I feel less than alert—despite the energy drink I consumed as the sun was first rising—when the homecoming queen drops me at the curb in front of my house. I’m relieved to finally break free from her dad’s old Lincoln that has a rancid stench of sunflower seeds and rotten cigars. I slam the rusty door and lean down to wave.
Mindy’s blond hair sticks out wildly around her face from her loose ponytail and there are dark rings beginning to form underneath her bright green eyes—both results of our eventful night. I imagine my own reflection would give me tremors at the moment if I had some kind of mirror at my disposal.
“See you at the dance tonight!” Mindy beams wildly.
“Yay. I can hardly wait,” I return, making no attempt to hide the sarcasm in my voice.
She honks the horn twice and pulls away. I hold my hand up until she is gone from sight. Although I get along with pretty much anyone and everyone, being in the company of royalty such as Mindy McKinney doesn’t make me popular by default. There are only fifty girls in the entire senior class, and being in a school that small, your chances of being homecoming queen—regardless of your looks or social status—become much higher by default. Don’t get me wrong; Mindy is certainly pretty and popular, but once you get to know her you eventually come to realize she has the personality of a tree stump, at best.
Having just returned from an all-nighter with some of my fellow senior girls, a nine-hour nap seems in order. For the record, it wasn’t my idea to “decorate” the senior football players’ homes for homecoming. I say “decorate” very loosely as transporting chickens from a classmate’s farm to the players’ garages was involved. We also placed large tire tractors in the middle of their driveways and wrapped their cars with endless rolls of Saran wrap. Most likely we will get some kind of “disciplinary action” for our excursion—maybe even face suspension once Monday morning arrives. But what would senior year be without the threat of not getting to participate in the graduation ceremony?
I look up at our stellar stone-front house nestled just on the edge of the thick woods that separate us from town. We built the monstrosity ten years ago after my parents received a generous inheritance from my wealthy grandparents. I’ve never understood why my parents, who are hardly ever home themselves, felt the need to have three extra bedrooms. I sometimes wonder if maybe they had planned on having more children, but changed their minds once they realized we actually needed to be fed, clothed and given occasional attention.
Surprisingly, the front door to the house is wide open. We never use that door, not even on Halloween as my mom doesn’t believe in giving sugar to other people’s children—she thinks they’re all too hyper even without it. Instead, my best friend and I like to hide in the bushes and see how many kids we can scare half to death until a parent comes by to chew us out. Last year there were hardly any kids who came out—I think the little buggers are finally on to us.
A gust of really cold wind blows through me and I look up to see the clouds are beginning to thicken. Holding my sweatshirt tightly against my body, I quickly cross the manicured yard to the open door and slam it shut behind me. I holler out a greeting that bounces off the peaks of the high ceilings, but is met with silence. Figuring my dad is probably engaged in another bizarre project, I continue all the way through the house to our backyard.
The weeds out back have always been a major source of contention for my dad. Even though fall is here, he’s known to be working on the weeds up until the first frost of the season. On more than one occasion, I remember him having to wear gloves and a stocking cap while doing it. According to him, they are on the county’s property line—why should he spend his precious time weeding it when his taxes pay the county to do a perfectly good job of it?—or something like that. My dad is forever ranting about some political conspiracy theory or how the president is a horrible leader and will eventually cause the apocalypse in one way or another. I don’t usually give that much weight to his ramblings—if I did, I certainly would have turned insane years ago.
But I find the backyard to be empty, too.
Despite the wicked wind pulling my hair up around my face, the trees in the forest seem to be unnaturally still, causing a cold trickle of fear to run down my back. I never used to be such a scaredy-cat, but my best friend and I recently watched a marathon of horror movies and my overactive imagination can sometimes get the best of me. A few days ago I could have sworn on my own life that a lifelike doll from my childhood was staring at me—I spent an entire morning paralyzed in bed until I was completely sure she wasn’t going to attack me.
Deciding I just need a shower and a whole lot of sleep to reset my paranoid mind, I turn on my heels just as a faint moan drifts towards me. I stop at once.
Filled with a sickening dread, I shuffle over to where the now gold and red trees meet our backyard. The only thing I see moving is a small gathering of bright leaves. They circle in the sky just above me in a mini-tornado pattern before they flutter down and land at my feet. I stand and watch, fascinated.
The moan returns, more guttural this time. My attention is drawn back to the woods. Another sound like a heavy log being dragged through dried leaves comes from my right. Just a few yards away from where my dad thinks to be our property line, the outline of a person comes into view behind a line of nearly bare maple trees.
By her ill choice in fashion, it is obviously a younger woman coming toward me although the features of her face are not totally clear in the distance between us. Her long brown hair hangs down in straight clumps, swinging back and forth with each off-balanced step she takes. A bright pink t-shirt with the word “Boss” displayed across the chest in rhinestones clings tightly to her petite body and her long legs jet out from what I perceive to be a totally out of style pair of all too short gym shorts. Why she would be dressed in such skimpy attire on a cool fall day is beyond me, but I guess she could be one of those insane people who like putting their bodies through the torture of daily exercise.
What this chick is even doing in the back of our crappy old woods is a serious mystery in itself. From her ill style of clothing and neglected personal hygiene she would be better off heading to a mall for some kind of emergency makeover.
“Can I help you?” I finally ask her loudly. Then I correct myself silently—probably nothing I can do will save her from her traumatic lack of fashion sense. “Do you need…something?”
Her speed quickens at the sound of my voice and the odd moaning amplifies—I suddenly realize she is making the horrible noise. Great. Lack of fashion and inability to communicate are apparently both problems for her. The wind slams a rotten odor into my nostrils, forcing me to hold my breath.
With each step she takes, it is clear there’s plenty more wrong with her. Her head hangs down and off to the side as if the muscles in her neck have worn out. I still can’t see her face clearly as that nappy hair covers most of it, but there’s something really off in the coloring of her skin that seems to be more of a pale gray. And the deficiencies don’t stop there. Not only is her skin discolored, but it’s muddled and torn. It’s far worse than having just forgotten to wash her face at bedtime.
I begin to fear that she’s a leper.
My heart beat speeds up to a disconcerting rate. “Ah…are you okay? Do you need a doctor or something?”
As the distance closes between me and this tragically fashion-challenged woman, I become frozen in fear. Hair still covers a portion of her face but I can now see her pupils. They are completely white. And her jaw hangs down to reveal a majority of her teeth appear to be missing. Her face is covered in something kind of like boils that ooze blood. Together, the neglected appearance and nasty smell are simply nauseating—it is far worse than my original conclusion of a lack of fashion.
It occurs to me now:
1. This woman is definitely not okay,
2. If she gets any closer, she will get her leprosy or whatever all over me, and
3. Being near her could result in great bodily harm or possibly some kind of dismemberment if she is in fact violent, as I’m beginning to suspect.
Although my bowels have pretty much turned to liquid, a pulsating adrenaline shoots through me now. Conveniently enough, my dad likes to randomly chop down trees that he thinks are encroaching on our property line, so there’s usually an ax to be found in the backyard. I reach over for it and hold it up between myself and the woman. But the ax is so heavy and my hands shake so badly it probably makes no kind of threatening gesture whatsoever.
The woman raises an arm in my direction with impossibly slow movement. I shriek when her hand reveals five bloody stubs where her fingers should be.
I’ve certainly never been anywhere near strong and the very thought of confrontation freaks me out—just last spring when Darcy Sanderson threatened to punch me for kissing her ex-boyfriend I had cowered behind my locker door and nearly cried. But I somehow manage to push this mutant of a woman away with the handle of the ax. She stumbles backwards and tumbles onto her back.
I’ve never tried to hurt someone like that before and instantly feel remorseful. “Sorry! Are you okay?” I ask, stepping forward with the intention to help.
But any trace of pity for what I’ve done disappears the second she scampers back onto her feet. One of her arms had landed underneath her and bends unnaturally in the other direction because of it. She opens her mouth with a slow exaggeration and makes an even more horrific noise. My pathetic attempt to defend myself has only pissed her off. I’m beginning to suspect there’s something really, seriously wrong with her.
“Ohmigod!” I yell when she continues coming at me. At this point, not only do I think she is unable to comprehend whatever I say to her, I know she is physically incapable of hearing me—at least partially. Once she had returned to her feet, her head flopped to the other side to reveal a giant gaping hole filled with blood where her ear should be.
I realize the smart thing would probably be to drive the ax into her skull and at the least hope to sever her spinal cord. But my experience with zombies at this point is limited to what I’ve seen in movies and not coming at me in real life. You may like to think if a zombie ever attacked you that you’d be all badass and fight for your life like some kind of hero, but unless you’ve ever had a rotting human being approach you in your backyard and catch you off guard, you don’t really know how you would actually react.
My screams sound very much like those of a four-year-old when I drop the perfectly good weapon to the side and hightail it back to the house. I run with such a burst of energy that I know I would finally be capable of beating that do-gooder Christy Barts in the mile run—if only we were doing the yearly test in phy ed rather than me running for the preservation of my life. Funny how fear motivates a girl more than the mere threat of a lower grade.
I breeze past my empty house and run down the street like a totally insane person, screaming and throwing my hands around wildly in the cold air. A surge of adrenaline rages through my veins like hot lava as my feet pound the pavement in staccato bursts. A full three minutes pass before any other houses come into view, but I continue running down through the cul-de-sac with this new speed I didn’t know I was capable of until today.
The few neighbors I spot outside are going about their business as if it is any other fall day. The old widow I only know as “Mrs. Gervais” is dressed in a super ancient barn-jacket that is ten sizes too large for her. She raises her wrinkled hand to wave casually in the midst of raking a pile of leaves as I dash by in a blur.
The one and only Darcy Sanderson is standing on the porch of her parents’ house, looking as if she just rolled right out of bed with her dark hair mangled and zero makeup. She had not been invited on our senior girl outing, although as a disclaimer, I had not been in charge of the guest list. She gives me a predictable one-fingered salute while watching her stupid, yippy little dog take a dump in the neighbor’s yard. Other times, when passing by, I’ve been tempted to launch that little hairball across the yard with a simple flick of my ankle, but I’m not into animal brutality. Besides, the poor thing suffers enough by mere default of its ownership.
In seeing how normal the rest of the neighborhood appears to be acting this morning, I start to wonder if maybe I had just imagined the rotting woman dressed in her tribute to the 80’s outfit. I had skipped lunch yesterday—everyone knows your brain is capable of crazy things when lacking in natural sugars. At least that’s what my friend Brenda said when she was caught making out with someone other than her boyfriend last summer.
Once I’ve reached the front yard of my lifelong best friend’s house, I finally allow myself to look back down the road in the direction of my own home. To my relief, the disfigured woman is nowhere to be seen. Aside from a handful of dead leaves dancing over it, the road is still.
I stop to clutch my sides when the runner’s death cramps kick into high gear. My chest tightens to the point where I wonder if it is possible to have a heart attack when I haven’t even been asked to the senior prom yet. Back in junior high, there was a time when I wanted to get a guy’s attention and went out for cross country. The coach had to call an ambulance when I declared myself unable to walk at the very first practice, but it turned out I was only having charley horse cramps in my legs. That was when I first realized I have a natural aversion to anything fitness related.
“Emma?” Upon hearing my name I look up and find Finn leaning out a second story window of his house. He gives me his best WTF look. “What are you doing?”
“Crazy…woman…at…my…house!” I yell up at him between bouts of pain shooting through my lungs.
My voice is high and squeaky, like a dog’s chew toy. I clear my throat and try again. “There’s a freaking zombie at my house!”
Finn shakes his head and sighs. “What? Hold on a sec—I’m coming down.”
Before I can protest, he disappears from the window. In the few seconds it takes before he joins me, I debate whether or not to continue running until I reach the Mexican border. But who am I kidding? I probably can’t make it another block as much as my sides are killing me. Quite possibly I will die from the pain alone at this point.
In general, I’m not exactly what you would call an athletic person. My idea of exercise is going down to the mailbox by our short driveway. Frankly, I don’t see the point in it—every time you eat something you take another step backward anyway.
When Finn appears in the doorway, I dart into his mediocre-sized arms for an embrace. While holding him, I decide his arms maybe aren’t so much mediocre, but they are definitely un-muscular. Regardless, I squeeze him with all of my strength and savor the smell I know to be Finn mixed with trendy cologne. I let my face rest against his super soft Darth Vader t-shirt for a minute before pulling back.
I take the opportunity to really assess my old friend up close. His nose and cheekbones are both smooth and his silky skin is always the most gorgeous shade of tanned brown no matter the time of year, making his dark brown eyes suck you in even more than they already do on their own. His shaggy brown hair is tousled messily around his face to make him appear disheveled, but I know for a fact it takes a ton of hair products to achieve this look. He spends more money on that stuff than I do on my own mop of curls. My hair has a mind of its own and more often than not I just throw it into some kind of sloppy bun. Other girls spend all morning straightening their hair, curling it, or whatever, but that just seems like too much work.
As I study Finns’ face, I can’t believe I haven’t spent all this time actively pursuing him. He’s actually pretty hot, aside from his occasional dorky demeanor.
A dramatic sigh shoots out of me, making my friend appear baffled by my extreme behavior. “I’m so glad you’re home, Finn. You don’t even know.”
By the look he gives me I know he is somewhat amused by whatever explanation I may have. “What is going on? What were you saying before about a zombie?” All it takes is his adorably crooked smile for me to instantly question myself. I never really used to care what he thought of me when we were younger, but in the past couple of months I’ve started to develop a pathetic crush on my old buddy. Now pretty much everything I say is focused on whether or not he will think I sound like an idiot. About eighty-six percent of the time, he probably does.
I let out a nervous bubble of laughter. “Not exactly a zombie, zombie. I’m not really sure. You know I totally flunked biology last semester.” This is not one of my prouder moments as I fumble in front of him. Maybe the woman’s lack of communication skills rubbed off on me a little.
My friend grips me by my arms in more of a mocking gesture than anything. “Emma, why is your face so red? Wait—have you been running?”
I purposely scrunch my face, knowing he hates it when I do that. He recently told me to knock it off and said the senior guys rated me second most attractive female in our class, but mentioned they could never take me seriously. I’m guessing it has something to do with the fact that I would rather spend my nights hanging out with the guys playing video games than going to slumber parties to make out with pillows—or whatever they do at those things. I haven’t been invited to an overnight girl party since the seventh grade when I drew a Hitler mustache on the hostess. Apparently some markers are a bit more permanent than others and people can get pretty uptight about their dance recitals.
“Finn, you say it like I’m not capable of running.” Okay, so maybe I’m not totally capable. Not really, anyway. Athleticism doesn’t run in my family—my parents are also more the type that tire just by listening to others talk about their exercise regimen.
“The only time I’ve ever seen you run is for gym class. You wouldn’t be running unless something was actually chasing you.” He chuckles at his own joke, making me even more furious with him.
I glance back in the direction of my house to find the road still remains clear of disfigured corpses. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I don’t know what it was, exactly, but there was this thing wearing women’s clothes…albeit really tacky women’s clothes…but that’s not the point. Its skin was all funky and it didn’t have very many teeth—or fingers. And it had this ginormous hole in its head. But it was still walking—not necessarily talking though. But it came after me so I hit it with the ax handle. When it came back again I just ran.”
He rolls his eyes to the top of his head while thrusting his head back and forth like he is trying to shake out what I’ve just told him. “Em, you get crazy like this every time we have a movie marathon. I’m beginning to think they’re a bad idea.”
“I’m not kidding, Finn. This is totally serious. We have to call like the police or the Red Cross or something. Whatever it was, it was not right.”
My friend looks closely at me for a moment to decide if I’m totally pulling his leg or not. When his insidious little smile drops, I know he is finally coming to his senses. “You’re being totally serious right now?”
We have been best friends since like the third grade and he is supposed to believe everything I tell him. Well maybe not everything. I had told him Harry Potter turned evil in the last movie and killed all his friends but only because he bailed on our plans to see the premiere together. If he had read the books like I told him to, he wouldn’t have fallen for it. I considered it a schooling in good literature.
I swear I try to resist the urge to smack him on the forehead, but sometimes I just can’t help myself—my hands can have a mind of their own.
“Ouch!” he yells, grabbing my arm and holding it away from him. “Okay! I get it. You don’t have to get all violent on me. We’ll call the police.”
“Thank you.” I’ve almost completely stopped quivering from my encounter with the backwoods woman. Finn always has this way of calming me, probably because he knows me better than anyone else on the planet. With heavy relief, I follow him down the path back to his house. But we stop short when a low shriek comes from not too far off in the distance. The sound makes the fuzzy hairs on the back of my neck stand erect.
We both freeze in place, barely daring to move our eyes to look at each other. We each have the same “deer caught in the headlights” look—and I literally know what that looks like. Finn was riding with me last spring when I ran smack into a giant buck. The windshield cracked into a hundred pieces and the front end of my mom’s BMW was totaled. I couldn’t get behind the wheel of a car for another month because I kept having flashbacks. Besides, a lot of those frisky buggers are always running around here like they own the place.
“What was that?” Finn finally asks.
I throw my hands into the air. “Probably more freaking zombies. How the hell should I know?”
I’m only being facetious but Finn’s dark brown eyes grow larger. “Stay here,” he says, pointing a finger at me as he edges over in the direction of his neighbor’s house.
But I’m quick to run after him. “So I can get attacked by another one of those freaky things again while I’m standing here all by myself? Forget that. I’m coming with.”
My friend ignores me and continues into the neighbor’s yard. A second shriek resonates from across the street, this time in a higher woman’s pitch. I jet into Finn, clutching him from behind in a serious death grip. I’m not a big fan of the sound people make when screaming in general, but after my earlier run-in, I’m guessing something terrifying is about to go down and we already covered the part about what a coward I become in the face of danger.
“Emma, let go.” Finn’s voice is steady and calm.
I shake my head in refusal. “No way!”
“Emma. Someone is coming this way and something tells me we should run.”
Although I probably respect Finn the most of all the people in my life, I think my props to him grow even more in this moment. He sounds totally normal, yet when I peer around his body I discover that by god, he is right.
A short and slender decaying man wearing bloodied work attire limps across the yard toward us. His suit looks oddly out of place for the situation. His bright green tie is jerked off to the side like maybe he had tried removing it at some point, but his now messed up mind didn’t know how to make his fingers work properly to do it. He looks very much like my friend from the woods, with all-white eyes and a nasty skin complexion. Only this guy is missing an entire arm, and dark blood spews from the corner of his mouth. He moves in slow and smooth movements, looking almost as if he is swimming under water.
Any other time I would have laughed at the way his thinning hair stands straight on end across his slick forehead, but instead I let out another eardrum-shattering shriek. Finn scoops me into his arms—albeit with more grunting than finesse—and pulls me off of my feet. At least I finally know what it is like to have Finn holding me in his arms, even if it is the last lame thing I do before I become a human chew toy.
All at once my head makes contact with a metal lamppost behind us, making a terrible ringing that circles through my skull. I look up to see Finn’s wide eyes staring back down on me. I think I either laugh or say something to him before everything turns black.
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