21 July
I’m over staying my welcome. We’re all crammed in this one apartment with no real privacy and no idea of when any of us can leave the city. I arrived nine days ago and hoped to stay for a week at most. Realistically I was going to stay for five days. Even though it’s the start of a zombie outbreak and Rachel is being really cool about me staying here, everyone is in a mood with each other. We’re boxed in here like it’s a perpetual traffic jam, sitting around, waiting for the news that our homes have been overrun with the dead. No one in the apartment works. Most are students who study Spanish for a couple of hours a day then they come home, so usually there are nine people in the one apartment at any given time. There’s always someone in the bathroom or kitchen. There’s three people always trying to use the stove so you have to become a master of a one-pot meal or you cook in bulk at weird hours of the day and store everything in a fridge that can’t possibly hold any more food.
Speaking of which! Katy found a weird smell coming from the fridge so she roped Derek into clearing it out with her and ditching anything that had expired. They lined everything up on the small table as a showcase of their cleaning efforts. There were containers of mayonnaise and cheese that had expired two years ago. Food with names on it from people no one here have heard of. Some kind of pasta and pesto combination that made us gag. Raw chicken that had gone grey. And despite packing the table with crap that has to be thrown out, there’s still no space in the fridge.
You can hear every conversation through the walls. Some nutjobs here are morning people, most are night owls, so there’s only about a three hour gap in the day when everyone is asleep. The moment the first person is up they’re banging something or running a shower and leaving doors open that slam shut in the breeze.
Right outside our window there’s a big crane jackhammer thing that’s knocking down a building across the road from us. That starts at seven in the morning with a
ka-kunk, ka-kunk, ka-buuuuuuuh, ku-ku-ku, ka-kunk,
and on it goes. It never fucking stops! If the window is open you get a dust storm slapping you in the face. If it’s closed you start melting from the heat.
Rush hour traffic seems to last all day. They love honking here. It’s like they beep their horns instead of using indicators. Beep! “Everyone get out of my way, I’m about to change lanes!” Beep! “I gave you plenty of warning, buddy!” Beep! “Get off the road, I have places to be!”
Cristina finally snapped at the French kids. So far they’ve demonstrated zero life skills. They burn the most basic of foods, they don’t clean up after themselves, they don’t know how much they’ve drunk. I don’t know if Cristina is bracing herself for what’s about to come – that we’re all going to have to run for it one day and survive on our own – but already we’ve had whispered conversations about what we would actually do. If Cristina has to mother three French kids who can’t take care of themselves then there’s a chance that she’s mentally divorcing herself from them. How the hell those three are going to survive on their own is a mystery. I can barely remember what I was capable of when I was sixteen. I couldn’t drive, I wouldn’t ask for help if I was lost, and I was stuck pining over some girl who knew I existed but didn’t actually care if she ever saw me again.
Michael has twisted his ankle. He was out for a run (which is a terrible idea if people are all on edge about seeing sprinting zombies) and came back hobbling. Apparently he didn’t see a step and took a tumble. He says he’s been trying to get back into shape. I bet he’s going to regret that run if the zombies come today.
There are only two topics of conversation here. The first is how fucking tired we all are, how little we slept, and that we’re blaming it on the heat. The second topic is the obvious. Shops are closing early, the police are everywhere, the CDC have arrived in St. Petersberg, and the news for some reason hasn’t been reporting on the infected and quarantined Russian soldiers which is suspicious.
There is petrol rationing now. Trucks need special permits to travel and need to be checked before entering the city.
We’re all on a constant rotation of water bottles in the freezer. Finish one, fill it up, put it in the freezer. Take one from the freezer, put it against your neck, scull it, fill it up, put it in the freezer.
I finished
28 Days Later
. Lessons learned: avoid going through tunnels. Mountain bikes are a good mode of transport. Entire cities might burn out of control if no one is there to put out the fire.
Rachel just came in in tears. She’s been trying to call her mum in London with no luck. She’s refreshing the news page every thirty seconds waiting for an update. The last update was four hours ago. She’s convinced that something has happened since then. She’s packed her bag and has her shoelaces loosened and open by her door in case she has to leave in a hurry.
I’ve been sitting here with nothing to do. The only thing on a constant loop in my mind is: what happens, if by the end of the day, the entire city has turned into the undead and you’re left here, locked behind a door, being as quiet as possible like in a submarine movie, hoping that none of them can hear or smell you? I’d have to creep to the bathroom and kitchen in my socks, but I wouldn’t be able to use the bathroom because they might hear me, so I’d have to find someway of getting rid of urine and shit without drawing any attention to me. And then the day will come when I open the fridge and it is completely empty. I will have to make a break for it. I’ll try busting into the other apartments, but how will I know if they’re occupied by others like me? They’ll be moving around as quietly as possible as well, maybe carrying a knife with them at all times in case someone like me comes along.
I won’t ever know how many zombies are lining the streets. I won’t know where they are if they’re just slumping around. They might be one street over, wandering about with no purpose, just waiting for that one tell tale sound that screams: HUMAN! It might be something as simple as me crunching over broken glass, having to climb over two cars that have crashed into each other, or something out of my control like plastic cup rattling over the pavement as the wind sends it my way.
The military will have blockades on every road heading out of the city. They’ll have snipers and machine guns ready to mow down the wandering undead. I’ll have to put my faith in some sniper to not shoot me.
And
I’ll have to put my faith in some colonel issuing orders based on info that are for his eyes only. From what I’ve heard, snipers aren’t exactly the most compassionate of people, they’re just in a competition with each other to see who can get the most kill shots. So, do I stay in the city and outwit a million zombies or do I take my chances with a high-school dropout that’s picked me up in his scope from a mile away?
“Huh, the zombies are learning to walk around with their hands in the air.”
BANG!
“Damn dude, nice shot!”
“Cheers.”
I have a headache that won’t seem to leave me alone.
Part 2.
I tried calling my folks but there was no answer. I sent them a message and I won’t call until they respond. The problem with thirteen people here is that everyone has their phone on loud and there are multiple calls every day so everyone jumps at their phone as soon as they hear the same annoying ringtone. I just wish they would change it to something different.
Part 3.
I was sitting in the kitchen having a late night snack with Ediz when the French girl came in. She was wearing one of the guy’s t-shirts and it came down past her hips, but she wasn’t wearing anything else. Literally, nothing else. She started rummaging through the fridge and the cupboards, looking for a snack. Ediz and I were gawking at her the whole time. We invited her down to join us at the table. Her t-shirt was loose enough for us to see down her top and after a while she forgot to keep her legs crossed. I know it’s weird because we’ve seen her in all her glory up on the roof, but there seems to be something different about sneaking in a glance when a girl is dressed and seeing something awesome, compared to seeing a girl sunbathing while nude. Or maybe guys are just weird. Thankfully, none of the other people in the apartment came to interrupt us or else we would have looked like dirty old pervs.
22 July
It’s the French girl’s birthday today. She’s seventeen. Yep, I feel dirty and old for having stared at her for so long. Her skin has improved and she’s celebrating with a couple of drinks. She’s weary about going up to the roof and I don’t blame her.
None of us are getting much sleep still. There are twenty phone calls a day so at best we might get an hour of uninterrupted sleep. The coffee is on a constant rotation.
The heat, though. What the Jesus titty fucking Christ is up with the heat? How did anyone even think to settle in the middle of the desert? Was it to escape invaders? Perhaps the Moors conquered the south of Spain and decided that going farther into the desert was just too much hassle. So obviously the locals set up camp right here hundreds of years ago and stuck their tongues out at the aggressors and built a city here because no one in their right mind would come along and tell them to move! I’m English! I’m not built for this! My people have not left our fields and drizzle for thousands of years! It’s where I belong, not sitting in ball soup every hour of the day. I should’ve come here in the spring before this misery kicked in.
The situation, shall we say, is reported to be getting better. They still don’t have a cure (they’re dead and they came back to life. They’re not going to magically be cured of the deadness no matter how much money people throw at funding research) and there’s no vaccine (though they are ‘looking into it’), but they have isolated and quarantined certain areas around the world. So far everything is working out. The confirmed death toll: 3,450 (world wide). The confirmed number of resurrected: 4,200.
There’s a problem with getting accurate numbers. Firstly, there might not actually be any zombies in the rising-from-the-dead sense. Everyone on TV is still being far too cautious about labelling them as ‘undead’. If we give them the benefit of the doubt then there are zombie-like people who might be suffering from a brain-eating virus while still retaining enough motor skills to roam around looking for a cuddle.
Secondly, the death is limited to people or former people who have died and aren’t getting up again. That includes zombies who have been put down with a shotgun blast to the face. In that case they are definitely dead and go into the death toll category, but they’re in there with people who were never resurrected and died in hospital.
3,450 confirmed dead in a week.
They have captured a lot of the zombies and have put them in prison (now there’s a weird concept). They are keeping them alive to see if there is actually a cure. Also there were some outcries that these people aren’t actually dead. And who’s to say they’re wrong? I’m in the middle of Madrid saying “That’s a zombie and it’s dead,” while pointing at a grainy image of some guy in St. Petersberg. I don’t have a medical license so my opinion isn’t all that special. They’re trying to reverse the condition. Besides, they’ve only been shooting and killing the aggressive attackers, anyone who poses a threat to anyone else. The docile ones were rounded up. They’re treating it like small pox or TB and protective suits are a must.
I downloaded Wikipedia and have stored it on a flash drive. You never know when you might need to learn how to make a battery or find out who was the longest reigning monarch in the thirteen century. I wonder if I will actually ever open Wikipedia on that flash drive.
Just finished
Dawn of the Dead
. Lessons learned: if you’re going to build an anti-zombie truck tricked out with anti-zombie weapons so that you can leave your fortress, start building it as soon as you can. Also, when one of the guys keeps his girlfriend locked away, saying that she isn’t feeling well, that shit is suspicious! Go check it out.
23 July
Shops and restaurants are opening up again! Public transport will be up and running on the 27th. I’ve already forgotten what day of the week it is since I’ve been backpacking for two months now and it doesn’t really matter what day it is. God that’s awesome. I just need to get back to London by the 1st of September. I wonder if this whole outbreak has given anyone from work pause for thought. Maybe some have decided that they really aren’t going to spend the last of their days working for some asswipe. I got a quick update from Steph about that. She said Gary is about to go on annual leave. There is talk of everyone quitting the day before he goes, just to fuck up his vacation time. I still can’t believe he dangled the chance of a promotion in front of me two weeks before I was due to take time off. Then he had the gall to say that he was disappointed in me for not taking his offer. Well Gaz, that would have cancelled my trip around Europe which was already largely paid for.
“You should be working towards a down payment for a house,” he said. Gaz, shut the fuck up.
Oh, they’ve found the culprit behind the disease: fleas. Yeah, just like the great plague that wiped out a quarter of Europe a few hundred years ago. Fleas are infecting people. Cats and dogs are now being disinfected and rats are being exterminated. There’s rat poison on every corner in every city around the world. If it wasn’t already our apocalypse, it’s certainly now theirs.
On a side note, there is a virus that can only live in rats that only reproduce in the intestines of a cat, so first of all: what the shit? It means that a rat must run to a hungry cat and then be eaten so the virus can reproduce, and then the cat needs to die and be fed on by even more rats. That’s like the weird reproduction cycle in
Aliens
.
Either way: stay clear of rats, cats, fleas, and people who want to bite you.
I’m still wondering how a bra breaks during dinner.