“I thought you’d like some company for dinner.” Pearl lowered her head and grabbed her left arm. “I’m sorry for the way Tanya acted earlier.”
“You don’t have to apologize for her.”
I eyed her suspiciously. Pearl seemed different from Tanya, as if she actually had a brain, but they were still friends, so I didn’t know what to think.
“I know, but she really is a nice girl. She’s trying to get on with her life.”
I closed the door, and we headed toward the elevator.
“Everybody has lost someone to the zombies, you know. And Tanya thinks the sooner we quit talking about it, the sooner they’ll go away.”
The doors slid open and we stepped inside. “I don’t think the zombies are going anywhere anytime soon.” I punched the button and the doors slid shut.
“I don’t know. They might. They’ve all left Florida.”
I raised my eyebrows. That was news to me. “Where did they go?”
Pearl shrugged. “I don’t know. Oregon I guess.”
The doors opened and we headed into the dining room, which was filled with mainly teenagers and a few adults. They were all talking loudly, and no one looked up as we entered. I was reminded of my school cafeteria as we grabbed trays and loaded them with food. We headed to a table at the back of the room, and Tanya and Nancy gave us dirty looks as we walked by. I glanced over my shoulder as we passed. Tanya leaned into the table and whispered to the other girls. We found two empty seats and sat.
I looked at the food on my plate—pizza with a salad and chocolate cake for dessert. It might not have been much better than school food, but it was better than cold slop from a can. I greedily bit into the pizza and relished the cheese that ran down my chin.
“How long have you been out there?” Pearl stared at me in amazement.
I slurped up the mozzarella and spoke with my mouth full. “I don’t know. I kind of lost track of time.” I wiped the grease on the back of my hand and swallowed. “You said all the zombies left Florida, do you know why?”
Pearl nibbled her slice of pizza. “I heard some of the teachers say it was because of the humidity.”
I stuffed another bite into my mouth and pushed my eyebrows together. “What would humidity have to do with it?”
“Something about speeding up the decaying process. They’re dead, you know, and they decompose right before your eyes. Humidity would speed up the process of decomposition.”
“That would mean the zombies would have to be conscious of their condition. Are they really that smart?”
Pearl shrugged. “I don’t know. How else would you explain why they left?”
I finished my pizza. There was no way to explain it. I was still having a hard time believing it. I was beginning to like Pearl, and I believed she was different from the others. I decided it was time to get to know her.
“Did you lose your family to the zombies?”
Pearl set down her pizza and folded her arms on the table. “We all did. That’s why we’re here. If you have family, you get to live with them in the cities.”
“Are there a lot of people in the cities?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
“Where are you from?”
“North Carolina.”
“How long have you been in Florida?”
“About ten days.”
“What do you think is going to happen to us?”
Ten days was enough time to figure out what was going on. She probably knew something, had some idea what people had planned.
Pearl picked up her slice of pizza. “Who knows? What we need to worry about now is surviving. We have it pretty good here. The zombies won’t bother us, and we get to live our lives.”
“Yeah, but to what end?”
Pearl stared at me. “Why does there have to be an end? Can’t you be content to be alive?”
Her question was a little disconcerting, although there was some truth to it. I should be happy to be alive, but we also had to face the fact that everything we knew had changed. Life wasn’t the same, which meant survival was a whole new game. I could’ve pointed that out to her and probably started an argument, so I decided to keep my mouth shut.
After we finished, we went into the lobby with several of the other kids and watched Sleeping Beauty. I found it difficult to focus on the film because my mind wandered elsewhere. Florida was a large state, but it surely couldn’t house that many people. And what was the business of the East Coast dealing with zombies for three weeks? That was really troublesome to me. Why hadn’t there been any warnings? Was someone trying to cover something up? It didn’t make any sense. Even if they played it up as a biological attack, someone would, or should, have done something. How many survived? How many were still out there?
My mind drifted to the guy on the transport. Was it a coincidence that he suggested we come to Florida, or did he know something? There were so many questions and no answers. It gave me a headache.
At ten we were all sent to our rooms. I said goodnight to Pearl and then took my shorts off before scooting under the covers. The sheets were stiff and a little scratchy, but they were much more comfortable than my dirty sleeping bag. I clicked off the light. Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes and saw Mom’s face, her mouth twisted open in a silent scream, blood smeared on her cheeks, and the fleshless hands of zombies that clawed at her skull.
I gasped and jerked my eyes open. I rolled onto my side and folded my hands under my head. I hadn’t had any trouble sleeping before because I’d been so exhausted. When I actually had the chance to relax, I also had time to think. If only we hadn’t gone to the complex. What was Mom thinking? She knew as well as I did that Dad was dead. Did she really expect to find him alive? I curled my hands into fists and clenched my jaw. She’d still be alive if she hadn’t been so stupid. She shouldn’t have left me all alone. What was I supposed to do?
I sat up in bed and stared at the floor. I wanted to cry, to mourn the loss of my parents, but I was too angry to muster any tears. I felt abandoned and neglected. Worst of all, I felt as if I wasn’t important. Of all the things they were concerned about, why wasn’t I their first priority? We should have never separated. I snatched the remote off the nightstand and turned on the TV. Static flickered through the room. I turned it off in disgust and then threw the remote.
If they’d cared about me at all, I wouldn’t be in this mess. We’d all be in Florida together, happy.
Well, as happy as we could be with zombies roaming the Earth. I stood from the bed and paced the room. Maybe Tanya was right. Maybe we shouldn’t dwell on it anymore. We can’t bring them back, and if we could, I’d tell my parents to go straight to hell.
How dare they leave me alone!
I threw myself back on the bed. Eventually, I drifted into a restless sleep. Visions of my mother’s demise projected themselves onto my mind’s eye, but they no longer made me sad. She’d gotten what she deserved.
The next morning Pearl came by my room and took me to our first class. Since we had so little space at the hotel, each grade was crammed into a separate conference room with the same teacher teaching us all the different subjects. There were about two hundred total teenagers, ranging in age from thirteen to eighteen. We learned the same things we would have at any other high school, but there was a sense of pointlessness to the whole process. There weren’t any colleges to go to. Even if there were, where would we find jobs afterward?
I found out the majority of the population on the East Coast had either been devoured by or turned into zombies. It was pretty safe to assume the same thing was happening on the West Coast. The most conservative estimate anyone could come up with was that eighty percent of the population would be obliterated by the zombie horde. Where they were getting those numbers, I had no idea. I wasn’t exactly sure who “they” were, but it was the talk of the students during breaks. It was tragic and devastating, and pretty much the end of life as we knew it. Those of
us who’d survived were extremely lucky.
Besides being taught reading, writing, and math, all the teens were expected to help around the complex. Some were taught farming skills, others were trained as electricians, there were construction workers, and others were placed in the service industry. I wanted to go into the electrical field, but I was placed in housekeeping. My main duty was to make sure the suites where one of the five families lived was always clean, but I was also expected to serve meals and cleanup afterward. I was assigned to the Johnson family. The news did little to brighten my already sour mood. I was a glorified maid. The one good thing about the job was that I got to do it with Pearl, who was highly liked by the Johnsons. Since money was obsolete they showed their appreciation for a job well done by giving her things. Pearl had her own personal computer, which I used to charge my iPod. I would often stick in my earbuds and block out the entire world. It wasn’t much, but it was better than being dead, or even worse, undead.
CHAPTER 5
I woke up every morning for the next two years and went to classes. After that, I went to my job. I didn’t have any other choice. What was I going to do? This was my new life. The new normal. On the day of my seventeenth birthday, I couldn’t do it anymore. I woke up and felt a pressure on my chest, and every time I thought about going to class, I broke out into a sweat. The thought of scrubbing another toilet made me nauseous. I was tired of pretending everything was fine. I wanted out. I made it a point to leave my room before Pearl arrived and went to sit by the lake.
The sun peeked over the horizon, and I inhaled a humid breath. By that point, the zombies had all migrated west, and there was an invisible line, starting at the panhandle of Nebraska, extending north to Canada and south to the Gulf of Mexico, that the zombies refused to cross. There had been plans in the works for several months to build a wall to keep the zombies on one side while the humans repopulated the nation on the other. It was assumed that if given enough time, the zombies would decay away to nothing.
I put in my earbuds and turned up the volume. White Zombie’s More Human than Human thumped in my ears. I sat on the beach and threw some sand into the water. I watched the ripples for a second, then leaned back on my elbows. What was I going to do? I may have been tired of my “life” and ready to escape, but it wasn’t as if there were that many options available to me. I leaned my head back and sighed. A shadow crossed my face, and I turned to see an entourage of soldiers heading into the hotel.
The man at the front was bald with a pock-marked face and tattoos of pin-up girls on his forearms. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, making them prominent. He glanced down at me, smiling. I stared at him and the group until they disappeared inside, then I jumped up and followed them. The hotel buzzed with rumors for days that an elite group of soldiers was going to be visiting. They had supposedly been handpicked by Mrs. Johnson to oversee the construction of the wall. I didn’t believe it, of course, because rumors like that floated around for weeks and nothing ever happened, but my interest was piqued with the new group. I could only hope the rumors were true.
I lagged behind and stayed out of sight until the elevator doors closed. I watched the lights to see what floor they were heading to. They stopped in the penthouse. I was curious but not stupid. If I went upstairs, I’d have to wait on them. If they turned out to be plain soldiers who weren’t tasked with building the wall, I’d be pissed. I decided to play it safe. My plan was to head back outside when someone grabbed my arm.
“There you are.” Pearl pulled out my earbud and hissed in my ear. “They have been looking for you all morning.”
“No.” I groaned. “I don’t want to go up there.”
Pearl directed me toward the elevators. “They said they have something important to tell you.”
Another new development. My curiosity went up another level. “What?”
“I don’t know.”
The elevator doors closed, and I turned off my iPod. “Who are those people who just came up here?”
“They’re the soldiers in charge of the wall.”
I raised my eyebrows. I was right to hope. “So they are going to build one. Who’s the guy with the tattoos?”
Pearl stared at me for a moment. “That’s Liet. He’s been promoted to general. You don’t want anything to do with him.”
I shrugged and turned my music back on.
Normally, Pearl would have been right. Most of the soldiers in Florida weren’t very nice to be around. They had attitudes, thinking they were untouchable and could do anything they wanted. Some even stole things from the local markets because they knew no one would do anything. Not all of them were bad, but the vast majority of them were. I had a different feeling about Liet and his soldiers, though. I mean, they were going to build the wall. They were going to make it possible for life to go on. They thought of the greater good. That meant they were the good guys.
The elevator doors opened, and Pearl and I headed to the kitchen. Olivia Johnson, the head of the Johnson family and our employer, grabbed my arms and pulled me to the corner.
“Krista, darling, where have you been? The genealogy department called. They found some of your family.”
My eyes grew wide and my heart fluttered. “Really? Who is it?”
“Your second cousin.”
My excitement faltered a little, but I was still curious. “Where are they?”
Mrs. Johnson smiled. “Well, my dear, it so happens your family is the new general.” She patted me on the shoulder and left the kitchen.
I stared after her, mouth agape. This was too good to be true. I willed myself to fly, just to make sure it wasn’t a dream. I didn’t pinch myself as you’re supposed to, mainly because I still feel pain in my dreams. For some reason, no matter what I’m dreaming, I can make myself fly, so that was the test I used. I couldn’t, so I was awake. This was turning out to be the best birthday ever. I opened the kitchen door and stared at Liet. I saw him clearly, but I didn’t recognize him. I racked my brain, but had no memory of him.
I put my iPod in my pocket and then carried a tray of food into the dining room. It was crap that I still had to do my job and Mrs. Johnson didn’t introduce me to my family, but business was more important. As usual, my happiness would have to wait.
Mrs. Johnson sat at the head of the table, and Liet sat to her right. They talked softly about their plans for the wall. All I heard was that they needed more workers, and that the ones they had at the moment needed more motivation. I set the plate in front of Liet, who looked up and smiled. I hesitated for a moment before smiling back. I felt Mrs. Johnson’s gaze upon me, so I hurried out of the room.
I stood by the door, hoping to hear more about their plans and waiting to see if Mrs. Johnson would introduce us, but they switched their conversation to construction supplies, which was boring. I turned my music back on and waited until it was time to clear their dishes.
I was in the kitchen, scraping uneaten food into the garbage can, when it felt as if my earbud fell out. I went to grab it and was surprised to feel a hand. I turned abruptly and looked up at Liet.
He smiled and folded his hands across his chest. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
I turned my music off. “It’s all right.”
“I’m General Liet.” He held out his hand.
I shook it briefly. “Krista.”
“I suppose they told you we are related.”
“Mrs. Johnson mentioned something, but, I have to say, I don’t remember you.”
Liet smiled. “The last time we would have seen each other was at the family reunion twelve years ago.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He handed it to me. “That photo was taken at the picnic in the park.”
I unfolded the paper and stared at the smiling faces of my family. I instantly found my five-year-old self and my parents. I also recognized several aunts and uncles and my grandparents, but there were also several people I didn’t know. Liet move
d so he stood next to me.
“That’s my mom right there.” He pointed to a woman with frosted blonde hair, holding a beer and smoking a cigarette. “She would have been your mom’s first cousin. And that’s me. I was fifteen at the time.” He pointed to a skinny kid wearing short blue basketball shorts and a Led Zepplin t-shirt. “It was our last family reunion because we moved to Louisiana shortly after.”
I squinted at the picture, then glanced at the man before me. There was definitely a resemblance, but Liet had come a long way from being the thin kid in the picture. I folded it and tried to hand it back. He held up his hand and shook his head.
“How long have you been here, Krista?”
“Two years.”
“Pchoo. That’s a long time. Do you like it here?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.” I wanted to tell him I thought I was in the ninth level of hell, but I’d just met him. I needed to play it cool, figure out his intentions.
“What do you do here?”
“Go to class, then come up here and wait on the Johnsons.”
“When I saw you by the lake, weren’t you supposed to be in school?”
I nodded.
“Why weren’t you in class today?”
I shrugged again. “I didn’t see the point in it anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, why do we have to go to school and learn math and all that other stuff if we can’t use it in the real world. I mean, there is no real world anymore.” I threw the plate I held into the trash. “And I’ll be damned if I’m going to be someone’s servant for the rest of my life.”
Liet’s smile grew wider. “What you really want is a little adventure.”
I nodded. “Yeah. That would be nice.”
“You ever been outside of Florida?”
“Not in two years.”
“Well, Krista, since you and I are the only family we have left, we need to stick together. Would you like to go with me to Nebraska?”
I straightened. “Yeah.”
Life After The Undead Omnibus Page 5