Cinco De Zombie

by Albert Aykler

  Beyond the family table, I could see the waitress chatting with the biker couple. She asked them about a patch on one of their jackets.

  “Oh, God, thanks. I’m so thirsty. Thanks!” Soccer Dad pounded the chaser before he set to work on the main event.

  “Can I have the skeleton man this time, Dad?” Apparently, Tara had called dibs on the first one, so Soccer Dad obliged and gave this one to young Chad.

  “Anything else I can get you?”

  “A new hand, maybe.” Soccer Dad waved around the bandage cloud that was his hand.

  “Honey…What have you done to your bandage?”

  “Whoa. That’s not looking much better.” Pete stepped back. Sensible guy.

  Karen-Mother-of-Two looked up at Pete, “Sorry. No, I think we’re all OK for drinks now. Thank you.”

  “Yeah, thanks again.”

  “Take care of that thing.”

  “Or it’ll take care of you, right? I mean, me.” Little did Soccer Dad know, but both were true.

  “It doesn’t look too good.” Just as the waitress had suspected, the First Lady Biker turned out to be an off-duty nurse (so, Biker Nurse). She peeled the dressing from Soccer Dad’s wound.

  “Ahh…the air on it feels good.”

  “Ah zee air…exactly what it wants.” Ziggy whispered play-by-play running commentary at me between sips of his glowing blue tequila disaster.

  “Yeah, it’s really warm.”

  “You betcha it’s warm. Trying to escape. To make ze carrier ze infected.” Ziggy whispered.

  I had so many questions, but I didn’t want to miss the action. Carrier versus infected?

  The waitress had brought the Biker Nurse the big metal first aid kit and a pair of blue latex gloves from the kitchen. Biker Nurse touched the open wound. Ziggy looked uneasy.

  “Tsk. Tsk. I don’t zink a zin scrap of latex will keep it out.”

  “What? Isn’t that impossible?” I whispered back at him. I couldn’t let that one sit. I had to ask.

  “Yes, but…”

  “It was a squirrel?” The nurse asked the dad.

  “Chipmunk,” Tara chimed in before her mom or dad could.

  “Wow.”

  “Right. I know.” Soccer Dad could not believe his luck. He remained oblivious to how bad it was.

  “Looks painful.”

  “Well, this helps.” He held up his second Big Blue Monsterita and took another drink.

  “I don’t know…I can clean it. But you say you cleaned it an hour ago?”

  Karen-Mother-of-Two checked the time on her phone. “Just about an hour and forty-five minutes.”

  “And it didn’t look like this when you were done.”

  “No. I watched the guy doing it and it was red, but not…”

  “Not oozing.” This time young Chad jumped in, maybe too delighted to be the authority on the ooze.

  “Right,” Karen-Mother-of-Two confirmed.

  Ziggy leaned across the table and spoke under his breath again, “Ze guy is Kevin, I zink. Yes, definitely Kevin. He infected zat squirrel.”

  “Chipmunk,” I corrected.

  “Whutevah.”

  The nurse sounded worried, “Hmm. I think you better get to the ER tonight.”

  “Really?”

  Ziggy whispered so hard that I knew he wanted to scream, “We cannot let zat happen.”

  I couldn’t figure out how we could stop them, “You going to tell them the whole deal?”

  “Maybe we go to the parking lot and pop some tires or somezing. We need to keep an eye on zem so zey don’t infect ozers.”

  Meanwhile, the nurse was giving in all on her own, “Well, it’s OK for now, but I wouldn’t wait until morning if it keeps this up. How do you feel?”

  “OK. It doesn’t hurt much. But I think I might be getting a cold.” Soccer Dad snorted back more snot than anyone in the restaurant felt comfortable hearing go back up inside him.

  The nurse quietly poked at one of the raw, swollen red bitten areas with her rubber gloved finger. I could see she wanted to test him on how much it hurt in case he was trying to sound tough for the kids or something. The waitress saw the nurse doing this, too, and when Soccer Dad did not react, they looked at each other. From the looks of the wound and how hard she dug into it, anyone else would have yelped.

  Ziggy noticed this, too. “Oh, zis is new. Zis is weird. Numb or dead?”

  “Well, could be that blue tequila bomb is helping keep the pain down, but you’ll wanta take it easy so your liver can help get this healed up.”

  “I still have my appetite.”

  “I bet he does. Probably wants somezing a little more rare. Maybe one of his children.”

  “Ziggy, shuttup.”

  “I’ll finish my chimichanga and then we can head over to the hospital.”

  “Not much will happen in the next hour or so, honey. You’ve got some time. It’s only a little nip. They do see these kinds of things. Not from chipmunks, but…“ They all laughed lightly at Biker Nurse’s mention of chipmunks, relieved she didn’t sound worried. She moved gracefully from cleaning to wrapping up the wound. She was good. Kept her patient and his family calm. We only knew she was covering up any worries because we had seen her test Soccer Dad’s pain reaction.

  I glanced over at Biker Nurse’s partner, a Big Lady Biker with short-cropped hair and a round face. She worked slowly on the last of her burrito, knowing what I suspected, that the calmer Biker Nurse sounded, the more worries she was trying to hide.

  And the waitress. She was privy to all this, too. A bell rang from the kitchen window, and she did not wait to get after it, probably not wanting to give away the Biker Nurse’s worries to the family.

  As the Biker Nurse focused on closing up Soccer Dad’s bandage, I continued looking around at the rest of my fellow audience members. This included virtually everyone in the restaurant along with the cook and dishwasher trying to catch the action through the kitchen window. Lovely Karen-Mother-of-Two, took picture after picture of the wound, the old bandages, and the new ones with her phone.

  The kids sucked at their sodas between mouthfuls of their dinners, tapping at messages and games between taking photos of the scene. And in the other direction, I saw that the waitress had not gone straight to the kitchen window to pick up our food, but stopped at the bar to chat with the bartender and the cop. I am not the world’s best lip reader, but I did not need to be. The three of them openly but quietly discussed what they should do. Whether they ought to call it in.

  Then Karen-Mother-of-Two asked Biker Nurse the question on everyone’s mind. “Do you think it’s OK to wait until after dinner?”

  “He should be OK. It’s a bad scratch, but just a scratch. They can treat even the worst-case scenario at the hospital.”

  I could feel the impact wave of the collective sigh of relief from the bar. The nurse had saved them all a lot of paperwork, insurance, police reports, etc. Ziggy watched all of it intently. I don’t know how he planned to stop them if they reached for the phone, but his wacky Austrian wheels were definitely turning.

  Karen-Mother-of-Two still had worries. “Worst case scenario? What’s that?”

  “Well, rabies, honey. It’s very, very rare, but the way you’re talking about that chipmunk…well, it’s a good chance.” For my money, Biker Nurse had decided it was rabies, but had been a nurse long enough to know she better not hand out a diagnosis without a ream of test results and hospital malpractice insurance to cover her.

  “The man at the campground said it wasn’t rabies.”

  “Was he a doctor?”

  “No.”

  “Well, best for the doctors to run some tests.”

  And here came Ziggy with his breathless commentary again, “It’s not fucking rabies… much, much worse.”

  “Ziggy, come on. Maybe it wasn’t Kevin. Maybe it isn’t the absolute worst thing.”

  “Reconsider the facts of your life a moment.”

  ”Huh?”
<
br />   “When has anyzing in your life not been ze worst fucking zing?” He sounded disgusted with my thickheadedness. More than usual.

  “Do you think that’s what it is? Rabies.” Karen was on to Biker Nurse.

  “I couldn’t say, honey. It’s pretty rare.”

  “It’s not rabies, Karen.” Soccer Dad gave her that dimpled perfect toothed grin that had taken him through every so-called difficulty of his life.

  “But we should go to the hospital, right?”

  “Oh definitely. It’s a two-hour drive to the clinic in town, but it’s worth it in this case, I think.”

  “Fine. You win. As long as I get another beer before we go.” Dad did not intend to receive treatment sober.

  Biker Nurse smiled at Soccer Dad. “To help the pain?”

  “Pain? No, so I can handle her driving.”

  Karen-Mother-of-Two laughed but did not hesitate to add, “You’re such a jerk, sometimes.”

  “Only sometimes? I’m improving.”

  “Not really. We’re in public.”

  Biker Nurse chuckled along with their patter while somehow commiserating with Karen as she did. She finished wrapping the wound and gathered up all the old bandages. “But don’t let anyone else touch this without gloves. And get to the hospital.”

  “Shit. It is rabies, isn’t it? I knew Kevin was full of it.” Soccer Dad figured it out when Biker Nurse mentioned the gloves and fear sat him up straight.

  “Well, don’t panic.”

  “Oh, panicking would not be entirely irrational. But it wouldn’t help eizer.” Ziggy was too pleased with himself.

  “Why isn’t he sicker or a zombie?” I asked. “This isn’t how it usually goes down.”

  “It isn’t usually transmitted across species. In ozer viruses zer can be a carrier mode, especially when going from rodent to human. Zat is ze most likely reason he is not dead or trying to rip out our spleens—”

  “Shh.”

  The waitress brought over our food. Two plates of tacos for me and a heaping saucy Drunken Chimichanga platter with rice and beans for Ziggy.

  “All set?”

  I noticed a plastic garbage bag in the pocket of her apron. Probably to help with the clean up over at the family table.

  “I think we’re good.”

  “OK. Let me know if you need anything.”

  “Zanks. We will.”

  As expected, the waitress went from our table over to help clean up the table with the Biker Nurse and Soccer Dad who were still talking about what he should do about his hand.

  “It takes time and you’ll be getting to the hospital within 24 hours. If it is rabies, and that’s a really big if, then they can treat it. You’ll probably get to do a little staycation while you recover, but from what I have heard, most people aren’t much more than bored and tired during the treatment.”

  “Well, let’s hope it’s not that.” Karen pushed the remains of her taco salad into the I’m-not-finishing-that space of the table. Her voice hardened into something not so very Mother-of-Two-ish sounding. I looked at her more closely. This was a new Karen. A Corporate-Karen. A Corporate-Cutthroat Karen. And she did not believe a word this Biker Nurse told her.

  “Right. It’s probably something else. Who knows? I don’t know squirrels.”

  “Chipmunks.” Tara clung to this as a fundamental moral distinction. A squirrel could never do such a thing.

  “Them either.”

  “Thanks for cleaning it up and having a look.”

  “Yes, thank you. He was a nice guy, but I’m not sure about his medical training.”

  “He did you OK. It’s a weird one.”

  “We’ll get your next round.” Soccer Dad was in a spending mood.

  “Whaddya say Gene, you up for another?”

  “Sure.”

  “Look at ze air.” Ziggy interrupted my eavesdropping.

  “What?”

  “Ze air. Above zem in ze light.”

  Ziggy motioned somewhat discreetly with his fork-full of chimichanga. I saw a fog under the cantina style beer company themed light fixture hanging above the table where the Biker Nurse had cleaned up Soccer Dad’s wound. It looked like the heavy cigar smoke movies always show hanging over poker tables, an open secret of thick velveteen air no one dare mention or disturb. Maybe because of the light or maybe because it most certainly rose up off the hot wound when the bandage came off, I thought it had a red tint. The disturbing wound-steam dissipated as we watched.

  “Going. Going. Gone. Out of ze air. Into ze lungs.”

  ”But that’s not how it works, Ziggy.”

  “We don’t know zat. We know nozing.”

  “Shouldn't we do something? Clear the place out?”

  “I don't zink so. Hard to tell. Don't you know? You've seen more of zese zan me. Zan anyone. Even after zree years sleeping.”

  “Have I?”

  “I work in ze lab. You do clean up.”

  “Exactly. I haven't actually seen an outbreak start.”

  “Except ze very first.”

  “Not that I can remember.”

  “Me neizer. But we should have some time. We can get him on ze way to hospital when no one is looking and have Silvercrest pick him up. According to ze reports, zey die for a few hours before any zombies appear.”

  “So, we let him die…”

  “I zink so.”

  We returned to our meals.

  “My God, these tacos look amazing.”

  Right on cue, the jukebox switched to a happy Mexican oompah band song. The Biker Nurse sneezed. Soccer Dad coughed. Ziggy gulped down the rest of his Monsterita, and I continued attacking my tacos.

  In twenty minutes, the first of them would die. Five minutes after that, the first would rise. What used to happen in hours would take minutes. New strain of the virus. New rules. Kevin’s boondoggle revenge. Z minus twenty-five and counting.

  4 Not a Taco. Not a Pie

  Z minus twenty-four minutes, thirty seconds.

  I nearly wept at the two beautiful plates of tacos laid out before me. Five to a plate, one in the middle, and four arranged around that. I could eat them all and would eat them all but…

  “What if I puke again?”

  Kevin asked that question once. A long time before that night at El Coyote, but not a long time to me. The Silvercrest Cinco de Mayo party a few months before he and Ziggy had knocked me out. Put me on ice.

  I remember Ziggy laughing at Kevin the same way he was about to laugh at me for asking the same question in El Coyote Gordo. Ziggy’s laughter said, If you puke again, I laugh again. You are alive again. The joke of life keeps going. And Ziggy keeps laughing.

  It had been much too easy to convince Kevin that he could win a jalapeño pepper eating contest. He simply did not consider the reality that some people grew up eating spicy food—built on peppers much hotter than jalapeños—and some of them worked right alongside him in the lab.

  I don’t know what he thought Vivek and Albert complained about when they talked about how little flavor the cafeteria food had. Maybe he thought they identified a lack of salt. Or a lack of other herbs and spices (possible, but not the whole story). And when we ordered Indian or Thai food from outside, he skipped certain dishes because he found them too hot. Did he miss the fact that Vivek and Albert both kept going without breaking a sweat? And they were not alone.

  Other departments and labs included scientists with a much higher heat tolerance than Kevin. But he thought he had some gift for eating hot food because he loved Tabasco sauce and could order hot wings instead of medium. Oh, Kevin, your self-delusion was so much easier to see than my own.

  All that said against him, Kevin did well considering we talked him into it as a joke. He ate four. Threw up. And then sat at the table ready to start over. Competitive guy. Never mind that Vivek and Albert had each finished their seventh pepper while laughing at each other because their jaws started to get sore from all the chewing. Their mouths looked more gre
en than red. Kevin’s had the red meter pinned. His whole head looked like an overripe bing cherry with a long blond ponytail.

  While others in the lab-on-lab competition had substantial beads of sweat on their brows, Kevin’s body had gone into open revolt. Sweat pumped from every pore. He needed to stand under an air-conditioning vent and cool his system down. With Vivek and Albert leading the way, our lab had a total count of fourteen peppers. The next lab had ten. We could win without Kevin, but Kevin’s pride…

  He started repeating the question, “What if I puke again? What if I puke again? What happens if I puke again? Do they count the second time?” Panting and gasping between every other word.

  Ziggy was not kind. He was funny. And reliable in a pinch. But to him, a joke built on your pride was a joke until your pride ran out. He told him, “Oh, come on, Kevin. Look at Albert. Look at Vivek. Hardly red in ze face. You simply got a bad pepper in zere somehow.”

  “Just stop, Kevin,” I pleaded.

  He told me, “No. I can do this.” And then the hiccup train arrived later than expected, but in a mad rush to get Kevin somewhere else. Anywhere other than near those peppers.

  Kevin could not manage words through the hiccups. He stopped trying to speak. Even Ziggy told him to stop through his laughter. “Come on, Kevin. Eat some shoo-gar. Sit down. You are kaput.”

  But he didn’t. Kevin waited until we grew tired of telling him to stop and went over to his bowl of peppers, found one, and ate it, giving it a good chew as he did. Even Vivek (seventeen peppers) and Alberto (ten) expressed admiration and shock. The team won and Kevin contributed. He also passed out, pressing his face against the cool cafeteria floor shortly before the awards ceremony.

  Perhaps we should mark that as the first Quiet Kevin Silvercrest Boondoggle.

  And now, what if I puke again? What about this boondoggle of my own? Trusting Ziggy until my self-awareness caught up with my sense of shame and good judgement? Ten tacos. How many zombies? But I had a talent. Sid Singleton was weaned on zombie killing as sure as Vivek and Alberto ate hot peppers at grandma’s house.

  Anyway, Ziggy had a mouthful of Chimichanga when I asked, and I couldn’t make out his response, so I asked again. “What if I puke again?”