More Zombie-ish Shenanigans...
http://lucybond.livejournal.com/484266.html#comments
Following on from the zombie-ish story, as requested, first draft, so excuse spelling/etc.
The world comes swimming back, and I cough and spit to try and rid my mouth of the foul taste. I realised, too late, that I'm making a lot of noise, so I stop, and listen. Nothing. How late was it? The room was completely dark, but I could still taste it, still smell it.
At first, I tried not too move much, just tensing and relaxing my limbs. They all seemed to be responding, and there was still no sound. I tilted my head sideways a little, and the pain came. I can tell I'm lying on my back, and there's something lumpy and uneven behind me, something weighing down across my chest.
I didn't know what it was, but there was still no sound, and no movement, so I cautiously raised my right hand towards my shoulder, and reached out with my fingertips. Torn fabric, and a horrible slickness beneath, greasy, like cold chicken. Disgust overcame me, and I flung myself upright, scooting away from the thing on my bottom, my head reeling.
With my left hand (the clean one, the one that hadn't touched the thing) I dug into the pocket of my jeans to find my mobile. I squeezed the keypad, shining the faint greenish beam of the screen-saver across the floor. Where was the damn torch? I didn't want to turn it towards the spot where I'd just awakened, but I didn't have much choice; the torch must have fallen from my hand, so it couldn't be far.
The screensaver light lasts for 25 seconds. It crept over the dark shape, illuminating just a small patch at a time. The claw hand spread towards me, and the arm looked twisted, blackened. There was a glint of bone, and then, the bloated torso. I must have stared for a long time, not wanting to turn the beam onto the face, hidden in shadow. I became aware that my heart was racing, now, just waiting for the thing to move. The screen went dim, then black, and I was in darkness again, but rather than terrifying me, it felt comforting.
Where was Hel? I hoped she'd gone for help, I feared she'd run screaming into the night and not been a blind bit of use. I wondered why I didn't do the same myself, but I guess I was waiting; waiting for the thing to get up, like I had. Maybe I was in shock?
I ran through the last events I could remember in my mind, to check they were all still there, and just as I was recalling the struggling, the biting, those foul hands on my body, I heard the cop-car coming. It's a small town, so that meant Morgan's Dad, or the infamous Officer Tilly. Boys used to laugh and say that having Tilly as a surname made him sound like a girl, and it was no surprise then, that he'd grown up to hate children. I hoped it was Morgan's dad.
The noise of the siren was so loud now that I realised it would drown out any other sound in the house, and my strange calmness left me. If the thing lurched to its feet now, I'd be none the wiser until it had me in its grip again.
And then the car was here, pulling round the corner, over the kerb, onto the grass verge, and the flashing lights filled the room, changed everything.
I saw what I had been trying to avoid seeing, and my mind almost split in two. The part of me who loved her Dad's science magazines looked at the shrunken-back lips, the teeth, startlingly yellow against the black gums, the shrivelled, sneering face, and those ragged-edged eyeless voids, and thought of the Ancient Egypt project we'd been doing in school. But the part of me that had only turned thirteen last spring, that had never been allowed to watch a movie our Mom deemed 'too scary'... well, she started to scream, and she didn't stop. Not as the cops came in with their heavy flashlights, shouting. Not as Morgan's dad carried me out onro the grass, checked me over and helped me into the back of the car. Not until I saw Helens frightened face looking up at me from the back seat. Good old Hel.
There were a lot of questions after that, obviously, and I wasn't sure what they wanted to hear. I knew what it looked like. It looked like I'd broken into an old house, and, for some reason, bitten the hand of a dead guy half off, like a wild dog.
A professional lady who'd been trained to talk to shaken-up kids asked me all sorts of crazy stuff, and I answered as best I could. She talked to Hel in another room. They had the doc check me over, too, and he found the bump on my head, obviously, and some bruising to my shoulders, but he said that could have happened when I fell. Someone official took a photo of my bruises, and I felt cold and silly standing in my vest and jeans.
Morgan's dad, who we all called Officer David, was more help. He brought me clean clothes, and a towel, and told me where the washroom was. I never knew the police station had a shower, but you learn something new every day.
The only soap was a block of harsh stuff for hands, but I scrubbed it into my hair,
When I came out, in a baggy sweatshirt and matching navy pants, he sat me down and spoke sense.
"You've had a rough evening, Carly. We've left a message for your sister..."
They were still trying to get hold her. She was going to suffer for this, when Mom and Dad got back from their conference, and I heartily hoped she wouldn't call them right away and make them come home. The cinema would let out soon, and then she'd turn her phone back on.
I nodded.
"You've seen those forensics shows?"
I nodded again. I wasn't allowed to, but sure I had.
"Well, the geeks from the lab will have to work this out, but it looks to me like the cadaver was sat in a chair in the kitchen or something, and he fell down on you in the dark, when you kids were snooping around."
Really? It looked like that? I nodded again.
"Poor old guy must've broken in himself and holed up there. Died in his sleep, drunk, more as likely. Must have darn near scared the life out of you, too?"
He was looking me right in the eye now. I mumbled that yes, that was the god's-honest truth.
"So you couldn't see a thing, and you lashed out anyway you could. You both fell down and you took a blow to the head. Do you remember blacking out, Carly?"
I shook my head firmly, like I had for the doctor; there was no way I wanted them to drive me out to the city hospital.
"Well, alright then, I better take you home."
I was quiet in the back of the cop-car, so he turned on the radio. It was a country station, what a cliche.
I could see Maggie running from the bus-stop, as we waited on the porch. Officer David wouldn't leave me home alone, and when my sister reached us, she was out of breath, thanking him, and not even looking daggers at me. We went inside.
"They told me what happened, Carly. Please, can we just not tell Mom & Dad yet? I told the cops I'd call them, but..."
Maggie was nineteen. She was meant to be the responsible adult.
"Of course not. I don't want Dad's conference to be ruined. He has to make a speech tomorrow."
More importantly, I didn't want my summer to be ruined, We were meant to be enjoying three weeks of parent-free life while they went on their little sabbattical, and neither of us wanted to talk about the plans we'd been making ever since they first suggested it.
"I'm tired, Maggie. It's three in the morning, I need to go to bed..."
She did something strange, then. She hugged me. It was a pretty swift hug, but all the same, it surprised me. We'd felt too much like rivals this six months past, since she moved back in.
"You finally did it. You found a dead body," she whispered in my ear.
I shrugged. She knew me too well, after all.
"Poor Helen, though, I hope she can get some sleep."
I trudged upstairs to my room, flicked on the bedside lamp, and slipped into my pyjamas. Another light, from the window across from mine flicked on too, and I went over and drew the curtains back.
Helen was sitting my the window on the house next door, her face pale and startled. She was trying to hiss something, but I couldn't quite hear her. I mimed putting my cupped hand to my ear.
"Carly!" she called out, hoarsely, "I'm not crazy, am I? We both saw it move? It..." she shivered in her thin nightdress, "...it caught you...?"
"Yes." It felt good to say it out loud.
"Are you OK? Did it... hurt you?"
"I'm OK, Hel, just bruised up a bit. Seems like when we struggled it..." I didn't know what to say. 'Died' didn't seem quite right.
Hel interrupted. "You stopped it, Carly. You saved us."
She turned away then, but I heard her mutter "Thank you," as she drew the curtains again. She didn't turn off the light. Neither did I, that night.
The next morning, I stood in front of the mirror, and held up my phone to take a photo of the bruises on my shoulders. They looked more like fingerprints, and even more the day after, before they began to turn from purple to yellow, and fade away.
I made notes in my journal.
What had I done to defeat the thing? I hadn't got a good kick or punch in before it had hold of me too tight to do it any damage, the only thing I'd done was to bite. The more I thought about it, the more like a monster I felt. But that felt fantastic. I felt ready to take on anything.
Following on from the zombie-ish story, as requested, first draft, so excuse spelling/etc.
The world comes swimming back, and I cough and spit to try and rid my mouth of the foul taste. I realised, too late, that I'm making a lot of noise, so I stop, and listen. Nothing. How late was it? The room was completely dark, but I could still taste it, still smell it.
At first, I tried not too move much, just tensing and relaxing my limbs. They all seemed to be responding, and there was still no sound. I tilted my head sideways a little, and the pain came. I can tell I'm lying on my back, and there's something lumpy and uneven behind me, something weighing down across my chest.
I didn't know what it was, but there was still no sound, and no movement, so I cautiously raised my right hand towards my shoulder, and reached out with my fingertips. Torn fabric, and a horrible slickness beneath, greasy, like cold chicken. Disgust overcame me, and I flung myself upright, scooting away from the thing on my bottom, my head reeling.
With my left hand (the clean one, the one that hadn't touched the thing) I dug into the pocket of my jeans to find my mobile. I squeezed the keypad, shining the faint greenish beam of the screen-saver across the floor. Where was the damn torch? I didn't want to turn it towards the spot where I'd just awakened, but I didn't have much choice; the torch must have fallen from my hand, so it couldn't be far.
The screensaver light lasts for 25 seconds. It crept over the dark shape, illuminating just a small patch at a time. The claw hand spread towards me, and the arm looked twisted, blackened. There was a glint of bone, and then, the bloated torso. I must have stared for a long time, not wanting to turn the beam onto the face, hidden in shadow. I became aware that my heart was racing, now, just waiting for the thing to move. The screen went dim, then black, and I was in darkness again, but rather than terrifying me, it felt comforting.
Where was Hel? I hoped she'd gone for help, I feared she'd run screaming into the night and not been a blind bit of use. I wondered why I didn't do the same myself, but I guess I was waiting; waiting for the thing to get up, like I had. Maybe I was in shock?
I ran through the last events I could remember in my mind, to check they were all still there, and just as I was recalling the struggling, the biting, those foul hands on my body, I heard the cop-car coming. It's a small town, so that meant Morgan's Dad, or the infamous Officer Tilly. Boys used to laugh and say that having Tilly as a surname made him sound like a girl, and it was no surprise then, that he'd grown up to hate children. I hoped it was Morgan's dad.
The noise of the siren was so loud now that I realised it would drown out any other sound in the house, and my strange calmness left me. If the thing lurched to its feet now, I'd be none the wiser until it had me in its grip again.
And then the car was here, pulling round the corner, over the kerb, onto the grass verge, and the flashing lights filled the room, changed everything.
I saw what I had been trying to avoid seeing, and my mind almost split in two. The part of me who loved her Dad's science magazines looked at the shrunken-back lips, the teeth, startlingly yellow against the black gums, the shrivelled, sneering face, and those ragged-edged eyeless voids, and thought of the Ancient Egypt project we'd been doing in school. But the part of me that had only turned thirteen last spring, that had never been allowed to watch a movie our Mom deemed 'too scary'... well, she started to scream, and she didn't stop. Not as the cops came in with their heavy flashlights, shouting. Not as Morgan's dad carried me out onro the grass, checked me over and helped me into the back of the car. Not until I saw Helens frightened face looking up at me from the back seat. Good old Hel.
There were a lot of questions after that, obviously, and I wasn't sure what they wanted to hear. I knew what it looked like. It looked like I'd broken into an old house, and, for some reason, bitten the hand of a dead guy half off, like a wild dog.
A professional lady who'd been trained to talk to shaken-up kids asked me all sorts of crazy stuff, and I answered as best I could. She talked to Hel in another room. They had the doc check me over, too, and he found the bump on my head, obviously, and some bruising to my shoulders, but he said that could have happened when I fell. Someone official took a photo of my bruises, and I felt cold and silly standing in my vest and jeans.
Morgan's dad, who we all called Officer David, was more help. He brought me clean clothes, and a towel, and told me where the washroom was. I never knew the police station had a shower, but you learn something new every day.
The only soap was a block of harsh stuff for hands, but I scrubbed it into my hair,
When I came out, in a baggy sweatshirt and matching navy pants, he sat me down and spoke sense.
"You've had a rough evening, Carly. We've left a message for your sister..."
They were still trying to get hold her. She was going to suffer for this, when Mom and Dad got back from their conference, and I heartily hoped she wouldn't call them right away and make them come home. The cinema would let out soon, and then she'd turn her phone back on.
I nodded.
"You've seen those forensics shows?"
I nodded again. I wasn't allowed to, but sure I had.
"Well, the geeks from the lab will have to work this out, but it looks to me like the cadaver was sat in a chair in the kitchen or something, and he fell down on you in the dark, when you kids were snooping around."
Really? It looked like that? I nodded again.
"Poor old guy must've broken in himself and holed up there. Died in his sleep, drunk, more as likely. Must have darn near scared the life out of you, too?"
He was looking me right in the eye now. I mumbled that yes, that was the god's-honest truth.
"So you couldn't see a thing, and you lashed out anyway you could. You both fell down and you took a blow to the head. Do you remember blacking out, Carly?"
I shook my head firmly, like I had for the doctor; there was no way I wanted them to drive me out to the city hospital.
"Well, alright then, I better take you home."
I was quiet in the back of the cop-car, so he turned on the radio. It was a country station, what a cliche.
I could see Maggie running from the bus-stop, as we waited on the porch. Officer David wouldn't leave me home alone, and when my sister reached us, she was out of breath, thanking him, and not even looking daggers at me. We went inside.
"They told me what happened, Carly. Please, can we just not tell Mom & Dad yet? I told the cops I'd call them, but..."
Maggie was nineteen. She was meant to be the responsible adult.
"Of course not. I don't want Dad's conference to be ruined. He has to make a speech tomorrow."
More importantly, I didn't want my summer to be ruined, We were meant to be enjoying three weeks of parent-free life while they went on their little sabbattical, and neither of us wanted to talk about the plans we'd been making ever since they first suggested it.
"I'm tired, Maggie. It's three in the morning, I need to go to bed..."
She did something strange, then. She hugged me. It was a pretty swift hug, but all the same, it surprised me. We'd felt too much like rivals this six months past, since she moved back in.
"You finally did it. You found a dead body," she whispered in my ear.
I shrugged. She knew me too well, after all.
"Poor Helen, though, I hope she can get some sleep."
I trudged upstairs to my room, flicked on the bedside lamp, and slipped into my pyjamas. Another light, from the window across from mine flicked on too, and I went over and drew the curtains back.
Helen was sitting my the window on the house next door, her face pale and startled. She was trying to hiss something, but I couldn't quite hear her. I mimed putting my cupped hand to my ear.
"Carly!" she called out, hoarsely, "I'm not crazy, am I? We both saw it move? It..." she shivered in her thin nightdress, "...it caught you...?"
"Yes." It felt good to say it out loud.
"Are you OK? Did it... hurt you?"
"I'm OK, Hel, just bruised up a bit. Seems like when we struggled it..." I didn't know what to say. 'Died' didn't seem quite right.
Hel interrupted. "You stopped it, Carly. You saved us."
She turned away then, but I heard her mutter "Thank you," as she drew the curtains again. She didn't turn off the light. Neither did I, that night.
The next morning, I stood in front of the mirror, and held up my phone to take a photo of the bruises on my shoulders. They looked more like fingerprints, and even more the day after, before they began to turn from purple to yellow, and fade away.
I made notes in my journal.
What had I done to defeat the thing? I hadn't got a good kick or punch in before it had hold of me too tight to do it any damage, the only thing I'd done was to bite. The more I thought about it, the more like a monster I felt. But that felt fantastic. I felt ready to take on anything.