Running with the Horde

by Joseph K. Richard

  “It’s okay?” he asked after he followed me up the driveway and put the car in park.

  “It’s great,” I told him and started unloading stuff from the trunk.

  Mark hustled to join me after getting the boys inside. His motor was running overtime as he dashed from the car to the kitchen. I wasn’t moving fast enough for him. He looked at me with alarm like he just realized he had tied his wagon to a crazy dimwit.

  “Fucking hurry up! We need to be inside before they come back!” he shouted.

  Mark was becoming quite liberal with his use of the F word and I kept on forgetting to be appropriately afraid of zombies. I picked up the pace to match his and soon the SUV was empty of supplies and toys.

  In the kitchen I found one of those kitschy wooden plaques with little hooks to hang keys on. This one was hand painted with the words: Key Party Staging Area, it seemed a little risqué for the personality of the house but everyone has their secrets.

  Sam was sleeping on the kitchen floor and Jacob was sitting at the table paging through my photo album. Mark was staring out the window overlooking the driveway searching for zombies.

  I gathered all the keys and hurried outside. I found one that fit the side door to the garage. It was dark inside and smelled like motor oil and leather but was empty of cars and clutter and just as neat as the house had been.

  In the back corner of the garage was a large shape covered with a velvet tarp. I pulled off the tarp to reveal a large motorcycle, a Harley Davidson Softail with shiny chrome tailpipes. I carefully covered it up and hurried to the garage doors. It was a double garage but had two single stall doors separated by part of the wall. I opened the door furthest from the bike and pulled the Equinox inside. It smelled like moldy cabbage and farts but would have to do if we needed to leave in a hurry.

  Later that evening I had the grill burning on high, heating two large pots full of water for everyone to wash up with. We didn’t have an endless supply, so all four of us would have to use it. The boys would go first, then me and Mark last. I felt bad about that but he did have vomit in his hair.

  He was rooting through drawers by candlelight for some fresh clothes to wear and not speaking to me. I’d given Sam his first pill. He was wrapped in a thick blanket asleep on the floor by the bathroom waiting for the bath to be ready. I was keeping warm just inside the door from the deck where I could watch the grill while Jacob sat against the wall across from me still studying the photo album.

  I was deep in thought thinking through the ramifications of the Linus Funhouse I’d been through earlier when it registered that Jacob was waving at me.

  “What’s up, bud?” I asked him.

  “I’ve been talking to you.”

  “Oh yeah? Sorry,” I said.

  “Did you fart inside your brain?”

  I couldn’t decipher this question, “Sorry, Jacob, I don’t know what that means.”

  “My daddy would look like you sometimes when mommy was talking to him. She would say he farted in his brain.”

  “Ah,” I replied with a chuckle, “No I didn’t fart in my brain I was just thinking about something else and didn’t hear you.”

  Jacob considered this a moment, no doubt queuing up his next question.

  Mark joined us in the hallway and sat down by Sam. He pulled his sweaty head into his lap and started gently smoothing his hair back.

  “George?”

  “Yeah, Jacob?”

  “Did you fart in your brain because you have shit in your head?”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “Daddy said it when we were waiting for you in the car.”

  “Oh.”

  I looked over at Mark, his face was red but he wouldn’t look at me. I tried not to laugh.

  “Hey, Jacob, do you know you just said a naughty?” I asked him.

  “I know but my daddy says them too. He didn’t used to but he does now, so it’s not naughty anymore,” he said.

  Mark sighed and gently laid Sam’s head on the carpet.

  “I am going to go find something for us to eat. Can you call me when the water is ready?

  I nodded and went back to staring out the door.

  “George?”

  “Jacob.”

  “Who are these people?”

  He was holding up a photo of Dave and Brenda. I took it from his fingers and stared at it for a moment. Dave and Brenda were arm in arm on a beach someplace. Probably in Mexico. Suntanned and smiling, looking their best.

  “Just some old friends.”

  I smiled and handed the photo back to him. He traced their faces with a pudgy little finger.

  “Do you miss them?” he asked with his head cocked to the side and a quizzical expression on his tiny face.

  “Sure I miss them. They were my friends.”

  I was still smiling as he went back to the album but it was an empty smile and I suddenly felt ill. Dave and Brenda were not my friends. I never even really knew them. My only real memory of them was caving Dave’s skull in with a bat and taking all their food. What the hell was wrong with me that I would save their picture in a photo album and take it with me on the road during the zombie apocalypse?

  Was I fucking crazy?

  “George?”

  “Yes?”

  “Did you fart in your brain again?”

  “You know…this time I might have. I’m going to go check on that water.”

  I left him there looking at the faces of all my dead neighbors and went out to stare into the pots of water. I knew it wouldn’t boil until I looked away but that was fine. I stood transfixed in the darkness staring at the blue flames heating the pots. I needed a moment of peace from Inspector Jacob.

  The little bastard had gotten inside my head and started me thinking. I’d never really had any close friends in my entire life.

  Causal friends I had coming out of my ass but nobody close. I was always kind of out of place, like I was missing some critical piece that allowed for sustained social connections.

  The same could be said for girlfriends. I dated a lot but nothing ever really stuck until Daisy came along. Likely she had just started up with me out of boredom or having nowhere else to go.

  She and I didn’t talk much, had virtually nothing in common but I sure enjoyed her physical company. Maybe Mark was right and I was a shithead. I never explained my actions to anyone. Never tried to rationalize my choices. Rarely conceded on anything.

  In general, I was pretty much happiest alone or when I got my own way. I just didn’t care. Even worse, I only just realized I didn’t care. The word sociopath crept through my mind like a cockroach. I considered it and found the notion very upsetting.

  I didn’t want to be a sociopath!

  Headlights crested the horizon heading in our direction. I killed the burners and ducked out of sight behind the grill as they did a slow drive by and scanned the neighborhood with powerful spotlights.

  I prayed they wouldn’t see a candle flickering in a window or unnatural shadows moving on the curtains. Sweat trickled into my eye, this would be an inconvenient time for Jacob to come flying out the door to start another Q & A session with me.

  Someone must have heard me praying because whoever they were, they drove on by.

  It seemed like it could’ve been the Humvee from the drugstore but with the lights so bright I couldn’t be sure. I touched the pots, they were hot but not boiling. Unfortunately this would have to do. I hefted them in and dumped them in the tub.

  Mark was back upstairs when I finished the second pot. I told him he should hurry, the water wasn’t that warm. The look he gave me told me he’d seen the vehicle too. We were going to have to keep it dark throughout the night.

  …

  The water in the tub was black with colorful red chunks as I watched it swirl down the drain. Mark complained as he was getting dressed in the next room that he felt dirtier after his bath than he had before it. Jacob thought that was silly. I thought dirty bath wate
r had to be better than having dried vomit in your hair but I didn’t say anything.

  After a dinner of hearty beef stew from cans, Mark got the boys tucked snugly into bed with extra blankets, it was going to be a cold night. They got the master bedroom with the king-sized bed and I took the room with the queen.

  I was doing my best to tidy up the dinner mess in the dark when Mark came in and said the boys wanted to say goodnight to me. As I made my way up the stairs I could hear Jacob softly singing about Santa Claus coming to town.

  I poked my head in the door and asked if I could come in. Jacob said I could. Sam said nothing, he was dead asleep. I took a seat on the edge of the bed and sat there while Jacob finished his song. It was a profound pleasure to hear him singing so sweetly. For a moment everything felt normal about the world.

  “Do you know what song that was?”

  “I think I’ve heard it before, Santa Claus is coming to town, right?”

  “Do you know why I was singing it?”

  “Nope.”

  “Christmas is my favorite.”

  “Ah,” I looked at him, his two big eyes boring holes into mine in the ambient light of the moon shining through the curtains. Somehow the kid had remembered it was almost Christmas. I wouldn’t have guessed a four year old could keep track of time that well in light of the circumstances.

  “What do you want for Christmas?” I asked.

  “Nothing, it doesn’t matter anyway but it’s still my favorite day.”

  “Of course it matters, what do you want?”

  “Santa’s a zombie now he won’t come this year.”

  I shuddered at the notion of a zombie Santa and could only imagine what kind of gifts a creature like that would bring.

  “First of all, Santa is not a zombie. He is a magic man and therefore immune to being a zombie. Second of all, he will come this year, same as always. I’ll bet you a jellybean.”

  Jacob considered my wager like I’d just dropped the keys of a new Benz on the table and he was fixing to call.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “So when he does come, what do you want?”

  I was really hoping he didn’t say he wanted his mom to come back because I would have cried for sure.

  “I want two things. One for me and one for Sam.”

  When he didn’t expound further I explained to him that he needed to speak the things out loud or write them down or Santa wouldn’t know what to bring and would just leave two wooden train cars. They would be quality, handmade toys but not the most fun to play with.

  “I want an air rifle for Sam because that’s what he really wants and I want a Sparky Speaks for me.”

  “What is a Sparky Speaks?”

  “It’s a puppy that talks and can learn tricks I teach him. I wanted a real dog but mommy said I wouldn’t take care of it. So I want a Sparky Speaks until I get older. I get to have a real dog then.”

  I could recall a similar discussion I once had with my parents. They told me no as well. I had attempted running away from home, Jacob just wanted a toy substitute. Evidently, he was more mature than I had been at his age.

  “Well, Jacob, if you and Sam are good, I am sure your Christmas wishes will come true.”

  “Not all of them will.”

  “Did you forget to say one?”

  “No I didn’t forget, I just know Santa can’t bring my last wish.”

  “What is it?”

  “I wish my mommy was still with us. Daddy says she’s in Disney World but I know she’s dead.”

  Dammit…

  …

  Mark and I were sitting on leather chairs in the living room keeping watch through the front windows and drinking whiskey-cokes.

  We didn’t have much in the way of guns, just my handgun and a banged up .38 Special from Mark. He said he found it somewhere. It was loaded with the two bullets he’d found it with. If it came down to a shootout, we were screwed.

  “How did you know they weren’t friendly?” I asked him. We had been rehashing the day’s events.

  “By the way they were driving after they spotted us. Like they would do anything to catch us. It was just a feeling,” he said.

  I remembered my old buddy Steven.

  “I think your instincts were spot on.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I’m pretty sure I recognized one of them and if I’m right then he was part of a group that tried to kill me a while back.”

  I didn’t feel like retelling the entire story but he kept pressing me so I relented and told him everything from my botched rescue attempt to my prison break with Daisy. Most of that part I had to make up since I wasn’t planning on telling Mark about my power over the undead.

  When I finished he let out a low whistle and sat back in his chair.

  “So lemme get this straight…you witness a murder and a group kidnapping. You attack a fortified mansion full of armed wackos, several of which you kill. You get jumped by hot twin girls. You turn the tables, take one of them hostage, free the kidnappers, get shot, get kidnapped yourself by the people you freed. Get tortured for information you don’t have. Escape with one of the twins. Shack up with her for months only to have her kidnapped away from you by her evil twin sister. You are currently trying to find her. Did I cover everything?”

  “She’s pregnant. I got her pregnant. You forgot to mention that,” I said.

  “My apologies, I forgot you knocked her up.”

  “Hey!”

  “No, I mean it! I really am sorry. You’ll be a great dad! Have you picked out names yet? I like Satan or Damien, both would suit any kid of yours just fine.”

  “What the fucks your problem?” I shout-whispered.

  “You! You’re my fucking problem! I haven’t even known you one whole day but I’m sure of two things: you’re a fucking liar and you’re fucking crazy.”

  I started to defend myself but he interrupted me.

  “If Penthouse and Soldier of Fortune magazines had a child, it would be that bullshit story I just sat through for over an hour. You say you recognized someone from that Humvee?”

  I nodded.

  “That would be a neat trick since I pulled up as soon as you got out of the building and we got out of there. I drove by those front doors no less than thirty times and do you know what I saw in the doorway each time?”

  I didn’t answer him. I did know what he saw but it seemed like more of a rhetorical question. I was learning that when Mark wanted to rant it was best just to wait him out.

  “I SAW THREE ZOMBIES!!! They were watching me and the boys like we were three meatballs on a stick! So my question, GEORGE, is why they were so interested in us. Just three unattainable moving targets driving around them in circles when they had a perfectly healthy meal-ready-to-eat stuck inside the building with them?”

  “Mark,” I stammered, “You are massively overthinking it. I don’t know why they didn’t attack me. Maybe they didn’t see me. I was real quiet. Who knows what goes through their minds, I don’t that’s for sure. Let’s just be grateful we all made it out okay. It was a tough day for everyone.”

  That was the tipping point for Mark. He launched himself out of his chair and was on me fast, catching me on the chin with a vicious left hook. I fell out of my chair seeing stars. The next thing I knew he was straddling me around the ribcage and pounding me in the head with both fists.

  My nose exploded in agony as fresh blood poured into my mouth. I gagged and futilely tried to protect my face with my forearms as I struggled for position. I outweighed him by fifty pounds and had five or six inches on him but it was all I could do to get my knees and elbows in position as he tried to beat me to death.

  I mustered all the energy I had left and threw him across the room. He crashed into a delicate end-table, turning it into kindling. A beautiful lamp shattered over his head and he sat there stunned, blinking like a beached fish. A thin trickle of blood leaked down his face like a tear, from a tiny shard of glass in his
eyebrow.

  I used the chair to pull myself to my feet. Pain and anger fighting for my attention as I tried to staunch the flow of blood with the armguard from my chair. I stared at Mark from the corner of my eye with my head tilted up toward the ceiling.

  He was looking at me with shame in his eyes. I could tell all the fight was out of him but I wasn’t done yet. I wanted my pound of flesh. I wanted to kill him. I picked up my gun from the table beside the chair as Mark stiffened with alarm.

  Rage pounded through my body and I could hear myself growling. My right eye was swelling shut and my ears were on fire. I dropped the arm guard and the blood flowed freely down my face like a macabre goatee.

  He scooted his ass back toward the wall as I stepped toward him. I pointed my gun at his face walking closer until the barrel rested under his left eye. I spit a chunk of bloody mucus on his shirt. I wanted to shoot him so bad I could taste it. I grabbed his shirt collar with my free hand and shoved him down on the ground under the window sill. He was shaking but didn’t resist as I pinned his arm and chest with my knees and tried to push my gun through his skull.

  My blood dripped on his cheek like a leaky faucet.

  “I really want to shoot you, Mark,” my voice coming out in a choked wheeze, “You got one thing right. I am fucking crazy.”

  He didn’t say a word but silent tears streamed out of his eyes. We stayed there like that for a long minute as I thought about how much I wanted to pull the trigger. I had never been so consumed by anger.

  “Will you wrestle my daddy quieter, George?” A soft voice spoke behind me, “You’re gonna wake up Sam.”

  Time stopped. My head pounded. I thought about Sparky Speaks.

  “You got it, Jacob.”

  I slid the gun back into my holster and stumbled off Mark and back into my chair. Mark exhaled slowly and scrambled to his feet. He caught up Jacob in a hug. They were both crying softly as he carried him back upstairs.

  I didn’t see Mark again that night. I stared blankly out the window as first a handful, then dozens, then hundreds of zombies surrounded the house like vengeful demons responding to my subconscious call for help. I didn’t send them away.