DAY 18
Last night while I was building a sound suppressor for the M-1, I heard several planes fly over my house.
I opened the door to Albert’s room to see if he wanted to go check it out, but he was out cold, snoring loud enough to wake attract the dead. I grabbed my carbine and went out the back door and up onto the roof. Without the city lights shining, the stars lit up the sky.
By the time I got on the roof nearly a dozen more large planes were rumbling overhead in formation, flying north. I couldn’t tell what kind of planes they were other than they were prop driven, huge, and noisy as hell…The final evacuation, maybe. But to where? I hoped Gerald Ritchie would be on air in the morning with some answers.
As the planes receded into the distance, I heard what sounded like a wave coming up the street. First a few, then what seemed like dozens of undead ran up the street, heading in the direction of the receding planes. This went on for almost five minutes. When I estimated that hundreds had passed, a chill ran down my spine. I had no idea there were that many of Them so close by.
I sat there on my roof, cowering and shivering, too afraid to move for fear of drawing their attention. Finally, the last of Them disappeared up the street. As I recovered, I thought to myself, those monsters must have driven themselves nuts trying to figure out what to run after during the last thunderstorm.
This morning Albert and I took the M-1 carbine out behind the garage to test the silencer. Firing it made more noise than I would prefer, sounding a little like hitting a 2x4 with a rubber mallet, but the trade-off is that Albert seems familiar with the weapon. That will help if we get into trouble.
While I was waiting for Gerald’s report to come on, I went in to the front bathroom to put away some towels. I glanced down at the toilet and noticed what looked like little red flakes all over the toilet seat. I bent closer to see what they were and then recoiled in disgust.
“Ghaahh! Crabs!” I yelled involuntarily.
I stomped into the kitchen to find Albert rooting through the cupboards and, of course, scratching himself.
As calmly as possible I told Albert he had a problem. He was pretty horrified by the news and seemed to have absolutely no idea how it could have happened. I told him it was most likely a gift from Cindy. As I said it, a thought struck me which seriously pissed me off. I suddenly wondered what else she could have given him.
If Albert got HIV or something equally as heinous…When I suggested this he turned white. I asked him why he didn’t wear a condom. He looked at me and whined that he did, every time. It took me almost fifteen minutes to calm Albert down and convince him that he was probably ok, but that we did need to take care of the crabs.
I wanted to catch Gerald Ritchie’s broadcast but Albert was so freaked out that he was ready to take a flame thrower to his privates. I thought of my neighbors up the street who had three kids. On the few occasions I had spoken with the dad, he had complained about his kids always bringing home some disease from the other kids at school.
If they hadn’t cleared everything out when they left, they probably had something in their medicine cabinet to deal with Albert’s problem. If nothing else, the dad was about Albert’s size and we could at least find him something to wear other than my work out sweats (note to self: burn work-out shorts when Albert is done with them).
The walk up the block was nerve wracking. After seeing so many of those things last night I kept thinking they would all suddenly jump out of the woodwork. We made it to the neighbor’s house without incident, although the silence all around was spooky as hell. We went around back and I quietly tried all the windows and doors. No luck. I was getting ready to break a window when Albert lifted up a pot and retrieved the spare key.
We let ourselves in and cleared every room. The house was pristine. All the furniture was covered with sheets as if they expected to return at some point. Albert bee lined for the bathroom but stood helplessly, as he didn’t know what to look for. I found a box of RID lice treatment under the sink. There were still plenty of clothes in the closet for Albert to choose from.
We got back to my house in time for me to catch the last ten minutes of Gerald Ritchie’s report. Albert wasn’t sure what to do so I told him he’d need to shave himself and follow the instructions on the box. Honestly, I was trying to pay attention to the broadcast and didn’t give Albert’s dilemma much thought.
Gerald reported that Los Angeles has officially been abandoned. While authorities have promised to return for more refugees, Ritchie speculated that the government has probably cut their losses and will not be returning. The government’s official statement is that until the plague has died off, all the major cities will be considered quarantined areas. Citizens are being urged to stay away from the infected and get out of the cities any way they can. Gerald closed with his trademark phrase and the broadcast ended.
After the report I noticed that Albert still hadn’t come out of the bathroom. When he finally did come out, I was speechless. Apparently, he had taken my off-hand comment about shaving a little too seriously. While I presume he shaved where he was supposed to, he took the liberty to shave his head, eyebrows, and every other place on his body that had hair. He also cleaned every surface in the bathroom with rubbing alcohol.
Albert waited patiently for me to stop laughing my ass off and then asked me if there was anything else he needed to do. When I couldn’t stop laughing I think he finally realized he went too far.
I told him that Chloe needed to go out just as an excuse to get away from him so he could reclaim some dignity. I followed the dog as she wandered around outside the house. As we came to the front yard I saw the remnants of Albert’s clothes from the first night still lying in the grass. Next to them was his Louisville Slugger.
I picked up the splintered bat and noticed dried blood and long, dark hair stuck in the cracks. It dawned on me why Albert had avoided mentioning what happened to Cindy. I picked up
Albert’s discarded clothes with the end of the bat and deposited the whole mess into my trash barrel.
As I closed the lid, I mused that after experiencing crabs, maybe now Albert wouldn’t feel so bad about what he probably had to do to his girlfriend.
DAY 19
Today Albert and I attended to a grisly task.
When I took Chloe out this morning I finally realized that there were almost thirty dead bodies lying in front of my house. I can’t even begin to describe the stench that was permeating everything around me.
A month ago, this situation would have shocked me to the core, but now, dealing with a pile of dead bodies had somehow made it to the bottom of my priority list. The worst part is that not all the bodies are (or were) human. Over the last week, the rat and crow population has grown to enormous proportions. Every day I shoot at least a half dozen of the hairy, diseased, little shits. I avoided killing the crows until now but this morning I had finally had enough of them.
While Chloe was doing her business the crows cawed a chorus from the trees overhead. I put her back into the house and went up onto the roof with my .22 carbine. I saw a dozen crows picking at the carcasses across the street and took aim. The first one I hit screeched and flopped around before dying. The neighborhood went quite in an instant, as if someone flipped a switch. I took aim at a second crow but before I could fire the whole group of them took to the air.
Dozens of crows abandoned the trees and they all circled overhead. The cawing began again but this time it was one continuous barrage of noise. I fired into the black cloud of flapping wings a half-dozen times. Two crows dropped out of the sky. The rest shifted direction and disappeared into the west.
I watched them until they were just a small dot against the dark, overcast sky. My stomach churned. I had the sense that I had just made some enemies who would not forget or forgive my actions.
When I told Albert that we would have to do something with the dead, he suggested putting them into the empty pool down the street. When we had gone to my neighbor’s house to get the lice medication and Albert’s new wardrobe, he had noticed that their pool was empty. I hadn’t even noticed that they had a pool.
Albert laid out a plan to roll each of the carcasses onto a makeshift litter with broom handles so we wouldn’t have to touch the bodies. We could put them into the back of my newly acquired gardening truck and haul them to the neighbor’s house. We donned glasses, filter masks, latex gloves, and rain jackets (I had an extra one for Albert) and went to go get the truck.
The truck didn’t want to start but finally did (getting a charger from an auto parts store just made it to the top of my to-do list). We backed the truck right up onto Dawn’s front yard and began. It was miserable, unsanitary, nauseating work. Twice Albert threw up, but he kept going. When we got to the neighbor’s house with the first load, we backed the truck up near the edge of the pool.
Albert had placed a 2x4 board with a rope tied to its center in the bed of the truck near the cab and ran the rope down past the tailgate before we loaded the bodies. He and I pulled on the rope and after straining for a moment, the whole load began to slide off the tailgate.
The bodies landed in a heap at the edge of the pool and we pushed them into the deep end with the broomsticks.
It took us three loads and nearly five hours to take care of all the bodies. It was slow work that was compounded by the fact that we had to be quiet and were constantly stopping to be wary of any more undead that might be lurking about.
It began to rain heavily during our second haul. The noisy downpour lulled us into a false sense of security. We were hefting Dale’s fat carcass into the truck on our last load when Albert froze, dropped his end of the litter, and pointed across the street. I was achy, dirty, and sweating, despite the freezing rain, and in no mood for any delays. I glared at Albert for a moment before turning to look at what he was pointing at.
Across the street, someone was walking on the sidewalk, heading toward Dawn’s house. I couldn’t see them clearly because of the rain smearing my goggles, but I could tell that the person was rail thin and ragged looking. Stringy shoulder-length black hair hung in a tangle off their head, and I realized it was wearing the remains of a nightgown. I froze, and we watched in silence as it stopped and stretched its neck, sniffing the air in the tell-tale characteristic of the infected.
I was still holding my end of the hammock and motioned for Albert to shoot the thing. Albert vigorously shook his head “no”. The creature started to walk across the street toward us.
Thunder rumbled overhead, momentarily distracting it. I glared at Albert but he wouldn’t budge. I carefully lowered my load and unbuttoned my raincoat. I had my carbine slung underneath to keep it dry.
The thing either heard me or sensed my movement, because it picked up its pace and headed right for us. I fumbled with getting my coat out of the way and bringing up my weapon. I shot it at less than fifteen feet. It fell out of sight in front of the pickup truck. Adrenaline surged through my body, all my aches and pains momentarily forgotten. I felt chilled and shaky, and cursed myself for letting my guard down.
We waited for several minutes, listening to the rain and looking for any movement anywhere. Finally we ventured out into the street to investigate our newest addition to the pile. As I rounded the front of the truck I saw the body lying on its back in the street in a puddle of water. Tears welled up in my eyes as I recognized her. It was Dawn, her body frail and decimated. Half her neck was torn away and sections of her arms and breasts had been bitten and eaten.
I felt a wave of guilt and shame flood over me. I had the sense to fire another round into her head to be sure, but then I took off my raincoat and laid it over her body. Albert looked at me strangely, but I didn’t care. We finished our job in silence.
When we dumped the bodies by the pool, I turned away while Albert pushed Dawn’s body over the edge and into her final resting place. After seeing her like that, I feel strangely haunted by her death.
DAY 20
Well, it’s official.
Sometime during the night the power finally went out. This morning I woke up to a freezing cold house. I went into Albert’s room to find him snoring like a leaf blower, oblivious to the cold. I woke him up and we checked the water and gas as well. Both are shut down.
It was still pouring down rain so we put out some empty five gallon plastic buckets to catch rainwater. Albert opened the lids to my trash barrels. We had emptied all of my trash along with the bodies into my neighbor’s pool (I figure if my neighbors ever come back and complain I will deal with it then).
When we had pulled the body out of Dawn’s house yesterday I noticed that she and her husband had apparently bought stock in a candle manufacturing company. They had more candles than we could burn in a year.
We went back over there and loaded up everything we could carry. We also cleaned them out of their canned goods and staples of flour (organic wheat - disgusting), sugar (raw), and sea salt. We found an outdoor propane heater and took that as well.
Albert suggested that we go from house to house gathering supplies (this from the guy who wouldn’t steal a car), but I can’t bring myself to face any more infected neighbors we might find still trapped in their houses. Maybe I’ll feel different when things get a little more desperate, but not now. We discussed our proposed trip to the Bishop’s storehouse and decided to do it today.
We hauled a six-gallon can of gas over to the gardener’s truck as it was running a little low. I spotted three infected creatures over on the next block but we managed to get by them without being detected. I know we should take those things out whenever we have the opportunity, but after yesterday neither of us wants to deal with Them if we can avoid it.
One creature heard our truck start and raced after us as we sped down the street. We lost the thing a block later. We headed north toward Sylmar and made it to the Bishop’s storehouse without incident.