by Lowry, Chris
I took a quick look over my shoulder, did a head count.
If it was Z, I could get it before it got too close.
A spiked gumball bounced off the hood of the bus with a loud clang. I looked back and saw the shadow Z launch a sidearm pitch.
Another gumball whizzed by my head, and I lowered the pistol.
Z don't pitch. Z don't throw.
Then Tyler stepped out of the woods.
"Thought you were going to shoot me," he called out.
Bem stepped out behind him, bundled up in his jacket.
"Us," she called.
I don't remember running. I don't recall scooping her up or spinning her around, and those weren't my tears leaking all over the place.
I set her down and grabbed Tyler's outstretched forearm, pulled the slight boy into a hard hug.
"We know where they sent him," Bem said.
"I was going to track," Tyler confessed. "But it's a straight highway shot."
"How far behind are we?"
I led them back to the group.
“Days,” said Tyler.
“They could have gone off track,” I said, thinking to myself.
“Not with the guy they have leading,” said Tyler. “I eavesdropped on him. He’s a by the book dude.”
By the book.
Words that would never apply to me.
Throw the book, sure, or crack open a book, always.
But my life up until the Z had not been lived by any set of rules.
Which is how I ended up mid-level management in a cube farm, nursing rage daily at the constraints of a life I hadn’t chosen.
Or I guess a life my choices led me to live.
Two kids in one state, a third in another. Two ex-wives. Money coming in, because that’s all their moms told me I was good for.
Other men raising my children.
Other men hearing about boy problems and dealing with pre-teen angst, learning their favorite songs and how often it shifted.
Other men playing at Dad.
I got the visits.
Long weekends and holidays.
It still wasn’t enough.
Imagine spending a decade of your adult life just sad. Miserable.
Waiting for the weekends to show up.
But I’m not sad by nature. Never had been.
So, it mixed in me.
All that sadness, all the dreams of a future that didn’t happen, of a present out of my control turned into a singular emotion.
Rage.
I got pissed.
Which as it turned out, was the perfect emotion to have in a zombie apocalypse.
CHAPTER THREE
“What’s the plan?” Brian asked.
“You’re in charge,” I told him.
Brian wanted to lead a group since we first met in a traffic jam in Orlando.
He was running from a zombie herd with his friend Peg, I was running from the other direction with an undead herd of my own.
We met literally on top of cars smashed together creating a roadblock and Brian blew them all up to cover our escape.
He told people I did it, but I don’t remember it that way.
“You’re going to run off and rescue him,” Brian told me.
I hate it when someone knows me or can read me. I feel like they’re going to sell me something.
“We’re going with you,” he said.
I didn’t want to buy that. But I didn’t know if I had a choice.
“What about the town?” I asked.
They had left the safety of a small pocket community in Kentucky to follow after me.
I couldn’t aske them to keep going.
Turns out, I didn’t have to.
“We’re going to be chased too,” Peg explained. “Better to have you with us when it happens.”
“What happens?”
“When her husband shows up,” Peg pointed to Anna.
He’s not my husband.
“It’s what he calls himself,” Peg explained in the dry sort of way she had of talking. “It’s easier for us to refer to him that way.”
“I don’t like it,” said Anna and she glanced at me with a look in her eye.
A look that begged for help.
“I don’t like it either,” I said and tried not to sound distracted.
“Good,” said Peg. “We need that. To keep us safe.”
She looked at me too and it hit me.
Who said I can’t appreciate the subtle approach, so long as I could see it coming.
And have it explained to me in small words.
They were scared and wanted me around to protect them.
CHAPTER FOUR
I went back to Pine Bluff once.
This is the small southern town in Arkansas where I grew up.
I don't remember it being so poor so decrepit so destitute.
But it was or is still.
Driving around, twenty years after I left just to visit the graves of my grandparents and look at the places where I spent time as a child.
I saw so much potential in the place.
Driving by homes built in the late 1800’s still standing period brick structures that looked worn and dirty and tired.
I could see the potential of the place the possibility of a future.
Or maybe it was the ghosts of the past I saw the lingering spirit of what might have been or what once was a bustling township.
Because even though I grew up in the poor part of town and even though I was poor there was money in Pine Bluff.
Smart men who made lots of dollars.
My grandfather was one of them.
A smart man when it came to building his skills and portfolio.
I wish I would have listened to his advice growing up.
But like many young people I only came to know how smart he was once I was older.
What I remembered about him was, he built a city.
Not all of it, and certainly not enough to even have a street named after him.
But he built a reputation for being someone solid, dependable.
Reliable.
And he was good at what he did.
At least I inherited that much from him.
Blue collar zombie killer. That’s me.
CHAPTER FIVE
I could hear the screaming and shouting from the building.
We stood on a small hill several hundred yards away just arise in the neighborhood that gave us a clear view of what was going on below.
Hundreds of zombies surrounded the building and it looked like the squad was making an Alamo of it.
“We can't let you go alone,” said Brian.
“You came this far,” I told him. “This is close enough for you.”
I looked around at the group of people that followed me to find my son. Anna. Peg. Brian. Byron. Hannah. Tyler and Bem.
They all watched me, waiting for orders.
I looked down at the mass of writhing zombies below and knew I couldn't ask them to go.
“Give me your ammo,” I told them.
I laid out two of the rifles and collected magazines for each of them.
There were one hundred sixteen shots.
I took two pistols and four magazines each.
Then I looked at the pike in Brian's hand.
It might be a good last-minute resort tool but for close-quarter work with that many Z's I didn't think it would be as effective as I wanted it to be.
Not alone.
“Dad,” said Bem, her voice soft with fear.
I pointed at the hunting rifle that Tyler carried.
“Are you ready to earn your Southern boy hunting stripes?”
He laid down on the hill and sighted in on the zombies below.
Brian fell next to him
“This is how you help me,” I said. “Keep the path clear. Watch my back.”
I leaned over and kissed Anna quickly.
She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and drew my head
down and held it, our lips pressed together tightly.
She pulled back and her eyes flashed a promise.
“I'll drive,” she said.
I started to protest.
It wasn't going to be safe for her.
But she climbed into the truck before I could say anything rolled up the driver's window reached over and locked the passenger door.
She dropped it into gear.
I grabbed the rifles and jumped in the bed of the truck.
“This is stupid,” Peg called out. “There has to be a smarter way.”
But she dropped on the berm next to Brian and lined up her rifle too, ready to cover my six.
Or shoot me in the back.
Anna jammed the accelerator and we raced down the road towards the crowd of zombies.
She reached the edge and started to turn around as they noticed us.
She backed the truck in plowing through four or five with the tailgate.
She stopped before she got stuck.
I lifted a rifle in each hand, started firing and jumped over into the fray.
Growing up I watched war movies like Rambo and Commando, about
superhuman soldiers who are able to take on entire armies by themselves.
Heck, even Karate Kid got to take on the Cobra Kai dojo all by himself until Mr. Miyagi jumped in to save his ass.
Each of those guys had a montage where they were able to prepare their weapons, prepare their themselves for battle.
I didn't get a montage.
I got thrown in the deep end of the pool. Or jumped in this case.
I shot every zombie I could see in the head.
I didn't hear the shots of the people on the hill helping me, but I watched Z fall around me who hadn't been shot by my hands.
Gore and viscera covered me soaking my shirt soaking the leather jacket I wore.
Covering my face, covering my eyes.
I shook my head to clear my vision and kept firing as I walked forward.
I couldn't stop. I wouldn't stop.
Not until I reached the Boy.
The three survivors of the squad leaned over the edge of the building and fired down into the zombies.
It sounded like I was surrounded by Hornets.
Buzzing zipped past my ears, past my head.
I don't know how I didn't get shot.
I don't know how I didn't get bit.
All I saw was red rage. The gun in my left hand clicked clicked dry.
I dropped it. Pulled the pistol out.
Sent sixteen shots into sixteen zombie faces.
Stuck it in my pocket and pulled out the next pistol to shoot again.
And then they were beat back, a twelve-foot circle cleared by all of my group.
Overwatch keeping me safe, or as safe as one could be surrounded by the walking dead.
The boy and two other survivors saw the opening and made a dash for it through the door.
They ran for the pickup and leaped over the truck bed collapsing into it. I backed away until my bottom hit the steel bumper.
And then I slung the empty rifle on my shoulder grabbed another pistol and kept firing until the Boy reached over and dragged me into the back of the truck with them.
Anna took off.
To use the truck as a battering ram.
We nearly bounced out of the bed as she plowed over zombie speed bumps with loud thuds, crushes and slick sounding squishes.
We were at the hill in seconds that stretched like hours.
The Boy jumped out of the truck bed first and Bem grabbed him in a giant bear hug.
The other two survivors stood staring. shocked, surprised they were still alive.
Probably wondering who we were but those answers would come later.
I slid over the side of the truck bed and stood on shaky legs.
I saw everyone staring at me and caught a glimpse of what they saw as Anna opened the door and the mirror flashed my image back at me.
I didn't have skin.
I had dripping gristle covering every inch of my face, my hair, my coat my shirt my body.
You could barely see the white of my eyes.
“I guess you don't want to hug your old man,” I joked with the Boy.
He let go of Bem and sobbed as he plowed into me keeping his face turned away from my body but smearing the gore and gristle over his torso as he squeezed me in a bear hug that I didn’t want to let go.
I'm not saying the tears cleaned my face all the way, but there were clear tracks in the blood and dripping off my cheeks and chin.
We could hear the zombies moaning as they groaned up the hill in our direction, chasing after us.
Their slow shamble gave us ten minutes before we had to get out of there.
And I wasn't sure what else Nashville held.
“I've got it Dad,” said the Boy as he stepped away and use the back of his hand clean off his face.
“What? What have you got?”
I was afraid he was going to say bit. Tell me he had the virus.
But he reached into his closed coat
And pulled out a map.
CHAPTER SIX
I don't think anyone knows what it's like to live with a broken heart.
It's stupid, really.
A song, a part of a movie or even words from someone else could set it off, like a tear bomb explosion.
When I lived in Florida, I would drive my two older children back to Arkansas, a fifteen hour drive.
It would usually be after a great visit where lots of fun was had.
I often started out at six or seven at night, so the kids could sleep while I rolled over the dark highways to catch a sunrise in Mississippi or Tennessee.
Tired after a day of play, more tired still from driving and too much coffee, the walls would come down.
Those barriers we build to block off the pain.
Some singer would talk about driving his son home on the interstate and driving back by himself or reminisce about the memories of watching their kid grow up.
The things I missed.
Just the little things.
That would set me off.
Tears would spill, throat clogged from sobs bitten back.
I'd grip the wheel tight while the lights around me turned kaleidoscope in my eyes.
Keeping it between the lines, keeping it locked just under eighty.
I missed so much, compounded still by a third child from a second ex. Closer still for every other weekend, and some trips back to Arkansas.
But most nights I was alone, unless I found company in the arms of a stranger.
Even then that was physical, just a respite, like giving salt water to a man dying of thirst.
Nothing quenched.
Heartbroken.
I don't think I'd wish that on my worst enemy, living in a kind of hell where any sort of happiness made me feel guilty.
Those little thoughts would pop up in my mind, as if I didn't deserve to be happy because I was missing out on so much.
It didn't matter to me how many happiness gurus I read, and there were a ton.
It didn't matter that the kids had great stepfathers, men who were better matches for the women I had children with.
My dumb choices led me to be alone, and I built a prison of guilt, and misery, which made it impossible to love me.
It was no wonder I liked killing Z.
Liked isn't the right word.
I was damn good at it.
And who doesn't like being good at something. Great even.
