ljidol 6 : topic 5 : zombie dream story

Nov 22, 2009 16:14

"You should sleep" she says.

Staring out the window, watching the moon rise into the night sky, I didn't realize anyone else was awake.

"I'll try to sleep a little later." I lie.

I can't tell her that there will be no sleep for me. Tonight I am watching. I want to know exactly what happens at night. I want to know when they come out, how many there might be, how fast they are. She might be able to control it, but they can't.



And tonight I am waiting. Waiting to set my plan in motion.

"It might be the last night of sleep we get for a few days." she reminds me.

"This might be our last night alive."

"I'm already dead." she whispers.

"I'm sorry, you know what I meant."

"Do you really believe it's worth the risk to leave?" she asks.

It is worth it. It is worth it, for my son, maybe only for him. But that's not what I say. I can't tell her that either.

"For any of us to have a chance, we have to try. We can't stay here forever. I know there's not as many of them out there as there used to be, but eventually they will find us here. And you know the only chance for you and your daughter is the cure. We may never get this chance again. We don't have a choice, we have to risk it now. We'll take what food we have left. I've got the gun. I know we can make it for 2 days."

But that's not the complete truth, I know not all of us are going to make it.

"Are you afraid?" I ask her.

"I don't think I know how to be afraid anymore."

I stare at her and wonder what about her is truly her, and what about her is something else. I wonder what she was like before all of this, before everything changed.

With just the light of the moon to go by she doesn't look much different than me. You can't see the wild look in her eyes, or the jagged nature of her teeth. No, she just looks dirty, grubby even. Hair unkempt and clothes torn, her daughter too, from the days before they were able to control it. And now there are no showers to be taken, or new clothes to risk going after. You never know who or what is going to be out there. Food only, that is the only reason to risk leaving. Until now.

"We leave tomorrow," I say.

She stares at me with those eyes that can look right through you, before finally going back to sleep. I don't know if she believes me, she doesn't have to. All I really need her to do is sleep. I don't want to have to do it while they're awake.

I never imagined it would come to this.

He told me two days. To be by the wall at the airport in two days. Only humans, no undead. If there are any vamps with us, that's what he called them, they won't pick us up. You can't trust them, he said.

I watch the children asleep on the bed, holding onto each other like they have known each other their whole life. That's what this will do to you. Make you attach yourself to anyone, anything that provides a sense of normalcy. Just so we don't feel alone. Just so we can feel like a real family. So we can forget, so we can forget everything.

They sleep opposite, his head nuzzled in the nook of her dirty feet, and vice versa. Just in case. I don't want her teeth too close to his neck while they sleep. Just in case. I can't lose him too. No I won't lose him too.

I stare at him and wonder how he would feel knowing what I know, knowing they aren't coming with us. Just the two of us, starting over. We're going to a real community, with food and shelter, other children, other families just like us.

I tell myself, that makes it all worth it. We will move on from this, he will forget this.

More lies. This time to myself.

He may forget some things, but I don't think he will ever forget the little girl he's slept next to for so many days. The little girl he is not afraid of, but should be. And I try to convince myself that is the real problem. She could kill him while she dreams. I must protect him from her. He has grown too close to her, and I have grown too slack. It has been too nice having this small family. We have all grown too comfortable with each other. What would happen, what would they do, if they found out we were going without them? Would they lose control, would they hunt us down and kill us? I don't want to believe that, but I don't want to believe anything about what's happened.

I tell myself I have no choice. Their anger, their violence, their nature, their impulses are all bubbling against the surface, hiding, waiting for the right moment.

I have seen what they can do, I remind myself.

I don't know what she is, what they are. I don't know what happened, maybe no one does. But I do know they are dangerous. I have seen it with my own eyes. And I will never forget it.

It started slowly. First people dying, just falling over dead for no conceivable reason. Then the rumors, that some of the dead were coming back to life. Then more and more dying, and relatives secretly keeping their dead, just in case. Then the screaming in the middle of the night. Waking up to those screams, I will never forget that sound. People running outside, cars driving frantically away. Trying to escape, but for most of them, there was no escape, but they didn't know that yet.

From my window I watched it all. But there's only one image I can't get out of my head. One woman. One woman dragging her husband's dead body, stiff as a board, out of the house. I guess she thought she could save them both. But when he "turned", when he "woke up" in her arms, dug his teeth into her neck, and ripped out her throat, that's when I knew nothing would ever be the same again.

There is no word for what so many people have become. And no rhyme or reason that I can see for why some people stayed dead, and some came back, or why some can control their new impulses, and others can't.

Before all this, I used to wonder if I was the kind of person who would survive an apocalypse. I know it's a crazy thing to think about, but I used to wonder. I used to wonder if I had it in me to make it. If I had the will to push back in the face of certain death. I used to imagine things that don't seem so crazy anymore. Like a zombie apocalypse. I imagined zombies pounding on my door. I imagined having to tell my son, "Close your eyes baby. We are going to die now, and it is going to hurt. But I will never let go of you." And as the zombies broke through the barricades I would lay us on the bed, throw a blanket over him and tell him I love him, just before they tore through it and us. Before they killed us both.

Yes, I used to worry I would be the kind of person who gives up. The kind of person who would cower in face of real peril. That it would be easier to just give up without a fight.

But just like old horror movies and stories, nightmares and daymares can't prepare you for this. They can't predict how you will react. What kind of person you will become.

I always wondered if I would be strong enough to survive. But I never wondered how far I'd be willing to go to survive. No, I never wondered if I'd be able to kill to survive.

Tonight I stay up. Tonight I convince myself there is no other way.

Tonight when the moon falls I will take my gun and shoot them in the head, mother and daughter. Tonight I will protect my son and I as I should have from the beginning.

I will tell him I had to do it, just as I tell myself. That something went wrong. And we will leave. We will leave and never come back.

Tonight I tell myself we will make it to the airport. But I wonder. As I watch the moon begin to fall, I wonder what kind of person I have become. And I wonder if I will ever see the moon rise again.

lj idol 3, dreams

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