A.K.A. No Time for a Love Story (Book 1): Just Another Day

by Sims, Jacob Louis

  “I’ll drag his stupid ass out if I have to, and if he won’t hurry, I’ll just shoot him in his leg or something and leave him. I don’t even care that we’ll have wasted all this time, nearly dying and shit; if that motherfucker tries that ‘just wait a minute while I get ready’ crap I’m gonna fuck him up. Bad. We won’t have the fuckin’ time for that shit, once we get there.”

  34

  A little after 2:15, we crossed through the pasture that outlaid the northeast part of Dalzell and approached the cattle fence that lets goes into Barney-Riva Street, the street Joey’s house was on. Once there, we crouched behind it with our weapons at the ready and surveyed the area.

  “Looks clear to me,” I said to Frank, “do you see zombies anywhere?”

  “No,” he answered, “I don’t see shit. Looks safe to move.”

  “Okay, here we go….”

  We hopped the fence and made our way to Joey’s front door at a trot, where we found that it had been broken clean off its hinges. Blood caked the doorframe and the outer walls of his house, around the door.

  “Be ready for anything,” I whispered to him. “The way into his attic’s in his bathroom. Let’s clear the rest of the house before we breach that. Eyes open.”

  “Gotcha,” Frank whispered back with a hard, determined look on his face. “In and out.”

  “Right.”

  We quickly cleared the house and closed the doors. We found nothing - just lots of blood, and the corpse of a zombie laying half in and half out the back door, which I dragged out so I could close the door - and went to the bathroom door, where we stood quietly, listening for any movement. After standing for five minutes and hearing nothing, I motioned to Frank that I was gonna do a countdown with my fingers and that I wanted to breach the door on one. So at one, I kicked the door in and Frank rushed in with his weapon, ready to fire.

  The bathroom was empty.

  “Joey! Hey Joey!” I yelled up at the attic entrance. “We’re here to save you buddy! Me and Frank! You alive up there, man?! If you are, please respond! Say something!”

  I didn’t expect a joke response like Frank gave me when he crawled out from under the hood, ‘cause Joey’s sense of humor sucked - and wasn’t surprised one bit when he didn’t respond at all. I did hear some furtive movement from up there, though, and so did Frank.

  “Okay… you heard that, too,” I whispered, figuring that if whatever was up there couldn’t hear us, it might forget about us - if it was zombie-Joey and not live-Joey (although sometimes it was hard to distinguish the two from one another). “We gotta be under the impression that Joey is now a zombie. Even Joey would’ve said something if he realized that someone was in his house without his permission. I’m gonna go up there, quick and hot, cool?”

  “Cool. How you gonna get up there, though? Is there a ladder somewhere?”

  “Yeah, outside. Wait here, just in case he says something or tries coming down. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  Once back in the house with Joey’s neighbors ladder, I set it up under the attic trap door and climbed up - with my pack off - and stopped just below it.

  “If anything happens,” I whispered down to Frank, “like if a zombie or whatever grabs me and starts eating me, just light us the fuck up, dude. Alright?”

  “Yeah, alright,” he whispered back. “But nothings gonna happen, so just shut the fuck up with that shit.”

  “Hope not. Okay, here goes nothing.”

  I lunged my upper half up through the hatch - and quickly saw that there was no immediate threat. The attic, however, was a complete fucking disaster. It smelled like raw shit and stale piss, and there was garbage strewn all over the place - crusty, empty food containers, empty soda bottles and cans, globs of unrecognizable food stuck to the floor and walls, and piles of what looked like vomit. The stench was almost unbearable - I nearly puked in my mouth.

  At the far end of the attic, I could see Joey - illuminated by scented candles that were positioned throughout the attic - with his back to me, hunkered down over something, tossing his head from side to side.

  “Okay, I see him,” I whispered down to Frank. “C’mon up. But be ready, I can’t tell if he’s alive or not. It looks like he’s eating or something, I can’t tell.”

  After he got up there with me (and after he stopped gagging ‘cause of the odorificness), we made our way to where Joey was at, who was still oblivious to our presence. When we got near him, we saw what it was that he was doing. And it was fucking disgusting!

  He was tearing into one of his cats with his teeth, like a wild animal, and was covered in its blood and gore. Beside him, laying on some roof insulation, was the corpse of his other cat, eaten down to the bone.

  “Holy shit! What the fuck are you doing, you freak!” Frank yelled as he swatted the cat out of Joey’s hands, finally getting his attention. “You fucking make me sick!”

  I didn’t say anything, ‘cause I still wasn’t sure Joey was alive - I just stood quietly at Frank’s side with my AR’s barrel inches from Joey’s face, waiting for him to do even the slightest stupid thing. Like flinch. Or blink. Instead… he talked.

  “Wha…… wha……” he stammered, blinked repeatedly, and squinted his eyes like he wasn’t sure we were real. “What…… are you guys doing here?”

  I was a little let down. I was hoping deep down that he was a fuckin’ zombie, I really was. Not because I wanted to shoot him in his face, or anything, but because of what he did to his cats. He loved those cats, it was sick (seriously) how much he did, and to see him ripping raw meat off the cat’s hind leg like he was eating a piece of chicken really spoke of the kind of person we had risked our lives to save. We were gonna bring that back to Gus’s. I almost shot him anyway.

  “What the fuck do you think we’re doing here, Joey?” I sternly asked him, the barrel of my AR still in his face. Frank had walked away, towards the hatch, but was still keeping a good eye on Joey - he just didn’t want to be near him. Neither did I. “We are here to save you. You left me a message, don’t you remember? Around four days ago?”

  “Oh… yeah… I did… but I didn’t think you would come. I thought I was going to die up here. I ran out of food a couple days ago…. and was soooooo hungry…,” he said, as he glanced over at the cat Frank had hit out of his hands.

  “You sick fuck. You said you had enough food for a week! A week! It’s only been four fucking days! I should fucking shoot you right now, and drag your fat ass out for the zombies to eat. I……” I had to walk away, too.

  I was about to Frank when I heard a rustling sound, and saw movement in a dark corner of the attic from the corner of my eye. “What the fuck?”

  “It… it’s nothing, nothing,” Joey groggily said from his knees on the floor where I had left him. “Don’t worry about it…… it’s nothing… really…”

  “Nothing doesn’t move, Joey,” I said over my shoulder. Frank had come to my side and had his MP5 trained on Joey, ‘cause he noticed Joey was acting a little hinky.

  I got to the moving bundle - that was oddly human-shaped - and bent down and removed the blanket that had been thrown over it. I could not believe my fucking eyes - it was Joey’s mom, tied up with clothes-line, and she was a fuckin’ zombie. I reflexively lurched backwards, and fired into her face - turning it into mush.

  At that moment, I heard an amazingly loud, inhuman wail from behind me, and turned in time to see the muzzle flash from Frank’s weapon as he put down Joey - who came to a thudding halt at my feet, clutching a pretty big kitchen knife in his gore-stained right hand.

  “Holy shit, Dave! I didn’t mean to do that! I turned around from watching you shoot his mom and he was right there! I just shot without thinking… he was gonna fucking kill you! I…”

  Frank then popped, puking up all the beer we had drank on the way there, plus those dee-licious cookies. I knew how he felt. Even though I told Joey I wanted to shoot him, I most likely wasn’t gonna do it. After all, he was our friend, a
nd we did go there to save him. I fuckin’ felt like puking myself.

  “Hey, you did the right thing, man. Like you said, he was gonna kill me, stab me in my back with that pig-sticker. You didn’t do anything wrong, really. You just saved my life, Frank. Thank you.”

  “Yeah, but I still feel like shit about it,” Frank responded, spitting on the floor. “The stupid fucker… what was he thinking? The bitch was a zombie! Fuck!”

  “Well, you know how he felt about his mom… He just couldn’t cut that fuckin’ cord. Pathetic. What a fucking waste… Fuck! We may as well get going back. We just might make it before the sun goes down, if we’re lucky.”

  “Yeah, okay, let’s go…”

  35

  After we got out of the attic, with the hatch closed up tight to block out the oppression within, we figured we’d go through Joey’s house to see if there was anything in there we might have needed. One never knows. Plus, since the stupid fuck was dead, he didn’t need any of his shit anymore.

  What we found in the kitchen was quite the surprise: his fuckin’ cupboards and fridge were full-up with food. We could not fucking believe it. His mommy must’ve brought it over for him when the dead first started walking, ‘cause he had never bought this much food for himself before, especially of the un-microwavable kind. For some reason or other, the freak had resorted to eating his beloved kitties, while right down below his fat, retarded ass was enough food to last him way more than the week he had mentioned in his message to me. It was mind-boggling, and not worth the brain-power spent thinking about it. So we moved on.

  There wasn’t much else of use in his house: just a shit-ton of useless cd’s, dvd’s, records, and collectibles that were worthless even before the world went to shit. The only thing of any worth in the whole place was the food. So, instead of leaving it to waste (like Joey seemed to have been doing), Frank and I bagged it all up, and loaded it and our gear into Joey’s pride and joy - his Mustang.

  We had both decided that walking clear back to Gus’s was not gonna happen - the trip to Joey’s was kinda shitty, aside from the brief time spent in Ethel’s house, and the relaxing walk through the airfield - and figured we could ride in style and relative safety for at least a little of the way there.

  “Before we go, there’s something I wanna do,” I told Frank as he was getting into the driver’s seat of the ‘Stang. “Wait here for me, it’ll only take a couple minutes.”

  “Okay, but make it quick, we got company coming,” he said, gesturing over my shoulder at a handful of zombies that were making their way towards us through the Joey’s neighbors yards and in between their houses. They hadn’t actually seen us yet, but were just shambling away from the fire that was slowly consuming the town. The fire wasn’t close yet, but the smoke from it was blowing right at me, and it was getting pretty thick.

  I used the smoke to my advantage as I ran to Joey’s shed, where I retrieved his lawn mowers gas can, and then ran back to his house. I then went inside and dumped all its contents throughout, made my way off his porch and to the front of it, and drew my .40. I knew that I didn’t need to burn the house down - as the approaching fire would certainly do it for me - but I was pissed at Joey for trying to kill me, the fuck.

  Also, for years, I had been threatening Joey that I was gonna do just that, among other things (he never answered his front door when I knocked on it - sometimes for over ten minutes straight - which really pissed me off), and figured it was about time that I lived up to my word.

  So I took aim at a small, metal space heater that I had set on his ratty recliner - of which I had thoroughly doused with gasoline (and urine) - and fired. The spark from the impact hit the recliner and the motherfucker went up with a whoosh, the rest of the place right behind it. I stepped back, turned, and walked to the waiting car with a big smile on my face. Arson is so much fucking fun!

  I stopped at the car and turned back around to watch the place burn. The house must’ve been fairly old or something, ‘cause it went up fairly quick. While I watched, I had a flash of regret at what I had done - I was pretty sure that in some cultures (Viking, maybe?), the burning of the dead was considered a warrior’s burial, and Joey most definitely did not deserve that. But, thankfully, those cultures were long dead and their ancient rites didn’t apply to the here and now.

  “Okay, dude,” I said to Frank after I got in the car, “run this shit, and run it hard.”

  “Fuck yeah!” he yelled. “I’ve been wanting to do this since I met Joey! Buckle up, Dave, ‘cause I’m gonna fuck this shit up!”

  36

  And fuck it up he did. Boy, did he ever!

  Frank threw that bitch in drive and put his foot to the floor, sliding the car from its spot in Joey’s front yard and barreled down the road - and away. He hit the corner of Barney-Riva and Oak Street (which eventually turns into N2975th Rd.) and slid around it at at least forty m.p.h., then flew north down Oak towards I-80, hardly even slowing down where the street took a ninety degree turn and paralleled the interstate for about a half mile, eastward.

  At the end of the road where it snakes into Plank, instead of slowing down and taking the curves, Frank blasted that fucking car through the ditches and jumped right the fuck over Plank and into the cornfield across the street. It was just like the “Dukes of Hazzard” - but only without the stupid rebel yell. The car landed in the field in a perfect four-point landing, and blasted right through a big wooden fence that bordered the field, turning it to toothpicks and splinters.

  By all rights, Frank could’ve taken Plank nearly all the way down to where it hooked into Peoria Street - as Plank Road was essentially clear all the way down to where I blew up all those cars. Instead… he kept on racing through field after field, yard after yard (when he got to ‘em) - plowing through fences, jumping the car in and out of ditches, barreling through a couple small wooded areas where he toppled a few small trees, and he even drove the ‘Stang through a fuckin’ creek. It was awesome!

  That car was getting beat the fuck up: all its windows were smashed in, the passenger side front fender got ripped off, the hood was peeled half-way back over itself, and the body was getting pummeled from all sides by the countless impacts with the fences, trees, other cars that happened to be in Frank’s path, and even the occasional lone zombie that Frank drove into - the pride and joy of the late Joey Sanchez was turned into a goddamn motherfuckin’ warhorse. Fuckin’ A.

  We were flying through a cornfield, seconds from being on Peoria Street - making a whole lot better time than we would have if we had taken the roads - when, as we were passing over the ditch in between the field and the road, the car slammed hard to the ground (which caused the air-bags to deploy), went from what had to be at least eighty to thirty miles an hour, and slid into the ditch on the opposite side of the road, the both of us screaming in fear for our lives the entire time. In front of us, most likely due to the hugely loud sound of the accident (my ears were fuckin’ ringing like mad), about a couple dozen zombies shambled in our direction from around the Midland Plaza and the HyVee gas station, moaning as they came.

  We scrambled outta the car as quickly as we could, grabbing our gear and weapons, and got ourselves ready to move on foot, as we weren’t all that far from Ethel’s house - who we had promised earlier to visit on our way back - and not too far from Gus’s, either, for that matter. I really didn’t care which way we went - Gus’s or Ethel’s - as long as it wasn’t right there. The zombies were getting closer and closer by the second.

  “Thank god for seatbelts and airbags,” I said to Frank as we shrugged on our packs. “Our asses woulda got tossed through the fuckin’ windshield for sure if it weren’t for that shit. Hurts like a bitch, though.”

  “Yeah, I think my fuckin’ nose is broke, man,” he said, nasally, as he grabbed his nose and cracked it back into place. “Not anymore… Look at this shit, Dave, the cars’ front wheels got ripped off. Man, we got lucky.”

  We got lucky as hell. What happen
ed, at least what it looked like, was that as we were going over the ditch - which was pretty fuckin’ deep - the front wheels must’ve went down into the ditch and got caught inside it, getting ripped clean off as the car passed overhead. We were lucky the car didn’t go end over end, as fast as Frank was driving the thing.

  “So what ya wanna do, go to Gus’s or Ethel’s?” I asked Frank, as I checked my AR’s mag, making sure it was full and ready to rock. “I really don’t care either way.”

  “Well, we did tell Ethel we would go there,” Frank said as he put a full mag in his MP5, “so let’s run by, then head to Gus’s right after.”

  “Word… Let’s get moving then.”

  So instead of fighting our way through the approaching zombies - since they stood between us and Gus’s - we took off at a quick jog away, south down Peoria, in the general direction of Ethel’s, leaving them all behind to shamble along after us. We could’ve killed them all, but as we were faster than they were and there was no sense in wasting ammunition or attracting more with the loud reports of our weapons, we figured the best option would be to get on down the road. The fuckers were so slow, they didn’t pose us an immediate threat - just as long as we didn’t get stopped for some reason, and allow them to catch up.

  37

  About a couple hundred yards or so down the road, where Midtown Road perpendiculars Peoria, we were forced to stop. A burning mini-van blasted by right in front of us - with the burning driver beating at the window - crossed Peoria, and careened into the front of a house. Gunfire erupted from the direction the van came from, towards Ethel’s, and we rushed to it with our weapons at the ready. Rounding the corner, we quickly saw that we weren’t in danger of being hit by a stray bullet, as everyone that was shooting was doing it at Ethel’s house. We ran and hid behind an old Ford Tempo before any of the shooters saw us.

  “We’re gonna kill them fuckers, right Dave?” Frank asked me after we were hidden behind the car. “Them fuckers are shooting at Ethel for some fucking reason. They gotta die, man.”