Tim 3

by Mark Tufo

  “You letting this whole woman thing get to you too?” I asked. “If you ask if your ass is getting fat, I’m out of here.” Actually I was stalling. Looking at Scarlett’s form in the mirror was mesmerizing. You’d have never known it from the clothes she wore, but she could have easily passed for a fifties pin-up model. She had the full curves in all the right places.

  “Getting your jollies? You piece of shit pervert,” Scarlett said. “You must have been quite the ladies’ man, and by that, I mean you must have had a nice place in the basement where you stored their bodies.”

  “Jealous? I would have treated you right for the five minutes it took me to cum. After that, though, all bets are off. Unless you could cook, then we might be cool again.”

  “I don’t even think misogynistic begins to describe you. To be honest, I think you might be gay.”

  “What’s wrong with you? I’ve nailed at least a hundred women.”

  “Right there.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “You say you nailed women. Someone that really loves females does not talk about hammering them like tools. I think you’re a closet homosexual, and belittling and demeaning women is your way of coping with what you think is an inadequacy. There’s nothing wrong with being gay. Some people are, and I saw how you looked at Raoul’s package; you just about turned green with envy.”

  “You done?” I asked, trying to keep my tone as level as possible. She nodded, giving me the confirmation I’d asked for. “I’m not a pillow biter.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with being a power top. You know what they say, it’s always better to give than to receive.” She was laughing, laughing at me, while she said those words!

  “When we find your kids, Scarlett—and we will, I promise you that—I am going to slowly pull them apart like a smoked pork loin. It will be fabulous as they cry, “Why Mommy?! Why are you eating us mommy?!” And that will be the final thing that they remember on this earth. That their mommy didn’t ever really love them, that she always secretly wanted to eat them. To chew them up and shit them out! That will be my gift to you, Scarlett.” I fully expected her to go running off into the deep dark recesses of her mind. I was slightly shocked when, before she walked away, she told me that she would kill me before she ever let that happen.

  Sometime while Scarlett and I were talking, Manny had given getting dressed a go. He was wearing a men’s dress shirt and little else. I’ve got to admit the image of him in that shirt stirred something deep inside of me and NOT because it was a man’s shirt! He looked hot that way, with his… I mean her hair still wet from the shower. Too hot for a zombie apocalypse. Not sure what Manny’s propensity for menswear was, but we needed to get Scarlett into something more appropriate. I got Manny back into the closet and found some jeans and an old UCLA Bruins sweatshirt. I wanted to get some sneakers on, but Manny wouldn’t let me work the arms to tie the laces and for right now that was past his skill set. We found some slip-on flats that would have to do. I hadn’t thought about it until we were out of the house and halfway down the walkway, but the little girl had not been in the closet the last time. It’s all right, all good things in due time. I was going to eat her too.

  I toyed with having Manny get a car, but where I wanted him to go wasn’t too far and it gave me plenty of time to figure out how I was going to proceed. I had two extremely dangerous enemies to deal with. Luckily, they didn’t fight on the same side or I’d have already been extinguished. That little juicy piece of information was going to stay close to the vest. The hospital was a fucking disaster. It was exactly how you expected ground zero of a zombie plague induced apocalypse to look, and then some. The front of St. Deneaux’s Mother of Mercy Hospital was literally piled high with the bodies of zombies. Intermingled amongst them were the scattered remains of humans that had been their victims, and sprinkled all over like chocolate shavings on a heaping sundae were hundreds, possibly thousands of brass casings.

  “There’s no food here,” Manny hissed.

  “For fuck’s sake, you fat bastard, you literally just ate a quarter ton of fucking food; you think you could hold off for like half an hour?”

  “No more than that.”

  I’d not been expecting that reply. He gave me my window and I was going to take advantage of it. It was more of the same inside, except it was more compacted, the disarray and mayhem, I mean. I led Manny to the surgical wing. I found an operating room that had been in mid-surgery when the shit had gone sideways. According to the board outside the room, this was a gastric bypass surgery. Unfortunately, the doctor had turned and used his teeth to rip open the large abdomen instead of the scalpel he’d died with, in his left hand. Can’t trust left-handed people anyway. Don’t believe me? Well the Catholics thought it was the devil’s hand up until fairly recently, and the only reason I think they stopped saying that was because Beelzebub had made a large donation to the papal retirement fund to get them to shut up about it.

  “I need some of those tools.”

  I got a large question mark.

  “To blend in, it will help us infiltrate. If we look like a doctor, more groups will be willing to allow us entry.” I kept my fingers crossed that Scarlett, who so far had been absent, didn’t pop into the mix and start poking holes in my already threadbare explanation.

  Manny watched intently as I wrapped up a handful of surgical tools in a towel. When I had everything I figured I needed, I went out to the lobby. A grandmother who should have maybe passed over a decade before the z-poc was hunched over in her chair. She looked like she’d died waiting for her HMO paperwork to come through.

  “Can’t get good health care anymore,” I told her as I snatched her oversized purse from her bony hands. “What the fuck?” I asked as I strained to lift the thing. I turned it over, and nickels and dimes rained from the bag. “You going to pay for your bill with this?” Had to have been a couple of hundred dollars in change stream out of that thing. What I was more interested in was the .22 caliber that fell atop the pile. That, I wanted. I shoved it and the surgical tools back inside and walked to the pharmacy. I found the antibiotics I wanted easily enough; it was the pain pills and anti-depressants section that had been hit hard. In the middle of an apocalyptic event, who the hell doesn’t want to get stoned off their ass and be made cheery about it? Seems they were onto something. Whatever junkie had hit this place, he wasn’t the most thorough, or maybe, considering the blood stains, he’d been interrupted before he could finish.

  I grabbed a large bottle of oxycodone and some valium and even some prozac in case I started to feel a little fucking blue. Oh boo-hoo, woe is me. Fucking pussies. What’s making you all sad? Your douche bag boss? Quit. Your cheating asshole of a spouse? Divorce them. Your disrespectful kids? Discipline them right or cut them loose. Taking a pill to fix yourself is about as effective as drinking, and you know how well that worked for my shithead dad. The best medicine I ever had was when his brain slid down my throat. That, that should be the cure for whatever ails you. Just fucking eat it. That’s the marketing slogan I’m going to have for all the zombies when they finally and completely take over the world.

  “Got a problem? Just eat it!”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” It was Scarlett, she was holding her head like she’d just woken up from an all weekend bender. “And where did you get that purse. Goodwill?”

  “Typical chick. Why would you give a shit about what kind of bag we have? It carries stuff, that’s all that matters.”

  “So if I said to you, ‘Who gives a shit which football team wins on Sunday, they all just smash each other into the ground,’ what would you say to that?”

  “I’d say you’d better be careful what you say.”

  “The purse. It’s a nice look for you.”

  I swear she couldn’t help herself. It was like she was five and there was a room of brightly colored buttons, and for some damn reason, she needed to push every goddamn one of them.<
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  “This day is not going to go well for you,” I told her matter-of-factly, and for some other poor slob, definitely not for him either. I kept that last part to myself. We were just walking out of the hospital. I wasn’t paying much attention to where we were going; I was just plotting out my next moves. It was hearing Manny’s growls that brought me to see what he saw. We were looking down the barrels of three rifles. Two men and a woman had us. They were less than twenty feet away, if they started pulling the triggers, we became someone’s bad memory, scattered all across the walkway.

  “Manny, I need to speak,” I said hurriedly. Well, unbeknownst to me, when Manny relinquished control of our voice box, he allowed all users access. Scarlett obviously being more familiar with the wiring was able to get there first.

  “RUN!” was all she could get out before I clocked her in the fucking temple sending her sprawling. The trio with guns looked at me suspiciously. I had to go with what the bitch had put in motion. I begged Manny to start running. We went a good city block before he finally stopped. The taller man grabbed my elbow and spun me so I was facing him.

  “What are you running from?” The other two came up. They no longer had their guns trained on me, but they were close enough that if I did anything even slightly suspicious I would be riddled with holes.

  “There were zombies,” I breathed out quickly, though I wasn’t winded at all.

  “You seemed pretty relaxed when you walked out.” This from the female. She looked to be in her early thirties, fit as a fiddle, and I wanted to rip her tits off.

  “Kindzi, relax,” the second man said as he heard the woman’s accusatory tone.

  “Well what do we do now?” the first man said.

  “Do, Greg? What do you mean? We go back to the hospital get the medication we need and get out of here,” Kindzi said.

  “What’s your name?” Greg asked.

  “Scarlett.” I was shooting for demure, but I had so little experience with that particular emotion I don’t know if I pulled it off or not. Could have been sneering for all I knew.

  “Something’s wrong,” the other man said, looking at me pretty intently.

  “Yeah, she’s fucking scared, Andy. How would you feel if zombies had just chased you and three strange people were surrounding you?” Greg said.

  “I didn’t see any zombies,” Kindzi said. “Don’t let your penis start talking for you.”

  “Please!” Greg said pinching his nose between his forefinger and thumb. “Can we have just a semblance of social graces? Can’t you see she’s petrified?”

  “Please,” Kindzi said. “Petrified, my ass. She’s hiding something, and you can’t see it because your dick thinks she looks like a young Diane Lane.”

  Kindzi was the dangerous one in this trio. Astute didn’t begin to scratch the surface.

  “What do you have in the bag?” Kindzi snatched it from me before I could stop her. Andy stepped up when I moved to get it back.

  “She’s a fucking junkie,” she spat as she pulled the bottles of pills out.

  “They’re not for me. I’m not alone.”

  “What the fuck?” Kindzi said as she pulled her thumb out of the bag. A fat drop of blood was pooling up on the pad, she stuck it into her mouth and sucked down the viscous fluid.

  “Surgical tools,” I explained.

  “No shit.” She was still sucking the wound. I couldn’t tell you how much I hoped that scalpel was infected with the black plague or something equally as nasty.

  “What’s going on, Tim?” Scarlett asked.

  “I don’t need two of you questioning me on this!” I damn near shouted.

  “Huh?” Greg asked.

  Fuck—I’d said it out loud. “Sorry, I’m under a lot of pressure and I’m scared. I just need to go.”

  “We’ll go with you. I was a medic, so maybe I can help.” Greg said.

  “Greg, we’ve got our own shit to deal with,” Kindzi said.

  “She’s right,” Andy beseeched.

  “We’re all in this together. We have to help each other,” Greg pleaded.

  “Is that what you told those twats that killed your mother and father?” Kindzi asked. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry that was too far. Listen, Harlot.”

  “Scarlett, bitch,” I told her.

  “Yeah, whatever. We don’t have time to babysit you and your habit.”

  “I said the drugs are not for me, and I don’t remember ever asking for any of your help. I got what I needed, and I can be on my way.”

  Manny was not liking the path this conversation was heading down. His hands came up and started reaching for Greg.

  “Manny STOP; you’re going to get us killed!” The three were looking at me as if I’d lost my damn mind. I was watching with a surprised look as my hands grasped his shirt. “Manny fucking stop! We’ll eat, we’ll eat soon but not these three!”

  He finally acquiesced and gave me the power of the arms. I smoothed out the shirt where I had wrinkled it up and patted his chest like I’d meant what I’d done all along.

  “Something is seriously wrong with this one. Let’s go, Greg.” Kindzi tossed the bag back by my feet. She and Andy were already heading away.

  “Are you going to be all right, Scarlett?” Greg asked.

  “Fine, fine, but if I do need help?”

  He seemed to be struggling with divulging anything to me.

  “You could keep me safe.” I moved in closer and looked up into his eyes.

  “We’re staying at the firehouse on Barclay. It’s safe there. Bring this other person with you.”

  “Greg, let’s go!” Kindzi waved the man on.

  I could conceivably kill Greg right now, grab his weapon and kill the other two. Still too risky—I’d be in a firefight with two to one odds, and if they were any good, this again would end with me splattered all over the sidewalk.

  “Tonight,” I said to Manny and Greg.

  Greg turned and ran to catch up. He looked back at me one more time and gave a slight wave.

  “Dumbass,” I said, smiling at his departing figure.

  “You let food go,” Manny berated me.

  Manny’s stomach was the definition of a narcissist. Everything, and I mean everything, revolved around his fucking belly. But he wasn’t stupid. Hugh would have been going off the rails about letting a meal go. Manny had understood the low odds of a successful hunt. I’m not saying he was happy about it, I’m just saying he knew that it wasn’t the best time. He was gaining awareness, and that was pretty friggin’ scary.

  “They’ll be ours soon enough. Can you wait until tonight?”

  I could see Manny calculating just how long that was. He finally answered. “No longer. Find us a place to rest.” He retreated somewhat. I could tell he was trying to act more nonchalant than he actually was. But in actuality, he was hovering pretty damn close, watching my every move. What happened in the next few hours could go a long way to establish a trust and rapport between us. Something I needed desperately, and I sure as shit didn’t need anything or anybody ruining that for me. I casually walked over to Scarlett, who was trying to sit up, and I kicked her in the side of the head, knocking her out immediately. With the joy I was feeling with finally being in control, I almost didn’t give a shit about finding Yorley. Looking down on Scarlett’s unconscious body, I thought about bringing the heel of my boot down onto her skull and not stopping until her head was a jumbled mess of stupid inane, insane female thoughts. I snorted when I realized I wouldn’t have to do a thing and that would already be true. Looking back, of course, I should have. I guess that’s just the way the cranium crumbles.

  I found a modest little home with the front door kicked in, which meant no zombies, and most likely it had already been ransacked by scavenging humans. It was a good a place as any to get some shut eye and plan for the festivities of the night. It was perfectly quiet in our mind except for the occasional moaning of Scarlett in the far off reaches. I knew Manny was close, but right no
w he was leaving me alone, and I’ve got to admit it was nice to be with myself. I wasn’t one of those crazy bastards that wanted nothing to do with himself. I was just fine in my own skin, and I guess in anybody’s skin really. I laughed myself to sleep.

  I sat up with a start, shaking my head back and forth trying to knock the cobwebs away. I didn’t have a clue where I was or what was going on. I answered at least one of the questions when I reached up and grabbed hold of two well sized tits. I’m not going to lie, the sensation was not wholly unpleasant; in fact, I sort of liked it. I just wished they weren’t mine. I missed my body.

  “You can let go at any time.” It was Scarlett.

  I almost pulled away quickly, like the time when my mother had walked into my room and had caught me tugging off to lingerie catalogs. Talk about getting a fucked up message in regard to sex; she’d beat my ass with a paddle. Then she’d told my father about it. His response had been to get me the most hardcore porn magazine he could find; it involved women older than my grandmother doing things with whips and chains. “You jack off to this stuff, then you’re a real man.” That was some stellar advice from my dear old man. Nothing like leather-faced women donning cow hide to get your young rocks off to. Oh, and you can trust me I did, many, many times. I was fourteen; the hole in a toilet paper roll looked appealing.

  I was thinking about finding a mirror and doing a little more exploring. Scarlett began protesting the second that thought flashed across our shared mind. That made it that much more appealing. I would have too, but Manny was not on board with shoving various foreign objects into our privates. He was hungry. His next words chased any sexual thoughts far away from the forefront.

  “It is time to prove your worth.”

  There was no need to read between the lines there. I either fed him or died. My chances of successfully resisting him like I had Hugh were marginal at best. It was just brutally difficult trying to get a proper foothold in Scarlett’s head. Martian terrain would have been more welcome.

  “Get going, slave,” Scarlett whispered in my ear.