by Mark Tufo
It was getting late and we were all tired. Tracy watched with curiosity as I prepared another tent a few yards away from the rest. I then made an exaggerated stretch and let everyone know I was heading off to bed. I had other things on my mind but it didn’t stop me from almost immediately falling asleep. Colors flooded my senses, I felt like I was in Candy Land, I’m not making this stuff up. There was a river of chocolate lazily flowing through a rolling landscape of what looked like whipped cream. There were cliché candy cane trees, and what appeared to be giant broccoli sprouts which seemed wholly out of place, but stranger still were the variety of Pop-Tart fruit, still in their leafy foil packets that hung bountifully down from their boughs. Tommy was paddling from the distant shore towards me on the world’s largest Snicker’s bar; he would occasionally pause from his paddling duties and take a generous bite.
“Hey Mr.T!” Tommy shouted. Smatterings of chocolate nearly covered him from head to toe.
Henry came bounding up, a huge white chocolate bone in his mouth. “You know that chocolate’s not really good for dogs, Tommy.”
“It’s not real chocolate!” he yelled in his best stage whisper. “It’s cacao, dogs can eat that!” Tommy had stepped off his makeshift boat and approached me, all smiles and happiness. “Didn’t think I could do it Mr. T, but I did,” he said proudly.
“Do what Tommy?” I asked, I figured he was referring to getting his chocolate bar across the river. “And what’s with the broccoli?”
“Get you here,” he answered. “And Mom always said I should eat more greens.”
“Get me here? This is a dream, Tommy. What’s going on?”
“Just testing a little, you’d better go, Mrs. T is coming.”
“Wait, what?”
I snapped awake as Tracy came through the front flap of the tent.
“Nice place you got here.”
“Hi hon,” I said groggily, and somewhat disoriented. Something incredible had just happened but it would be days later before I could put it to page. Tracy proceeded to get into the sleeping bag I had set up. Within seconds, my earlier ‘dream’ forgotten, I pounced on her with all the grace of a jungle cat on Valium.
“What the hell are you doing?” she asked with a trace of bewilderment.
“You know,” I said softly.
“No I don’t,” she answered.
“Come on, you know.” I said trying to lead her on.
“No I do not… wait, are you trying to fool around?” she asked incredulously. “Are you effen crazy?!” she barked. Her voice was rising exponentially. “You’ve got a better chance of shitting out gold coins!”
I didn’t think that was feasible, so apparently getting laid was out of the question. My humiliation was compounded by the riotous laughing of BT from his sleeping area a few feet away. I’m a guy, no matter how dire the situation, if we’re not quite dead yet, we’re thinking about sex. My face flamed as I fell asleep. No wonder I dreamt about a tanning bed.
‘Why do they put nipples on modeling dummies?’ I pondered the next morning as I arose out of the tent, shifting around what the good God gave me. Fucken BT, always Johnny on the spot, was there to witness my indignation.
“Got any change for a $20 Gold Eagle? I see you didn’t get that taken care of last night?” He laughed.
I was about to verbally whiplash him, when the next word out of his mouth saved the day.
“Coffee?”
I started walking over to him.
“Don’t get too close, we hardly know one another.” He laughed again.
“Fucken funny,” I said as I grabbed a mug of the steaming goodness. Dunkies it wasn’t, but it was still incredible in its own right. I sat down next to him just to fuck with him. I attempted to put my arm around him.
BT shot up like a bottle rocket. “Dude?!” BT said disbelievingly.
I feigned innocence.
BT moved his smallish camping chair to the far side of our impromptu campfire. Sometime during the night someone had found and placed a Styrofoam prop fire resplendent with rocks and logs into the middle of our clearing.
As BT settled his not insignificant weight into the chair I had to ask. “How the hell is that thing supporting your weight?”
“Play nice boys,” Jen said as she came from the direction of the restrooms. She handed BT a canteen heavy with water. BT drank greedily, easily consuming half of the contents.
“Want some?” BT asked as he held the canteen out towards me.
“No, I’m good. I’ll go get my own,” I answered.
“Mike, just take this one, man,” he said thrusting the canteen a little closer to my face.
“Don’t sweat it man. I’ll go get my own.”
“There’s some right here. Don’t be difficult.” BT said, his dander starting to get a little riled.
“BT I don’t want it. I’ll get my own,” I said a little more sternly.
“It’s because I’m black, isn’t it!” he yelled.
Jen had stopped what she was doing to see how this potentially volatile situation panned out. Oh I knew how it would end up, my teeth in BT’s knuckles seemed the most likely scenario.
“BT, come on, you know me better than that.”
“I don’t know shit,” he hissed, his bulk seemingly swelled in proportion to his anger. He was a second and a half from coming out of his chair.
All of the boys were now a few feet away, Brendon was coming to the forefront, trying his best to throw a wedge between me and BT. I didn’t think he would even qualify as a speed bump if BT got going.
Tracy had taken this, the most blessed of opportunities to emerge from our tent.
“BT,” she said with no small amount of force.
“My beef’s not with you, Tracy,” BT said never taking his eyes off of me. “Is this how you want it Mike? Your woman doing your battles for you?”
“BT!” my wife yelled.
“What, WOMAN!” he shouted back.
“He wouldn’t take that canteen if I handed it to him.” Tracy said.
“Huh?” BT asked, confusion creasing his brow.
“BT, Mike is a germaphobe. I swear to you as I stand here, he would not take that canteen from me if I had just taken a drink from it.”
“Really?” BT asked incredulously. He then turned back to me. “I guess I owe you an apology,” he said as he laughed. “Wait then, how do you two kiss? Forget it, I don’t want to know.” And then apparently this was the funniest thing in the world. In between swigs of the canteen BT would break out into spontaneous laughter. “Can’t… kiss.” He laughed. “You could get cooties.” If the guy wasn’t such a solid block of granite he probably would have split his sides he ended up laughing so hard.
“No shit, Mike? You can’t drink off someone else’s beverage?” Jen asked. “That’s funny.”
I forced an anemic smile. Neurosis number 22 had reared its ugly head.
“How’d you have kids? Artificial insemination?” BT said roaring with laughter. “Immaculate conception? Wait… wait… I know… stunt double!”
I got up and left BT to his own devices, at this pace it would be hours before he realized I was gone.
“Holy shit, Mike. That was close,” Brendon said, as we put a few feet between us and the tittering titan.
“Yeah about that, Brendon, I appreciate the sentiment. But you’ve seen the propensity I have for getting into trouble.”
“In a hurry,” he added.
“In a hurry,” I conceded. “The point is Brendon, I don’t want to drag anyone else down with me.” He looked crestfallen. “Like I said, Brendon, I do appreciate the help, I just couldn’t live with the guilt if anything happened to anyone of you, especially if it was to save my ass.” He looked like he was about to say something. I didn’t want to give him any room for maneuverability. “Besides, can you imagine how bad Nicole would make it for me?” I looked at him questioningly.
“I suppose you’re right,” Brendon acknowledged.
/> I arched an eyebrow at him.
“No, you’re definitely right,” he conceded.
BT had for the most part calmed down. Tracy, I guess, wasn’t ready to let me off the hook, quite yet. “Yeah, you should see what he has to do before he gets on a toilet.”
“Tracy!” I shouted, more than a smidgeon mortified.
“Oh that’s not even the worst of it, at… ”
“Oh for the love of God.”
Justin, Travis and Tommy had resumed their dummy target practice. Now seemed as good a time as any to see how it was going. Two rows of seven dummies were lined up like advancing zombies. Errant arrows were strewn everywhere including the ceiling, but more than a proportionate amount had struck their targets with withering precision. As we came up to the ‘range’ Tommy was drawing the bow back, he let loose an arrow that created sparks as it plunged feet well short of its intended target.
“Good one, Tommy,” Travis said. “That’s your closest one yet.
Tommy was beaming. “You fink?” he asked as he handed the strawberry jelly coated bow to Justin.
“Uck,” Justin said as he pulled out a small box of baby wipes just for this occasion.
Brendon and I both looked quizzically at each other. Brendon broke the silence first.
“Mike this is about a third of the distance when he shot that guy from Durgan’s assault.”
I nodded, what words were there?
“And now he has a professional bow, not that piece of crap kid’s toy.”
I nodded again. It was nice to know that someone else was seeing what I’d been seeing for a while.
“What’s up Hon?” Nicole said as she wrapped her arms around Brendon. “You look a little out of sorts.”
“Nothing babe,” Brendon said as he leaned down to kiss her.
I turned away slightly. I didn’t want to make anybody else uneasy. It was just that, well dammit, I could not get the image of my daughter being anything other than that precious seven year old, daddy’s little girl, out of my head. I know she’s an adult and she has her own life now. It’s just that in my reality she has chosen the realm of celibacy. It’s small measures like this that allow me to sleep at night. One of these days I know, sooner rather than later, my brain is just going to freeze up. It will be the human equivalent of the blue screen of death. Unfortunately I have yet to discover my reboot button.
Justin let loose his shot. Everyone laughed and cringed in equal measures as the arrow struck the dummy’s stones. I swear he looked right at me for half a heartbeat before he joined in the celebration with everyone else.
Just then a loud ‘thud’ up by the front of the store cut the revelry short. I should have immediately taken charge and started delegating. Getting out of the store alive should have been my main objective. But I’ll admit, curiosity got the better of me so I started towards the front door. For one fleeting night since this whole shit storm started I had felt good, safe even. But it was all an illusion as I was about to painfully learn.
Travis was first to the front. “No biggie Dad, there’s only one.”
He didn’t have to add… zombie.
“Uh… Dad… there’s more.” Travis said hesitantly.
“Well shit, there’s always more. They’re like fucking wolves, pack animals,” I said testily. I was more than a little pissed that my home away from home was no longer the safe haven I had deemed it to be.
Brendon and Nicole had reached the front and were standing next to Travis. Suddenly Nicole turned and ran back to our ‘campsite’. She said nothing as she brushed past but I saw tears on her face.
“What’s the matter with her?” I asked. I was really hoping it was the overly dramatic part of Nicole coming out. It wasn’t.
“Mike, you’re going to want to see this.” Brendon swallowed hard.
“Am I?” I asked. I was liking this less and less. And then someone punched the shit out of me. Figuratively, although literally would have been better. My old world nemesis stood less than three feet away from me separated only by a flimsy pane of glass no thicker than a Coke bottle.
“Oh Jed. What did they do to you?” I wanted to cry. I fell to my knees, hampered somewhat by the new sport brace I had ‘acquired’ but still, to the ground I went. I buried my face in my hands, tears of true sorrow leaked through my clenched fingers. My body tensed each time Jed’s head butted the glass, his mouth snapping wildly at the air, drool running viscously down the front of his tattered shirt. A broken tooth protruded at a slight angle from his top lip. Dirty hands with torn fingernails scratched at the glass. Cataract clouded eyes stared pitilessly at me. It wasn’t until I let my gaze travel lower that my resolve got steeled, or more likely my innards got liquefied. “Brendon, take Justin and Travis and let’s start the evacuation process like we talked about last night.”
Brendon had learned quickly enough to not question orders. For that I was thankful. “One car or two, Mike?” he shot back quickly.
“We’ll do two, but let’s make it really quick.”
Curiosity was killing him, I could almost sense it. “There’s only a couple, Mike. I know it’s Jed and all, but still…”
I pointed to a small nametag festooned to Jed’s breast pocket.
“Oh fuck.” Brendon turned on a dime, Travis and Justin on his heels.
I stared long and hard into Jed’s eyes trying with every particle of my being to discern some small part of him that may have retained anything remotely resembling humanity. There was nothing there. He would eat me as quickly as the next without the smallest bit of remorse for what he did. I slowly removed the weights that BT had placed the night before. Each one seemed to be attached to my heart, miring it down into the depths of despair. BT came up just as I had finished pulling the last fifty pounder out of the way.
“Oh, I knew if I waited long enough I wouldn’t have to move those things again.” BT said in way too jovial a mood for my liking. He saw that I was not enjoying his conviviality. “What’s up Mike? I mean Nicole came back crying and then the boys said that we had to get stuff ready to go, but they said there were only a few zombies.”
I just pointed out through the glass door. Jed had followed me and was watching me hungrily as I cleared the doorway.
“It’s just a… Jed? Is that Jed? What the fuck is Jed doing here?”
“Look at his name tag.”
“What the fuck is a zombie doing with a name tag?” BT asked. His features turned ashen as he focused in on the little white card.
I hated nametags and this one wasn’t going to do anything to change that. Anyplace you ever had to go where people needed a nametag was not a place that I wanted to frequent. I don’t give a shit if you’re Cindy from Spokane, I didn’t know you before tonight and I have no desire to know you after. Do they use them at high school reunions so that you recognize then laugh at the football jock who is now fifty pounds overweight and balding? Or maybe for the prom queen who pumped out five kids, smokes like a chimney and now scratches her ass in public? I mean if that’s the case then I guess they’re alright, but Jed’s nametag didn’t give a name, only a message. “Found You.” Those two ominous words were a personal affront. Don’t get me wrong, I understood that this world was now all about survival of the fittest. It was a depraved, cruel world and getting harsher by the moment. Zombies were everywhere and would attempt to eat us with wild abandonment. Renegade roves of thieves, muggers, pillagers and general degenerates were also out there and given the opportunity would take everything they could from us. But this was different. We were being hunted, purposefully sought out for extermination. My fears for my family plummeted to new depths of despair. Like life wasn’t already hard enough. I had come to love Jed, but I thought no more for the bullet I put through his head than he would have had he got a hold of my flesh.
“FUCK YOU!” I screamed into the day, hopeful that my words would find the ears of those that came after us.
And they did, but not with the desired ef
fect. The car that had delivered Jed sat idling in the shadows of an alleyway across from the sporting goods store. Cigarette smoke poured out through the slightly open window, a mirthless laugh escaped the driver’s dry and cracked lips “Soon Talbot, so very, very soon.” The car pulled out and away on the deserted roadway as Jed’s body twitched one final time on the frozen pavement.
CHAPTER 15 Journal Entry Fourteen
Within ten minutes we were loaded up and on the road. My mood couldn’t have been any more sour if I had just come home to realize my wife had run off with my best friend and taken the dog. (Wait, scratch that, if she had taken Henry that would have been worse.) A small grim grin bubbled to the surface with that new thought.
“Mike,” Tracy said her face a lighter shade of white. “Mike,” she said again when I didn’t immediately respond. “Brendon’s having a tough time keeping up.”
“Huh,” I said breaking free from my black thoughts.
“Brendon, the other minivan, they can’t keep up,” she said, her knuckles white on the dashboard.
The tachometer was buried deep in the red as the Terrible Teal machine was topping out at somewhere near 120 miles per hour. I couldn’t be sure because the numbers only went to 110 but the needle was pressed firmly against the upraised stop pin. Brendon’s van was a distant memory in the rear view mirror.
Tracy placed her hand on my shoulder. “Mike,” she said pleadingly. BT sat quietly in the back. A few more shades lighter and he would be able to get into some of the finer country clubs in the area. A tire blow out now would most likely send us into the Guinness book of records for most barrel rolls. Well as a kid I had always wanted to get into that book of oddities. Probably for something more mundane like how many pieces of bubble gum I could chew and not necessarily for being the world’s largest rolling meat grinder. My foot eased off the accelerator. I had placed so much force on my right leg trying to press the gas pedal into the floorboard that I was now in the unenviable process of trying to alleviate a charley horse while also keeping this missile on the straight and narrow.