Day
1:
The
world as we know it, is over...
Something is happening all
over the world. People are getting sick, they are dying, and then
they are coming back to life. Once they come back, they try to kill
everything and everyone they see.
Dad
had been bitten by a guy at the hardware store yesterday. A guy came
into the store and started attacking everyone in it. Dad tried to
stop him, but the asshole took a big chunk out of Dad’s arm with
one bite. Dad tried to claim that it wasn’t bad, but the sickness
took him within hours of getting bit. He began coughing up blood
almost immediately, and it just got worse from there.
The news
said to quarantine anyone who was sick. But my parents never trusted
the news, so being told that a bite or scratch could infect and kill
you wasn’t something they took to heart. Dad wasn’t quarantined,
he wasn’t locked in a room, he was left on the couch…and that is
where he died...only to come back moments later and try to kill my
Mom.
Our
neighbor Art heard the screams and ran over to help, and shot my Dad
in the head with his rifle. Art said that this isn’t the first one
he’s killed. I asked Art how he could kill one of his best friends
without hesitation. He told me that thinking about it wasn’t an
option.
The dead are coming back to life. How is this
possible?
Mom
is hysterical and has locked herself in her room. I can hear her sobs
all the way down in the living room.
Art and I dragged Dad’s
body into the garage, and tomorrow we are going to burn his corpse.
They say its the only way to be sure that he’s dead.
The
other day in school we were given the assignment to keep a blog of
our daily life for at least a month. We were supposed to turn the
assignment in to our teacher tomorrow, and I waited until now to
start writing down my thoughts and experiences.
So let me
introduce myself, my name is Nick, I’m 17 years old, and I'm just
trying to survive...
Day
2:
I
watched the TV all morning. News reports saying this shit is
happening everywhere. No place is safe - not even my middle of
nowhere town in Oregon. The local news reported that our 24,000
residents are evacuating the city in mass numbers. I asked Mom if she
wants me to start packing the car, and she told me no.
All
the news reports keep calling the sick, the walking dead, or the
undead. One expert on TV referred to them as zombies. He said that
the term originated in the 19th century to describe animated corpses
who have returned to life through witchcraft. The news reporter
refused to call the sick “zombies”, but I think it suits them
just fine.
This afternoon Art and his family came by to help
us bury Dad. I tried to talk him into just digging a hole and laying
Dad to rest in the ground, but Art was insisting that we burn his
body. Art built a small funeral pyre (he told me its what the Nazi’s
used to burn bodies during the Holocaust), and we set Dad’s body on
it. Mom wouldn’t leave her room when we lit it on fire. Art and his
Wife Marie said a few prayers and blessed us. Then they left to go
home and finish packing. They are going to the FEMA camp in Portland
tomorrow.
The
neighborhood is quiet after most people left. Mom and I are going to
stay and wait for help.
I
made a list of all the food we have left. We have enough for at least
10 days. I’m going to cook us up the perishable food first.
Day
3:
Art
and his family left today. They headed north to Portland because FEMA
has a camp there. But Mom doesn't want to leave. She is too scared
and thinks our house is the only safe place. I tried to tell her that
we need to leave, that we need to seek shelter elsewhere, but she
isn’t listening to me anymore. She just sits in her room and reads
her bible. She keeps rambling about the book of revelations and the
rapture. I keep telling her that if this was the rapture, then the
dead wouldn’t be trying to eat the living.
I
keep trying to connect to the internet to check my email, but all the
lines are busy...stupid fucking dial-up internet!
We
have less canned food than I thought. Going to scavenge houses
tomorrow. Hopefully I'll find something left for us.
Note:
need weapons to protect house.
Day
4:
The
TV is officially gone now, and Cable stations have gone off air. AM
Radio has some reports, but not much. All I am getting from the AM
stations is the message to head north to the FEMA station, and to
avoid all contact with the sick or recently deceased...that and
religious talk show hosts talking about the end of the world.
I
searched a few homes today. Didn't find much of any real value. I
guess most of the neighbors took anything good with them as they left
town. I did find a music box to bring back to mom. I stole it (can I
even really call it stealing, anymore?) from Mrs. Butterfield up the
street. I don’t think she’ll miss it, and I’m pretty sure Mom
will love it.
Other
than that the neighborhood is quiet, and there are no zombies
shuffling around.
The
biggest problem of the day is that Mom is getting sicker from the
stress. She’s not eating, and she won’t come out of her room. I’m
really worried about her.
Day
5:
Mom
refuses to leave her bed now. Says they'll eat her if she walks
outside. I tell her it's safe here... But she won't listen...She
hasn’t bathed in days and she smells really bad. I know that’s
horrible to say about my mother, but its true! At least I am taking
showers.
The
neighborhood is really quiet now. No cars. No planes. No noise except
for me walking around. I think we are the last two people in the
city, and that frightens me.
Radio
says power grid shutting off soon. I need to get batteries and
supplies before that happens. I’ve got no choice but to head into
town tomorrow. Wish me luck.
Note:
get food and first aid.
Day
6:
I
rode my bike to town. The city was overrun with zombies. I don’t
know how many of the 24,000 residents in this town made it out alive,
but from the hundreds I saw walking around Main Street, I don’t
think many did.
Oddly
enough, I saw my PE teacher, and the cute girl from my English class
snacking on what looked like road kill. Is it sad that I checked out
her ass? I think it was just a reflex to how I look at most cute
girls. Regardless of how good her butt looked, I still avoided them
like the plague.
The
pharmacy and the corner market were completely emptied out. The only
place that wasn’t totally ransacked was The Pirate’s Den bar on
the far end of Main Street. That is where I found a bunch of cool
shit in the back of the bar. I grabbed tons of booze, and a pistol
from behind the counter.
Gonna
drink tonight...
Day
7:
Hung-the-fuck-over.
Completely worth it though.
Mom
isn't getting any better and she seems to be becoming more delirious
as time goes on. I don't think I can fix her either. She pretty much
ignores the food I bring her, and she isn’t drinking water either.
I fear that she is going to become too dehydrated to even move soon.
I just don’t know what to do to make her want to get better. It
feels like she is just giving up.
We
are running low on food. I have to go to the store tomorrow. I hope
to find something to eat.
I
messed around with the pistol today. Its a Beretta 92FS. My dad used
to have one of these a few years ago. I checked and there are 9
rounds in the clip, should I save 2 of them just in case...?
Day
8:
I
went back into town again today. The convenience store I found was
nearly empty. I grabbed what I could, but it was mostly canned beets
and dog food... I someone had already cleaned out the cigs and the
safe... Bummer.
Killed
my first zombie too... I found it in the back of the store. It was
just standing in a corner looking confused and unaware of it’s
surroundings. I tried getting a closer look the guy to see if I knew
him or not, but half of his face was torn off, and I couldn’t get a
good enough look at the other side. I accidentally kicked a shelf and
alerted the zombie. He lunged at me, and I was able to avoid him long
enough to shoot him with the Beretta. It took me 6 shots to finally
hit him in the head. But as soon as that bullet entered his brain, he
hit the floor like a ton of bricks.
I
heard more noises out front after the last gunshot, and I realized
that the noise attracted more of them to me. I grabbed what I could
and bounced-the-fuck-out-of-there.
The
lesson I learned to day was, don’t fight zombies with guns unless
you have lots more ammo.
Day
9:
They
shut off the power today. I put fresh batteries in the radio for mom
to listen to the news. The National Guard is evacuating every city in
the state and taking them to the FEMA camp in Portland. Mom doesn't
want to go. I constantly tell her that its safer there, and that
we’ll be around other people in the same situation…but she
doesn’t seem to care anymore.
I just want to drag her down
the stairs, out the front door, shove her in the car and leave this
city in our dust…but I still don’t have a license, and I can’t
drive a stick shift for shit. Maybe I can try and find an automatic
and learn to drive that way…I mean, it can’t be that
hard…right?
She found my gun too. She wasn't as pissed as I
thought, but she took it away because she thinks I’ll hurt myself
with it. I’m not pissed off that she took the gun either. In fact,
it makes me happy that she was able to muster up enough emotion to
yell at me for it.
Maybe she is getting better?
Day
10:
Food
is running really low. We only have 2 cans of beets, and 6 cans of
dog food left. I think beets taste like piss, so I gave them to mom,
while I ate the dog food. I couldn’t risk Mom seeing me eat the dog
food, so I hid in the garage and wolfed down the gravy filled bits as
fast as I could. Honestly, it wasn’t that bad.
To
pass the time, I started reading Mom's copy of the Twilight book
today. Got about 100 pages in and nothing is happening. Seriously, I
don’t understand how this book is popular? In my school, everyone
hazes the new kid for the first few weeks they are here…how is it
that every kid in that town knows who the dumb bitch is right away?
Day
11:
Mom
found the cans of dog food, and she didn't take it well. She began to
cry and blame herself for it. I tried to tell her that it's ok, but
she just wouldn't listen. She spent all night sobbing in her room. I
felt like a horrible son for letting her catch on to what I was
doing, but what else can I do? We don’t have any more food, and
I’ll have to head out in the morning to see what I can scrounge up.
I’m thinking I might give cat food a try… ha ha ha.
The AM
Radio stations have stopped playing the Christian talk shows. The
only thing left now is the Emergency broadcast message telling all of
us to head to Portland. The FEMA camp is located at the Rose Garden
and the Memorial Coliseum. I kept thinking about how Dad used to take
me to the circus at the Coliseum back in the day. That was a lot of
fun.
That got me thinking about my Dad again. I wonder how
he’d handle this situation? Would he have gone to the camp right
away, or would we have stayed and tried to survive here? Dad was
never a boy scout, or a survivalist, but he was really good at
figuring things out. I wish he was here to tell me how to “figure
out” Mom, and get her to leave.
I want to cheer her up.
Tomorrow I'll find us some real food if it fucking kills me.
Finished reading Twilight today. The book is one of the worst
things I have ever read. I feel stupider for having read it. But I
will start on New Moon tomorrow. This is how bored I am.
Day
12:
…Mom
killed herself last night...
She came in my room, kissed &
hugged me, told me she loved me, went back in her room, closed the
door, and then I heard the gunshot.
I didn’t know how to
react. I wanted it to be an accident. I wanted her to have fired the
gun by mistake.
I waited at the door for a few minutes for
any sign of life. I wanted to hear a cry, a whimper, a noise of any
kind to signal that she was still alive. After a few agonizing
minutes, I knew that she wasn’t alive. I just sat in front of the
door and stared at it. I didn’t open the door and go in the room. I
left it closed. Part of me wasn’t sure if she would get back up
again a minute or so later and try to eat me. I knew she had shot
herself in the head, but I had to be sure. I had to wait to make sure
that I was safe.
Three hours passed and not a peep from her
bedroom. Caroline Francine Paskus, born April 19th,
1972, laid dead on the other side of that door.
I'm
lost. I'm scared. I miss my mom and my dad. I'm an orphan now. I'm an
orphan in a doomed world.
There
are still 2 more bullets in the gun... What's worth living for
anymore?
Day
13:
Couldn't
function today. I didn't go in to mom's room at all. I just can't
look at her like that. Every time I walk to the door to open it and
cover up her body, I can’t. My hands tremble as soon as I grab the
door knob and they won’t let me turn it. Its like my body is
telling me “No!”
I
need to leave this place, but I don't know where to go. The radio
says to go to Portland, but how will I get there? I have to learn how
to drive. I have to get away from the city and teach myself how to
drive a car.
The
zombies are getting closer now. They are leaving town in search of
more food. I need to think of an exit strategy and fast.
Day
14:
Mom's
room is starting to stink. I still can’t open the door to her room.
I just took a bunch of towels from the closet and shoved them in the
bottom of the door to cover the smell. It helps, but the smell
lingers like crazy.
I wonder how my friends are doing. I
wonder how my family is doing. I wonder how anyone is doing. I keep
thinking that this will all be over soon. I want this to all go back
to normal. I miss TV, I miss video games, I miss the internet...I
miss my parents most of all.
The dead are getting really
close now. I counted 20 or so of them walking up the street. They are
looking for food, it looks like they’ll eat anything they come
across. But they keep shuffling towards the house, and I wonder if
the smell from my mom is attracting the zombies to my house?
I
decided to leave tomorrow. I'm packing up my stuff into a backpack &
duffle bag. I am going to leave at dawn.
I
need to find a way to bury my mom tonight. I just hope I have the
strength to do it...
Thank you for reading the first 14 entries of the daily blog series
A BOY AND HIS BLOG
You can find the rest of the entries at:
http://a-boy-and-his-blog.tumblr.com