Still Dying 2 (Dying Days)

by Armand Rosamilia

  Seeing all those creeps still reaching out for us, long after there was any chance they could catch us, was fucked up. They didn’t get us then, but tell that to my brain when I go to sleep. They catch me every night.

  I guess I thought we were gonna drive a few miles and let these family people out, then decide whether to go back and finish our sentences and get on with our lives, maybe kick the shit outta Pokey a little more, and have a good story to tell in the yard about the escaped mental patients or bath salt junkies or whatever they were. I guess I thought it was a pretty isolated situation. But it wasn’t.

  We didn’t get more than a mile, before we saw more wrecked vehicles, more creeps stumbling around, chewing on crash victims, trying to latch onto our van. I ran over more of those fuckers than I could count, then Bozy and I discussed it, and we decided to get off the highway.

  The mom was starting to cry pretty loud about her bite—must’ve hurt like a son of a bitch. Mister Dad was trying to comfort and shush her, and I could tell he was a little afraid one of us hardened murderers might lose our temper, but more than that, he was worried that his wife was getting sick. Bozy had already thought about this; I could tell by the quick sideways glance he gave me.

  “Should we call somebody?” I asked, hearing some squawking come from the radio. Bozy heard it too, and he ignored me, instead turning up the volume. As I turned off the exit toward the beach, I started to realize shit was a lot more widespread than I had thought at first. The voices on the scanner were talking about “outbreaks” and “widespread riots” and something about some of the creeps having been deceased, just a few hours or minutes earlier. Health authorities had told the cops it was infectious—not to get bitten or scratched under any circumstances.

  Mister Dad heard this. One of the little girls did too. “Daddy, we need to get mommy a pill or something!” she said. He just hugged her and shushed her; I guess trying not to think about the “or something”.

  We were at the beach, driving through one of the little neighborhoods where instead of a backyard, they had a pier for their boats. Kind of empty this time of year; I had figured we could hole up in an empty house if we needed to, get supplies. Or, if somebody was home, just pull off a “home invasion” as they call it on the outside. Not much activity here—no creeps at least. We passed a couple of moving cars; maybe not everybody knew what was going down.

  “Pull in here,” Bozy said. It was a little clearing/parking space, unoccupied and looking out over some low swamp land. Swank houses all around, but they looked mostly empty. The mom had gone from crying to moaning in this real weird way. The girls were dead quiet, freaked out I guess, or maybe in shock.

  I did like Bozy said. He checked his chamber, and gave me this real grim look. “I saved one. In case…this happened,” he sort of muttered.

  Mister Dad knew what was up right off. “No…NO! No, she’ll be fine. Just give her….”

  He started crying, looking at us like those people looked at me in that gas station when I rolled in with my shotgun and my ski mask.

  “I’m gonna need your help, man,” Bozy said, and I knew what he meant. I didn’t like it, but I guess he had the worse job. I sure couldn’t a done it.

  I hopped out the door and went around to the passenger side, moving real careful and slow so as not to spook anybody. I opened it up. “Hey, girls. Listen, we’re gonna go get some sea shells. Then how about maybe some ice cream?”

  They looked at their dad for permission, but he was hugging his wife tight and looking at Bozy, who sat there in the front seat, holding the shotgun in his lap, but pointing it at the guy, real smooth like always. Mister Dad nodded his head; he didn’t want to scare the girls either, and I guess he knew somewhere in there that this had to be done.

  “Nnnnnnnaaauuughh,” groaned the mom. Made my skin crawl.

  I reached in and took the girls’ hands, tugging nice and easy and smiling in a way that I hoped didn’t make me look like a goddamn short eyes. “We gotta get away from here, ‘cause of those creeps back there. There might be more. But first—sea shells and ice cream.”

  They looked up at me all trusting, looking back at their dad and, maybe, knowing like he did that their mom was a goner, but not ready for it to be real.

  “Naaaaaauuuuuughhhhhhhhhh” again, even louder. I was getting pretty edgy. In my head, I could see her popping up any second and reaching out in that spidery way those creeps back on the highway had.

  Mister Dad was shaking his head, snuffling but holding it back to keep from scaring his daughters. It hurt to see that.

  As soon as I had the little girls out, I shut the van door and started walking them toward the swamp, moving faster than I wanted too. From the corner of my eye, I saw Bozy move—fast as a snake, and I heard the muffled sound of Mister Dad crying out as Bozy cracked him with the shotgun butt to knock him out.

  “Let’s see who can find the prettiest shell,” I said, hoping the girls didn’t hear my voice crack.

  I kept walking and walking with them, looking back toward the van every few minutes, even though it fell out of view when we slid down the back to the low ground.

  “We’re getting too far away, Mister,” the oldest girl said, and I felt creepy again.

  “I don’t see any good shells anyway. We need to go to the real beach,” said the younger one.

  Then I heard it; the boom of Bozy’s shotgun blast. He had done something to cover up the muzzle I guess, to muffle the sound. But the girls still heard it. “What was that?” they asked.

  I just shook my head and shrugged, hoping they didn’t see it in my eyes, the deception.

  I squatted down with them and finally got them a little distracted for a few minutes, writing our names in the sand. Then I heard Bozy, behind me, say, “Hey, Randall.”

  I turned around and saw him there, hiding the shotgun behind his back. “We gotta go.”

  “All right, girls. Get your shells and let’s go.”

  “To get ice cream?”

  “Yes. To get ice cream.” I hoped Bozy wouldn’t make a liar out of me, and let me find these girls some goddamn ice cream.

  “What now?” I asked Bozy under my breath.

  He just shook his head, looking far away.

  As we walked, I figured Mister Dad would still be kayoed, and I’d have to tell the girls he was taking a nap.

  “Is Mommy okay?” asked the littlest one.

  “Mommy got real sick,” I said, and that was all.

  They just looked at me all confused, waiting for more. Then we got up the bank and the van was in sight. The sliding door was open and I figured Mister Dad would be lying their on the seat where he had been holding his wife, but he wasn’t there. Bozy stopped.

  “What’d you do with him, Boze?” I asked.

  “Just a swat. On the jaw.”

  He must’ve come to. Maybe he was looking for us. Bozy peeked in the van and looked toward the back, where Pokey was. Then he stumbled backwards, gasping, his arms and shoulders all stiff.

  “What..? What!?” I asked, pushing the girls behind me. But he didn’t need to answer, because I heard Mister Dad doing that fucked up moaning thing, looking at us with empty eyes, pieces of Pokey’s neck hanging from his teeth.

  I couldn’t let the girls see. I turned around and pulled their heads against my side. Bozy pushed me. “Go!”

  I picked up the big one and Bozy grabbed the little one, and we bolted. Those poor little girls yelled and screamed and hit us the whole time, wanting to see their daddy.

  But they couldn’t. Not ever again. Because he was long gone. Just like everything sensible and proper.

  Gator Aid

  Frank J Edler

  The A1A on the outskirts of St. Augustine was still choked with a traffic jam that would never ease. The only things that moved along this highway any longer were the dead who still walked and the living who were still cursed with a soul.

  A group of five survivors weaved their way in and out o
f the permanent standstill of vehicles. They navigated the cluttered roadway like a well rehearsed SWAT team, always on the lookout for the wandering dead. They were headed toward a small side street off the highway that was marked with a once ornate wooden sign.

  The sign was mounted on two posts; its original lettering had been weathered and worn. A newer piece of plywood was affixed over top the old sign. It read in large and messy red lettering, "GATOR AID". To the dead, it was meaningless; to the living, it meant the world.

  The leader of the group, a middle-aged man, motioned for the others to break away from the cover of traffic and make their way up the short road that passed through a stand of cypress and opened up into a modestly sized parking lot. The rest of the group, two males and two females, lined up and made their way to the side street like a human snake. Each member covered one of their exposed sides until they safely reached the open lot.

  The parking lot was dotted with a few cars that had started to rust beyond use. The blacktop of the parking lot had already succumbed to the intense Floridian sun, bearing cracks so wide the lot was beginning to look more like a meadow than a parking lot.

  They spied a path that would take them to where they had set out for this morning, from the safety zone they were shacked up in back at St. Augustine proper. Noting no zombies in the clearing of the parking lot, they made their way toward the path. That path would lead them to a day of fun.

  * * * * *

  Ava sat on a creaky stool inside the gatehouse. She swiveled her hips back and forth, making the stool screech out an obnoxious tune. It was one of the ways she broke the monotony of waiting for the first guests to arrive. She longed for a piece of bubble gum to chew and snap.

  She placed her elbows on the desk and cradled her chin on her hands. She looked out the gatehouse window, one like you would find at ticketing booths at many of Florida's once vibrant tourist attractions. There was a vented metallic circle to communicate through the glass and a cutout at the base to pass money and tickets through. The latter had been sealed off since money and tickets were of no use in this world now.

  She watched the entry path for arriving guests, both wanted and unwanted. From where she sat, she could easily see sections of the walkway painted in different colors. Each color was the target area for a booby trap that was triggered by a lever with a corresponding color in a panel just above the window.

  Nobody, living or dead, was making their way to the front gate just yet. The only things out there we some bugs flying around and dozens of tiny geckos scurrying around on the ground.

  A big red bird suddenly flapped in from above and landed on the little ledge in front of the window. Ava bolted upright on her stool as her hairs stood straight up on her arms.

  "Hello sexy, gimmie food," it squawked through the window and bobbed its head up and down.

  "Damnit, Armand, you scared me half to death!" Ava said trying to calm herself down. "I don't have any food for you but the guests should be arriving soon. I'm sure one of them will have some M&M's. I put the word out for you."

  Armand, a Scarlet Macaw, had become Ava's de facto pet; though, he was more like a friend really. She would give Armand his M&M's and Armand gave her someone (something, she reminded herself) to talk to.

  He squawked with irritation, having struck out on candy for breakfast. The bird had a thing for those little bite sized candies. Fortunately, the candy coating gave them a long shelf life and the guests seemed to be able to get their hands on them pretty easily.

  "Melt in your mouth not in your hand." He sounded out in the tell tale, high pitched warble of a parrot.

  The door to the gatehouse opened behind Ava. She rotated in her seat. RRrrrreeeeeeek. It squealed the whole way of its 180 degree rotation.

  Cleetus, the farm's main hand, entered.

  * * * * *

  Cleetus reminded Ava of every bad redneck cliche. He was tall and lanky. He wore a filthy, old John Deere trucker hat that smelled worse than the stains in the armpits of his plain white t-shirt. The coveralls he never removed were crusted with the dirt of a thousand wrangled alligators. His Adam's apple stuck out about a half mile and bobbed up and down like an elevator on his nearly giraffe length neck.

  "Girlie, one of the gators is plum dead! Why ain't you come give ole Cleetus a hand with it? " he asked as spittle projected from his mouth in every direction.

  "Fucking asshole, whaaaak!" screamed Armand through the glass.

  Cleetus spotted the bird out on the wrong side of the glass and his eyes turned to saucers.

  "Girlie, git that dang bird in here 'fore he baits one of them zombies up to the front door n' scares all the guests off!"

  Ava quickly unlocked a steel intake panel set into the front of the gatehouse next to the ticket window. She beckoned Armand to come in through the three foot tall opening. She sealed the door shut after he begrudgingly waddled in.

  “I’m warnin’ ya girlie, keep that bird in line or the gators are gonna have them one more chicken dinner! That bird is real ornery to me and Otis and the only reason he ain’t gator bait is ‘cuz he’s taken a shine to you. Now come help me get the dead ‘un outta the pen ‘fore the dang guests arrive.”

  The two made their way back to the gator pens just past the courtyard behind the gatehouse. Armand took wing and watched at a safe distance from a perch on an old Cypress. Cleetus was cursing under his breath the whole way. The gators were all in the artificial pond, keeping a watchful eye on the duo. Cleetus and Ava hopped over the fence into the pen. Cleetus put his hands on his hips trying to figure out the best way to drag the dead gator that was laying half in and half out of water. Ava turned back to keep an eye on the gatehouse to be sure there were no early arrivals.

  Cleetus suddenly grabbed her arm firmly above the elbow to gain her attention quickly. “NEVER turn your back on the water, Girlie!”

  “I - I just wanted to keep an eye on the gate in case—”

  “In case one of these gators gets hungry and wants a quick bite to eat? Girlie, that’s exactly what these gators are waitin' fer ya to do. NEVER turn your back on the water. Mind my words girlie. Now help me get this thing by the tail so we can drag it away from the water’s edge.”

  They dragged the three hundred pound corpse up next to the fence. It was a big enough alligator to be certain, yet in these difficult times the farm’s gator population was a bit on the runtish side; even so, three hundred pounds was a lot of gator.

  Otis, the manager of the farm, waddled up the path from the bunks as Cleetus and Ava were about to maneuver the gator’s body over the fence. Otis was the antithesis of Cleetus, like a bulbous man-frog, he was short and fat. He was almost completely bald sans a few long strands of hair that he actually attempted to comb over the top of his head in a comical attempt to hide his shortcomings. It was all Ava could do to not to laugh every time she looked at him but she held it back for her own sake.

  Otis lent them a hand hauling the carcass up and over the fence. With a bunch of grunting, pushing and shoving on both sides of the fence, the limp carcass smashed down on the other side of the fence.

  “Get in shape fat fuck, whaaaaack!” Armand teased from his branch.

  Otis did his best to ignore the bird and went in to boss mode and began barking out orders. “Get back to the gatehouse, girl. The guests will be here soon now. Cleetus help me bring the gator over to The Shack.”

  Ava looked to the ground, shoulders sunken and walked back to the gatehouse. Cleetus and Otis made their best attempt at a comedy routine, hauling the gator’s body over to The Shack.

  The Shack was once the farm’s quaint little cafeteria. Now it served as the place where Otis and Cleetus brought the dead gators. They told Ava the bodies were piled up in the restaurant's long dead walk-in freezer. It was the only way to keep the stench down so as not to attract any predators. Or hungry zombies. They disallowed Ava to enter The Shack for her own sake. The thought of the farm’s dead gators piled up and rotting was enoug
h to convince her not to be too curious about it anyway.

  * * * * *

  The first group arrived about a half hour later. They made their way up the entrance walkway carefully. The guests were visibly weary of walking through the painted areas and stepped as quickly as they could through them. They weren’t exactly sure why the path was painted in various colors but they knew enough not to linger in those areas for too long.

  Ava greeted the guests as they walked up to the window, “Welcome to Gator Aid gator farm, what have you brought for admittance?

  “Thanks, I’m Russ, we were told about this place by some of the others back in St. Augustine.” Russ held up two obviously dead chickens by their feet, “We’ve brought a few chickens. I hope it’s enough.”

  Ava unbolted the steel door next to the window. Russ placed the chickens in the door and Ava locked it again. She bid the group an enjoyable visit to the Gator Farm and raised the gate via a lever in the gatehouse. She knew two chickens for five admissions would upset Otis but that suddenly didn’t matter to her. There was a boy, roughly her age, that was part of Russ’ group. Upon setting her eyes on him, her heart began to flutter and her knees weaken. She was suddenly grateful she was seated on her stool or she would have fallen over for sure.

  The boy lingered at the window as the rest of his group shuffled in. His smile so big and perfect, Ava could barely get the words out to acknowledge him. She stumbled out her usual welcome, through the glass partition, never taking her eyes off the gorgeous guy. “Welcome to the uhhh Sexy Aid... I MEAN...Gator Aid. I meant to say Gator. Oh god.”

  She tried to hide her beet red face behind her hand. The handsome teen smiled a million dollar smile at her. He was clearly tickled by her faux pax. He held up the backpack he had clenched in his hand and Ava looked at it curiously. Ava unlocked the intake door, grateful there would be a little more of an offering from the group. He winked at her and Ava was left catatonic.