block are vacant. We have already cleared the dead from them. We also set booby traps,” Joey says. His grin sparkles with mischief.
