Just Down The Road

A few hours passed by of eating and sharing childhood stories. Cody, Connie and I were sitting by a spot I commonly sat in for lunch when school was in session.

"Do you think Miss Love is doing okay? If the military is killing people in those neighborhoods... do you think she was one of them?" Cody asked me. It was a dark question, even for him, but I suppose it was natural. I had a lot of hope, only assuming that the military killing people was fake because it just didn't sound possible to me.

"She's probably fine, I mean, we made it, right? It's not like everybody else is dead," I told him, shrugging it off while biting into an apple.

"Yeah, you're probably right. Sorry, I'm just thinking worst case scenario. It would suck to live forever at school, wouldn't it?" Cody asked Connie and me.

"I'm just worried I'll never get to play Minecraft again. I already miss games," I said.

"Don't you think that's a little childish? I mean, come on! We're all twelve, or really close to it, and you're thinking about games," Connie said with a prissy attitude. That kind of annoyed me, that my interests were being dragged by her, but I tried my hardest to understand her circumstances.

"I guess you're right," I said shortly, not wanting to dive deeper into a conversation with her.

"Hey, is Mr. Schulz a good lookout?" I asked Connie, trying to change the topic of the conversation. Bob stayed behind with us, and it was only my path to a conversation that I knew with certainty Connie would talk about.

"Yeah! He might have glasses, but he's got great eyesight when he looks far away. I bet you he could see the doorknob of the house down the street, that's how good his vision is!" Connie bragged about her father with a bit of pep in her chest, and both Cody and I laughed.

Cody was on the same page with me, able to notice that Connie was a very confusing girl. By no means did it make her annoying, but her paths into conversations that modeled zombie shows and other forms of media were just annoying. It's hard to keep hope when somebody is constantly dragging you down like she tried.

I filled my mouth with the various food we had around us. Luckily, the kitchen was stocked with all of the main food groups, being that this is an elementary school.

We had quite a composition of people. Gammie used to be a lunch lady for this school, and could carefully pick out what we should be eating, and what we shouldn't be eating in a day to maintain nutritional health. Fruit, vegetables, a little bit of meat, some grains, and milk was what we had for the meal today.

"You know, we're pretty lucky that your Mom is a doctor and Gammie is a lunch lady, right Cody? They can tell us everything we need to know about how to get the biggest and strongest we can from the food we have," I said, putting the last bite of my apple into my mouth.

"You're so right! Mom always has cough medicine at our house too, and she brought a little with us just in case. She has really good stuff she got from her office, at least, that's what she said anyway," Cody said. He bounced the tray up and down on the table with its angled edge lightly and eventually, Connie broke the silence.

"It seems like we have a really good group. You know, in all of the zombie tv shows, doctors are apparently really rare and sought after, so maybe we'll have a big group," Connie said again.

Cody and I weren't really sure where to pick up in that conversation, since all we knew about Connie was that she was a fan of these tv shows. I wanted to be chipper and accepting, so I agreed with her to clear any tension.

Another hour passed, getting closer and closer to sunset, and I got bored of sitting in the lunch room. All of the adults were arranging the classrooms and nap mats to make comfortable beds for everybody, about sixteen people in total to make beds for. While Mom and Gammie were doing that, Niko took me to the front of the school to get a walk in.

"It's so boring being old like me. Never grow up Leon, okay?" Niko asked me, ruffling my hair.

"I hate to be negative, but I don't think that's avoidable. What were you like at my age? Did you want to grow up too?" I asked him. Niko baffled at my question, laughed at it and slapped his knee extravagantly before settling down and stretching his hands out by the front door to the school.

"Of course! All kids want to grow up, but all grown-ups want to be kids. It's a confusing cycle, but I think you should like how lenient the world is for people your age. Don't take it for granted," Niko said.

We both peered out the door, waiting to see if Dad would come back around the front. Skylar was watching as well, sitting beside me, and moving her fingers to jump around as the imaginary man we all played with when the car was moving fast down the highway.

"It's getting pretty late, they should've been home by now," Niko said. Idiotically, he opened the front door and walked a little further outside.

Being so small, I hadn't seen a lot of people freaked out by any odd anomalies, especially not anything to do with a zombie apocalypse. However, I was newly introduced to the idea when I saw a look of horror on Niko's face.

I ran outside too, thinking I wanted to see what was going on.

The Elementary School had a two-way road right in front, and a small, looped driveway to drop your kids off and leave. Down the right-most part of the road, I saw Dad and Papa running at full speed, breaking into a sweat, with bags full of a ton of supplies.

The reason they were running is because of what was behind them.

It was an understatement to say a few zombies. It was probably, being generously low as possible, around a hundred, maybe two hundred zombies.

"OPEN THE DOORS!" Dad yelled out, holding the bag shut with his hands as he watched out for Papa to keep up.

Niko, still locked in shock, could only watch, but I was able to do something. I don't believe myself to be more brave than Niko, I just thought of myself to be too ignorant to understand what I was looking at.

Dad met the entrance to the door with a strong arm and helped Papa in, quickly shutting it after the other fathers and husbands all made it in.

Dad urgently closed the curtain and then put a chair in front of the door. After the room grew silent with desperate pants, I could hear the moans, groans, and subtly put-together words forming outside of the doors, as loud banging could be heard along the walls.

"What happened Dad?!" Niko shouted out to him. I looked at Dad's right arm, and it happened to be covered in blood.

"They... came at me... the dead, they tried to eat me. I'm lucky Bob was there, otherwise, I wouldn't have caught him before he took a bite... I had to kill him, he wouldn't stop. Where's your mother? The others?" Dad asked.

"They're still in the cafeteria talking. How many did you kill? Did you need help? What supplies did you grab?" Niko asked, rapid-firing questions while wiping blood off Dad's arm. Everybody was visibly shaken, especially the husband of one of the wives that joined our ranks.

He had a bite taken out of his arm.

It was disgusting, absolutely putrid smelling, and so ugly that I couldn't avert my eyes completely, that's how bad things were. I was convinced that it would be the end for him until I noticed that Connie was starting to rub off on me.

"Guns, some of my knives, a hatchet, all of our canned food and other foodstuffs in the cabinets, toilet paper, contact solution, everything I could grab really. And, I'm going to break it to everybody, but what happened in that neighborhood... it's terrifying. We need to get away from the windows, now," Dad said, pushing us all away.

"Why are you acting like those dead people behave like the zombies in all of the tv shows? If you're too close they'll hear you? There's no way it's that accurate," Cody asked beside me. I was too shaken to say anything, still trying to look away from the arm wound the one guy had.

"I hate to say it, but they do. I called out to one, but he didn't answer to my voice, he answered to the sound I made. And they're not... human, anymore. I can't describe it like they're monsters, but that's how I'm treating them. They're too unpredictable to put a title on, I guess," Dad explained, pushing us all to the cafeteria after closing the curtains on the door.