Read GRANDMA? Part 1 (YA Zombie Serial Novel) Online

Authors: J.A. Konrath,Talon Konrath,Jack Kilborn

GRANDMA? Part 1 (YA Zombie Serial Novel) (3 page)

A window.

It was only half size, leading into the window well right outside the kitchen. Josh and I liked to go in there sometimes because it always had awesome animals in it, like salamanders and frogs and mice.

"C'mon," I told my brother, grabbing his hand. "We're getting out of here."

I told him to climb the shelf and open the window. Josh surprised me by doing it without complaint.

BOOM!

The banging had resumed. I chanced a look at the door and saw one of the three hinges had fallen off.

"Hurry up, Josh."

"Randall!" he squealed.

"What?" I stared up at him, alarmed.

"There's a mouse nest in here! It's awesome!"

"We don't have time now, little brother."

"The mouse has a bunch of babies."

"Really? Lemme see." I hurried up the shelf next to him, looking at the nest. "Awesome."

"They're pink and don't have hair yet. Got your phone?"

"Way ahead of you." I used my phone to take a picture of the mice. Then the door burst inward with a giant
BANG!

"We gotta go," I said.

"Don't step on the mice."

We climbed out of the window well, careful not to step on the mice. But once we were in the backyard, I wasn't sure where to go. Run into the woods? It was too easy to get lost. Plus, we didn't know if there were more zombies out there.

"We should hide," Josh said, "wait for Mom and Dad to get home. Dad will kick Grandma's ass."

Our father never really liked his mother-in-law.

"What if Grandma finds us?" I asked. "I think we should run."

"Where?"

I had no idea. And my foot was really starting to hurt. I seriously needed to get some shoes on. I remembered my flip flops were on the pier.

The pier…

The boat!

"C'mon!" I said, pulling Josh's arm. We ran to the stairs leading to the dock, me limping because the pain was so bad. The boat was a Bass Tracker, fourteen feet long, with a 40 horsepower Mercury engine. I carefully put on my sandals and we climbed aboard. I told Josh to untie us while I sat in the driver's seat, reaching for the ignition.

No keys.

"Josh, you need to stay here. I have to get the keys."

"Don't leave me again, Randall."

"I have to. I'll only be thirty seconds. Go ahead and count, like we're playing hide and seek. Go."

Josh began to count slowly. I jumped out of the boat and hobbled up the pier, heading for Grandma's house. She always kept the keys on the kitchen table.

I got to the patio door and paused, looking through the window. The kitchen was empty. I eased the door open, slipping inside, heading for the table.

No keys.

I began searching cabinets. I didn't find keys, but I did find Grandma's stash of hard candy. I grabbed a handful, shoving them into my pocket, pausing to eat one. (I had to, to get the smell of peppermint out of my mouth, so Josh didn't think I'd been eating candy.) Then I started going through the drawers, until I found one with keys in it.

About five thousand keys.

"Damn, Grandma. How many locks do you have?"

She must have saved every key she'd ever had, going back to World War II. The boat key had a yellow sponge thing on the key ring so I knew what to look for. No idea why it had that sponge thing, but I was glad it did because it made the keys easy to find. Once I grabbed them, I limped back onto the patio, but my way was blocked by Grandma and Phil.

"You're too young to take the boat out by yourself," Grandma said, wagging a finger at me and she moved closer. "Now give me the keys, and let me eat your face."

"I thought zombies ate brains," I countered.

"We do. But you, young man, don't have any."

Wow. Zombie Grandma was a jerk. And I'd spent $20 of my own money buying her slippers for Christmas.

"How did you become a zombie?" I asked Phil, purposely ignoring Grandma.

I was hoping he didn't say, "Jesus bit me." Not because of the religious ramification, but because I didn't want my little brother to be right.

"Ralph," he said. "Bit my arm."

I didn't know who Ralph was, and didn't really care. But I had more questions.

"Why did you turn Grandma into a zombie? You just bit her once. You're trying to eat me, but you didn't try to eat her."

They looked at each other, and then began to giggle in a creepy, gurgly way. Like they had a secret joke they wouldn't share.

While they were preoccupied with alienating me, I dashed left and headed for the dock. I managed to get around them, but they reacted fast and were quickly right on my heels.

I looked ahead and saw Josh in the boat. He shrugged his shoulders with his palms facing the sky.

"Josh, get ready! I got them!"

I was jingling the keys in the air, like he would hear them. Josh pointed.

"They're behind you!" he yelled.

No duh. I didn't need to turn around to see, because I heard them on my heels. Practically close enough to grab me.

I couldn't make it to Josh in time. And if I did, the zombies would get on the boat behind me.

For some reason, I thought about this morning. Me, Dad, and Josh fishing on the boat at sunrise. I hooked a big one and Dad coached me as I played the fish.

"Careful, son. Don't pull too hard. Let him wear himself out."

Someone shoved my shoulder. I fell forward, skinning my knees.

"That fish is huge, Randall!" Josh said, ready with the net. "A giant bass!"

I managed to hang onto the boat key, but while I was on my knees Grandma grabbed my hair and pulled my head back.

"We got him, Randall!" Josh lifted up the net as if the bass was his, so proud even though it was just a little two pounder. I unhooked it and threw it back. "You'll be next," I said to Josh.

But he hadn't caught any fish that morning.

"Randall!"

I stared at Josh, waving his arms on the boat, and realized something for the first time. We said
I love you
all the time, same as we said it to Mom and Dad. But until that very moment, I didn't really understand what it meant.

It meant I couldn't let the zombies get my little brother.

"Josh! Catch!"

I threw the boat keys as hard as I could. My aim was good, but my self-sacrifice turned to poopy when the keys hit Josh square in the face, bounced off, and plopped into the water.

"You s-word, Randall! You hit me in the nose! You suck!"

Stupid Josh never could catch anything.

I felt teeth on my neck. But I fought as hard as I could, and watched as Grandma's uppers fall onto the pier next to me.

"Damn dentures," she cursed.

"Don't you have any Poligrip?" Phil asked.

"I use Fixodent."

As they debated the various merits of their preferred denture creams, I mourned my failure. I was going to get devoured, and so was Josh. It was going to be awful. Have you ever seen old people eat? It's gross. Now imagine them eating you.

I looked ahead to say a final goodbye to my brother, and him holding the fishing net, lake water dripping off it, the keys inside.

Apparently that little yellow sponge thing on the key ring was so the keys floated. Good thinking, somebody.

Josh held up the net, triumphant, like he'd done earlier with my bass.

"Randall! Come on!"

Grandma still had a tight grip on my hair. I couldn't get away without scalping myself.

"Go without me, Josh!"

Above me, the undead argument continued, becoming even stupider.

"Poligrip is zinc free."

"So is Fixident."

"Why does it matter that they're zinc free?"

"I'm not sure. What does zinc do anyway?"

"I don't know."

I watched Josh sit in the captain's chair and put the keys in the ignition. He'd never driven the boat by himself, but he'd sat in my lap, or Dad's, and steered before.

"You can do it, Josh," I said under my breath.

And he did. He started the boat, gunned the engine, and took off.

He got all of two feet away before the mooring line held him back. Stupid Josh had forgotten to unhook the stern, and the boat was still attached to the dock.

"The line!" I yelled. But he couldn't hear me with the motor on. He just revved the motor more.

"I have zinc in my Geritol," Grandma said. "So why do I want zinc free denture adhesive? Isn't zinc good for you?"

"I like cats," Phil said. "Do you like cats?"

"I love cats."

"I have an old tabby named Eisenhower who is quite the rascal. Tore up my rug the other day."

"Don't you have rug runners?"

"Of course. But the rascal managed to get under the plastic. The rascal."

"Sounds like a real rascal."

"He is. The rascal."

As I listened to the inane ramblings of the geriatric undead, and watched bonehead Josh try to drag the whole pier into the lake with zero success, I realized that I wasn't ready to die yet. Not with all of these morons around me.

I pulled hard, ripping out a nice chunk of my hair, but getting free. Then I headed for the pier, starting to sprint. Screw the foot pain.

I was just ready to hop into the boat when the mooring line pulled free. I must have done a bad job winding it around the tie-down cleat on the pier. My bad.

The boat took off just as I jumped. I missed it and landed in the shallow water, my flip-flops coming off and my bad foot landing right on a sharp rock.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Hurt like hell.

I must have screamed loud enough for Josh to hear me, because he slowed the boat and began to turn around.

I couldn't believe it. I was actually going to live though this nightmare.

That's when Grandma yelled, "CANNONBALL!" and jumped onto my head.

For a little old lady, she hit like linebacker. I went under, pinned to the bottom of the lake, my face in the sand and very little air in my lungs.

I wondered if drowning was better than being eaten alive. They both sounded bad. But then, there weren't many ways to die that were appealing. Smothered by swimsuit models? Getting hit in the head by a home run ball when the Cubs win the World series?

That wouldn't be too bad. But knowing the Cubs, I had a much better chance of being smothered by swimsuit models.

As my lungs burned and my brain screamed for oxygen, I heard a roar in the water. It grew louder and louder, until it blotted out all thoughts about girls in bikinis.

Well, all girls but Jaclyn Swedberg. It was hard to stop thinking about her. My Dad had a Playboy with her pictures in it, and she was maybe the hottest babe ever.

In fact, as far as last thoughts went, thinking about Jaclyn Swedberg wasn't a bad last thought to have.

Then the roaring sound was practically on top of me, and when I realized what it was I became even more panicked.

No, Josh! Don't…!

Then there was a
THUNK!
as the boat hit Grandma. But any momentary relief I felt from being free was countered by the 40 hp motor spinning a propeller inches away from my face. It missed my nose by less than an inch. Blowing water in my face.

I swam away from it, almost getting scalped, and then popped to the surface alongside the boat, gasping for air.

"Randall!"

Josh killed the engine, and the boat coasted into the shore—

—right next to Phil the zombie.

I swam to the ladder next to the motor and pulled myself onto the boat, just as the Phil was climbing onto the bow.

"Josh! Reverse!"

Josh pulled the throttle back and gunned it. I fell forward, onto my hands. But so did Phil, falling right off the boat, and into the lake next to Grandma.

"Slow down, brother," I said between breaths as we reached the middle of the lake. "You did good."

"Grandma got run over by a bass boat," he said, singing it like the reindeer song.

I laughed, enjoying the moment of not being chased, and shut my eyes. My breathing slowed down and the sun warmed me up. My foot was throbbing, but it felt really good to be alive.

"Uh, Randall?"

"What?" I said peeking open one of my eyes.

"Do you think they know how to swim?"

"Who?"

I stared at the shore line and I saw zombies. Elderly zombies, standing there, watching us. Dozens of them. Maybe even a hundred.

Then they all jumped in the lake and began to swim towards our boat.

 

Northern Wisconsin

FIVE HOURS EARLIER

The most stereotypical redneck you could imagine held a lightning rod in the palm of his three fingered hand. How this came to occur is an interesting story (to the parties involved.)

Each of the fingers was actually a thumb that he'd gotten fresh from a buddy who worked at the local funeral home.

"They already dead, they don’t need 'em no more," Einsten reasoned, and paid the mortician thirty bucks each, even though the skin on one was slightly darker than his, so people always thought that  finger was dirty.

Einstein would've been happy with his original set of fingers, but he'd used the chainsaw wrong when he tried to make an
automatic beer launcher swimming pool
and decided if he had more thumbs he could get a better grip on that chainsaw or any other thing that looked like it needed more thumbs on it.

Since all of his thumbs worked, he considered himself a scientist—after all, he'd sewn them on himself and used steel screws to secure them to the bone. A damn fine job considering he'd done it all under the influence of Jack Daniels Tennessee Whiskey. Then he'd used fishing leeches to get the blood flowing to his new appendages, a trick he learned from the TV show E.R. He went through two bottles of penicillin to fight off infections that damn near killed him, but the end result was something to be proud of.

"Look, Debra!" he bragged to his wife when the last fever broke. "If man's only advantage against other animals is a thumb, well I am triply advanced!"

"If you're so smart, how'd you cut off all your fingers in the first place?" she countered.

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