Darlings of Decay

by Chrissy Peebles

“Hey,” he said before walking towards me to take a seat on the desk. “I’m ready to be undead.” He joked as he closed his eyes, waiting for me to start turning him into one of the infected.

  My heart started racing as I dipped my makeup brush into the grey concealer and started dotting it all over his face.

  I had never been this close to him before, so close that I could almost hear his heartbeat, and I swore it was beating even faster than mine.

  “Do you think we’ll make it out of here?” I said quietly, blending the concealer over his eyelids.

  “Of course we will. I know our plan is a bit sketchy, but it’s all we’ve got. And after seeing you kick that zombie’s ass before, I know you’ll be fine.”

  “I hope so.” I cringed at the thought of that creature, the sickening crunch of the knife going into its skull.

  “I know so. I mean, I knew you were strong, but jeez. You stabbed that thing right in the face, Eva. It was amazing. You’re amazing.”

  The butterflies fluttered about in my stomach, but I ignored his compliment. After what I heard last night, I found it hard to trust his kind words now.

  “I lied last night, Eva,” he said, not opening his eyes even though I had finished applying makeup to them. “Tom’s a sleaze. I couldn’t to tell him the truth. Last year, when our old drummer, Will, told us about a girl he liked, Tom purposely started flirting with her and they hooked up two weeks later. Will was crushed. He left the band because of it.” He paused, waiting for me to reply.

  “Wyatt, it’s okay. We’ve got more serious things to worry about right now. Forget it.” I said, wondering if he was telling the truth.

  “No, I won’t,” he said as he opened his eyes. “If I don’t tell you this now, I might not ever get the chance.”

  He held my hands in his and looked into my eyes, demanding my attention.

  “Tom’s like a kid who isn’t interested in a toy until another kid picks it up and starts playing with it. Not that I think you’re a toy… Ugh. This isn’t going well.” He sighed, pausing before continuing his speech.

  “If I told him the truth… If I told him what I really think about you, he’d be all over you. You heard the way he spoke about women last night; he’s a pig. No way was I going to let him near you.”

  I realised I had stopped breathing. I let out a sigh and took in a long, deep breath as I matched his gaze. He searched my eyes, as though trying to read my thoughts.

  “So, what is the truth?” I managed to ask, my heart pounding in my chest.

  “The truth is…” He trailed off, looking down at our intertwined hands as he spoke.

  “The truth is, I think you’re the most beautiful, smart, amazing girl I’ve ever met and I think about you all the time. I love that you’re independent. I love that you are strong and that you don’t need a guy to save you all the time. I love… everything about you.”

  He looked up at me then, the corner of his mouth turning up into a half-smile as he continued.

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about last night, Eva. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you for months, but I was… I didn’t want to ruin our friendship if…” He paused again, closing his eyes as he cringed. “If you didn’t feel the same way. But I couldn’t take it anymore, especially when I saw that Cosmo Guy hitting on you last night…” He rolled his eyes. “I knew I had to take a chance and tell you. So, here I am.”

  He waited anxiously, trying to gauge my reaction.

  I had stopped breathing again. The butterflies in my stomach had sparked into a frenzy, sending flutters of excitement dancing through my veins.

  What could I possibly say to such a sweet revelation? Words eluded me, so I decided to do something I had wanted to do ever since I laid eyes on him.

  I smiled at the thought of what I was about to do, and Wyatt’s shoulders relaxed once he saw happiness spread across my face.

  Slowly, I leaned in towards him, and he responded by doing the same. With our lips finally about to touch, I felt the butterflies going wilder than ever before.

  This is it, I thought.

  This is my moment.

  A sudden loud crash echoed throughout the diner, interrupting our perfect moment and bringing us tumbling back down to reality.

  Quickly, Wyatt stood up, slamming the door sideways as he ran out into the diner, with me right behind him to see what had happened.

  Ben was standing with his hands covering his ears from the noise, and was surrounded by pieces of broken plates all around him on the floor.

  “What did you do?” Wyatt asked Ben, clearly frustrated.

  “Sorry, I… I knocked the plates over. It was an accident.” He apologised.

  “Uh. Guys?” Jo called from the other side of the counter, looking out the window.

  We all turned to face the windows of the diner to see at least a dozen zombies stumbling up to the glass.

  “I think they know we’re here now!” She whimpered as she backed up, side-stepping her way around the counter to grab hold of my arm.

  “Time to leave!” Said Wyatt as he ran back into the office to grab our weapons.

  “How are we going to get passed them now?” I asked, running in behind him to grab my satchel.

  “We won’t, not with so many of them out there waiting for us. We’ll have to hideout in the basement.” Answered Ben as Wyatt passed him his makeshift spear.

  My stomach turned as we quickly ran out of the diner and into the hallway, headed for the basement.

  There’s no way we’ll survive this now.

  I followed the others as Wyatt opened the door into the stairwell and started running down the stairs.

  “Wait!” I whispered, and they all stopped on the stairs to look back at me. “We’ll die down there. We have to get to the car.”

  Wyatt stepped back up the stairs and onto the landing to face me.

  “They’re waiting for us out there. We don’t have any other choice.” He said softly, taking hold of my hand.

  “Yes we do.” I replied, pulling him towards the trolleys.

  I knew we only had two choices:

  Leave.

  Or die.

  Chapter Ten

  Wyatt slowly creaked the door of the stairwell open, peering carefully into the diner. I could see through the crack that dozens of zombies crowded around the diner, growling as they pressed up against the windows.

  I held my breath as Wyatt quickly snuck through the door and behind the counter, running low and fast so the creatures wouldn’t see him.

  I moved forward and watched as he stayed low, making his way over to the other side of the diner, pressing his back up against the counter to stay out of sight.

  For a moment, I thought about praying for him, for us, to make it out of here unscathed.

  I stopped believing in God the moment I found out my parents had been killed. When the Police woman with those melancholy eyes sat me down and told me the driver of the taxi they were in fell asleep at the wheel and veered directly into the path of a semi-trailer. In an instant, they were gone, and my faith died along with them.

  But, as I watched those mindless zombies sniffing and clawing at the glass, their sinister eyes searching for signs of life, and saw Wyatt coming dangerously close to them, I wished more than ever that some omnipotent being was watching over us, keeping us alive.

  Slowly, Wyatt reached his hand up towards the cash register, crinkling his nose as he pushed the eject button, causing the cash draw to ‘ding’ as it popped open.

  Peering around the corner of the counter, he breathed a sigh of relief to see the zombies hadn’t heard it over their moaning, and he reached into the cash drawer, picking up a coin.

  He hurriedly crawled back towards the other end of the counter, close to the hallway where Ben, Jo and myself were watching him, waiting.

  He rose up over the counter and slid the coin into one of the jukeboxes.

  Carefully, he started flipping through the song choices
.

  “Wyatt!” Jo whispered impatiently. “Just pick one! It doesn’t matter!”

  “It does matter!” He whispered back, searching the song list. “We’re about to do something completely insane and extremely dangerous – we need a power song!”

  Jo sighed, exasperated, but I couldn’t help but smile to myself.

  Finally, his eyes landed on the perfect song.

  “Oh yeah,” he grinned. “That’s the one.”

  Wyatt pushed the button and rolled back into the hallway, just as Rock Around The Clock by Bill Haley and His Comets started blaring throughout the diner.

  “That should distract ‘em long enough.” He said as he locked the door.

  This was it.

  Our only chance to make it out of here alive.

  Wyatt and Ben held the trolleys still while Jo and I climbed in, already loaded with our bags and the weapons we gathered from around the diner.

  “Ready?” Asked Ben as he and Wyatt positioned the trolleys up against the double doors in the stairwell. Hearing a loud smash from back inside the diner, I knew the zombies had made their way inside. It was now or never.

  “Let’s do this.” I answered, holding my spear in position.

  They pushed the trolleys forward, slamming us through the doors and out onto the street.

  Even though the majority of zombies had been lured towards the front of the building by the music blaring through the outside speakers, and most were now making their way into the diner, at least a dozen still stood between us and Wyatt’s car parked two blocks away.

  They gave the trolleys one last push before Ben climbed in alongside Jo and Wyatt jumped in with me.

  Jo ignited the fire extinguisher to help cloud us from the zombies and I began slashing at any who got too close.

  I could feel my heart pounding and my arms shaking as we sped down the street, hacking off zombie heads as we zoomed passed.

  “We’re nearly there!” Yelled Wyatt as he fought off one of the zombies, gutting it like a fish with a butcher knife.

  I could see his yellow Chevy parked by the sidewalk on the next block, and I knew we would be there in a matter of seconds considering how fast we were flying down the street.

  “How are we going to stop?” Yelled Jo as the fire extinguisher started to sputter.

  Before anyone could answer, the trolleys hit the curb and toppled over, sending us all flying onto the hard concrete.

  I winced as I skidded across the ground, grazing my arms on the footpath and coming to a stop against the brick wall of a building.

  Opening my eyes, I could see a giant hoard of zombies running down the hill, literally falling over each other to get to us as we lay on the ground helplessly.

  “They’re coming!” I yelled as I picked myself up and held my hand out for Ben.

  I helped him to his feet while Jo and Wyatt quickly snatched up a few of the knives strewn along the ground from the fall.

  Feeling a sharp pain soaring down my arm, I started running fiercely towards the car, too afraid to look at what was causing it.

  Wyatt made it to the car first, fumbling around in his pocket for the key and frantically sliding it into the door, throwing a knife, the hairspray and lighter into the backseat.

  I jumped into the passenger seat and slammed the door shut behind me as Ben slid into the back.

  “Where’s Jo?” I heard Wyatt ask, fear in his voice.

  Turning around, I saw Jo was still running towards the car, clutching her spear tightly, with at least six zombies right behind her.

  “She’s not gonna make it!” I said as I reached into the back seat, grabbed the hairspray and lighter, and jumped back out of the car.

  “Eva! What are you doing?!” I heard Wyatt yell as I ran, but I didn’t stop. I had to help Jo.

  “Just start the car!” I yelled back.

  One of the zombies jumped at Jo, falling short and clutching her ankle, causing her to fall to the ground.

  Jo held her spear high and started stabbing it repeatedly until it let go of her ankle, while I ran up next to her and lit the lighter as I held it in front of the hairspray can. I had no idea what I was doing, but I had to do something fast.

  Just as the other five zombies were about to close in, I pressed down on the hairspray can, sending a huge flame bursting into the air in front of me.

  I felt my fingers starting to burn, but I sprayed the flames on the zombies as they came running towards us. I looked in horror as they continued running towards us, now as ferocious fireballs.

  Jo stood behind me now, pulling on my singlet, urging me to run.

  “Come on, Eva! We can make it!”

  I turned and together we ran to the car as fast as we could, Wyatt putting his foot down on the pedal as soon as we jumped inside.

  “Eva! You’re hurt!” Wyatt said, glancing at me as he sped down the street towards the city centre.

  Looking down at my right arm, I saw a huge gash just below my shoulder, blood pouring out of it.

  “I must have landed on one of the knives when we tipped the trolleys.” I replied, suddenly feeling the pain a whole lot more.

  “Here, you gotta put pressure on it. Give me your scarf.” Ordered Ben as he leaned forward from the back seat.

  I unwrapped my scarf from around my neck and handed to him, and he proceeded to tie it tightly around my arm, stopping the bleeding but intensifying the pain.

  “Good thing we’ve got a medic with us.” Said Wyatt, relief washing over his face.

  I looked in the rear view mirror to see the hoard as they chased after us, trying to ignore the pain in my arm.

  Their rotting limbs and decimated consciousness made them slower than us, shuffling more than walking or running. But their animal instincts and ever-expanding numbers made it easy for them to corner their prey. That’s how they were quickly overthrowing the entire population of Australia.

  “Fire doesn’t work. I lit those bastards on fire and it slowed them down a little, but it didn’t stop them. Maybe if it was a huge explosion or something that engulfed them enough to melt their brains, but just lighting one or two on fire isn’t enough. We need to remember that. I say we just stick to knives and weapons that we’re sure will destroy their brains.” I said, turning to everyone to make sure they understood.

  “But when you threw hot oil on the one in the diner, it stopped it… for a second.” Wyatt added, confused.

  “I know. Maybe because he was so new? He’d only just turned. The ones chasing us looked more… decayed. And they were definitely more brutal.” I said, trying to understand how the virus works.

  Everyone nodded as we drove further into city, passing half-eaten corpses and straggling zombies on the way.

  Melbourne had fast transformed into a war-zone, and I cringed at the thought of what awaited us at Melbourne Central.

  Chapter Eleven

  “I feel so ridiculous right now.” Wyatt said as he leaned out the window, reaching for the ticket that slid out of the machine as we waited to enter the Melbourne Central underground parking garage.

  We had seen more zombies than we expected dotting the streets on our drive from the diner into the city, and I kept a careful watch through the windows while Wyatt waited for the boom gate to rise.

  Slowly, he edged the car down the winding slope and into the parking lot.

  I felt relieved to see it was practically empty except for a few cars here and there.

  Pulling up as close to the elevator as possible, Wyatt parked the car and we climbed out, our eyes searching the vacant floor for any signs of movement.

  I pulled my satchel over my shoulder and held my knife close.

  After our last encounter in the street and losing some weapons in the trolley crash, we each only had one knife left.

  Waiting for the elevator, I felt grateful that the city still had power, although for how long I didn’t know, so we had to be quick.

  The doors slid open and we stepped insi
de the elevator, Ben anxiously pressing the ‘door close’ button repeatedly. We sighed in relief as the doors closed, but gasped in shock when we saw our own reflections in the mirrored doors.

  “Woah!” Exclaimed Wyatt as he touched his face.

  “Cool!” Said Ben, scrunching up his face and groaning like a zombie.

  I smiled proudly at my works of art.

  “Ewwww,” Jo said as she moved closer to the door, looking intently at her zombie-fied face and neck. “I look so gross! Good work, Eva.”

  She turned to give me the thumbs up as the doors opened onto the first floor, revealing a zombie standing right in front of her.

  Before any of us could warn her, Jo faced forward to step out of the lift, screaming when she saw the white eyes of the creature staring her in the face.

  Instinctively, she punched the zombie right in the head, sending it stumbling backwards and right over the balcony, falling down to the floor below.

  “Wow! Go Jo!” Laughed Ben, and she gave him a high five even though her hand trembled uncontrollably.

  Slowly, the four of us stepped out of the elevator, looking around for any more unwanted surprises.

  “Time to be zombies.” I whispered as I started stumbling around, trying to walk like all the zombies I had seen that day. The others followed my example.

  “Which way?” I asked, looking at Ben.

  “I dunno.” He replied, shrugging his shoulders.

  “What?!?” Whispered Jo, exasperated.

  “I don’t know, I think it’s on this floor somewhere.” He continued, looking around at the stores.

  “We need a map,” said Wyatt, spotting one further ahead and making his way towards it, still trying to walk like a zombie. “I’m feeling ridiculous again.” He smirked.

  Once we reached the map of the mall, we realised we needed to go down one level and walk to the other side of the centre.

  “We’ll never make it!” Jo groaned, dropping her face into her hands hopelessly.

  “Yes we will,” I said sternly. “We’ve made it this far. We can do it. Let’s go.”

  I just hope it’s open, I thought as I looked around the shopping centre.