POW! (Book 1): The Zombie Days (3 page)

At this point, Kyle’s jaw nearly fell to the floor. He shut it with an audible snap of teeth that must have been before getting out the words, "Damn, your girl moves fast, doesn't she? I thought you liked them with at least a little bit of class, homie."

"I do not move fas-"

"It's okay, he's not being serious. He’s just jealous that you didn't get to make fun of his little penis first."

Everyone fell into an uncomfortable silence I guess my game could have used a little bit of work. It had been a while since I tried to impress a girl; or anyone else for that matter.

"So, yeah . . . my clothes are still . . . ya know . . . I should go back to what I was doing," said Evelyn, clearly trying to find a way to escape the two of us.

"Good thinking," I agreed. "I wouldn't want anyone to steal your clothes and be forced to walk around in a shirt with the chest all stretched out."

She giggled, turned around, and slightly brushed my arm on her way to the door. "I'll see you guys later." Looking over her shoulder, she added, "Feel better, Kyle! And don't worry, there's someone out there for you. I mean, I think my mom really likes you. She can't get enough of putting her pie in your face." Then she headed out.

"I still think I have a shot," he said with a smirk as soon as the door shut behind her.

"The only thing you've got on me is she hasn't seen your junk fresh out of an icy stream. However . . . she has been here. And I'm pretty sure that's much, much worse than any amount of shrinkage. I'm not even sure if all of this is new vomit. And that awful smell . . . Goddamn, dude. I had her scent all up in my nostrils, but as soon as I came in here it was gone. Now I’ve just got vomit and rat feces, so thanks a lot for that."

"Sorry, Mr. Perfect. The cleaning lady hasn't been here in at least 25 minutes. You know how I roll."

"That's Mr. Baby Dick McGuinness to you, sir. Now, I think that's enough of a sick day for you. Get ready and let's go play . . . I mean work."

"You think our work is play?" asked Kyle.

"Well, I can't really think of anything that I'd rather be doing. Can you? I mean, look at it this way—we are looked up to by like everyone in our town. We're thought of as pretty much the bravest people in the entire world. We don't have to put up with shit from people, because we don't work with people. The people here are the sheriff’s job. We just deal with these dead assholes that everybody thinks of as scary monsters."

"And you don't think they're scary monsters?" he asked in a childish manner.

"This is the way I see it: How many of them have I killed versus how many of them have killed me? And they've had the chance. They've gotten the jump on me quite a few times, just the other day even. I mean, really, I kind of suck at my job, when you think about it. They’re really slow, unarmed, dead people that attack us, and I’ve still had a few scares. We were only asked to do this because we’re former Marines and we decided to stick around this place. We’re all set here, man."

Kyle sat quiet for a moment. Then, "So you really don't think they're scary?"

"Most people look at them like the devil himself has possessed the dead, but when I look at them all I see are those cheesy old, wind-up, chattering teeth. That's all they are to me, man. We got really lucky that these are the monsters we’re faced with. They start out as dead. Half of the work is already done for us. We just have to stop them from moving around and killing people. We could have gotten witches or vampires or killer robots or even aliens; now try to imagine that shit. Being attacked by a far superior being, that is some scary shit."

"I guess I never really thought about the other mythical beings Earth could've been plagued with. I suppose it kind of seems like anything is possible now, doesn’t it?"

"Anything except for you and my little butterfly shacking up," I fired.

"Only time will tell, my friend."

Finally, he got up off of his ass, looked around the place for a moment, found some pants on the floor a good distance from any puke, sniffed the crotch of them, and put them on while I watched the entire sequence of events in disgust.

"Ready for the day," he proudly proclaimed.

"I always knew you were a high maintenance kind of gal, but you never cease to amaze me, Kyle. Let's go.”

"What's going to be our plan of attack for today, homie?" he asked as he shut the door behind him.

"Same thing we do every day, Stinky. Try to take over the world."

"Who you callin' stinky?"

"Come on, Kyle, your breath smells like you ate the contents of a well fed zombie’s stomach. You reek."

"Let's not go getting too graphic, now. I'm still feeling a bit queasy, in case you hadn’t noticed."

"Well, if you keep talking so close to my nose I'll probably start to hurl, too. At least you probably got everything out of your stomach already. There’s not enough fresh air out here to make that stank go away."

Just as I turned to make my way out, Evelyn came running up to us, her face creased with worry. Her rack was jumping up and down like two cute little bunnies under a blanket on Easter morning, so it was hard for me to look at her face.

"Guys! I really need your help!"

Yup. She's worried. Moving eyes up......... Now.

Okay, now. Nailed it.

"What's wrong, my little butterfly?" I asked her.

"No time for that flirty bullshit right now, Peter. My

mom's gone!"

I tried to get my mind to focus on something other than her body, but came up short.

"And we have to find her!" she yelled after my blank stare proved I was quite likely not fit to be defending a town full of people from an undead force.

"Do you know where she went?" I asked.

"Yes, she packed up all her essentials and took the horse, so I imagine she went down the hill to the refugee camp. She's been talking for a while now, about how she wants to go see if my dad is down there and still vertical. You know, in the good way."

"That was fast. She was just here like, what, three minutes ago?"

"I've been noticing things disappearing for a while now, but I didn't think she was packing. I thought she was just getting even crazier and losing things. But when I saw the horse missing, it all just kind of clicked. Then I ran inside to see if maybe the horse just got away. I found a note on the counter that said not to worry and she'd be back soon."

"That's all it said?" I asked.

"That's it. I think she felt like I was safe with you two around and that she could leave me here until she found what she was looking for."

"Homie, we have to find her, she's the closest thing I've got to a girlfriend."

Evelyn and I said in unison, “Gross."

"Shut up, she's nice to me."

"Okay, Kyle, since you say so, I suppose we’ll go find her. Did she say anything to you about leaving? You two were just alone in here," I said.

"No, man. She just came by to check on me and give me some of her pie, as you can see over in that puddle.” Kyle pointed to the gelatinous berry colored pile of slime on the floor.

“Come on, guys. We have to go before she gets too far ahead of us. Do you guys need to pack anything in case it takes more than just today?" asked Evelyn.

I looked at Kyle, and he looked back at me.
I'll let you take this one, little buddy.

In his most macho voice, he said, "To go looking for a more mature woman on horseback who just left should not take us that long. And even if it did, we were trained by the United States Marine Corps. We know how to survive off of the land in even the harshest of environments."

Snare set.

"Dude, we were just POG-ass reservists. Tone it down a notch, ‘Human Shield.’ The only field experience we really have is sitting litterally in an open field waiting for some helicopters that almost never showed up."

"I was never a fan of the call sign Human Shield," he said.

"Are you guys just going to reminisce all day and then make out or are we going to go find my mom?" Evelyn demanded.

"We'll be on our way in a second. We are going to need at a bare minimum our camelbacks. Kyle, you grab yours and we'll be next door grabbing mine."

He ran back inside his place and Evelyn and I headed one house over to my place.

"You two live next door to each other?" she inquired.

"Yeah. It’s not weird or anything. We used to have bunk beds at my place, but that seemed like it was just a little bit odd when there was an open place so close. So he moved next door. It's smart for work reasons, you know? This way we can still carpool to work and try to save the environment."

She tried to stifle a laugh at the carpool comment, but failed as a small snort popped out which she covered with her hand. We arevied at my front door and went inside so we could grab the camelbacks and my lightest bug out bag. Yeah. I have more than one bug out bag. You never can be too cautious. Especially in a time where there are zombies roaming the Earth. By the time we had everything packed and ready, Kyle was at the door.

"If you two are done boning I think we ought to head out," he shouted from the front door. Pure class.

"So, kids, it seems like our plan is to, on foot, go after

a woman on horseback," I said as we began our journey by stepping away from my house. "Evelyn, how well does your mother ride?"

"Well, she's been riding her whole life, so basically she can get anywhere she needs to go."

"That's unfortunate," I replied. "I was hoping that she would be very uncomfortable, unstable, and slow which would make it much easier to catch up to her."

"No such luck, POW."

"Holy shit, that is super lame. Don't call me that anymore, okay?"

"Oh, and calling me your
little butterfly
isn't?"

"I've got my reasons for that," I said, smiling in her direction.

"What possible reason could there be for that?" she asked, with a doubtful eyebrow raised.

"Well, butterflies are insects, right? And most people tend to think that insects are gross-"

"I don't think that I like where this is headed," said Evelyn.

"I like it, please continue, Prince Charming," Kyle said with a chuckle.

"Let me finish, butterflies are something completely different than what they are expected to be. The first time we met, you gave me a smile that made me quite certain that you were an evil demon or something-"

"Not getting better," she said, glaring at me as we continued walking.

"-but now, demons are usually thought of as these horrible, nasty red creatures with horns and always fucking things up for everyone. You, on the other hand, are a beautiful demon that brightens my day when I see your face." At this point, I had to verify that I was not looking at her chest. Eye contact. That meant huge points for me.

"Oh my God, I didn't think you were capable of being sweet, but I think that's about as close to sweet as you're probably ever going to get. So I'll give you an A for the effort, and cut you off before one of the two of you finds a way to spoil it," she said, clearly half melted.

"Take it or leave it. That's all I got," I said, still maintaining eye contact.
I'm getting better at this,
I thought. “If we stick together long enough, I think you’ll find that I’m full of surprises.”

Evelyn leaned over and gave me a peck on the cheek.

Kyle, completely revolted by this display, spit out a bowl of snot from the back of his throat that nearly landed on my left boot.
I'll let it slide this time.
At least Evelyn was on my other side and was in no danger of catching any loose booger shrapnel. Plus, I was in a pretty damn good mood just then.

"That is so gross," said Evelyn, heading toward a nice shade of Hulk green.

"That's not what your mom said," Kyle shot back. Evelyn turned a little bit greener even though the comment made no sense at all.

"Bro, I can't believe how much thought you put into that little butterfly speech you just gave," said Kyle, with an expression of disgust smeared across his face.

Without saying anything, I shot him back a look that said,
Not bad for pulling the whole thing straight out of my ass, huh?

He had kind of a sad puppy look on his face. This would be a good time for me to try to make him laugh.

"Don't worry bud, someday you'll spew out some cheesy shit to a girl and she'll fall madly in love with you, too."

"Who's madly in love?" asked Evelyn, giving me a playful shove.

"I mean, we'll find her mom pretty soon and then you two will be all set," I joked. "You'll look like a knight in shining armor to her."

Kyle got a big grin on his face. Evelyn looked at him, and then to me with a look that said she was both horrified and disgusted. Her face mirrored exactly the awful feeling in my stomach as I regretted my words almost immediately.

"Speaking of finding her mom, I think we'd better pick up the pace a bit if we're going to catch up to her today. Wouldn't you agree?" asked Kyle.