It’s About Zombies

This is just another zombie story. Except of course this one actually happened. At least, it happened to me.
I was well prepared for the outbreak. I had loved zombie stories as a kid so I knew all the lore. And I had had first hand experience in combat. I was an army veteran. I had been to war. I knew how to use a gun and I knew how to protect myself. I knew how to survive.
I got home in late June. It happened a couple of weeks later. But I saw the signs after only a couple days. People were different. They weren’t as happy as I had remembered. Perhaps it was just the ringing in my ears, but they seemed to be making grumbling sounds quite often. And they would get into these trances where they’d just stare at you like you were a ghost. Like they didn’t know you.
I spent those two weeks attempting to detach myself from my family. I knew they would turn any day and I didn’t want to be hesitant. I kept my distance, I didn’t look them in the eyes. I didn’t talk to them. I pretended they were already dead and gone. They didn’t fight it. There wasn’t much of them left in there anyway.
I found one of my old hunting rifles and tucked it under the bed. Every night I laid awake as long as I could, expecting to have to defend myself at any moment. I was just waiting for the world to end. It happened just after the sun had set. I was cleaning up after dinner in the kitchen. The suds in the water were soft. It was a softness that I hadn’t felt in a long time. I heard a loud bang. It startled me to the point that I shouted. It had to have been a gunshot. I knew that sound all too well. People were defending themselves. Fighting the outbreak. It had started. The gunshots kept sounding. I thought I would have been used to that awful sound but it shook me to my core. I think it was because I knew what came next. I picked up a kitchen knife out of the bubbly water. I turned around and sure enough, staring at me was the person I married. I couldn’t allow myself to think of it as anything more than that. It was the empty shell of someone I once loved. Someone I would never see again. It started approaching me with that dead look in its eyes. The person I loved was long gone. I backed up and it reached out to me. I had to act the same way I did on the battlefield. You can’t treat your enemy like they are a person, this was not a person. This was never a person, I told myself. I did the knife maneuver I had practiced thousands of times. And it was done. It didn’t have time to make a peep, but fell to the floor with a thud. My children, attracted to the noise, waddled in. They went straight to the body on the floor. They were going to devour it. They hunched over it and started grabbing at it. I couldn’t let them do it. With tears in my eyes, I did what I had to do.
I then locked the doors and closed all the blinds. I turned off the lights and hurriedly lit our camping lantern. The lights would be out soon anyway. I did it too fast, though, I burned my right thumb. I ran to the sink and stuck my hand in the suds. Their softness almost seemed like a mockery. It was something I would never maintain. Something I would probably never feel again.
I couldn’t stand the smell of rotting flesh so I dragged the bodies outside. I shouldn’t have. It just attracted more of them. They were clawing at the door. Feeling overwhelmed, I collapsed into a ball on the floor. The ringing in my ears was so loud. The gunshots were so loud. The clawing was so loud. In the moment I almost thought I heard someone tell me to open the door. But I knew that was just my conscious telling me that there was an easy out. But I was a fighter. I wasn’t going to give up. I grabbed one of my kids’ backpack and dumped out all of the books. I filled it with all the supplies I could think to grab as fast as I could and then grabbed my gun. I opened the back door and came face to face with my neighbor. He looked normal but then all at once his face changed into a mangled one. Bloody and torn. I shot him and ran out the door. Why did he look normal for a second? Was I hallucinating? The stress of the moment must have gotten to me. At least I hoped that that was the case. If it wasn’t, then I might be left defenseless. I could think a zombie was a normal person. I shook it off. I told myself it was a one time occurrence and decided not to worry about it. After all, if it happened again and I died, I guess it would just be my time then. It’s not like I could prevent it.
I could still hear the gunshots echoing into the night. At least I knew that I wasn’t the only one fighting. I ran into the woods. There wouldn’t be a lot of them there yet. They would be where the people were. They were once people, after all.
Luckily, my cul de sac was right beside a huge forest. We loved all the nature when we moved in, I never expected to appreciate it for this reason too. I ran until I had to jog, and then I jogged until I had to walk, and then I walked until I couldn’t walk any further. I stumbled upon a hill that had a small, rocky cliff, about five feet high. It was concave enough that I could sit under it and be covered. I sat down and blew out my lantern. It was difficult, but I dozed off eventually.
I awoke to gray skies and the smell of rain. The soft pitter patter of rain on the leaves around me was nice, but the growing dampness of my clothes was not very pleasant. Dried blood on my face, that I didn’t know existed, slowly washed away.
I hugged my backpack to block some of the rain. I stayed like that for probably half an hour before the rain stopped. I got up to try and find a better shelter, but stumbled upon something I didn’t expect to find at all. A dog. Well, she found me, really. Poor thing was probably out all night. My guess was that her owner let her outside but then didn’t live long enough to call her back in. I pet her and she looked at me curiously.
Then she started barking. I panicked. I would be found and eaten alive if she didn’t stop. Maybe she was hungry. I opened my bag and grabbed some canned tuna. I quickly opened it and shoved it in her face. She quieted down and ate it. I was relieved. Once she licked it clean she looked towards me and I pet her again. Then she started barking again. I shushed her and said no, even tapped her nose. But she wouldn’t stop. I was frantically looking around for a solution. But none offered up. Then my eyes met my rifle. I had a solution. I picked up the gun and looked at the barking dog. I couldn’t do it. I could gun down my whole family but I could not shoot this dog. At least I knew my family was gone. This was just an innocent dog. I grabbed my bag and I ran. She didn’t follow me at first but after a short while the barking started to get louder again. I struggled to maintain my balance on the wet forest floor, but I was determined that today was not the day I would die. Eventually the trees started to thin out. I was reaching the edge of the forest. I had to lose this dog but she would probably be able to track my scent for miles. I knew what to do. I had to cover myself in mud to mask my scent. I would have been unhappy about it but my clothes were already soaked. It was almost like I was in the trenches. I could have gone back into the forest and tried to avoid the dog. It wouldn’t have been too hard, it was a very large area. However, I imagined that her barking had probably attracted a lot of dead people, and I wanted no part in that.
I walked the streets in search of survivors. I kept my gun in my hands and loaded, I wanted to be ready for anything. The streets were quiet. Homes had their curtains drawn and lights off. Not that their lights would be working, anyway. As I got deeper into town I saw someone in the distance. They had a car. A police car. I grew hopeful. If this police officer was still alive they would be very useful. I started running towards them. This was a bad idea. I was covered in mud. I definitely looked like a member of the undead charging at my next meal. They shot me.
I awoke in a hospital bed. It was soft. I was relieved. The lights were on. Jazz music played quietly in the background. I was no longer covered in mud. Perhaps I was too quick to judge how fast the world would fall apart. Maybe the military already contained those who had turned. Or maybe the hospital had a generator and we were the last ones left. I didn’t know. But in this moment of safety I did decide I knew one thing. I was going to be okay.

Author's Note

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