Way of the Barefoot Zombie

by Jasper Bark

  "So you're really going to stay and join the Ounfó then?" said Benjamin, joining her on the stairs.

  Tatyana nodded and made sure he didn't get dirt on her clean step. "Yes I am. In fact I'm kind of honoured they've accepted me, seeing as I don't come from the island or anything."

  "I don't think we had any choice about accepting you," said Brigitte sitting on the step above them. "As servants of the Loa we have to heed their wishes, and Papa Legba was pretty adamant that you stay. You have a talent for this and you might not realise but you've had the calling for a long time."

  "Who'd have thought?" said Benjamin.

  "Yeah," said Tatyana. "But I think I've been looking for something to believe in my whole life. That's probably what drew me to the ZLF. I wanted to have faith in something and I thought taking up a cause would give me that. Of course there were other things that attracted me too." She took Benjamin's hand as she said that. He squeezed it in a friendly fashion and let go. He was withdrawing from her emotionally. She knew he had to, but she missed being close to him. And she missed the sex. She was probably going to have to go without it for a while.

  "I know what you mean about the ZLF," Benjamin said. "I think we all hoped the cause would give us something we were looking for."

  "What were you looking for Benjamin?" Brigitte said.

  "I think I was looking for somewhere to belong. And I think I was really trying to piss my step dad off."

  "That's the first time I ever heard you call Richard your step dad," said Tatyana,

  "I know. I guess that's what he is though. I need to accept that if I'm going to get on better with him and my Mom."

  "This is a really mature side that you're showing," said Tatyana. "I rather like it."

  "Thanks," said Benjamin. "Coming here has put a lot of things into perspective for me. Doing this course showed me how much I wanted to belong and the things I was capable of doing to feel I belonged. I think that's what my fascination with Zombie movies was all about."

  "Really?" said Tatyana.

  "Yeah. It was the tension between being an individual or fitting in. The human survivors in these movies were like the individuals resisting the mindless herd of the Zombie conformists. I always identified with them at the beginning of the movie but towards the end when they all start becoming Zombies I couldn't help thinking it would be easier to just lie down and get it over with. To get bitten, become a Zombie and then they couldn't hurt you anymore."

  "So you secretly always wanted to conform," said Brigitte. "That's why you identified with the Zombie."

  "Exactly, even though all the dressing up and stuff made me stand out."

  "I find the West's fascination with Zombies quite baffling actually," said Brigitte. "Is that what it's all about, being an individual or conforming to some sort of mass cultural stereotype?"

  "Not entirely," said Benjamin. "I think the Zombie is sort of how we secretly see ourselves and our society. Our culture's all about mindlessly consuming material things, a bit like a Zombie. We're devouring the world's resources and any other culture that gets in our way. Trying to turn them into mindless consumers like us. Modern Zombie films are always about the breakdown of society due to some calamity that brings the dead back to life. And we don't want to admit it, but we know that if we carry on this way our society's going to break down and that's the kind of world we'll be living in."

  "Wow," said Tatyana. "You have been getting things into perspective haven't you?"

  "Yeah I guess I have. You know I'm reminded of something my granddad once told me. He wasn't my real granddad, he was Richard's dad but he's the closest I ever got to a real granddad. He was a broker during the stock market crash of 1929. He saw all his money wiped out in one afternoon. The only thing he could think of doing was to open the window of his top floor office and walk out onto the ledge. When he got out there he just froze. He couldn't get back inside and he couldn't jump. He was trapped there for eight hours until the fire fighters got him down.

  "While he was up there, facing death, he said his whole life suddenly fell into perspective. He saw all the wrong choices he'd made, like cheating on his wife and lying to his bosses. He saw the reasons why he'd made those choices and the things he could do to put things right. When it looked as though his life was over he saw all the ways that he could fix it."

  "I know exactly what you mean," said Tatyana. "That's totally what we've been going through."

  "Isn't it though?"

  "God yes. It just cuts through all the bullshit. Being so close to death for so long has convinced me that there's got to be something else beyond it. I'm not entirely certain what that is but I'd like to learn more about it. I know this probably sounds a bit strange coming from a former atheist, but Voodoo just makes sense of the way that I've always experienced the world. Do you know what I mean?"

  "Yeah, I think I do. And trust me, nothing sounds strange after what we've just been through"

  "I've always known there was this other invisible world going on all around us but I never wanted to admit it. Mainly because of my father I guess. I mean he told me and my mother we were atheists and so we were. I was too frightened of him to argue. I was frightened of being disloyal to him. That if I started believing in things he didn't, then I'd stop loving him, which I don't want to do, in spite of all his faults. I think I was also afraid that if I started to believe in religion it would take over my life and I'd stop being the person I was. Now, of course, I realise that having a faith allows me to be the person I really am."

  "Now look who's getting some perspective." Benjamin said.

  "So you understand then, why I'm doing this I mean? And you're not mad at me?"

  Benjamin shook his head and rolled his eyes in mock exasperation. "Are you kidding? I'm so impressed by what you're doing. Why would I be mad?"

  "Well, you know, because of you and me, and the way things have turned out."

  "Listen, we've grown up loads together and now I guess we've gotten to a stage where we going to have to grow some more apart from each other. I won't stop loving you though, no matter what happens."

  "I can see what you saw in him now," said Brigitte.

  Tatyana put her hand on Benjamin's knee. "He's lovely isn't he?"

  "And what about you Benjamin?" said Brigitte. "What are you going to do next?"

  "Well first I'm going to grab a shower, get my stuff together and catch the launch this afternoon," he said. The islanders had got a boat together to take all the people left alive who'd worked for Doc Papa over to Haiti. Benjamin was joining them.

  "After that," Benjamin continued. "I think as soon as I get home I'm going to have to get in touch with the families of our friends and explain what happened to them here."

  "Are you okay to do that?" Tatyana said.

  Benjamin shrugged. "Someone's got to and I guess it ought to be me. I got them involved in the first place so I suppose it's my fault." Tatyana and Benjamin's mood suddenly dropped as they thought about the friends they'd lost.

  Brigitte put her hand on Benjamin's shoulder."What you did was foolish, ill considered and reckless, but you can't hold yourself responsible for what happened to your friends. I've been holding myself responsible for what happened to my fellow islanders since I left the island two years ago. I realise now that I was wrong to do that. There's only one person who's ultimately responsible and he paid the ultimate price."

  "Yeah, I still get creeped out when I think about what happened to him," said Benjamin. "I guess your ancestor really knew how to place a curse."

  "Yes. He certainly did."

  "So you're really going to try and get on better with your folks?" said Tatyana.

  "Well my Mom mainly. But Richard too I guess. First I've got to face the music and explain what happened to Richard's yacht and the five million he put up for me to come here."

  "How do you think they'll take it?"

  "Richard will be a dick. My Mom will play peacemaker and I'll have to eat
a lot of shit and make a lot of compromises to get back in with them. But I figure it'll be worth it to patch things up with my Mom."

  "That's kind of a big step for you."

  "It is, but out in the jungle, when Brigitte did that Voodoo healing on me, it lifted so much anger off me. I see now how so much of it came from my relationship with my Mom. We both miss each other and the way it used to be between us. I want to put that right now. I never properly thanked you for that Brigitte."

  "No thanks are needed," said Brigitte. "In fact I should really be thanking you."

  "You should?"

  "Yes, you've made me realise how important the bond between a mother and a son is. I haven't told anyone, but before I came back here I gave birth to a son. It was part of the agreement I had with Miriam and Oliver Chevalier. I carried him for nine months but I told myself that he wasn't my child. I was inhabiting another woman's body and the baby inside me belonged to Miriam and his father not me. I felt so guilty about what happened to everyone on St Ignatius that I was fixated on getting back here and doing what I thought was my duty to them. I forgot about my duty to my son. He might not have been conceived in the womb I was born with, but I'm still the only mother he has. I need to become the mother he deserves."

  "How are things with your own Mom?" said Tatyana.

  "They've been worse," said Brigitte. "At least she's talking to me now."

  "Cos she's forgiven you or cos she's not a Zombie anymore?" said Benjamin.

  "Probably the latter."

  "This is incredible," said Tatyana. "The past week or so I've been more intimate with you guys than anyone else in my life. But I've learned more about you in the last thirty minutes than the whole time I've known you. It's like we're suddenly spilling our guts."

  "That's what happens when you think you might not see someone for a long while," said Benjamin. "You suddenly think of all the things you want to tell them before you go. That reminds me, I need to shower and pack."

  Tatyana stood on the jetty and waved goodbye. Benjamin was fooling around at the back of the boat, pulling faces to stop her from crying. It didn't work. The tears ran down her cheeks.

  She'd pulled Benjamin to her for one last kiss just before the boat left. He was a little surprised and hesitant at first but she wasn't going to let him go without one. That meeting of lips spoke more about how they felt than they'd said in their whole awkward farewells.

  She watched until the boat disappeared over the horizon, taking all those people away to carry on with the rest of their lives. While she stayed here to continue hers.

  Is this where the adventure ends? thought Tatyana. She remembered Benjamin telling her his Uncle Brian once said that there were no beginnings or endings in real life. Just a sequence of events from which we draw our own significance.

  Tatyana was sure of one thing, no sequence of events would ever hold more significance than those she'd just lived through.

  THE END

  Jasper Bark is a novelist, children's author and script writer specialising in comics and graphic novels. He's written three previous novels, A Fistful of Strontium (Black Flame, 2005 with Steve Lyons) Sniper Elite: Spear of Destiny (Abaddon, 2006) and The Afterblight Chronicles: Dawn Over Doomsday (Abaddon, 2008). His all-ages book, Inventions, Leonardo Da Vinci, has been translated into five different languages and his Battle Cries series of graphic novels are used in schools throughout to improve literacy for 12 to 16 year old readers. He's written comics for just about every publisher in the British comics industry, from 2000 AD to The Beano, and an increasing number of American and international publishers. Prior to this he worked as a film journalist and cable TV presenter by day and a stand-up poet and playwright by night. In 1993 he released an anthology of poetry and a spoken word album both called Bark Bites. In 1999 he was awarded a Fringe First at the Edinburgh International Festival.