Z Notes | Book 1 | Z Notes

by Lilly,Shawn L.

  Matt nearly dropped his beer at the name. That was his boss’s name, and he also drove a truck with the same color of the vehicle the overhead camera of the helicopter was showing on TV. But Matt knew he wasn’t drunk. His boss was a recovering alcoholic and hadn’t touched anything with alcohol in twelve years. “Besides feeling under the weather, what could have made him lose control of his truck?” he asked himself.

  Matt reached over and grabbed the phone to call the hospital for an update on what was going on. But when placing the phone to his ear, he remembered his phone was cut off last week, and he was still too broke to pay to have it turned back on.

  Matt had no car and always caught a ride to work in the mornings. So he guessed he would have to wait till tomorrow and see what was going on, if anyone had heard anything. But till then he would just set back and watch whatever was on till Supernatural came on that night and head off to bed.

  After Supernatural went off, Matt got up and took a shower. Matt was in the bathroom toweling off when a loud bang hit the wall next to him. Matt nearly jumped out of his skin. Usually his neighbor on that side of him was so quiet. So Matt paid it no mind and finished drying off. (Boom! Boom!) It went once or maybe even twice, but Matt couldn’t let him keep making all the noise all night. So Matt knocked on the wall.

  “Hey!” screamed Matt through the wall. “If you’re hanging a picture, hurry up. If not, please keep it down. I’m about to go to bed.”

  The bang came one more time. Matt waited, and after what felt like ten minutes, nothing else came. Figuring the last bang was in acknowledgment he had heard him and would stop, Matt decided it was time to lie down for the night. But sleeping that night was something he wasn’t going to seem to get.

  Cops seemed to be in full force that night. It seemed there were sounds of sirens all around his apartment building from fire trucks, ambulances, and even maybe a couple of EMS trucks. Matt tossed and turned half the night till he seemed to be able to block out all the stuff going on outside. But at the point of falling asleep, there were once again the sounds of running in the halls outside his room over and over again. Matt had enough and got pissed and flung the blankets off him and jumped up. Storming to his front door, he unlatched it and unbolted it. Swinging the door open, he shot his head in the hallway and screamed, “For the love of God, keep it down!” But nothing was out there moving around making the noise he had heard. Then a thought struck him, Maybe the place is haunted by running ghosts. “Nah,” he said to himself.

  Just when he was about to pull his head back into his room, a blur ran from one corridor at the end of the hall and into another corridor. Matt watched a second or two longer, and two more blurs passed in the same manner as the other one going in the same direction. Matt pulled his head in and closed the door and refastened its locks. “The runners are those people’s problems now,” said Matt to himself out loud.

  Turning around Matt went back to his bedroom and crashed onto his bed, and that was where he stayed the rest of the night till daylight broke the next morning.

  Morning came with the creeping of the sun over the horizon. Matt had not moved since falling on his bed after looking out in the hall. So his face was facing the window and he hadn’t shut the curtains, so the sunlight hit him square in the face.

  Matt moaned and got up and went to the bathroom and relieved himself and washed his face and hand. Going to the kitchen he grabbed an orange and a beer from the refrigerator. Setting there Matt ate his orange and sipped his beer slowly. After he was done, he wiped his hands on a nasty towel he had in the kitchen for the use of only wiping his hands after touching anything. Opening the refrigerator he now noticed the light was out. Trying to fix it himself, he tapped it and flicked the button on the fridge that made it turn on and off. The light stayed unlit, so Matt closed the door and looked around the room and saw all his clocks were off except the batteried one on the wall. Walking over the wall, he turned on the front room light. The light never came on no matter how many times he flicked it on and off. Cursing once more he walked to his wall of bills, a wall he would post all his bills on so to know what was due first.

  The power bill was overdue by a month, but it was still not due to be cut off yet. It wasn’t due for another two weeks still. Matt knew how the power people could be though. They would cut your power because they felt like it and put it back on whenever they thought they felt like it. “Fucking monopoly,” said Matt to himself.

  Checking the time on the wall one more time, he could see it was five minutes past seven o’clock. His ride should have been here by now, and if he had shown up, why didn’t he beep the horn or come up and knock? Grabbing his wallet Matt walked to his room and got dressed and walked to the front door. As he unlocked everything, he went for the doorknob and stopped. On the other side of the door, he could hear some strange sound. It was a sucking sound when eating, or maybe someone got sick out there and his or her dog was out there licking it up. The thought of it nearly made him sick. Bracing himself for a puke-eating dog, he opened the door wide and began to say, “Get out of—” But Matt had forgotten what he was about to say. The sight before him was something he couldn’t even imagine in his wildest dreams. Crouched down before him was his landlady. She seemed to be eating something. What she was eating he couldn’t make out, but it kind of looked like the skinny guy living right across from this place.

  But that would be crazy, right?

  Matt was so in shock the smell of the hall hadn’t hit him yet. The landlady had stopped eating as soon as Matt opened the door to yell. She just crouched there with blood all over herself. Something dark and slimy hung from her mouth extending to her hands.

  Matt took a step backward and watched as the landlady started to stand up. Matt knew better than to take a second or two to see what would happen. Matt hurried up and slammed the door shut.

  Slam! Matt turned the bolt lock as the first ram from the other side of the door came. The sounds of banging and scratching were so loud. It sounded as if she was digging her way through the door.

  “Miss Leyro, maybe we can renegotiate the terms now,” said Matt latching the last lock on the door. All he heard from the other side was screaming and more scratching.

  Matt swore and ran over to the couch and pushed it to the door to brace it closed. Sitting behind the end of the couch, he leaned his back and head against it. He listened to the sounds of the landlady attacking his door.

  “What the hell is going on out there?” asked Matt to himself.

  What a Lovely Place to Be

  The sounds of eating still came from the other side of the door which Matt and Frank braced themselves against. The sounds of fighting over the meal had stopped. There came the steady bumps to the front door as the undead were fighting over their kill. But Frank and Matt were holding strong and hard to not let the door budge open at all. Matt looked as white as a ghost and hadn’t moved any the whole time. Frank on the other hand looked like this happened every day of his life. He also moved only when the sounds outside got loud enough to hide any sounds he made while he rearranged himself.

  It was nearly three hours when all sounds on the other side of the door stopped, and all that could be heard was the whistle of the wind seeping through the door’s tiny openings. Matt blinked a couple of times and slowly lifted his hand and placed his finger to his lip to signal Frank he was to stay still while he got up and looked outside. Frank just cracked him a tiny grin and returned to looking at whatever he was looking at before Matt moved.

  Matt slowly rose up and placed his hand on the floor to help balance himself. Setting on the floor for a couple of hours and staying tense as they were wasn’t helping his muscle much. It felt like he was a tackling dummy for a college football team. Matt pushed off with his hand and stood straight up and waited there for a second. Bending his knees by crouching and standing back up, he took his first step slowly, heel to toe and heel to toe till he was next to the side window next to the door.

/>   The window had a half-hanging curtain on it. It was ripped in some spots so Matt had to be careful not to pop out in one of the holes. Doing so and having anything see him from the outside could be bad news for him and Frank. Slowly sliding the curtain to the side, he took a peek out the smallest corner of the window toward the porch. The porch seemed to be clear from all undead, but there were smears of blood all over the place. It kind of looked like a fat guy exploded upon the porch.

  Matt moved up a tab a bit higher and looked just in front of the door. The remains of the lady were still there, what was left of her that is. Matt lowered the holey curtain and moved from the window and stepped over Frank. Frank watched him as he walked over his leg and then turned around the corner and out of sight.

  Matt was now in the living room and staying low walked to the closest window he could get to. Doing the same as he had done at the last window, he peeked out and had another look. The streets were now not so lonely and unbanned anymore. There were at least six walkers moving about abandoned cars. Matt watched on to make sure they were just regular walkers. But it was too hard to tell them apart from the others who could do a little more than just walk.

  Moving back toward Frank, Matt stood over him and gave a nod. Frank quietly got up and moved to the living room and started looking around the room for something. Matt stood in the entrance way and watched on. Not sure what he was looking for, he just stood there. Frank came upon an oak table that came as high as his knees. Frank bent over and gave it a lift and grunted at its weight. Looking up and over at Matt, he just stood there and stared at him.

  Matt looked back and gave him head gestures in the way of “What? Why are you looking at me?”

  “Are you going to stand there or going to help me move this in front of the door?” asked Frank, waiting patiently by the table.

  Matt was still dumbfounded on why Frank needed the table but got over to his side and stood just across of him. Watching Frank, Matt placed his hands on the same place as his and helped lift the table into the air. The table was not very big, but it weighed a ton. They grunted and moved it to the front door and placed it longways against it. One side was on the door, and the other side was hitting the bannister of the staircase leading to the second floor. There was a little room on the side close to the stairs.

  “I see the point of the table now,” said Matt in a low tone. “But it’s not long enough to stop the door from opening at all.”

  Frank walked over to the table and made some minor adjustment to it and stood back and gave it one last look.

  “It will be just fine” was Frank’s only reply to his buddy’s comment. “That little space is there in case someone out there finds out we’re in here.” Looking at Matt he could tell he still didn’t understand the concept of his plan. “Look. The door was kicked in so it doesn’t lock anymore. And the table will keep it closed. If someone finds out we’re in here and pushes the door, it will move the table and have it hit the bannister. The sound should alert us to someone at the door.”

  Matt smiled big and gave his buddy a nod. Matt wasn’t much for thinking big ideas on the spot. It usually took him some time to plan something out. Matt had planned many store raids and house raids for supply and made it out just fine. But if things got a bit hairy, it was Frank’s fast thinking that would get them out, like now.

  Matt walked over to the door and picked up his pack and grabbed Frank’s as well and gave the bag a toss toward him. Frank snagged it out of the air. Matt started for the kitchen and heard a noise and stopped in his tracks. Frank was just as fast to freeze as well. It sounded like a bag had moved from somewhere in the kitchen.

  Reaching for his bag he turned it around and untied the machete from it. He held it in his hand as he laid the bag on the floor and looked back at Frank.

  “For as long as we’ve been here and all the moving we have been doing, do you really think there is someone in there?”

  Frank gave a shrug of his shoulders and said, “Could be a crawler or a person who was tied up and killed for his food or something. Now he has turned and can’t move.”

  Matt figured the second more than the first, seeing it hadn’t come at them yet.

  Matt flexed his fingers around the grip of his weapon over and over. The palms of his hands had been now sweating, and he was letting his nerves get to him more than they should. “It could be nothing at all,” he kept telling himself with each step closer to the kitchen. It wasn’t a far walk to the kitchen, but with the small steps Matt was taking, it felt like a mile walk. Each drop of sweat that hit the floor sounded like a gunshot to him. It also felt like each step he took just so happened to find the nosiest floorboard in the house. What felt like forever to Matt was only several steps, and now he was one step away from entering the room with the mystery sound.

  Taking a deep breath, Matt raised his weapon and rushed into the kitchen ready to swing at anything that moved a fraction of a second too fast.

  The kitchen was empty except for some cobwebs in the corners of the ceiling. Matt released his breath and looked back at Frank to come on in. Frank smiled and walked into the room and had a look around him. Just as he was looking around, the sound came from close beside him. Frank kept his smile and looked over his shoulder at the refrigerator. Upon it was a picture drawn and colored by someone very young, being held only by a SpongeBob magnet. The window just over the sink had a baseball-sized hole in it, and over the hole was a plastic bag. The bag had tiny holes in it, and the wind outside was blowing good and strong it had the bag working hard to stay in place. The hole only let a little bit of wind pass through, and it was hitting the picture dead-on each time it blew outside.

  Frank looked back at Matt and smiled big and gave him a punch in the shoulder and left the room. Matt could do nothing but laugh at himself. Lowering his weapon he began to look around like what his comrade was most likely doing.

  Matt searched the cabinets for food of any kind. Frank was upstairs doing the same and also looking for any weapons he could find. Matt checked all the upper cabinets, and nothing was in them except for a couple of empty boxes and cups and broken plates. Before he checked the bottom cabinets, he looked over at the refrigerator.

  “It wouldn’t be that easy, would it?” Matt asked himself out loud.

  Walking over he gave the handle a tug, and the refrigerator door opened wide. The smell of rotten food and spoiled milk nailed him square in the face. Matt nearly vomited on the spot and hurried to close the door and rush to the window and breathe in the air the breeze blew though the bag. Once Matt felt his stomach settled down, he walked out of the kitchen and looked around the house. On the walls were photos of a man and a boy. There was no mother in any of them. Matt started wondering what might have happened to her and why she wasn’t in one of the photos. From downstairs he could hear Frank upstairs moving around. Making his way to the steps, he walked up them and found four doors. At the very top to his left was what looked to be the master’s bedroom. Just ahead and next to the master’s room was a bathroom. To his right were two bedrooms, and from the sounds coming out of the farther one, that was where he would find Frank.

  Matt walked into the room sucking on his teeth; Frank looked up at him in a neck-breaking pace.

  “Dude, you need to go open the refrigerator down in the kitchen,” said Matt sucking on his teeth some more. “They got a jar of peaches down there that taste like a bit of heaven.”

  “And you couldn’t just bring them up when you came?” asked Frank.

  Matt shrugged and said sorry. Frank shook his head and passed by Matt.

  “As I don’t want to waste more time here like you seem to want to,” said Frank from the stairs, “I’ve checked that room and the one next to it, and there was nothing in there useful at all. Might want to take a look out the window though, carefully.”

  Matt could hear his steps fade away from earshot, and a large grin came on his face. “That’s what you get for laughing at me, turd,” Ma
tt said out loud to himself and walked to the window.

  Stepping to the edge he took a glance out of the window and saw that two of the six walkers were gone or just out of his sight. The other four seemed to just roam around like bored kids looking for something to do.

  Ready to step away from the window, movement caught his eye. Just down the street were the undead, and they seemed to be moving their way little by little. Taking a chance, Matt pressed his face against the glass to see past the new undead to see behind them. With a sharp intake of breath, Matt stepped away from the window and rushed out the door into the hall to the top step.

  “Hey, Frank!” yelled Matt, not caring if he was overheard. “Step it up. We have company on the way.”

  Matt could hear more movement below now. The steps got louder and faster from the hall to the kitchen. Matt took to the master’s bedroom and walked in.

  The room was an utter mess. Clothes were thrown all about the room. You could tell the person packing up was in a hurry. Dresser drawers were pulled out, and Matt had to push them a little back in to get by. A lamp lay next to the bed, with its bulb broken and the pieces not far from where it had landed on the floor.

  Matt walked to the closet and saw it was almost empty. Some loose hangers, about thirty of them, hung on the bar with nothing on them. A couple looked to have fallen on the floor and stepped on, from the bent up way they looked. There were even boxes on the floor with their lids still on them.

  Reaching down Matt slid a couple of the lids off and rifled through them quickly. Most held paperwork and pictures. The ones that held nothing of use were tossed behind him, scattering their contents over an already messy room. As he was moving the last box, something behind it scratched the wall and fell with a thud. Matt jumped backward and looked for the exit.

  Frank seemed not to hear it, for if he had, Matt was sure he would have come up running the stairs toward the sound. Matt seeing what scared him took a couple of deep breaths to calm him down and smiled for being such a sissy. Lying on the ground now at the back of the closet was a baseball bat. It looked rather new, so Matt reached in and grabbed it. Getting back to his feet, he made for the door and down the stairs. Frank was in the kitchen stuffing something in his bag.