2024: Zombies

3

There before me, hanging from the ceiling, was my brother.

A crying sounding like a dying animal escaped my lips, as his body was still swaying from side to side.

The man ran in with his machete raised and pushed me to the side.

‘’Shit, kid, what did you do?’’

‘’I… that’s my brother, never… me… no.’’ I couldn’t even get the words out.

I was too freaked out to think straight.

‘’Why did he kill himself?’’ the man asked.

‘’How the hell should I know!’’ I yelled at him and moved to stand on the chair to get his body down.

The man stopped me, and I pushed him away.

‘’Leave me the fuck alone!’’

I was still in denial that my brother did something like this to himself.

‘’We have to get out of here. Now isn’t the time to let our emotions get the best of us.’’

‘’Then go!’’ I pushed at him.

I finally got him down and sobbed even harder. My older brother had died.

I still couldn’t believe this outcome; never did I think I would see a family member of mine dead in such a way.

‘’Wayne,’’ I shook his body, as if he would answer me.

There was a growl, and I heard a scream.

‘’Come on kid, you have to man up and defend your sister.’’

‘’She is not my sister, and I’m not a kid!’’ I yelled.

I looked up to see Chrisean clinging to the man as he chopped at the intruder, and I guess that’s what brought me back to the now.

I jumped to my feet and hurried to the closet, then pulled out three bags, a shoes box fell to the ground and when I opened it, I was stunned at what I saw.

‘’I gun with three additional clips, a tape recorder, and an envelope. I grabbed them all and hurried out to where Chrisean and the man were.

‘’Good, you are back to your senses.’’

I gave him the back without a word.

‘’We need to fill these with as many supplies as possible,’’ he told me and together we moved around the kitchen.

But for whatever reason, the cupboards were empty.

‘’Shit, our maid is to go grocery shopping tomorrow.’’

‘’You have a maid?’’ Chrisean asked.

‘’That’s not important girl, what is though is why there is no perishable food here.’’

‘’Well, none of us are home that much, and my parents mostly eat out, so I guess they never find the need to buy food. Well, since they knew I was coming home for the weekend, they told her to get some groceries, but I guess that will never happen now.’’

They only think that we had were six bottles of water, a can of tuna and a bottle of flat grape soda.

‘’Just great!’’ The man kicked angrily at the kitchen stool.

‘’We have to go,’’ Chrisean said.

I could hear more and more growls. All the screams from earlier had died. Which meant that everyone was now either a zombie or just dead.

I grabbed two bottles of water for myself, then gave two to Chrisean and the other two to the man.

I didn’t bother telling them about the gun and the other things I found.

‘’Do you at least have a first aid kit?’’ he asked.

‘’I brought it on campus with me and left it there.’’

‘’Fucking hell!’’ he yelled. ‘’It’s ok, let’s just go.’’

‘’Wait, we need weapons. We can’t just run out blind like that.’’

I nodded and hurried to the garage where my father had an ax that he never used before. He bought it to chop wood, but the opportunity never came about.

I then removed the crowbar from the old car and gave it to Chrisean.

I guess the zombies went away or were hiding because outside was quiet and there were now in sight.

‘’We have to lay out but move fast,’’ the man told us.

And I wished I knew his name, because I didn’t know what to call him if a moment arise to get his attention.

As we left the gates of the community, I felt a hand in mine.

I glanced at Chrisean, and she gave me an anxious look.

‘’Do you think we can trust him?’’ she asked, and I stared at the back of the man in front of us.

‘’I mean, so far he has been helpful.’’

She said nothing.

The closer we got to the main street, the more I realized the gravity of what was really happening.

Bodies lay dead in the streets; fire was everywhere along with broken water main.

‘’A supermarket, maybe we can find a few things there,’’ the man said.

And I doubted it after seeing those two videos of people savaging through the little that were on the shelves.

When we entered, I was right. The place was empty, and the shelves were on the floor.

‘’What do we do now?’’ Chrisean asked.

‘’Check the storage, I’m sure not many people were smart enough to look there.’’

We followed him to the back, and he was somewhat right. Even though the door was open, there wasn’t much taken from the large room. But there were two dead bodies on the floor, one with a gunshot to the head and another that had a cord around the neck.

My guess was that they killed each other over supplies.

‘’Only take canned food. We won’t need to cook them.’’

I did as he said, taking cans of tuna and stuffing them in the sides of the bag.

I saw Chrisean picking up peanut butter and jam. She even stopped to read some labels, and I wanted to tell her that now wasn’t the time to be picky, but he beat me to it.

‘’Young lady, now isn’t the time to worry about your diet. Just grab, and make sure they can sustain you for a while,’’ he told her while pushing crackers and biscuits in his bag.

Chrisean looked over at me, and I nodded in agreement with the man.

He was smart and seemed to know what he was doing.

I saw a case of bottled water and pointed them out to Chrisean and the man; we shared them evenly then got back to adding things I think we would need in my bag.

Chrisean opened a locker and found a first aid kit.

‘’Good, keep it. We will need it.’’

She also stuffed a few other things she found in her bag.

‘’Now listen, you two have to be smart from here on. Don’t try to be the hero. And if we should ever be separated, don’t just go around trusting just anyone. There are people out there who will feed you to these monsters. They will take your supplies and even kill you.’’

I nodded.

‘’Good, it’s a dog-eat-dog world now and every man to themselves, but the three of us can stick together and make it out. Maybe the government has deployed troops to look for survivors and take us to some military base.’’

I highly doubted that, but I didn’t dare say it out loud.

‘’Ok, stay close to me.’’

But our time with the man was cut short.

There was a growl, and a woman appeared before us.

She opened her mouth, letting out a screech, causing spit and blood to drip from mouth.

The smell radiating from her made us gag.

The man acted fast, chopping her head off, and then turned to us.

‘’Honestly, you two, if you want to live, you have to be alert and act fast. If no-‘’

His words were cut off as a zombie seemed to materialize out of the dark and sunk its teeth into the side of his neck.

The man made a gargling sound and tried to fight, but his life was draining away fast.

I raised the ax, and let it sink in the top of the zombie’s head, then finish taking the man’s life. It made no sense to make him live because he will only be just like them.

I removed his bag, just so Chrisean and I could have more supplies.

‘’Come on, we need to get out of here.’’ I pulled her along with me, and together we ran to somewhere we hoped to be safe.