Just Another Day Read online

  “Okay, Frank,” I whispered, “check it out. I think we should get across this road and head over to that Culver’s, and chill for a minute. Maybe have a beer. Then I figure we could take the road it’s on, I think it’s Midtown, ‘cause I’m pretty sure it goes on towards Plank Road. Maybe not all the way to it, but probably close enough. Once on Plank, I think we should go up to the cemetery there, cross it, then go through the airport land to Dalzell, and then to Joey’s. Sound good?”

  “Yeah, sounds good,” Frank whispered back. “Let’s do this shit! …Hey, it’s good to hear that we’re not the only ones left alive. I had a dream last night that we were and it freaked me the fuck out.”

  There was sporadic gunfire going on all around us, some just a shot here and a shot there, and some sounding like an all-out battle - either way, it was signs of life, and it was good to hear.

  “Word up, dude. Okay, here we go.”

  I was a little worried about passing through all the vehicles that were sitting on 251. Both the north and southbound lanes were jam-packed with cars, bumper-to-bumper, from the ditch on our side (the east side), through the deep, wide ditch in between the lanes, and clear into the ditch on the other side. I could only imagine as to what went on there, why the flow of traffic had stopped as it did, and what had happened to all the passengers.

  As we weaved our way through the carnage, stepping over the bodies littering the ground and climbing over bumpers, trunks, and hoods when we had to, we didn’t encounter any zombies out walking amongst the cars with us, but we did see quite a few that had been trapped in their vehicles, their vehicles now turned into steel and glass and plastic sarcophaguses.

  The ones that could, beat on their windows as we made our way past them, and struggled to get out at us, but were too weak to break the glass - and the ones that couldn’t (like the many small children we saw still strapped into their child-seats) just watched and followed us with their cold, dead eyes.

  28

  I was about to come out of the northbound lane into the center ditch (which was packed three-lanes deep) when I tripped over something and nearly fell on my face. As I was picking myself up, using the bumper of a beat-up white Honda Accord as leverage, I wondered just what the fuck I had tripped over, ‘cause I didn’t remember seeing anything in my path - and I was seeing everything, it was like I was back on patrol in Iraq, looking for snipers and road-side bombs.

  “Fuck! Zombies!” Frank whisper-yelled behind me. “Dave, watch the fuck out!”

  I turned and saw what it was I had tripped over - or more like what had tripped me. A crawler was making its way out from under the van I was walking by when I fell, dragging itself right up to me. It was a female zombie, and might’ve even been pretty once, but getting its legs ripped off at the hip and half its face peeled away to be left dangling wiped any attractiveness clean away.

  And she wasn’t the only one. They were coming out from under the vehicles all around us, boxing us in. I saw in the distance a handful of walkers making their way to us, as well.

  “Fuck!” I yelled, as I climbed into the bed of a GMC Sierra. “Get up on the cars! On top! We’re gonna have to hop from one to the next!”

  “Jesus Christ, Dave!” Frank yelled as he was climbing atop a Ford Mustang, much like the one he owned. “They’re fucking everywhere! What the fuck, man!? It looked clear a minute ago!”

  “The motherfuckers must’ve been hiding under the fuckin’ cars, just waiting for someone to walk by!”

  To make matters worse, some of the zombies that we thought were crawlers were getting up from the ground, to their feet. For some reason they had lain on the ground and crawled under the cars themselves. I only hoped that it was to chase someone or something, and not ‘cause of some retained ability to think and lay traps. If that was the case, humanity is fucked.

  “Can you make your way to me?” I asked Frank.

  “Yeah, I think so. Hold up.”

  After he got into the truck bed with me, we continued to hop from car to car, only getting on the ground when the cars were too far away from one another to jump, and only shooting when we absolutely had to. No sense wasting bullets on shit we could just jump over, or run by. Twenty minutes later, we put our boots to the ground on the opposite side, and sprinted to the Culver’s.

  “We’re gonna have to take a different way back to Gus’s,” I said, getting a couple beers out of my pack. “I do not want that shit following us back. Probably should’ve just killed as many as we could, and led the rest this way. Oh, well.”

  “Yeah, but it looks like they’re coming this way, anyway.”

  “Yup,” I said as I handed him his beer. “Drink up, then. We’ll let ‘em get a little closer, draw more away from the road. Maybe that alone will clear it enough for us, so we won’t have to find a different path back.”

  “Hope so.”

  “No shit. Check it out, this road looks pretty clear, so if we have to kill any zombies on the way, let’s try and keep it that way, okay. Instead of using our guns, why don’t we just split their skulls or chop their necks with our machete’s?”

  “Fuck yeah! Sounds fucking awesome! I’ve always wanted to cut off some mother- fucker’s head with a machete!”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  Beers finished, we continued on our trek to Joey’s. Midtown Street wasn’t nearly as bad as 251, so we just ran down the center of it, zig-zagging around stalled cars when we had to. Every now and then, a zombie would pop out from the bushes or beside a car or whatever, and we’d just wind up and cleave their heads from their bodies (some of the time), or cave in their heads with the saw-edge of the back blade. Good times were had.

  We were almost to the end of Midtown, to where it goes into Peoria Street, not Plank, when someone started shooting at us from the second-to-last house on the right side of the street.

  “Cover, cover, cover!!!” I yelled as I dove behind the hood of a Ford F-150 Super-Duty, putting its engine compartment and tires in between myself and the house where the shooter was firing from. “Frank… Frank, are you hit!? You okay!?”

  “Shit!!!… Yeah, I’m okay, I’m okay!!! I just shit myself a little, that’s all!!!”

  “Been there, done that, man!!!”

  Frank had got himself behind an 80’s Chevrolet Monte Carlo, with its engine and tires between himself and the shooter.

  “That’s the fuckin’ first time I’ve been shot at, man!!!” Frank said laughing. He was actually taking it pretty well, nearly getting his ass shot off. “Scared the shit out of me, you know!!! For real!!! Hah!!!”

  “Yeah, it’s not fun! Was it close?”

  “Fuckin’ whizzed right by me!!! Sounded like big fuckin’ bees!!!”

  “Yup, sure does! …Check it out, dude, whoever shot at us might’ve thought we were zombies, so I think we should try and talk to them before we go over there and blow their fuckin’ heads off, all right? But if they keep shooting, even after we try make it known we’re alive and not fuckin’ meat-puppets, they are toast. Cool?”

  “Yeah, sure… but you can do the talking. I’ll keep a lookout for any zombies.”

  “Cool…… HEY!!! CAN YOU HEAR ME!!!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, in the hope of getting the shooters attention, and letting him know we were live people. “YOU IN THE HOUSE, CAN YOU HEAR ME!?”

  “Jesus fucking Christ, don’t yell so loud, you fucking idiot! You’re going to draw every zombie here from the rest of the goddamn neighborhood! Get your asses over here, quick! I promise I won’t shoot, I just thought you boys were zombies, that’s all!”

  “Frank, whaddaya say?” I whisper-yelled to him. “Should we go? For a minute, maybe?”

  “I guess we could,” he whisper-yelled back. “See if they’re doing okay, or whatever.”

  “Okay… Hey there! We’re coming out. Do not shoot, or we will be forced to do the same! I’ve been killing people for the last five days, and one more won’t make much of a damn difference. Got it?”<
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  “Yeah, yeah, just get your asses moving! I won’t shoot, I promise!”

  So I took the lead and we ran in a crouch to the house, machetes back in their sheath’s and our weapons scanning from window to door to window, ready for the shooter to renege on its promise. The motherfucker’s lucky they didn’t, ‘cause we were both primed to do some serious killing.

  As we approached the porch steps, the front door of the house opened up and the most unlikeliest person stepped out - an old woman (she was at least in her fuckin’ eighties - short, plump, and sweet-looking) holding a beautiful Henry Yellow Boy rifle.

  “Get the fuck in here, boys,” she said, in the most grandmotherly tone, “before the riff-raff comes over. I’ve got cookies.”

  29

  Once we got in the house, she closed the door, locked it, and put three cross-boards - one towards the top, one in the middle, and one around the bottom - into some sturdy-looking steel braces that were secured to the doorframe with some heavy-duty lag bolts. It was a pretty cool and very secure set-up. Looking through the rest of the living room (which was the room she let us into) we saw that if the rest of the house was as secure as that room, a person could take a horde like the one Gus and I had in the burning house without a worry - every window that we were able to see was heavily fortified in much the same fashion as the door, making the house nearly impenetrable.

  “This way, boys,” she said as she walked out the room, presumably to the kitchen.

  She wasn’t kidding before. Right in the middle of the kitchen table was a big, heaping motherfuckin’ plate of freshly-baked chocolate-chip cookies!

  “Fuck yeah!” Frank and I said at the exact same time.

  “Okay, enough of that shit. Sit your asses down, have some cookies, and tell me just why the fuck you dumb-asses were out running around in this shit?”

  “Well…,” I said around a mouthful of scrumptiousness, “we’re on our way to Joey’s - our buddies house. He’s trapped up in his attic. We’re gonna go there and try to bring him back home with us. You got any milk? I got beer, but I don’t think it’ll go good with cookies.”

  “Hmm… going to save your buddy. Valiant… but stupid.”

  “What? What do you mean?” Frank asked, in between bites.

  “Oh, just that the guy - I’m assuming it’s a guy - might not even be alive when you get to his house. For all you know, he could already be one of those… things… outside. When’s the last time you boys talked to him?”

  “Hah! …Well… I never actually talked to him… He left me a voice-mail, telling me that he was okay - unbitten - and stranded up in his attic. He also said that he had enough food to last him a week, but that was it. He also asked me - fuckin’ begged me, really, sorry - to come and save him. I called him right back and got no answer, and did the same before we left this morning and got no answer again, but that’s just Joey being Joey.”

  “Well, I still think it’s a stupid thing to go running around out there, even if it is to save someone. Chances are, you’re not going to make it, and that’s a shame - believe me, it is. I’ve lost my own son and two grandsons to the same heroic idealism. They actually came back… but they were like them, not… normal… I had to put them down.”

  “…I’m really sorry about that, but… no offense meant… we’re not your sons.”

  “I know that, I’m just saying…”

  “Understood. But I know we can handle ourselves out there. I, myself, I spent the first day and night of this… epidemic… out there on the streets, and I’m still kickin’. So I think we’ll be fine, ma’am.”

  “Tough guys, are you? Well then, there’s nothing I can say to stop you. I just hope you boys make it, you seem like such nice boys. And no more of that ma’am shit, my name’s Ethel.”

  “Ethel, nice to meet you. This strapping young man here is Frank, and my name is Dave.”

  “It’s nice to meet you boys, too. So… when are going to continue your little rescue mission?”

  “As soon as we have a couple more cookies,” answered Frank. “And maybe use the bathroom?”

  “Upstairs, first door on the left. And you,” she said wagging her finger at me, “I’ll get you your fuckin’ milk… but only if you give me one of those beers you mentioned.”

  30

  We stayed there for around another half-hour before we got back to our rescue mission - which Ethel very aptly named it - but only after we had a couple beers, finished off the cookies (which didn’t taste too bad atall with the beers), and I took a healthy shit. Man, the turtle was poking its head right the fuck out!

  Before we took off, Ethel told us that if we did indeed make it there and back alive with our friend, that she wanted us to stop by and let her know we were okay and unscathed. Plus, she wanted to make us a home-cooked meal, ‘cause she was lonely and had no one to cook for since her husband died last year. We both quickly agreed (‘cause who’s gonna turn down a free meal, right?), and promised we’d be back as soon as we were able.

  Back on the move, we jogged down to Peoria Street and crouched behind a couple charred, unidentifiable cars that were twisted around each other, their drivers and passengers looking like burnt matches.

  “Okay, Dave,” Frank said, “I know where I’m at. If we cut directly through these houses yards, we should come out on Plank Road, at the edge of the cemetery.”

  “Fuckin’ A. I was just guessing earlier, but that’s cool. We’re almost there.”

  “Yup, let’s go. Cool if I take the lead?”

  “No prob, just be careful. Remember, look everywhere, at everything. That’s the main job of being point - seeing the bad shit first, before the bad shit sees us.”

  “Okay. We’re off.”

  We took off at a sprint, cutting through yards and jumping over or through bushes, and jumping fences when we had to. Due to the lay of the land, we couldn’t take a direct direct route through all the properties, but Frank was able to lead us on the most straight-forward way possible, just a little zig-zaggy.

  We were taking a break, leaning against the side of a house catching our breath, when a zombie came plummeting from above, and landed right on top of both of us - knocking us to the ground.

  “Aaaah…. Fuck!!!!” Frank hissed through his teeth as we both tried to get out from under the zombie - who thankfully hadn’t realized that he was laying on top of Grade-A beef. “Holy shit!!! What the fuck, they’re falling out of the fucking sky now?!”

  “Jesus Christ, let’s get this fucker off us, man!!!” I also said through my teeth, as I was beating at the zombie’s face and head with my gloved fists, trying to hammer its skull in. By that time, it had realized what it had fallen on top of. “Motherfucker!!! Cats, dogs, and now you?! Fuck that!!!”

  We managed to drag ourselves from under it without getting bit (at least I hoped), and Frank chopped the zombies head off with his machete - and stabbed it in its brain through its eyes, just in case the head could survive without the body. Saw that shit in “Return of the Living Dead 2”, so who can say?

  “That was close, man,” I said to Frank.

  “Too close. Fucker must have fell from that open window there,” Frank said, pointing to a second-story window that had curtains hanging out of it.

  “Yeah, must’ve. We got fuckin’ lucky there, dude. The fuckin’ thing seemed dazed after it hit us, if that’s even possible…You bit?”

  “No, you?”

  “Nah. Not a scratch.”

  “Cool… we’re almost to Plank Road. I can kind of see some cars parked on it through the bushes over there… see? Looks like it might be the same kind of mess that was on 251.”

  “Yeah, I can see them,” I said. “Fuck. I was hoping the road wouldn’t be packed like earlier. That’s a bummer. At least we know to look for zombies hiding under cars, now.”

  Frank took the lead again, going at a nice, slow and careful pace. It wasn’t even nine o’ clock yet (I was sporting a nice new-ish Casio calcu
lator watch, that I found on the neighborhood sweep), so we had plenty of time to get there and back. No point in rushing headlong into anything.

  We were nearly to the bushes that separate Plank from the neighborhood we were currently in - bushes that were so thick, we could hardly see through them - when a girl started screaming bloody-murder from somewhere on the opposite side.

  Just like with Gus, we paused, looked at each other - nodded - and barreled through the bushes. Headlong, headstrong…

  31

  We barreled right through them bitches… and right into a pack of stinky, nasty fuckin’ zombies. Six of them, to be exact. How we didn’t see them on our way through was simple - we had our fuckin’ eyes closed to avoid getting ‘em poked out by a branch or a stick (I saw it happen once when I was a kid, to my friend Luke - there was blood everywhere). At least my eyes were closed, and since Frank was in front of me and he didn’t see them either, I am assuming his eyes were closed, too.

  The eight of us went to the ground, hard, but lucky for Frank and I, we landed on top of the zombies, and only took a little bit of the impact.

  We scrambled to our feet as quickly as humanly possible, and began frantically firing into the zombies faces and heads, before they had a chance to get up. I say frantically, ‘cause when we finally got ourselves up, we saw what it was that we had stumbled into.

  We were right in the middle of a massive, massive horde. The six we had just executed were out on the fringe of the horde, but the rest were closing in the gap with a quickness - and that horrible, soul-crushing moan filled the air as they came.

  “FFFUUUUUUCK!!!” I yelled as I fired well-placed shot after well-placed shot into the faces of the approaching undead. “Frank!!!… head over to that van!!! We gotta get on top of it, or we’re fuckin’ dead!!!”

  “AAAAAAAAH!!!” He yelled as he tore the fuck outta the zombies with his MP5, turning their heads into blood-geysers. “Okay!!! …Moving!!!!”