Adventures of a Middle School Zombie (10 page)

“So what do you think?”

“I’m not so sure this is a good idea, Jed. You’re just gonna piss him off even more.”

“Well, yeah, that’s the point. Like that’s going to make it worse?”

“I guess. But remember, it can always get worse.”

I looked at Anna. I wasn’t sure she was going to come, and I nearly passed out when I asked if she would meet Luke and me after school. When she said, “Sure,” like it was nothing, I felt we had reached another level in our relationship. Acquaintances. Maybe even casual friends.

I even started to think there could be something more. For now, I was just happy she was here.

“How about you?” I said to Anna. “Worth trying at least?”

“As long as you make sure it works,” she said, smiling. “And I know you can make it work if you put your mind to it.”

Ever since Robbie burned me in the bathroom, he was on my butt even more. Sometimes it was as simple as lunging at me in the hall. I’d backpedal instinctively, usually into someone, and they would shove me into someone else, who shoved me into someone else—someone started calling it Zombie Pinball, and the name stuck.

Other times Robbie would make a big show of pulling on latex gloves he’d stolen from Biology Lab, grabbing me under my arms, and placing me in the nearest receptacle. I’m not sure, but I think I even lifted my legs to make it easier. It just happened without me even thinking.

If I didn’t do something, this was going to last the rest of the year. I imagined twenty years from now, me leaving my job, and there being a middle-aged Robbie in the parking lot. “Deeeeeeeeeee Jaaaaaayyyyyy, time to play Smell My Finger. If you can’t guess where it’s been, you know what happens.”

It felt like this was going to last forever.

I had to take control, even if just for one afternoon. And it was all about embracing who I was.

This zombie was gonna strike back. Even if it killed me.

The bare bones of the idea had come to me back when I was stuck in the trophy case. These three words came into my brain:

“Use the Ooze.”

The only power I had over Robbie was my deep and unrelenting zombieness. Already he thought Ooze might turn him undead. But I needed him to
believe
I could turn him zombie, and not just with Ooze. I had other bodily fluids at my disposal.

First was the building of a believable foundation. Robbie was gullible, but he had to be absolutely convinced of my zombie powers.

What is the one place where fiction can become fact?

That’s right. Wikipedia.

I fashioned an “Everything you need to know about zombies” Wikipedia page. It was filled with research, quotes from experts, and facts as derived from the Bureau of Reanimated, Autonomous and Inert Neuro-energy Sciences (BRAINS), otherwise known as the top-secret and highly classified federal bureau of zombie studies. No Wikipedia page is complete without a top-secret government program—I’ll wait as the irony sinks in.

BRAINS came to the conclusion that zombies, despite their depiction in movies, have light appetites, enjoy long walks on the beach, and are relatively harmless save for one by-product of the type of cell reproduction necessary to prolong their “lives”: a sticky substance that forms on their skin in times of physical exertion (though also noticed in stressful situations).

This “Ooze,” found in much higher concentrations in zombie blood, “holds the key to life in death, and while scientists have yet to discover exactly how or why it works, it clearly is vital to maintaining organs and tissues that, by previous measures, would have been considered inanimate.”

While Ooze was necessary to zombies, it had a different effect on live tissue, according to a bunch of stuff I made up as I went along. Lab rats exposed to Ooze at first became excited, bordering on hyperactive. Within minutes they lost coordination, lurching about as if taking on the perceived attributes of zombies. Skin took on a gray pallor, and twenty-four hours later, the rats had no vital signs, yet continued to move in ways that suggested a complete loss of motor skills. Researchers determined the rats had become, in effect, the kind of living dead portrayed in such classic zombie movies as
Night of the Living Dead
and
Dead Alive
—shambling afterthoughts with purposeless lives.

There was a rumor that a researcher had been contaminated with Ooze during the study, and that while the feds had shredded all records related to the accident, those on the inside revealed the man had attempted suicide thirty-seven times before being placed in a highly classified hospice, where to this day he is the longest-living (so to speak) resident.

I threw in a few graphs and pie charts for good measure. My favorite was the “Time of Zombification” based on “Square Inches of Flesh Exposed to Ooze.”

It was easy to spread the word, thanks to Twitter and Facebook. I started it with a fake account on Twitter, @keepaneyeout, which was “Your No. 1 source of zombie-related info.” Josh and Luke were my first followers, and it took only about three days before I was up to more than fifty, just about all of them at Pine Hollow.

Pretty soon I noticed #zombiescourge was trending. Turns out I’d tapped into a very popular Twitter subject. It was filled with discussion of government conspiracies to keep the growing undead population under wraps and the outing of various zombie celebs: Lindsay Lohan, Ryan Seacrest, any Kardashian—couldn’t argue with them. In fact, I retweeted some of them.

Next was formulating a method of Ooze delivery. There were two rules: There had to be a lot, and it had to be an accident. At least, appear to be an accident.

Short of tearing off a few limbs each night, there was no way to generate enough real Ooze to make this work. That’s one reason I was depending on the Wikipedia page and its tidbit about the concentration of Ooze being much higher in zombie blood.

The plan required two things. First, Robbie had to be paying little attention when he ripped out my arm and noted how little blood was involved. Honestly, I wasn’t worried about that at all. He paid more attention to humiliating me than anything else.

Secondly, I needed my blood to spurt. Check that. I needed buckets of my blood to spurt out.

That meant a traumatic injury to a maneuverable body part. A part I could aim and use like a gun.

An index finger.

And where do the majority of horrible junior-high accidents occur, at least according to another Wikipedia page?

Woodshop. This revelation came from the conversation I had with Chris, about how easy it would be to lose a digit to the band saw, which popped back into my mind the moment I thought
finger
.

I drew everything up and showed Anna and Luke.

“So this is … what, again?” he said, pointing at the crude sketch.

“Plastic bag of blood.”

“And this?”

“Some sort of tubing.”

“And this little dangly thing? With all the spray coming out? That’s not your—”

“Dude, that’s my finger.” If zombies could turn red, I did it right then. I hoped Anna didn’t get where Luke was going. If she did, she didn’t show it.

“See,” I continued, “there’s the saw. Finger into saw and, bam! Major industrial accident. Lots of highly toxic zombie blood. Awesome.”

Luke shook his head. “That is more than just awesome. That hits awesomely awesome. But I’m not sure you’ve thought this out.”

“I’ve thought of everything.”

“Including the ‘after’ part, when all this is over and Robbie figures out he is not turning zombie and comes after us? And I do mean us. Both of us.”

“Really, that’s what you’re thinking about? Us? Like when he pushes ‘us’ in the hall? Puts ‘us’ in the trash can? Shoved ‘us’ into the trophy case? Is that the ‘us’ you’re talking about?”

Anna put her hand on my elbow. “Jed, hey, Luke is on your side. So am I. I think we’re both a little worried about what Robbie will do. You know he’s more than a little crazy.”

I knew I was asking a lot. Anna didn’t really know what she was getting herself into. It was a big risk to befriend someone so different.

Luke had always been there for me. But until this year, that hadn’t been so hard.  It was a lot tougher now, and I had to make sure he at least was going to be with me on this.

If not, then I really was on my own.

Luke looked down. “So how’s this bag thing work?” he said.

Cool.

“I figure I wedge it under my armpit and, when the time is right, squeeze. And it goes through the tube.”

“What tube?” Anna said. Even cooler.

“Not sure yet,” I said. “Maybe taping together a bunch of heavy duty straws. I’m pretty good with duct tape.”

“That’s not going to work,” Anna said. “How about, let’s see. Surgical tubing. You can get it online. Flexible and strong.”

“That would work.”
Way better than straws, doofus.
“Thanks, Anna.”

“I just hope you know what you’re doing.” I could hear the caring in her voice. She was with me, too. If zombies could get the chills, I had them right then.

It was one thing to put it down on paper. Quite another to make it all work.

Each day after school I spent some time building the Ooze delivery device. First I would have to pick the banana peel and assorted crap out of my hair from the latest Dumpster dive, courtesy of Robbie (keeping my motivation strong). But finally I thought I had it, right down to the fake blood of pancake syrup and red dye, to which I’d add a little Ooze for effect.

When it was ready to go, I called Anna and Luke.

“Meet me in my garage,” I told each. “I think we’re ready for the first test.”

I was standing at my dad’s worktable when Anna and Luke arrived. In front of me were a plastic bag and a four-foot piece of tubing.

“Let’s set it up,” Luke said.

He poured the blood into the bag and zipped up all but the last corner. He handed it to Anna, who poked the surgical tubing into the bag before duct-taping it securely.

“Ready with this,” Anna said. “Want to strap in?”

“Let’s do this.”

She slipped everything up my shirt, wedged the bag under my armpit, and threaded the tube through my sleeve. I swear my heart fluttered a little as she touched me. Unnerving, but then pretty cool. Maybe having a beating heart wasn’t as annoying as I’d imagined.

I took the end of the tube with my index and middle finger. It was a perfect fit.

“Let’s pretend you’re sawing that bookshelf you’ve been working on since the start of the year while everyone else went on to the birdhouse,” Anna said. “There you go, saw saw saw, not paying attention OH NO WHAT DID YOU DO, YOUR FINGER IS GONE.”

I squeezed the bag as hard as I could.

Nothing. But I felt something very wet down my side.

Luke laughed and pointed.

“Oh no, the saw-blade came off and cut you from your armpit to your waist,” he said. “Oh, the humanity.”

I looked to the right and saw a huge and very uncomfortable red stain spreading down my side. Luke reached up and pulled out the bag, which had opened along the zipper.

I could tell Anna was stifling a laugh. “Plan B?” she said.

I knew a balloon wouldn’t work because each of the fifty or so I’d tested busted as soon as pressure was put on. Rubber gloves didn’t work either. Too awkward. And by the time you cut heavy duty garbage bags down to fit into an armpit, there was no way to attach the tubing without blood leaking everywhere.

“A bulb?” Anna said.

I thought she was talking about a light bulb, the kind that goes off when you get a good idea. This was not, however, a good idea. How do you fill a light bulb with blood?

She saw my doubt. “You know, those plastic bulbs that come on those things you use to keep a turkey moist?”

“Baster?”

“What did you call me?”

“No, no, I’m sorry, I—”

“Jed, relax, I’m kidding. Yes, a baster. A turkey baster. They look like big syringes.”

“Right, that’s what I said. You baster.”

We laughed.

“You look even cuter when you smile,” Anna said. “You get less gray when you blush.”

Luke looked at the two of us. “All very adorable, but can we get back to business?”

We went to Phase Two, taking fifteen minutes to steal a few basters from our kitchens. Luke taped four bulbs together, and Anna inserted the tubing. There was more taping, and we put it in place.

“OK, here goes nothing,” I said.

I squeezed with my upper arm, pushing on the bulbs. A beautiful arc of fake blood streamed out, going at least ten feet. I was so happy; it never occurred to me how hard it was going to be to clean up.

“Dude, that was awesome,” Luke said. “Robbie is going to be a zombie in seconds. He’ll be a Rombie!”

“A Rombie, awesome,” Anna said.

I placed the zombifier—no, the Rombifier—on the work table.

I was feeling better about this. There was no way I’d be able to beat Robbie in a fight. But by playing to my strengths, I might have a chance at surviving seventh grade.

And even for a guy who spends every day in flat-line, survival hadn’t been so easy lately.

“This is going to show Robbie once and for all,” I said. “He’s been picking on the wrong zombie.”