The sounds of occasional gun-fire continue in the distance as I sit here in the last few minutes of daylight, my journal finally finding a use. I found it in the bottom of one of my old backpacks that I’d emptied out to use for my scavenging, and it was like a light bulb came on. I’d had this damned thing for a year, but I’d never written anything in it. I’d always meant to start writing, meant to put my English degree to good use, but I’d never actually done it. Now, I find there’s not much else for me to do with my free time.
When the power comes on, as it does a few times each day, the lights flicker and the TV stations play a continuous loop of the emergency broadcast that started four or five days ago and has been in heavy rotation ever since. The same well-tanned faces repeat the same well-turned verses meant to lure each of us into a false sense of safety even though the fear is evident in their eyes. The world is ending, and the same politically correct bullshit spews on and on in a closed loop of insanity.
Honestly, I’m amazed the power is still able to come on at all, even if it is only for a few minutes here and there. It’s like the power grid is thrashing as it dies, refusing to go gently into that good night. None of the houses closest to me have any lights showing at night, and I haven’t seen or heard any of my neighbors in days. I hope a few of them made it off of the island before the bridges were destroyed. When the power comes on I try to charge up my cell phone in the hopes that the service will be restored and I’ll be able to contact some of my family and friends, though the basic services we all came to depend on so heavily were the first things to fall apart. I’d heard that the government had commandeered most of the communications networks almost immediately after the initial spread of the infection. When some of my neighbors were still here, there had been rumors that the government had used the cell networks and satellites to coordinate bombing runs on some of the larger cities where the infections had run rampant. I’d guessed that they’d attempted to slow the spread by taking out the major population centers. I’d been able to see the cloud above Manhattan from my apartment and hoped it wasn’t nuclear. Maybe the government still had access and was communicating out there somewhere, but I’d gotten nothing but dead air on either of my phones and the same old TV loop was all I’d seen for days.
America had fallen apart so quickly, everyone panicking and running in any direction they could. Stores were looted, cars stolen, houses burned and through all of it came more and more of the infected. I call them “infected” like I diagnosed the cause. What a fucking joke! I’d laugh if I could, but it’s really not that funny when the joke is played on everyone. I still didn’t know if it was a virus or a chemical attack or simply the end of days. I guess it really doesn’t matter anymore. It probably never did considering how quick things changed. In a world where the ends were made to justify the means, the end came faster than anyone would ever have thought possible.
I guess I’m getting a little bit ahead of myself here. I should probably explain who I am, and what I’m doing with this journal that no one will ever read. I don’t have any use for my old name, and most people who knew me used my nickname anyway, so I guess you can call me Gids just like they used to. I’m an overweight thirty-something from Long Island, NY who is holed up in a tiny studio apartment with a dog named Marcus. I used to work for a local cable company where I was a trainer for a customer service department. I was one of those faceless drones that sat everyday in a coldly lit cubicle farm, one of those guys who hated his job but needed the paycheck. I used my weekends to recharge my batteries just so I could face another humdrum week of being under-appreciated and overworked by the evil overlords of the corporate managerial system. Now, I’ll never have another job or paycheck or weekend.
I guess you could say I’m just a survivor of the zombie apocalypse.
There, I said it. “Zombie.” I know it sounds fucking crazy, and I don’t even want to write that word down, but I’ll be damned if I can think of anything else that so accurately describes the current situation that the world finds itself in. The dead have come back, and they are just as hungry as all of those old Romero movies made them out to be. They’ll eat just about anything, but they crave human flesh. That sounds like a cheesy tag line for a movie I would have rented only a few weeks ago. Who knew that the worse parts of the bible were probably true?
I can remember the first Z I saw. That’s what I call them now. “Z” is easier to say without feeling the hysterical butterflies in my stomach, if you know what I mean. I remember that first Z, and there was a time I’d see it every time I closee my eyes. It was a surreal moment in time. I felt like Alice jumping down the rabbit hole. The world spun and I was faced with the kind of imagery that Dali would have created after eating a pound of hashish.
It all happened so quickly. I remember that I watched as blood hit the counter in a series of splashes, and heard the pop as the waitresses fingers crunched in its mouth. The Z’s white eyes were vacant and unfocused. The waitress’s eyes rolled back in her head as she passed out from the shock and pain of the vicious bite. His jaw kept moving in a grinding fashion, the mush of her digits slowly dribbling from his dark lips to splatter on the front of his hooded sweatshirt. The blood was so dark on the white counter top.
The things I remember about that moment when the world changed seem insignificant now, a bit distant and cold and fuzzy inside my head. I wish my old life didn’t seem so unpolished and incomplete upon retrospection, but the harsh reality of the last few days makes me wonder just what the fuck I was doing with my life.
Has it really only been a few weeks since this started? I don’t think I’d be able to tell what day it was if my watch didn’t have the date on it. Things like knowing the date and day of the week and the exact time of day kind of took the backseat once the infection turned the entire world into a killing field. The first day I realized things were going to shit was July 24th. It was a Saturday, and I’d been out drinking the night before. Now, it feels like a lifetime ago that I went into the diner down the street from my shitty little studio apartment to get some breakfast and work off a hangover.
Friday night had been a really good time. I met up with some old friends at a dive bar in Bethpage for a few pints. Everyone showed up to support a local band a co-worker was in. We drank beers and boilermakers as they played some overly loud rock n’ roll.
I saw a lot of faces I hadn’t seen for quite a while…..faces I’ll probably never see again considering how quickly everything went to shit. I didn’t drink too much the night before, but at the ripe old age of thirty-four I guess the hangovers come regardless of my quantities of consumption. The diner would provide me with the coffee and carbs I’d need to get over it, so I legged my way over after walking the pooch and leaving him a rawhide to gnaw on while I was gone. I didn’t want to have him barking and bothering the neighbors. Now his barking keeps me alive and I reward my four-legged Z detection system. Funny how things change, isn’t it?
I sat in the corner, the place mostly empty as I’d missed the morning and afternoon rush by sleeping in ’till 2:30pm. My waitress seemed to be the only one actually working at the moment, and I could tell she was tired even though she was covering the few of us in the diner with a haste born of the kind of organizational skills I’d never possessed. Her black sneakers whispered over the dingy carpeting as she brought out orders and simultaneously freshened up our coffees. The owner sat in his usual spot behind the cash register, his thick glasses gummy with finger prints, his gigantic blubbery ass molded around a wooden stool. As always, a copy of the local newspaper was laid out neatly in front of him, opened to the sports section.
I gave them both a nod as I walked in and chose a booth near the window. I didn’t know either by name, but I came in often enough to recognize their faces. In truth, I didn’t want to know their names. I just wanted to have a place to eat without any hassle or small talk. I don’t think I’m any different from most people in the modern age. We each had our own problems, and little time or concern for others that couldn’t be summarized in a Facebook or Twitter update. Maybe that means I was detached or self-involved, but it was the way of the world – right or wrong.
There were a few other patrons in the place, though I didn’t register any of them in any real way other than as nameless faces in small groups. I can’t say I even remember seeing what I assume was a vagrant, one of those dingy bum’s that beg for change at 7-11 every morning so they can buy booze or get a little something to eat. If pressed for details, I guess I’d say that he seemed to be sleeping on his stool at the counter, all hunched over with a grimy hooded sweatshirt on. Other than that, I didn’t pay him any attention. That’s how the world dealt with people like that before it all turned upside down and we all became just like him.
I ordered, drank a lot of coffee, and ate quickly when my food finally came out. The warmth of the rather shitty watered-down coffee was making my stomach finally settle, and the mild banging in my head was slowing as the bacon worked its greasy magic in my gut. I noticed that all four of the TVs on the walls had scattered news broadcasting as I felt a moment of contentment. Then everything went and got completely and utterly fuckered.
My waitress was poking the bum in the shoulder, and what drew my attention was that her voice was getting louder as she asked him if he was ok. He was now completely slumped over on the counter top, his food untouched beside him. As she poked his arm again, this time harder and more insistent, he began to slide sideways off his stool. She reached out to grab him and the hood on his sweatshirt fell back as his head rolled around on his neck. I can only imagine the smell that assailed the poor woman as his skin was obviously unwashed and very dirty. Dark veins bulged through his pale, unshaven skin, and blood appeared to be congealed on his left ear.
I say “ear” like he still had one. Even after all this shit has gone down I candy-coat my words to lessen the impact. Oh, the joy of having been a corporate professional where talking out of one’s ass was a prerequisite.
This guy didn’t have a “left ear”. He had a gaping hole on the side of his face that I could stick all five fingers of my meaty hand into and wiggle without touching the edges. He was missing the ear, part of his jaw, and a bunch of scalp from the back of his head. It looked like he’d had it torn off in one quick jerking motion, the skin tearing around his jaw line, leaving a curving gash with white specks of bone poking out in the wound. I remember wondering why it wasn’t bleeding. The injury was so big it should have been shooting blood all over the place, but it just looked caked with dried blood.
The waitress pulled back at first as the bum continued to fall off the stool. Then – and god bless the waitress for her will to help – she moved forward and tried to catch him. That’s when his mouth opened wide, and he just bit her like nothing in the world mattered more to him. It was so quick. His mouth opened, her fingers got caught, and his yellowed teeth clamped down. It sounded like a pop-gun, the way her fingers just came off like that.
POP
And then she was falling back from him, bleeding all over the place and screaming. The bum just swayed there and began to chew. The waitress checked out of reality, falling hard and cracking her head on the floor. I can’t think of a more natural response to watching someone carelessly eating my fingers.
That’s when my breakfast made an immediate exit the same way it went in. The few other patrons were all screaming, and the owner was moving his ponderous backside around the counter. I watched as a guy in the brown shirt and shorts of a delivery man pushed the bum hard from behind, sending him sprawling limply to the ground next to the waitress. The bum didn’t even try and stop his fall, didn’t put out his hands to catch himself at all. He just went down like a wet bag of shit.
Within seconds of his fall he began to pull himself towards the waitress. He sunk his teeth into her calf, biting right through the dark stockings all diner waitresses wear as part of their uniform. A bloody chunk of stocking and meat ripped off her leg and went right down his throat like a snake gulping a mouse.
I’d love to say that I got up to help the delivery guy and the owner. I’d love to say that I pulled the waitress away from his grasping hands and gnashing teeth. I’d love to tell you that I was transformed into a hero, the kind of guy that when it comes to fight or flight firmly decides upon fight.
I can’t do that, though. I grabbed my jacket and got the fuck out of dodge. I ran the entire way back to my apartment and slammed the door behind me. I spent the next half hour dry-heaving into a cold toilet while my dog tried to lick my face. I had always hoped I would respond well if tested, but I didn’t. Every instinct I had told me to run, to get away, to hide. I was unable to resist. I had neither the will nor the strength. I don’t know if that saved my life.
I don’t know if it should.
Once my body stopped trying to forcefully eject my stomach, I spent hours huddled in the dark confines of my apartment watching the news channels, following the broadcasts that detailed the outbreak. It was the only thing being shown for days as the world went to hell in a hand basket, and I watched it all.
CNN was the first to notice that the riots spreading through major cities were in fact being caused by the infected who appeared to be feeding on the living. They ran a tape of a young white girl getting attacked by a big Asian guy with a missing arm, his jacket bloody and shredded. I watched as the film showed her struggling as he bites her once, then again. Her throat was torn out and her blood ran onto the sidewalk as her attacker left her to chase after a blurred motion that passed briefly in front of the camera. The news anchor pondered that the infected are attracted to sound and movement, which was why her attacker didn’t stay to feed.
A clock appeared in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, and in less than two minutes her eyes opened, and she began to move again. She was obviously dead, the puddle of blood around her prone body was huge and it no longer squirted from her mangled neck. Her movements were stiff and awkward, as if she didn’t know how to control her extremities and get them to work in unison, and it was obvious she was having difficulties standing. She eventually gained her feet, and looking rigid and uncoordinated she shuffled out of the camera frame.
The news anchors debated the validity of the tape. It was the first time I heard someone use the word zombie in all seriousness. It wouldn’t be the last.
So much more has happened since that day. So much that I wish hadn’t, and yet sadly know will happen again. I don’t have anything left to pretend, no more need for politically correct excuses. I guess that was the push I needed to finally start writing in this journal. So, I guess I will continue to write until I can’t do it anymore. If hell has come to earth, I plan to do my penance with my pen, recording what happens as each day goes by. Maybe someday someone will read this and know my story. Maybe they will understand the world within which I live, and the choices it forces upon me. Maybe they can pass judgment on me, and maybe it will be more kindly than my own.
Maybe they can excuse the undeniable will of instinct that made me run that day in the diner…..and that made me run so many times after.
Maybe.
