After I returned to my apartment I dropped everything in the middle of the living room, released Marcus from his leash, and sat in my recliner to stop shaking. I sat there for what must have been a few hours, and didn’t notice the time pass at all.
I know that I’ve done a lot of stupid things in my life, and made more than my share of bad decisions. I’ve learned from many painful experiences that I can be incredibly naive and inconsistently aware of what should be immediately considered life-threatening. I’ve paid dearly for many of those mistakes, and the scars and broken bones are the least of it. Looking back at that moment, at the minutes I spent in that closet, I realized that none of my past mistakes had provided me with anything tangible that I could use to prepare for the new world within which I was struggling to survive.
Eventually I realized that Marcus was asleep in my lap, and that his weight was cutting off the circulation to my left foot causing it to feel like I had pins and needles under the numb skin. When I got up to stretch my leg and relieve the pain I was shocked to see that it was completely dark in the apartment. Looking out the small gaps of my window I noted that the sun had set and dark clouds had rolled in. Checking my watch, I found that it was after 1AM in the morning and nearly had to sit down again in shock. I’d gone out into the other apartments early in the afternoon, and hadn’t spent more than thirty minutes outside of my own locked doors.
Had it really only taken that long? Could everything that had happened to me fit into a half-hour?
I’ll never really know the answer to those questions as I’d lost all sense of time during the surges of adrenaline and fear, and had sat in shock for hours until Marcus brought me back to reality. The whole thing felt like it had happened to someone else. I just felt tired and numb inside as I ran through the details of the event.
I’d never checked my watch while searching through the Twit’s apartment, and I realized quickly that I’d been nearly comatose since returning to my own. I tried to shake off the numbness so that I could focus my mind. The questions, doubt and guilt came storming back as the cobwebs cleared and thoughts of what I’d done that afternoon returned.
Why had the Twit been hiding in his closet under all those clothes? What had happened in that apartment? How had the blond been injured, and who had killed her? Had he trashed his own home, and, if so, why? What had kept him there, and why hadn’t he left? Why was his front door opened if he was hiding? Why had he remained quiet when he heard me searching his apartment, and why – good god why – had he attacked me?
I played through possible answers to these questions, but nothing really seemed to fit. Maybe the Twit had snapped after having to shoot the blond in his bedroom. Maybe there were other people involved and the Twit was simply left behind. Maybe he’d been injured but hadn’t succumbed yet to the infection. Maybe he thought I was a Z and finally decided to defend himself when I’d stepped on him.
None of those answers were really enough. None of the possible reasons for what had happened seemed true or real. None of them answered the question I was still hesitating to ask.
Was his death my fault?
I shuddered at the thought even as I had to answer honestly. The reason didn’t matter so much as the result.
I’d killed a man.
It took me more than a few minutes, standing there in the dark inside of my apartment, to swallow the truth and control how it would make me feel. The entire time Marcus sat at my feet, guarding against the darkness I couldn’t let get inside of me. I know he can’t possibly understand what is happening, but in that moment he may have saved me. It helped to be reminded that I wasn’t the only one depending on my ability to adapt and overcome in order to survive in this new world. A small heartbeat waiting patiently at my feet told me just how much I was needed. I know he’s just a dog, but right then I wouldn’t trade him for all the gold in Fort Knox.
I rubbed his ears and then lit a candle so that I could clean myself up. As I went through the motions of removing the dried blood from my face and arms, I realized that I might be able to grimly accept the fact that I’d killed another human being in anger. I also knew that I hadn’t yet fully comprehended the changes that this acceptance would cause in me, and may never really know. For the time being it was all still too new, too fresh and painful, and I needed distance from it if I was ever going to understand what had happened.
While I’d realized that I’d likely have to defend myself from Z’s if I was to survive, I’d never entertained ideas of what could play out when I encountered other survivors. I’d just assumed that it was very much an “Us” vs. “Them” scenario, but my blood splattered clothes clearly defined a different situation entirely. This new found perspective, however, wasn’t enough to forgive what had happened.
My response to the attack was completely unforeseen. I’d always planned to retreat, to run when possible and live to fight another day. Hell, I’d have preferred to avoid fighting at all, but that hadn’t been the result of this morning’s search. I had stood my ground in the face of any preconceived notions to the contrary. I could have tried to escape the apartment, but I didn’t. I could have used the bat to break his arm and loosen his grip on my ankle so that I could high-tail it out of there, but I didn’t. I could have just tried to knock him down so that I could run, but I didn’t. Maybe none of those answers came to me in the heat of the moment because of my fear, and I’m only thinking of them with 20/20 hindsight. Regardless, I could have done a lot of things to try and escape, but I didn’t.
I had attacked, and I had done so with a fury I was unaware I’d been capable of.
Maybe I’d just never had a reference to compare it to. Truthfully, I’d never been a violent person, not in any real sense of the word. I’d been in only a few fistfights in college while working as a bouncer for a bar frequented by locals, but that had been years ago and had only occurred because I was always working around drunken redneck townies who didn’t like students mixing it up with their old ladies. Scuffles broke out and I was getting paid to put them down. I didn’t drink on the job, and that meant the advantage was all mine when a drunk would stumble over to start screaming and swinging fists.
Those few fights had been brief and decidedly one-sided, and other than a few busted knuckles I’d escaped unscathed from them all. Most of all, I’d never felt guilty about those fights because I’d been the one in control. I hadn’t started them but I had ended them, and I only used as much force as was needed to get my point across.
That wasn’t how things happened in that small closet. I’d lost myself in my anger and fear and had reacted with sheer violence. I might justify my actions with the excuse that I hadn’t known that I was about to kill a living, breathing human being, but that wasn’t really the truth. If I was to be 100% honest with myself then I’d have to admit that in that moment, I just didn’t care. I had lashed out with the intent to cause as much physical harm as I could.
It didn’t matter if I’d done that while believing I was only smashing the skull of a Z. The intent was the important thing, the truth of the matter, and it was nothing I could find an excuse for.
A man was dead because of me. Regardless of the situation that caused it, I’d killed him in a rage. I don’t know how I can accept that about myself. It’s a very hard truth, and it’s one I feel very naïve for having neglected to comprehend or prepare for. I wish I could just chalk it up as another example of how I am ill prepared to exist in this new world, but that seems hollow and false and unfair. My need for constant wariness, for vigilant attention to an environment now filled with an untold number of dangers from the undead was something that I was still trying to understand. It was inevitable that I’d make a mistake. Eventually, everyone does, only mine had inadvertently caused the death of another man.
I’d have to find a way to live with that, to accept what I’d done if I was going to continue to survive.
I crawled out of my dirty, blood stained clothes, blew out the candle and climbed into my bed. Marcus jumped up beside me as I wondered about what I was becoming. One question kept looming just around the corner, but I knew I didn’t have the strength to answer it before sleep claimed me. I drifted off with it circling through my dreams.
Is survival enough?
